Lily Ivory (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
vintage_magic) wrote2015-11-30 01:00 pm
vintage_magic) wrote2015-11-30 01:00 pm
Forest Covered App
( PLAYER INFORMATION )
Name: Lady
Contact: the_embroideress@yahoo.com, embroideress on plurk
Are you over 17?: yes
Characters in Forest Covered: none
( CHARACTER INFORMATION )
Name/Work Name: Lily Ivory/Lilith
Canon: The Witchcraft Mysteries
Canon Point: The end of book 4, In a Witch’s Wardrobe
AU/CRAU: Holly Heights CRAU (August 2014-November 2015)
Age: 33 (31 in canon plus 2 birthdays in Holly Heights)
History:
Pre-canon
Growing up in the small west Texas town of Jarod, Lily’s childhood was troubled. Her father Declan was a male witch who walked out on his family when Lily was still a toddler. Lily’s unnamed mother was apparently a normal woman who had trouble accepting that her daughter had magical powers.
Lily learned that she was a witch when she was 8, getting into an argument with a classmate during a school campout. The classmate called her a “nasty old witch,” infuriating Lily and causing the other children to turn on her. She climbed to the top of the cliff next to the campsite, magically helped by the vines there, and cursed her classmates. All of the other children got food poisoning as a result and the people of her hometown shunned her because of her strange abilities.
After that, Lily’s mother sent her to live on the outskirts of town with Graciela, the witch who had raised Lily’s father after his parents died. With her adoptive grandmother’s guidance, Lily spent the next several years learning to admit to herself that she was a witch, to control her temper, and to hide her powers from normal humans. But she wasn’t completely successful with the latter two and there were other incidents over the years. Lily’s first boyfriend ended up with a minor head injury after she realized he was just dating her to win a bet. And she was kicked out of high school after their star football player, who had been harassing Lily, developed an ailment which badly affected his play.
However, the major one happened when Lily was 17 and forced her to leave town before she could finish her magical training. Lily’s mother belonged to a snake handling church and they tried to exorcise Lily by tying her down and setting poisonous snakes on her. Lily feared for her life and while she didn’t enchant the snakes, a dozen people got bitten and three died. She had to turn herself in to the police to protect Graciela from the mob that showed up at her house. She spent weeks in jail before the charges got dropped after witnesses dropped out and the prosecutor fell ill; Graciela denied it but Lily knew it was her doing. She couldn’t remain in her hometown any longer so Graciela told her to go to a witch friend of hers in Mexico.
But Lily disobeyed and went looking for her father instead. After about a year, she finally tracked him down in a remote Bavarian town. The reunion was a negative experience with her father rejecting her and sending her away although he later claimed it was to protect her from a demon he had become beholden to.
Afterwards, she spent over a decade wandering the world alone, visiting many countries but never staying anywhere for long. She eventually found herself in a rural French cemetery, wondering if anyone would mourn her when she was gone and realizing that she wanted to find a community, make a home and have friends, possibly even start a family. Then, one night in a Hong Kong bar, she met a parrot named Barnabas who suggested she try San Francisco…
Secondhand Spirits
Shortly before the start of the first book, Lily moved to San Francisco in hopes of finally making friends and living a normal life. She opened a vintage clothing store called “Aunt Cora’s Closet,” sharing the space with her new Wiccan friend Bronwyn who ran a herbal stand in a corner. However, she was soon visited by Aidan Rhodes, a powerful male witch who knew her father and who claimed to be in charge of the city’s witches. Against her protests, he presented her with a familiar, a half goblin/half gargoyle that could transform into a potbellied pig; she got stuck with him when Aidan left while her back was turned and named him Oscar.
In search of inventory for the shop, Lily’s assistant Maya brought her to elderly Frances Potts’ house. There they met Jessica, a little girl who lived nearby. Shortly after the girl left, Lily and Frances heard the scream of the child-abducting demon La Llorona and learned that Jessica had disappeared. Concerned because normal humans wouldn’t hear a demon’s wail unless they’re marked for death, Lily decided to cast a protection spell for Frances without the other’s knowledge.
The next morning, she received a visit from Inspectors Romero and Nordstrom of the SFPD, who had learned of her late night visit to Frances’s house from a surveillance camera. They questioned her and informed her that Frances was found dead in a pentagram. Disturbed that her spell had failed, Lily decided to investigate Frances’s death and find a way to get Jessica back from La Llorona. Along the way, she became acquainted with Max Carmichael, a reporter trying to debunk the supernatural, and Herve LaMansec, a voodoo priest.
In the end, Lily discovered the truth behind Frances’s death and the children who disappeared from that neighborhood over the past 35 years. With the help of Bronwyn’s coven and Aidan, she managed to rescue Jessica and banish La Llorona from San Francisco Bay, getting pulled under by the demon and risking her own life in the process.
A Cast-Off Coven
About a week later, Lily was asked to look into a possible haunting at the San Francisco School of Fine Arts; the students were scared and some believed the school was being haunted by the ghost of John Daniels, a student said to have committed suicide by throwing himself down the bell tower stairs in the 1960s. In exchange for looking into the matter, the school’s provost promised Lily some Victorian clothes found in a sealed closet at the school. But before she found anything supernatural, Jerry Becker, a wealthy benefactor of the school, was discovered dead at the foot of the bell tower stairs. Lily initially wanted to leave finding the killer to the police but Aidan visited her the next morning and insisted she investigate the death. He revealed that Jerry was a client of his and suggested that Lily contact a psychic called Sailor for help. Lily agreed because she was obligated after receiving Aidan’s help with La Llorona.
Eventually, Lily was able to identify the demon at the school and learned that it was trying to find a host to permanently possess. She brewed at home and then returned to the school with the clothes from the closet. Outside, Bronwyn’s coven helped her burn the clothes and Lily put the ashes into her cauldron. Warning everyone else to stay outside, Lily went into the deserted school and hauled her supplies up the bell tower stairs in order to perform the actual exorcism. She succeeded despite the demon showing her illusions and two of her friends showing up. Afterwards, she had a confrontation with Jerry Becker's murderer at the top of the bell tower stairs.
With the killer in police custody, Lily returned to the school the next day and sealed off the closet where the demon had been conjured to prevent anyone from accidentally summoning him again. Considering the things that have happened since she moved to San Francisco, she decided it would be best to try to finish her training and asked Aidan for help.
Hexes and Hemlines
Lily soon found herself drawn into another investigation when Carlos Romero asked her to be an unofficial occult consultant on a bizarre murder case. The victim was the leader of the Serpentarian Society, a rationalist group trying to debunk superstitions; Malachi Zazi was found dead on the dining table of his 13th floor penthouse, stabbed with a shard from a broken mirror and surrounded by bad luck symbols the morning after one of the society’s midnight supper parties.
She visited Aidan for a lesson and saw a vision of Malachi with snakes wrapped around his neck as if they were scarves during a scrying attempt. When Aidan learned that Malachi was murdered, he warned her to drop the investigation but refused to give a reason. Ignoring him, Lily left and returned to the shop to find Bronwyn hadn’t come in for work. Going by her friend’s apartment to see what was wrong, she found Bronwyn’s daughter Rebecca was there and upset because her husband Gregory was a suspect in Malachi’s murder. Lily thought it couldn’t just be coincidence and agreed to help. But before she could start her investigation, she was visited by a timebending witch named Doura, who also warned her off the case.
Ignoring Doura’s warning, Lily proceeded to look into the Serpentarian Society and talk to guests from the dinner party. The investigation was complicated by a group of devil worshippers, hexes and a rattlesnake found at Malachi’s apartment, the corpse disappearing, reports of a person running around wrapped in scarves and a hat like Malachi used to, a coven of evil witches working with a scientist in pursuit of eternal youth, and a hex that weakened Lily’s powers.
