Post by Gabrielle DuMinuit on Jul 7, 2007 15:42:58 GMT -5
Triste Witches are the nyeusi descendents of Triste. Even in In the Forests of the Night, where they were introduced, they were still something of a mystery. Little information was given. They will be discussed more extensively in 0113 - Untitled and Tiger Eyes if those are ever published, but in the meantime, here's some basic information. Note: before reading these essays, I will advise you to read the essays on elementals, higher nyeusi and lunar vampires.
Introduction to Tristes
Though they are commonly called witches, "Triste" is not one of the Macht lines. Tristes are not mortal; they are nyeusi, descendents of Zadre through Triste herself. Despite the term "witch," they have far more in common with vampires. They are ageless, and incapable of breeding mortally. They also must feed on mortal power in order to survive. Where they differ from vampires is that their bodies remain alive (more or less), and that they have conscious control over the flow of immortal and mortal magics. A Triste is, prior to initiation, extensively trained in the manipulation of his own power (mortal and immortal), and that of those around him.
A Triste has very fine control over his own body, to the extent that he can consciously control his heartbeat and body temperature, and even the electrical impulses of his nerves. When injured, his body will normally heal at a human rate, but with concentration he can accelerate that healing past what even a vampire is capable of.
This ability to manipulate auras is the most crucial skill a Triste learns. By either fanning an aura beyond its normal weight, or draining power from it, a Triste can affect someone's physical health, state of mind, thought patterns, or emotional intensity. Altering the exact shape and flow of an individual aura can heal physical wounds, or change lust to hate or fear to physical pain. A tiny thread of power can calm a heart attack- or cause one.
This same manipulation is what allows a Triste to feed. Unlike vampires, Tristes do not have to physically take blood into their bodies in order to take the mortal power from it. Powerful enough Tristes do not even necessarily need to touch their prey, though skin to skin contact makes feeding easier, and aligning any two power centers (see the next section), such as clasping hands (palm to palm) or holding a hand over the heart or throat, is best.
The Decigram: Ten Power Centers, Senses and Auras
The symbol of power used by most Tristes is the decigram- a ten pointed star. This symbol represents the ten senses, ten power centers, and ten auras, which are the basis of Triste magic. Students study to master each sense, each power center, and each aura.
Power centers are the areas of the body where it is easiest to penetrate someone's aura (including one's own) in order to manipulate that person's personal power/magic. The five power centers most commonly worked with by Tristes are in the palms of the hands, between the brows (the third eye), at the throat, and over the heart. Others are located in a straight line down the body. These power centers, or Chakras, are not only valuable to Tristes; many other magic-users, including some Macht witches, also utilize these hot-spots.
The ten senses are defined slightly differently by individual teachers, but in general they are Sight, Hearing, Touch, Taste and Smell (those five, I'm sure you know), Life (the ability to sense the base power of other living creatures), Mind (telepathy, mind-reading and influence), Farsight (the ability to see beyond the current location), Foresight (a rarer skill, the ability to see before or after the current time), and Aura (the most crucial of Triste abilities, the ability to read the currents of power given off by a living creature).
Auras are the layers of power that encircle a healthy, living creature. Different layers echo different physical, mental and emotional states, so affecting those auras will affect those states.
The Corporal Aura is what most of us consider the physical body. Tristes consider this physical form just a manifestation of mortal power; manipulating it is what allows them to heal (or harm) themselves or others.
The Elemental Aura rests just beyond the skin, and can be considered the "potential" aura. This is very weak in most creatures, but stronger in shapeshifters of all types, as this is where the additional forms are "stored." Triggering this aura can force a creature to shapeshift, while suppressing it will make it impossible for them to do so.
The Life Aura extends perhaps a foot beyond the body, and is what most psychics manage to see. It is highly reflective of the varying powers a person has, and their life experiences and personality, almost like a psychic fingerprint. Manipulating it in others doesn't make much of a difference, but a Triste's ability to alter this aura on themselves is what allows them to masquerade as other breeds without detection from vampires or witches who are capable of reading auras.
