The Blue Heron Institute
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Alexander Belanger
An Augur with an interest in Kennet, and a history with Charles. He's the headmaster of the Blue Heron Institute, the leader of the Belanger Circle, and a prominent enemy of Bristow. He's the viewpoint character of 7.x.
Practice: Augur
- A Lighter Shade of Black: Alexander is more charismatic, reasonable, and personable than Bristow, but make no mistake, he is not at all a nice person and can't be trusted.
- Body Horror: Places a sparrow's intestines inside his eye in order to copy Bristow's Sight.
- Boom, Headshot!: John kills him by shooting him in the head, and it's described as looking like a cracked egg afterwards.
- The Chessmaster: It's revealed in the 'Borrowed Eyes' comic that he's been preparing for a war against Bristow for years, even when they were on good terms.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Has a habit of betraying people he was on good terms with and taking what they'd built up. He did it with Charles by forswearing him, and again with Bristow by stealing Tanner, and then the school for the Aware he was trying to build.
- Conflict Ball: His Augury revolves around the kinds and shapes of Strife, and it surrounds him while using the strife.
- Death by Irony: The Augur was killed by someone he never saw coming, both as an enemy and in person.
- Disproportionate Retribution: He winds up forswearing Seth not because they turned against him, but because they refused to choose a side.
- Dropped a Bridge on Him: After the end of the Bristow/Belanger fight arc, Alexander's brooding, angry, and making preparations to fight back. He starts preparing to get a primordial released, then begins to take on Ted Havens... and then John Stiles walks up to him and puts a bullet in his head before Alexander even knows he's there.
- Evil Is Petty: When the trio manage to derail his plans and Ray ends up becoming interim headmaster, he responds by having unknown figures move to release the bindings on a primordial Durocher's bound, puts Ray in the crosshairs of some dangerous people, and is implied to cut Lucy's connections with John. The last ends up backfiring as it's implied that doing that is what allowed John to sneak up on and kill him, as he wouldn't have done so had he been aware of Lucy's presence.
- Faux Affably Evil: Compared to Bristow, he's far more affable, to the point where the girls are able to initially cut a deal with him... but whenever he's seriously cornered or sufficient benefits are available, he drops the affable act and strikes hard, as Charles and Seth can attest. And when he's finally defeated, he tries to unleash a Primordial in revenge.
- Good Smoking, Evil Smoking: Interlude 7.x reveals that he's a smoker, and he's definitely pretty evil, though he uses the habit mainly to keep his memories together for use in augury.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: His death seems to have been at least in part the result of his using Practice to attack Lucy's connections, since the way it happened was by damaging her connection to John after she saw him kill Alexander.
- Karmic Death:
- Alexander sees people as little more than pawns, and Others as just tools to be directed at enemies or drained for power, so it's fitting that an Other working on their own agenda is the one to kill him.
- It also may be literally true in his case due to the in-universe karma system; Ted Havens' multiple heroic lives ensure that he has excellent karma and that therefore the spirits are likely to ensure things work in his favour, so it's possible that Alexander's attempt to kill or enslave him aided John in getting the drop on him.
- Lack of Empathy: His answer to Luisa being disturbed by his, Musser, and Bristow's amorality in a flashback is to make jokes about Bristow not killing her to avoid having a revenant show up.
- Long Game: The most dangerous thing about Alexander is that he's capable of seeing ahead thanks to being an Augur, and that means he can lay the seeds to your downfall years in advance before you even know he's an enemy.
- Manipulative Bastard: He treats pretty much everyone as pawns. The 'Borrowed Eyes' comic reveals that he let some friendships fade for years just so he could say Bristow was one of his closest friends without lying.
- Man of Wealth and Taste: He and all his apprentices dress business casual. Zed thinks it makes him look like a smarmy businessman.
- No Dead Body Poops: When John shoots him in the head in Interlude 7.x, his augury powers continue in a magical variation of this trope being averted until it finally goes out when Musette starts eating him, and the narration with it.
- Pet the Dog: While not stated explicitly, it's heavily implied that he supported Zed in transitioning, since Raymond Sunshine mentions how important it would be to have someone with established authority like Alexander support Zed's new name and there don't seem to have been any problems with it.
- Rules Lawyer: He has a particular specialty in the use of karma, such as when he got Charles forsworn by goading him into accidentally hurting him, and being good at staying ahead of karmic debt until he can discharge it or pass it on.
- Seers: Exaggerated, he has an international reputation for his ability to see the future and constantly uses it in maneuvering to get more power and status for him and secondarily for his family.
- Would Hurt a Child: Uses doom magic alongside Nicolette to make a Hungry Choir ritual participant's pistol drop, misfire, and shoot them in the foot, before the second misfired shot takes most of their head off. The fact that this person happened to be a child, even if they were threatening Brie, doesn't appear to visibly bother him.
'Rad' Raymond Sunshine
A teacher at the Blue Heron Institute.
Practice: Technomancer
- Despair Event Horizon: According to Zed, Ray hit his after his son Hector died. Zed later expands on it- Hector became terminally ill and Ray went searching for a cure. He found one, but Hector was so furious that his father had abandoned him as he was dying that he refused the cure, refused to listen to him, and chose to die. Ray never understood why, and now can't handle people being angry and unreasonable.
- The Empath: He has some kind of power that lets him sense emotions.
- Energy Weapon: He uses an antiquated laser projector in his practice.
- Heroic Neutral: While he's one of the more reasonable and powerful teachers at the school, his commitment to spreading knowledge means that he also has to remain strictly neutral, preventing him from interfering in the conflict between Alexander and Bristow.
- Like a Son to Me: He became a father figure to Zed after falling out with his own son, Hector, who died.
- Outliving One's Offspring: His son Hector died of a terminal illness after being so bothered by Ray not being there when he was sick because he was searching for a cure and found it, that he refused to take it and died.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Although he has his failings (such as his initial conflict with Lucy), he's broadly a good teacher who is concerned about his students and is willing to admit fault when he makes a mistake.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: According to Charles, Ray's last name, 'Sunshine', was a bit more fitting back when he knew him, being "bright, goofy, and cheerful" before he lost his son. In Alexander's Interlude, this seems to bear out as true.
