sharkbitesMary Hawthorne
Name: Mary Hawthorne (aka Marie Leveaux)
Age: 616 (apparent age 18)
Race: Caucasian
Sex: Female
Skills: a rather good cook, and knowledgeable about agriculture and animal husbandry. Can read and write Latin (Classical and Vulgate), German, Greek (Classical and Byzantine), as well as a couple of languages that aren't human. Passably good shot with simple firearms (revolvers, double bbl shotguns and lever action rifles), but doesn't like them and prefers melee weapons such as knives or swords. Highly skilled at what an earlier age would call Witchcraft...though she is very careful about concealing this and the subjects of her display of power normally either don't realize what she is doing or don't live to talk about it....or both.
Personality: Rather attractive by Wasteland standards, 5'6, 115 lbs, with long black hair and blue eyes. Polite and calm, sometimes eerily calm. Occasionally talks in a oddly archaic manner of speaking, especially when speaking about the past. Does not seem to be at all well versed in current Commonwealth history, but seems unusually knowledgeable of the past...can speak on colonial era Massachusetts, and Salem in particular with a particularly disturbing level of authority....and oddly enough the longer before the War the subject, the more detail and knowledge she displays. People who associate with her will know she is very literate and a voracious reader of books, not all of which are in English.
Weapons & armor/clothing: Possesses a .38 snub-nose and a .45 ACP Revolver (the latter a weapon antique by even Pre-War standards), 12 gauge double barrel shotgun, Revolutionary War sword, and several knives. Normally only carries a knife and/or the .38 revolver unless she is expecting trouble....and it is not prudent to display her "abilities". Usually dressed in standard Wasteland attire for women, if appropriate clean pre-war clothes.
(Previous) Occupation(s): Student/researcher/practitioner of the Arcane, medicine woman, housewife
Faction (Minutemen, Institute, BOS, Railroad, None. Etc): None
Backstory: Born in Boston, Massachusetts in November 1671, youngest daughter of Thomas Parker, a wealthy merchant, and his wife Elizabeth. Due to her family wealth, she well well-educated by the standards of the age, receiving a classical education, which included being taught to read Latin and Greek. In 1688, she married John Hawthorne, a County Magistrate and merchant living in Salem, and a devout Puritan. She bore him a daughter, Abigail in 1689 (died of pneumonia in 1691). Aside them the birth (and loss) of her daughter, her life was uneventful until the the events that led to the Salem Witch Trials in 1692. Her husband, was called upon to investigate the allegations being made. Not being familiar with witchcraft, he acquired what were considered authoritative works on the subject, such as the infamous Malleus Maleficarum, and A Tryal of Witches, an account of the witchcraft trials in Suffolk, England in 1663. These works had a serious impact on the still grieving John, who became convinced that his infant daughter was in fact murdered by witches and became obsessed with fighting the minions of Satan who had taken his beloved daughter from him and threatened the Godly people of Salem. They also had an effect on Mary, who, without John's knowledge, read his reference works while he in Court. The loss of her daughter, and to an extent her husband...now obsessed with the trials...had shaken her faith in God, and she found the Malleus Maleficarum's lurid depictions of women consorting with "daemons" strangely exciting. This would likely have not gone beyond prurient fantasies, if the trials had not finally unearthed a genuine "witch".
