She fit most naturally in Middleton, being a seeker of knowledge and not really interested in pursuing either good or evil ends. By that point, too, there was none of the Five Point Guard left, and she fit the description for Fire Point Guard perfectly. However, as Exalted, she was a mite too powerful for me to feel easy taking her unchanged on the game; on the other hand, she wasn't powerful enough to merit being Cursed. So I fastforwarded her a thousand years or so, made up some intervening history, and gave her a number of Curses to compensate.

The fact that she ended up having so many fire associations was actually--well, not a mistake, but certainly an accident. '_' The character-base is normally associated with wind and birds, but things kept happening--her favorite spell as a just-awoken Exalt was Flight of the Brilliant Raptor, there was the whole association of the Solars with light and heat, and then the Fire Point position fit her to a T, her eyes became gold because of blindness and the correction of that, and then "Hope on Fire" suited her so well as to be practically her theme song. I've just accepted it as inevitable, by now.

POWERS

Sorcery – Tai’en has access to most of the known spells of the Terrestrial Circle, the Celestial Circle, and several of the Solar Circle, as well--although the Solar Circle is rendered moot by Roc’s curse. There are, in addition, a few that she created on her own, through much experimentation. They take, at a minimum, several seconds to cast; most of the more powerful ones take hours-long rituals, if not days or even months. Many of them, as well, are rendered moot either by Phoenix’s Curse or the nature of the Dream itself, which isn’t constructed in quite the same way, nor has the same system of spirits and gods that supported her world. Still, sorcery is where her main strength is, at least in comparison to other Exalted. It’s an extremely potent force, but she’s limited by being able to cast only a handful a day; the mental focus caused by drawing and shaping the energies into the forms she wants is exhausting, the higher levels even more so than the lower ones. As such, sorcery is only something she calls upon when other, simpler methods aren’t available. Effects range from calling up vines to trap a target, to summoning a cloud to ride on, to protecting an area from all magic.

Charms – There's sorcery, to do with true magic, and then there are the natural Charms of the Solar Exalted. Sorcery warps the fabric of reality itself, bending it to the sorcerer's will; Charms, on the other hand, are more limited in scope. They tend to affect people directly, largely the user in the case of most Solar Charms, and flow more naturally to the user's nature. She cannot learn the Charms of another type of Exalted, for instance, as she is a Solar and must work in Solar ways. Tai'en's learned a good number of them as well, mainly in the areas of magic (there are magic Charms that are different from spells themselves), dodging, archery, language, performing, and melee combat.

Exalted – Just by nature of being Exalted, everything Tai'en can do is greatly scaled up from regular human levels. Likely the most noticeable are her physical attributes--she can leap twenty feet in a bound without even the use of Charms, perform acrobatic stunts, run for a day without too much strain, and lift a few hundred pounds--and she's not particularly physically-gifted for an Exalt. A little more than average, thanks to her years and her time to hone her abilities, but nothing to stand out among them. Her mind is her particular strength, though, and there she is equal to the most gifted. Little gets past her, and few puzzles do not crumble before sustained concentration on them. In addition, all Exalts can learn things at a much faster rate than normal humans, picking up skills within weeks instead of months or months instead of years, heal at an accelerated rate with few complications (it's like a slow regeneration; she can't heal an amputated arm or a missing eye, but a shattered bone can be reknit with little care and enough time), sustain more damage, and resist toxins and magical effects with more success.

Thaumaturgy – The magic of mortals is small and meager compared to the magic of the Exalted, but they have their place. Often, Tai’en finds them more useful when using sorcery or even Charms would be akin to using a hammer to crush a fly. Thaumaturgy tends to be heavily ritual- and component-focused; herbs, salts, candles, and diagrams figure greatly. With thaumaturgy, she can set up wards (never of very great strength, so their stopping power is not much, but often useful when simply keyed to alert her), summon beings (mainly animals; she can’t summon a sentient being because of Phoenix’s curse), make simple talismans, work minor and slow effects in the weather (for instance, calling a rain that arrives after a few days and lasts for a day), or chart the power lines in an area so as to know where to build and plant to take the best advantage of it.