Marie Durocher
A teacher at Blue Heron Institute, and an evoker of pre-human deities.
Practice: Cultist
- Badass Teacher: One of the most powerful practitioners in the world, and a teacher at BHI.
- Barrier Maiden: Says that she's not particularly afraid of getting gainsaid by the Carmine Exile because she believes the threat of her gainsaying (And the subsequent power loss) unleashing the various monstrosities she's bound upon the world again makes it far too dangerous for them to risk it.
- Creepy Good: She's one of the nicer and more reliable teachers at the Blue Heron Institute... but her field of studies is Eldritch Abominations, so this comes with the territory. She also tends to rely on scaring her students in order to instill in them a proper respect for the danger of the things they're working with, which is reasonable given her area of expertise.
- The Dreaded: Durocher is so powerful that people are very afraid of crossing her, and the Aurum Coil notes that she's even a danger to the Judges in a fight, who are all Physical Gods.
- The Hedonist: Her younger self was very into drink, drugs, and sex.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: A lesson she imparts on her students is knowing when to flee when they come across something they can't handle, and to make sure to avoid even being in such a situation whenever possible.
- Lovecraftian Superpower: Her practice consists of communicating with pre-human divinites in a guttural language that is painful to pronounce.
- More than Meets the Eye: Lucy notes that she's mousy and frail-looking despite being relatively tall, but she's also one of the most dangerous practitioners in Canada and the world due to her control over pre-human divinities.
- Neutral No Longer: While she's largely neutral in the fight between Bristow and Alexander, and later between Musser, the girls, and Charles, learning that Musser murdered Timothy Crowe and ate his intelligence is enough to make her take a side against him.
- Power Incontinence: Zed says in the SunnyDay Logs that the weakest practice he saw her use made car alarms go off two blocks away. In Interlude 3.z, her practice makes two buildings collapse and blows something up.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: She's one of the more reasonable teachers at the school once you get past her terrifying focus and intensity. During one class, Lucy suggests threatening to shoot her as a solution to a problem, and Ms. Durocher praises her for creative thinking.
- Sink or Swim Mentor: At the start of her class on binding, she tells them that she's going to release an Eldritch Abomination-class Other at the end and the class (plus her assistant) will have to handle it. While she keeps her word, her assistant handles the Other easily enough that it's clear there was no real danger, with none of the class having to actually help; the real lesson she was teaching them was to Know When to Fold 'Em by demonstrating how little they can do against something of that class.
- This Is Unforgivable!: How she treats the revelation of AJ's murder of Timothy Crowe, as he'd deceived the entire Blue Heron crew about it for decades, to their faces, without batting an eyelash about working with Luisa, Timothy's sister. Durocher is so disgusted that she immediately removes her support of Musser and vows to dismantle his power structure completely.
Guest Lecturers
Lawrence T. Bristow, Esq.
The former headmaster of the Blue Heron Institute, who seeks to regain his position from Alexander.
Practice: Collector
- Ambition Is Evil: Charles describes him as always being a power-hungry asshole long before he started collecting titles.
- Collector of the Strange: Collects people who are Aware, people who been touched or are aware of magic and Others but have not Awakened as practitioners, and houses them in properties he owns, making him basically a practitioner landlord. It's later revealed that what he actually wants to collect is titles.
- Evil Versus Evil: Neither he nor Alexander are the best of people, as Bristow cares little for collateral damage in his rivalry and sees nothing wrong with basically owning people.
- Fatal Flaw: Pride, or rather, his ego. He's good at setting things up, but once he has, he refuses to believe that anything could hamper or destroy them:
- In Gone Ahead 7.9, when he's confronted with the reality that he's lost, he refuses the option of ceding and losing everything he built, but with a chance of starting again and building something new, and chooses to give himself to the brownies.
- The Judges point out in Summer Break that if he hadn't been so proud as to avoid summoning them to arbitrate over his wager with the Trio, they would've sided with him and foresworn the Trio on the spot.
- Fate Worse than Death: Chooses to accept a terrible fate at the hands of the brownies than submit to Alexander or the Kennet Trio.
- The Friend Nobody Likes: Even his friends and allies tend to view him as a blowhard; one ally notes that many people only sided with him over Alexander because Bristow was more petty and therefore more likely to hold a grudge if they didn't.
- In-Series Nickname: "Larry", used by his friends (in the Gone Ahead 7.x flashback) and Jeannine Preston (in the present).
- Manipulative Bastard:
- Talks a big game about how his tenants are free to make their own choices, but shamelessly admits to Verona that he basically manipulates them for his convenience, and no matter what he does, they need him too much to leave. Alexander's copying of his Sight reveals that he can literally see people's finances, making it easier to manipulate them through rent offers.
- Kevin's Interlude reveals that the way he brought Ted into his service was by making him promise during one of his time loops that if his assistance helped Ted defeat his monster, then he'd join with Bristow. Despite the fact that only Ted can remember the incident, it's still considered a binding promise.
- Miles Gloriosus: The demonic plaque Clem has implies that despite his outer front, in the end he's just a pathetic blowhard. This is a view shared by Alexander.
- Mysterious Backer: He has his various Aware capable of functioning outside his properties do jobs for him in return for answering their questions, giving them better apartments, or lowering rent.
- Smug Snake:
- His phone conversation with Verona has him talk down to her while saying he basically owns all of his tenants, so there's nothing she can really do to him because no matter what happens they'll always come back to him due to the pattern he's set up.
- Nicolette describes him like this in relation to the more Manipulative Bastard Alexander; Bristow has a lot of schemes and plans, but at the end of the day he always falls flat on his face.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: He says in Gone Ahead 7.9 that something really bad is coming, and what he was trying to do with the school and the network he wanted to set up would have helped them prepare for it.
