Calliope Cloverbloom (retired)

Calliope Cloverbloom
"I didn't do it! You can't prove it."
Gender	Female
Race	Hyur
Clan	Midlander
Citizenship	Gridania
Age	21
Nameday	29th Sun of the 5th Astral Moon (Sept. 28, Libra)
Occupation	Traveler & Mischief-Maker
Guardian	Oschon the Wanderer
Alignment	Chaotic Good
Relationship?	Single

Demographical / Physical

Character Name: Calliope Cloverbloom

Nicknames, if any: Callie, Runt

Race & Subgroup: Hyur Midlander

Gender ID: Female

Age (or human approximate): 21

Nameday: 29th Sun of the 5th Astral Moon (Sept. 28, Libra)

Height: 5'1"

Weight: 91 ponze, thin and wiry

Hair: Chocolate brown, straight, shoulderblade length (sometimes braided)

Eyes: Storm-cloud gray

Skin: Pale, with light freckles on the tops of her cheeks and bridge of her nose

Fashion Style: Tomboyish, usually pants and a tunic, and either boots or sandals depending on what's going on. Her clothes are generally of high (though not wealthy) quality and color. Callie dislikes dresses and would be rather grumpy about wearing one if she had to (and would probably go bright red if someone made a big deal out of it).

Other Appearance Details: Although not very girlish in clothing, Callie is very feminine in other ways, such as wearing eyeliner and keeping her hair long and smoothly brushed and in ever-changing style. When somewhere dry like Ul'dah, she'll often wear lip gloss and scented lotion to keep from drying up.

Psychological / Mental

Morality / Alignment: Chaotic Good

Guardian Deity: Oschon the Wanderer

Attitude: Optimistic and perkily upbeat, in spite of her eye-rolls and sounds of mock-exasperation.

Positive Traits: Callie can be encouraging and energetic, and usually will do her best to take care of whatever's needed of her. She's outgoing and sociable, and is always ready for a challenge. When it comes to her friends, there's little she wouldn't do for them, and she'll quickly step up to protect them even against - gulp! - an enormous Roagadyn.

Negative Traits: She can sometimes be a bit of a brat, engaging in all manner of huffing and pouting and mockery and other immature behaviors, though she generally means to be good-natured about such things and is exhibiting those traits as an awkward way of showing that she likes someone.

Quirks: She's very peculiar about how things feel when touched. Slimy or wriggly sorts of things are going to get a yucky-face from her. If it's slimy and wriggly, forget about it, she's done.

In-Character Job: She grew up learning brewing at her family's mead business, but she always preferred chasing her brother Selarian and his best friend Gustas around and getting into adventuresome mischief. If you asked her what her job is, she'd probably just shrug and say her job is to keep those two out of trouble, even though she's usually the one getting them into said trouble in the first place.

Professional Skills: Though she'd never claim to be a rogue or thief, Callie has a professional level of skill at sneaking about, getting into places she's not meant to be, opening locks, palming, and other sorts of slight-of-hand. She can also brew up a tasty batch of mead, if she has the proper equipment and materials.

Amateur Skills / Hobbies: Callie's pretty good at baking, though her general cooking skills are only modest. She sings on a regular basis, though she's neither talented nor talentless at it, and usually the songs are just whatever made-up words she thinks are amusing in the moment.

Likes / Wants: Cookies, and chocolate, and candies, and ice cream, and... she has a sweet tooth. She'd also like it to stop raining constantly in Ul'dah. It's supposed to be a desert. Why is it not being a desert? Somebody help.

Dislikes / Avoids: Birds. Feathers are weird! She's also not very fond of bitter or sour foods. Oh, and slimy things, and wriggly things, and especially slimy and wriggly things.

Family, Friends, & Love

Location of Home, if any: Near Gridania

Place of Birth: Near Gridania

Relationship Status: Single

Orientation: Heterosexual

Favored Traits: Callie likes men who share her positive attitude and have a playful spirit, the sort who would encourage her own behaviors and be encouraged by her in return. She'd probably find possessiveness to be cute as long as the man didn't get weird over it, and as long as it didn't cross the line into controlling behavior.

Disfavored Traits: An excess of gruffness or stoicism, or emotionlessness. She doesn't like it if she feels helpless, either - for example, she'd find it frustrating if the man were in a sad or dour mood and she couldn't encourage him out of it, or if he were angry and she couldn't calm him down.

