<em>There once was a little girl just like you.  Her green eyes flashed with a thousand worlds unseen and her heart sang for all those undiscovered lands.  Greedy was her mind and idle her hands for the tasks her mother gave her.  She could not hear her father’s commands because all she heard was the roar of the ocean and the beat of her heart for another place.  Each night, despite the locks on her doors and the shutters of her window, she would slip out to the shore.  There would she sing for the lands lost her.  On that shore each night under the moonlight she would mourn a life that had never lived.<br/><br/>On this little island did this girl become a woman.  All those things that a woman needs she was given, but she desired nothing laid before her.  Shells from the blue reaches, pearls paid for by her father’s nets and the attentions of men most acclaimed would not quench her thirst.  Like a drowning man amidst the sea, she begged only for the taste of spring water.  So much did she long for those far away shores that she did the most unthinkable thing of her life.  <br/><br/>She filled a bag with all her shells and pearls, stuff it so that her parents might think it her.  That bag she then threw into the waters, under the same moonlight she had sang so many times before.  There she then cried out her father’s name and hide herself among the rocky alcoves that lined this island.  When her parents came, there was a great commotion as they sought to find her.  They saw only a shape bobbing in the water before it disappeared under the waves.  Her father and her suitors dove under the waves, while she fled from her spot.  On her mind was only one thing and that was to catch the merchant ships of the harbor.<br/><br/>Not all of her precious stones went to the bottom of the water.  Some were set to wet palms and close eyes while she made her way onto the ship.  Such was her craft that none suspected the new worker.  So great her skill of stealth that none knew she rested in the bowels of that ship.  Quietly she existed there, for none could call a life of eating and sleeping much else.  Yet were her tale to end here or even at the destination of this ship, then I would not have a story to tell you.  No instead fate had a different twist for her, a play of irony.<br/><br/>You see her parents now wailed for the loss of their daughter beneath the sea.  The spirits heard of this cruelty and set out to make it so.  Spirits of wind and water fell on this little vessel, tearing it up into the mighty sky and then down below into the black waters.  Wood cracked and sails were abandoned.  Sailors took off in their boats while their ship sank, praying for safe waters to shore.  The depths commanded that she come to meet them just as her parents thought she had before.<br/><br/>Oh but our little woman was not done then either.  The storm was so great that it threw here in the deep places of that ship.  Planks of wood groaned so loud that it nearly made her deaf.  Water seeped into her so quickly she thought it would fill her to the brim.  Yet she did not give up but instead rose to the surface.  Nimble fingers grasped at sturdy and crumbling beams alike, fear propelling her upward into air and water both.  Clutching only a bag of biscuits and water, she leapt from the bowels and into the sky.  <br/><br/>She did not find water when she landed, but rather barrels strapped together.  A raft that the moonlight had sent her, a blessing that not even the spirits of the sea could take.  Oh certainly they tried but she clung to her raft with such fierce determination it cowed even the quick souls of the wind.  So instead they tried to make her wish for the death of the waves.  In the sky the sun beat down upon her brow and the water steamed with flames from beneath its waves.  Her stomach turned against her as it betrayed her hunger and the winds refused to cool her burning skin.  Only at night did the moon grant her relief and each night she would sing her praise to that lovely vision.  <br/><br/>She watched, each night, as the moon came to her in a different shape.  Her eyes red with tears at first, but then red from not having tears any longer.  Each night she would sing a different sing to that vision of the moon, wetting her lips only to keep the purity of her words for that vision to hear.  So long did she sing for that far away creature that she barely noticed the pain any longer.  Only when there was nothing left for her to feel and hope dared leave her body, did she look to the sky to see her precious moon was no more.<br/><br/>Yet even then she did not cry out for mercy.  No, she only sang one more song.  A song not for the life she had lost or the one she had never lived.  Such a song would not have raised an ear of interest from those souls gathered.  No her song was for the moon she would not see again and the waters she would never kiss.  That song she sang on her last mortal day was in mourning for a world she would soon leave behind.  For that night her stage was a raft and her audience the stars above.  On that night she received her final blessing from a Princess and Queen.<br/><br/>For down came her beloved moon.  Down came the Princess of the Heavens and the Queen of the Untamed.  She descended from her throne behind curtains of starry night to touch her hand to the forehead of her minstrel.  Beneath her raft were raised the wings of watery angels that carried her forth.  From the sandy bottoms of the water came their spirit to carry her home and guide her to a destiny she knew had eluded her.  <br/><br/>That then is the story of Blessed Water of Moonlight.  That then is the beginning of a tale unending…</em><br/><br/>Name: Blessed Water of Moonlight<br/>Caste: No Moon<br/>Motivation: To gather and protect the lore of heroes past throughout the West<br/>Anima: Flickering lights like water on the surface of the ocean<br/>Spirit shape: Sting Ray<br/><br/>Strength: 2   Charisma: 4           Intelligence: 4<br/>Dexterity: 3 Manipulation: 3        Wits:  4<br/>Stamina: 2   Appearance: 3        Perception 3<br/><br/>Essence 3<br/><br/>Willpower 5<br/>Conviction 3<br/>Valor 2<br/>Temperance 2<br/>Compassion 2<br/><br/>Intimacies:<br/>History<br/><br/>Heart’s blood 2<br/>Contacts 2 (Merchants, traveling storytellers/minstrels)<br/>Mentor 2 (Lunar Elder performance and martial arts)<br/>Artifact 2 (The Unsurpassed Pipa)<br/>Artifact 2 (Silk Armor)<br/>Rescources 1<br/><br/>Favored Skills:<br/>Survival 2<br/>Lore 4<br/><br/>Unfavored:<br/>Awareness 2<br/>Dodge 2<br/>Socialize 2<br/>Integrity 2<br/>Performance: 4<br/>Investigation: 1<br/>Presence: 2<br/>Occult: 2<br/>Lore: 4<br/>Linguistics: 2<br/>Martial Arts 2<br/><br/><br/>Knacks:<br/>Prey's Skin Disguise<br/>Twin-Faced Hero<br/><br/>Charms:<br/>1st Charisma Excellency<br/>Instinct Memory Insertion<br/>Perfect Fear Scent<br/>Hide the Cunning Hunter<br/>Inspiring Battle Hymn<br/>Terrestial Circle Sorcery<br/>-Emerald Counter Magic<br/><br/>(http://gallery.photo.net/photo/7507887-lg.jpg)