Jonathan Travers

From Familia Niveum

Current revision as of 01:03, 30 August 2006

Duke of the British Mythos

Oh, yes, rather. Care for a spot of tea?

Affiliation

Light

Code of the Light:

1. Humanity must live, and live forever.
2. What must be done ought be done cleanly.
3. Humans must be protected, particularly from themselves.

Miraculous Abilities

• Aspect 1
  • 5 Permanent Aspect Miracle Points
• Domain 4
  • 6 Permanent Domain Miracle Points
• Realm 0
  • 5 Permanent Realm Miracle Points
• Spirit 3
  • 8 Permanent Spirit Miracle Points

Gifts

Unblemished Guise

(Penetration 1) Jonathan can disguise himself as an ordinary human, although a Power can penetrate this disguise with a little effort.

Limits

Focus: Excalibur

A limit of Domain ( +1 DMP ) Excalibur is always on Jonathan's person, though most of the time, it is not in its true form: this ability of the blade to change its shape was the thing Jonathan discovered in his poring over old myths that let him track it down. It is his bond with the previous Noble of the British Mythos, Arthur, whose spirit ascended to his station even as his body was rowed to Avalon; it broadens his puissance and control over his Estate.

Light Touch

A limit of Spirit (+3 SMP)

Jonathan is not imposing, and cannot directly control his Anchors, or work miracles through them without their consent. He must stay on good terms with them and keep them happy.

Restrictions

Bonds

• The sanctity of his Estate (5)
• Winnifred Burrington, his Anchor (5)
• Sarah Kincaid, his Anchor, a friend and former lover (5)
• Excalibur (3)
• His personal library in the Chancel (1)
• His father's treatise (1)

Virtue

Collected: The traditional British coolness under fire is an essential part of him. No matter how dire the circumstance or how frantic he is, Jonathan will be able to think rationally and use his full faculties; for example, even if scrambling to make it on time to an important event, he would not forget to take anything with him.

History

Jonathan Travers was born and raised in London, his father a scholar, his mother a minor actress. He grew up on old books, older buildings, tea and scones; as a teenager, to his parents' disappointment, he rebelled against the quietude of his life by taking up the company of wilder boys, and refused to continue his studies; he spent a lot of time on the streets, roaming all of London, from the Docklands to the West End; he returned with bruises and torn clothes, sometimes drunk, always finding his rebellion just a bit empty. His parents wrung their hands, unable to set him back on the right path.

It took two deaths to restore him to his former self: the first, that of one of his wildest friends, Sam Chambers; the older boy had drunk a bit too much, gone a bit too far, and wound up trying to rob a mysterious stranger carrying a folder of papers and getting stabbed for his trouble. The other was his father's. That night, he returned, panicked, to his home to find that his father had been stabbed in his study, although his mother had not heard anyone enter; the study itself was a mess, papers scattered everywhere, as though the killer had been looking for something, whether he found it or not.

A week later, Jonathan returned to quietness, to schooling and his studies, finding them comforting; following in his father's footsteps he went to Oxford, studying history, particularily that of England--and it was there that he came across his father's work, finding it fascinating--but there was far less published than there should have been, given the rich quality of his father's work; when he returned home that summer, he entered his father's study, tidy and rarely disturbed since the death that occurred there. The papers that had been there were gathered into stacks on bookshelves and in drawers; Jonathan spent the entirety of the summer going through them, putting together parts of a brilliant work that he understood could never have been published, because the implications were staggering. His father's other work investigated parallels between ancient and recent British myth--the papers in the study went far, far beyond that, tying together pieces of history and pieces of myth, from Arthurian legend to the actions and deaths of English royalty to fairies Under the Hill to trends in literature. It implied the supernatural, eerie things; it meticulously supported the notion that England had a deep, old magic beyond the common man's ken.

Jonathan graduated from Oxford with honors, and spent as much time trying to complete his father's work as he did publishing his own. Working as a librarian, he repeatedly turned down offers to become a university professor. His father's library was a start on his own, which grew into a remarkable if eccentric collection; he left Britain only rarely, and never for long, loving London of the present as much as London of the past, drinking tea with scholarly friends or female companions on rainy days. He studied the mystical things he first encountered in his father's treatise deeply, and found that England had a deep and quiet magic, a magic men could and did wield; he studied that magic, cautiously but as curiously as he studied anything else, and came to some small degree of mastery over it before he was enNobled.

