ATD Characters: Morgan-Jeterix
November 9, 2012
“Morgan Jeterix” by Eve Ventrue
She is a lady of the House of Thompson, a family of Hala stock. Being a Hala, her family were well-known farmers owning vast tracts of fertile land in the central Hala-lands about three hundred miles east of the Killbane River. The Thompsons are publicly acknowledged and certified by the Sisterhood of Light as being Empathic. As such, all Thompsons are registered and painted with a 4-D tattoo marking them as empaths that only the Sisters can see. Among the House’s various empathic talents is the ability to see through complex illusions.
Morgan was the twelfth of fifteen Thompson children. She is typically of sturdy build with tanned, swarthy skin and burnished blonde hair that she most-often wears braided. When she was thirteen, a fire broke out in the Thompson manor which eventually burned the structure to the ground. Morgan was rescued and carried to safety by her father, though he suffered terrible burns in the process. Seeing her father suffering from his wounds, Morgan decided to join the Grand Order of Hospitalers and become a healer.
Morgan Jeterix in her Hospitaler uniform (painting by Eve Ventrue)
After nearly being killed in the fire as a girl, Morgan decided that life is precious and was determined to live it by following her heart no matter where it might lead. Her behavior afterwards was shocking by conservative Hala standards, earning her the epithet “Jeterix” which means Unmarried and Unprincipled in Hala. The “Jeterix” tag was normally a mark of shame for a woman in Hala society, but Morgan wore it with pride, officially adding it to her name. Morgan was well-known for her steamy and rather messy love affairs. She was constantly beginning a new relationship and ending an old one: her brief love affair with fellow Hospitaler and ex-Black Hat Bethrael of Moane was an A-List scandal in the city of Bern. Morgan did not confine herself to class, age, station or gender–any who caught her eye was a potential lover. Morgan was seductive and charming, and she had secretly learned the art of Xaphan Tropism (the art of inducing a sexual climax using minimal touches on non-erogenous parts of the body such as the wrists). Her touch was said to be “electric”.
Morgan would eventually teach Private Taara how to fight like a Hospitaler and the secrets of Xaphan Tropism (painting by Fantasio)
When Morgan met Paymaster Stenstrom and his friends Private Taara and Lord A-Ram, that’s when things really got interesting.
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia, Fantasio and Eve Ventrue
Carahil’s Daughter
October 4, 2012
As many people know full well, raising a child can be a trying and difficult undertaking. Children can be a veritable bundle of dynamite ready to explode at any moment despite one’s best efforts to diffuse them.
“Atha” by Fantasio
Take Carahil for example. Often considered a child himself, Carahil lost his heart to the Windwalker Mabsornath, the Cat Goddess of Zall 88 and they went off to the top of the Universal Tree and were wed. With marriage came children, seven of them in fact, four girls and three boys. Most of them were somber, thoughtful children, aware and weighed down with the burden and responsibility of being gods and the power the comes with it.
And then there was Atha. The youngest of the lot, Atha was an enigma to her parents in many ways. She most often chose to appear as a human instead of as an animal, as was the usual case: her brothers all appear as various types of seals, her sisters as wild cats. On occasion, Atha does appear as an animal, as a giant black snake, and, rarely, she appears as a cloud of smoke.
Most often, however, Atha chooses to appear as a human of changeable age, sometimes as a mischievous child and other times as a full-grown adult. In fact, she greatly resembles her grandmother, Lady Poe of Blanchefort, appearing tall and thin in a silvery gown and short platinum-blonde hair. Her one distinguishing feature–she always wears a pair of intricate, geared goggles as the ladies on Hoban often wear. The goggles are a constant feature whether Atha appears as a child or an adult, always perched on her nose covering a good portion of her face. Atha’s goggles are huge and protruding, rather like a pair of binoculars made of gold, silver and brass. It has been said that to see her eyes beneath the goggles is to go mad.
Atha shares much in common with her father. Atha keeps her word–if she promises something she follows through. She possesses his whimsy and unpredictable sense of fun and humor. She loves pranks and jokes, however, unlike her father whose pranks are always benign, Atha’s are anything but. She is selfish and self-absorbed, she is flighty as well, given to fits of rage and temper when things don’t go her way. According to various Hertog writings, she has a fascination with Vith heroes, both male and female, putting them through the wringer, literally torturing them (sometimes to death) with adventure and quest occasionally ruining their lives, and then, when she has had enough fun, she takes them into her bed and seduces them. Atha’s wanton promiscuity with the younger folk is well-known. In time, she became known in various pantheons as a goddess of mischief, of sex (and the misfortune of having sex) and questing.