The next aura, which some teachers would call an extension of Life, is usually referred to as Power. If the individual has psychic ability, this aura will be stronger. If it is too strong, and overwhelms the surrounding auras, the individual may drown in his or her own power- psychics who cannot turn off visions, for example. Obviously, this aura is stronger in creatures like vampires, as well. When vampires throw power at each other in order to fight, this is what they're tossing around.
The Health aura hovers about two feet off the skin, and acts very much like a protective shell. While this aura is strong, it is difficult for others to manipulate any of the auras within it. However, the health aura deteriorates rapidly in the face of exhaustion, starvation, dehydration, illness, or other physically damaging states.
Just beyond is the primary auras of Emotion and Mind. These auras are rarely of equal strength, and in some people one may be significantly stronger than the other, but once they have reached their balance (whatever that is), tampering with them can be devastating. People with powerful Emotion auras tend to be empathic, while people with powerful Mind auras tend to be more intuitive. Tossing power into someone's Emotion aura (or deadening the Mind aura) will make him frazzled, obsessive, prone to panic attacks and temper tantrums, and completely unable to concentrate or problem solve. Dampening the Emotion aura (or overworking the Mind aura) will leave someone unable to form or recognize emotional attachments, while their mind works at a frantic pace, unable to rest or come to a conclusion.
The last three auras are referred to as the Red, White and Black auras. These are the auras that reach out the furthest, and when strong, can actually be sensed even by untrained humans. The Red aura reflects intense, obsessive emotion- lust, need, hate. The White aura is more tranquil- love, peace, acceptance. The Black aura reaches out the furthest, and strengthens in the face of fear and pain. If you have ever walked through a hospice or funeral home, and come away feeling like the air clung to you and made you heavy, you walked through the stains of others' Black auras. If you have ever been in the presence of a powerful spiritual leader, or walked through a church, and felt calmed just by being there, then you were affected by a lingering White aura. Felt uncomfortable just being in the presence of newly-weds (even if all they're doing is looking at each other), or sitting between two angry people (even if they aren't shouting)? That's the Red aura.
Triste Poisons, and Firestone
As was mentioned in In the Forests of the Night, Triste blood is poisonous to vampires. In Midnight Predator, firestone was introduced- a creation of Triste witches, which is also poisonous. What these two things have in common is that they are both containers for the Triste power, which will feed ravenously on other power with which it comes into contact. The more similar the power is, the easier it is for the Triste power to feed on it.
Firestone is a distillation of Triste power, bound into glass or crystal. It is transparent red in color, with veins of gold; the stronger it is, the more gold. It is most often forged into some kind of blade, but threads of it can also be woven into rope or wire, or set into jewelry. It can only be broken or otherwise shaped by a powerful Triste (or some of the higher Nyeusi).
Red (the weakest) firestone can limit a vampire's a ability to heal, and weaken them. Though it is not as poisonous to shapeshifters and other nyeusi, it will create wounds that will scar a shapeshifter or Macht witch. Firestone reacts slightly differently around purely human power, such that wounds made with firestone on humans heal faster.
Gold (pure) firestone is instantly deadly the moment it touches vampiric blood. Small wounds on shapeshifters and Macht witches can be incapacitating, and major wounds heal more slowly than those from a regular blade, so wounds that otherwise might not have been fatal, may be. Gold firestone is powerful enough that it's not healthy even to a human being.
There are of course levels between these two, of many varying strengths. Few Tristes are capable of making firestone, and even fewer can make gold firestone; even if they can, it is a very draining experience. Firestone is therefore valuable in the realm of Nyeusigrube, for its many uses.
