Welcome to Griss
I've been working on this for months and kept meaning to take photos of it in-progress, and suddenly it's done; the world of Griss has genes from German Expressionism and Universal Horror in its blood, so I felt like drawing some of my ghoul characters in the style of a 1930s film poster.
Left to right:
Kimilli — One of Sonnambul's growing community of immigrants from Sholopueya. Likes collecting leaves, making friends by giving them leaves, and long walks by lamplight. Dislikes talking about why she left, which is inconvenient for me trying to figure out what her home was like. Very sweet, but apparently unimportant. Why is she even in frame?
Kaya — She and her dad technically aren't homeless, currently, but she spends most of her time with other street urchins and would be sent to a workhouse if the truancy officers ever managed to catch her. Developing a reputation for herself as a reliable courier, including some of the press. It helps that most strangers don't realise she's a girl and even more assume she can't read. Always watching. Never speaks. Seems to know every hole in every wall and comes and goes as she pleases.
The Gutter Knight (Lilita) — One of the more substantiated urban legends of the undercity, wanted for interrogation by the city security office for unspecified causes. Actually a reclusive entomologist with an immune disorder who wears a filtered suit when she goes bug-hunting. Raised as a living showcase for her mother's pioneering work in modern haematology, and consequently no longer in contact.** Friend to children. Still surprisingly well-connected, despite her seclusion, but basically uninterested in conniving of any form and thinks she's successfully keeping to herself.
Aminah — Young reporter with a philosophical enthusiasm for her work and a promisingly level head, assigned to his Lordship's son's funeral banquet (important) which she hopes will lead to her name on an article disentangling the impending succession crisis (ambitious). It's the best and worst of times for her journalistic idol Zengé to return from foreign correspondence. Their editor has promised to protect her credit and warned her not to let him drag her into anything; which technically, she thinks, may not preclude asking for advice or taking notes on his methods from a safe distance. Well, safer, at least. Safety is an illusion in this line of work anyway.
Zengé and Kopé — The infamous adventurer-journalist and his pet monkey. About 60% Tintin, 30% Upton Sinclair, 30% Hunter S. Thompson. (20% of overlap seems right.**) Terminally incapable of remaining uninvolved. His cynicism manifests as casual knavery and strategic libel, and he's fascinated and appalled by how much he keeps getting away with mostly unscathed. He's also delighted by how instantly his new glasses let him change from an aging boyish cherub into a malicious twit, which somehow prevents everyone from recognising him but is closer to the altruistically spiteful twit he sees himself as.
Prospata* — Sickly but flamboyant heiress who spent most of her childhood in the country for her health, leaving her the only surviving inheritor of her family's businesses after her other relatives were gruesomely murdered. Suffers from a critical shortage of both personal friends and family allies among the aristocracy, which she seems to be trying to compensate for by ingratiating herself to the Lord Proprietor's own administrative directors... especially the security office, raising questions about what possible use they could have for her.
Bramantine — Wanted to be an agent for peace and justice ever since she was a little girl, which first drove her to earn her acceptance into the ranks of the security office, and now several years later to be slowly driven back out of it. Derivative of multiple characters associated with the names "Orlando" and "Furioso".** City politics are about to hand her the opportunity to either salvage her dream job, or toss it all and maybe if she's very lucky she might make a living as a private eye. Trying to cultivate a properly dour inner monologue to distract herself from thinking about why she enjoys being regularly addressed as "Sir" or "Bram" and how much that influences her hesitation.
Qiyi* — Came to Sonnambul from Neijing twice, first for university and then several years later as a political refugee, and now lives as an acclaimed fine artist patronised by the nobility. His impeccable poise and courteous deadpan protects him from being known as a schemer and provocateur with a mischievous sense of humour. He and Zengé are husbands, by habit and practice if not formality, which is flagrantly evident to anyone acquainted with both of them but remains private thanks to minimal overlap between their professional circles.
*I keep changing their names. "Prospata" might be final.
**Griss is particularly self-indulgent of me, and I haven't even footnoted all the ghouls in this picture who are shameless expies of random other favourite characters into a cannibalistic heterotopia — only the ones I feel are most direct. :P
(Despite the quote from Poe, I managed to only pick characters who are ghouls as well as men and/or women; I apologise for the misinformation. This picture is certified free of both brutes and humans, though.)