Atha, also taking after her father, also has a habit as masquerading as other out-worldly entities, in particular, an entity known as the Shadow tech Goddess. Why she does such things is not known, though it is assumed such antics are for personal gain.
Carahil, though he loves his daughter, was beside himself and didn’t have a thought as to properly teach her not to do some of the things she often did. His solution to the problem was one many parents often make use of: he found Atha a “babysitter“, one whom he thought would teach Atha virtue and proper manners through deed and example. He therefore “dropped her off” at Castle Blanchefort to be taught by the people there and, with luck, her positive experiences would calm her down a little.
There she came under the tutelage of Maser of Blanchefort, his mentor and lover Laika of Stonebringer Tower, Sebastian of Tusck and Millicent of Blanchefort, a distant cousin of hers.
Would it do her any good–only time will tell.
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia and Fantasio
SOTSE Characters: Lady Alesta of Dare
September 28, 2012
Lady Alesta of Dare is a girl of Barrow stock hailing from the western city of the same name. The Dares are the largest extended family on Kana with over sixty percent of people of Barrow stock being Dares.
“Lady Alesta of Dare” by Kayla Woodside
When visiting the marketplace with her mother, she often saw a group of apparently impoverished beggars being harassed in the town square by gawkers. She asked her mother who the beggars were and her mother told her: “Pilgrims of Merian,” and she said nothing more, hurrying on.
“Alesta” by Eve Ventrue
One day, she stopped to listen to what the Merians were saying. They said, amid the jeers, that the Elders were not gone, and to see them one need only open one’s eyes. The Merians mentioned their Star–a yellow star to the west. The people listening to them laughed. What star, they asked. There is nothing there.
“I see it!” Alesta cried. The Merians turned to her and she pointed right toward it.
Though her family protested, Alesta had found her calling. She left her family in Dare and set out, traveling in the meager wagons of the Pilgrims of Merian. She quickly discovered that there was much more to the Merians than they let on to the public. They took her to a sacred mountain to pray and discover her path. She knelt in the snow at the summit for hours waiting to hear the yellow star speak.
At last, she heard a kind voice whisper in her ear: “Save all those who fall astray.”
Alesta on the Merian Ship (From LoE Book VII cover, by Carol Phillips)
Though threadbare and impoverished, her star protected her. She wore a belt that allowed her to walk invisibly if she so wished and had beads that shielded her mind from attack.
She eventually ended up on a small outpost overlooking a watery world of evil unknown to the Sisters or the Fleet, hiding right under their noses where the unwary were lured in and killed. It was very dangerous, and should she and her Merian order be discovered by the caretakers of this world, there would be no mercy and no help for them. As always Alesta and the Merians were on their own in a dangerous world.
One day, she saw a star fall, and that was beginning of the end …
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia, Eve Ventrue, Carol Phillips and Kayla Woodside
From the Gates of Hell, the Heade-On-The-Hearth
September 13, 2012
Wherever people have sailed, be it across the seas, over the mountains, or through open space, there have always been tales of lost ships, the ghost ships: The Flying Dutchman, the Mary Celeste, the Edmund Fitzgerald, and on and on.
And so goes the Heade-On-The-Hearth, a warship in the League’s Fleet like many others, she has assumed a unique place in the lore of inter-stellar shipping, the demon ship that comes upon one in the emptiness where there is no help.
The “Heade-On-The-Hearth” by Fantasio
The Heade served for only a short period of time. Shortly after her maiden voyage, she was conscripted into battle with the Xaphan armada at Sorrander-Quo. There, she sustained major damage to her starboard fairing and had to be towed from the theatre. Eventually she was scuttled and left to drift in The Kills region of space. She was removed from the Fleet’s active books.