In 1692, at the height of the Trials, Mary Bradbury of nearby Salisbury, was arrested for witchcraft. Accused of casting spells on ships, and even changing into an animal, she was speedily convicted when a cache of Occult Books was found hidden in her cellar. Both her and her husband strenuously denied any knowledge of them, but Mary was convicted anyway and sentenced to hang for practicing magic. The books themselves had, when not produced at the trial as evidence, been stored in a locked chest in the Hawthorne home. At night, Mary dreamed of something inside the box calling to her, inviting her to open the chest and learn the secrets the books inside held. As she was unable to get the key, she was not able to do so. After Mary Bradshaw's conviction, the books were publicly cast upon a fire and burned before a n assembly of the whole town....at least except for one. Returning from the book burning event alone....she was astonished to find a large leather-bound book, undamaged yet smoking from the fire she had watched her husband cast it in not twenty minutes ago, waiting for her on their kitchen table. She did not realize it at the time, but the entire course of her life was dependent on what she did next. Partly due to her fear of what would happen if it became know the book had inexplicably appeared to her, partly due to to the desire to learn it's secrets, she seized the book and hid it away. The next day, she found herself compelled to read it, but she could not as it was in a Byzantine dialect of Greek that she was not familiar with. That night, she dreamed again. In this dream, she was drawn to the Salem Jail, then to one particular window. That barred window was that of the cell containing Mary Bradbury, currently awaiting execution. Mary greeted her warmly, telling her she bore her no ill will for her predicament. She then explained that the world she knew was but a tiny bubble in the vast cosmos, and the book, an ancient text of great power, was the key to opening the door to the wider universe. While the book had clearly chosen her as it's next custodian, she was not yet ready to learn the truth about Mankind's true place in the universe. However, in exchange for her aid, she would teach her what she needed to know to learn about, and survive in, the Real World. If she wished to escape her existence as a common housewife, and learn wonders beyond all imagination, all she need to was to was bring her a piece of chalk, or charcoal before the end of the night after next, as that next morning she would hang as decreed by her husband. Then she awoke, back in her bed. she thought upon the dream all day, while doing her domestic chores, and what she should do next. That night, she crept out of the house and made her way to the cell in her dream, and without a word, quietly placed a piece of chalk she had purloined from the dry goods store that afternoon, upon the windowsill. Before she could pull her hand away, a arm reached out and grasped hers from the darkness inside the cell and held her in place.
"Know this", Mary Bradshaw whispered, "While I blame ye not for my situation, I will have my revenge against your husband for what he has done. All the others he has done to death or imprisonment were innocent....only I was guilty of what he accused me of...and more that that...and I only fell into his hands through my own carelessness. There is no going back for you now...you've just done him to death as surely as if you cut his throat while he lay sleeping...once I have had my vengeance, we will meet again and your apprenticeship will begin." The hand then released her and she spoke one last time. "Now go, child...and enjoy your husband's bed for what time he has left. You will soon learn how ethereal everything you have been taught really is."
She crept back home, and into bed undetected, filled with dread and anticipation of the future. The next morning, the alarm was raised as one of the condemned prisoners...none other than Mary Bradshaw..had escaped from her locked cell in the night. The only clues being some sort of markings scrawled on the floor in chalk, partially obliterated by the footprints of rats, which infested the jail. The focus rapidly turned outward as it was learned her husband had also disappeared from their home in Salisbury. Suspicion turned to one of the jailers, who was believed to have accepted a bribe from her husband to let her escape, but he denied it vigorously and nothing could be proven. One year and one day after Bradshaw's escape, John Hawthorne was killed. While riding to Salisbury to hear a case, witnesses reported his horse panicked suddenly by the sight of a large blue boar on the Salisbury Road and ran into the Caramec River, and Hawthorne was carried under by the horse and drowned. Shortly after that, State officials began to intervene in the ongoing Witchcraft trials in Salem, and the cases against those awaiting trial fell apart under higher scrutiny, and the Governor pardoned the last group facing trial. At that point, the Witch trials fell apart, and those already tried had their convictions reversed on appeal....including Mary Bradshaw. With the trials having been discredited, Mary Bradshaw and her husband returned to their Salisbury home, and resumed their lives. Shortly after that the Widow Hawthorne, as her apprentice, began her studies in the Arcane, a journey she has continued on to the present day.