- Would Hurt a Child: While he won't get his own hands dirty, he has no problem setting his Aware on child practitioners who won't play ball with him, and uses the fact that they're Innocent and not technically being ordered by him to keep his hands clean of bad karma.
Abraham Musser
A founder of the Institute who split with it after Alexander ousted Bristow. He returns to teach a lesson on human binding.
Practice: Collector (Taker), War Mage
- Abusive Parents: He treats his own children like crap, and as a child had an abusive father who made him swear to enter the top 2% of his school's students on pain of being forsworn.
- Ambiguously Human: As he's taken on all the Musser family head echoes upon rising to head of the family, he's got more in common with Matthew harboring the Doom (Which made him Other) than he does most human practitioners.
- Collector of the Strange: He has a lot of magical trinkets, and multiple Implements. One of the most commonly used is a catcher's mitt that automatically catches whatever is thrown or fired at him and allows him to return it back, potentially lethally.
- Cruel Mercy: How his third bid for Kennet ends. He is allowed to leave Kennet, with no harm done to him, his familiars, or his implements. But his secrets are revealed to Durocher, who swears to personally dismantle any powerbase he might recoup in the future in revenge for his crimes, and, as Charles gleefully points out, he was evicted before he could get to his car, leaving him without transport in hostile territory with an angry Durocher on his heels.
- Dark Horse Victory: He ends up as the head of the Blue Heron Institute after both Alexander and Bristow end up dead or worse.
- Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: While willing to call upon the Judges to arbitrate on his behalf, he treats the more or less godlike Others with about as much contempt as he does almost everyone else.
- Disc-One Final Boss: After the battle for the Carmine Throne, Musser seemed set to be one of the major antagonists of the setting through his plans to claim Lordship over most of Ontario and wage war on Kennet. However, after several arcs as the main antagonist, his conquests are suddenly stymied by Charles, and he loses much of his power several arcs later once Durocher turns on him, leaving the Carmine as the true main antagonist.
- Dragon Ascendant: He was originally Bristow's right-hand man before rising in prominence after Bristow is taken by the Brownies.
- Familiar: As a Taker Collector, he's stolen the Familiars of at least six other practitioners, seven if he never took a familiar of his own.
- Four Eyes, Zero Soul: Wears glasses and is an amoral individual.
- Fate Worse than Death: He gets trapped with Maricica inside the sealed box for the next 300 years.
- Hero Killer: He manages to defeat John's Dog pack plus Bluntmunch's Dog Meat and re-bind them even while outnumbered 11 to 1.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: He got his start by murdering Timothy Crowe and stealing his intelligence. This is also the straw that breaks the camel's back for Durocher, and what brings about his defeat.
- Home Field Advantage: He has numerous stolen demesnes that he's taken from other practitioners, and has all the godlike power afforded to him inside them.
- I Am the Noun: When arguing with a Judge over the length of a gainsaying, he argues that, as the Musser patriarch, he is Practice to such an extent that the argument automatically weighs in his favour simply by force of him decreeing it. The Judge grudgingly acknowledges that he's right.
- I Control My Minions Through...: Fear. His many Familiars were all stolen from other practitioners and bound to him, but when those bindings are temporarily neutralized, they're all too afraid to flee or act against him.
- Irony: For all his talk of practitioners ruling over Others, the Musser family practice of their head taking on so many echoes that it can subsume their very Self makes him far more inhuman than he professes to be.
- Jerkass: On top of specializing in taking things from other people, he's just an unpleasant person on a personal level as well.
- Kick the Dog: Upon capturing Lucy, he doesn't bother taking her Implement for his own or Raquel's use only because he considers it too cheaply made to bother with.
- Know When to Fold Them:
- After the price of continuing his Lordship claim on Kennet is made clear, Musser decides to cut his losses and leave Kennet with 10 of his amassed practitioners for the time being in return for giving back the Dogs he bound.
- It's only mentioned briefly, but he also resigned as headmaster of the Blue Heron Institute in order to avoid a prophecy, which is implied to have been the potential three-beat of the girls defeating whoever holds that position.
- Legacy of the Chosen: As the heir to the Musser family, upon being given the leadership of the family a vast collection of echoes of every single past Musser patriarch (With the occasional matriarch) is imbued into him such that he becomes Musser, singular. Abraham Junior "A.J." Musser is strongly implied to no longer exist as an independent person.
- Loss of Identity: A.J., his original self, is implied to no longer exist as an independent being due to the echoes of all the past Mussers subsuming his Self.
- No-Nonsense Nemesis: Is completely business-like and efficient about whatever he decides to do, with neither mercy nor sadism delaying him for a second, nor does he show any particular pleasure or anger at anything.
- Power Nullifier: Is somehow immune to the powers of Kevin Noone's evil eye.
- Psycho Knife Nut: One of his stolen Implements is a knife whose cuts grow and roam across the body on their own, with a playful sadism at first but eventually striking lethal points.
- Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: Makes the argument to the Judges that he embodies Practice to such an extent that he is able to weigh the rules in his favour, simply because he says so. Much to the Trio's fury and disbelief, the Judges actually concede the point.
- Shadow Walker: One of his stolen demesnes allows him this ability, by extending claim to unclaimed shadows in open areas.
- Simple, yet Opulent: Is noted to dress in an expensive but casual style.
- Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil:
- The girls have a particular issue with Musser for his keeping his Familiars as slaves.
- That some of the Musser echoes have whips and the oldest known echo carries around chains heavily implies that the Musser family was involved in the Transatlantic slave trade long before they became practitioners and started enslaving Others instead.
- Start of Darkness: Used an alchemical ritual as a child to take his friend Timothy's knowledge, killing him in the process, in order to get the grades needed to keep himself from being forsworn.
- Take Over the World: Downplayed as he only seeks to have control over Ontario, but his main plan is to create a bunch of allied Lordships in order to supplant the control of the Judges.
- Upper-Class Twit: Though Musser himself is intelligent and hardworking, while parleying with the Trio he compares them to poor people "unfairly" pointing fingers at the rich for their problems, showing some of the attitude of this trope.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: His son, Reid, is a hollow shell of a man who exists primarily to please his father, and who is immediately discarded as soon as he fails.