Several months later, mariners began issuing warning of a pirate ship sailing the deep sea between Kana and Onaris. Witnesses claimed a black Webber ship came at them from nowhere bent on theft and mayhem, a ship missing its starboard faring. Eventually the name of the offending ship reached the ears of the Fleet admiralty: the Heade-On-The-Hearth was doing the pirating. An investigation of The Kills revealed that her hulk was missing. It was later discovered that a band of pirates from Onaris, the Drury Brothers as they were known, had stolen the Heade from The Kills, strapped on a set of old Woburn rocket engines and brought the Heade back to life. The Druries used the Heade to great effect, able to fall on the weak and helpless and flee just before any dispatched to stop them could arrive.
Eventually the Fleet set a trap for the Druries off of Exeter’s Belt (a nebula eventually renamed Druries Belt). The Druries took the bait and, in the ship battle that followed, were sunk by the Fleet after hours of fierce fighting.
So much for the Drury Brothers …
However …
The Heade-On-The-Hearth modified with spotlights and tentacles (by Carol Phillips)
Eventually, the sightings died down, and the Druries and their black ghost ship faded into lore. On the new world of Bazz, they said the Devil had a new assignment for the Druries, to feed his children.
They still say if one dare to venture alone from Kana to Onaris and one wander off the shipping lanes, the Druries will get you.
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia, Fantasio and Carol Phillips
TOTSE: The Pilgrims of Merian
September 2, 2012
Sketch of the cover to LoE Book VII “Against the Druries” featuring a Merian ship attempting to rescue the wreck of the Demophalon John (Carol Phillips)
The chief tenet of their teachings is that the Elders of Old are not gone, only relocated. They believe in the Star of Merian, the astral presence of the Elder Merian thought to be long dead. They say those with clear sight can see the Star of Merian as a great yellow star, easily visible in broad daylight, and that it is wreathed in a twisting red cloud. A prerequisite to joining the order is to be able to see the star.
The Merians travel the countryside by way of floatwagons covered with tarpaulins. They have no known permanent headquarters and make a meager living selling hand-made trinkets and cloth and performing calligraphy (see below). When asked where they come from, the Merians always say “Westwood“, though such a place has never been located. Occasionally, the Merians will stop and settle in one place for a year or two. They often ask the local Lord or Lady permission to settle, and, when granted, build a temporary village called a Hermitage. The estate of Belmont-South Tyrol resides on the grounds of an old Merian Heritage. Though they are impoverished in the extreme, those who enter a Merian Hermitage are welcome to share in anything they have.
“Lady Alesta of Dare and Pilgrim of Merian” by Eve Ventrue
Though threadbare and impoverished, it is said in some quarters that the Merians are much more capable and advanced than they let on. Some say that their belts allow them to pass unseen if they wish, and their beaded necklaces shield the wearer’s mind from attacks and illusion. There is also the various tales that the Merians may travel virtually anywhere they wish at the blink on an eye via an arcane bridge called The Merian’s Road. Xaphan Traders often tell tales of selfless, green-robed people who walk into peril to rescue those in need and that they travel by way of a “Road” wreathed in fog.
Such tales have never been verified and the Merians themselves never speak of such things.
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia, Eve Ventrue and Carol Phillips.
SOTSE Characters: Lt. Gwendolyn
June 26, 2012
“Lt. Gwendolyn” by Eve Ventrue
Indeed, Gwen did have a bit of trouble with her temper. Her uncle of the Cone side of the family, Derlith, was fond of his niece and helped her channel her aggressions in constructive ways. He got her into contact sports: boxing, sambo, grappling–all things Zenon-girls was not expected to do. Gwen’s size and solidity helped to excel in those sports and Uncle Derlith took her to compete in tournaments every year on Onaris. She has a slight limp from a broken ankle suffered in one of those tournaments when she refused to submit from a sunk-in ankle-lock. Gwen also, unlike her sisters, mastered the FEDULA, the LosCapricos weapon of the Prentiss Household. She was quite deadly with it.
Lt. Gwendolyn wearing a Fleet Tremblar Uniform (note, the rapier-like FEDULA at her hip) –painting by Eve Ventrue
There was a darkness that seemed to hang over Gwen growing up. She had an aunt on her mother’s Cone side of the family who terrified her. Darkness seemed to walk with the woman, and when she came to Prentiss for a visit, Gwen often hid. Even the lurid sound of her voice scared Gwen. Through the vents in the manor, Gwen could hear her aunt frequently talking about some woman to the east whom she despised and cursed. She even hated her son, a boy named Stenstrom whom she hoped to torment.