Having learned firsthand the perils of discovery, she maintained a low profile. Through supernatural means, she has lived far longer than any human has a right to. To evade detection, she occasionally left Massachusetts for a time, until time, now her ally, made it safe to return. The Great War found her in distant Maryland, a place called Point Lookout, where she joined a coven led by the then Matriarch of the Blackhall family, Constance Blackhall, devoted to the worship of a being known as Ub-Qualtoth. Constance herself had a unaturally long life, due to spells from a tome of great power, known as the Krivbeknih. the coven fell apart after the book was stolen from her, and without the spells within, Constance finally was claimed by old age in 2156. Mary, now calling herself Marie Leveaux after she married Simon Leveaux, a Cajun from Louisiana, meanwhile, had retreated deep into the swamp where the radiation ghoulified her. She then spent the next few decades living as sort of a medicine woman, serving the local Swamp Folk, who had come to accept her, not to mention greatly respected her power. Eventually, Constance's great-grandson, Obediah Blackhall, found a mercenary that was able to retrieve the Krivbeknih from the rival Cult that had stolen it. At first, unaware of the real power the tome had, he used things he gleaned from the book to convince the Swamp Folk he was a priest of Ub-Qualtoth and begin to revive the flagging fortunes of his family line, now down to him and his young grandson, Zachariah. His attempt to enact a ritual sacrifice to Ub-Qualtoth caused a ritual of Marie's own, using the discarded corpse of the sacrificial victim, to backfire and she confronted Obediah. Learning he had the Krivbeknih, the only tome she knew of that would enable her to recover from the predicament she was in, and that he had no idea what he had been foolishly trifling with, she struck a deal and a partnership was formed. In exchange for access to the Krivbeknih, she would take him as an apprentice, and show him things more important than mere earthly power. Obediah has used what he has learned to revive the flagging fortunes of his family, he rules all Point Lookout with a unshakeable grip. Also, in Zachariah, he found a solution to the problem of his mortality.
Marie herself, has continued her own research, and has learned of an artifact of great power, Kremvh's Tooth, whose last known location was in Massachusetts, the land of her youth. With her apprentice's help, and somewhat to his relief as his teacher is his only credible rival for power, she has journeyed back home, to Salem, to reclaim her old home and from there begin her search.
Age: 616 (apparent age 18)
Race: Caucasian
Sex: Female
Skills: a rather good cook, and knowledgeable about agriculture and animal husbandry. Can read and write Latin (Classical and Vulgate), German, Greek (Classical and Byzantine), as well as a couple of languages that aren't human. Passably good shot with simple firearms (revolvers, double bbl shotguns and lever action rifles), but doesn't like them and prefers melee weapons such as knives or swords. Highly skilled at what an earlier age would call Witchcraft...though she is very careful about concealing this and the subjects of her display of power normally either don't realize what she is doing or don't live to talk about it....or both.
Personality: Rather attractive by Wasteland standards, 5'6, 115 lbs, with long black hair and blue eyes. Polite and calm, sometimes eerily calm. Occasionally talks in a oddly archaic manner of speaking, especially when speaking about the past. Does not seem to be at all well versed in current Commonwealth history, but seems unusually knowledgeable of the past...can speak on colonial era Massachusetts, and Salem in particular with a particularly disturbing level of authority....and oddly enough the longer before the War the subject, the more detail and knowledge she displays. People who associate with her will know she is very literate and a voracious reader of books, not all of which are in English.
Weapons & armor/clothing: Possesses a .38 snub-nose and a .45 ACP Revolver (the latter a weapon antique by even Pre-War standards), 12 gauge double barrel shotgun, Revolutionary War sword, and several knives. Normally only carries a knife and/or the .38 revolver unless she is expecting trouble....and it is not prudent to display her "abilities". Usually dressed in standard Wasteland attire for women, if appropriate clean pre-war clothes.
