Vervain Blackthorn
Vervain Blackthorn
Vervain is a stoic but compassionate soldier, shadowed by a spiritual blight from generations long past. Stern, sensible, and strong, she makes for a good leader in an inexperienced group and a reliable member of one that has earned its iron.
Physical Description
General Physical Condition
Vervain Blackthorn's stature is as one would expect of a career soldier. Taut muscles give her a frame that, though not as bulky as a warrior used to feats and gainful exercise, nonetheless emphasizes a certain gritty and tenacious strength that has endured through lean times without failing.
Body Features
A pattern of scarification, present also on her face as a trail of wounds stitched shut with black and gray thread traces its way across her limbs and torso. Together, they tell the story of a veteran yet to meet a permanently deadly match. Indeed, even if one were to make a study of her, Vervain's tapestry would only offer one or two remnants that might look like they had once been life-threatening.
She has, however, wisely decided not to push her luck, and as such has started to lose some definition and ease of movement owing to less frequent use in fierce engagements and more in the heavy lifting work that goes into keeping a battle company in good supply.
Facial Features
Vervain is a gaunt-faced woman whose rugged skin that nonetheless keeps a pale shade with hardly a hint of ruddiness to be seen save for on the coldest days, with features that, though prominent, are worn and weary like an eroded hillside denuded of soil. In the same way that dark shadows outline a craggy cliff face, Vervain's visage is etched with scars of varying age, many of them still stitched closed by thin black or gray threading, and others showing an odd orange tinge beneath the slowly healing skin. Her droopy but nonetheless alert eyes are an unusual coppery color, but unlike the metal, they rarely shine in the light. Even her raven black hair seems to have given up on luster and started to gray prematurely.
Physical quirks
Vervain will, when given the opportunity, make an effort to spruce up her appearance with some tactfully applied makeup. It is often difficult to acquire those sorts of supplies on campaign, though, so a notable portion of her war earnings go towards keeping a personal stash of paints, powders, and dyes.
Special abilities
Part training, part environmental exposure- Vervain is capable of wielding and resisting vital and void energy. Although it does not come with the same proficiency as a spellcaster, she's picked up enough tricks to innately funnel positive power into her blows against the undead, and negative when facing infrequent living opponents. Ordinarily this ability manifests as a slight greenish-yellow glow focused around whatever implement she strikes with.
In addition, Vervain is unnaturally durable in some ways, but fragile in others. She can take many grievous injuries and recover from them with proper tending, but the drawback of this is that her natural healing processes are nearly completely drained. Even simple wounds such as a slashed cheek or sprained limb require specific mending with needle or potion.
Apparel & Accessories
Despite the Cemetery Gatekeeper's nominal attachment to the Order of the Steelsworn, neither her arms nor armor bears much of that group's distinctive heraldry. Instead, her band's theme of dark colors reflected the work they carried out. Her armor, a composite of iron and bronze chain links, bands, and plates, is enameled black and green, with the colors further blackened by a coating of soot and ash that the superstitious claimed sullied those it landed on, owing to it coming from creatures of undeath. The cloth elements of Vervain's suit were beige, darkened in the same manner as her armor. The main quirk in the already wizened armor are intentional dents hammered into larger spaces of otherwise flat metal, giving the impression of a crude death's head.
Vervain's chosen weapon- a two-handed war flail with a pair of spiked balls on the ends of chains somewhat shorted than was traditional but with a longer shaft to compensate- was largely a match for her armor. The haft, almost a match for a proper polearm, was made of sturdy wood reinforced with bands of iron, with the space in between where the strengthening rivets had been placed having been further added to with strips of leather for extra grip. The heads of the flail were made unique in the same way as her armor, with the steel globes having been made imperfect with purposefully-placed hammer blows to grant the otherwise featureless spiked balls a sort of skull face.
Mental characteristics
Personal history
Perhaps surprisingly for someone with an otherwise fairly standard military background, Vervain Blackthorn originates from a minor monastic sect spread thin throughout the Lacertian empire. About as numerous as modern-day Quakers or the Amish but more geographically distributed, this sect believes themselves to be of a unique line of descent and holds many religious doctrines because of this. It is an esoteric group to many, with its specifics only vaguely known by the larger population, but one widely recognized for its dedication and unfaltering loyalty to good causes.
Education
Vervain's education would be considered middling by a high society's standards, but fairly comprehensive in the eyes of a down-to-earth commoner. She has a basic understanding of things like mathematics, biology, history, and literature as much as such things are understood. Her specialization, however, has got to be in her knowledge concerning that thing which has been her metaphorical bread and butter for nearly two decades: the undead.