And, eventually, her aunt would call for Gwen. “GWENDOLYN… COME HERE!!” rang out in her thoughts. Dreading each step, Gwen would come down the stairs and enter the parlor where her aunt and darkness waited.
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia and Eve Ventrue
SOTSE Characters: Lady Vendra of Cone
June 18, 2012
In what she thought would be the opening notes for the symphony of the rest of her life, the great Nether Day Ball in the city of Feren turned out to be one of the last.
“Lady Vendra of Cone” by Eve Ventrue
When she came of age, her mother persuaded her to join the Posts. For a small initial fee, one could leave a letter in a general Fleet Posthole and any Fleet member who was looking to have a pen pal could respond and strike up a rapport. Vendra thoughtfully penned her letter and submitted it. She got many responses, though most she rejected. One, however, stood out. Lord Stenstrom of Belmont, a young Com officer aboard the Fleet Webber Amazing had answered her post. Vendra liked his simple wit and fine penmanship and decided to answer his reply. They soon, via correspondence, struck up a healthy friendship. With each exchange of letters, Vendra was more and more convinced that Lord Stenstrom was the man for her.
When all of the Cone daughters, except for Sephla who was on the BANNED list, were invited to the much-anticipated Nether Day Ball in Feren, Vendra immediately penned Lord Stenstrom a note and entreated him to accompany her.
She promised it would be an evening neither would ever forget.
Though she reserved final judgement until she met him in person, Vendra felt herself losing her heart to Lord Stenstrom, and when she saw him at last tall and handsome in his Fleet uniform, that was all–she was in love. They took an introductory swirl across the ballroom floor, every step a wonder. She tingled at his touch. They were such a fine pairing. After the dance, Vendra excused herself and Stenstrom went to get her a glass of punch. She gathered her friends and pulled them aside. She could barely speak she was so excited.
Lord Stenstrom.
Lord Stenstrom!
Everything she hoped he’d be.
Tall.
Handsome.
A fine Zenon House.
Perfect.
“In love. I’m in love,” she told her friends, breathless, and they clapped and congratulated her.
In later years, as she sat in a daze in her dreary convent room on the nightmarish world of Carina 7, she would reflect back on that fateful moment, standing amid her friends, speaking so freely of the new love growing in her heart. She would reflect back on the great mistake she made letting Stenstrom go, of parting with him. She should have stayed and gotten punch with him.
She should have never let him go.
In her excitement, she forgot about her sister, Lady Sephla, and all the enemies she had rolling about Kana. She forgot about the social game on Kana, the one-upmanship, the tawdry little ploys ladies played upon each other.
“Lady Jubilee” by Eve Ventrue
When she returned to the ballroom floor, she couldn’t find Lord Stenstrom anywhere. Where had he gone? She smiled as she checked the nooks and corners.
Where could he be?
And then she saw him, out on the dance floor with some silver-haired girl Vendra had never seen before. She tried to get his attention, to pull him away from the intruder, but she could not. That woman was nailed to him, eyes locked, feet in step. Eventually, arm-in-arm, they left the floor and vanished, probably retreating to some quiet alcove or terrace, the silver-haired girl taking what should have been hers.
She would later learn that silver-haired girl was Lady Jubilee of Tyrol, one of her sister’s most heated rivals.
The anger, the rage, the broken heart. It was too much. She threw all her colorful Cone gowns out her window, put on an ugly gray suit, and threw herself out as well. She survived her suicide attempt and went mad. Her family, not knowing what to do with her, committed Vendra to a convent on Carina 7 where they heard she would receive the best of care.
As her family departed in their transport, the dames of the convent converged on her room and slammed the door behind them.
“We have things to teach you, Lady Vendra,” they said, eager. “Wondrous things …”
–Lady Vendra of Cone appears in LoE Book VI: The Sands of the Solar Empire coming soon from Loconeal Publishing.
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia and Eve Ventrue
SOTSE Characters: Paymaster Stenstrom
June 6, 2012
“Stenstrom, Lord of Belmont-South Tyrol” by Eve Ventrue
“Bel” is a very different sort of fellow from his predecessors, Captain Davage and Lord Kabyl.
