I didn't know about TKH until @elmushterri 's latest episode, and like someone else whose gorgeous post I saw, made a Tumblr account just for this! I really hope I'm not too late, but either way it was really fun drawing her even though it took almost nine hours!
Also since some people wanted to collaborate with eachother on how their Knights would interact with eachother, YES PLEASE I WOULD LOVE TO JOIN IN IF YOU GUYS WILL LET ME!!
Ethel was a teenager in Britain when the First World War broke out, and lived with her large family. She dressed as a man and hid her identity, usinig the fake name "Edwin", and joined the army to prevent her brother from doing so (he had to take care of the youngest children in her absence because the parents had been on vacation and were unable to travel back because of the war). She was only 16.
In the British army, she cared for the carrier pigeons as they traveled, but did her fair share of trench digging and a little fighting on the battlefield and probably won a lot of pub brawls whenever they stopped in a town, using her wits. One person in her regiment knew her secret, but kept it quiet for her, they were best friends and she was also hiding the fact he was probably too young to fight. Well, one fateful day the two of them were in a shell-hole together, and he had been hit.
Ethel died running across trenches and No Man's Land to get him to safety, and didn't stop until she reached the medical tent, where she smiled at him, said, "Lord be my witness, it wasn't long but I bloody sure lived" and collapsed, having bled out after her absurd feat of strength and endurance. He wrote back to her family as soon as he could, because they hadn't known she was in the army, and between him and her family, she was awarded multiple medals after her death and a museum was eventually built in her hometown for women involved in the war effort.
Ethel's Mortal Wound symbol is from a grenade blast that hit her as she ran across the battlefield, damaging the arteries in her neck and causing her to bleed out. Her weapon is a shovel, which is incredibly useful! WW1 shovels often had serrated edges on one side so they could be used as a saw to cut wood, but it means that she can cause some serious damage with a wound that's difficult or nearly impossible to heal. If Saving Graces are canon, her's is to summon forcefields (in the shape of pigeon wings!), that are typically used as shields but she can use to carry things or possibly even fly! Also it's not a power but she is insanely good with birds, and pretty good with horses and sometimes dogs, and it almost looks supernatural (it's not she's just really good at reading their body language). Despite being only 16/17 at the time of her death, and a little feral (she won pub brawls against grown men at the age of 16 what did you expect), she is incredibly mature when it's called for. In fact, you wouldn't think she's as young as she is unless someone told you! Older Knights probably like her just cause she's incredibly obedient compared to the other teenage Knights (army training) and waited until given the O.K. to go into battle, but she's probably more skilled at fighting than most Knights due to her experience in life. She's also probably better than most at controlling her Awakened form (if that's canon) because she has had to learn how to control her emotions.
The downside? She sometimes comes across as rude, arrogant, or strange (she doesn't tell anyone her backstory unless they ask or if she really needs to win an argument and mentions her multiple medals, so unless you ask or someone tells you, you wouldn't know that she acts like a hooligan because she spent her teenage years winning drinking competitions and pub brawls against grown men), jumps at loud noises (read: will attack anything within shovel range if a balloon pops behind her, and might actually take your head off on accident, because explosions and gunfire are literally what killed her), and talks to pigeons, horses, and dogs like they're people. She also has difficulty backing down from a challenge, and a concerningly large vocabulary that could make a sailor blush.
