Mara "Creep"

Appearance
Mara is young and pretty, with a strange, haunted look about her. She holds eye contact for entirely too long without ever seeming to really see you. Her frequent rarely reach her eyes when speaking with other mortals, and even then she hasn't quite figured out the difference between a smile and a grimace. Despite her strangeness, she has a sort of innocent magnetism about her that lets folks feel they can trust her - she's just a bit...odd.

Mara typically dresses simply - a dark threadbare homespun sweater and warm woolen pants. Her sense of style is essentially having no sense of style. She's not used to be the center of attention, and easily fades into the background. Typically slithering around close to her body heat and under her clothing is Mara's faithful friend Mr. Snips, a tiny green snake who excels at slipping into tight spaces and retrieving small objects like coins.

Playbook
Mara is still young and inexperienced, but she's assured that she has great potential. She doesn't particularly care about achieving her potential though - she'd much prefer to be reading, but unfortunately her bodily needs require her to make money to afford sustenance. It's all quite a pain, but she's figuring it out slowly and making her way through.

Mara's skills are quite varied, but she doesn't excel at anything yet, well, except for making friends...ghost friends, that is. Mara always seems to find a new ghost friend wherever she goes, although sometimes these ghosts get angry at the other humans and eat them. Mara understands though - everyone has to eat, which is exactly why she's doing all of this.

Before joining the gang
15 years ago, a young priest found a baby on the steps of the Church of the Ecstacy of the Flesh in Charhollow. This priest wasn't like all of their brethren though, for they were currently possessed by an agent of The Reconciled. Knowing that the church would dispose of the poor child, or worse, use her in one of their rituals, the priest spirited her away to the headquarters of The Reconciled.

Not knowing what else to do with her, the cabal of ghosts raised her as best they could, possessing a wetnurse to see her through her infancy, and then raising her collectively, letting those with bodies cradle her and provide the touch she needed, procuring food and water to satisfy her other mortal needs. Still, she grew up strange, spending all her time among those who were long dead and for whom time held little meaning.

The other urchin children mocked her relentlessly when she began to leave the house on her own, mocking her outlandish tales of her upbringing by "the smartest ghosts in the whole city." They nicknamed her Creep, a name that has since stuck and one which she is resigned to suffer until the end of her days.

On the streets she learned to fend for herself, stealing what she needed to survive so that the absent-minded and otherwise occupied ghosts of The Reconciled didn't need to bother themselves with her care. She still bunked among their number though: in a long forgotten library deep in the bowels of Charterhall where only the dead could find her. She scoured the books of the library with a deep hunger, teaching herself the finer points of reading and writing, and then beginning an eclectic education in such varied topics as sparkcraft, spectrology, demonology, astrology, alchemy, and unnatural philosophy.

Mara stole to live, but lived to learn, and developed a particularly loose interpretation of morality, having come to understand that death isn't so bad, at least for most of her friends.

Mara's lonely existence was poised to change as soon as she met Colette. The older girl found Mara while she was sneaking into a fancy Charterhall bakery to make off with some food. Colette had been working there for several weeks, building trust until she figure out how to break into the safe when she watched Mara make short work of the lock on the back door. Sensing an opportunity, Colette promised she wouldn't rat Mara out, but instead would offer her a wealth of coins with which to buy even better food, if Mara would just open the floor safe so they could abscond with the cash.

Mara was enamored immediately, having never spoken so many words with another body in possession of its own spirit before, and this one so pretty and charming besides. The two robbed the bakery, then the travel safe of a noble's carriage while he fretted over Colette (who'd almost been run over by his reckless driver!), and even a stash house belonging to The Lampblacks while they were otherwise engaged with threats on all sides.

Mara was delighted to have made such a close friend and was happy to tell her all about her ghost friends and their acquaintances, including Madame Ribaldi and The Syndicate. Mara had only met the rising lady of crime once, but Ribaldi had made an impression when she came to meet with Salia, and Mara confessed a great deal of admiration for the lady, with her fine clothes, air of confidence, and sharp wit. Mara even told Colette of Salia's promise to send any talent the way of The Syndicate, should she stumble on any likely characters.

Thus was Colette's fateful plan devised - she would pretend to be an agent possessed by The Reconciled, and she'd deliver Mara to The Syndicate. While Mara kept them busy, Colette would slip away to get a crucial piece of information requested by none other than Bazso Baz!

Unbeknownst to Mara, Colette and Bazso have a history, and she'd exploited it to gain access to the stash house for their last heist. Bazso was naturally pissed, and it didn't take him long to figure out who'd robbed him and put the squeeze on Colette. All would be forgiven of course, provided she could bring him the documents from Ribaldi's office.

