Born of Blood and Water

Short History

TW GENOCIDE, VIOLENCE, FAMILY DEATH

Xiomara was born on an island of Sirens called Gennaios, west of Corfu. Orphaned soon after her birth, she was raised by her sister, Liene.On the night of Xiomara's ceremony to a full-fledged Siren, which would grant her the majority of her power, the island was attacked and their population slaughtered. Only Xiomara and Liene escaped, entirely by Liene‘s determination to save her family. They arrived in Benghazi, Libya, and lived there for nearly a year while Xiomara utilised her militaristic upbringing and fought -regularly to the death- for money.Almost a year after their arrival, Liene was killed by guards outside of one of Xio's fights. Xiomara found her body hours later, abandoned in an alleyway. Every present person at the club was slaughtered in the aftermath. Xio proceeded to give in to the numb rage of her grief, and for the next ten years would work for whoever would pay the most, regardless of intent or morality.Eventually, she left Libya on her own and moved to France. Living briefly with an elderly woman, Alexandrine Bruyere, in her chateau until her death. She is left the chateau in the will. Mara grows to hate the tauntingly empty halls of the palatial home. To fight the loneliness, she filled it with strangers and parties for a couple of years before giving up and leaving it to collect dust.Here, she moves from country to country, buying small homes and collecting occasional friends and acquaintances she will eventually abandon or keep very light contact with. Including Hilda Goetz, who facilitates her movement between borders, keeps her safe houses and finds the work that she performs.

Brief details

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Sirenic traits

Her tail is roughly 10 ft long from hip to fin tip. Half solid tail, half delicate fins, making her full length around 12.5 ft.Her scales are shimmering and iridescent with a white-gold-blue shift, her fins are the same tones, but fully translucent and fragile.
She has complete movement control of the fins via solid bands on the outermost edges.Small, ornamental, teardrop-shaped fins decorate her hips, shoulders and elbows in the same tones as her tail fins.At any time, but especially when hunting or seducing prey, the gold of her iris' can expand to take up almost the full sclera of her eyes. Similarly, in periods of intense emotion, even if above / outside of water her hair will float as though suspended.The way Xiomara transforms is by taking a breath of water. This causes her body to shift to grow its gills and form her tail immediately.