- World's Best Warrior: Musser is a contender for the single best combatant in Canada, at the very least. Later in the story he begins conquering Ontario via the simple method of challenging everyone within three day's walk to serve him or fight, defeating all challengers, and moving on to the next region, and continually expands the scope of his conquest as he finds no Lord in Canada is able to stand against him.
- Would Hurt a Child:
- When his former apprentice Yellowston tried to sabotage a diagram Musser had them set up, Musser punched him in the throat before turning the diagram on him while he was still reeling from the blow, and left him bound in the wall as a Vestige, still somewhat aware of his surroundings, but dimly. Luisa is disturbed after he tells the story, but Musser says he won't be releasing the Vestige because it might be useful for resources someday.
- As the trio attempts to stall him during his Lordship claim for Kennet, he contemplates killing them all right then and there and dealing with the Judges later. Notably, this thought comes because he finds their banter irritating rather than because he thinks it's necessary to his plan.
Students
Alexander's Apprentices
Nicolette Belanger
A young practitioner from the Belanger family, though not by blood. She's technically Chase's apprentice, but in actuality she's one of Alexander's. She's the viewpoint character of 2.z.
Practice: Augur
- Abusive Parents: When she was ten, her parents left her at home for a weekend with her brother to look after her, but her brother was a drug abuser and her parents refused to acknowledge this. He wound up accidentally fracturing Nicolette's skull after accusing her of stealing his drugs, and left her in the shower for at least a day without getting help. Her parents were angrier that she refused to forgive him than at her brother for giving her injuries that left her in a coma for several days and resulted in her going permanently deaf in one ear and having vision problems, as well as her injuries making her more susceptible to possession by spirits. She's also got a hole in her skull that makes her vulnerable to contracting meningitis.
- The Atoner: Has been trying to make up for inadvertently crippling Melissa with her Omens by sending her good Omens from time to time.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: Her shitty brother and parents aside, her interlude makes it clear that few of the Belangers really like her or want her around, and her patron Alexander intends to marry her off to someone once she turns eighteen if she still happens to be in his service.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Aside from getting her skull fractured and being left in the shower for a day without help, she spent several years homeless, trying to both recover from her injuries and find a way to function with the spirits.
- Defeat Means Friendship: While she's the proximate antagonist from the Blue Heron Institute early on, after the trio defeats her she ends up becoming one of their few allies there, partially because she appreciates their ability to get in Alexander's hair. When Lucy is going through the Implement ritual and goes through a possible future where she gets married, Nicolette and Zed are even considered close enough friends for them to be invited to her wedding.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Her response to Lucy and Verona's retaliation against her is to interfere with Avery's ritual at the Forest Ribbon Trail to try making her Lost or otherwise suffer a terrible fate.
- Everyone Has Standards: She objects to Alexander forswearing Seth, saying that forswearing is a practice that should be left in the past.
- Evil Is Petty: She interferes in Avery's attempt at the Forest Ribbon Trail because she's mad that Avery's trying to attain power, and because she's mad that the Trio had the nerve to retaliate against her constant incursions in a way that scared her, even though they repeatedly asked her to leave them alone and tried to warn her off.
- Eye Scream: Twice: When the trio turn her Observer against her, it nearly takes out an eye, and when they use glamour on her, it makes her believe that her glasses exploded and destroyed her eyes. As Augury involves the use of either the Augur's eyes or the eyes of others, it's a pretty big deal to her.
- Heel–Face Turn: Finally turns on Bristow (having turned on Alexander earlier for personal reasons) when it's clear the alternative is the girls suffering a Fate Worse than Death.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Part of why she decides to attack Avery is out of jealousy that she was picking up power so easily without the sacrifices Nicolette had to make.
- Hoist by Her Own Petard: She could have left Avery alone, or at the very least not personally taken revenge, but she chose to mess up her attempt at the Forest Ribbon Trail and stole Snowdrop, which led to Snowdrop stealing her agenda and setting the Institute on fire.
- Oracular Urchin: During her time on the street as a runaway she was able to see the future but wasn't able to process it, spinning elaborate conspiracy theories just to stay sane. After Chase found her and she Awakened she steadily got better and became a seer.
- Outside-Context Problem: She, along with her patron Alexander, are under the impression that the Others of Kennet are being actively wrangled by a surprisingly versatile practitioner, and that the trio are of no consequence. At no point does it occur to them that the Others are in charge.
- Pet the Dog: Offers Seth sanctuary after they're forsworn, even though they never liked each other.
- Seers: Thanks to her background as an Aware before she was Awake Nicolette as an Augur specializes in various Omens and the fates they can bring.
Seth Belanger
Alexander's nephew and apprentice, an Augur whose position in the Belanger circle is by virtue of bloodline rather than any particular talent.
Practice: Augur
- Asshole Victim: He's not a very nice person, so Alexander forswearing him hits a bit less hard than it might have.
- Brought Down to Normal: Alexander forswears him for being one of the apprentices who turn against him, but refuses to openly pick a side, based on the fact that he had sworn to live up to his potential on his grandmother's deathbed and failed to do so.
- Dismotivation: According to Alexander, Seth had countless opportunities to improve himself and make something of himself, but he never took any of them.
- Dramatic Irony: When threatening to do something that would get Nicolette forsworn, he boasts that "You’d be forsworn, and you’d be entirely at the mercy of any of us, if we were gracious enough to give you sanctuary, after." After Seth is forsworn, Nicolette is the only one to offer him sanctuary.
- Jerkass: Constantly leers at Nicolette and makes inappropriate advances at her, and makes a pass at Snowdrop (who looks eleven at the time.) Needless to say, nobody likes him.
- Nepotism: His only real successes come from coasting on the family name, in stark contrast to the rest of Alexander's apprentices, all of whom have distinct talents and accomplishments of their own.
- Seers: He's an augur, but not a particularly good one.