Living Relatives: Selarian (brother), Nimue (mother), Lamont (father), Lillian (daughter - presumed alive), several aunts and uncles and cousins.

Friends / Allies: Gustas Greycliff, Piperlily Arcanis, Varys Suelan, Talan Dracht, Devyn Piper

Rivals / Enemies: Vincent Lutesong

History

Lamont had always been a bit of a wanderer, journeying around the land in the pursuit of greater magical abilities in all forms. There were some who referred to him as a sage, though in truth much of his popularity may have been due to the bottles of mead he'd bring and share with new friends in the places where he'd go, after which the local folk would be clamoring for more of the stuff and it'd be easy to arrange for the local tavernkeep to have some brought in from the family company. Callie didn't get to know her father well in her youngest years, but her mother was a wonderful caretaker and her relatives were always there to look after her when needed. It wasn't until she was four and her father had stopped home for several months at a time to mend from an injury that she really got to know him well, but he took a great interest in her since she had come to the age of being able to converse sensibly (prior to this, Lamont's distance from her had as much to do with his impatience for babies and young toddlers as it did his travels).

She'd heard so many takes from him during those months. There were always stories of the places he'd been and the things he'd seen, and the little girl was rapt to hear them whenever she wasn't chasing her older brother and his friends around. They mostly tried to evade her, since what little boys wanted a little girl tagging along on their adventures? Surely she'd get girl cooties all over everything, and it'd be just awful. Nevertheless, young Callie always managed to keep up with them, and her father's tales of his travels had only encouraged her to believe the world was far larger than her mother's ovens and the family stills. Callie learned those tasks well, but her heart wasn't in them, it was in the fields and the trees, and that cliff over there - what could lay in the shadow behind the boulder?

The years went quickly by, and Lamont's visits home were always anticipated by both of his children. Callie went from toddler to child to youth, her years passing into double digits, and ever-chasing the boys around and forcing her way into their games. From time to time she'd develop a little crush on some friend of her brothers, but she was younger than them and small as well, and their own interests were never upon her. Most of them had grown up with her following the group of them around, so they didn't even think of her as a someone to ask on a date or to have an eye upon - she was "one of the guys", after all!

As her brother approached young adulthood, he made plans to leave Gridania for Ul'dah where he'd advance his knowledge of thaumaturgy to go along with the conjuring he had already studied, intending to become a magical savant like their father. His best friend and recurring target of young Callie's awkward crushes, Gustas, had made plans to leave as well - bound for Ul'dah as well, where he'd study pugilism and swordplay to become a fine warrior, for although he'd learned a bit of the conjuring arts alongside Selarian, he hadn't the knack for the advanced study of it. Soon they had gone, and many of the other boys who'd been their friends also went on to other things - they got girlfriends, they went abroad, and Callie found herself spending most of her time with the few who were left.

That summer, a charismatic young man of near her brother and Gustas's age named Vincent Lutesong moved to the area from Aleport, and he quickly rallied many of the boys of the town to his friendship, including Callie, who had continued her tomboyish ways. He had also, however, brought with him new mischief, and without realizing it, the youths became swept up in what one might claim to be their very own little guild of thieves. Callie herself, being good-hearted and a little naive about such things at the time, caught on to little of the trickery of Vincent. She was instead entirely distracted by his handsome looks and smooth words, and in short time became swept up in him. Daydreamy as she was over her new boyfriend, she doted upon him without ever realizing just what he was up to with all those boys.

Inevitably, the authorities in Gridania did catch on, and an investigation began into Vincent's activities. Clever as he was, he knew that he'd need to leave town and lay low, but he didn't want to put any of those very useful boys in harm's way. They might still work with him somewhere else, and for all he knew he might one day have quite the guild of thievery in another place with them under his wing as each grew of age to leave his family. Callie was the perfect one to set up as the culprit, and so he did - every bit of evidence was carefully placed to point to her as the one who'd singlehandedly stolen from merchants around the town. Although Callie had talent in such sneaking and pilfering from her time among the boys, she certainly wasn't actually the one who'd done those things, but the evidence said otherwise and she was hauled away to imprisonment for her crimes.

