Wilhemina "Willy" Renquist
Willy was a strange character I played on the Neverwinter Nights roleplay server "Savage Frontier". Her heritage was unknown (even to her) and she was a truly strange looking woman who was so desperate for affection and...meaning... in her life, that she found herself in love with a self-destructive man who was just as much sadist as masochist. Eventually, she bore his twin daughters, but the years wore heavily on her. Although the player behind Scarecrow wrote multiple stories about their years together and their daughters, the only other one I wrote that has survived, ironically, is her eventual suicide.
Secrets & Lies
Bleeding
Secrets & Lies
Born to a Luskan prostitute and one of her many faceless, unsavory clients, Willy began life as Martha Washin and she lived and died on the filthy streets of Luskan. She learned to pick pockets before she could speak and walked easily in the shadows as early as she can remember.
Thievery always seemed a victimless crime - she figured no one was really hurt by her stealing. A botched job (which she maintains to this day was not her fault) ended that theory when the family she and her friends had marked fought back. Two of her cohorts died in the struggle and Willy soon found herself laying face down in a pool of her own blood, dying.
Even now, she does not understand why Mama Renquist (as she came to call the woman) left her to languish so long in that unclear space between the living and the truly dead; perhaps as punishment for her crimes. Still, from the very brink of absolute death, Willy was pulled back by the priestess they had attacked. The priestess, whose daughter had been killed by one of Willy's friends, graciously took her in. She was just shy of fourteen years old.
Mama Renquist gave Martha a new identity as her adopted daughter, and Willy became known as Wilhelmina Renquist. She endured many hours of lecture and prayer, coming to understand and respect the ideals presented to her. Eventually, however, the retired priestess, who despaired of ever mending Willy's wayward habits, send her to study with her distant cousin in Nesmé. Jygil reluctantly accepted Willy as a page, allowing her to stay if she continues her service of Waukeen and her studies as a priestess. 'Aunt Jygil' will keep a close eye on her 'niece'.
Bleeding
It had taken every last coin in her possession; but she had secured a night in the familiar retreat at the top of the stairs. The suite in which she'd first given herself to him, in which - in all likelyhood - their daughters were concieved, in which they had-...
Memories flooded her as she lay naked in the large marble tub, her waist-length dark curls - shot through with silver these days - floating on the surface around her. He had been tender, even when he brought his dagger to her flesh, and she remembered the confusion, the pain, the pleasure. The grave purr of his voice when she succumbed and the stern order tinged with worried paranoia when at first she did not return the...favor.
Her flesh, so dark a brown as to be nearly black, was scarred in various place. Not from battle, as she often claimed, but from his twisted lust. She traced a familiar mark upon her wrist with a featherlight fingertip and sighed. I did love him once... perhaps even now, I still do.
The mirror across the room told the tale; she was no more the sixteen-year-old street rat seeking redemption in the arms of a sociopath. Only thirty-four years old, Wihelmina Renquist-Corvidae looked twice that. Her beautiful, luxuriant curls - the only part of her body that had been been sold; were threaded with silver and her body, always thin and strong, was emaciated and weak. Life, such as it was, with her beloved had never been easy. But life without him was...even worse.
She hadn't seen him in twelve years - since the night he tore a screaming Mallory from her arms and went home, to Waterdeep. It mattered little, at the time she was relieved to see the back of him. Though she loved him still, his midnight revelations about his past had shattered her peaceful - if not idyllic - world.
Willy closed her eyes tight, sinking lower in the tub, If Mallory was lucky, she is already dead... It was enough for her that she had saved Hallie... no, she is Lark now... from his taint.
Or had she? The girl with music as well as murder in her veins had left some years before - having heard the truth of both her paternal horrors and her mother's sordid past. Willy had not seen her since.
She half expected to find her, playing her lute in the bar of the Sundered Shield, but no such luck. Tonight was the first time she had seen the old place in twelve years; she did not miss it, but then, she had not expected to.
The years alone were rough; a street rat and unwilling child prostitute, risen to Acolyte of Waukeen, fallen to wife of a madman, fallen further to begger and still further, to pickpocket and common sneak thief... Willy no longer felt the need to struggle to survive.
Her daughters, wherever they roamed, wanted no more to do with their mother. Nor should they, for she was ashamed of her life. Her husband, though the memory of his love lived on, was dead in her heart.
With eyes lightly closed, she traced that first scar, the most familiar one - for it had been opened and reopened in their years together. Bleed for me, Princess, he had purred into her ear. She could still feel his breath on her neck as the blade dragged across her skin.
Bleed for me, Princess, his voice echoed through her mind.
And so, as the warm water went cold around her body, one last time... she did.