Chase Whitt
One of Alexander's apprentices, an Augur who is technically Nicolette's sponsor, though in practice she serves under Alexander.
Practice: Augur
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: The Whitt family is this; Chase is the de facto family head due to his apprenticeship with Alexander and is slowly cracking under the pressure, while his sister and cousins live in terror of being married off for political advantage.
- The Chains of Commanding: As the de facto head of the Whitt family, he's very aware of how much he's responsible for and how everyone's hopes rest on him. He defects to Bristow because what Bristow's offering is enough for Chase to step down as the head of the family, and he feels he can't do it anymore.
- Drowning My Sorrows: Fernanda notes that he drinks a lot when he sees his non-practitioner friends, because of how lonely he gets.
- Heroic Sacrifice: After Gillian is turned into a horror, Chase volunteers to have the horror traits transferred to him.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: When confronted by not only Nicolette betraying him but the Kennet Trio backing her up, he decides it's better to surrender.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Consistently misgenders Zed and engages in microaggressions.
- Seers: Good enough at augury to catch Alexander's eye.
Wye Belanger
Alexander's first and oldest apprentice. He's not around the Institute often, as he runs the family business while Alexander teaches.
Practice: Augur
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones:
- He genuinely cares about Reid and Raquel Musser, though they're both so much younger than him and so twisted by the toxic environment of the Musser family that it's as much a matter of pity as friendship.
- He also genuinely mourns Alexander's death.
- The Gambler: His Implement is a set of knucklebones carved into uneven dice.
- Nepotism: Technically. He's Alexander's nephew once removed, so that definitely got his foot in the door, but his accomplishments since were his own doing.
- Non-Action Guy: Presents himself as this to Avery when he asks for her help in saving the Musser kids. According to him Nicolette would thrash him in a fight.
- Seers: His ability to see the future is so good that he's Alexander's chosen successor as head of the Belanger family.
- Undying Loyalty: The only one of Alexander's apprentices to stay loyal when Bristow tries to tempt them away.
Tanner Gilpin
One of Alexander's apprentices. He Awakened after finding a portent of the future written on the wall of a burning building, which he took and used for his own gain.
Practice: Augur
- Out of Focus: Receives the least focus out of all of Alexander's apprentices, and is unlikely to receive any more after he turned coat.
- Seers: He specializes in seeing the future of Events as opposed to people like Alexander's other apprentices, very good at it by all accounts.
- Portent of Doom: Found literal Writing on the Wall, he removed it and took it home with him, using its clues to get ahead in life.
Sunshine's Apprentices
Zed Sadler
The apprentice of Rad Ray Sunshine, and one of the numerous practitioners attempting to infiltrate Kennet. He's the viewpoint character of 3.z.
Practice: Technomancer
- Ambiguously Brown: Zed is noted to have dark brown skin, but his race is ambiguous.
- Cool Car: Drives an old station wagon that's been enhanced to resist bullets and take voice commands.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Prior to becoming Raymond's apprentice he was kicked out of his house by his father after he learned about Zed's activities online, had implied suicidal thoughts, and was targeted by both figurative and literal Internet predators on numerous occasions.
- Defeat Means Friendship: While he's introduced as an antagonist, it's clear from the start that he's not unreasonable, and he becomes one of the trio's few allies at the Blue Heron Institute later on.
- Haunted Technology: Has cassettes containing ghosts and beings formed from static.
- Magitek: He specializes in the Technomancy version of it, of course, particularly utilizing haunted technology.
- Official Couple: Gets together with Brie as of Interlude 3.z.
- Playful Hacker: He breaks into a meeting that his mentor is having by hacking into it with Nina's help.
- Sobriquet Sex Switch: Downplayed, he used to go by "Zoe" before coming out as Zed about a year and a half before the story proper.
- Trans Tribulations: Due to awakening prior to transitioning, Zed has to constantly deal with both Others and practitioners misgendering him both accidently, and directly maliciously in the case of Chase.
Ms. Durocher's Apprentices
Ulysse Miraz
One of Ms. Durocher's apprentices.
Practice: Chosen
- Carry a Big Stick: His main weapon is a divinely-granted burning club that can burn through anything it hits and punishes those who avoid being hit by it by bumping their temperature up a few degrees.
- Official Couple: With Eloise, being bethrothed to her.
- Mr. Fanservice: Lucy notes that he's so attractive she initially suspects it may be supernatural. When Fernanda is checking if Avery is gay or bi, she asks if she finds Ulysse attractive; when Avery answers in the negative, Fernanda says she's definitely 100% gay.
- Playing with Fire: His divine patron is a god who would have brought fire to humanity, akin to Prometheus or Maui. One who failed, true, but only because he was the most powerful and thus met with the most opposition. As a result, Ulysse's various divine tricks are fire-based.
- Warrior Monk: He fights with a literally god-given burning club.
Eloise Miraz
One of Ms. Durocher's apprentices, implied to be from the Duchamp family.
Practice: Enchantress
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: Her familiar, Schartzmugel, is a High Perversion taking the form of a giant centipede.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: She comes from one that judges their daughters on how well they can present themselves and how valuable they would be as potential wives.
- Official Couple: With Ulysse, being betrothed to him.
- Superman Stays Out of Gotham: After Bristow ousts Alexander, Eloise leaves the campus because she's squarely on Alexander's side, and also because as an Enchantress, she could do a lot of damage to Bristow and his team by altering their connections. Bristow's Augurs have to keep looking out for her, but Team Alexander are without Eloise's help for the duration of Gone Ahead.
Amine Roscio
One of Ms. Durocher's apprentices.
- Kill the God: He made his name by forcing a god to unmake itself.
- Mr. Fanservice: Several of the girls in Ms. Durocher's class are noted to be crazy over him.
Musser's Apprentices
Reid Musser
Abraham Musser's son and apprentice. He's the viewpoint character of 12.z.
Practice: Collector (Taker)
- Boom, Headshot!: John kills him with a shot to the head and two more to the chest for good measure.
