Isolde Varrach [Ermordenung]

Isolde Varrach stands a little under six feet, slender and graceful as a dancer, with unnervingly pale skin, sharp dark eyes, and an ebony braid that reaches nearly to her knees. She likes to weave flowers into it, always ones as poisonous as they are lovely. She wears long, elegant gloves, peeling them off only when she means to kill, and carries a slim jeweled dagger at her hip, her only weapon; she wears no armor. Alchemical elixirs keep her young and stunning, and her beauty is perhaps the most lethal thing about her. She speaks the language of her homeland and several neighboring domains, always in the same aristocratic tone.

Her body is so saturated with poison that any bare-skin contact can kill. Touching someone requires a normal attack roll; the victim then saves vs. poison at +4, dying on a failure and taking 10 damage on a success. On a natural 20 she has seized her foe firmly: the save becomes unmodified, failure is death and success costs 20 hit points, and the save repeats every round until the victim breaks free.

Away from battle she hunts men by seduction. Her husky voice works as a charm spell, which makes luring them close easy. Her kiss demands a save vs. poison at -4 or instant death, and a successful save still inflicts 30 damage. Anyone who fails to escape her arms is kissed again the next round. Like all her kind she has Strength 18/50; weaker victims must save vs. paralyzation at -4 to wrench free, those of equal Strength save unmodified, and stronger ones gain +4.

She cannot bear touching other women, so against them she uses her dagger, a +1 dagger of venom filled with a solution of her own blood. Its victim saves vs. poison at -4 or dies; a success means no venom got in. It holds enough for six strikes. She is immune to nearly every poison except the touch of another ermordenung.

Isolde was born to aristocrats near a city of the domain who served its former ruler, Corisande Vell. As a girl she was the close friend of that ruler's daughter, Ilsabet Voranne, two years her senior. When Ilsabet began scheming for the throne, Isolde became her right hand, not from any hatred of Corisande but from pure devotion to her friend.

Ilsabet perfected a method of toxic infusion and asked Isolde to be its first subject. Isolde agreed, lay in a coma for two weeks, and woke as the first ermordenung. Her first task followed a fortnight later. She went to Corisande's chambers, swore loyalty, and warned of a plot by Ilsabet, with hired killers already on the way. Hearing what sounded like a mob at the outer door, Corisande fled with her through cobwebbed passages in the manor walls to the coachhouse, where a fine coach and a cloaked driver waited to carry her to safety. When the coachman threw off hat and coat, he was Ilsabet. As Corisande turned in horror, Isolde kissed her, and the old ruler dropped dead to her daughter's laughter.

Corisande's face haunts Isolde still. She dreams of her victim returning as a ghost, and feels those lips on her own whenever she kisses anyone, which is why female skin now revolts her. She soon led a small clan of fewer than six ermordenung, and as their value to the ruler grew, so did their numbers and Isolde's power. Over the years remorse has faded into relish for the suffering she causes.

Her touch makes love, marriage and children impossible. She claims to scorn such things, but the denied intimacy eats at her. Each month she must brew and drink a fresh anti-aging elixir, whose secret recipe reportedly consumes at least three young men; if she misses a dose she ages rapidly. As Ilsabet's closest adviser she largely chooses who becomes an ermordenung, and many call her the mother of the race, though she had no hand in creating the formula.