Bronwyn eventually asked Lily to drop the case because Rebecca didn’t want to be associated with witches and she agreed at first. But then someone left a hex on Bronwyn’s doorstep and Lily decided whoever was behind it must be stopped despite her friend’s wishes. Lily got into arguments with several of her friends for her meddling and Max, who she had been dating, told her they should just be friends because he couldn’t accept that she was a witch. Feeling lonely and like an outsider, she tried to bring the case to an end with magic by casting the Living Things in You spell. It caused the murderer to believe there were snakes inside of them and give themselves away.
With the murderer apprehended and the evil coven’s plans foiled, Lily managed to smooth things over with Bronwyn and her friends although she didn’t make up with Max.
In a Witch’s Wardrobe
Accompanied by Aidan, Lily attended the Art Deco Ball at Oakland’s Paramount Theater. There, she bumped into a woman named Miriam and sensed that her vibrations were off-kilter. Later in the evening, Miriam fell unconscious in the woman’s lounge and Lily found that she was wearing a cursed corsage. After Miriam was taken to the hospital, Lily discovered the reason she wouldn’t wake up: her soul had become trapped in a mirror. Meanwhile, Aidan disappeared despite promising that he’d look into the matter. Lily tried to communicate with the woman in the mirror but Miriam’s words came out as gibberish. Unable to learn anything else, Lily went back to her apartment to look up things in her Book of Shadows and brew something to help Miriam.
The next morning, Carlos showed up at the shop to once again ask Lily for help. This time, he was investigating the death of a Wiccan who went by the name of Tarragon Dark Moon. His attempts to find information about the dead woman’s friends and relationships hadn’t worked out and he wanted Lily to ask around about her. He also warned her that there had been several incidents of antiwitch vandalism by a group calling itself Defenders of Morality.
Lily went on to investigate both matters, meeting Miriam’s father at the hospital and learning that Miriam’s baby daughter hadn’t been well lately either. She didn’t have much luck getting information out of Tarragon’s coven or convincing Sailor to help her communicate with Miriam. But she did learn that Miriam belonged to the same coven as the dead woman and had been in the same botanicals training group.
Eventually, she managed to nag Sailor into breaking into the Paramount Theater in an attempt to talk to Miriam’s soul in the mirror. Their séance was cut short when they stirred up other spirits in the theater and get attacked by them. Running to the foyer, they escaped the ghosts but found themselves trapped because the doors to the street were locked. The security guard found them and they were arrested.
(Note: At this point, she was apped into Holly Heights but was canon updated after a couple of months there to the end of book 4 as described below.)
After being bailed out of jail by Carlos the next morning, Lily learned that Herve’s voodoo shop had been vandalized by the antiwitch group. She continued the investigation by questioning more people, including Calypso Cafaro who ran the botanicals training group Miriam and Tarragon had been in. She seemed shocked to hear of what had happened to her pupils but Lily wasn’t completely convinced of her innocence.
That night, Lily’s own shop was vandalized and she was left feeling violated. Sailor rushed to her aid, having sensed that something was wrong due to his psychic powers. Lily also called Carlos to report the vandalism and learned that Calypso had been accused of witchcraft in the past by a foster daughter. After the police finished examining the scene and left, she got into argument with Sailor. But things took an unexpected turn when he suddenly kissed her and they ended up in bed together.
Returning to Calypso’s place the next morning, Lily didn’t find the woman but there was evidence of a strong love spell having been cast, which made her wonder if the night before with Sailor was a result of their feelings being manipulated by magic. It also deepened her suspicious that Calypso might have been responsible for Tarragon’s death and Miriam’s curse.
Hearing that several of the people involved in the case planned to go to the movies at the Paramount that evening, Lily and Sailor made plans to be there. At the theater, Lily learned who the true culprit was. During their confrontation, the culprit tossed a chair at the mirror where Miriam was trapped, shattering the glass and fragmenting the soul’s reflection. With Calypso’s help, Lily attempted to magically reconstruct the mirror to save Miriam but only succeeded in fusing the broken bits together into a misshapen hunk of glass. Still, it was enough for the woman’s soul to escape and return to her body, allowing her to finally wake up.
She returned to her car to find Sailor gone and Oscar mute on the subject. Going by his apartment, Sailor’s landlord informed her that he’s gone, making Lily come to the conclusion that Aidan had driven him from town. In the following week, her heart ached about Sailor’s disappearance and she wondered if she was meant to be alone even as her friends helped her clean up the shop. Things had just gotten back to normal when she received a call from one of Graciela’s friends, warning her that her father was coming to visit…
Personality: Before settling in San Francisco, Lily was a lonely misfit witch who had never really fit in anywhere. Her goals when she moved there were relatively simple: make friends, become part of a community, run her shop, and possibly find love. Basically, she wanted to finally have a normal life.
But while her loneliness has eased with new friends and finding her place, she’s still rather guarded. It’s difficult for her to completely trust people after being shunned her whole childhood and being run out of her hometown while still a teenager. Even in the more open-minded atmosphere of San Francisco, she still tries to hide her witchiness and doesn’t confide that to new people easily, believing she’ll be looked at differently. She’s evasive about it when the police question her after Frances’ death and when Max comes into the shop looking for herbs. Even with her friend Bronwyn who is a Wiccan and works in her shop, Lily doesn’t readily reveal that she’s a witch. They finally talk about it when Bronwyn sees her upset and asks her if it was about being a witch; she had noticed the cleansing rituals that Lily performed in the shop each morning and drawn the conclusion herself. Although she becomes somewhat more open about being a witch as the series progresses and the number of people who know her secret grows, it’s still not something she brings up casually to new people, especially normal humans without magical powers.
Despite trying to hide that she’s a witch, Lily is protective of others, sometimes to the point of being meddlesome. This is especially true when it comes to protecting normal humans from supernatural entities because she knows she’s better able to deal with such things. She takes it upon herself to cast a protection spell for Frances although it wasn’t asked of her and to rescue Jessica. And although she asks Bronwyn’s coven for support in dealing with La Llorona and Sitri, she advises them to stay back and let her actually deal with the demons. Even when Bronwyn and her other friends become upset with her for continuing to meddle in the Malachi Zazi case, she continues because her friends are being threatened and she won’t stand for that. She can be quite stubborn when she believes she’s in the right.
Since her powers had caused her to be shunned while growing up in Texas and she spent her years abroad traveling alone, Lily never really made friends or had much practice interacting with others so she can be awkward in social situations. She seems to have made friends pretty quickly—she’s already starting s shop with Bronwyn and Maya within several weeks of meeting them—and does okay in dealing with customers at her shop. But she’s still challenged when it comes to small talk and there are awkward moments which leave her friends gaping, like when Lily admits she never graduated high school.
There are also other subtler signs of awkwardness. She gets nervous when she’s waiting on someone’s doorstep, hoping for admittance because she remembers how she was unwelcome as a child. And although many people probably wouldn’t think much of getting a wedding invitation for someone they don’t really know, Lily is excited when a business associate invites her to her niece’s wedding. While she doesn’t voice these feelings out loud, Lily does think them and it shows her yearning for acceptance among normal humans. Many well-known pop culture references like Star Wars and Mary Poppins also tend to go over her head, which makes people look at her strangely sometimes.
