The Maiden of Skye
FAMILY: A distant but fiercely loyal advisor of Clan Blackmoore. Responsible for siring most of the clan indirectly, if not all of them, through those she turned personally in the earliest days of the Roman invasion of Britain. Morven currently maintains a small hamlet on the Isle of Skye where four vampires other than herself live, all of them devoted to their polytheistic religions.

Hers is the smallest portion of Scotland, however, its tactical position is of utmost importance for the lineage as it will become the last bastion of hidden vampiric life should the church even seem to be considering openly hunting them again. The few who follow her are ancient and wise, as well as exclusively female.

FAMILIAL POLITICAL SUPPORT: Neutral bordering on liberal.

APPEARANCE: Morven was a fifteen year old girl when she was turned; short, gaunt, and barely out of what must have been an impoverished childhood. Vampirism has emphasised the paleness of her skin, leaving her dark freckles in stark contrast with it. Her hair is a dull, listless shade of auburn and always tied up in intricate braids that she must have had help with.

She usually decorates her skin with mossy green swirls and lines using face paint, especially when venturing outdoors or somewhere she can be seen, and her wrists and arms are tattooed in the same colour with bridal patterns. In past centuries she was the embodiment of the baobhan sith and quite possibly where the legends originated from.

TRUE AGE: 1841 (roughly)

BLOOD LUST AFFINITY: Men with ambiguous or even no morals – typically adulterers, rapists and murderers (of women and children).

HISTORY: An illegitimate child in the highlands who was foisted off on her disreputable father, Morven was left to raise herself for the most part. She was never given an education, either on how to write or how to read, and spent most of her days wandering a particularly thick forested area. When she turned thirteen, she was married off at a cheap price to a travelling mercenary whose eye she caught, primarily for the pious religious views she was cultivating. Her husband, Dagda, was a self-destructive, masochistic vampire who thought his only worth was in resisting his true nature and refusing to drink the blood of women and children.

Fatally injured during a chance encounter with a particularly violent legion of Roman soldiers, Dagda fled with his wife to a nearby cave where he was forced to turn her, against his own wishes and code of honour. Shortly thereafter, he fled the country and neither hide nor hair was seen of him again in Scotland. Morven was left to struggle through the tumultuous fledgeling years on her own and in her wake she left entire groups of men – Romans and Picts, soldiers and hunters alike – drained of blood.

At some point before Christianity became widespread on the Isles, Morven snapped back to reality and looked around in horror at the life she had been living. Like Dagda, she had sired and abandoned many vampires, none of whom would ever know she 'mothered' them, so to speak. She made a vow of purity, chastity and honour and moved to the Island of Skye where she created a small coven by siring a handful of new children. After the girls, she would create no more.

Worshipping a cocktail of old Celtic polytheistic Gods and Goddesses as well as a few Roman ones, she particularly focused on the goddess Airmed, a goddess of healing. The few times she travelled outside of the British Isles, she began to research into a 'cure' for vampirism much to the dismay of many others who were satisfied with their way of life. Her centuries of work have yielded no results whatsoever, save for an intricate understanding of herbal medicine.

During the 14th century, she and her coven openly joined forces with Clan Blackmoore, though only Morven ventured outwith the Isle of Skye during this time. She fought and starved with the other vampires on the moors and despite her small size and frail appearance she was more than enough to help combat the humans. Alistair Blackmoore, whose sire she sired, took a liking to her in particular and promised her a more pacifistic leader to serve under if she joined up with him.

In the short-lived and bloody vampiric uprising in the background of the Jacobite rebellions, she served as Alistair's chief executor, still following her code but ultimately abandoning her isolated way of life. Now she is one of the senior members of The Council, an advisor to the young Blackmoore chieftain.