7 Years Old

Syndil's mother shook her finger and said in her heavily accented English, "You must not stay inside so, my dove. It is not healthy."

Syndil smiled up at her mother with those beguiling eyes and whispered, "I will go out and play soon, mamma. I would like to finish this book first."

Her mother merely "harumphed" and left the bedroom in a swish of skirts.

As soon as the door clicked closed a smile lit Syndil's dusky features. Small, beringed hands clutched at the book she professed to have been reading and tossed it aside. Beneath where the book had lain was the body of a small kitten - dead. Its limbs had been twisted and manipulated, paws sliced open to display the bone inside. Each sliver of bone had been carved with intricate symbols and words.

Syndil labored over her grisly masterpiece for a few more minutes, before hearing the call of her mother. Annoyance flitted across her features. There would be more time later. Perhaps, she could put the rhinestones in the eyes then. The kitten was cute before, but now it would be beautiful.

"Derek, stop."

"Stop what, Syndil? Aw, come on. You're not going to leave me hanging are you?"

"I don't want to go any further."

Syndil shook her head at the boy, frowning. Her first kiss should have been beautiful. She'd spent hours admiring her lips in the mirror, puckering prettily. Instead, Derek had slobbered all over her face and made her feel awful. She was angry and disappointed. They should have caressed each others' cheeks, closed their eyes, and touched lips in a poignant way. There was nothing poignant about what Derek did. He was a bull in a china shop. Syndil snapped out of her reverie as Derek reached for her again, his body sliding across the leather backseat.

"Derek, I said stop. You don't want to see me angry."

"C'mon, baby. It feels good, don't it?"

That was the last straw. Syndil smiled coyly at the boy, while her hand delved into her purse for the pearl handled straight razor she always carried.

"Show me how its supposed to go again, Derek?"

Derek leaned in to give Syndil another wet, inexperienced kiss.

Just before his lips could meet hers, they met steel. Syndil slashed at the boy's face and neck, screaming nonesense in her fury.

"Beautiful, beautiful! It was supposed to be poignant, you fucker! I'll show you! I'll show you!"

In a matter of minutes, Derek's screams turned to whimpers, and then there was nothing. Syndil took her time to carve a few symbols into the boy's cheek.

"You should have practiced, Derek. You should have practiced."

20 Years Old

"How much are these plates, ma'am?"

"Twenty dollars. They belonged to my great-grandmother. Antiques, I think."

Syndil examined the rare chinese Imari plates. No scratches, no chips. She didn't have the heart to tell the woman that this set could sell for just under a grand. Besides, she wanted the plates for her own. Each plate was decorated with Imari red enamel, gilt and underglazed blue - fabulous. Qianlong. Yes, that's what they were. Likely made in the late 1700's. Syndil ran her fingertips reverently over the face of the plates.

"I'll take these, ma'am."

The owner moved toward Syndil, preparing to take the plates and wrap them, when another woman nudged her rudely aside. Losing her balance, she fell grasping for the table - with the plates. Both table and plates toppled over to break the owner's fall. The plates shattered as they hit the concrete, fragments scattering in several directions. Syndil stood in the middle of this chaos, surprised and dismayed.

"The plates!" Syndil covered her mouth with her hand, eyes wide.

The owner shook her head as if to clear it and called to the woman that tripped her.

"Hey you! Look what you did! You ruined this woman's plates!" The owner gestures to Syndil.

The third woman, her face cast into a sneer, glanced down at the owner.

"If you weren't so fat, you would have been watching where you were going. All you've got is shit here anyway."

Syndil was beyond furious. Those plates were priceless to her, and this woman's rudeness had cost her something precious. She couldn't stand the woman's look, her face, her walk. Her purse didn't match her outfit. It was all wrong. Everything about her made Syndil want to vomit.

Instinctively, she helped the owner to her feet, and murmured, "Thank you anyway. They were lovely plates." Before the owner could respond, Syndil disappeared in pursuit of the third woman.

The flea market was packed, but she found her prey easily. The scent of her cheap perfume was like a trail of blood, leading her to the inevitable kill. Syndil hid in a niche, and just as the woman made to move passed she struck. Her hand shot out to tangle in the woman's hair, twisting it painfully. Syndil was careful to keep the woman's eyes off of her face. She held the straight razor before the woman's gaze menacingly and whispered.

"You should always watch where you're going. Today, you lost that luxury."

Syndil's arm anchored over the woman's face, her mouth, holding her in place as the straight razor gouged out her eyes. She didn't have to muffle the screams long. The woman, surprisingly amendable, fainted so that Syndil could finish the job properly.