Against her better judgment, Mara agreed to the plan, with Colette insisting that "sometimes you have to make hard choices," that "she has to look out for herself first", and that "those stupid old ghosts have never really done anything to make her life better - they'd be content to watch her shrivel away and die in that library."

The plan seemed to be going fine as far as Mara could tell, at least until Madame Ribaldi stormed into the room in the middle of her testing and demanded to know where Colette was and what they'd stolen!? Madame Ribaldi and Salia interviewed Mara and soon got to the bottom of things - Colette had never intended to return to Mara and release her, intending for her to bear the full brunt of Ribaldi & Salia's wrath herself. Fortunately for Mara, the elder women recognized the work of a con artist and the naiveté of the younger girl, and they showed her mercy.

According to the testing Madame Ribaldi's people had put Mara through, she has incredible potential, and for her part, Salia recognized that the biggest failing in Mara's rearing was the social skills required to survive in the realm of the living. The two leaders of their factions came to an accord, and Mara was offered a choice: she would either be cast out from the library of The Reconciled and in debt to The Syndicate for a staggering sum, or should could work off her debt as a member of Ribaldi's organization, where she'd learn valuable skills with which to make her own way in the world once her debt is paid.

This is how we find Mara, known on the street as "Creep", a new, uninitiated fledgling member of The Syndicate. Colette is at large, Mara feels a deep sense of responsibility to make things right with Salia and the rest of The Reconciled, and Madame Ribaldi has plans for furthering Mara's education. Despite everything, Mara still finds herself missing Colette in the dark hours before dawn.

After joining the gang

 * Mara joined the "Assassins" crew. It seems like a pretty frivolous affair to her - who even cares about dying anyway? You just get to become a ghost and have fun adventures and read books all day. She looks forward to making new friends from the marks though - she'll show them her library and read them so many stories!
 * Mara went with a couple of the other assassins and the big tattooed guy she can't understand to a fancy party waaaay above her library on the surface.
 * She tried to give a lady some pretty flowers, but the lady got very mad at another lady. Is this how courtship works?
 * Mara did some reading afterward and thinks the mean lady might have had something called allergies. They're supposed to make you cough, sneeze, and turn all red. The mean lady definitely turned red and she was screaming, which is pretty close to sneezing.
 * Mara made a new friend named J-O-N-A-T-H-A-N. He is very sad because his wife (the mean lady!) left him when he died. Mara brought him to the wedding so he could get her back, but he got very angry at his sister and ate her. Mara will hold his hand tighter next time so he's not so sad.

Family
Mara was left on a church stoop as a baby. There were signs that her parents are rich, but nobody knows who they are...Plot hook for the future!

Significant Others
A Significant Other

Mara's barely spoken to other humans, let alone date one. She has started reading romance novels recently though, and finding herself increasingly enamored with many of the beautiful ladies she meets. She's currently making a study of courtship, determined to unlock its secrets.

Friends, Acquaintances and Rivals
Friend Outside The Group

An ally and sometimes host of The Reconciled, Mr. Kebbler is also an initiate in the Path of Echoes. He's a benevolent older man possessed of the rarest thing in Duskvol: a good heart.

Friends In The Group

Rivals And Enemies
 * Mara liked the big tattooed man, even though she couldn't understand him. It was funny when he carved all those silly pictures into the dinner steaks. She hopes he's nicer to her ghost friends in the future though, even if he was just trying to stop Jonathan from eating him.
 * Bedlam is fun! Ae keeps popping up here, then there, just like Mara's ghost friends! Mara is working up the nerve to ask Bedlam if ae'd show Mara how to do it too. She didn't like when Bedlam dragged her out of the murder room though - just because Mara is young doesn't mean she can't take care of herself!
 * Mara's not sure what to think of Amadeus. They rubbed a bunch of charcoal on her fact, which smelled nice, but then they seemed disappointed in how she talked to the mean lady, and they stole her lily! It was probably a good idea, but they could have just asked - she's not dumb! They also married that mean lady, which was very confusing, because Mara was the one who brought her flowers, and showed an interest in her life when she brought the mean lady's husband for them to get closure! She doesn't think that's really Amadeus' fault, but she still feels bad about it for some reason.

Colette was the first living human to truly treat Mara like she was worth a damn. That acceptance made it just that much harder when she turned on Mara and left her to take the fall for their crime while Colette fled the scene. She was Mara's first mortal friend though, and the young girl hasn't learned her lesson yet - she harbors a secret hope that Colette actually did have a good reason for betraying her.

Additional Scenes

 * Sometimes, we play out scenes of characters interacting outside of Sessions. When we do, we make a page for those and link them here! (Date This Happened)