Post by Josiah Gray on Apr 19, 2012 19:53:56 GMT -5
Player: Josiah
Contact: PM account
Intentions: Hero
Background
Name: Josiah Gray
Race: Human
Species: NA
Age: 21
Tier: 3
Social
Place of Birth: Columbia, Alexandria
Allegiances: Alexandria, the Dragon Knights
Aspirations: Find his brother
Nicknames: The Blue Mage, Jo, Josey
Titles: None
Relatives: Elijah Gray (Twin), Abraham Gray (older brother, deceased), James and Esther Gray (parents)
Significant Other: None
Mental
Personality: Like many an introvert, Josiah starts out quiet and shy, keeping his personal feelings and thoughts to himself with strangers or groups, passive until such a time that he has something genuine to offer or inquire of the conversation. Go through a few layers, and it's clear he's an intelligent dreamer with the wisdom that comes from a painful childhood and a vast assortment of life experiences crammed into several wandering years, courtesy of Sakuya. He has a large appreciation for the quiet, subtle moments of life, for literature and the arts, and feels strongly for fairness and kindness as major virtues to which all should abide - starting with himself. He cares deeply for all living beings, and he goes to extreme lengths to help and support them. He does this not just because it's the right thing to do, but also as part of his codependent personality. He intensely feels the need to prove himself and find recognition in others, and so keeps a lot of secrets about himself.
Likes: Kindness, cloudy days, twilight, the night sky, quiet, classical music, humor, books, cool temperatures, being complimented, helping others, second chances, learning, reading, magic
Dislikes: Ignorance, hatred, harsh words, sunny days, absolute darkness, bright lights, hard rock, heavy metal, swearing, sports, seeing people suffer, hurting people, having his secrets exposed, letting people down
Strengths: Josiah's mind is his greatest asset. An extremely intelligent individual, his massive repository of knowledge is sort of the result of cheating - gaining knowledge from the minds of others around him rather than a book like normal people. When it comes to magic, he's also an originator, an extremely creative mage, using his magical abilities in a great variety of ways without even needing to be taught. He is a logical individual and tries to think ahead as much as possible before committing to an action.
Weaknesses: Josiah suffers from extreme self-consciousness issues, physically and socially. He covers himself up in several layers at almost all times to take care of the former, and agonizes over social encounters with friends and strangers alike when it comes to the latter. An overdeveloped sense of empathy for his fellow creature has become full blown co-dependency. He needs people to tell him he's doing good and helping them, to reaffirm him, and conversely is highly susceptible to a cutting tongue. It's all too easy for him to become depressed.
Physical
Major Details: Pale skin, brown eyes, short dark brown hair, glasses and bucket hat almost constantly, 5'8"
Appearance: Slightly less than average height, Josiah has a rather average physical appearance. He's not that muscular, and could hardly even be described as "athletic." His skin varies between being a sickly pale and just untanned, depending on how well he's feeling. He seems to perpetually have dark rings under his eyes, which themselves can easily get bloodshot from different sources. His brown hair, while short, still manages to look scruffy at times. Glasses and a bucket hat give his face a near-perpetual shadowed look.
Natural Abilities: Josiah has only average strength at best, and struggles at lifting over 50 pounds manually.
Natural Traits: Josiah has the average traits of a human being.
Strengths: Josiah's only real physical strengths are his reaction time and eye for detail. While his body can't keep up, his eyes are able to track fast moving objects with proficiency thanks to Sakuya's training. He also has a proficient, albeit average-sounding, singing voice.
Weaknesses: Josiah's body is poorly off. He lacks much strength, or much agility - both in his muscles, and his joints. He has a weak immune system as well. Allergies, asthma, pains in his wrist and ankles and general sickness are all common ailments in his life. He has poor handwriting, and his eyes are more photosensitive than the average person. He doesn't sleep well, and must sleep much longer than the average person to get a good night's rest - or cheat and use magic.
Magical
Specializations:
- Tier 1: Psychic (Mental), Proficiency 3.
- Tier 2: Elementalism (Mental), Proficiency 3. Josiah can create and manipulate many natural aspects of the world, both solid ones like earth, water and plants, and energy-based ones like fire, lightning and light.
- Tier 3: Kanji (Written), Proficiency 3.
