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The Witch Durant
The greater the shadow, the closer to the light we dance.
- — Nadya
Nadya, also known somewhat cryptically as "the Witch Durant," is a wandering vagrant living out of an old Winnebago as she travels up and down the west coast. Most folks pass her off as a con-artist, peddling charms against ill fortune or similar snake-oil to the gullible... but others know that her skills are anything but trickery. And no, she's not actually Romani, though that's another rumor following her around.
Personality[]
Cheerful, fatalistic, sardonic and silly by turns, the only constant about Nadya is the fact that she always seems to find something to smile about. Whether that thing is herself, others, or the situation in general is up for grabs. However, the smiles and smartass remarks never get in the way of getting done whatever needs to be done. When she's working, Nadya steadies down quite a lot from her usual demeanor, putting whatever job is at hand before her (admittedly somewhat odd) sense of the ridiculous.
SKILLS[]
ACADEMICS[]
- Novice
- Nothing particularly out of the ordinary, amounting to what you'd expect from the classic public school curriculum, supplemented by experience and the internet.
COMBAT[]
- Novice
- Largely amounting to a good deal of practice at avoiding being made into a meal, with defense being far more important than causing any appreciable damage to anything. On the other hand, Nadya fights dirty when she fights, and anyone thinking she'll be a soft mark will end up with bashed ears, broken fingers, and similar painful-but-minor injuries as she tries to get away.
LORE[]
- Competent
- When dealing with the forces of darkness, you need to be specific. That means understanding the question as well as the answer. While Nadya may not know specifics such as the True Secret Names of specific demons or the location of the One True Grail or suchlike, but she knows the weaknesses of most eldritch species, their habitats and habits, and the sorts of things you'd expect a zoologist to know. Just about stuff that goes bump in the night.
- And she may find a vampire's reactions to their species' "scientific" terminology amusing.
SURVIVALISM[]
- Competent
- During the course of her esoteric education, Nadya learned quite a bit of woods-lore that isn't quite druidism; she knows which plants are poisonous, which can be used for what kinds of folk remedies, and similar such things as well as a bit of knowledge on the practice of hunting. She may not be able to completely live off the land, but there aren't many natural life forms in North America that she isn't familiar with the uses of.
POWERS[]
HEDGE MAGIC[]
- Basic
- Nadya's magic hearkens back to the style of the 'strange person in the woods brewing up odd potions' stories. While most often employed for things like potions against illness or good luck charms, it is a generalist school that operates on the idea that, with the right ingredients, you can accomplish nearly anything. None of her effects are particularly flashy or powerful, but she can brew you a tea that'll clear the sludge from your lungs or make you a cream that'll clear up your skin. Get her the proper gubbins and she might be able to manage something fancy!
This is kind of a blanket ability that covers the Healing, Elementalism, and Spirituality styles of magic all at the Basic level.
WARDS[]
- Enhanced
- Something Nadya has always been particularly good at, and what really allows her to continue her current lifestyle, is warding. Glyphs and charms and seals against all manner of thing adorn her mobile home, partially for her own protection and partially as wares for sale. Having trouble with roaches? Hang one of these in the cabinet under your sink. Want to protect your store against shoplifting? Use this gunk to draw this symbol on the underside of the main counter. A pesky vampire not willing to accept a polite 'no thank you'? Wear this necklace, and for $5 more she'll throw in one for ghosts too.
ADVANTAGES[]
MINOR ESOTERIC REPUTATION[]
"The Witch Durant" is something of a title, granted to Nadya by the coven she studied with before taking her practice abroad. While it doesn't confer anything resembling rank, there are some who know the name and the reputation attached to it, namely that of a granter of protection and succor to those that need it. She's been doing this for about two decades or so, after all.
THE WINNEBAGO[]
While this beast of a camper has certainly seen better days, it's holding together rather well considering its age. Sure there's some duct tape on some of the seat cushions, and one of the windows has a crack all the way across it, and the gas mileage is pretty awful... Really, the fact that it works as well as it does is something of a miracle. Witches, go figure.
WEAKNESSES[]
HOMELESS VAGRANT[]
Despite having a Winnebago in reasonable condition (everything works, even the tape deck if you jiggle it right), Nadya does not have a fixed address and lacks most forms of proper modern documentation as a result.
NO SPONTANEOUS CASTING[]
Any mystical effect Nadya could ever hope to enact requires preparation and time to enact. Even things that do not appear to require a full ritual still need specific components to be arranged or utilized in a specific manner, and it's obnoxiously difficult to inscribe a spell circle on the ground when some big horrible nasty is trying to eat you.
Nadya Artomovna Morozova was born deep within the old Soviet Union before its collapse, though she certainly didn't spend even most of her life there. Her family eventually immigrated to America, settled down, and worked on rebuilding their lives. Still only barely a teenager, Nadya was fairly quick to adapt to this new life, a new school, new language... It may not have been the smoothest transition, but in time, everything steadied down.
If asked, Nadya would be hard-pressed to define just when she started slipping into the paranormal. The Russian Old Country has always been steeped in folklore and mythology, and such things just seemed to come naturally. A bit of superstition passed down from her grandmother, a bit of 'folk remedy' her da used for colds... Perhaps that could have been the end of it, if she hadn't ended up caught in the outskirts of a dark coven's escapades. A few of her friends were directly involved in dealing with the witches that had turned their knowledge to selfish and destructive ends, and by extension Nadya herself was dragged into things. Learned things.
Years later, when most people would be settling into a career and starting to set up savings for retirement, or planning a family, Nadya formally adopted her title as the Witch Durant, liquidated her assets, and took to roaming in a second-hand Winnebago to ply her new trade. Her parents were confused at first, but they grew up in the Old Country, and they understood the sorts of things a witch needed to do. These days, she travels up and down the west coast peddling her skills and wares, following the winds and her whims.