Aside from Tristes, the person who is known to have used it the most is Jeshickah, who wove firestone wire into the poppers of some of her whips (Jaguar and Gabriel do the same thing) and firestone thread into much of the rope she uses, so the would be as effective against shapeshifters and vampires and witches as they are against humans, and would allow the humans she works with to heal a little faster to keep them from dying. Firestone set into rope or chains, or resting against a vampire's skin, can make it impossible for a vampire to transport.
There are other, less generic uses for firestone, as well - you might think of them as spells. Instead of raw power, firestone can be imbued with a particular will, with the intention of for example affecting a specific aura. One such example was a necklace given by a Triste to a disloyal lover's "other woman" (whom he married), which chronically drained energy away from the emotion and red auras, leaving the wearer devoid of any drive or passion until finally she killed herself. After the woman's bereaved husband also passed away, the "garnet" necklace was put up to auction at the estate sale and came into the possession of the Madder family.
Triste blood in itself is actually just blood, identical to human blood. However, as the elemental power is bound to the blood, most of the time when a vampire drinks a Triste's blood he gets a good bellyful of its power, too - which is the "poisoning" that can lead to weakness or even death. It doesn't help that most Tristes who allow themselves to be fed upon use it as an opportunity to feed upon said vampire; especially with his blood in a vampire's veins, a Triste can drain raw power far faster than the vampire can drain blood.
It is, however, possible for a strong Triste to restrain his magic and allow a vampire to feed without being poisoned. If the Triste is willing, he can even allow just enough magic into his blood to make it a powerful or even drugging meal. Most vampires would never trust a Triste to do this, of course, and most Tristes would not trust a vampire at their throat for that long without exercising some kind of magical control over them. After all, a vampire is still strong enough, and fast enough, that at that proximity they could break a Triste's neck before he could fight back.
Training and Initiation
Unlike other nyeusi (vampires and shapeshifters), a human cannot be changed into a Triste without at least some level of consent and participation. The change itself is very physically strenuous (deadly, actually), and someone without intense training in physical and magical self-control will not survive it. Even if he does, he will then be unable to feed or otherwise maintain his own body.
Many students are chosen because they already have some talent: human witches and psychics and untrained (or sometimes trained) Macht witches are most favored, though shapeshifters also have some innate control (through their ability to shift their own shapes). However, more important than latent ability are a sharp mind, rigid self control, and a good deal of physical endurance.
The actual method of instruction varies from teacher to teacher. Some are gentler than others. A more strenuous, pitiless education is more likely to produce a stronger Triste, but it is also more likely to trigger insanity, aneurysms or spontaneous heart failure. Depending on the methods of the teacher and the aptitude of the student, training may take anywhere from six months, to several decades. A longer period of time increases the likelihood that the student will survive training, but like among lunar vampires, there is a relatively narrow window of time - late teens, early twenties - when the body is most malleable to invasion by the parasitic, immortal power, so a student who survives three decades of training may then be too old to survive initiation.
Only after a student has mastered the necessary skills can the initiation - a massive transfer of power between the student and his teacher, enabled by some kind of blood ritual - take place. Again, different teachers have different rituals, some with higher or lower fatality rates, and prone to produce more or less powerful results.
Due to the commitment of time and power, most teachers guard their students well, and are quick to retaliate against anyone who threatens them. However, since successful training is rare and even some who survive initiation do not live through the first couple years, Tristes in general are uncommon in Nyeusigrube, with only a couple dozen known to exist.
Notable Individuals
Unlike vampires, shapeshifters and elavie, Tristes do not have any particular culture of their own kind. Instead, individuals make their own niche wherever in Nyeusigrube suits them. They have their own specialties, and their own rules.
Tatiana: She is unique for her long-term instruction of multiple students at a time. She forms cult-like rings, weeding out students as they fail to live up to her expectations. She may instruct the members of a particular cult for decades before deciding none of them suit her. Most of the time, the individuals who meet her standards are not the original members of her cults, but children of two cult members who have been raised conscious of their power.
