Hozxi
"Have patience; all things are difficult before they become easy."
Details
Full Name: Hozxi, daughter of Saksathaos, son of Yster, twenty eighth in the line of the Tribe of Memnos
Race: Kishoi Moratallen
Sex: Female
Age: 22
Height: 219 cm (7 feet 2 inches)
Weight: 107 kg (236 pounds)
Birthdate: 75 Glade 99
Birthplace: A caravanserai somewhere in the Zeraphi desert
Profession: Seer, Alchemist, Mercantilist, Outcast
Housing: A converted spare room on the waterfront of Port Udori. One of the few rooms she's been able to rent in the past year that affords her the necessary privacy to do her alchemy and ceiling space, it was originally a temporary arrangement: a desperate attempt of the clerk at the Office of Immigration and Citizenship to accommodate her. She had moved to other, more upscale apartments around the Commons, but after nearly eight months and seven leases Hozxi found that sometimes what is not broken need not be fixed.
Partners: Hozxi speaks distantly of her betrothed back among the Memnos, but not with any great affection. Otherwise she would not have left to find a new life in Kalzasi.
Titles: Memnosyne Seer
Factions: none
Fluencies: Common, Tallenese
Appearance
Hozxi is immediately the center of attention in any room she enters, whether she wants to be or not.
Some of that is her choice of apparel. She wears the traditional woven robes of the Memnosyne whenever possible; long, ornate fabrics that stretch from the top of her head down to the balls of her feet. Each one has a unique kaleidoscopic pattern, handmade by the weavers of another tribe that Memnos traded with in herbal remedies and scrips of good fortune.
Some of it is the commanding build underneath. Hozxi stands heads above the men around her. The hands that hold her instruments of alchemy and turn the pages of formula books and business ledgers alike keep firm grips. When she walks, she does not make sounds as her feet fall; a lifetime in the desert of sand and glass.
Some of it is her iridescent eyes. They gleam with topaz. Their gaze is piercing, but not invasive; curious, but not naïve; eager, but never too generous.
The rest comes from when she speaks. A Tallenese accent permeates the fortunes she tells and the agreements she coordinates, and with it is the passion of a soul that was steeped in the values of the half-giants from birth. If it is to be done then it must be done with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul. She exudes the confidence of hard work and tenacity. Her movements, her gestures, are all done without half measures.
Personality
An upbringing that left lasting scars on Hozxi's mind. For all of her industry, she can feel the undercurrents of failure. Whatever you do will not undo what has been done.
Hozxi's gentle first impressions belie the rage that lies underneath the surface. Rage at the kin she may never see again. Rage at the beasts of the desert for making life so hard for the tribes, that they must follow their rigid codes or suffer oblivion. Rage at a world order that allows such callousness, that actively promotes it in the interest of politics or honor or whatever the women at the top decide to call it.
Hozxi walks the tightrope between serenity and violence more carefully than most. It gives her the edge, the focus that she needs to find opportunities that may be lost to those without the commitment or those who do not demand the commitment of others.
History
Hozxi was born into the tribe of Memnos during their trip across the desert to Zeraphesh. Her parents were caravaneers, just like the majority of the tribe, transporting goods along the roads that connect the City of Glass to the various oases that pocket the Zeraphi desert. As a young girl she saw the dangers of their trade: wild predators, bandits, corrupt tax collectors, and the constant threat of the Mists rising in a sandstorm without warning.
It was more important to her to see how the tribe countered such dangers: the Memnosyne Seers, a tradition of mages that used Semblance to read the desert's winds and know what paths were safe and what danger was coming. The Seers were raised from boys and girls that showed potential and Hozxi so desperately wanted to have that potential. She watched as they looked for a new acolyte and pleaded to be allowed to experience the Trial.
A Seer's trial was to be left in the desert and survive.
Hozxi felt the first true fear of her life as she saw the tribe move on without her. Thirteen days passed as Hozxi wandered the sands with only a waterskin and a walking stick and the Cardinal Rune of Semblance freshly etched onto her skin. You will see the world as it is for the first time. Whether or not you come back to the world we know is up to you. For thirteen nights she sleptwalk across the sands and felt her skull split open as her body crossed the threshold. Things of nightmare came from the depths of her mind and became real for thirteen rises and falls of the sun.
For the next eight years she served the Tribe as best she could, reading the winds and the sands as an acolyte, directing the lead caravan on where to go and where not to go. She was made an adult in the eyes of her kin. She was betrothed to another member and promised a life of prosperity eked out in the shadow of the City of Glass.
It was all so incredibly boring.
So, as the new year 120 came in the Age of Steel, she left. Hozxi forsook all of her belongings and slipped away from the Tribe at the dead of night while trading on the western edge of the desert. She had no plan, no destination, only the desire for more from life than seeing the same expanse of barren windswept dunes for eternity.
Her travels have brought her here, to Kalzasi. Whether or not she will stay, what mark she will make, is firmly in her own hands.