Alici
Player: hiddengecko
Character Full Name: Alici Holdt
Character In-Game Name: Alici
Nickname(s): Confessor
Association(s): Scarlet Crusade (Former), The Argent Crusade (Current)
Race: Human
Class: Confessor (Priest)
Skills and Abilities:
Standard Priest Package: As befits a Confessor, Alici is capable at healing and protective prayers as well as wards, yet mediocre with most forms of offensive magic. She’s a particular knack for healing in an area, however.
Edge of Renumeration: Alici has never been particularly strong in the art of Smiting, and so she makes up for this by judicious use of her dagger - though Alici's physical talents are likewise lessened considerably if disallowed the use of her prayers. As she is not particularly strong, she imbues her weapon with the most subtle of consecrations to give it a sting, and uses what Smiting she is capable of to render a target vulnerable. (Smite, Shadow Word: Pain, Shadow Word: Death, Devouring Plague, etc.)
Voice of an Angel: While the aesthetic quality of her voice has no proven effect upon spellcasting itself, Alici tends to sing her spells, rather than mumbling or chanting them. Singing lends her confidence and lends passion to her faith, and as such bestows greater strength to spells of healing and mental influence alike. Listeners may find soreness and wear drain away, while enemies discover themselves wracked by terror that exceeds the natural, or their minds invaded by gentle pleas that force betrayal or confession. (Hymn of Hope, Psychic Scream, Prayer of Healing, etc.)
Anatomical Acuity: While the Light requires no particular knowledge of biology to heal, an Inquisitor’s ability to inflict pain without causing accidental death is less forgiving, uncouth as it may be. As such, Alici has an intimate understanding of the workings of the human body; while the finer points of anatomy are of little relevance in a fight, knowledge of the location of major organs naturally comes in useful. Causing harm is not the sole use of this knowledge, however; Alici is passable at some basic surgery, at least when combined with her understanding of the Light. (Any number of healing spells, as well as passive increases to damage done and the like found throughout the talent trees.)
Your Mind Makes it Real: While Alici by no means a Shadow Priest, she is skilled with the magic of the mind and memory alike. These abilities are now most commonly used to sooth painful memories and comfort, yet her training’s darker origins have left with her certain gifts; causing pain and pulling secrets from the darkest corners of a mind was once her specialty. She cannot read minds, but to forcibly loosen one’s lips is another matter entirely. Another ability she has found use for is to force a confrontation of guilt, even bringing a subject to experience a memory as though it were presently happening. Not to say that they believe it is presently happening; simply that it feels as such. (Psychic Horror, Mind Vision, Mind Soothe, Fade, etc.)
Sacred Illumination: An interest in calligraphy blossomed into a fascination with runes and holy symbols, and she now makes use of them in in her prayerbooks and upon clothing or weapons. She’s also possessed of an interest in sewing, though only for mending and modifying clothes - she is no tailor. She also plays a lyre fairly well, though this has no known combat application. (Inscription, some Tailoring, various Priest passives and abilities as regards justification for holy symbols – such as Inner Fire for stronger clothing, and the like.)
Age: 21
Sex: Female
Hair: A very light blonde
Eyes: Hazel
Weight: 122 lbs
Height: 5’6
Usual Garments/Armor: Alici usually wears the uniform of her station, but even outside it bears a distinct aversion to the wearing of trousers and their varied and sundry cousins. Stockings are a reliable constant, however, as is her truesilver dagger. She is never seen without the latter, wearing it upon her hip even at sermons and while delivering confessions – though she has, fortuitously, learned not to fiddle with it during either. She often carrying throwing needles hidden in her boots – knives are harder to conceal, but she’ll often carry them anyway if expecting a need for them.
Other: Alici has a very lovely voice, enough to warrant a specific mention as such. She’s a quite good singer, as well – though she is not given to writing her own music.
Personality: Alici is soft-spoken and gentle, given to little acts of charity and kindness. While non-confrontational and even meek in most respects, the woman is by no means weak. She is possessed of her own brand of quiet stubbornness, and can be aroused to argumentation – usually polite – or even violence should the need arise. While she strives for serenity and to think before actions, Alici is young and so failures are inevitable – though less common by far than one would typically expect for a woman her age. Even so, politeness is maintained even to enemies – she is courteous in battle, and sometimes even merciful.
Her Faith in the Light is of the utmost importance to her. Throughout her life, it has been her shield and her fire alike; it drives her, and in it she finds solace. It has been her one ally through every hardship, and she follows its tenants unhesitantly. Her understanding of some has long been twisted, however; Respect is tantamount to submission, and Compassion comes with a price. Those who do not walk in the Light are tolerated, and nurtured if it is called for, but she will not abide open blasphemy or opposition.