Lily can be insecure, both about her relationships with people and her powers. She worries about losing Bronwyn’s friendship when she goes against her friend’s wishes and continues investigating a case involving Bronwyn’s son-in-law, after finding a hex on Bronwyn’s doorstep and deciding whoever left it had to be stopped. And being romantically attracted to Max, who is skeptical about all things supernatural, she worries that he won’t be able to accept the fact that she is a witch. Yet, she realizes she can’t deny she’s a witch and eventually breaks up with him. After coming to San Francisco, making friends and gaining a familiar, she realizes how lonely she had been before. And while things have improved, she still seems a little lonely considering how she clings to her friendships. She also tends to be bad at lying, often using half-truths if she needs to do so in hopes of not sounding completely unconvincing. And can get embarrassed about her friends knowing about her love life.
She sometimes doubts herself with regard to her powers since she was forced to leave her hometown before her training was finished. When Frances dies despite the protection spell that she cast, she feels guilt and horror and wonders if she’s losing her powers. Similarly, she wonders if she’s losing her powers in the third book when her magic isn’t working as well as usual due to some evil witches putting a hex on her. At one point in the books, she sits in her living room and practices basic magic like commanding the lights on and off and lighting candles without touching them, just to make sure she hasn’t lost her magic completely.
She can be impulsive at times and isn’t the most patient person. She can get frustrated or exasperated easily, leading to bickering and sarcastic remarks. This tends to happen when she’s dealing with Aidan, who is in the habit of withholding information from her, and Sailor, who’s not always happy to help with her cases. Oscar can try her patience at times by acting like a child and she tends to take offense at negative stereotypes relating to witches. However, she generally tries to keep herself from losing her temper because it’s dangerous with her powers.
There’s also a humorous side to Lily. She’s often making wry or ironic observations to herself and sometimes making jokes to her friends. And although her choice of words is usually normal, her thoughts and speech are occasionally sprinkled with colorful expressions from her Texas days, such as “whomperjawed,” “nervous as a cat in a room full of rockers,” “scareder than a sinner in a cyclone,” and “as mean as a skilletful of rattlesnakes.” And despite having left Texas over a decade ago, she still retains an accent and speaks with a twang, which becomes more prominent when she’s upset.
Debt: Her spouse in Holly Heights was Lezard Valeth and he came from a canon point where his world was being destroyed and believed he would die if returned there. (His world was actually saved in the end and he survived but he wasn’t aware of this at the time.) With his disappearance from Holly Heights, Lily believed that he was sent back to his world by the Landlord and died as a result. She wishes to revive him and for the two of them to be able to return to her own world.
Previous Game Info: Lily spent about fifteen and a half months in Holly Heights, beginning in August 2014. Being a slice of life game in a suburban setting with characters sorted into families, Lily’s life there was generally a lot less eventful than it was in San Francisco except for the times when the Landlord was playing tricks on the residents. She initially fretted about getting back to San Francisco to try to save Miriam and it took some weeks for her to finally accept that there was no way out of the town.
After a canon update to the end of the fourth book, she settled into a routine of running a vintage clothes shop called The Witch’s Wardrobe and then going home at night to cook dinner and perhaps do a bit of gardening or reading. During events, she did see some pretty strange things like being turned into a mermaid, being followed around by pokemon, and getting to fly on the back of a friendly dragon. She made a lot of acquaintances over her time in the game but her more significant CR included the following:
Eagle and Lion from Kemono Kingdom Zoo. Among the first people Lily met in Holly Heights were her assigned children, Eagle and Lion. They were actually animals despite having a mostly human appearance and looked like adults rather than children due to the fact their species matured more quickly than humans. Because of this, Lily treated them as grown up roommates rather than children although she still worried about them when Lion got sick one time and whenever the Landlord played his tricks. They sometimes cooked together and the whole family once spent the day fishing at the local lake since it was a pastime that Eagle enjoyed.
Lily was rather sad for a while when they both disappeared about a year after she arrived. She’d grown rather fond of them and they’d been around so long even before she arrived, she’d sort of taken for granted that they’d always be there. As consolation, she was left with a couple of Eagle’s feathers and Lion’s sister, a lioness that actually looked like a regular lioness but acted more like a housecat.
Lezard Valeth from Valkyrie Profile. Lezard arrived on New Year’s Day to complete the family, bearing a marriage certificate that stated he and Lily were married. Lily was less than happy with this stranger showing up at her door, saying that he was now her husband, and accidentally dumped a load of snow from the roof onto him with her magic! Things didn’t improve when he made jokes about sharing the bed. Lily felt as if the Landlord was mocking her failed love life by marrying her off to this sorcerer and even asked over the network about getting a divorce. But since it was impossible, she settled for making him sleep on the sofa rather than letting him share the master bedroom.
This temporarily changed in February due to magical roses from the Landlord with instructions to give them out to other residents. The flowers that Lily and Lezard exchanged caused them both to act in ways unlike their usual selves. Lezard became desperate to get her attention, filling the house with flowers, cooking dinner, giving shoulder massages. And Lily became flirtatious towards him, even allowing him to share the bed. The night before the magic wore off, they shared a good night kiss which resulted in both of them having racy dreams about a wedding night. Lily was rather embarrassed when she woke up in the morning and neither of them spoke of the dreams then.
Things went back to as they were before but Lezard would soon start developing feelings for her, such as being concerned when Lily suddenly turned green in March. He eventually confessed his feelings in May but Lily was a bit doubtful, thinking it might be the Landlord manipulating feelings again. Still, it left her with confused feelings on whether she was actually starting to like him too and the question came up again in June when the Landlord scattered falling stars with characters’ secrets inside, allowing Lezard to learn he wasn’t the only one who dreamed about a wedding night. She still held back though, worried about the idea of another failed relationship after the multiple failed relationships in her own world. But she was concerned about him when they found themselves locked into a haunted room on a cruise ship the next month. Since he still lacked any of his own magic, she gave her protective medallion to him to help keep him safe.
After Eagle and Lion disappeared around the beginning of August, Lily became worried that the same would happen to Lezard and wanted to keep him close, finally allowing him to regularly share the bed again. Even if she didn’t completely want to admit it, she’d grown to like him and wished for some of his magic back instead of using a regain for herself. During their last couple of months in the game, they became lovers even if he still exasperated Lily at times by doing things such as creating a skeleton army in October. Lily was torn when she woke up one morning to find him missing and the belief that the Landlord had doomed him by sending him back to his world was what led to her contract with the Witch.
Rahzel Anadis from Dazzle. Rahzel was another person Lily met on her first day in Holly Heights and helped her get oriented. Several months later, Rahzel started working for her part-time at The Witch’s Wardrobe. And being another magic user, she became one of the few people that Lily confided to about her magic. They worked together when faced with some of the Landlord’s tricks such as being locked in a library with the Landlord’s apparently dead body and being on a cruise ship that seemed to be haunted. And although she offered to punch people a few times on Lily’s behalf, Lily managed to talk her out of it! With her departure from Holly Heights, Lily left the shop to her.
Veronica from Bokura no Kiseki. Veronica was another friend who learned of Lily’s magic. A princess from a world where magic existed, she became indignant when she heard about how the people in Lily’s hometown had treated her, believing it to be unfair. After hesitating a bit, Lily admitted that she knew magic and that it had been the reason she was shunned. They also became neighbors when Veronica moved into the house across the street when she turned 18. Due to the magical roses in February, Lily ended up hating Veronica for a while but felt embarrassed about it afterwards and that she needed to apologize even if it had been under the influence of the Landlord’s magic. With things back to normal, they occasionally visited and took turns trying out each other’s cooking.
