Eleanora Blackwood
| Name | Eleanora Blackwood |
| Race | Vampire |
| Type | Witch |
| Faction | Nightbred |
| Premiere | Desideratum: Blood Bonds |
| Relative(s) | Not Applicable |
Biography
Eleanora Blackwood’s past has an air of mystery to it. Though no one knows her precise age, the first accounts of Eleanora appear following the great witch-hunts- the first account coming from 1649 out of Chelmsford in central England. Some speculate that she may have, originally, been a kind witch, but the bloodshed and cruelty she witnessed twisted her soul. Others think that she had been wicked from birth. Either way, she holds only a terrible hatred within her heart and a desire to wreak havoc upon the Earth. For example, it was Eleanora, herself, that unleashed the Great Famine upon Ireland. Many other calamities in England, Scotland, and Ireland can be traced to her as well.
At some point, she became obsessed with finding powerful magical relics in order to amplify her power. This took her across the continents of Europe and Asia, but she eventually ended up in the Mediterranean. There, she sought a particular relic, though no mortal knows what it is, they do know that the adventurers Theodore and Debra Ravenhurst- found it first. This led Eleanora on a long journey that ended at Wakefield, New York. Upon her arrival, she planned to steal the Ravenhurst trove for herself, murder his heirs, and burn the manor to ashes- yet she found that it would not be so easy. Somehow, either Debra or Theodore managed to enchant the manor, hiding the relics away. Worse, their son, Anaximanes, appeared to be the key to unearthing the boon.
She first tried to woo the man, but he fell in love with a girl named Eliza Day. Next, Eleanora tried her magical spells upon him in order to charm Ravenhurst into her slave. This also failed, for he seemed resilient against magic. She turned to a powerful succubus, Dionyza, to help her brew a love potion knowing that his resistance would fail against such eldritch power, yet still she failed, for a girl named Mizah stole the potion! Finally, her last effort was to call upon the undead, and use them as pawns, while killing off Eliza Day. She planned to ruin Anaximanes completely, driving him into her arms. She took no chances, and though he remained resilient to her spells, she bombarded his psyche whenever he slept with images designed to bring him into her power- yet the involvement of Brone Lorcan, a friend of Ravenhurst, finally broke him from her spells, and he came before Eleanora- face to face. Ravenhurst stood incensed, and, his heart aching with pain and rage, he strangled Eleanora Blackwood to death! However, evil does not die so easily...
Eleanora Blackwood died at the hands of Anaximanes Ravenhurst, yet her tale did not end there! As Ravenhurst strangled the life from the witch, she desperately tried to call on the hidden nosferatu surrounding the pair- yet the dark creatures did not respond. While Eleanora told Anax of her plans, Ivor listened from the shadows, and determined two things that unsettled him. One issue he had was that Eleanora referred to him as if he were merely a tool for her to use. He saw himself as a lord of the undead, and her speech angered the old fiend. Secondly, he realized how Machiavellian the witch was! Her plans were intricate, brutal, and precise. At what point, Ivor wondered, would she turn on him? He knew her to be quite formidable, for he almost died at the hands of Van Helsing, and would have, if not for her interaction. Yet he coldly watched Ravenhurst extinguish her life, and waited until the man and witnesses fled into the night!
Ivor then came to Eleanora’s corpse, and while her blood still ran warm, drank deep of it, infecting her with the dark vampire curse. When the sheriff and others arrived later in the night, they found her body drained of all blood! The scene only heaped more superstition on Ravenhurst, or The Anax, as the townsfolk called him. The next night, she returned to unlife! Eleanora felt betrayed, and instantly went to destroy Ivor for ignoring her pleas for help- only to find she could not harm him. The vampire curse would not allow her to harm her progenitor, and she fell into line. As Ivor’s servant, he felt safe from her powers and plans, and knew that he had Eleanora’s vast magical power at his disposal. She demanded her spell book, The Book of Shadows, be brought to her, yet the old tome had disappeared, confiscated by some random passerby. The vampires remained in Wakefield for less than a week after the death of Ravenhurst, ignorant to what he had become. Instead, Ivor tried to locate the very relics which Eleanora spoke of, the ones hidden inside the manor, but failed to find anything.
Eleanora, however, focused on revenge, and she felt nothing but ire for the Irishman, Brone Lorcan. She heaped the blame upon him, and tracked him through her magical scrying. She showed Ivor her powers, and he took her as an adviser- though he always kept a wary eye on the witch. She led him across the country to Portland, Oregon, where Brone Lorcan worked as a deckhand. Eleanora begged her master to turn him into a vampire as well that she might lord over him, a broken and twisted shadow of his former self, and that is precisely what happened. For a long while, things went on, and Eleanora used Ivor for some dark ends, always careful not to push him too far. She even acted as if she loved the hideous vampire, in a bid to further gain control. She defeated countless vampire hunters for Ivor, for they had no defense against her magic. Everything proceeded well enough, until she began having strange premonitions. A woman, clad in red, a link to Van Helsing, would come to slay Ivor- and would succeed. At first, these visions delighted her black heart, because once her chain to Ivor lay severed, she could find her Book of Shadows, and return to her search for artifacts of power, some of which she knew lay in Oregon! However, the visions eventually showed this red-clad woman having something to do with the destruction of Eleanora herself! That kicked her into action, and she urged Ivor to have this potential threat eliminated as quickly as possible!