Pandora: Initiated by Triste herself in 1200 BCE, Pandora is one of the most powerful Tristes in Nyeusigrube. She is one of the few Tristes strong enough to change her shape; her second form is a bat. Though Pandora's students tend to be the most powerful, they also have the highest fatality rate during training, with over half of them dying within the first month alone, but if they survive initiation they have the highest survival rate after that.
Jesse Fontes: From the early years BCE, Jesse Fontes specializes in controlling and containing vampires. Very powerful, he is also for hire. For example, he worked with both generations of Midnight to set into the building the magics that make it impossible for any vampire to transport into the building, or out from any of the trainers' cells.
Dinah Alina: Jesse's student, Dinah works as a healer... and specializes on feeding on the Black aura. She once healed a young woman suffering, among other things, severe blood poisoning. She was later so impressed by said young woman's strength and innate power (in her fever and trauma induced delirium, among other things, she summoned and named a k'jait) that she offered to train her, but the woman insisted on going back to her sisters and brother as soon as she had recovered. Dinah always had a good eye for potential.
Alexander Weatere: One of Pandora's fledglings, he is mentioned in In the Forests of the Night.
Christian Denmark: One of Pandora's most recent initiates, Christian (introduced in Tiger Eyes) is currently the leader of the Frost ring of the Bruja Guilds.
Adjila: Yet another of Pandora's, in this case from 1415, Adjila was one of the co-founders of Bruja. For the last several hundred years, he has been involved with Shevaun, a lunar vampire in Kendra's line. Adjila has a second form of a raven.
Ramsey: The fourth of Triste's students, Ramsey was initiated in 1312. She works extensively as a mercenary, and was also influential in the founding of the Bruja Guilds. She is most famous for taking in the Macht witch Eric Marinitch in 1700 and training him as her student.
Eric Marinitch: Ramsey's student, Eric was later forcibly changed into a vampire by Kendra... and a few others, who poisoned themselves in the attempt to drain him for the change.
Rikai: No one knows who trained Rikai; the teacher she knew, everyone else in Nyeusigrube swears never existed. This fact, however, doesn't unnerve people nearly so much as her raw power - and her sheer madness. Rikai is one of the Wild Cards, and her special fascination is Evil.
(Information (c) Amelia Atwater-Rhodes)
Introduction to Tristes
Though they are commonly called witches, "Triste" is not one of the Macht lines. Tristes are not mortal; they are nyeusi, descendents of Zadre through Triste herself. Despite the term "witch," they have far more in common with vampires. They are ageless, and incapable of breeding mortally. They also must feed on mortal power in order to survive. Where they differ from vampires is that their bodies remain alive (more or less), and that they have conscious control over the flow of immortal and mortal magics. A Triste is, prior to initiation, extensively trained in the manipulation of his own power (mortal and immortal), and that of those around him.
A Triste has very fine control over his own body, to the extent that he can consciously control his heartbeat and body temperature, and even the electrical impulses of his nerves. When injured, his body will normally heal at a human rate, but with concentration he can accelerate that healing past what even a vampire is capable of.
This ability to manipulate auras is the most crucial skill a Triste learns. By either fanning an aura beyond its normal weight, or draining power from it, a Triste can affect someone's physical health, state of mind, thought patterns, or emotional intensity. Altering the exact shape and flow of an individual aura can heal physical wounds, or change lust to hate or fear to physical pain. A tiny thread of power can calm a heart attack- or cause one.
This same manipulation is what allows a Triste to feed. Unlike vampires, Tristes do not have to physically take blood into their bodies in order to take the mortal power from it. Powerful enough Tristes do not even necessarily need to touch their prey, though skin to skin contact makes feeding easier, and aligning any two power centers (see the next section), such as clasping hands (palm to palm) or holding a hand over the heart or throat, is best.
The Decigram: Ten Power Centers, Senses and Auras
The symbol of power used by most Tristes is the decigram- a ten pointed star. This symbol represents the ten senses, ten power centers, and ten auras, which are the basis of Triste magic. Students study to master each sense, each power center, and each aura.