- Tier 4:
- Tier 5:
Visual Display: When performing strong acts of magic, his eyes glow a dark blue. This same color shows up when he projects raw psychic energy, uses his Written magic, or when he attempts to use certain elements, like fire, lightning, or light.
Special Abilities: Alternative Sense (Magic), Empathy, Elemental Shape (Snow), Teleportation
Bonus Special Abilities: Familiar, Insight
Unique Abilities: None
Strengths: Josiah's strength is fully in the power of his mind and his attempts to "live and breathe magic". He is a highly skilled telepath and dextrous telekinetic for his age, and is especially proficient in clairvoyance, the psychic art of scrying for people, places or events. A true Elementalist, there are many aspects of the natural world open to him, but like some druids, he has only really trained - and prefers to use - that skill only for air, earth, water, ice and wood. Due to his ingenuity, he's also proficient at using his various specializations to strengthen one another, depending on what he's attempting to do. For example, he has numerous "programs" written into his mind to help him focus and concentrate on different mental spells at the same time.
Weaknesses: As much as Josiah has trained to make magic his life, his abilities are far from infallible. Using magic too much, or going beyond his limitations has led to many a headache throughout his life, and even now, migraines are a frequent fact of life. Despite the breadth of his Elementalism and his written magic, he himself doesn't have the mind or experience to use them to their full potential. His use of energy-based elements of nature is vastly weaker than other kinds, and he is partially afraid of using them as well. The lethality of those elements - fire, lightning, light - weighs heavily on his mind and leads him to holding back too much, even against significant, monstrous threats. Clairvoyance is itself a highly complicated art to use, especially when one is trying to see the past or future, or searching for an unknown, or fighting through wards, or being fought by a mage's resistance, or ...
Inventory
Mundane:
Magical:
Amethyst Amulet - Written/Material (Perpetual). A silver amulet hanging on a black cord at heart height. A magical blue amethyst is embedded in the center, and the image of a dragon wraps around it. Focused by the dragon, the crystal aids focus and empowers Mental forms of magic by .5 Proficiency.
History
The story of Josiah's life is as much the story of his brother, Elijah. Twins to a family that already had an seven-year-old son, the pregnancy was rough for their mother. Elijah was born a few minutes ahead, a healthy baby boy despite it all. Josiah, on the other hand, was born small and unhealthy - and would have died, if not for all the work poured into keeping him alive by doctor first, and healers second.
Alive, the younger twin was still far from well. The doctors presumed it was Elijah who had received more nutrition in utero, leaving Josiah under-nourished. The near loss, coupled with Josiah's comparative fragility to the other two, led to some spoiling by both parents. The once-only child, Abe, became keenly aware that he was not the focal point of his parents' attention over the coming weeks.
As weeks turned into months, Josiah's health turned into more visits to doctors and healers, concerned at every runny nose and the hidden consequences thereof. Bills were racked up, always tolerable enough for their living conditions, but it left little for the extra expenses a young teen is told by society to expect from his parents - which Abe was, and did, to his great dissatisfaction.
By the time the twins were walking around, the worst happened: their mother, Esther, lost her job. Suddenly down a major source of income, "making ends meet" was dashed into "struggling to pay the next bill." James was already working most of the day, and Esther had to work two jobs to make half of what she had been before. Overtime was piled on even as they continued to worry over their often-sickly child.
No money for a babysitter meant the twins were prime targets for Abe's frustration. There were more than enough opportunities for him to make it clear to the younger boys that they were poor because of Jo, that they lost their old house because of him, that they barely got any presents because of him, that every time Jo got sick and had to go to the doctor was just digging them deeper into debt. The teasing went from mischievous to malicious fast.
Jo and El, as similar as "identical" twins usually are, had always acted differently from birth, but it was Abe's emotional abuse that cemented the difference in their personalities. Jo took the words to heart. Elijah got straight-up indignant. The former found his way into a book and crawled inside, trying to bother anyone and everyone as little as possible. The latter started copying the nearest source on martial arts he could find and got to punching his aggression out.
As the three got older, their dynamics evolved further along those lines. Abe got bigger, and rougher, and fell in with increasingly darker crowds in high school. Josiah got quieter, more nervous, and kept to his books - books more suitable for someone several years older. Elijah became more determined, more stern, and more aggressive. Abe and El fought on more than one occasion, when an easy target's twin brother came to his defense. As the oldest by almost twice their age, the (im)balance was firmly in Abe's favor. Yelling and getting grounded was never punishment enough to act as a deterrent.