His ascension to the ranks of the Nobilis came when his research led him to believe that he knew the current location of Excalibur. Hunted by the same stranger who once killed Samuel Chambers, Jonathan fled to Glastonbury Tor, where he found and took up Excalibur, which had disguised itself as a white stone; with the blade in his hands, he was enNobled, and knew the truth of things, including the stranger--who had killed his father, and became an anchor.

Anchors

A Quiet Love: Winnifred Burrington

A petite brown-haired woman, Winnie--despite her name, American-born and -raised, though of British ancestry--is a renowned scholar in the field of mythology, with an interest (though not an exclusive one) in British myth; Jonathan has collaborated with her on a number of papers, and, since his enNobling, shown her the basis for several more. The two have been colleagues for nearly eight years, good friends for most of the eight, occasional lovers for five. They share a calm, unurgent love that will never shake worlds nor burn sun-bright, but is no less remarkable for that. It is an affection born of scholarly respect, intellectual banter, and a love of England's (damp) beauty; of quiet afternoons with tea and rain tapping gently at the window; of a shared understanding of the deeper truths and beauties that underlie the mundanities of existence.

A Blood-Born Hate: Eventhiel Seranthalien

Sir Eventhiel Seranthalien, called Neversleep for his tireless devotion to his duty, is the First Knight to the Queen of Elfhame Autumn's-Hill, and no human at all; rather, he is a warrior Sidhe, a faerie from one of the Chancels (Autumn's-Hill, to his people) that creates them. One of his primary duties is to prevent knowledge of the truths behind Britain's myths from falling into the hands of mortal men, and in carrying out those duties, he slew Jonathan's father (and on the way to his dwelling, one of Jonathan's friends, not realizing the connection); some years later, he made an attempt on the lives of Jonathan and Winnifred. When it failed, he proceeded to follow the escaped Jonathan to Glastonbury Tor. There, Jonathan found and took up Excalibur, and became enNobled--thus rendering him no longer a mortal man. As knowledge of his Domain flooded into him, Jonathan came to know who and what Eventhiel was, and what he had done. In hatred and fury, Jonathan bound the Sidhe Knight to him as an anchor, realizing clear-headedly even in his rage that the faerie performed a sometimes-vital function and could be very useful in protecting his Domain.

First Love: Sarah Kincaid

Sarah is intensely intelligent, thoroughly independant; a poet, playwright, and novelist, she is a lapsed Jew (mostly at first, thoroughly after becoming an anchor, althoug she still attends synagogue periodically and keeps the holidays) and a pragmatic, sardonic woman who lives with a passion that usually hides her occasional bouts of depression, black moods that come like storms. "Rubbish" was the first thing Sarah ever said to Jonathan, immediately before dissecting a point he made about Jane Austen in the discussion section of a British Literature course at Oxford. That first semester, their relationship was a hotbed of debate that occasionally sparked real anger, and soon took itself out of the classroom and into their free time. They'd half-discuss, half-argue subjects from literature to politics to spirituality to theatre over tea at first, then later over dinner, until in three months' time, she kissed him in the middle of an argument. Their relationship developed in spurts, fuelled by the same passion that had sparked their debates, which persisted, but tended to end in clothes being shed hastily on the way to the bedroom. Jonathan fell further and further into the kind of fierce love that young lovers tend towards; as the years passed and they graduated from Oxford, they grew closer and closer, more and more in love--a love that would, ultimately, undermine the relationship. Their debates began to feel too much like arguments, and while Jonathan did his best to support Sarah, care for her, and ease the pain of her black moods, what she wanted was what they had before they fell in love--someone who would match her rather than defer to her, would challenge her, force her to rise to new heights. The relationship ended with bitter words that would eventually be taken back and broken hearts that, in time, healed; something of the previous flame returned, but it no longer burned as brightly. An attempt at being casual lovers ended poorly; their attempt at being friends has suceeded brilliantly, and although Jonathan still loves her, he squashes any romantic shadings his feelings develop.