Power centers are the areas of the body where it is easiest to penetrate someone's aura (including one's own) in order to manipulate that person's personal power/magic. The five power centers most commonly worked with by Tristes are in the palms of the hands, between the brows (the third eye), at the throat, and over the heart. Others are located in a straight line down the body. These power centers, or Chakras, are not only valuable to Tristes; many other magic-users, including some Macht witches, also utilize these hot-spots.
The ten senses are defined slightly differently by individual teachers, but in general they are Sight, Hearing, Touch, Taste and Smell (those five, I'm sure you know), Life (the ability to sense the base power of other living creatures), Mind (telepathy, mind-reading and influence), Farsight (the ability to see beyond the current location), Foresight (a rarer skill, the ability to see before or after the current time), and Aura (the most crucial of Triste abilities, the ability to read the currents of power given off by a living creature).
Auras are the layers of power that encircle a healthy, living creature. Different layers echo different physical, mental and emotional states, so affecting those auras will affect those states.
The Corporal Aura is what most of us consider the physical body. Tristes consider this physical form just a manifestation of mortal power; manipulating it is what allows them to heal (or harm) themselves or others.
The Elemental Aura rests just beyond the skin, and can be considered the "potential" aura. This is very weak in most creatures, but stronger in shapeshifters of all types, as this is where the additional forms are "stored." Triggering this aura can force a creature to shapeshift, while suppressing it will make it impossible for them to do so.
The Life Aura extends perhaps a foot beyond the body, and is what most psychics manage to see. It is highly reflective of the varying powers a person has, and their life experiences and personality, almost like a psychic fingerprint. Manipulating it in others doesn't make much of a difference, but a Triste's ability to alter this aura on themselves is what allows them to masquerade as other breeds without detection from vampires or witches who are capable of reading auras.
The next aura, which some teachers would call an extension of Life, is usually referred to as Power. If the individual has psychic ability, this aura will be stronger. If it is too strong, and overwhelms the surrounding auras, the individual may drown in his or her own power- psychics who cannot turn off visions, for example. Obviously, this aura is stronger in creatures like vampires, as well. When vampires throw power at each other in order to fight, this is what they're tossing around.
The Health aura hovers about two feet off the skin, and acts very much like a protective shell. While this aura is strong, it is difficult for others to manipulate any of the auras within it. However, the health aura deteriorates rapidly in the face of exhaustion, starvation, dehydration, illness, or other physically damaging states.
Just beyond is the primary auras of Emotion and Mind. These auras are rarely of equal strength, and in some people one may be significantly stronger than the other, but once they have reached their balance (whatever that is), tampering with them can be devastating. People with powerful Emotion auras tend to be empathic, while people with powerful Mind auras tend to be more intuitive. Tossing power into someone's Emotion aura (or deadening the Mind aura) will make him frazzled, obsessive, prone to panic attacks and temper tantrums, and completely unable to concentrate or problem solve. Dampening the Emotion aura (or overworking the Mind aura) will leave someone unable to form or recognize emotional attachments, while their mind works at a frantic pace, unable to rest or come to a conclusion.
The last three auras are referred to as the Red, White and Black auras. These are the auras that reach out the furthest, and when strong, can actually be sensed even by untrained humans. The Red aura reflects intense, obsessive emotion- lust, need, hate. The White aura is more tranquil- love, peace, acceptance. The Black aura reaches out the furthest, and strengthens in the face of fear and pain. If you have ever walked through a hospice or funeral home, and come away feeling like the air clung to you and made you heavy, you walked through the stains of others' Black auras. If you have ever been in the presence of a powerful spiritual leader, or walked through a church, and felt calmed just by being there, then you were affected by a lingering White aura. Felt uncomfortable just being in the presence of newly-weds (even if all they're doing is looking at each other), or sitting between two angry people (even if they aren't shouting)? That's the Red aura.