- Deader than Dead: Like all contestants for the Carmine Throne, upon death he's dissolved to nothingness.
- Familiar: Two, Drowne and Blackhorne, both taken from other practitioners.
- Heel–Face Door-Slam: He finally realizes how awful his family was and takes the first steps towards doing something better... but it's in the middle of the contest for the Carmine Throne, so he gets killed by John immediately afterwards.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Faced with possession by an unbound and vengeful Drowne, he surrenders and swears all oaths demanded of him.
- Laser-Guided Karma: His Interlude makes it clear that he's a misogynist who thinks nothing of enslaving Others and in particular taking the Implements and Familiars of other practitioners, and is obsessed with his family standing and physical appearance. By the end of the Interlude his tools are freed, the Other he enslaved has scarred him, and he's beaten so badly that a doctor tells him that they normally only see his level of injury in those involved in drug-related crimes. Raquel, who he deemed only being useful for marrying off, is the only person keeping him company at the hospital. Unbeknownst to him the mother of Lucy, his enemy, is taking care of him, and by the end he's fully aware that his father's absense shows that he no longer considers him a Musser, but of the Mussers, like Raquel.
- Pet the Dog: Once saved a pregnant woman's life from a practitioner serial killer and even delivered her baby when he couldn't get anything out of it besides assuaging his guilt. Being a Musser, however, he views the whole episode as a moment of weakness.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: He views Others as tools and has a misogynistic view of women, viewing Raquel as worth nothing besides someone to marry off, and focuses on her body in ways that would be creepy even if she wasn't underage and his cousin.
- Would Hurt a Child: Some of it can be blamed on his father's influence and familiar pressure, but he was willing to strike, choke, and brand a child younger than sixteen before stealing her Familiar and casting her out on the street with nothing and no-one, then torture her through the brand from afar to keep the stolen Familiar in line.
Blackhorne
Reid's first familiar, taken from an unknown practitioner.Type: Deuadai
- Chekhov's Gunman: First appears in Snowdrop's Interlude as a random Other she encounters while trying to dodge the brownies out for her blood, before he's revealed to be one of Reid's familiars.
- Fauns and Satyrs: He's a deuadai, noted to be like a satyr but more savage and strong than lustful and feral. Which isn't to say he's not lustful and feral.
- Happiness in Slavery: Of a sort. He does genuinely like Reid, despite being enslaved by him, but not enough to stick by him when presented with other options.
- Made of Iron: The resistance of his chest and hand are greater than the force provided by a chainsaw engine, forcing it to stall out rather than cutting deeper. And despite the grievous injuries left to both body parts, he doesn't care about either in continuing the fight.
Drowne
Reid's second familiar, taken from the practitioner descendant of the woman Drowne once loved.Type: Visage
- Best Served Cold: He waits some years before capitalizing on an opening presented by Montague once his stolen familiar bond to Reid is neutralized. In that opening Drowne utterly destroys Reid, freeing both himself and Blackhorne, forcing Reid to forgo all claim to his stolen Implements, and physically maiming him on top of anything else he did while conspiring with the Witch Hunters while Reid was too insensate from pain to register. The fallout sees Reid utterly bereft of all standing with his father and family, and Drowne free to return to his true partner.
- Body Horror: He's a face and nothing else, and that face can merge with people and things to let him control them. The visual effect is... unsettling.
- Kavorka Man: He was an ugly fisherman who won the heart of a beautiful young woman. Doubly so after other jealous suitors of the woman maimed his face and she stayed with him anyways.
- Revenge: After becoming an Other, he haunted the descendants of the men who maimed and killed him. The moment one showed any sign of being like the worst of their ancestors he'd start acting against them. In the process he figured out the rules that governed Others and made it a contest. The descendants always had a chance to figure out his history, unravel what he was, and stop him. Sometimes it worked and he was driven away, sometimes they didn't and he won. What exactly that means is... unclear.
- Undying Loyalty: As much as he's defined by his revenge on the descendants of those who did him wrong, he's equally defined by the protection and support he gives to the descendants of the woman he loved. Come present day, he became the Familiar of one of her descendants when the girl was homeless and alone, showing her that there was magic in the world and becoming her familiar to provide her lifelong support... until Reid stole him away.
Raquel Musser
Musser's niece, who has been under his guardianship since her mother disappeared due to having too much of an "independent streak".
Practice: Collector
- Altar Diplomacy: Her likely fate as a female Musser. In Arc 19, it's revealed that Musser's increasing desperation has pushed him to marry Raquel off early for the sake of an alliance, which drives Raquel to desperate measures.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Though she openly considers Avery an upstart dissident and agent of chaos, she nevertheless grows steadily more friendly due to Avery's determination to keep up contact.
- Last-Name Basis: As far as she's concerned only people who she considers friends can call her by her first name, and expects the same from others, so she insists that she and Avery are just "Musser" and "Kelly" to one another.
- Lonely Rich Kid: At her core, Raquel is this. She's only got a few friends at the Blue Heron Institute, who her uncle quickly cuts her ties with after he assumes the headmastership.
- Odd Friendship: With Avery after Summer Break, mostly through email. Raquel gets television recommendations from Avery and even starts following her sister's podcast about her favorite show, Blasphemy Girls.
- Read the Fine Print: Raquel's failure to check properly when Avery presents her with a contract that could possibly cause her uncle to fail is a key sign that her Arranged Marriage has pushed her past the edge of desperation.
- The Unfavorite: Women are considered lesser in the Musser family because the men get most of the power, and Raquel is no exception. As a result, she's desperate to gain her uncle's approval.
Other Students
Brie Callie
A participant in, and later winner of, the Hungry Choir's game.
Practice: Undecided (Host or Harbinger)
- An Arm and a Leg: The waifs bit off most of her hand and took off a large part of both legs.
- Action Survivor: Actually managed to win the Hungry Choir's ritual. She had help, but considering that by the eighth night, she was missing both feet, it's a hell of an accomplishment.
- Damsel in Distress: Got taken prisoner by the goblins in Out On A Limb 3.7. The trio rescued her in 3.8.
