Personal Information

Your name: Riley
Your age: 25
Contact info: PM

Character Information:

Full Name: Johanna Maria Herolt
Nickname: Joanne, Anna, currently goes by Joan, and will be hereby referred to as “Joan” [Optional]
Species: Witch
Powers: Curses, hexes, herbal remedies, similar to Voodoo. She has powers over life and death granted to her by the silk-cotton tree she cares for (or at least the sapling she brings with her) Much like a necromancer, her ‘arts’ are deeply rooted in death, or the lack thereof, and it grants her the ability to force truths from the dead. While a corpse may sing of its untimely death, and speak on any number of accounts, the undead have more control. While she cannot force lengthy platitudes from their lips, given enough concentration she can force one word/thought answers from them, ‘pulling’ the information from beyond the grave.

Family:

• Father: Jacob Hendrick Herolt (1660-1724)
  
• Mother: Johanna Helena Herolt (1668-1723)
  
• Siblings: Andreas Walther Herolt (1693-1767)

Age: 305 (Appears 28-32)
Birthday: 1708
Gender: Female
Orientation: Asexual
Status: Single [Married, single, engaged, etc]
Occupation: Medical Examiner/ Supernatural Consultant


Other: She is well versed in biology and makes it her life’s work to take the myth out of legends and find facts of all supernatural beings. Often times she works with particular hunter groups for exorbitant fees as a consultant, but only really helps if it is a truly rotten supernatural. (i.e.: Kills everyone and anyone, human or not, while leaving a big mess)
A pretty color: Purple!

Appearance:

Eyes: Soft grey, often confused by others for blue
Hair: Straight, golden blonde, worn long
Body: Curvaceous and by no means a tiny woman (Approx 180-195 lbs)
Other: She’s almost never seen without a hat on her head, or some other accessory. Gloves, jewelry, shoes; appearance is very important to Joan

Personality: Joan is not a very complicated person, she enjoys simple things in life: music, desserts, knowledge.  Most of the time she is very much a perfectionist, never doing anything unless she is exact, precise and going according to plan. She cannot fathom people who go through life without a plan, "go with the flow" is not a motto to her.  If she takes a project underway she will see it through to the bitter end, and will relentlessly pursue the desired results.

Though outwardly very serious,  any individual who manages to make it passed her guard (figuratively and literally) will find a person who loves nothing more than a decent conversation and wit.  She enjoys laughing, but has a peculiar sense of humor at times, more of a dry humor than slapstick.  Show her you are a competent and witty person and she would gladly share a piece of cheesecake.

While others are busy pairing up with others, searching for the physical satisfaction of a romantic relationship is not something she does.  She feels whole unto herself, though does not discount romance.  It simply isn't a passion she has had the luxury of feeling.  The whirlwind feeling of losing yourself in the eyes of another has never happened for her, and she feels fine with that.  A life searching for a piece that may or may not fit forever is a battle Joan is glad to never face.  Some may think it lonely, but as mentioned previously, she will gladly share a piece of cheesecake with someone she adores, she just won't share their bed.


Likes: Cheesecake, long-forgotten books, biology, gardening, laughing, wit, France, classical music: specifically baroque


Dislikes: Spiders, flirtation, flippancy, frivolity, tardiness, cell phones (a necessary evil)


Strengths: Immeasurable patience, Well-Educated, subtle, relentlessly pursues her goals


Weaknesses: Arrogant, cold, distant, detached, easily gets caught up in philosophical debates


Weapon of choice: Scalpel, and curses; Greggor does all the heavy lifting

History: Joan is a child of the Enlightenment, also known as the Age of Reason. Her family birthed many intelligent women, the most famous being her grandmother, Maria Sibylla Merian. Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium made her renowned, as her studies gave significant contributions to the realm of entomology. It was during the study when Maria’s eldest daughter, Johanna, fell in love with the country of Suriname. After a few trips back and forth from Amsterdam to Suriname, Johanna moved her family to the country in 1711, when young Joan was 3 years old.

In the Dutch colony, Joan learned as every good girl should, but remained wild and impetuous throughout her childhood. Due to her heritage, she spoke German at home, learned Dutch in school, and also fervently studied French with her tutors as she had fallen in love with the romance of Paris. Her mother taught her art, mainly with oil and water colors, a gift from the great Maria Sibylla. She learned with other girl-children, whose parents ran the surrounding plantations, all lucrative businesses on the backs of slaves. While Joan’s family abhorred the treatment of slaves, they kept some of their own, always careful to treat them with a modicum of respect.
Through a series of events, Joan befriended an old wise woman, known to the town only as Obeah, similar as calling a woman “witch”. Joan called her “Mama Isuri”, and from her began to learn the ways of asking the spirits for assistance. Healing, curses, hexes, Mama Isuri taught Joan all she could. It was not until after the death of Joan’s mother that Mama Isuri initiated Joan fully as her apprentice. By 1738, Joan had soaked up all the knowledge Mama Isuri had to offer and took off to fulfill her dreams.

The journey to Paris was arduous and difficult, giant ships the only passage between the new world and old. Joan was not alone though, a childhood friend whose life she’d saved with her powers over life and death. Though born under the name of Dineth, Joan refused to allow him to keep the name after taking him as her servant, her confidant, her protector. From then on she called him Greggor, deeming it a more fitting name for their life in Paris and the name stuck for longer than their visit.

It was in Paris after a particularly enthralling philosophical discussion that she met her first vampire. Immediately she became enthralled with the idea of eternal youth. Through use of her powers and promises from spirits she had greatly extended her life, but she continued to age. Already she could feel her body losing its vitality and her grip on her powers. Terrified of withering away, Joan began to study vampires and other supernatural creatures as she tried to figure out exactly how they continued to survive without aging. Her studies granted her a potion that slowed the aging process considerably, but she could still feel her youth slipping away, ever so slowly.
The next two hundred years, Joan spent in search of eternal youth, a way to keep herself, and her forever companion Greggor from aging ever again. Hiring translators along the way, she traveled as far as Thailand to the east, and eventually returned to the Americas, beginning in Suriname and working her way north. She was going to venture through the United States of America in the 1960’s, but found the flower-power and free love undesirable. Instead she traveled further north to Canada, researching Wendigoes and other creatures of dark.

Her jobs changed throughout the centuries. Sometimes she taught languages to students, still fluent in the ones from her youth with the addition of English in the latest centuries. Every half century or so she would enroll in college under a fake name, or stolen identity and receive certificates and degrees. While she always continued to pursue the supernatural in her free time, she saw no reason to not further her education. In the last fifty years she has mostly kept work as either a mortician, or even more recently a medical examiner under her most recent name of Joan Herolt.

Being a mortician, or even medical examiner, allowed her access to body parts that would otherwise be hard to come by. Thumbs of a murderer or the eyes of a victim are easy to procure when you work with the dead on a regular basis. No one really notices if a dead body set for cremation is missing anything. Though getting the chest cavity of a rotten man to plant her roses in takes planning, once accomplished, no rose will ever be a more beautiful shade of red.


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