Triste Poisons, and Firestone
As was mentioned in In the Forests of the Night, Triste blood is poisonous to vampires. In Midnight Predator, firestone was introduced- a creation of Triste witches, which is also poisonous. What these two things have in common is that they are both containers for the Triste power, which will feed ravenously on other power with which it comes into contact. The more similar the power is, the easier it is for the Triste power to feed on it.
Firestone is a distillation of Triste power, bound into glass or crystal. It is transparent red in color, with veins of gold; the stronger it is, the more gold. It is most often forged into some kind of blade, but threads of it can also be woven into rope or wire, or set into jewelry. It can only be broken or otherwise shaped by a powerful Triste (or some of the higher Nyeusi).
Red (the weakest) firestone can limit a vampire's a ability to heal, and weaken them. Though it is not as poisonous to shapeshifters and other nyeusi, it will create wounds that will scar a shapeshifter or Macht witch. Firestone reacts slightly differently around purely human power, such that wounds made with firestone on humans heal faster.
Gold (pure) firestone is instantly deadly the moment it touches vampiric blood. Small wounds on shapeshifters and Macht witches can be incapacitating, and major wounds heal more slowly than those from a regular blade, so wounds that otherwise might not have been fatal, may be. Gold firestone is powerful enough that it's not healthy even to a human being.
There are of course levels between these two, of many varying strengths. Few Tristes are capable of making firestone, and even fewer can make gold firestone; even if they can, it is a very draining experience. Firestone is therefore valuable in the realm of Nyeusigrube, for its many uses.
Aside from Tristes, the person who is known to have used it the most is Jeshickah, who wove firestone wire into the poppers of some of her whips (Jaguar and Gabriel do the same thing) and firestone thread into much of the rope she uses, so the would be as effective against shapeshifters and vampires and witches as they are against humans, and would allow the humans she works with to heal a little faster to keep them from dying. Firestone set into rope or chains, or resting against a vampire's skin, can make it impossible for a vampire to transport.
There are other, less generic uses for firestone, as well - you might think of them as spells. Instead of raw power, firestone can be imbued with a particular will, with the intention of for example affecting a specific aura. One such example was a necklace given by a Triste to a disloyal lover's "other woman" (whom he married), which chronically drained energy away from the emotion and red auras, leaving the wearer devoid of any drive or passion until finally she killed herself. After the woman's bereaved husband also passed away, the "garnet" necklace was put up to auction at the estate sale and came into the possession of the Madder family.
Triste blood in itself is actually just blood, identical to human blood. However, as the elemental power is bound to the blood, most of the time when a vampire drinks a Triste's blood he gets a good bellyful of its power, too - which is the "poisoning" that can lead to weakness or even death. It doesn't help that most Tristes who allow themselves to be fed upon use it as an opportunity to feed upon said vampire; especially with his blood in a vampire's veins, a Triste can drain raw power far faster than the vampire can drain blood.
It is, however, possible for a strong Triste to restrain his magic and allow a vampire to feed without being poisoned. If the Triste is willing, he can even allow just enough magic into his blood to make it a powerful or even drugging meal. Most vampires would never trust a Triste to do this, of course, and most Tristes would not trust a vampire at their throat for that long without exercising some kind of magical control over them. After all, a vampire is still strong enough, and fast enough, that at that proximity they could break a Triste's neck before he could fight back.
Training and Initiation
Unlike other nyeusi (vampires and shapeshifters), a human cannot be changed into a Triste without at least some level of consent and participation. The change itself is very physically strenuous (deadly, actually), and someone without intense training in physical and magical self-control will not survive it. Even if he does, he will then be unable to feed or otherwise maintain his own body.
Many students are chosen because they already have some talent: human witches and psychics and untrained (or sometimes trained) Macht witches are most favored, though shapeshifters also have some innate control (through their ability to shift their own shapes). However, more important than latent ability are a sharp mind, rigid self control, and a good deal of physical endurance.