Kotarou Katsura and Gintoki Sakata from Gintama. Among the older residents of Holly Heights, Lily sort of became odd friends with Katsura and Gintoki. Lily’s early encounters with Katsura were him showing up at her door to trick or treat and to sell sweets as a very pushy salesman. She grew to think of him as a weird actor fellow from the way he talked about being on a television show back home. She also learned about some of the more serious problems in his world related to aliens invading Earth. Katsura developed a crush on her but Lily was oblivious to it.
Later on, she also met Gintoki who arrived in Holly Heights some months after Katsura and also got some glimpses of a troubled past in his own world. And one time, Lily mentioned that the seamstresses at her shop could custom make things, unknowingly setting off a chain of events where Katsura stole Gintoki’s robe to have a duplicate made as a gift. In general, they were friendly even if she thought them a bit strange at times.
Chiaki Nanami and Ibuki Mioda from Dangan Ronpa. Chiaki was one of Lion and Eagle’s schoolmates at the elementary school. Lily initially met her at the 2014 Halloween party and was surprised to learn that she was only in elementary school despite looking like a teenager. She worried a bit that other kids might have teased her as a result for being different and because Chiaki mentioned her assigned parents had disappeared. The girl later became a customer at Lily’s shop and Lily told her a bit about the vintage fashions she sold.
It wasn’t until many months later that Ibuki arrived and Lily spoke to her because she mentioned looking for Chiaki. Lily found her rather strange and they didn’t always get along due to Ibuki’s energetic nature and wild ideas such as the suggestion during that first conversation that she might be stalking Chiaki!
Makoto Tachibana from Free! Another of Lily’s younger friends, she sometimes talked with Makoto about gardening since he and a friend had opened a flower shop in town and she taught him how to dry flowers. In October, she made a protective medallion for him when he confessed that he got scared easily although she passed it off as a good luck charm rather than telling him it was magical and that she was a witch.
Hajime Ichinose from Gatchaman Crowds. Hajime was assigned as Lily and Lezard’s new daughter in early October. In the few weeks that they lived together before Lezard’s disappearance, Lily found her to be cheerful and energetic and generally got along with her.
Inventory: the clothes she’s wearing (a vintage dress and a pair of Keds), a protective medicine bundle (a charm bag on a braided belt of silk), a protective medallion, one of Lezard’s shirts (I imagine her clutching it and trying to feel his vibrations from it when the Witch shows up to make her offer.)
Abilities: Lily is one of the most powerful witches in San Francisco and has a lot of magic. Although her magic is versatile and can be used for many purposes (protection, healing, persuasion, glamours and exorcisms are just a few), it tends to be much subtler and take more time than magic in other canons. As Lily points out a few times, she can’t just wiggle her nose or point a wand and make magic happen.
For example, one of her main talents is brewing and it’s noted the first time she brewed in the series that it took an hour of boiling for the brew to be ready. Sometimes, the brewing itself is enough to cast the spell but other times she takes the resulting liquid and uses for purposes such as drawing magic circles or giving it to others to drink. In a similar vein, she also often puts together charms and carves protective medallions. And even makes a mandragora (a homunculus created from a mandrake root) in one case although this required burying the root for a month after it was prepared.
Lily’s other specialty is sensing vibrations from textiles about the people who wore them, usually personality and emotions. She can also do this to a lesser extent with other inanimate objects and buildings. While she can use the things she senses to make educated guesses about things that might have happened, she does not have the ability to see actual memories from this. Also in terms of sensing things normal people wouldn’t, she can try to read people’s auras.
She’s capable of summoning and has to take care not to say the names of demons for fear of accidentally summoning them. On the opposite side of the coin, she can also exorcise them.
She has a special connection with snakes, inherited from her father, and believes it saved her when the people of her hometown tried to exorcise her. She seems to be able to influence their actions and is capable of casting a spell that makes the victim think they have snakes inside of them as well as an antidote spell.
There are also a variety of other minor powers that she can use without having to brew or create a charm that could be roughly grouped together as psychokinesis: knocking a person off their feet with an energy blast, producing light from her hand, lighting candles without touching them, causing lights to turn on or off, animating inanimate objects.
She has an inability to sink in water due to being a witch and normally floats like a cork.
Sex magic exists in her world but with Lily’s lack of practice with relationships, she ends up unintentionally casting a couple of times and is pretty embarrassed the next morning when she wakes up to find clothes dancing around the shop or that there were rose petals all over the room. (The scenes fade to black and it’s more of a humorous thing in canon. It’s also the kind of thing she finds embarrassing so she’d be unlikely to ever openly talk about it.)
On the more mundane side of things, Lily is skilled at gardening, growing a large variety of herbs on her terrace for use in her spells. She’s very knowledgeable about botanicals and can also mix them into things like poultices even without her healing magic. She’s also a good cook, making her mother’s Cajun recipes when she feels nostalgic and baking fairly often. And due to all the laundry she does for her shop, she’s familiar with many different methods of cleaning textiles and removing stains.
(Note: She lost her canon powers when she arrived in Holly Heights but regained most of her magic during her time in the game. The exceptions are being able to sense from people and from places.)
Strengths and Weaknesses:
Strengths
One of the strongest witches in San Francisco. Lily’s magical talents are exceptional, stronger than most other witches that she’s ever met. She refrained from ever joining a coven because she already had so much power on her own and feared what forces might be unleashed when her magic was added to a whole group of witches.
Great concentration. Lily’s magic is about focusing intentions to achieve the desired results so she’s developed great concentration as a result.
Very knowledgeable about plants. She’s great with plants, being a talented gardener and quite knowledgeable about their uses in brewing, making charms, and healing.
Excellent at brewing and crafting. Brewing in her cauldron is something that she’s especially good at and she’s also talented at the crafty side of magic like putting together charms, carving protective medallions, and making spirit bottles.
Resilient and able to bounce back quickly. Lily’s been through a lot and does have trust and abandonment issues but she but seems pretty resilient both mentally and physically considering that she survived everything that happened to her in childhood without going crazy. And she’s often ready to go back to work within a day or two even when things that would traumatize most people happen. For example, she nearly drowned after La Llorona pulled her under San Francisco Bay but was ready to open the shop as usual the next morning.
Weaknesses
Socially awkward and a bad judge of character. Lily didn’t really have any friends growing up other than her grandmother Graciela since the townspeople shunned her. And she spent many years wandering the world as a loner so she doesn’t really have that much experience with social situations. It’s not until San Francisco that she really makes friends. As a result, she’s not always the best judge of character and can sometimes be deceived by people with bad intentions.
Not in complete control of her magic. Although Lily has a great deal of power, she’s not always in control of it, especially when her emotions are running wild. This can be dangerous and result in people getting hurt such as during the exorcism back in her hometown. Even in less serious situations, objects can go flying off shelves or cast about if she’s upset or angry.
Terrible at certain types of magic. Despite all her powers, Lily is terrible at scrying despite others saying that a witch of her abilities should be able to see. She also lacks a talent for fighting magic, preferring instead to brew in the calm of her kitchen.
Insecure. She tends to doubt herself at times, uncertain if she can accomplish what’s needed with her magic or feeling inferior when she compares herself to other women. Meeting Calypso for the first time, she feels jealous and like “a shadowy little gremlin” in comparison.
Laziness about learning new things. Lily can be kind of lazy about learning new things without others to give her a push. She was kicked of high school and never graduated and it wasn’t until her San Francisco friends encouraged her to do so that she actually studied for the GED. Similarly, she was forced to leave Jarod before she completed her training with Graciela and doesn’t seem to have made much of an effort in all the years that she traveled the world since there are still magic-related things that Aidan or Sailor have to explain to her.