Anima – By spending a mote of Essence, Tai’en can flare her anima, causing herself to glow brightly and her caste mark to appear on her forehead, while at the same time knowing the time of day. Useful in situations where she forgot to bring a light. In addition, if she takes damage, by concentrating, she can harden her anima so as to eliminate some of the damage she would have received.

SKILLS

Alchemy – More skill than magic, alchemy in her world is the proper mixing of substances in order to draw an effect from the reactions between the substances. Tai’en’s picked up a little bit of it, but in her line of research, it was less useful than even enchantment, and so she never learned more than beyond the basics. Alchemy especially has little effect on Exalted, another reason why she didn’t learn much of it. At her level, she can brew a few elementary potions, such as those that staunch bloodflow, act as an antiseptic, accelerate recovery time (to the level of Exalted recovery; fairly useless for those with accelerated healing already), act as an antidote given a specific venom, or enable the drinker to sleep peacefully.

Archery – She’s a superb archer, learned as a necessity during her youth in order to hunt and defend her village, then honed over her years traveling and adventuring. She’s the best with a longbow, but a fair hand at the crossbow, as well, though on the whole she prefers the speed of the longbow to the power of the crossbow. In addition, she’s learned many of the Charms associated with the bow.

Swordsmanship – Over the years, she’s managed to hone her sword skills to high levels, under the tutelage of a superb Sidereal warrior and with the necessity of adventuring to push her. Sorcery is extremely powerful in its own right, but it’s not nearly as swift or generally as protective as a good defense with the sword can be. She’s picked up a few Charms for the sword, but only the base beginning ones.

Staff – For many years, she’d never picked up the sword--they were expensive and hard to get, after all. Her weapon of defensive choice had been the staff, instead. With the obtaining of her first daiklave, that began to fall by the side, but she kept up with it for those times when a daiklave was simply too flashy for her purposes. As a result, though, she’s not as skilled with a staff as she is with sword or bow, just practiced.

Medicine – One of the primary duties of a shaman is to act as the village healer. Although her normal interests didn’t terribly incline her toward the healing arts, she learned enough to take care of all but the most serious of injuries, using mortal means. She picked up a few Charms, but only the beginning few; she possesses no ability to heal others rapidly, though she can heal herself quite quickly, and soothe away the pain of others, as well as diagnose what they have (if it’s not an obvious wound).

Investigation – Research and investigation has always figured rather heavily into the knowledge-seeking Exalt’s tools, and so she’s become fairly adept at it; piecing together clues from fragments in texts or on the scene, finding omissions and suspicious parts in people’s tales, and so forth. She has a few Charms in this, but not a terrible amount.

Metalworking – As part of her studies in crafting, she had to find something to craft--and while architecture was useful for a number of reasons, it didn’t lend itself very well to making artifacts, at least not artifacts that were easy to carry around. From studying the machines in Rathess, as well as working with another Twilight Solar, a blacksmith who had Exalted in a village near her school, she learned how to forge metal into a variety of shapes and maintain them. As she grew more accomplished, she began to branch out into whitesmithing, as well, learning how to craft smaller, more jewelry-like items. She has many of the Charms associated with crafting, which tend to be applicable across the board.

Artifact-crafting - Over her years of Exaltation, Tai’en devoted herself to learning every useful aspect that she could, and the crafting of powerful artifacts was certainly one of them. In a phrase, she can enchant objects. Most of the time, artifact-crafting requires many months and much intensive labor, both mental and physical; if she lacks the particular skill to make an artifact (such as weaving a cloak of hiding), she’ll work closely with someone who does have the skill in order to carry off the artifact. In addition, it usually requires very rare components--the eyes of a god, dew gathered from the petals of a night-blooming flower that blooms only on a full moon on a certain day, and so on. Something like pure gold is a fairly mundane requirement. If she can meet all of the requirements, though, some very powerful items can be created; some examples can be seen in her +resources.

Talisman-crafting – The making of talismans is something every shaman or thaumaturge learns how to do, and Tai’en was no exception. She can make simple, low-power talismans that grant good luck, ward against specified things, allow their wearer to escape almost certain death once, enhance fertility, ward against disease, and so on and so forth.