The actual method of instruction varies from teacher to teacher. Some are gentler than others. A more strenuous, pitiless education is more likely to produce a stronger Triste, but it is also more likely to trigger insanity, aneurysms or spontaneous heart failure. Depending on the methods of the teacher and the aptitude of the student, training may take anywhere from six months, to several decades. A longer period of time increases the likelihood that the student will survive training, but like among lunar vampires, there is a relatively narrow window of time - late teens, early twenties - when the body is most malleable to invasion by the parasitic, immortal power, so a student who survives three decades of training may then be too old to survive initiation.
Only after a student has mastered the necessary skills can the initiation - a massive transfer of power between the student and his teacher, enabled by some kind of blood ritual - take place. Again, different teachers have different rituals, some with higher or lower fatality rates, and prone to produce more or less powerful results.
Due to the commitment of time and power, most teachers guard their students well, and are quick to retaliate against anyone who threatens them. However, since successful training is rare and even some who survive initiation do not live through the first couple years, Tristes in general are uncommon in Nyeusigrube, with only a couple dozen known to exist.
Notable Individuals
Unlike vampires, shapeshifters and elavie, Tristes do not have any particular culture of their own kind. Instead, individuals make their own niche wherever in Nyeusigrube suits them. They have their own specialties, and their own rules.
Tatiana: She is unique for her long-term instruction of multiple students at a time. She forms cult-like rings, weeding out students as they fail to live up to her expectations. She may instruct the members of a particular cult for decades before deciding none of them suit her. Most of the time, the individuals who meet her standards are not the original members of her cults, but children of two cult members who have been raised conscious of their power.
Pandora: Initiated by Triste herself in 1200 BCE, Pandora is one of the most powerful Tristes in Nyeusigrube. She is one of the few Tristes strong enough to change her shape; her second form is a bat. Though Pandora's students tend to be the most powerful, they also have the highest fatality rate during training, with over half of them dying within the first month alone, but if they survive initiation they have the highest survival rate after that.
Jesse Fontes: From the early years BCE, Jesse Fontes specializes in controlling and containing vampires. Very powerful, he is also for hire. For example, he worked with both generations of Midnight to set into the building the magics that make it impossible for any vampire to transport into the building, or out from any of the trainers' cells.
Dinah Alina: Jesse's student, Dinah works as a healer... and specializes on feeding on the Black aura. She once healed a young woman suffering, among other things, severe blood poisoning. She was later so impressed by said young woman's strength and innate power (in her fever and trauma induced delirium, among other things, she summoned and named a k'jait) that she offered to train her, but the woman insisted on going back to her sisters and brother as soon as she had recovered. Dinah always had a good eye for potential.
Alexander Weatere: One of Pandora's fledglings, he is mentioned in In the Forests of the Night.
Christian Denmark: One of Pandora's most recent initiates, Christian (introduced in Tiger Eyes) is currently the leader of the Frost ring of the Bruja Guilds.
Adjila: Yet another of Pandora's, in this case from 1415, Adjila was one of the co-founders of Bruja. For the last several hundred years, he has been involved with Shevaun, a lunar vampire in Kendra's line. Adjila has a second form of a raven.
Ramsey: The fourth of Triste's students, Ramsey was initiated in 1312. She works extensively as a mercenary, and was also influential in the founding of the Bruja Guilds. She is most famous for taking in the Macht witch Eric Marinitch in 1700 and training him as her student.
Eric Marinitch: Ramsey's student, Eric was later forcibly changed into a vampire by Kendra... and a few others, who poisoned themselves in the attempt to drain him for the change.
Rikai: No one knows who trained Rikai; the teacher she knew, everyone else in Nyeusigrube swears never existed. This fact, however, doesn't unnerve people nearly so much as her raw power - and her sheer madness. Rikai is one of the Wild Cards, and her special fascination is Evil.
(Information (c) Amelia Atwater-Rhodes)