And then the unexpected happened... Maybe it was because of all the magic Jo had been exposed to growing up... Maybe it was a side effect of being so sickly, a way of his spirit reacting to his physical weakness... Maybe, he was just always meant to be a mage. It started as telepathy when they were only nine. Elijah started hearing his brother's silent thoughts, and Josiah heard his in return. Telekinesis showed up second - only minor control at first, but enough that Josiah didn't have to flip the pages by hand after a few weeks. Not wanting to seem different, Josiah asked Elijah to keep it as the twins' little secret.
It wasn't until El and Abe had started physically fighting again that the secret slipped. Abe had pinned the older twin, and was preparing to do ... something. He didn't get that far. Josiah separated them. Forcefully.
There was more than a little rage behind Abraham's eyes then, as he realized the small, useless, pampered wimp of a brother was spoiled by the universe as well. Throwing El to the side, the eldest at his most furious went after Josiah instead, and abandoned all pretense of control. A broken arm from the pounding was met with discordant sobs before Elijah moved back into the fight and struck their older brother with more force than a ten-year-old has a right to put out.
The investigators said Elijah had hit him with a telekinetic blast of his own. They hypothesized - but didn't say - that Elijah's use of magic was likely due to Josiah, and that the pair had inadvertently become mage and familiar. But that didn't change the fact that Abe had a broken neck before he even hit the ground. Even under the circumstances, a lethal use of magic was grounds for required enrollment at a magical boarding school, for training as much as isolation from the nonmagical community. An emotional argument between parents, children and law enforcement eventually led to the conclusion that separating the twins would be an unnecessary cruelty.
It was a hard transition for everyone. Growing up in a magic school was an entirely different world from their small house. They went from being mostly alone and self-sufficiently left to their own devices, to a rigid curriculum of guidance and conformity.
As a nervous, unhealthy bookworm, Josiah was a prime target for bullying even there. Even magic schools have them - and though the teachers were more alert, the threats were more malevolent. Outed as a killer, such individuals gave El a wide berth. That only gave Josiah even more reasons to stay with his twin, who every day looked a little less identical. More than once, a person had started teasing the younger only for the older to step in. Elijah got used to being sent to detention and doing extra chores. The Infirmary got used to repairing telekinetically broken limbs.
The school gave them no end of opportunities to train their magic, but it wasn't "home." The atmosphere was designed to teach them discipline and control. For El, it was absolutely stifling, and it wasn't long before El had become determined to get back home - Josiah safely in tow. The bookworm was no fan of the place either, even if he was easier to placate and didn't complain about his treatment. He was for escaping, in as much as El was for it. The pair spent half their time training, and the other half trying to get away from the school. They even had a few "successes," but it was getting home afterward that was the problem. They were caught shortly after leaving the premises each time.
- each time, except the last. They made it outside, and were running (read: El was running, and pulling Jo along like a flailing kite behind him) through the forest when they were stopped by a woman they'd never seen before. It was more surprise to find anyone out so late than anything she'd done that stopped them. They thought she was one of the teachers, come to turn them back around. She was a teacher ... but not one of theirs. Yet.
But she was there about going back.
Young and impulsive and desperate to get "home," they were in vital need of a talking-to and the Fey was the one to give it. Two telepathic conversations were divulged concurrently to each of the boys in the relative privacy of their mind.
"You keep hiding, Josiah ... behind behind your brother ... in a book ... in daydreams that pass with the hour ... You hide from him. You hide from others. You hide from yourself... That's such an awful lot of hard work, not to stand out. You're brother keeps trying to protect you. He's devoted so much of himself to you, because he loves you. Isn't it about time you show him you don't need protecting? Isn't it time the two of you have your own lives?"
An offer to leave the school and all it represented was taken by both. All they had to do was agree to be her students instead, though she wasn't much of the classroom teaching kind. "We'll survive."
One argument between the school's administration and Sakuya was ended with, "It's funny that you still think this is up to you."
"Training" with the ancient Fey, if it could even be called that, was an entirely different experience. They never stayed in one place for long - Sakuya was whimsical like that - and so half of everything they learned was from hands-on experience. ("And this is the Obsidian Wilds." "Isn't this place supposed to be a death trap?" "Yes, it is. Avoid the ROUSes. They shed.")