Cruelty and exploitation of the weak infuriates her immensely, particularly that of children. While she has no real desire to be about children—she tends to avoid them , in fact, though not to the point of rudeness or being unkind—she is fiercely protective of them, especially against adults or those stronger than they. Perpetrators of such abuse may find themselves subject to far worse than a tongue-lashing, should she learn of it.
As kind as she is, Alici has a certain air of mystery about her. Not a proud or teasing one, to be certain, but she keeps to herself. Little is known of the Confessor’s past, save for rumors of varied degrees of plausibility, and to a select few of her superiors her past as a member of the Scarlet. She speaks rarely of her past even to them, they know better than to pry overmuch.
Other races are regarded without malice, for the most part, but little curiosity. She does not particularly like orcs, seeing them as responsible in part for bringing the Legion to Azeroth, and she struggles with a particularly strong dislike of the Undead, having worked alongside several which she regards as pitiable. Draenei she respects greatly, as does she some Blood Elves – though she regards them with some suspicion on account of their fel usage. She is saddened by the savagery of trolls, and that the Kaldorei do not see the Light as she does – although she does respect them, if not to quite the extent of the Draenei. While the Light is the highest magical art there is, Arcane is worthy enough in her eyes, and natural and elemental magic noble, although she regards both with some wariness. Fel disgusts her, but she tolerates its usage amongst the Argents because she must.
History: The result of a largely financially-motivated union between minor Lordaeronian nobles, Alici’s youth was less than happy. The girl's birth was intended to cement the marriage both emotionally and in the eyes of the public, yet it did anything but. To begin with, neither parent was emotionally prepared for the difficulties of raising a child: Catherine was kind, but often weak and emotionally immature; James was cold and uncaring, with a penchant for distant, brooding apathy. Even worse, Alici had quite strikingly pale hair--both her parents had dark. It was the result of a recessive genes and nothing more, but fostered no trust between her parents: each had suspected the other of philandering before, but her father now felt justified in his suspicions and felt no love for his alleged daughter.
While her hair could be dyed (and it was, regularly, with the hairdresser paid well for his silence) Alici’s mother loved her, despite the complications she brought to their marriage. The girl was gentle and well-meaning, inquisitive and affectionate – nothing like her father. Her mother taught her to read, to sew, to sing and play the lyre; her father was busied often with managing their estates and was not greatly missed by either. Alici was happy then, at least as often as not. It did not last; when she was but ten years old, Prince Arthas returned to Lordaeron and took his father’s crown.
Alici’s family fled, barely escaping the ensuing slaughter of the aristocracy and abandoning their property and fortune to the ravages of the Scourge. The Holdts traveled east with many of the other refugees of Lordaeron, until they came at last to the city of New Avalon. It was not long before the city came under the control of the Scarlet Crusade, and for the time being the order kept them safe from the menace of the undead. Free now from the constraints of nobility and name, Alici let her hair return to its natural color and hoped that perhaps they could rebuild some semblance of a happy life in the Enclave. It was a weak and ill-founded hope, however, and she knew it.
While they had enough money banked outside the city to live at least comfortably, her father had been driven low by the loss of his estates. He turned to the bottle, and to violence; Alici in particular found herself the target of his outbursts and of his belt, as did her mother should she try to interfere – and sometimes even if she did not. The bruises became harder to hide and impossible to ignore, and her feelings toward her father grew from indifference to terror; when Alici was 11 she pleaded with her mother to be allowed to train for Priesthood. Unwilling to see her daughter hurt further, and hoping she would grow up to be something, her mother acquiesced, and so Alici was bundled off hurriedly to Tyr’s hand to seek the tutelage of the Scarlets. She took her father’s belt with her; at least he would be unable to hurt her mother with it, she reasoned.
Alici was happier there; she missed her mother but not half so much as she was relieved to be free of her father—to her shame. Her studies proved to be more than a distraction, however; she learned much of both the arts of the divine and the philosophies of the Scarlet Crusade. She had long been aware of the Light in a sort of peripheral, cultural sense, but nothing like she experienced it here. It was tangible and real, a holy flame that burned warm within, healed wounds, filled even the undead with fear.