( SAMPLE )
Characterization Sample:
A prose log with Lezard from Holly Heights
A network post from Holly Heights
Another network post from Holly Heights
Name: Lady
Contact: the_embroideress@yahoo.com, embroideress on plurk
Are you over 17?: yes
Characters in Forest Covered: none
( CHARACTER INFORMATION )
Name/Work Name: Lily Ivory/Lilith
Canon: The Witchcraft Mysteries
Canon Point: The end of book 4, In a Witch’s Wardrobe
AU/CRAU: Holly Heights CRAU (August 2014-November 2015)
Age: 33 (31 in canon plus 2 birthdays in Holly Heights)
History:
Pre-canon
Growing up in the small west Texas town of Jarod, Lily’s childhood was troubled. Her father Declan was a male witch who walked out on his family when Lily was still a toddler. Lily’s unnamed mother was apparently a normal woman who had trouble accepting that her daughter had magical powers.
Lily learned that she was a witch when she was 8, getting into an argument with a classmate during a school campout. The classmate called her a “nasty old witch,” infuriating Lily and causing the other children to turn on her. She climbed to the top of the cliff next to the campsite, magically helped by the vines there, and cursed her classmates. All of the other children got food poisoning as a result and the people of her hometown shunned her because of her strange abilities.
After that, Lily’s mother sent her to live on the outskirts of town with Graciela, the witch who had raised Lily’s father after his parents died. With her adoptive grandmother’s guidance, Lily spent the next several years learning to admit to herself that she was a witch, to control her temper, and to hide her powers from normal humans. But she wasn’t completely successful with the latter two and there were other incidents over the years. Lily’s first boyfriend ended up with a minor head injury after she realized he was just dating her to win a bet. And she was kicked out of high school after their star football player, who had been harassing Lily, developed an ailment which badly affected his play.
However, the major one happened when Lily was 17 and forced her to leave town before she could finish her magical training. Lily’s mother belonged to a snake handling church and they tried to exorcise Lily by tying her down and setting poisonous snakes on her. Lily feared for her life and while she didn’t enchant the snakes, a dozen people got bitten and three died. She had to turn herself in to the police to protect Graciela from the mob that showed up at her house. She spent weeks in jail before the charges got dropped after witnesses dropped out and the prosecutor fell ill; Graciela denied it but Lily knew it was her doing. She couldn’t remain in her hometown any longer so Graciela told her to go to a witch friend of hers in Mexico.
But Lily disobeyed and went looking for her father instead. After about a year, she finally tracked him down in a remote Bavarian town. The reunion was a negative experience with her father rejecting her and sending her away although he later claimed it was to protect her from a demon he had become beholden to.
Afterwards, she spent over a decade wandering the world alone, visiting many countries but never staying anywhere for long. She eventually found herself in a rural French cemetery, wondering if anyone would mourn her when she was gone and realizing that she wanted to find a community, make a home and have friends, possibly even start a family. Then, one night in a Hong Kong bar, she met a parrot named Barnabas who suggested she try San Francisco…
Secondhand Spirits
Shortly before the start of the first book, Lily moved to San Francisco in hopes of finally making friends and living a normal life. She opened a vintage clothing store called “Aunt Cora’s Closet,” sharing the space with her new Wiccan friend Bronwyn who ran a herbal stand in a corner. However, she was soon visited by Aidan Rhodes, a powerful male witch who knew her father and who claimed to be in charge of the city’s witches. Against her protests, he presented her with a familiar, a half goblin/half gargoyle that could transform into a potbellied pig; she got stuck with him when Aidan left while her back was turned and named him Oscar.
In search of inventory for the shop, Lily’s assistant Maya brought her to elderly Frances Potts’ house. There they met Jessica, a little girl who lived nearby. Shortly after the girl left, Lily and Frances heard the scream of the child-abducting demon La Llorona and learned that Jessica had disappeared. Concerned because normal humans wouldn’t hear a demon’s wail unless they’re marked for death, Lily decided to cast a protection spell for Frances without the other’s knowledge.
The next morning, she received a visit from Inspectors Romero and Nordstrom of the SFPD, who had learned of her late night visit to Frances’s house from a surveillance camera. They questioned her and informed her that Frances was found dead in a pentagram. Disturbed that her spell had failed, Lily decided to investigate Frances’s death and find a way to get Jessica back from La Llorona. Along the way, she became acquainted with Max Carmichael, a reporter trying to debunk the supernatural, and Herve LaMansec, a voodoo priest.
In the end, Lily discovered the truth behind Frances’s death and the children who disappeared from that neighborhood over the past 35 years. With the help of Bronwyn’s coven and Aidan, she managed to rescue Jessica and banish La Llorona from San Francisco Bay, getting pulled under by the demon and risking her own life in the process.
A Cast-Off Coven
About a week later, Lily was asked to look into a possible haunting at the San Francisco School of Fine Arts; the students were scared and some believed the school was being haunted by the ghost of John Daniels, a student said to have committed suicide by throwing himself down the bell tower stairs in the 1960s. In exchange for looking into the matter, the school’s provost promised Lily some Victorian clothes found in a sealed closet at the school. But before she found anything supernatural, Jerry Becker, a wealthy benefactor of the school, was discovered dead at the foot of the bell tower stairs. Lily initially wanted to leave finding the killer to the police but Aidan visited her the next morning and insisted she investigate the death. He revealed that Jerry was a client of his and suggested that Lily contact a psychic called Sailor for help. Lily agreed because she was obligated after receiving Aidan’s help with La Llorona.
Eventually, Lily was able to identify the demon at the school and learned that it was trying to find a host to permanently possess. She brewed at home and then returned to the school with the clothes from the closet. Outside, Bronwyn’s coven helped her burn the clothes and Lily put the ashes into her cauldron. Warning everyone else to stay outside, Lily went into the deserted school and hauled her supplies up the bell tower stairs in order to perform the actual exorcism. She succeeded despite the demon showing her illusions and two of her friends showing up. Afterwards, she had a confrontation with Jerry Becker's murderer at the top of the bell tower stairs.
With the killer in police custody, Lily returned to the school the next day and sealed off the closet where the demon had been conjured to prevent anyone from accidentally summoning him again. Considering the things that have happened since she moved to San Francisco, she decided it would be best to try to finish her training and asked Aidan for help.
Hexes and Hemlines
Lily soon found herself drawn into another investigation when Carlos Romero asked her to be an unofficial occult consultant on a bizarre murder case. The victim was the leader of the Serpentarian Society, a rationalist group trying to debunk superstitions; Malachi Zazi was found dead on the dining table of his 13th floor penthouse, stabbed with a shard from a broken mirror and surrounded by bad luck symbols the morning after one of the society’s midnight supper parties.
She visited Aidan for a lesson and saw a vision of Malachi with snakes wrapped around his neck as if they were scarves during a scrying attempt. When Aidan learned that Malachi was murdered, he warned her to drop the investigation but refused to give a reason. Ignoring him, Lily left and returned to the shop to find Bronwyn hadn’t come in for work. Going by her friend’s apartment to see what was wrong, she found Bronwyn’s daughter Rebecca was there and upset because her husband Gregory was a suspect in Malachi’s murder. Lily thought it couldn’t just be coincidence and agreed to help. But before she could start her investigation, she was visited by a timebending witch named Doura, who also warned her off the case.
Ignoring Doura’s warning, Lily proceeded to look into the Serpentarian Society and talk to guests from the dinner party. The investigation was complicated by a group of devil worshippers, hexes and a rattlesnake found at Malachi’s apartment, the corpse disappearing, reports of a person running around wrapped in scarves and a hat like Malachi used to, a coven of evil witches working with a scientist in pursuit of eternal youth, and a hex that weakened Lily’s powers.