Something must have clicked in Josiah, because it was quickly apparent in their journeys that Josiah was the better mage, and was rapidly outstripping his brother even further with his talents. A psychic herself, she was able to further Josiah's awareness of so many different mental abilities, and Josiah's natural aptitude for magic had him learning and growing with rapid ease. Elijah similarly gained plenty of instruction and training with his own brand of Telekinesis, and Sakuya taught him to be as much a warrior as a mage.
Bouts of training went on and off throughout their many adventures as the pair of boys grew up under the ancient one's tutelage. The time went by fast, considering how the weekly lull of school had been replaced with "what crazy thing will happen next." They were in their late teens when The Accident happened. An investigation into a small town's disappearing livestock turned into something worse as they stumbled upon a pack of feral Werecreatures running together on the outskirts. The three tracked their movements to a cave where they transformed. Sakuya decided they should confront the pack the twilight before, where "they'll all be in one spot." She was hoping to end things diplomatically - or as diplomatically as they could.
A good idea in theory, it went horribly wrong. When the pack, angry and afraid at being outed, eventually attacked, the two telepaths tried to contain them all with non-lethal measures. Elijah was injured defending the more vulnerable of the two. More specifically, Elijah was bitten defending him. It wasn't as horrible as it could have been. The bite was to his arm, Sakuya had experience aiding weres, and since he was already a mage, it was easier for him to control the transformation experiences.
The fact that his twin brother was just cursed with a permanent, life-altering affliction that would subject him to public, social discrimination for the rest of his life didn't mean much at all, oh no.
Elijah's aggression was still a problem... and their lifestyle left him with no lack of material to feed that aggression. There were several occasions where he almost transformed in public, with the imminent intent of punching someone in the face, through the window, onto something probably breakable. It wasn't until the saber-were had lost control after being injured in a fight with a bunch of goblins, lashing out at everyone - his brother and teacher included - that he realized how deep the rabbit hole went.
When Jo woke up a few days after that, Elijah was just gone. He'd taken his things in the night. An attempt to sense him turned up nothing, and Sakuya refused to help. One emotionally charged conversation later led to the one-of-two running as fast as he could in the first direction he thought of. Elijah wasn't there. Sakuya told him that he wouldn't be, that both Jo and El needed to grow in ways they couldn't do while the other was there anymore.
Jo ignored her. In one of his most decisive moments, he was determined to find his brother. He wondered, later, if she intended that all along, but for her part, she would not help. The boys were young men, adults, strong in heart and soul. They didn't need her, or any other teacher anymore, but there were still others who did. The seeds had taken root. There were other seeds to plant.
One day they'll get home together. He only has an entire world to search for him. If he can help a few people along the way, so much the better.
Familiar
Name: Lord
Race: Spirit
Species: Item Familiar
Tier: 1
Appearance: In appearance like a dragon, his spectral shape is the massive image of a western frost dragon, translucent white, with giant limbs and claws. In his humanoid form, he is still a very feral looking draconic figure, lacking in wings, walking digitigrade yet bipedal.
Natural Abilities: Being a spirit, Lord does not really have any natural abilities.
Natural Traits: His dragon form possesses wings, claws, and thick tail. His humanoid form lacks the wings, and are more smaller, as sized for a humanoid.
Specializations:
- Shared
Special Abilities: Phasing, Healing
Bonus Special Abilities: Telekinesis, Humanoid Shapeshifting, Levitation
Unique Abilities: As an Item Familiar Spirit, Lord is connected to the Amethyst Amulet and to Josiah. He can exist either solely within the amulet, or as an external spirit.
Strengths: A representation of Josiah's detached, logical side, Lord is direct and decisive, emotionally, magically, and physically. He has no qualms using Josiah's more dangerous aspects of magic for him, so long as it is a matter of safeguarding him. He is fundamentally a protective spirit, and will willingly jump headlong into danger, if it means doing that.
Weaknesses: At Josiah's current strength, Lord cannot distance himself more than a mile from the amulet, and can only maintain his phased, solid form for a few minutes at best. Socially, he lacks tact and puts Josiah's well-being over everything and everyone else, and he lacks almost all of Josiah's mental skill and prowess. He suffers from the normal weaknesses of a Spirit.
