aurelia mercar 🐍

They’re spirits, not ghosts. And it’s less “trying to summon one” and more “this spirit is already here and just wants to feel included”.

perchance.org/character-he...

As do you, Vanya. That green compliments you and your companion both very well.

Mm, might as well look nice for Tarquin and Ashur’s big day.

Very pretty. And some food for thought…

ooopenlab.cc/quiz/lTHHdoS...

I met a spirit the other night who’d heard the two of you from the other side of the Veil. Funnily enough, it *had* been a Spirit of Innocence.

Trust me, everyone knows.

*takes a long drag from the hookah*

The cycle was not broken. It was just a matter of time.

It’s well past midnight when Aurelia slips into the Sanctum from a back entrance, hood up and eyes averted. She heads straight to the lounge, seats herself, and starts preparing the hookah with only slightly shaky hands.

It’s going to be a very long night…

#darp

The spirits quiet at last. Compassion spreads its warmth, fear and desire have transcended into love, and those split are finding wholeness once more.

Now I can finally finish these tinctures in peace. Next demon to go off the deep end is getting bound into an Orlesian sex toy.

No. There are already too many voices trying to be heard, and I’m not in the mood to shout over them.

Desire turns to Fear, for the root of all desires is fear. Fear of loss, fear of rejection, fear of denial.

Fear feeds Desire with the need to claim, fulfills belong. Desire feeds Fear with desperation, craving, longing. A self-consuming serpent, bleeding as it chews.

How will you stop the cycle?

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- no one else knows why she’s so connected to spirits and demons
- she figured out her whole soul thing a long time ago—if it bothers others, that’s their problem
- Dorian was her intro to the Shadow Dragons; she’s their personal apothecary now

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- she’s become known as a “spirit talker” in Minrathous
- she can see spirits even when they’re invisible to other mortals, & is good at communicating their needs between them and mortals
- demons are harder, but she’s also good at banishing them

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- but she didn’t cause trouble on purpose, so the Mercars raised and cared for her in their own way
- she learned from a spirit that she was related to the Pavus family, & when she was old enough she sought out Dorian to get to know him better

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- she knew things she shouldn’t know (like how both her parents had died, tho she remembered it in fragments that made no sense to anyone else)
- talked to spirits like normal people (learned lots of secrets from them)
- and she spoke like an adult

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- Aurelia’s birth parents succeeded in making a child with unusual magical skills, but it was due to Aurelia having the soul of a Fade spirit instead of a human
- so Aurelia was a strange kid from the start: weirdly quiet & observant, unsettling

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- Halward Pavus was the only one who pieced together what had happened & he took the secret to the grave
- he arranged for the child to be taken in by the Mercar family—removed from the scandal but easy to keep an eye on; they named her Aurelia

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- since Laenia & Romilian hadn’t told anyone their plans, no one knew the full story that led to the child’s birth but could guess enough—blood magic + demons = two dead altus mages & a mystery baby, aka A Scandal™

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- Laenia was severely & permanently weakened by the ritual, & was bedridden over the next 9 months
- she was kept alive by family & slaves until she died giving birth Aurelia, a baby girl with mismatched eyes who started fires within an hour of birth

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- by that point, they were too far into the ritual for it to be stopped, so Laenia could only hang on for dear life as her abomination-husband impregnated her
- once complete, Laenia was able to send the demons back to the Fade & kill the abomination

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- when they went to do the ritual, the power they used from the demons was too much & made everything extremely unstable
- this instability frayed at the binding on Romilian’s demon, & it broke out mid-ritual, turning him into an abomination

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- they eventually bound several demons in their home to use as power conduits for their ritual
- Romilian was paranoid that it wouldn’t be enough, so he secretly summoned and bound a demon into himself as an extra layer of insurance

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

⇀ ooc. Backstory (cont.):

- her parents couldn’t produce a mage child despite years of trying; only other child didn’t show magical talent fast enough and died in a “tragic accident”
- desperate, they turned to blood magic/spirit binding to ensure a powerful mage child

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

((Egg on my face trying to post Aurelia’s long-ass backstory right as I’m finishing lunch and trying to get back to work 🤦 okay let’s try that again with the right tags and also actually finish it))

⇀ ooc. Backstory summary:

(CW: child death mention, ritual sex, sexual assault)

- Aurelia’s mother Laenia was a cousin of Halward Pavus who married Romilian Elerius, from another altus family
- this makes Aurelia Dorian’s third cousin or something like that

( 🧵 #aureliastory )

*wakes up*

*looks outside*

*sighs*

More people need to learn how to talk to spirits properly…

Aurelia smirks, pleasantly surprised by his reaction. “Lucky you, then. Usually wisps attach to strong curiosity, excitement, mischief, and such. People find them a nuisance.”

She slips off the bit of wall and approaches while the wisp continues its circling. “Something on your mind, Warden…?”

… became visible to others. “It’s harmless, just… fixated. For some reason.”

She blinked, mismatched eyes moving to look at him directly. “No, sorry. You have a straggler following you.”

The wisp, sensing attention, began circling the Warden eagerly. Aurelia sighed, muttered a spell, and waved her hand. The air shimmered as the wisp …

… trailing behind a Warden with far too much enthusiasm. “He’s too busy for you. Go bother the cat up the alley. He likes playing with you.”

Aurelia had several usual haunts around Dock Town; spots where she could watch people going about their days, as well as the spirits that moved among them unseen. Not as many of those lately, mostly just wisps.

“Leave the young man alone,” she said aloud to one wisp as it passed…