She made herself useful to the Order in any way she could; work was a distraction from loneliness and gave her an excuse to avoid the tasks she hated most - such as family visits. She found a use for herself in healing and encouraging the wounded even as young as she was, and oft-accompanied surgeons as they made their rounds on and off the battlefield - though not during battle, naturally. In short order, she became rather desensitized to gore and violence, but remained surprisingly well balanced in the sight of that. By the time she had reached her teens, she had grown to be one of the most faithful of the acolytes. Quick-witted, perceptive, and quicker still to learn, she was selected at the mere age of fifteen to begin Inquisitor training.
She wrote her mother, and sometimes even agreed to visit, but did so far less often than she promised. Even holidays were conveniently forgotten; there was little indeed that could convince her to return to her family and bear the disapproving eye and swift hand of her father, and she felt a closer kinship with the clergy than her own blood. While the discipline of her teachers was harsh, it was reasoned and served purpose; she would return from penances and switchings alike with a sense of bolstered resolve and absolution that far outweighed any shame or soreness. Her father’s beatings suffered neither rhyme nor reason.
While she noticed much, the gradual downward spiral of the Crusade seemed to escape her notice—to be sure, she noted changes, but she was young and idealistic and reasoned that they had purpose; that these shifts of focus from protection to retribution were brought about by grim necessity rather than anything truly sinister. The Light was uncompromising: why should they be different? Her training was accelerated; new soldiers were needed to bolster their ranks, and Inquisitors required to root out traitors allied with the Scourge and tear secrets from those that would dare to keep the truth from the Light. She was taught new skills, new applications of her healing and her anatomical knowledge, darker secrets of the divine magic she had practiced. Ways to cause pain, ways to weaken a prisoner’s resolve, tricks for coaxing secrets, or forcing stilled tongues to wag.
Even during the fall of the Scarlets, she was not unhappy. She studied calligraphy, practiced the lyre, discovered a love of hymns and a talent for singing. The Light never once ceased to fascinate, never fostered complacency or apathy. She found a close friend in Ishmi, a fellow acolyte near her age who shared her love of the Light and natural curiosity. She hailed from the island kingdom of Kul Tiras, and Alici found herself brimming with questions about faraway places and sailing. Ishmi’s parents sent her to live with relatives in Lordaeron when she was very young, but she would weave tales of dubious veracity about sea monsters and pirates, of extravagance and trade, and Alici would laugh and not believe a word of it.
However noble her service, the Light did not always protect one from tragedy. When she was sixteen, Alici’s mother was found dead, her body badly beaten and dumped in an alleyway. Thieves, it was said. Alici was heartbroken; she had loved her mother dearly, and found herself wracked with guilt that she had not visited more often. The old adage about not appreciated one’s blessings until they were lost took on a new and personal meaning for her.
Before long it was time to grow up, as Alici saw it. Wondrous stories seemed much more distant with the undead pressing ever-closer and their training growing ever harsher, ever faster. The undead, they were told, had discovered a way to infiltrate their very ranks even among the living, traitors and cultists lurked about every turn, in every office. Even free from willing traitors, nearly any might be tainted. Fear exploded among the ranks of the Scarlet Crusade, and many Acolytes were rushed out of training to combat this new, hidden threat. Alici and Ishmi were among those selected; when Alici first donned the Inquisitor’s uniform, she was barely eighteen.
Both were excited at first, but Alici balked upon learning that she would be required to interrogate those she had thought of as brothers and sisters in the Light. She had seen torture already, of course, and even assisted when she was told, but that had been on cultists, criminals, deceiving outsiders. These were people whose faces she might recognize, and she would be expected to interrogate them alone.
Her first Inquiry ended poorly; while the man’s laughter at the nervous girl’s mannerisms soon faded to screams and pleas for mercy, she found herself retching and unable to continue, and a senior Inquisitor had to be called in to receive the confession. She found herself quarantined for nearly a month—it was difficult to tell simple nausea from the plague, at times, and safety was cheaper than not. When she was released, she learned Ishmi had garnered her confession on the first try – though the one that gave it did not survive long enough to hang, and the girl had locked herself in her chambers for some hours before taking up a penance for her clumsiness.
Later inquisitions went more smoothly for both; guilt was found more often than innocence, but nearly all the accused survived to see trial or the noose. Inquiries became a matter of course for Scarlet recruits, as well – though it was customary to avoid damaging them in any measurable physical way, or at least ways that were not easily healed. Her duties brought Alici some guilt, but she pressed it to the back of her mind and bore it nobly; nobody said doing the Light’s work was easy, and she knew that the most difficult things to do were often the right things to do. She spoke to no one of her misgivings; it would not do to instill doubt in the heart of another.