Architecture – This, she learned almost more through necessity than desire--first with helping a companion build the Manse that would later become their school, and later when forced to work for the Council in Nexus to repair buildings that she’d damaged. She saw the use of it, though, and so learned how to construct buildings in a variety of styles. In addition, she learned about the particular permutations and quirks that applied to the building of Manses, although it’s likely a skill that doesn’t avail her much here.

Performance – She’s fairly skilled with most aspects of performing things, ranging from speech and dance to a few instruments, but her main strength is in storytelling and singing, which was how she mainly made her way when traveling as a mortal. If pressed, she can summon up a dance or two or tootle a piece on a flute, but her skill is nothing to wow people. She actually gained quite a few Charms in this area, but as most of them have to do with manipulating the audience’s perceptions and reception of her, they’re rendered ineligible by Phoenix’s curse.

Survival – Growing up in the deep forest, and having to live off the land much of the time, Tai’en naturally learned how to survive on it. Even without the advantage of her spells, she could comfortably live on her own in not-terribly-harsh conditions; it would be rather harder in more extreme areas (the desert, the empty plains, etc.) She has a few Charms related to this area, mostly to do with taming animals, but largely relies on spells if she needs aid.

Martial Arts – She’s been disarmed and forced to defend herself a few too many times to like it. As one of her Circle-mates was a superb martial artist, she trained under him sporadically, just enough to learn how to hold her own against most normal humans if she found herself without access to either magic or weapons. It’s a stopgap measure, though, and she never pursued it any further than average competency.

RESOURCES

Hack – An orichalcum and moonsilver reaver daiklave that she forged herself, six feet long and nearly a foot wide, Hack is a powerful artifact in addition to being a good weapon. When activated, it splits into five slim blades that soar from her grasp to defend her. If something attacks, the blades seek to parry and counter the attacker, if it’s within five yards, and will continue to target the attacker until he retreats beyond range, at which point they’ll return to orbit Tai’en. If someone approaches within five yards but doesn’t attack, they’ll ignore him. If it’s a long-range missile, they’ll merely attempt to parry it. If struck hard enough, the blade struck at will drop to the ground, and must be picked up and reactivated again before it will rejoin its companions. Even if the blades aren’t struck down, it takes a turn for her to recall the blades back into their singular form.

It can affect even dematerialized spirits, or parry things normally unparriable--energy attacks, for instance, or flame, or a boulder. This holds true regardless of which state it’s in (separated or not). When committed, it's light and comfortable to wear; when uncommitted, it's far heavier than it seems like it should be, by virtue of the material it's made of.

Officially, its name is supposed to be Celestial Wings of the Guardian, named by one of Tai’en’s assistants who was horrified at her inability to name anything grandiosely, but she just calls it Hack.

Slash – An orichalcum reaper daiklave that she forged herself, perhaps four feet long and four inches wide. When activated, its blade turns into a bar of liquid light, bright enough that staring directly at it is like staring into the sun, and making it more difficult for her opponents to attack her. The colors of the light that form the blade in its activated state correspond to the nature of the wielder and the color of their aura; for her, it shines pale gold and white, suffused with scarlet and tinges of violet. In addition, its light is antithetical to demons and the undead and other creatures of the night, dealing aggravated damage to them.

However, its primary usefulness lies in its ability to slash arcs of concentrated light, up to 60 yards away. It can loose maybe one a turn, which can’t be parried without magical aid; the light simply passes straight through mundane weapons, and mundane armor is less effective against it than against a normal physical attack.

Like its partner Hack, this too has a grander official name, Radiant Glory of the Sun’s Talon, but Tai’en insists that that takes far too long to say and that Slash is much easier.

Spider-Gossamer Robe – When attuned to and wearing it, Tai’en sticks to things as easily as a spider does to the side of a building. She can walk straight up the side of a tower without hesitating, fall and catch herself on a slippery glass pole simply by slapping her hand down on it, and navigate her way over a pitching ship’s deck without losing her footing. Normally it takes the shape of a loose, flowing, long-sleeved black robe, but if she feeds it a bit more of her Essence, it can change into a black body-suit, the better for moving around in.