full history

TW GENOCIDE, VIOLENCE, SUICIDE MENTION, FAMILY DEATHXiomara was never given an alternative path to the one forced upon her. Now, there is no end to the agony of her story. Hell is eternal. Death is eternal. The story of the siren is eternal.Xiomara was born on an island known as Gennaios, to a mother who would not survive her birth and a father who was too heartbroken to go on. Her mother was a respected Elder and keeper of Sirenic texts. The only item of her mother's that she has to this day is a complete copy of her people's history, something that had seemed important at the time to save from their desolation, now it is all but a weighty reminder of her loss.After her father committed suicide, Xiomara was primarily raised by her sister, Liene Athanas and their aunt, the Grand Elder, the leader of all sirens and citizens of Gennaios. She took them in and gave them a place to live. Expectant that this would mean they follow under her strict tutelage and become great warriors worthy of her time and name.
Xiomara lived in relative happiness for the first decade of her life. Permitted to play, learn and spend a few precious hours alone per day. She trained dawn til dusk to hone her natural skills in combat. Until she was strong enough to survive the ceremony of transition.Guided from her bed on the night of her fifteenth birthday. Bound face down to a stone plinth. The bare skin of her back exposed to the night. Xiomara's aunt came to her with all the airs customary to her position, she whispered to the small girl the few chilling words that still haunt her nightmares:"I am going to take your life. You dare scream and you will bring disgrace to your family, your heritage and your status as a warrior."
A knife made of white stone was used to carve her unique pattern of ascension into her skin, a centimetre deep into the flesh and muscle of her back. Xiomara was shackled, choked with the stench of her own blood. Death in the air for the first time in her life, at least in memory. Never letting loose a single scream for the wrath of her Elders wrought more fear than the ancient rites she must pass through. Teeth cracking under pressure. She wished at that moment, and only that moment, that she would die faster. They undid her bindings to carry her to the beach, where they floated her, eyes to the stars, the delirium of suffering hazing any awareness of her surroundings. Fire in every inch of her body as the salt entered her wounds. The community softly sang ancient Gennosi prayers as the water shifted from ink to black-red in the night. Xiomara Athanas first died in the waters of her homeland.The Grand Elder finished her chant, signalling the young death and each living Sirenic warrior cut their palm. Granting Xiomara their individual strength and power to resurrect her as one of their own. Her once brown eyes shot open as the common Gennosi gold. The first sight Mara’s fresh eyes caught were the invaders slitting their first throats, leaving them to drain into the water. Her new body took every drop it could to heal her and grant her power. The deaths of her kin rebuilt her, far more powerful than any Siren before.There was a desperate attempt to fight the invaders back but the battle had begun far before this moment. Individuals picked off one by one during the entire ceremony. Men pulled the young Xiomara from the water and bound her wrists behind her back as they built the fires, stoked by their homes and belongings. She was forced to watch as every Siren’s blood was drained into buckets, cut limb from limb and burned. Every innocent human citizen coming to a similar fate, their human blood the only thing left untouched, useless to these invaders. The murderers faceless, unknown, even still.It was Liene who approached stealthily from the water, saving her sister from her fated torture. They found themselves picked up by a fishing boat off the coast of Libya a few days later. Broken, alone, starving and desperate. A state that would not change for years to come.Xiomara lived on the streets of Benghazi for just over a year with her sister, making use of her fighting skills to protect and feed her tiny family. In the early years, it had been about survival, fighting for money against men twice her size under the name Golden Wraith, a small teenage girl against a hardened killer always made for great odds. Long nights spent alone in underground fighting rings, coming back to the shanty she'd built with Liene, coated in dry and viscid violence. At 16, a year and two months from the eradication of her home, Xiomara returned as dawn was brushing the sky, to an empty house. Searching every alley, every place she knew they went together, despite her exhaustion, still dripping the blood of a young boy called Omar. Xiomara found Liene, bluing from death in an alley near where she fought that night, mutilated, her grey eyes empty and dry but still Xiomara saw pity and regret in their depths.There was no remorse that night. Xiomara turned up for her fight with a new skill. She'd not yet perfected the short swords forged from her own blood, but they did the job despite their rugged appearance. Mara learned that Liene had come to the crumbling building in search of Xiomara when she hadn't returned on time. The guards had insisted she must leave and that they didn't know any such girl. When Liene insisted she see her sister they'd taken her down the alley, pretending to bring her inside. Mara learned that much before levering her blade beneath his windpipe and tearing it from his body. Killing the guilty only inflamed the fury, no volume of tempering blood quelled the flames scorching her throat. The basement was a massacre, 30 or more. She took their money and wrote Golden Wraith upon the wall in Arabic with their blood.Once the reputation of the unbeatable vicious killer had been cemented in blood and Dinar, she began to get offers from the gangs. Soon after the gangs, came the warlords, the 'politicians' and she became a name known for cruelty. Killing criminals for money with the ancient skills she’d been destined to use to protect her kin.Leaving Libya at 19, Xiomara escapes to Europe, never returning to Benghazi. The first home she acquired was the decaying but grand 17th-century Château de Bruyère, in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine province of France. It’s elderly matriarch Alexandrine Bruyere a pitying sort, and so alone. It did not matter that in the 9 months they lived together the rooms were given life. When Alwxandrine passed the house was predictably immense and empty. Xiomara had intended to fill the rooms with training equipment and perhaps eventually other people who would come into her life. She hadn't anticipated the loneliness of only her own company in a 16 bedroom home. A home intended to house family and friends, workers, a life she did not have. A cruel highlight of her own loss.The siren spent almost three years in the echoing halls of her French castle throwing grand and gritty parties full of strangers to fill the silence, before escaping to a small croft in the Scottish Highlands, it was here she learned how to drive, how to take care of plants from an old woman in the local town. The croft was soon full and warm, only two rooms, a bedroom and a living room/kitchen. The only problem with the beautiful brutality of Scotland is that it is inhospitable for a creature intended for far warmer waters. In the end, purchasing her land on the Adriatic, close enough to her native Aegean seas without the shudder of the past in the air.The contracts she agrees to mostly consist of killing the despicable. As her morals permit, true criminals in the eyes of her upbringing, not necessarily of the wider world. An assassin with no allegiances. Well known for her ability to leave corpses without a mark if required, or glorious gore if demanded. Revered for her brutality and creativity in torture. She does not need killing in her life anymore but regardless, still enjoys the task when she chooses to.

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Now it would be appreciated if you read her history on my About page if you haven't already! Especially if you wish to make any reference to her past or present characteristics and experiences, please and thank you!With that I thank you for reading all of this! I hope to enjoy writing with you!

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