Alici later asked permission to Inquire as to the identity of her mother's killer, but was refused; no witnesses had come forward, her time was needed interrogating traitors and those possibly infected, and it would not do to have an Inquisitor stoop to vigilantism. Besides that, the mystery had gone cold, and the Crusade had more pressing things than chasing footpads, they said.
One year passed, and to her horror she found that Ishmi stood accused of sympathizing with the undead and their allies. Worse still, she was to preside over her friend’s Inquiry. To refuse a thing willed by the Light was tantamount to blasphemy, and blasphemy was met with death. Ishmi was appalled at who had been selected to attend to her, but she maintained her innocence; Alici began the Inquiry. She did not get very far; in under an hour she found herself unable to continue, begged forgiveness of Ishmi, told her she couldn’t hurt her any longer. Knowing Alici would face the same accusation as she if the Inquiry was halted, Ishmi confessed to everything.
Alici was congratulated for her bravery in confronting the taint of undeath in even her own friends, was assured that drawing out Ishmi’s confession would allow her to pass to the next life with the burdens of her sin lessened, but she did not watch Ishmi’s execution. While the girl who had been her closest friend burned, Alici locked herself in her quarters and wept, prayed for Ishmi’s soul and a swift death.
The loss had a profound effect upon the young Inquisitor’s perspective: for the first time in her life, she was alone. If even those closest to her could not be trusted, who could? Her questioning became more efficient, and many more confessions were garnered in the following months—yet her wariness was turned inward, as well. She began to peruse through paperwork and written records, asked the enlisted questions they were all-too-eager to give up about things they ought not to have spoken. The uniform had a way of loosening lips; all recruits had been questioned upon joining the order. What she found disturbed her more and more: corruption seemed rife within the upper echelons of their hierarchy and not among the rank-and-file, as they had been warned. Things that ought not to be hidden were, and outright lies were spread as means of control. Alici had learned much of the Light; she had learned that even deception had its place, but while a shepherd might lead their flock to the shear, they do not drive them into the fire.
She looked deeper, and what she found nearly broke her. Her mother was not slain by bandits: Her coinpurse was untouched and her wounds appeared to be inflicted by a fireplace poker; the body had been dumped where it was found, rather than the murder occurring there. Likewise, Ishmi’s sole crime had been refusing to further torture a prisoner when convinced of his innocence—a prisoner implicated so that his place would be taken by another better favored by the High Inquisitors. Alici was enraged; the Inquisitors were meant to be questioners, truthseekers, not politicking deceivers and glorified assassins. To lie in need was permissible in the Light, as was to kill the deserving in its name, but such webs of deceit and murders in the name of convenience and spiteful retribution were not.
The order could no longer be trusted, and so she elected to abandon it. Yet first, there was a matter of personal justice. She returned to her father and confronted him, forced him to relive what he had done to her and her mother time and time again until his appeals of mercy had faded to little more than unintelligible whimpering. She returned to him that which she had stolen from him: the very same belt that once terrified her so much, and whispered in his ear what he must do to be freed of his pain. And, with a prayer for the souls of her mother and of Ishmi, she left the Conclave. Ishmi, at least, would find peace; she had been innocent and offered up her life in the protection of another. There was no nobler death for a servant of the Light; it incurred a debt Alici could never hope to repay. She fled to the north, to Light’s Hope; it was the passing of her nineteenth nameday.
She came to the Argent Dawn in surrender and contrition, asking only to be allowed to atone for her sins. The mercy she was given surprised her, and to be welcomed so warmly amongst their fold even more so. The Scarlet was exchanged for the white and gold, and she took up the path of the Confessor: The application of skills within the position were different indeed from what she had been taught, but her own repertoire served it well enough—with some education.
Her sole request upon taking up her new mantle was that knowledge of her past was kept to her superiors; she expressed particular concern that meeting a Scarlet Inquisitor might frighten children. Some time was needed for her to trust other races, and more for the undead within the Argent’s ranks, but Alici had an open mind and a sympathetic heart. In the passing months, she gained a reputation as a gentle, quiet healer, and an understanding listener. Her devotion to the Light was fiery, certainly, but it was out of passion rather than hatred. She kept to herself outside her duties, and devoted her efforts to healing and charity. Penance would never pay for what she had done, but perhaps it would grant her peace.
Her father was found some days after her departure, having crudely hanged himself with belt nearly a decade out of fashion. Alici had asked him for no confession, and received none; she wanted his soul to pass with the weight of its sins dragging it downward. Redemption was best saved for those that sought it.
