Lenore Derilium

[Amanda]

Player name: Amanda
Character name: Lenore Derilium
Race: shifter (barn swallow)
Age: 17
Height: 5'5
Weight: 110 lbs

Physical description:
Lenore is an average (if a little skinny and sleep deprived) looking seventeen year old. Despite some difficulties she has had in the past, there is almost always a smile gracing her thin lips. Her hair is black, with a hint of blue sheen. It falls past her shoulder blades, and becomes untamable in wet weather. Her eyes are wide set and dark, with dark circles underneath from more than a few all-nights. Her skin is rather pale, as it is usually hidden under her long dresses and skirts. Occasionally, she is able to masquerade as a young boy because of her scrawny figure.

Possessions:
-small leather satchel, which she keeps food, bandages, and a spare set of clothes in.
-enchanted umbrella. It produces a yellow green glow at the tip when Lenore wills it, and it is enchanted to be unbreakable. It is quite useful for knocking people in the shins when self defense is needed. A gift from her father.
-a feather from her mother. Her mother also could take the form of a swallow, and Lenore keeps this feather to remind her of her family.

Strengths:
- can take the form of a swallow, which is useful for spying and scouting.
- has strange dreams that sometimes turn out to be true.
- she is quite fast, and can deal a fair amount of blows to her enemies whilst they stand dumbfounded.
- Lenore has an ability to stay awake late into the night, and often does. Sleep is not the first thing on her priority list.

Weaknesses:
- Lenore is a dreamer, and sometimes misses bits of reality due to daydreaming or being transfixed by an interesting object.
- she is exceedingly fragile and doesn't deal with injuries well.
- talks in circles and riddles sometimes, and her points aren't always clear.
- When Lenore shifts into her fully human form (her fragility and blue-ish hair are due to the fact that she's almost always half-shifted), or from her full human form to her bird form, she experiences extreme pain due to a magical accident when she was small.

History:
Lenore Derilium was born as a barn swallow shifter (the ability runs in her mother's side) in a country far west of here, as an illegitimate child to a mage and his maid, Gretchen. She lived in the manor with her mother and father, no one any the wiser (except the Mage and maid) until Lenore was four.

Lenore's father was performing a sealing ritual on an outlaw, a werewolf. He was attempting to make it impossible for him to shift into his wolf form, thus stopping him from wreaking any more havoc in the surrounding countryside. While the door to the study was locked, the window was left open for light.

Lenore, young and curious, hopped on the windowsill into the study. The werewolf was in great pain due to the experimental ritual, and as Lenore wandered closer to the fellow shifter, she was caught in the spell.

Her father, his eyes closed in concentration, only stopped the spell when he noticed, finally, another tiny being caught in the sealing spell.

He was horrified. He had no idea if she would ever be able to return to her human form (the spell was to lock the recipient in the current form), and he strove to reverse the damage for weeks.

His wife grew suspicious of the love shown to the maid's daughter, and soon enough, the truth came out.

The Mage's wife permitted the maid and her daughter to stay until her husband reversed the spell damage.

After a year of spells and experimentation, Lenore was able to shift back into her human form fully, but only with the same pain she felt when her shifting powers were sealed.

Lenore and her mother moved into a small house nearby and tried to go on with life. But the strain of finding small work and constantly shifting jobs wore hard on Gretchen. Falling ill three months after the move, Gretchen left her five year old daughter alone in the world when she passed.

The Mage found out about his mistress dying, and hires a nurse to care for Lenore. He visited her for a short period every two weeks, giving her all the things he deemed it necessary for a little girl to have.

When Lenore turned sixteen, and her father was growing old (he was not a young man when Lenore was born), he lost everything in a gamble. He lost his job, his money, and his wife left him. He committed suicide.

Lenore decided that her nurse was not needed any longer, and decided to travel east, into the unknown. She wanders from place to place, always smiling.

[Frug]

Umbrellas are too powerful. Everyone else will be wet in a thunderstorm, even an extremely windy one, while she stays dry. Think of the power.

Seriously though, I like it but I find the first part of the history could use some clarification. She had the ability to turn into a barn swallow before the magical experiment with her father? I think some mention of her ability before being trapped in a bird form would clarify it.

[Amanda]

Okay, thanks! I'll work on the history.

One thing, though. What if I make the umbrella a normal umbrella (with the light, though)? I just had a really vivid image of her with an umbrella. The way I meant to write it (it's not that clear now that I look at it), it should be just the metal part in the middle that is enchanted to be unbreakable. I could make it a fairly normal umbrella. Please let me keep the umbrella. Please.

[Stella]

Frug is just teasing you. An enchanted umbrella, unless it can destroy cities, isn't exactly overpowered. :p

[Amanda]

Oh. well that's good. At least I can keep the umbrella! ^_^

[Frug]

No, umbrellas of any kind are too powerful.

[Amanda]

I fixed the history. Are we good now? =)

[Saruna]

Hi there! I apologize for not making an entrance sooner -- got distracted by one thing, and then another, and here were are now. I am usually much more prompt, so let's see if we can get this app squared away pronto!

I would like to clarify one of her strengths:

- she is quite fast, and can deal a fair amount of blows to her enemies whilst they stand dumbfounded.

Does she have formal combat training? If so, what weapons -- if any -- is she capable of using effectively? Is she highly skilled, or only in passable self defense?

Also, does it still cause her pain to shift between forms?

One last thing: How did the death of her mother affect her as she grew up? How did she regard her father, and how did his passing affect her?