Contact: PM account
Intentions: Hero
Background
Name: Josiah Gray
Race: Human
Species: NA
Age: 21
Tier: 3
Social
Place of Birth: Columbia, Alexandria
Allegiances: Alexandria, the Dragon Knights
Aspirations: Find his brother
Nicknames: The Blue Mage, Jo, Josey
Titles: None
Relatives: Elijah Gray (Twin), Abraham Gray (older brother, deceased), James and Esther Gray (parents)
Significant Other: None
Mental
Personality: Like many an introvert, Josiah starts out quiet and shy, keeping his personal feelings and thoughts to himself with strangers or groups, passive until such a time that he has something genuine to offer or inquire of the conversation. Go through a few layers, and it's clear he's an intelligent dreamer with the wisdom that comes from a painful childhood and a vast assortment of life experiences crammed into several wandering years, courtesy of Sakuya. He has a large appreciation for the quiet, subtle moments of life, for literature and the arts, and feels strongly for fairness and kindness as major virtues to which all should abide - starting with himself. He cares deeply for all living beings, and he goes to extreme lengths to help and support them. He does this not just because it's the right thing to do, but also as part of his codependent personality. He intensely feels the need to prove himself and find recognition in others, and so keeps a lot of secrets about himself.
Likes: Kindness, cloudy days, twilight, the night sky, quiet, classical music, humor, books, cool temperatures, being complimented, helping others, second chances, learning, reading, magic
Dislikes: Ignorance, hatred, harsh words, sunny days, absolute darkness, bright lights, hard rock, heavy metal, swearing, sports, seeing people suffer, hurting people, having his secrets exposed, letting people down
Strengths: Josiah's mind is his greatest asset. An extremely intelligent individual, his massive repository of knowledge is sort of the result of cheating - gaining knowledge from the minds of others around him rather than a book like normal people. When it comes to magic, he's also an originator, an extremely creative mage, using his magical abilities in a great variety of ways without even needing to be taught. He is a logical individual and tries to think ahead as much as possible before committing to an action.
Weaknesses: Josiah suffers from extreme self-consciousness issues, physically and socially. He covers himself up in several layers at almost all times to take care of the former, and agonizes over social encounters with friends and strangers alike when it comes to the latter. An overdeveloped sense of empathy for his fellow creature has become full blown co-dependency. He needs people to tell him he's doing good and helping them, to reaffirm him, and conversely is highly susceptible to a cutting tongue. It's all too easy for him to become depressed.
Physical
Major Details: Pale skin, brown eyes, short dark brown hair, glasses and bucket hat almost constantly, 5'8"
Appearance: Slightly less than average height, Josiah has a rather average physical appearance. He's not that muscular, and could hardly even be described as "athletic." His skin varies between being a sickly pale and just untanned, depending on how well he's feeling. He seems to perpetually have dark rings under his eyes, which themselves can easily get bloodshot from different sources. His brown hair, while short, still manages to look scruffy at times. Glasses and a bucket hat give his face a near-perpetual shadowed look.
Natural Abilities: Josiah has only average strength at best, and struggles at lifting over 50 pounds manually.
Natural Traits: Josiah has the average traits of a human being.
Strengths: Josiah's only real physical strengths are his reaction time and eye for detail. While his body can't keep up, his eyes are able to track fast moving objects with proficiency thanks to Sakuya's training. He also has a proficient, albeit average-sounding, singing voice.
Weaknesses: Josiah's body is poorly off. He lacks much strength, or much agility - both in his muscles, and his joints. He has a weak immune system as well. Allergies, asthma, pains in his wrist and ankles and general sickness are all common ailments in his life. He has poor handwriting, and his eyes are more photosensitive than the average person. He doesn't sleep well, and must sleep much longer than the average person to get a good night's rest - or cheat and use magic.
Magical
Specializations:
- Tier 1: Psychic (Mental), Proficiency 3.
- Tier 2: Elementalism (Mental), Proficiency 3. Josiah can create and manipulate many natural aspects of the world, both solid ones like earth, water and plants, and energy-based ones like fire, lightning and light.
- Tier 3: Kanji (Written), Proficiency 3.