- De-power: During the fight for the Carmine Throne, she's abducted so the conspirators can take the Hungry Choir out of her body. After the fight, the Choir is unmade, leaving Brie without their power. Since then, she's become more of a Host for other spirits.
- Extreme Omnivore: As a winner of the Hungry Choir's ritual, she can eat just about anything without issue.
- Heart Is an Awesome Power: Winning the ritual means she has no obstacles to eating or similar indulgences. And while that might not sound like much, it means no obstacles. If she's snacking on something or going to a meal, hostile forces literally can't touch her, because doing so would impede her. If she wants to, she can take bites out of people and Others as easily as she could chew through cotton candy without fear of poisons or retributive curses. Lasting harm, up to and including death, doesn't stick because it would keep her from future meals, though this particular feature only comes up against the Hungry Choir so it might not be universal.
- I Owe You My Life: Zed helped her win the Hungry Choir's ritual, so she spies on Kennet for him.
- Man Bites Man:
- Tears chunks out of Gashwad with her teeth when the goblins go after the trio, and later explains that the reward for winning the ritual is having no obstacles when it comes to eating things, so she thought she'd weaponize it.
- She also winds up defeating Yalda by eating her.
- Non-Action Guy: Stays out of the conflict between Bristow and Alexander, in large part because she doesn't want to loosen the bindings of the Hungry Choir by using practice.
- Not in This for Your Revolution: She's technically part of Team Alexander, but she's in it more to take care of the younger students than because she actually supports him.
- Official Couple: With Zed, as of Interlude 3.z.
- Punny Name: 'Brie' is an actual name meaning 'marshland', but it's also a kind of cheese- fitting for someone who got chunks bitten out of her.
- Sealed Inside a Person-Shaped Can: She eats Yalda, the leader of the Hungry Choir, and is later tattooed with binding spells to keep Yalda's power inside of her. She then Awakens, with the intention of becoming a practitioner who uses that power as a source. Matthew later notes that Yalda could be released if someone were to kill her, and with all that's happening in Kennet is glad she doesn't show up with Zed so that he and Edith aren't tempted to do so due to the Hungry Choir's needed firepower.
- Wacky Cravings: A non-pregnancy example- Brie had pica, a condition where she'd regularly eat inedible things like screws, batteries and thumbtacks. This led to her regularly becoming ill from the results.
- Was It Really Worth It?: She won the ritual and can eat whatever she wants without fear of becoming sick, but is genuinely horrified by everything she had to do to win, and admits that she doesn't feel better for having won.
Jessica Casabien
An Ojibwe practitioner hailing from the Pic River First Nation, specializing in the use of the Ruins.
Practice: Unknown (related to the Ruins)
- And Then What?: She was wholly focused on finding the echo of her cousin and restoring it to him. Once she actually succeeds, she's not really sure what to do with herself after that.
- Brutal Honesty: Can be rather blunt in conversation.
- The Cynic: In her worldview most communities are comprised of a higher ratio of bad to good people, and so it's important to surround yourself with the few good people who are there.
- Hope Spot: She, Zed, Alexander, and a few other practitioners perform a ritual to find the echo she's looking for. They find it, it's not tainted or damaged, she almost gets it back... and then Shellie walks in and ruins the ritual for kicks.
- I Will Find You: A variation: she's looking for an echo that a cousin of hers lost, because he was unjustly arrested, held in jail for several years, and finally returned to his family, but he lost a part of himself and she wants to return it to him.
- I'm Not Here to Make Friends: While she never quite says the term verbatim, Jessica's at the Institute to figure out how to get the bits of her cousin's Self that were lost, and makes it clear she's not really there to make friends beyond that.
- In the Hood: Her Implement is the yellow raincoat she wears, which serves as a form of protection.
- Magical Native American: Downplayed in that while Jessica is a practitioner of First Nations descent, in particular Ojibwe, her practice isn't really linked to her heritage at all, having become Aware via entering the Ruins independently and awakening on her own around the same time the Kennet trio did.
- Mundane Utility: On top of protection, her raincoat Implement also supplies her with food so that she doesn't need to leave the Ruins just because she needs supplies.
- Took a Level in Kindness: Once Avery shows that she's not trying to screw her over by living up to her promises, Jessica's demeanor towards her improves considerably. She takes another one after actually saving her cousin, devoting herself to helping her friends in the same way others helped her.
Estrella Vanderwerf
A practitioner who focuses on Winter Faerie glamour. She leads her family due to all practitioners from it over the age of 18 having been executed by the Montreal Witch Hunters.
Practice: Winter Court of Faerie
- An Ice Person: The "winter" aspect of her practice is sometimes proverbial, but sometimes quite literal, allowing her to throw icicles with a gesture.
- Breast Attack: As compensation for attacking them after she loses, Estrella allows America to lightly stab her in the breast with a needle.
- Ice Queen: As befits her focus on the Winter Court of Faerie, her personality is fairly cold; at one point this is even lampshaded in-universe by a goblin that takes a bit too much pleasure in having her step on it.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Puts up a good fight against the girls while keeping them hostage, but once it's clear she's in trouble she immediately surrenders in exchange for an oath to argue for clemency on her behalf if their side wins.
- Hidden Depths: While she seems as cold and manipulative as any other practitioner, it's implied that her lesson in taking the students to one of the more rundown areas of faerie on a trip is to show them that most faeries are struggling just to get along, the same as most other people.
- Master of Illusion: Like anyone who focuses on Faerie practice, she is an expert at using glamour to create illusions.
- Mind-Control Music: Uses a music box that forces people before it to sit still and listen for as long as the song continues.
- Mystical White Hair: She has near-white hair despite being only 17, likely as part of her connection to the Winter Court.
- Young and in Charge: Only 17 and the head of her family due to those over 18 being executed by Montreal-based Witch Hunters.
America and Liberty Tedd
A pair of sisters who share an affinity for goblins, and former students of Toadswallow. Liberty is the viewpoint character of 8.a.