Where had they taken her? She couldn't say (and as an aside, if anyone has ideas or comments regarding this, chat me up on the Discussion page). It wasn't the worst that a prison could be, but it was hardly a comfortable place, and to make matters worse... young Callie discovered that at but fifteen years of age, she carried Vincent's child within her. One of the guards, out of sympathy, allowed her to write a letter home to her mother to let her know, so that Nimue would be able to come when the child was born and take the newborn away to somewhere better than a prison. The letter never reached Nimue, however - the mail carrier in town was none other than one of the boys who had still been working for Vincent, who had never left town at all. He'd only gone into hiding.

Callie was shocked by his arrival at the prison, but he brought her flowers and a silver tongue. Over the course of several visits in the weeks leading up to and following the birth of baby Lillian, Vincent sweet-talked her about the future they might have together. He'd started a farm and some of the boys were working for him there, and she could keep bees once she'd joined him there, since her family keeps bees. He'd be a proper father for Lillian, and make a wife of her once she was freed of the prison, and to that end, he'd even been saving money for her restitution so that he could convince those merchants to petition for her freedom ahead of her sentence. She'd asked why he'd done what he did, and of course he had a reason - if he'd have gone to prison, who would've set up the farm for those boys? But someone had to go, and he knew she'd understand that it was for the greater good of things, because she was such a good person.

Hook, line, and sinker.

Away Vincent went with baby Lillian as soon as she'd be able to take a bottle with sheep's milk, and... never to visit Callie in her cell again. Two weeks passed, and she worried. Three, and she wept. A month, and she bawled... and by the end of the second month since he'd gone with Lillian, and she sat in silence, eyes puffy and jaw set as she contemplated the remainder of her sentence, and what she would do to him when she was released.

The Calamity occurred, and in the process the prison walls were broken. Everyone - guard and prisoner alike - who could escape the area fled from it, including Callie, who like the other prisoners went into hiding following that harrowing time. For nearly three years she remained in seclusion, afraid that the authorities of Gridania would be looking for her and trying to bring her back to prison. Were she to be asked, she won't say where she was or who she was with... only that she was in good company, and that she had been looking for Vincent and Lillian. The day arrived eventually when she came across a familiar face from the prison, another prisoner who had been known to her. As it turned out, given the events of the Calamity the authorities had considered the prison to be a total loss and had never pursued anyone at all.

Overjoyed, Callie returned to her hometown with a mixture of hope and fear. She went in heavy garments, shielded from sight by her hood and robes - even though nobody had looked for her, it didn't mean she couldn't be arrested again if she were noticed by the Adders. Regardless of the risk, she had to find her mother and tell her of Vincent and Lillian. Good fortune struck again when she found her brother at her family home, and she explained the situation to all of them. To her surprise, she wasn't wanted at all anymore! Vincent hadn't ever had a farm at all, and he and the boys who'd worked for him had simply continued their misdeeds. As had happened before, those acts caught up to them again, and he once more tried to present someone else as the obvious scapegoat - only this time, another of the boys secretly objected to the plan, for the intended victim was a friend and he could see a pattern developing. Maybe it'd be him, next. The two boys talked to the authorities together and explained what had happened with Callie, and how Vincent had been intending to do it again with one of them.

Alas, Vincent and the other boys had escaped town before they could be caught, and then the Calamity had happened but a week afterward. What had become of Lillian? Nimue and Selarian couldn't say - no one in town had ever seen Vincent with a baby. Callie's first thought was to seek the two boys who had exonerated her, but Nimue explained that they left town in exile as a part of their deal to escape charges themselves when they'd spoken to the Adders. Possible leads, perhaps, though?

Callie settled in with her family again, and plans were begun to find those two boys, since they would have no reason to be hiding from anyone. Their father had been missing since the Calamity as well, and the two Cloverblooms busily made plans for the journey to come. However, it bore little fruit... though they followed every lead for the two boys, it turned out that both had been killed in different places, months apart, by apparent accidents that warranted no further investigation by the authorities of the areas. Selarian and Callie were suspicious, but it had been more than a year ago for both, and any evidence which might lead them anywhere had long since expired.

They stopped in Ul'dah to take the airship home, and there met with Gustas and explained the situation to him. He resigned from his duties with the Immortal Flames and joined them, and the three returned home to deliver the news to the parents of those boys, and began to plan the next journey - to look for Lamont, and in the process, turn over every stone in their path for any sign of Vincent. Had he and Lillian lived through the Calamity? Callie had to believe it. Somewhere out there was her little girl, and she'd get her back.

Gallery

WIP

Misc. Notes

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