Syndil teeters on the edge of madness. She always appears to be in control of herself, poised and elegant. Its this image she prefers to convey. However, sometimes she can't help but fly off the handle. Its a lot of little things, usually, but they all add up and when they do its best to be far away, and out of striking distance.

In her moments of insanity, she usually reaches for her anchor - the straight razor. She has no real talent at wielding the item in combat, but she can chisel a mean bit of bone. Her demeanor can change drastically, ranging from coldly menacing to passionately wild, and those who know her intimately have dubbed these mood swings as "episodes."

She favors the pursuit of arts and societal manipulation. She's just one fish, albeit a beautiful fish, in a sea of misfits. Bone crafting was her talent. She sold decorative artifacts of all shapes and sizes, armoire clocks, and, her favorite, baby rattles. Did her clientele know that what they were purchasing was bone? Oh, sure. Animal bone, they thought. What a novelty. Syndil was pretty sure they'd stop "oohing" and "ahhing" if they knew it was really human bone.

Syndil caught the eye of her sire after one particularly ravenous slip of control. The man just had to purchase his newspaper with a credit card. He didn't even bother to try to fish out some change. He was inconsiderate, and he had to die. Not only did he hold up the line, but he made her late for a dinner rendezvous. They were serving ginger flank steak with sake-glazed vegetables. Her favorite. Incensed, she followed him into the parking lot and slashed his throat.

He fought like a sissy, arms flailing wildly, and in the end she felt better for ridding the world of such a thoughtless man. He forced her hand. It was a shame, really. It was going to take her another good hour to clean the blood spatter off of her Versace dress.

Of all the ignorant things to do, bleeding on her was the worst. The finesse with which she manipulated the man's body, the care she took in carving her signature on his face, intrigued the watching, would-be sire.

Her integration into the Sabbat was as smooth as possible for a bunch of lunatics. They smashed her over the head with a shovel and buried her alive without bothering to ask her if she'd like to remove her good pearl earrings first. That earned them a few years of her anger. Oh, sure, she played by the rules, but she made it clear that she didn't like it. They were her mother's earrings after all and she spent weeks picking grit out of the platinum clasps. She eventually mellowed and was scouted into a pack.

They called her Princess. She allowed it for as long as she dared. One night the pack crashed a club, and to get even she started a riot. No fancy powers, not at all. Just good old fashioned feminine wiles. She gave a few too many men the look. No doubt the kind of look Delilah ensnared Samson with or Cleopatra employed on Marc Antony. She was probably trained from birth in the use of such looks as a national defense in times of crisis. The first punch flew when the men began to argue over who she'd be going home with. The pack never called her Princess again.

Syndil thought it best to broaden her horizons and travel. When she came to Mesa, she gawked. As far as she was concerned there was no culture to speak of, and she honestly wondered if these people ate with their feet and swung from tree branches. Mesa's only redeeming feature was Finn. He was her sunshine. They'd met by accident, really. She was under the throes of one of her "episodes" when he found her. She slashed at the woman's throat with her fangs, while simultaneously eviscerating her with the straight razor. She couldn't remember what set her off this time. Finn slipped from the shadows to observe the gruesome scene, eerie, thin hands hidden in his pockets. The sound of the wind against his body was enough to alert her to his presence, and she turned to pin him with eyes as wide as saucers.

"Help me." She reached for him then, wrapping her arms around his stiff, protesting body.

"Please help me. Please."

Syndil pressed her face against his thigh, shuddering. She clutched at him like a child. He was her anchor to sanity, her savior. It seemed like an eternity before his hand came to rest on top of her head. His hand soothed the mass of riotous, dark hair, then down further to cup her cheek. She reluctantly pulled away to stare up at him. His voice was scratchy. It suited him. He was beautiful.

"I'll help you, precious." She was his.

Finn was home. Mesa was home.

Appearance:

Syndil has medium-length, razor cut, black hair and blue eyes. Her skin has lightened considerably after the embrace, making her look like a porcelain doll. She has exotic features with high cheekbones, usually flushed pink. She is approximately 5'5, but almost always seems taller.

Syndil has a thin tribal tattoo that encircles each wrist like a permanent bracelet. Her ears are pierced, two times each, sporting polished steel ball studs. Syndil has the image of a skeletal dragon tattoed onto her abdomen. The tail curls provacatively just above her pelvic bone, while the maw of the beast extends toward her left nipple.

She's always fashionably attired with no real preference for any style of clothing.

Syndil wears a mantle of innocence, despite her gory affiliation with the Sabbat. Her bearing is one of confidence and eccentricity. People want to like Syndil. They also want to protect her.

She is almost always seen with an umbrella when outdoors.