Bracers – A set of ornately-worked orichalcum bracers, they’re basically just armguards--although ‘just’ is something of a misnomer, since they are essentially indestructible except by extreme forces. Dropping them into lava or beneath a small hill would do, and magical means most likely would. A direct hit by a high-caliber bullet qualifies; a low-caliber bullet would dent it severely, but not destroy it outright.

Red Feather Sword – As the symbol of her position as the Bearer of Fire, Tai’en received the Red Feather Sword. Aside from being a highly magical artifact, difficult to break and needing no sharpening, it also springs into flame when she wields it. Being struck by it inflicts burns as well as cuts. In addition, any struck by it find their passions cooled, falling into an oddly calm state and often unwilling to continue fighting, although it’s not unknown for people to do so--especially if motivated by something other than strong emotion. The calming effect is not subject to Phoenix’s Curse, since it is a property of the object, not her.

She is immune to the fire generated by it, and is the only one who can activate its burning state; the flame goes out if she passes it to someone else, leaving it a normal, if slightly warm sword. In addition, it allows her to create and control fire at will when she carries the sword. The flame itself, although magically created, is not in and of itself magical; it is vulnerable to all the things normal fire is.

Wings of the Raptor – In its unactivated form, it looks just like a heavy cloak. When she feeds Essence into it, though, they transform into a set of wings, twenty feet from tip to tip, that allow her to fly at eighty miles an hour at top speed. In addition, her eyesight sharpens to that of a hawk’s.

Eyes of the Sun – She ended up losing her sight as part of the price for her seeking of magic. At first, she compensated by the use of Charms and her familiars, but when she had time, she experimented with ways of constructing artificial eyes. Finally, after years of experimentation and the aid of some companions, she crafted a pair of orichalcum lenses. When attuned and placed over her own eyes, they enable her to see almost normally; things are tinged slightly gold, but other than that, she can see objects as well as she used to. In addition, they allow her to see the movements of Essence, as in the Charm All-Encompassing Sorcerer’s Sight. They turn her irises into blank golden discs with no pupils that glow faintly in the dark, lending her a somewhat off-putting appearance.

Tokk – Her first familiar, Krra, had died long ago, of course--even a special crow such as he couldn’t have equaled her lifespan. But he left behind many descendents, which Tai’en took on as familiars in turn. Her current one, Tokk, is a many-times-grandson of Krra’s, and is quite the cheeky little crow. Intelligent as a human child, he has a fairly short attention span and no particular powers to speak of, although he is rather bigger and hardier than the average crow. He’s unflinchingly loyal to her, and can gift her with a little more Essence, as well as allow her to use his senses when within a short range of her.

Components – She typically carries around the simpler components needed for simple rituals, such as salt, various types of herbs, string, a few stones or candles, and so on. These components rarely take up more than a few pouches’ worth.

WEAKNESSES

Hearthstones – In her world, hearthstones are crystallized Essence drawn from a pool of Essence known as a Demesne and focused into being by a Manse built on top of it. They accelerate her Essence recovery time, as well as provide other benefits, such as turning into a firebird or allowing her to escape all ties. In the Dream, however, they’re nothing more than pretty rocks; in this entirely different realm, they’re cut off from their originating Manse, and thus can’t draw upon their power to provide either Essence-recovery or their other benefits.

God-Cursed – As one of the Cursed, Tai'en is completely vulnerable to the Priests of the gods who cursed her--in her case, all three of the Master Gods. She cannot bring harm to them, and they can completely ignore her powers as if they simply weren't there. In addition, each Master Priest knows what her Curses are, in detail, and any other Priest can find out if they inquire of their god and their god feels like answering. The mark of her curse is a black tattoo on her forehead, bracketing the point where her caste mark would show.

