Priscilla

Human Female Swashbuckler 10 XP: 168265 Age 23 CG

An eye patch covers her missing left eye, and some emergency picks occupy the socket.

Full name: Marchesa Priscilla la Donne, aka The Mantis

Max HP 44 AC 6

Str 15 Int 13 Wis 12 Dex 16 Con 12 Chr 14

PP 95 OL 95 F/RT 95 MS 45 HS 30 DN 15 CW 95 RL 0

Languages: Italian, Greek, Arabic, Hindi

Priscilla is the scion (and only child) of the Donne family, a noble house of long standing in Syracuse. Though her family were Christians prior to Muslim control of the island, upon seeing the way the wind was blowing they converted to a man and thus maintained their holdings. It involved betraying a neighbor or two, but what can you do? What with the Fatimids in control these days the family is staunchly Shiite, Priscilla included.

As a young woman she was pampered and coddled, but she was quite the tomboy, escaping her governess and getting into fights with urchins. At fourteen she badgered the old family arms master into teaching her swordplay, and in time she became a fair fencer in the both the Florentine(rapier and main gauche) and Sicilian(cloak and dagger) styles. At sixteen she successfully begged her father for a boat, and she loved climbing the rigging like a monkey. The other nobles were constantly aghast at Priscilla's goings-on, and it was frequently said that she would never land a husband. This suited her fine, as she found her peers fools and boys in general yucky.

At eighteen she ran way from home, joining a merchant ship as a deckhand while disguised as a boy. She had to stab a few grizzled mariners before they would leave her alone, but she dispelled any doubts about her sex by spending freely at the whorehouses when they hit shore. After a month or so her ship was taken by Black Rachel, scourge of the seas. Rachel was impressed by Priscilla's swordplay and quick wit, and offered her a spot in the crew. She joined gladly, and lived well as a pirate. Sometimes she even got to see Barnacle Bashim, the #1 rouge of the Mediterranean! During a raid Priscilla lost her left eye to a trained parrot. A jaunty eye patch made her look rougeish and piratical, and she accepted it in time. Still, Rachel and her crew seemed to enjoy the killing and raping a little too much. Priscilla slipped away from the ship when they were in port in Palermo, and decided that she ought to try her hand at the wheel next time. She returned to Syracuse and snuck into her parent's house to steal a pile of money. She bought a ship in Marsala, and a crew to go with it. She was the very model of the gentleman pirate, treating the ladies well and granting quarter when it was asked. She traveled far and wide, and when she had enough confidence in herself she fired the whole crew. Her new crew was all women, and she revealed her own sex for the first time in over a year. She renamed her ship "The Black Widow", and took the name of Mantis, because the female is stronger than the male. She pirated extensively in the east, and collected a group of girl pirates around her, the core being Rani, Indira, Najwah, and Kudrun. They became known as The Widows, and were said to kill the men and enslave the women whenever they took a ship. Not true, of course.

The Black Widow met its end one day when the Widows made the mistake of sailing in waters under the control of Barnacle Bashim. He sank the ship, and only the Widows made it out alive thanks to some Oil of Etherality they had taken from an undersea dungeon. They were broke and depressed, and Priscilla decided to head back to Syracuse to hit up her folks for cash. Alas, their house had burned, and she was the last Donne left. When the Widows heard TrapoII was recruiting they decided to join. There were a lot of girls on the boat, and TrapoII seemed to live a dangerous life. Maybe his ship would need a new captain one of these days, and Priscilla planned to be ready.