Bronwyn eventually asked Lily to drop the case because Rebecca didn’t want to be associated with witches and she agreed at first. But then someone left a hex on Bronwyn’s doorstep and Lily decided whoever was behind it must be stopped despite her friend’s wishes. Lily got into arguments with several of her friends for her meddling and Max, who she had been dating, told her they should just be friends because he couldn’t accept that she was a witch. Feeling lonely and like an outsider, she tried to bring the case to an end with magic by casting the Living Things in You spell. It caused the murderer to believe there were snakes inside of them and give themselves away.
With the murderer apprehended and the evil coven’s plans foiled, Lily managed to smooth things over with Bronwyn and her friends although she didn’t make up with Max.
In a Witch’s Wardrobe
Accompanied by Aidan, Lily attended the Art Deco Ball at Oakland’s Paramount Theater. There, she bumped into a woman named Miriam and sensed that her vibrations were off-kilter. Later in the evening, Miriam fell unconscious in the woman’s lounge and Lily found that she was wearing a cursed corsage. After Miriam was taken to the hospital, Lily discovered the reason she wouldn’t wake up: her soul had become trapped in a mirror. Meanwhile, Aidan disappeared despite promising that he’d look into the matter. Lily tried to communicate with the woman in the mirror but Miriam’s words came out as gibberish. Unable to learn anything else, Lily went back to her apartment to look up things in her Book of Shadows and brew something to help Miriam.
The next morning, Carlos showed up at the shop to once again ask Lily for help. This time, he was investigating the death of a Wiccan who went by the name of Tarragon Dark Moon. His attempts to find information about the dead woman’s friends and relationships hadn’t worked out and he wanted Lily to ask around about her. He also warned her that there had been several incidents of antiwitch vandalism by a group calling itself Defenders of Morality.
Lily went on to investigate both matters, meeting Miriam’s father at the hospital and learning that Miriam’s baby daughter hadn’t been well lately either. She didn’t have much luck getting information out of Tarragon’s coven or convincing Sailor to help her communicate with Miriam. But she did learn that Miriam belonged to the same coven as the dead woman and had been in the same botanicals training group.
Eventually, she managed to nag Sailor into breaking into the Paramount Theater in an attempt to talk to Miriam’s soul in the mirror. Their séance was cut short when they stirred up other spirits in the theater and get attacked by them. Running to the foyer, they escaped the ghosts but found themselves trapped because the doors to the street were locked. The security guard found them and they were arrested.
(Note: At this point, she was apped into Holly Heights but was canon updated after a couple of months there to the end of book 4 as described below.)
After being bailed out of jail by Carlos the next morning, Lily learned that Herve’s voodoo shop had been vandalized by the antiwitch group. She continued the investigation by questioning more people, including Calypso Cafaro who ran the botanicals training group Miriam and Tarragon had been in. She seemed shocked to hear of what had happened to her pupils but Lily wasn’t completely convinced of her innocence.
That night, Lily’s own shop was vandalized and she was left feeling violated. Sailor rushed to her aid, having sensed that something was wrong due to his psychic powers. Lily also called Carlos to report the vandalism and learned that Calypso had been accused of witchcraft in the past by a foster daughter. After the police finished examining the scene and left, she got into argument with Sailor. But things took an unexpected turn when he suddenly kissed her and they ended up in bed together.
Returning to Calypso’s place the next morning, Lily didn’t find the woman but there was evidence of a strong love spell having been cast, which made her wonder if the night before with Sailor was a result of their feelings being manipulated by magic. It also deepened her suspicious that Calypso might have been responsible for Tarragon’s death and Miriam’s curse.
Hearing that several of the people involved in the case planned to go to the movies at the Paramount that evening, Lily and Sailor made plans to be there. At the theater, Lily learned who the true culprit was. During their confrontation, the culprit tossed a chair at the mirror where Miriam was trapped, shattering the glass and fragmenting the soul’s reflection. With Calypso’s help, Lily attempted to magically reconstruct the mirror to save Miriam but only succeeded in fusing the broken bits together into a misshapen hunk of glass. Still, it was enough for the woman’s soul to escape and return to her body, allowing her to finally wake up.
She returned to her car to find Sailor gone and Oscar mute on the subject. Going by his apartment, Sailor’s landlord informed her that he’s gone, making Lily come to the conclusion that Aidan had driven him from town. In the following week, her heart ached about Sailor’s disappearance and she wondered if she was meant to be alone even as her friends helped her clean up the shop. Things had just gotten back to normal when she received a call from one of Graciela’s friends, warning her that her father was coming to visit…
Personality: Before settling in San Francisco, Lily was a lonely misfit witch who had never really fit in anywhere. Her goals when she moved there were relatively simple: make friends, become part of a community, run her shop, and possibly find love. Basically, she wanted to finally have a normal life.
But while her loneliness has eased with new friends and finding her place, she’s still rather guarded. It’s difficult for her to completely trust people after being shunned her whole childhood and being run out of her hometown while still a teenager. Even in the more open-minded atmosphere of San Francisco, she still tries to hide her witchiness and doesn’t confide that to new people easily, believing she’ll be looked at differently. She’s evasive about it when the police question her after Frances’ death and when Max comes into the shop looking for herbs. Even with her friend Bronwyn who is a Wiccan and works in her shop, Lily doesn’t readily reveal that she’s a witch. They finally talk about it when Bronwyn sees her upset and asks her if it was about being a witch; she had noticed the cleansing rituals that Lily performed in the shop each morning and drawn the conclusion herself. Although she becomes somewhat more open about being a witch as the series progresses and the number of people who know her secret grows, it’s still not something she brings up casually to new people, especially normal humans without magical powers.
Despite trying to hide that she’s a witch, Lily is protective of others, sometimes to the point of being meddlesome. This is especially true when it comes to protecting normal humans from supernatural entities because she knows she’s better able to deal with such things. She takes it upon herself to cast a protection spell for Frances although it wasn’t asked of her and to rescue Jessica. And although she asks Bronwyn’s coven for support in dealing with La Llorona and Sitri, she advises them to stay back and let her actually deal with the demons. Even when Bronwyn and her other friends become upset with her for continuing to meddle in the Malachi Zazi case, she continues because her friends are being threatened and she won’t stand for that. She can be quite stubborn when she believes she’s in the right.
Since her powers had caused her to be shunned while growing up in Texas and she spent her years abroad traveling alone, Lily never really made friends or had much practice interacting with others so she can be awkward in social situations. She seems to have made friends pretty quickly—she’s already starting s shop with Bronwyn and Maya within several weeks of meeting them—and does okay in dealing with customers at her shop. But she’s still challenged when it comes to small talk and there are awkward moments which leave her friends gaping, like when Lily admits she never graduated high school.
There are also other subtler signs of awkwardness. She gets nervous when she’s waiting on someone’s doorstep, hoping for admittance because she remembers how she was unwelcome as a child. And although many people probably wouldn’t think much of getting a wedding invitation for someone they don’t really know, Lily is excited when a business associate invites her to her niece’s wedding. While she doesn’t voice these feelings out loud, Lily does think them and it shows her yearning for acceptance among normal humans. Many well-known pop culture references like Star Wars and Mary Poppins also tend to go over her head, which makes people look at her strangely sometimes.