(Previous) Occupation(s): Student/researcher/practitioner of the Arcane, medicine woman, housewife
Faction (Minutemen, Institute, BOS, Railroad, None. Etc): None
Backstory: Born in Boston, Massachusetts in November 1671, youngest daughter of Thomas Parker, a wealthy merchant, and his wife Elizabeth. Due to her family wealth, she well well-educated by the standards of the age, receiving a classical education, which included being taught to read Latin and Greek. In 1688, she married John Hawthorne, a County Magistrate and merchant living in Salem, and a devout Puritan. She bore him a daughter, Abigail in 1689 (died of pneumonia in 1691). Aside them the birth (and loss) of her daughter, her life was uneventful until the the events that led to the Salem Witch Trials in 1692. Her husband, was called upon to investigate the allegations being made. Not being familiar with witchcraft, he acquired what were considered authoritative works on the subject, such as the infamous Malleus Maleficarum, and A Tryal of Witches, an account of the witchcraft trials in Suffolk, England in 1663. These works had a serious impact on the still grieving John, who became convinced that his infant daughter was in fact murdered by witches and became obsessed with fighting the minions of Satan who had taken his beloved daughter from him and threatened the Godly people of Salem. They also had an effect on Mary, who, without John's knowledge, read his reference works while he in Court. The loss of her daughter, and to an extent her husband...now obsessed with the trials...had shaken her faith in God, and she found the Malleus Maleficarum's lurid depictions of women consorting with "daemons" strangely exciting. This would likely have not gone beyond prurient fantasies, if the trials had not finally unearthed a genuine "witch".
In 1692, at the height of the Trials, Mary Bradbury of nearby Salisbury, was arrested for witchcraft. Accused of casting spells on ships, and even changing into an animal, she was speedily convicted when a cache of Occult Books was found hidden in her cellar. Both her and her husband strenuously denied any knowledge of them, but Mary was convicted anyway and sentenced to hang for practicing magic. The books themselves had, when not produced at the trial as evidence, been stored in a locked chest in the Hawthorne home. At night, Mary dreamed of something inside the box calling to her, inviting her to open the chest and learn the secrets the books inside held. As she was unable to get the key, she was not able to do so. After Mary Bradshaw's conviction, the books were publicly cast upon a fire and burned before a n assembly of the whole town....at least except for one. Returning from the book burning event alone....she was astonished to find a large leather-bound book, undamaged yet smoking from the fire she had watched her husband cast it in not twenty minutes ago, waiting for her on their kitchen table. She did not realize it at the time, but the entire course of her life was dependent on what she did next. Partly due to her fear of what would happen if it became know the book had inexplicably appeared to her, partly due to to the desire to learn it's secrets, she seized the book and hid it away. The next day, she found herself compelled to read it, but she could not as it was in a Byzantine dialect of Greek that she was not familiar with. That night, she dreamed again. In this dream, she was drawn to the Salem Jail, then to one particular window. That barred window was that of the cell containing Mary Bradbury, currently awaiting execution. Mary greeted her warmly, telling her she bore her no ill will for her predicament. She then explained that the world she knew was but a tiny bubble in the vast cosmos, and the book, an ancient text of great power, was the key to opening the door to the wider universe. While the book had clearly chosen her as it's next custodian, she was not yet ready to learn the truth about Mankind's true place in the universe. However, in exchange for her aid, she would teach her what she needed to know to learn about, and survive in, the Real World. If she wished to escape her existence as a common housewife, and learn wonders beyond all imagination, all she need to was to was bring her a piece of chalk, or charcoal before the end of the night after next, as that next morning she would hang as decreed by her husband. Then she awoke, back in her bed. she thought upon the dream all day, while doing her domestic chores, and what she should do next. That night, she crept out of the house and made her way to the cell in her dream, and without a word, quietly placed a piece of chalk she had purloined from the dry goods store that afternoon, upon the windowsill. Before she could pull her hand away, a arm reached out and grasped hers from the darkness inside the cell and held her in place.