- Tier 4:
- Tier 5:
Visual Display: When performing strong acts of magic, his eyes glow a dark blue. This same color shows up when he projects raw psychic energy, uses his Written magic, or when he attempts to use certain elements, like fire, lightning, or light.
Special Abilities: Alternative Sense (Magic), Empathy, Elemental Shape (Snow), Teleportation
Bonus Special Abilities: Familiar, Insight
Unique Abilities: None
Strengths: Josiah's strength is fully in the power of his mind and his attempts to "live and breathe magic". He is a highly skilled telepath and dextrous telekinetic for his age, and is especially proficient in clairvoyance, the psychic art of scrying for people, places or events. A true Elementalist, there are many aspects of the natural world open to him, but like some druids, he has only really trained - and prefers to use - that skill only for air, earth, water, ice and wood. Due to his ingenuity, he's also proficient at using his various specializations to strengthen one another, depending on what he's attempting to do. For example, he has numerous "programs" written into his mind to help him focus and concentrate on different mental spells at the same time.
Weaknesses: As much as Josiah has trained to make magic his life, his abilities are far from infallible. Using magic too much, or going beyond his limitations has led to many a headache throughout his life, and even now, migraines are a frequent fact of life. Despite the breadth of his Elementalism and his written magic, he himself doesn't have the mind or experience to use them to their full potential. His use of energy-based elements of nature is vastly weaker than other kinds, and he is partially afraid of using them as well. The lethality of those elements - fire, lightning, light - weighs heavily on his mind and leads him to holding back too much, even against significant, monstrous threats. Clairvoyance is itself a highly complicated art to use, especially when one is trying to see the past or future, or searching for an unknown, or fighting through wards, or being fought by a mage's resistance, or ...
Inventory
Mundane:
Magical:
Amethyst Amulet - Written/Material (Perpetual). A silver amulet hanging on a black cord at heart height. A magical blue amethyst is embedded in the center, and the image of a dragon wraps around it. Focused by the dragon, the crystal aids focus and empowers Mental forms of magic by .5 Proficiency.
History
The story of Josiah's life is as much the story of his brother, Elijah. Twins to a family that already had an seven-year-old son, the pregnancy was rough for their mother. Elijah was born a few minutes ahead, a healthy baby boy despite it all. Josiah, on the other hand, was born small and unhealthy - and would have died, if not for all the work poured into keeping him alive by doctor first, and healers second.
Alive, the younger twin was still far from well. The doctors presumed it was Elijah who had received more nutrition in utero, leaving Josiah under-nourished. The near loss, coupled with Josiah's comparative fragility to the other two, led to some spoiling by both parents. The once-only child, Abe, became keenly aware that he was not the focal point of his parents' attention over the coming weeks.
As weeks turned into months, Josiah's health turned into more visits to doctors and healers, concerned at every runny nose and the hidden consequences thereof. Bills were racked up, always tolerable enough for their living conditions, but it left little for the extra expenses a young teen is told by society to expect from his parents - which Abe was, and did, to his great dissatisfaction.
By the time the twins were walking around, the worst happened: their mother, Esther, lost her job. Suddenly down a major source of income, "making ends meet" was dashed into "struggling to pay the next bill." James was already working most of the day, and Esther had to work two jobs to make half of what she had been before. Overtime was piled on even as they continued to worry over their often-sickly child.
No money for a babysitter meant the twins were prime targets for Abe's frustration. There were more than enough opportunities for him to make it clear to the younger boys that they were poor because of Jo, that they lost their old house because of him, that they barely got any presents because of him, that every time Jo got sick and had to go to the doctor was just digging them deeper into debt. The teasing went from mischievous to malicious fast.
Jo and El, as similar as "identical" twins usually are, had always acted differently from birth, but it was Abe's emotional abuse that cemented the difference in their personalities. Jo took the words to heart. Elijah got straight-up indignant. The former found his way into a book and crawled inside, trying to bother anyone and everyone as little as possible. The latter started copying the nearest source on martial arts he could find and got to punching his aggression out.
As the three got older, their dynamics evolved further along those lines. Abe got bigger, and rougher, and fell in with increasingly darker crowds in high school. Josiah got quieter, more nervous, and kept to his books - books more suitable for someone several years older. Elijah became more determined, more stern, and more aggressive. Abe and El fought on more than one occasion, when an easy target's twin brother came to his defense. As the oldest by almost twice their age, the (im)balance was firmly in Abe's favor. Yelling and getting grounded was never punishment enough to act as a deterrent.