Lily can be insecure, both about her relationships with people and her powers. She worries about losing Bronwyn’s friendship when she goes against her friend’s wishes and continues investigating a case involving Bronwyn’s son-in-law, after finding a hex on Bronwyn’s doorstep and deciding whoever left it had to be stopped. And being romantically attracted to Max, who is skeptical about all things supernatural, she worries that he won’t be able to accept the fact that she is a witch. Yet, she realizes she can’t deny she’s a witch and eventually breaks up with him. After coming to San Francisco, making friends and gaining a familiar, she realizes how lonely she had been before. And while things have improved, she still seems a little lonely considering how she clings to her friendships. She also tends to be bad at lying, often using half-truths if she needs to do so in hopes of not sounding completely unconvincing. And can get embarrassed about her friends knowing about her love life.
She sometimes doubts herself with regard to her powers since she was forced to leave her hometown before her training was finished. When Frances dies despite the protection spell that she cast, she feels guilt and horror and wonders if she’s losing her powers. Similarly, she wonders if she’s losing her powers in the third book when her magic isn’t working as well as usual due to some evil witches putting a hex on her. At one point in the books, she sits in her living room and practices basic magic like commanding the lights on and off and lighting candles without touching them, just to make sure she hasn’t lost her magic completely.
She can be impulsive at times and isn’t the most patient person. She can get frustrated or exasperated easily, leading to bickering and sarcastic remarks. This tends to happen when she’s dealing with Aidan, who is in the habit of withholding information from her, and Sailor, who’s not always happy to help with her cases. Oscar can try her patience at times by acting like a child and she tends to take offense at negative stereotypes relating to witches. However, she generally tries to keep herself from losing her temper because it’s dangerous with her powers.
There’s also a humorous side to Lily. She’s often making wry or ironic observations to herself and sometimes making jokes to her friends. And although her choice of words is usually normal, her thoughts and speech are occasionally sprinkled with colorful expressions from her Texas days, such as “whomperjawed,” “nervous as a cat in a room full of rockers,” “scareder than a sinner in a cyclone,” and “as mean as a skilletful of rattlesnakes.” And despite having left Texas over a decade ago, she still retains an accent and speaks with a twang, which becomes more prominent when she’s upset.
Debt: Her spouse in Holly Heights was Lezard Valeth and he came from a canon point where his world was being destroyed and believed he would die if returned there. (His world was actually saved in the end and he survived but he wasn’t aware of this at the time.) With his disappearance from Holly Heights, Lily believed that he was sent back to his world by the Landlord and died as a result. She wishes to revive him and for the two of them to be able to return to her own world.
Previous Game Info: Lily spent about fifteen and a half months in Holly Heights, beginning in August 2014. Being a slice of life game in a suburban setting with characters sorted into families, Lily’s life there was generally a lot less eventful than it was in San Francisco except for the times when the Landlord was playing tricks on the residents. She initially fretted about getting back to San Francisco to try to save Miriam and it took some weeks for her to finally accept that there was no way out of the town.
After a canon update to the end of the fourth book, she settled into a routine of running a vintage clothes shop called The Witch’s Wardrobe and then going home at night to cook dinner and perhaps do a bit of gardening or reading. During events, she did see some pretty strange things like being turned into a mermaid, being followed around by pokemon, and getting to fly on the back of a friendly dragon. She made a lot of acquaintances over her time in the game but her more significant CR included the following:
Eagle and Lion from Kemono Kingdom Zoo. Among the first people Lily met in Holly Heights were her assigned children, Eagle and Lion. They were actually animals despite having a mostly human appearance and looked like adults rather than children due to the fact their species matured more quickly than humans. Because of this, Lily treated them as grown up roommates rather than children although she still worried about them when Lion got sick one time and whenever the Landlord played his tricks. They sometimes cooked together and the whole family once spent the day fishing at the local lake since it was a pastime that Eagle enjoyed.
Lily was rather sad for a while when they both disappeared about a year after she arrived. She’d grown rather fond of them and they’d been around so long even before she arrived, she’d sort of taken for granted that they’d always be there. As consolation, she was left with a couple of Eagle’s feathers and Lion’s sister, a lioness that actually looked like a regular lioness but acted more like a housecat.
Lezard Valeth from Valkyrie Profile. Lezard arrived on New Year’s Day to complete the family, bearing a marriage certificate that stated he and Lily were married. Lily was less than happy with this stranger showing up at her door, saying that he was now her husband, and accidentally dumped a load of snow from the roof onto him with her magic! Things didn’t improve when he made jokes about sharing the bed. Lily felt as if the Landlord was mocking her failed love life by marrying her off to this sorcerer and even asked over the network about getting a divorce. But since it was impossible, she settled for making him sleep on the sofa rather than letting him share the master bedroom.
This temporarily changed in February due to magical roses from the Landlord with instructions to give them out to other residents. The flowers that Lily and Lezard exchanged caused them both to act in ways unlike their usual selves. Lezard became desperate to get her attention, filling the house with flowers, cooking dinner, giving shoulder massages. And Lily became flirtatious towards him, even allowing him to share the bed. The night before the magic wore off, they shared a good night kiss which resulted in both of them having racy dreams about a wedding night. Lily was rather embarrassed when she woke up in the morning and neither of them spoke of the dreams then.
Things went back to as they were before but Lezard would soon start developing feelings for her, such as being concerned when Lily suddenly turned green in March. He eventually confessed his feelings in May but Lily was a bit doubtful, thinking it might be the Landlord manipulating feelings again. Still, it left her with confused feelings on whether she was actually starting to like him too and the question came up again in June when the Landlord scattered falling stars with characters’ secrets inside, allowing Lezard to learn he wasn’t the only one who dreamed about a wedding night. She still held back though, worried about the idea of another failed relationship after the multiple failed relationships in her own world. But she was concerned about him when they found themselves locked into a haunted room on a cruise ship the next month. Since he still lacked any of his own magic, she gave her protective medallion to him to help keep him safe.
After Eagle and Lion disappeared around the beginning of August, Lily became worried that the same would happen to Lezard and wanted to keep him close, finally allowing him to regularly share the bed again. Even if she didn’t completely want to admit it, she’d grown to like him and wished for some of his magic back instead of using a regain for herself. During their last couple of months in the game, they became lovers even if he still exasperated Lily at times by doing things such as creating a skeleton army in October. Lily was torn when she woke up one morning to find him missing and the belief that the Landlord had doomed him by sending him back to his world was what led to her contract with the Witch.
Rahzel Anadis from Dazzle. Rahzel was another person Lily met on her first day in Holly Heights and helped her get oriented. Several months later, Rahzel started working for her part-time at The Witch’s Wardrobe. And being another magic user, she became one of the few people that Lily confided to about her magic. They worked together when faced with some of the Landlord’s tricks such as being locked in a library with the Landlord’s apparently dead body and being on a cruise ship that seemed to be haunted. And although she offered to punch people a few times on Lily’s behalf, Lily managed to talk her out of it! With her departure from Holly Heights, Lily left the shop to her.
Veronica from Bokura no Kiseki. Veronica was another friend who learned of Lily’s magic. A princess from a world where magic existed, she became indignant when she heard about how the people in Lily’s hometown had treated her, believing it to be unfair. After hesitating a bit, Lily admitted that she knew magic and that it had been the reason she was shunned. They also became neighbors when Veronica moved into the house across the street when she turned 18. Due to the magical roses in February, Lily ended up hating Veronica for a while but felt embarrassed about it afterwards and that she needed to apologize even if it had been under the influence of the Landlord’s magic. With things back to normal, they occasionally visited and took turns trying out each other’s cooking.