Although she hadn't the access or inclination towards libraries of dusty tomes that cloistered clerics might study, her first-hand experience has given her invaluable knowledge at least equal to what anyone might learn from studying at the foot of a priest. Along with this, she has a comprehensive head for many of the practical things that go into army warfare. She might not have ever had a very high command position, but a veteran still comes to know the ebb and tide of battle regardless of their place in the hierarchy.
Employment
Vervain is employed as the quartermaster for the Cemetery Gatekeepers, a suppression company subordinate to the Order of the Steelsworn whose primary duty is the battling of undead produced by the Dead Lands. Although nominally a mercenary company, the Cemetery Gatekeepers have attracted some of the least mercurial fighters to their cause and formed a sturdy band of warriors and mages that has lasted longer than most groups in their line of work.
As quartermaster, Vervain tends to the equipment and supplies of the group and infrequently participates in battle when the lines are pushed dangerously back.
Mental Trauma
Some might consider Vervain's religious affiliation to be itself mentally traumatic. They would mostly be correct to do so, for although it gives a strict and unwavering structure for moral conduct, it imposes a great many pressures that can lead to unhealthy behavior or feelings about themselves. The burden and responsibility of Sin weigh heavily on the shoulders of these religious exemplars of duty and consciously chosen virtue.
Intellectual Characteristics
To Vervain, the simplest solution is usually the best one. Not because she lacks the intellect for more complex pathways, but simply because she is an adherent to the idea that the fewest moving parts produces the most reliable machine.
In a similar vein, she is not often one to delay making decisions unless it is obvious that there is more information needed to choose wisely. Every choice is a split pathway, and it is her responsibility to choose correctly and not become waylaid by insignificant factors.
Morality & Philosophy
Vervain's morality, and that of her religious sect, is largely based on a transactional balancing of the scales. The belief, in short, is that a soul will be examined upon death with a tally of their deeds. Rather than being weighed against some objective standard, though, this judgement is passed by comparing the 'good' deeds of the soul against the 'bad' ones. The nitty gritty of how this judgement is believed to proceed varies from individual to individual and group to group, but it is generally held that each decision has a 'right' choice and a 'wrong' one, and that it is the person's duty to ensure that they made the 'right' decision as often as possible.
Because of this, gray morality is often outright rejected by those who subscribe to this belief system, as are debates about future help or harm being a factor. This results in a system of morals that may often be seen as impersonal and calculating but also strangely selfish, as adherents are chosing from the framework that their decisions are ultimately about their own fates, rather than choosing goodness for its own sake.
Personality Characteristics
Motivation
Savvies & Ineptitudes
Virtues & Personality perks
Vices & Personality flaws
Hygiene
It's difficult staying very clean on the march, especially when undead are involved. Dirt and stains find their way into everything as they slowly soak up ambient void energy stirred up when the dead begin to walk again. Vervain does her best to stay hygenic, but her standards may not be as high as some high-falutin folks. A bit of soap and water usually does the trick, and she is fastidious in brushing her marbled hair and ensuring that her teeth are nice and clean.
Social
Religious Views
In the deep past, as punishment for some blasphemy or terrible mortal crime, a person or group is collectively cursed into a cycle of reincarnation and division, defined by a forced regret for the actions they had once taken, with a similarly forced inclination to make restitution for it. With this judgement not limited to the firstborn, in time it propagates and dilutes as the generations pass and the original souls further fragment into more and more offspring. Soon, the cursed line comes together into an organization of its own, dedicated to collective action to expunge the stains of the pass.
Time passes, and save for dedicated archivists and historians, the nature of the original sin is forgotten, and sometimes even the concept of their curse still being active is called into question since the upbringing of those heirs will already tilt them towards the feelings formerly forced upon them. By then, though, it’s become tradition and almost a religion unto itself, and such speculation is uncommon and generally frowned upon lest they incur more godly ire.
Aside from this, the character is habituated into entirely internalizing the order’s quest. Few desires are acknowledged save for those that might progress the great work, and even personal identity is vaguely secondary to the burden of sin that they are told that they bear, which can boil down to “this body is not my body. This self is not my self. It is a vessel to be used, and once I am done with it it shall be passed on.”
Speech
Vervain typically speaks in a slow and considered manner. Her voice is a somewhat raspy baritone with an accent that suits her molasses-paced speech.
Having aged out of her prime fighting years, Vervain Blackthorn is the quartermaster to Cemetery Gatekeepers, a suppression company subordinate to the Order of the Steelsworn tasked with fighting the undead in the Dead Lands.
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Alignment
Lawful Good
Age
32
Date of Birth
Equivalen of late summer/early autumn, August/September.
Children
Gender
Female
Eyes
Brown
Hair
Black
Skin Tone/Pigmentation
Sallow
Height
6'2"
Weight
170lbs
Quotes & Catchphrases
God's hooks! God's wounds! Poppycock!
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