And then the unexpected happened... Maybe it was because of all the magic Jo had been exposed to growing up... Maybe it was a side effect of being so sickly, a way of his spirit reacting to his physical weakness... Maybe, he was just always meant to be a mage. It started as telepathy when they were only nine. Elijah started hearing his brother's silent thoughts, and Josiah heard his in return. Telekinesis showed up second - only minor control at first, but enough that Josiah didn't have to flip the pages by hand after a few weeks. Not wanting to seem different, Josiah asked Elijah to keep it as the twins' little secret.
It wasn't until El and Abe had started physically fighting again that the secret slipped. Abe had pinned the older twin, and was preparing to do ... something. He didn't get that far. Josiah separated them. Forcefully.
There was more than a little rage behind Abraham's eyes then, as he realized the small, useless, pampered wimp of a brother was spoiled by the universe as well. Throwing El to the side, the eldest at his most furious went after Josiah instead, and abandoned all pretense of control. A broken arm from the pounding was met with discordant sobs before Elijah moved back into the fight and struck their older brother with more force than a ten-year-old has a right to put out.
The investigators said Elijah had hit him with a telekinetic blast of his own. They hypothesized - but didn't say - that Elijah's use of magic was likely due to Josiah, and that the pair had inadvertently become mage and familiar. But that didn't change the fact that Abe had a broken neck before he even hit the ground. Even under the circumstances, a lethal use of magic was grounds for required enrollment at a magical boarding school, for training as much as isolation from the nonmagical community. An emotional argument between parents, children and law enforcement eventually led to the conclusion that separating the twins would be an unnecessary cruelty.
It was a hard transition for everyone. Growing up in a magic school was an entirely different world from their small house. They went from being mostly alone and self-sufficiently left to their own devices, to a rigid curriculum of guidance and conformity.
As a nervous, unhealthy bookworm, Josiah was a prime target for bullying even there. Even magic schools have them - and though the teachers were more alert, the threats were more malevolent. Outed as a killer, such individuals gave El a wide berth. That only gave Josiah even more reasons to stay with his twin, who every day looked a little less identical. More than once, a person had started teasing the younger only for the older to step in. Elijah got used to being sent to detention and doing extra chores. The Infirmary got used to repairing telekinetically broken limbs.
The school gave them no end of opportunities to train their magic, but it wasn't "home." The atmosphere was designed to teach them discipline and control. For El, it was absolutely stifling, and it wasn't long before El had become determined to get back home - Josiah safely in tow. The bookworm was no fan of the place either, even if he was easier to placate and didn't complain about his treatment. He was for escaping, in as much as El was for it. The pair spent half their time training, and the other half trying to get away from the school. They even had a few "successes," but it was getting home afterward that was the problem. They were caught shortly after leaving the premises each time.
- each time, except the last. They made it outside, and were running (read: El was running, and pulling Jo along like a flailing kite behind him) through the forest when they were stopped by a woman they'd never seen before. It was more surprise to find anyone out so late than anything she'd done that stopped them. They thought she was one of the teachers, come to turn them back around. She was a teacher ... but not one of theirs. Yet.
But she was there about going back.
Young and impulsive and desperate to get "home," they were in vital need of a talking-to and the Fey was the one to give it. Two telepathic conversations were divulged concurrently to each of the boys in the relative privacy of their mind.
"You keep hiding, Josiah ... behind behind your brother ... in a book ... in daydreams that pass with the hour ... You hide from him. You hide from others. You hide from yourself... That's such an awful lot of hard work, not to stand out. You're brother keeps trying to protect you. He's devoted so much of himself to you, because he loves you. Isn't it about time you show him you don't need protecting? Isn't it time the two of you have your own lives?"
An offer to leave the school and all it represented was taken by both. All they had to do was agree to be her students instead, though she wasn't much of the classroom teaching kind. "We'll survive."
One argument between the school's administration and Sakuya was ended with, "It's funny that you still think this is up to you."
"Training" with the ancient Fey, if it could even be called that, was an entirely different experience. They never stayed in one place for long - Sakuya was whimsical like that - and so half of everything they learned was from hands-on experience. ("And this is the Obsidian Wilds." "Isn't this place supposed to be a death trap?" "Yes, it is. Avoid the ROUSes. They shed.")