Kotarou Katsura and Gintoki Sakata from Gintama. Among the older residents of Holly Heights, Lily sort of became odd friends with Katsura and Gintoki. Lily’s early encounters with Katsura were him showing up at her door to trick or treat and to sell sweets as a very pushy salesman. She grew to think of him as a weird actor fellow from the way he talked about being on a television show back home. She also learned about some of the more serious problems in his world related to aliens invading Earth. Katsura developed a crush on her but Lily was oblivious to it.
Later on, she also met Gintoki who arrived in Holly Heights some months after Katsura and also got some glimpses of a troubled past in his own world. And one time, Lily mentioned that the seamstresses at her shop could custom make things, unknowingly setting off a chain of events where Katsura stole Gintoki’s robe to have a duplicate made as a gift. In general, they were friendly even if she thought them a bit strange at times.
Chiaki Nanami and Ibuki Mioda from Dangan Ronpa. Chiaki was one of Lion and Eagle’s schoolmates at the elementary school. Lily initially met her at the 2014 Halloween party and was surprised to learn that she was only in elementary school despite looking like a teenager. She worried a bit that other kids might have teased her as a result for being different and because Chiaki mentioned her assigned parents had disappeared. The girl later became a customer at Lily’s shop and Lily told her a bit about the vintage fashions she sold.
It wasn’t until many months later that Ibuki arrived and Lily spoke to her because she mentioned looking for Chiaki. Lily found her rather strange and they didn’t always get along due to Ibuki’s energetic nature and wild ideas such as the suggestion during that first conversation that she might be stalking Chiaki!
Makoto Tachibana from Free! Another of Lily’s younger friends, she sometimes talked with Makoto about gardening since he and a friend had opened a flower shop in town and she taught him how to dry flowers. In October, she made a protective medallion for him when he confessed that he got scared easily although she passed it off as a good luck charm rather than telling him it was magical and that she was a witch.
Hajime Ichinose from Gatchaman Crowds. Hajime was assigned as Lily and Lezard’s new daughter in early October. In the few weeks that they lived together before Lezard’s disappearance, Lily found her to be cheerful and energetic and generally got along with her.
Inventory: the clothes she’s wearing (a vintage dress and a pair of Keds), a protective medicine bundle (a charm bag on a braided belt of silk), a protective medallion, one of Lezard’s shirts (I imagine her clutching it and trying to feel his vibrations from it when the Witch shows up to make her offer.)
Abilities: Lily is one of the most powerful witches in San Francisco and has a lot of magic. Although her magic is versatile and can be used for many purposes (protection, healing, persuasion, glamours and exorcisms are just a few), it tends to be much subtler and take more time than magic in other canons. As Lily points out a few times, she can’t just wiggle her nose or point a wand and make magic happen.
For example, one of her main talents is brewing and it’s noted the first time she brewed in the series that it took an hour of boiling for the brew to be ready. Sometimes, the brewing itself is enough to cast the spell but other times she takes the resulting liquid and uses for purposes such as drawing magic circles or giving it to others to drink. In a similar vein, she also often puts together charms and carves protective medallions. And even makes a mandragora (a homunculus created from a mandrake root) in one case although this required burying the root for a month after it was prepared.
Lily’s other specialty is sensing vibrations from textiles about the people who wore them, usually personality and emotions. She can also do this to a lesser extent with other inanimate objects and buildings. While she can use the things she senses to make educated guesses about things that might have happened, she does not have the ability to see actual memories from this. Also in terms of sensing things normal people wouldn’t, she can try to read people’s auras.
She’s capable of summoning and has to take care not to say the names of demons for fear of accidentally summoning them. On the opposite side of the coin, she can also exorcise them.
She has a special connection with snakes, inherited from her father, and believes it saved her when the people of her hometown tried to exorcise her. She seems to be able to influence their actions and is capable of casting a spell that makes the victim think they have snakes inside of them as well as an antidote spell.
There are also a variety of other minor powers that she can use without having to brew or create a charm that could be roughly grouped together as psychokinesis: knocking a person off their feet with an energy blast, producing light from her hand, lighting candles without touching them, causing lights to turn on or off, animating inanimate objects.
She has an inability to sink in water due to being a witch and normally floats like a cork.
Sex magic exists in her world but with Lily’s lack of practice with relationships, she ends up unintentionally casting a couple of times and is pretty embarrassed the next morning when she wakes up to find clothes dancing around the shop or that there were rose petals all over the room. (The scenes fade to black and it’s more of a humorous thing in canon. It’s also the kind of thing she finds embarrassing so she’d be unlikely to ever openly talk about it.)
On the more mundane side of things, Lily is skilled at gardening, growing a large variety of herbs on her terrace for use in her spells. She’s very knowledgeable about botanicals and can also mix them into things like poultices even without her healing magic. She’s also a good cook, making her mother’s Cajun recipes when she feels nostalgic and baking fairly often. And due to all the laundry she does for her shop, she’s familiar with many different methods of cleaning textiles and removing stains.
(Note: She lost her canon powers when she arrived in Holly Heights but regained most of her magic during her time in the game. The exceptions are being able to sense from people and from places.)
Strengths and Weaknesses:
Strengths
One of the strongest witches in San Francisco. Lily’s magical talents are exceptional, stronger than most other witches that she’s ever met. She refrained from ever joining a coven because she already had so much power on her own and feared what forces might be unleashed when her magic was added to a whole group of witches.
Great concentration. Lily’s magic is about focusing intentions to achieve the desired results so she’s developed great concentration as a result.
Very knowledgeable about plants. She’s great with plants, being a talented gardener and quite knowledgeable about their uses in brewing, making charms, and healing.
Excellent at brewing and crafting. Brewing in her cauldron is something that she’s especially good at and she’s also talented at the crafty side of magic like putting together charms, carving protective medallions, and making spirit bottles.
Resilient and able to bounce back quickly. Lily’s been through a lot and does have trust and abandonment issues but she but seems pretty resilient both mentally and physically considering that she survived everything that happened to her in childhood without going crazy. And she’s often ready to go back to work within a day or two even when things that would traumatize most people happen. For example, she nearly drowned after La Llorona pulled her under San Francisco Bay but was ready to open the shop as usual the next morning.
Weaknesses
Socially awkward and a bad judge of character. Lily didn’t really have any friends growing up other than her grandmother Graciela since the townspeople shunned her. And she spent many years wandering the world as a loner so she doesn’t really have that much experience with social situations. It’s not until San Francisco that she really makes friends. As a result, she’s not always the best judge of character and can sometimes be deceived by people with bad intentions.
Not in complete control of her magic. Although Lily has a great deal of power, she’s not always in control of it, especially when her emotions are running wild. This can be dangerous and result in people getting hurt such as during the exorcism back in her hometown. Even in less serious situations, objects can go flying off shelves or cast about if she’s upset or angry.
Terrible at certain types of magic. Despite all her powers, Lily is terrible at scrying despite others saying that a witch of her abilities should be able to see. She also lacks a talent for fighting magic, preferring instead to brew in the calm of her kitchen.
Insecure. She tends to doubt herself at times, uncertain if she can accomplish what’s needed with her magic or feeling inferior when she compares herself to other women. Meeting Calypso for the first time, she feels jealous and like “a shadowy little gremlin” in comparison.
Laziness about learning new things. Lily can be kind of lazy about learning new things without others to give her a push. She was kicked of high school and never graduated and it wasn’t until her San Francisco friends encouraged her to do so that she actually studied for the GED. Similarly, she was forced to leave Jarod before she completed her training with Graciela and doesn’t seem to have made much of an effort in all the years that she traveled the world since there are still magic-related things that Aidan or Sailor have to explain to her.
( SAMPLE )
Characterization Sample:
A prose log with Lezard from Holly Heights
A network post from Holly Heights
Another network post from Holly Heights