Practice: Goblin Witch Princess (America), Goblin Raider Princess (Liberty)
- All Take and No Give: America's concept of sibling loyalty is that Liberty should always back her up no matter what, but she rarely feels the need to return the favor when Liberty disagrees with her.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: In Vanishing Points 8.a, America says that Alexander was the only person not related to her who actually respected her as a person and respected her choices and requests, so she wants to get revenge for what happened to him.
- Daddy's Girl: Liberty is a big fan of her father Anthem and won't hear a word against him.
- Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: While they both seem pretty out-there at first glance, Liberty is far more grounded and reasonable than her sister.
- Freaky Fashion, Mild Mind: Liberty has her teeth filed and has the general scruffy goblin queen aesthetic, but her main method of keeping her goblins under control is... making them feel loved and appreciated.
- Green-Eyed Monster: America is envious of the trio for in her eyes "stealing" Toadswallow away from her and Liberty, when in reality he left to prevent other practitioners from forcing him to hurt people and ruin his business as a result.
- Guest-Star Party Member: Liberty comes to Kennet to assist the trio against Marcicia during the latter portion of Dash to Pieces into False Moves.
- Honorary Uncle: Toadswallow is theirs, after serving as their gateway into the world of goblins. They call him 'Uncle Toad'.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Liberty has a crush on Avery, but chooses to allow Nora to go for her rather than interfere and even pushes the latter in that direction.
- Secret Secret-Keeper: Liberty figures out from Flops that John shot Alexander, but chooses to keep it a secret for America's sake and because it'll likely come out anyway, unbeknownst to the trio.
- Sibling Yin-Yang: America is the more aggressive and straightforward of the duo, while Liberty is a bit more thoughtful.
- Supernatural Fear Inducer: Verona suspects they have something going on that unsettles people, some stripes they earned among goblins that gave them an intimidating "don't fuck with them" feeling. Though she does admit that this might not be true and just an excuse she's coming up with to cope with how they freak her out.
- Teacher's Pet: Very much not the norm, but Liberty immediately falls into this role when Toadswallow's the teacher.
- The Tooth Hurts: Liberty filed her own teeth down and mangled the braces that were on them.
- Used to Be a Sweet Kid: According to Toadswallow, they were demure young ladies of the upper class, until he started teaching them. They liked what he taught them enough that they both decided to become goblin queens.
Fernanda Whitt
Chase's sister, a practitioner focused on emotional and social manipulation. She has to constantly use these abilities to survive and avoid being screwed over due to her lesser position in the family. She's the viewpoint character of 6.z.
Practice: Emotion manipulation
- Abusive Parents: In addition to the constant risk of being married off for political advantage, she says that nobody has been genuinely nice to her since she was a child.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: The Whitt family is this; she lives in constant terror of being married off for political advantage.
- The Cynic: Her own harsh experiences have given her an extremely cynical, transactional view of the world.
- Manipulative Bastard: She's forced to manipulate, exploit, and betray those around her, including Laila, her best friend, simply to hold her own against her family.
- Took a Level in Kindness: Near the end of the Blue Heron arc she provides genuine advice and help to Avery, apparently in part because Avery reminds her of Laila.
McCauleigh Hennigar
The youngest of four siblings attending the Blue Heron Institute, McCauleigh comes from the extremely rich and violent Hennigar family. She would rather be anything else; in the next year she'll be expected to take an innocent life to cement her status and practice and she's desperately searching for another way.
Practice: Gore-Streaked Dancer
- Abusive Parents: The Hennigars train their children into violence and, when they come of age, force them to murder another child in bloody ritual combat. If the other child wins, they'll be adopted into the family, and if they refuse to fight, both would be sacrificed. McCauleigh's desperation to escape this fate is the driving force for her character.
- Commonality Connection: Initially, McCauleigh approaches her alliance with Verona as a business relationship; she'd give Verona information, and Verona would use it to hurt her family as much as possible in return. After she meet Verona's dad, however, she recognizes the similarities with her own family and they quickly became friends for real. By the epilogue, she's essentially Verona's closest friend outside of the trio.
- Disinherited Child: After her father Grayson condemns her to a torturous "training camp" in Italy to force her to follow the family practice, a reading he purchases from the Belangers indicates that she'll eventually give in but become an Empty Shell useful for nothing but killing who he tells her to kill and so he allows Verona to pressure him politically into allowing her to leave, forever disinheriting her.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: Explicitly calls herself Verona's "platonic life mate" in the epilogue, and is fully prepared to spend the rest of her life with Verona. Verona in turn says that all her life she's wanted cats and McCauleigh is basically a cat.
- Meaningful Rename: In the epilogue, she takes the surname "Roth," which belonged to her and Verona's mutual boytoy Anselm, killed by Charles in the fighting.
- Perpetual Frowner: She's described as having a perpetual "try me" face on.
- Sacrificed Basic Skill for Awesome Training: Exploited. McCauleigh was never taught even the most basic methods of caring for herself so that she'd always have to rely on her family; she needs Verona to teach her basic hygiene and budgeting.
- Tyke-Bomb: McCauleigh is fourteen years old and can win fights with grown men, and also has her family's Healing Factor war cry practice to fall back on if she's injured.
Former Students
Marlen Roy
A spy and messenger under the employ of Musser who rides an enchanted motorcycle.
Practice: Exact form unknown, but linked to Lost and City practices
- Flying Dutchman: She did a ritual as a child that detached her from Earth and earthly things, so she's normally never in one place for long and is always on the move.
- Human Traffickers: Part of her job is ferrying humans and Others. Her very first contract was transporting a man who was fleeing an arranged marriage back to the family he was fleeing from.
- Moral Myopia: She says Lucy has no right to judge her for her actions because she's harboring Nibble and Chloe, who are ghouls, ignoring the fact that they simply want to be left alone and have no desire to hurt people, while her actions serve to cause wider suffering to a wider group of people and Others simply for profit.
- The Needless: Due to rituals she's done, Marlen rarely needs to eat or use the bathroom as long as she keeps moving.