Something must have clicked in Josiah, because it was quickly apparent in their journeys that Josiah was the better mage, and was rapidly outstripping his brother even further with his talents. A psychic herself, she was able to further Josiah's awareness of so many different mental abilities, and Josiah's natural aptitude for magic had him learning and growing with rapid ease. Elijah similarly gained plenty of instruction and training with his own brand of Telekinesis, and Sakuya taught him to be as much a warrior as a mage.
Bouts of training went on and off throughout their many adventures as the pair of boys grew up under the ancient one's tutelage. The time went by fast, considering how the weekly lull of school had been replaced with "what crazy thing will happen next." They were in their late teens when The Accident happened. An investigation into a small town's disappearing livestock turned into something worse as they stumbled upon a pack of feral Werecreatures running together on the outskirts. The three tracked their movements to a cave where they transformed. Sakuya decided they should confront the pack the twilight before, where "they'll all be in one spot." She was hoping to end things diplomatically - or as diplomatically as they could.
A good idea in theory, it went horribly wrong. When the pack, angry and afraid at being outed, eventually attacked, the two telepaths tried to contain them all with non-lethal measures. Elijah was injured defending the more vulnerable of the two. More specifically, Elijah was bitten defending him. It wasn't as horrible as it could have been. The bite was to his arm, Sakuya had experience aiding weres, and since he was already a mage, it was easier for him to control the transformation experiences.
The fact that his twin brother was just cursed with a permanent, life-altering affliction that would subject him to public, social discrimination for the rest of his life didn't mean much at all, oh no.
Elijah's aggression was still a problem... and their lifestyle left him with no lack of material to feed that aggression. There were several occasions where he almost transformed in public, with the imminent intent of punching someone in the face, through the window, onto something probably breakable. It wasn't until the saber-were had lost control after being injured in a fight with a bunch of goblins, lashing out at everyone - his brother and teacher included - that he realized how deep the rabbit hole went.
When Jo woke up a few days after that, Elijah was just gone. He'd taken his things in the night. An attempt to sense him turned up nothing, and Sakuya refused to help. One emotionally charged conversation later led to the one-of-two running as fast as he could in the first direction he thought of. Elijah wasn't there. Sakuya told him that he wouldn't be, that both Jo and El needed to grow in ways they couldn't do while the other was there anymore.
Jo ignored her. In one of his most decisive moments, he was determined to find his brother. He wondered, later, if she intended that all along, but for her part, she would not help. The boys were young men, adults, strong in heart and soul. They didn't need her, or any other teacher anymore, but there were still others who did. The seeds had taken root. There were other seeds to plant.
One day they'll get home together. He only has an entire world to search for him. If he can help a few people along the way, so much the better.
Familiar
Name: Lord
Race: Spirit
Species: Item Familiar
Tier: 1
Appearance: In appearance like a dragon, his spectral shape is the massive image of a western frost dragon, translucent white, with giant limbs and claws. In his humanoid form, he is still a very feral looking draconic figure, lacking in wings, walking digitigrade yet bipedal.
Natural Abilities: Being a spirit, Lord does not really have any natural abilities.
Natural Traits: His dragon form possesses wings, claws, and thick tail. His humanoid form lacks the wings, and are more smaller, as sized for a humanoid.
Specializations:
- Shared
Special Abilities: Phasing, Healing
Bonus Special Abilities: Telekinesis, Humanoid Shapeshifting, Levitation
Unique Abilities: As an Item Familiar Spirit, Lord is connected to the Amethyst Amulet and to Josiah. He can exist either solely within the amulet, or as an external spirit.
Strengths: A representation of Josiah's detached, logical side, Lord is direct and decisive, emotionally, magically, and physically. He has no qualms using Josiah's more dangerous aspects of magic for him, so long as it is a matter of safeguarding him. He is fundamentally a protective spirit, and will willingly jump headlong into danger, if it means doing that.
Weaknesses: At Josiah's current strength, Lord cannot distance himself more than a mile from the amulet, and can only maintain his phased, solid form for a few minutes at best. Socially, he lacks tact and puts Josiah's well-being over everything and everyone else, and he lacks almost all of Josiah's mental skill and prowess. He suffers from the normal weaknesses of a Spirit.