Curse of Phoenix – Tai’en cannot use anything magical, spell or Charm, that affect the mind or soul of another sentient being. For instance, she cannot enslave a person’s will, nor can she harry someone into insanity, or use a Charm to make them believe her (regular persuasion is still a fair go, though). She can, however, still send people to sleep, or make herself invisible, or enhance her natural powers of charm in order to make it easier for her to make someone else like her, since those deal more with the body, the senses, or herself rather than someone else’s mind. So long as it directly manipulates another person’s mind, she can’t use it.

Curse of Simurgh – To ensure that Tai’en could remain trustworthy, Simurgh laid her own Curse on her chosen. Tai’en can never swear a false oath; anything she promises, she /must/ carry out to the best of her ability. If she breaks an oath, or even tries to do so, all her strength and powers completely desert her; she’s left gasping on the ground, able only to crawl, until she either decides to follow the oath again or the person she made the promise to frees her from it.

The only exception is if she did absolutely everything in her power to fulfill her word, and still can’t, or if external circumstances render the oath moot—such as promising to break free a prisoner, only to have the prisoner escape before she can even travel there. In such cases, then she’s free from her oath. She’s also freed if the person she swore the oath to releases her from it, completely of their own free will; in the case of a promise she made to herself, she can never break it.

In addition, she must agree to the oath of her own free will; a coerced oath is not bound to the Curse, so that she cannot, for instance, be forced to work for an enemy lest she face torture, for instance. It’s the spirit of the oath that binds her, as well. Sophistry and clever wording won’t save her if she feels that, at heart, she’s breaking the oath (although a little bending is allowed). If she truly believes that she’s following the oath even after slight bending, she won’t be affected by the negative consequences, even if someone else (including the original oath-giver) disagrees. If she becomes aware that her interpretation and the oath-giver’s interpretation are different, then she’s forced to bend to the giver’s interpretation (as she understands it, anyway), but otherwise she works from her own understanding of the promise.

Curse of Roc – Roc’s curse has two parts: first, she can’t use any of her powers within fifty miles of Winterheart. She can still employ the natural gifts given to her by being Exalted, as well as the abilities of her artifacts, but her Charms and spells all fail within that range, even if cast from outside. Secondly, she cannot cast Solar-level spells at all; their use is completely sealed off, even though she still remembers how to cast them. The energy simply won’t respond if she tries to shape it into a Solar spell.

The Great Curse – Of the curse that the Primordials flung at the Celestial Incarna, which rebounded upon the Exalted, the effects remain until this day. After several hundred years of dealing with its effects in her Circlemates and other Exalted, Tai’en has become aware of its existence; however, she can’t tell when it actually takes effect in her, because to her, nothing else seems different, and her actions seem all completely reasonable.

In short, the Curse’s effect on her is to make her become extremely self-centered and childish. She gains the immaturity of an eight-year-old, and moreover, an eight-year-old focused solely on self-gratification and ego. Wisdom, reason, selflessness--these all fly out the window. All that matters is what she wants to do, and she has no concept of danger or reason in the getting of it. The Curse strikes irregularly, but generally after she’s had to bow to the restraints of wisdom and the needs of others for too long, at the cost of her own desires; too much of this, and she regresses into her childlike immaturity.

It lasts for five days, during which she can’t tell that she’s acting any differently. Nor can she tell afterward, for that matter. She might think that something is strange with regards to other people’s reactions, but to her, that’s their issue--she certainly can’t see anything wrong. If someone tells her that she was acting irrationally, she simply has to take their word for it.

Limited Reserves – While she has a great amount of Essence, there still is a limit. If she runs out, she has to rest in order to regain any more, and she has no hearthstones to aid in the recovery rate. In addition, she can only cast a handful of spells per day; the higher-level spells, she can cast perhaps five times, given the amount of concentration and will she has to channel into the casting. The lower levels can be cast about twice that, but regardless, there’s still a limit before she has to stop and rest.

Ignore the Flashing Neon Arrow – In a word, she’s terribly, horribly obvious. Unless she goes to great pains to disguise herself, she stands out in a crowd--a six-foot-tall woman with white-black hair and tattoos all across her face is not common in most societies, especially when she wears items that scream, “Hi! I’m Magical!” In the largely domestic atmosphere of Middleton, she tends to stick out like a troll in the middle of a bunch of fairies.