Necromistress Lirit Willow
Sure, she stuck out a lil. City back then wasn't so open an' a kid with green skin was kinda easy to spot. I knew her. Seemed nice. Always polite and sweet. Never thought she'd raise the dead...In the spring of 1792, a tinkerer named Telika Fisher came to the capital city of Marietor with her daughter, Lirit Willow. She registered that they were there to stay (an action endorsed by King Adura the III), signed that she had committed no crimes, and applied for a birth certificate. Lirit Willow was recorded with ancestry that mixed together human (a quarter), orc (a quarter), and willow dryad, half). As they settled in the neighborhood began to be accustomed to the pale green child running about, laughing when she spoke to moss, and leaving small blades of grass between the lines of the cobblestones she ran over. Her mother started a relationship with a nearby ferrier, and the three of them seemed to be happy together, even if Lirit begged to go out into the nearby forest.
It was my pleasure to teach her. Yes, even now. She delighted in learning for learnings sake, and was a mature child who learned all I could tell her about trees, roots, branches, and flowers. From me Lirit learned about life and how what makes one person flourish might cause another to wilt.Her mother, who had at this point opened a small repair shop for clothes and random items, decided to send her child off to learn (her pregnancy may have had something to do with the decision to send a ten-year-old to the teachers when most students were around the age of six). Of all the teachers nearby, Lirit took to Teacher Orchard and ignored Teacher Sharp. She quickly mastered letters, kept a journal like the average citizen, and even tried to help students who were struggling with the knowledge of how plants and trees worked. Teacher Orchard requested that Lirit stop this, but only because she didn't have the patience to deal with younger children. As an older, and more mature, student, Lirit was allowed to roam around the capital and report the news to the Teachers, which in turn allowed them to spend more time teaching their other charges.
The Teachers are the ones to blame for this, not Lirit. She was lost without her mom, and it was like joy had shattered... we're all lost when our loved ones leave us, don't say this is all her fault. Just, most of us come back older and sadder. Lirit came back... harder. And smarter.When Lirit was fifteen, several things happened all at once. First, she started a relationship with a dragon-half named Mias Spiketail. Mias was new to the capital and depended on Lirit to show her around; the two of them began to get into trouble as neither had an apprenticeship and were allowed to roam free. A month later, Lirit's mother and her five-year-old half brother came down sick. The bad coughs worsened, and before either Lirit or her step-father was able to do anything, Telika and her son Nolwe were dead. Drizii and Lirit were devastated. Lirit began helping her stepfather, ignoring Mias, and looking for a teacher that would be able to explain exactly what had happened. She found Teacher Corpse.
Understand this. She didn't hurt anyone. Those people were already dead when Lirit brought them back to life. That "Necromistress" title, that's pure rubbish from those cult beings. She wasn't like that. She didn't have to be killed.Teacher Corpse was surprised to find a student as eager to learn about death as he was. The two of them left the capital and traveled around the country to test spells, follow up with others who claimed to have brought the dead back, and wrote volumes about how death was the next stage of life. [Note: As of this record, Volumes 1 through 3 have been banned from the country, Volume 4 was blessed by priests of different religions before burnt, and Volume 5 was never found.] The two of them came back to Marietor with an army of zombies, skeletons, and ghosts at their back. At this point, Lirit wasn't recognized as her skin color of spring green had changed to frozen blue corpse, green eyes turned dark brown, and hazel hair was black. Lirit took to the public square and explained that this was for the best of the country. The dead, she said, still wanted to life and would be happy to help work. Zombies didn't mind heavy work. Skeletons were great fighters, never fearing an arrow or sword. And ghosts would be able to help look after children. As she stood there, King Adura the III declared Lirit Willow, Necromistress, as acting against the good of king, country, and the will of men. He pointed out that she was the ones controlling the dead and that if there was a person in control, then they weren't choosing to live again. She argued back that he needed to learn how to talk to them; He argued that she'd created an army of dead, people who had been mothers, fathers, siblings, and more, to take over the city economically. When she opened her mouth to reply again, an arrow grew in from her chest, and the control she had over her undead snapped. It took a full two weeks to re-kill the dead, bury the newly dead, and for the king to make the announcement that necromancy was banned from the country.
Divine Domains
After Lirit's death, a new religion sprung up with the help of Teacher Corpse, who re-created himself as a priest. He fled left the capital and began preaching about life and death.
Holy Books & Codes
- Volume I: Seeing Death (describes watching animals and beings die in different ways, contains sketches)
- Volume II: Hearing Death (describes the last rites of many religions and the last sounds from the beings and creatures in the previous volume)
- Volume III: Smelling Death (describes the stages of scent corpses give off until they become skeletons)
- Volume IV: Tasting Death (describes eating the dead uncooked)
- Volume V: Touching Death (it's unknown what was in this book, and truth be told, that might be for the best)
Divine Symbols & Sigils
Lirit Willow's symbol is three leaves, one colored green (or shaded in) while the other two are left alone. The three leaves stand for the following reasons:
- Remembering we're all from the earth
- Remembering we all return to the earth
- Remembering now that we should be able to come from the earth a second time
Tenets of Faith
The tenets of faith vary between the secret groups of worshippers. However, there are several ideas that remain connected:
- Helping a creature or person die is allowed; delighting in their pain is not.
- Death, and life, are natural.
- Change is a type of death; we are not who we were yesterday and we will not be who we are tomorrow
- When a fellow worshipper dies, it is your duty to attempt to bring them back to life
Divine Goals & Aspirations
Known goals: Bringing the dead back to life to help the living
Secret goals: To have the same power Lirit did over life and death
Death is not the final word. In fact, I find that the dead still wish to live out their lives, they just need a little extra help to do so.
Divine Classification
Saint of Death
Professions
Life
1788
1817
29 years old
Children
Gender
female
Eyes
Dark brown
Hair
Black hair cut to directly under the chin
Skin Tone/Pigmentation
Pale blue
Height
5'2"
Weight
60 kg
"Necromistress" is such an incredibly good title :D It looks very promising - are you going to expand the article with how she came to learn necromancy and when she started going by that title? :)
Creator of Araea, Megacorpolis, and many others.
More details that need to make their way into the article :) Thanks for the comment!