He is of mixed Zenon and Esther/Tyrol heritage and is the youngest of thirty Belmont children (and the only male). Though the Zenons are potent in the Gifts, his Esther blood has robbed him of Gifts of the Mind. His mother, Lady Jubilee of Tyrol, taught him the ways of Tyrol Sorcery, which consists of mundane learning, such as herbal lore, chemistry, Sleight of Hand and lock-picking. It also covers more arcane subjects: Demonology, Cabalism, alchemy and sympathetic magic. He is said to be able to Walk in the Shadows, passing unseen. Bel carries two LosCapricos Weapons: The NTH’s of his father’s line, and the MARZABLE from his mother’s. The NTH’s are a mystical set of pistols that can kill anything: living, dead, undead, machine and intangible.The MARZABLE is a potent dagger that mystically replenishes itself. With the MARZABLE, he can never be completely disarmed.
“Bel” by Carol Phillips
He wears a long green coat formerly worn by members of the Hoban Royal Navy. Within his “HRN” he places many bits of his arcane equipment. The HRN appears to have certain mystical properties of its own, as the coat never shows wear or damage and always keeps Bel perfectly comfortable no matter how cold or hot it is.
Bel is also a well-known eccentric, wearing his HRN coat, his Vith triangle hat and a small mask, which nobody quite knows what to make of. He also never joined the Fleet, though his Programmability is high and his Father, Stenstrom the Older is a long-standing Warbird captain. Instead Bel became a Fleet Paymaster: essentially a clerk and shipboard civilian.
Bel, if anything, is a man of many secrets.
LoE Book VI: The Sands of the Solar Empire will be out July, 2012 from Loconeal Publishing
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia, Eve Ventrue and Carol Phillips
Book VI Cover Complete!
May 26, 2012
Whenever Carol Phillips finishes a new cover it’s like Christmas for me, eagerly huddled up next to my email waiting for that little electronic package to come skittering down the proverbial chimney.
And, here it is…
“The Sands of the Solar Empire” by Carol Phillips
Lord Bannaster of the Bones Club, by Carol Phillips
It’s a much darker cover than the previous five, even more so than the Temple of the Exploding Head, which is pretty darn dark. It features a steam-driven geared spider with guns, a balloon/air ship and the constellation Camalopardus and the Sanctum Sanctorum of the Bones Club. The Sanctum comes from my recollections of a Masonic temple that I once wandered into, and here it is in full paint, fully steampunked and super-charged a little.
I can’t wait to finish collecting the interior artwork and get it out to the world.
Look for LoE Book VI: The Sands of the Solar Empire coming this August from Loconeal Publications
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia and Carol Phillips
SOTSE Characters: Lady Jubilee
April 15, 2012
LADY JUBILEE OF BELMONT-SOUTH TYROL is the mother of Lord Stenstrom the Younger, the hero of LoE Book VI: The Sands of the Solar Empire. She was a key influence in his early life.
"Lady Jubilee" by Eve Ventrue
At a Nether Day ball, Jubilee overheard the younger sister of Lady Sephla speaking to her friends about a gentleman she was very keen on. Jubilee decided to steal the man to humiliate her. She marched out onto the dance floor to do her dirty work.
The gentleman in question was Lord Stenstrom of Belmont, an officer in the Stellar Fleet from Zenon. Handsome and black-haired, of all things Jubilee lost her heart to him and, after a torrid romance, she became his lady and bore him thirty children–twenty-nine daughters and one son, Stenstrom the Younger.
The enemies she made that night at the Nether Day ball would follow Jubilee and her children throughout her life.
Lady Jubilee was reputed to be a practitioner of Tyrol Sorcery. She was said to be a master at creating potions, brewing poisons, summoning demons, walking in the shadows and opening locked doors. She was a domineering and very intrusive mother, often disrupting her children’s lives. Many of her children ran away from home, only to be summoned back at her whim via sorcery. Her daughter, Lady Calami, ran away from home a record 4,000 times. Another Belmont daughter, Lady Constance, went Carofab to escape Jubilee’s clutches.
Lady Jubilee appears in The Sands of the Solar Empire, from Loconeal Publishing in June 2012
copyright 2012, Ren Garcia and Eve Ventrue
The Temple of the Exploding Head 