"Know this", Mary Bradshaw whispered, "While I blame ye not for my situation, I will have my revenge against your husband for what he has done. All the others he has done to death or imprisonment were innocent....only I was guilty of what he accused me of...and more that that...and I only fell into his hands through my own carelessness. There is no going back for you now...you've just done him to death as surely as if you cut his throat while he lay sleeping...once I have had my vengeance, we will meet again and your apprenticeship will begin." The hand then released her and she spoke one last time. "Now go, child...and enjoy your husband's bed for what time he has left. You will soon learn how ethereal everything you have been taught really is."
She crept back home, and into bed undetected, filled with dread and anticipation of the future. The next morning, the alarm was raised as one of the condemned prisoners...none other than Mary Bradshaw..had escaped from her locked cell in the night. The only clues being some sort of markings scrawled on the floor in chalk, partially obliterated by the footprints of rats, which infested the jail. The focus rapidly turned outward as it was learned her husband had also disappeared from their home in Salisbury. Suspicion turned to one of the jailers, who was believed to have accepted a bribe from her husband to let her escape, but he denied it vigorously and nothing could be proven. One year and one day after Bradshaw's escape, John Hawthorne was killed. While riding to Salisbury to hear a case, witnesses reported his horse panicked suddenly by the sight of a large blue boar on the Salisbury Road and ran into the Caramec River, and Hawthorne was carried under by the horse and drowned. Shortly after that, State officials began to intervene in the ongoing Witchcraft trials in Salem, and the cases against those awaiting trial fell apart under higher scrutiny, and the Governor pardoned the last group facing trial. At that point, the Witch trials fell apart, and those already tried had their convictions reversed on appeal....including Mary Bradshaw. With the trials having been discredited, Mary Bradshaw and her husband returned to their Salisbury home, and resumed their lives. Shortly after that the Widow Hawthorne, as her apprentice, began her studies in the Arcane, a journey she has continued on to the present day.
Having learned firsthand the perils of discovery, she maintained a low profile. Through supernatural means, she has lived far longer than any human has a right to. To evade detection, she occasionally left Massachusetts for a time, until time, now her ally, made it safe to return. The Great War found her in distant Maryland, a place called Point Lookout, where she joined a coven led by the then Matriarch of the Blackhall family, Constance Blackhall, devoted to the worship of a being known as Ub-Qualtoth. Constance herself had a unaturally long life, due to spells from a tome of great power, known as the Krivbeknih. the coven fell apart after the book was stolen from her, and without the spells within, Constance finally was claimed by old age in 2156. Mary, now calling herself Marie Leveaux after she married Simon Leveaux, a Cajun from Louisiana, meanwhile, had retreated deep into the swamp where the radiation ghoulified her. She then spent the next few decades living as sort of a medicine woman, serving the local Swamp Folk, who had come to accept her, not to mention greatly respected her power. Eventually, Constance's great-grandson, Obediah Blackhall, found a mercenary that was able to retrieve the Krivbeknih from the rival Cult that had stolen it. At first, unaware of the real power the tome had, he used things he gleaned from the book to convince the Swamp Folk he was a priest of Ub-Qualtoth and begin to revive the flagging fortunes of his family line, now down to him and his young grandson, Zachariah. His attempt to enact a ritual sacrifice to Ub-Qualtoth caused a ritual of Marie's own, using the discarded corpse of the sacrificial victim, to backfire and she confronted Obediah. Learning he had the Krivbeknih, the only tome she knew of that would enable her to recover from the predicament she was in, and that he had no idea what he had been foolishly trifling with, she struck a deal and a partnership was formed. In exchange for access to the Krivbeknih, she would take him as an apprentice, and show him things more important than mere earthly power. Obediah has used what he has learned to revive the flagging fortunes of his family, he rules all Point Lookout with a unshakeable grip. Also, in Zachariah, he found a solution to the problem of his mortality.
Marie herself, has continued her own research, and has learned of an artifact of great power, Kremvh's Tooth, whose last known location was in Massachusetts, the land of her youth. With her apprentice's help, and somewhat to his relief as his teacher is his only credible rival for power, she has journeyed back home, to Salem, to reclaim her old home and from there begin her search.