Emelia Atchins

Biographical information

Birthplace Alliria Born Died Age 31 Home Alliria Sexuality Pronouns

Physical description

Race Human Sub-Race Gender Female Height 5' 4" Mass 120 lb Hair color Blond Eye color Hazel Skin color Pale

Political information

Affiliation(s) Occupation What is your character's occupation? Clan(s) Caste Domain Masters Apprentices Alias(es)

Out-of-character information

Writer Aeyliea Created on 07/03/24 Avatar Link the source of your character's image (use a reverse google image search if you are stuck)

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Emelia is pretty for someone in her middling years, after a fashion. Of average height and build leave her otherwise unremarkable; her most striking feature are her eyes. They are a pretty hazel with flecks of gold, violet, blue and green in them and they shift subtly in changing light.

She rarely smiles and never speaks. She prefers to wear traditional dresses of workwoman quality; stout, high necked dresses with hems that fall to the ankles in subdued colors are her most often worn attire. She keeps her hair shoulder length at most. She also keeps herself fastidiously clean and neat.

When the sun goes down, though, she is wont to switch dress for sensible trousers and shirt, and mugs of ale and platters of food for knives.

Emelia has a tattoo round her throat, a thin band in black ink. Sometimes she wears a scarf to cover it, other times not. She keeps a familiar with her, as well; a magpie that is much more intelligent than even a raven should be.

<List a few key skills your character has>

She is quiet. Silent, actually; she utters not a single word - a mute, though not always so. Her familiar sometimes speaks on her behalf, although it is not actually clear if it is her words or the familiar's own at times. She mostly communicates through gestures or body language. She also carries a notebook of sorts. Paper being expensive, she seldom uses this.

In public, she is a pleasant enough woman even if she is distant. Tragedy has haunted her life, and its scars are evident. She is wary of men in particular, maintaining icy politeness at best. This particular personality quirk manifested itself after her son died.

Outside of this, she is an honest and forthright person, generally kind and well-meaning. There is a dark streak running through all of it, though; normally kind and generous, she has a violent temper when roused and bears grudges bitterly. She is generally law abiding but can dance round the moral and ethical implications of taking that same law into her own hands where she feels it is warranted. She has a particular burning hatred of the many and varied criminal organizations operating in Alliria, one that she conceals out of necessity.

Emelia was born of common stock in Alliria to an average family. Nothing of note occurred during her youth; she was an average child and led and average life. Her parents own and operate an inn, the Mistral Refuge, at the edge of the city not far from one of the main roads out to parts west. It offered a comfortable life growing up, although she like many other children in her family business started working early.

When Emelia was twelve, she suffered from an illness that took her voice from her and almost took her life. Even now, she can only speak a few pained words before becoming incapable of speech. The same illness that almost took her beyond took her mum's life.

The rest of her trouble started in her adolescence. Without much preamble, she found her head turned by a dockworkers' son, a stout boy by the name of Reph. One thing led inevitably to another, and she found herself pregnant at too early an age. Her father made a fuss about this and words were exchanged between families. Emelia was wed to Reph, crossbow wedding style. A year later, their son Samael was born.

At the outset things went fine. Reph was not a bad husband and the two got along well. Samael grew, Emelia continued to work in her family business and Reph worked the docks as his father had. Her father got over the impropriety. And so it went for years, the couple making the best of things. There was even a mutual respect, maybe even love between them as they raised their son together.

And then an accident left Reph crippled so that he could not continue the arduous work of the docks. By itself it would not have been trouble. Reph did not like being unable pulling his own weight, but it was difficult to find anywhere that would take a man who could neither read nor write and now could not lift anymore, either. He turned to drinking, and that was when the trouble started. It was only made worse when one of the many less scrupulous groups that infest Alliria like fungus in the dark (an apt comparison) offered him work.

That work ran contrary to his morals. The pay was too good though and came with the added problem that once you start working for criminals, you keep working for them unless you want to stop working...and living. The drinking intensified. Reph became violent, and the inevitable began.

Emelia thought it was something she had done at first. Attempts to ameliorate her husband's anger ended in failure. Wouldn't have been a problem for the most part, for Reph worked at night more often than during the day. He would never say what it was he was doing, and she was at first too uneasy to ask and eventually afraid to find out. She could not understand how someone who had been so caring could turn so dark and inward; it became difficult to hide her home troubles when she was at work as she herself became more withdrawn and introverted. She managed because she did not want her father pulled into the nightmare with her.

Everything came to a head one evening when Reph went too far. In the aftermath, Emelia was left without her son - whom she had loved dearly despite not ever wanting him in the first place - and with a husband that had become brutal beyond her ability to understand.

After a year of suffering, she finally decided that enough was enough. Instead of going to her family or to the authorities, though, she decided to turn to legend for help, learned of in a moment of weakness and called upon despite her better judgement.

<Fae pact goes here>