AlsaceAndLorraine/Magpie

Magpie

Smartmouth urchin with a heart of ...well something. Yeah, it's a cliche. But cliches only become cliche because they've got legs, right?

History

Magpie's grandmother was a witch. She always seemed to Magpie like the oldest person in the world- tiny, wrinkled, with rheumy eyes and slack lips. She owned a small cornerstore in the Imperial City, selling talismans and philtres for hopeful lovers. And even though the store was dark and crowded, reeking of dead rats and strange chemicals, she did a brisk business, for her charms whispered with power; not the mighty power of the Exalted, but the subtle, enduring strength of mortality.

Magpie was damn near imprisoned in that hole for the first few years of her life, helping grandmother trap beatles and pickel frog's brains. Magpie reckoned it was just as well customers didn't think about went into the charms; she figured no one'd sleep easier with a dreamcatcher they knew was strung with gut from a hanged man. She had to stay with her grandmother at the shop most days; Magpie's mother couldn't have been trusted to look after a damn dog, much less a restless child. Dancing Swallow relied on a throaty murmer and a certain ripe sensuality to attract patrons and keep herself in silk dresses and cheap perfume. This is not to say she was one of the canny sort; Dancing Swallow had always been dreamy and vague, and lacked some essential quality to take responsibility for herself. She left for an assignation one evening when Magpie was six or seven, and didn't come back. Magpie missed her. Dancing Swallow had never been attentive or loving parent, preferring to spend her time in an opium haze to raising her daughter, but once in while, she had held Magpie close in her arms and sang songs of haunting beauty and queer melody. It was those times Magpie remembered, when she thought of her mother. Magpie and her grandmother never did learn what happened to her; if some customer had gotten carried away, or if she'd abandoned them to become some rich'un's kept mistress. Probably she'd never find out.

After her mother disappeared, Magpie's grandmother must have decided that she couldn't keep Magpie from the world forever, because it was around that time that Magpie started to be sent out on all kinds of errands. Not without protection, of course; Magpie jangled with charms against theft, or accident, or ill-luck, and everything else her grandmother could think of. And apparently, grandmother'd stored up a lot of chores that needed doing, because suddenly Magpie didn't seem to spend so much as two moments strung together in the shop; if it weren't cow brains, it was parsley; if it weren't parsley, it was some dumb scroll in some dumb language she needed to get the scribe to copy. Magpie got to know the city pretty well, though. So, when a burner got knocked over and set the store afire, Magpie was on the other side of the city, trying to get some stupid merchant to pay the money he owed for his new wards. By the time Magpie got back from that, there wasn't anything left of the shop, or her grandmother. Or the block, really. The fire had caught, and caught fierce.

There was no one to take Magpie in, after that. If she had other relatives, she didn't know them, and Magpie and the Immaculates had never gotten along- they didn't think of Magpie's grandmother's meddling with things. So she lived on the street, sleeping dry when she could and wet when she couldn't. She got by, doing basically the same kind of things for the rough, greasy men of the disenfranchised that she'd done for her grandmother; run errands, plus acting as a lookout, passing messages, that sort of thing. She learned new things, too; how to fiddle open a lock, how to escape notice in a crowd, and make what her teachers were fond of calling "clandestine entrances." In short, she adapted pretty well to being on her own. It was hard, though; Magpie wasn't used to being alone, and she had a hard time making friends. The minor wards and charms Magpie managed to get working had saved her butt on more than one occasion, but it was a strangeness, and that was all it took for her to be shut out of the small friendships that developed among the disenfranchised. She was all cold inside.

The loneliness cut deeply some times more than other, and it was on one of those occassions that on a reckless impulse Magpie stole incense sticks from an Immaculate Temple, planted them in the ground in a deserted courtyard, and began to pray desperately, heedlessly for a friend, from any god that would listen, indifferent to the heresy. She'd been praying long enough that her knees were sore and aching, when she heard a scream that sounded almost human, and looked up to see a hawk pursuing a crow, talons extended. The crow already looked injured; it moved its wings awkwardly, and seemed barely able to keep itself in the air. A sudden spasm of rage shook Magpie; it just didn't seem fair, that the world was so cruel and hateful, that the powerful were so strong and weak so hopeless. She picked up a sharp stone from the ground, and threw it at the hawk, as hard as she could. She hit it dead on in the chest, stunning it momentarily- long enough for the crow to dive into any alleyway and conceal itself. Magpie hid too; the hawk looked mean. It circled for a while, looking cruel as death, but it gave up eventually, and then Magpie went looking for the crow. It was hurt; its wing was battered and bloody, and it wasn't moving much. It was an answer to her prayer, she figured; this bird would be her friend, if she helped it. It'd *have* to be. So she did. She carefully made a splint around the wing with twigs, and made some paste to smear all over it. It seemed to work; within a few days, the crow was up and flying again. And she was right, too, 'cause the crow stuck around, and was her best friend, cawing raucously at her jokes and nibbling at her hair. Sure, it got her in trouble- stealing things, harassing stupid people, but that was all right, because it got her out of trouble too, remembering to grab breadrolls for her some mornings, and diving at bullies who picked on her. She never named him; she tried to, calling him Shadow, or Chance, or, after a particularly chaotic afternoon, Trouble, but none of the names seemed to fit, so she wound up just calling him crow.

The world seemed okay, now that she wasn't alone anymore. She didn't starve, and she mostly slept warm- the crow was good at finding abandoned houses. Some wound in her seemed to heal, and since she didn't feel so much hurt herself any longer, she started noticing when others did. And since it seemed like all it took to help, mostly, was the gift of a breadroll or a rock thrown in the right place, she started looking out for people who needed it. And that made her warm too.

Appearance

Matted, tangled black hair. Short and boney. Skin roughened by childhood illnesses and a life of hardship. Dark eyes. A sunny grin. Her rough clothing is cut from sailcloth.

Personality

She tries hard to seem tough. She's bratty, resents being condescended to, compassionate and fearless. When she makes friends- or thinks she does- she becomes very attached, clinging barnacle-like. Resists being left behind. Takes threats to them very personally, and trusts to a foolish extent. Scrappy.

Character Sheet

Magpie
Caregiver

Str 1 Cha 3 Per 3
Dex 5 Man 2 Int 3
Sta 3 App 2 Wit 3

Abilities

Athletics 3

Awareness 3 (Of Danger +1)

Dodge 3

Thrown 3 (Rocks and Other Improvised Missiles: +3)

Craft 1

Larceny 3

Linguistics 1 (Native: Low Realm; Old Realm)

Performance 1

Presence 1 (When Impassioned +1)

Sail 1

Socialize 2

Stealth 3

Survival 1

Investigation 2

Lore 1

Occult 2 (Summoning Crows +1)

Melee 1

Brawl 1

Endurance 1

Backgrounds

Familiar 3 (the crow)

Contacts 3 (various disreputable figures)(One-Eyed Rat. Thugs 'R Us)

Resources 1

Virtues

Compassion ooo

Conviction oo

Temperance oo

Valor oooo

Thaumaturgy

Art of Summoning 1

Enchantment 1

Alchemy 1

Willpower: 8

CurrentXP: 6
TotalXp: 68