About Sophy CassellSOPHY CASSELL CR 4
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Created With Hero Lab® - try it for free at http://www.wolflair.com! Background:
Sophy was left an orphan during the Late Unpleasantness, when her mother was among the first to fall victim to the madman known as 'Chopper.' (Her father had been killed in an accident at the lumber mill many years before, and Sophy barely remembers him.) The whole season is a blur in Sophy's memory, from the raw pain of losing her mother to the night she found herself on Church Street, surrounded by smoke and shouting, taking part in a line of citizens trying to save what could be salvaged from the chapel and surrounding buildings. Someone set a stack of heavy books, charred around the edges and smelling of soot, in her arms, and mechanically she carried them to safety. As she went to set them down, however, the wind ruffled open the pages; reaching to close the cover, instead she began to turn the leaves slowly. Something about the books, so fragile and vulnerable yet having survived the fire, the treasures inscribed within intact, broke through the walls of grief that had closed in on her. When the fire at last was tamed, Sophy was still sitting in Maver Kesk's jewelry shop, turning the pages of the rescued books.
Sandpoint, feeling the duty of taking care of its own in the aftermath of its twin tragedies, sought homes and employment for those left destitute. Sabyl Som, respecting Sophy's new-found devotion to the chapel's books, offered the teenaged girl a place to live and a job taking care of the library beneath the House of Blue Stones. Quiet and introverted, she has spent the last five years perusing every volume she can find; when travelling caravans with dusty used book carts come to the Town Market, she arrives early and has accumulated quite a trove of history books to go along with the books on religion that were saved from the old chapel. Over the past several weeks, when Sophy has been sitting alone in the library in the evenings, strange and inexplicable events have been happening. Although the room is below-ground and has no windows, sudden breezes ruffle the pages of books she is reading and cause her candle flame to flicker; books she is sure she has put away safely suddenly fall off the shelves with a startling thud; when she turns away for a moment, her quill moves from one side of her desk to another; and she hears sounds like whispering behind the bookshelves, although when she goes to investigate, there is no one there. She has grown increasingly fearful and has started carrying a concealed dagger at all times, as well as a little bundle she bought from a peddlar as a good-luck charm to ward off evil, but she hasn't told anyone about her experiences, afraid they will think she is going insane (an opinion she has overheard from many of the town matrons, sure that spending that much time with books will "addlepate" an impressionable young woman). Her frightening experiences culminate the night before the celebration of the completion of the new church. Sitting alone in the library, Sophy was jotting down notes out of a book she was reading, half-distracted by thoughts of the festival the next day, when the long-displaced books from the old chapel were to be returned to their new home. One moment, everything was normal; the next thing she knew, her candle was burned down to a nub and in front of her was a page in her own handwriting, predicting blood and death to the inhabitants of Sandpoint at the festivities the next day. Staring at the paper in horror and confusion, Sophy wondered if the old wives of the town were right. Something was happening to her, something she didn't understand and couldn't control.
Description:
Sophy is a pretty young woman who always has a friendly smile for a stranger, but the talk around town is that the tragedy of her mother's death has left her "damaged goods" -- and the oddness of her upbringing since in the House of Blue Stones has done nothing to diminish her eccentricity. It is certain that despite her pretty face, no young men have ever had the temerity to "come courting." Although unfailingly polite, Sophy is quite shy and introverted; she seems happy with her books, and if she has an opinion on her social situation, she has never shared it. XP: 11,900 Erylium's memory:
The memories are horrific and dark and burn in your soul. For a moment you are transported onto the shoulder of a man your master and you are chirping with glee in a room containing several implements of torture. In one corner sits a spherical cage with spikes protruding inward from its iron bars, a naked women inside pierced and bleeding. In another stands what appears to be a star-shaped wooden frame, its surface studded with hooks, the corpse of a man crumpled on the floor before it. And in the center of the room is a long table covered with leather straps and a number of cranks that seem designed to rotate and swivel. Masked men armed with ancient curved swords are wrestling someone with a canvas bad on their head towards the table. Your master speaks with and icy voice, "Tell me what I desire and your son will be spared. Tell me what I want to know about Alaznist." Then the memories are gone, and you are quite sure that the demon has never seen, heard, or every thought of Amekio. |
