From Changeling Venue

“Only nature has a right to grieve perpetually, for she only is innocent. Soon the ice will melt, and the Blackbirds sing along the river which he frequented, as pleasantly as ever. The same everlasting serenity will appear in this face of God, and we will not be sorrowful, if he is not.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

Site Heavily Under Construction

Overview

Alias(es): K. D. Mason

Real Name: Generally Unknown

Age: Late 20s, Early 30s.

Concept: Horror Collector.

Entitlement: Blackbird Bishop.

Physical description:
Mask: As K. D. Mason steps up to the podium, the light almost seems to dim. Her pale skin, visible above a conservative neckline, seems almost to absorb the light in a direct correlation to how uncomfortable she appears under it. Her long hair falls between her shoulder, pulled away from her face. Her eyes, when she opens them, are dark to the point of blackness. Before long, however, she's covered them with her typical sunglasses. When she smiles, it is rare and small, as if afraid allowing greater breadth to the expression might hurt. Her voice is soft and thin in thanks, yet soft like velvent and enrapturing when addressed to a crowd.

Mein: Cordelia Marrow enters the room quietly, moving softly between conversations. Her many eyes are open, the two God gave her regarding the object of her attention while the others, seemingly randomly generated about her face and neckline, gaze in unknown directions; a clear, thick fluid weeps from the inhuman ones. Her pale skin, cold blue in the harsh light, extends even to her lips. Her long ragged hair, falling between her shoulders, is pulled back from her face. When she smiles, not commonly enough to be frequent, a row of jagged teeth becomes apparent in her small black mouth. Her clothes are dark, reminiscent of a day when dressing 'goth' didn't cost an exhorbinent fee. Black feathers flutter lazily in whatever air stirs the room. An occasional one falls away, from time to time accompanies by the sense of falling autumn leaves. At her neck hangs a ornament, a tin bird painted black; at her waiste, a metallic cylinder cut in an intricate design.

Relevant Mechanics: Fame (successful horror author)

Character Information

Known History

Basic Timeline:
1997

• Escapes from the Hedge into the St. Louis area.
  
• Receives the help of the Winter Court there, but is already too deeply fractured mentally to be easily reached.
  

1998

• Moves on in an attempt to find family. Spends the next year looking.
  

1999

• Eventually finds her Fetch.
  
• Begins a period of systematic stalking of her Fetch.
  

2000

• Murders her Fetch violently before her family while in Washington DC.
  

2001 to 2002

• Seeks consistant help from a Changeling pscyhologist.
  
• Begins to seek the companionship of others in Changeling society.
  

2002

• Publishes her first novella the pen name 'K. D. Mason'. The story, a simultaneously graphic and subtle exploration of the stalker becoming the stalked titled By Degrees, was published in the Cemetary Dance magazine.
  

2003

• Officially joins the Autumn Court.
  
• Publishes her second novella, Ten Hours to Midnight. Three more novellas follow in a variety of horror magazines that year.
  

2004

• Publishes a collection of short story horror fiction in book format, Before I Wake. The book is lauded for its diversity of competant fiction, carrying the reader through a variety of harrowing tales.
  
• Publishes her first full lenght novel later that year.
  

2005

• Continues publishing at an increased rate.
  
• Begins travelling sporadically to give lectures on the art and execution of horror.
  
• Makes connections in as many freeholds as she can during her travels.
  
• Begins to develop ideological friendships within the Spring Court.
  

2006

• Aligns herself with the Blackbird Bishops.
  

Current Activities

The desk of a writer.

Active Blackbird Bishop - Networked to help new Changelings.
Horror author.
Advocate against using other Changelings to kill one's Fetch.
Advocate for a process of owning one's own Fate.
Self professed pundit and occasional opinionated boar.

K. D. Mason in the News:
The author is said to be in seclusion working on her latest novel. No lectures are currently schedualed.

Merit Details:
Court Goodwill - Spring
Court Goodwill - Winter

Background:

Published Works of K. D. Mason

The cover art for Before I Wake.

OOC: Her most recognized works... feel free to add character reactions to the stories.

Short Stories in Magazines:
By Degrees - Published in Cemetary Dance, 2002 - Follows the story of a stalker who becomes the stalked.
Ten Hours to Midnight - Published in Cemetary Dance, 2003 - Tells the surreal story of a human fox hunt through a coma patient's mind.
Exit Strategy - 2003 - Published in H. P. Lovecraft's Magazine of Horror, 2004 - Tells of a kidnapping victim trying to blend in with a cult long enough to figure out a way to escape it until she discovers that they're worshipping an actual entity that is definitely not human.
Succulents - Published in Fantazia, 2003 - Follows a conversation between an terrified six-year-old and a self professed hag, in which the hag is slowly bantering with the child over whether or not she's going to eat him. In the end, it comes down to a phone call. If the child's parents pick up, he's safe. If they don't, he's stew. In the last paragraph, the boy hears only the sharpening of something growing louder while the phone continues to ring.

Compilations:
Before I Wake - 2004 - A collection of short stories, including her first two magazine submissions.
Pages of Horror - 2006 - An almost esoteric collection of flash fiction (extremely short, one to two pages) stories that illustrate various moments of horror, each firmly grounded in very firm reality. The small volume numbers less than ninety pages in all. Not as widely distrubuted as many of her other works; often used in a classroom environment.

Novels:
The Coming Night - 2004 - Opens on a protagonist locking away some unknown horror from its ability to ravage humanity, only to follow the his slow slide into servitude under the entity's evil indfluence.
The Court of Science - 2005 - The first person tale follows a serial killer's progression from insanity (believing himself possessed) to control (and actual regret and acceptance that he committed twelve horrible murders) during the course of his capture, trial, and incarceration. When another grisly murder occures in his penitentiary, following his MO but existing nowhere in his memory, he is tried again, convicted, and sentenced to death only to learn just beforehand that the possessing spirit is real and has moved on to the body of the psychiatrist who treated him.

Mutually Beneficial Relationships

Tommy Blue - Little big sister?
Clockwork - Everyone needs a frightening grandfather.
Alexander Delapore - A visionary.
Nycto Feraz - To say 'crafter of nightmares' does him no justice.
Gaea - A shared goal if a different avenue.
Gryphon - I never had an older sister...
Trystan Hunter - He has a plethora of names to choose from.
Pawn - We are familiar.
Joey Shears - Another artist, refreshingly different from the theme and media of my own choice.

Ideologically Opposed

You Can Quote Me...

OOC: Currently, this area is helping me develop attitude and personality for my character. This section may be revised for less content later

• "True horror, then, lies in the anticipation of what lurks in the darkness. Not in the monster itself, its form, or its method, but in the uncertainty of what these things might be. _This_ is what holds us fast in the shadow, praying that we find the courage to run yet paralyzed by fear. This is why we sleep with the lights on at night." - Excert from a lecture presented at the University of Central Missouri.
  
• "I am the cautionary tale."
  
• "Look at yourself, at your mask, at the eyes you've been hiding from. Stare into them and see the face of the thing that's replaced you. Now tell me. Can you see your hands wrapping around its neck? Can you feel the pressure of crushing its delicate wind pipe? Does the terror in its fading eyes compell you? Or does it leave you trembling in your own weak fear? Ah... I see. You're not ready. Then leave the wretch be... for now."
  
• "We did not appreciate our freedom when we had it, but the memory of it called us back. It was that sense, the shallow echo of it that carried us through the Hedge. And then, finally, we were free! ... But are we?"
  
• "I know the word you're looking for. It is classified as a 'five dollar word', which we both see you cannot afford, so let me help you with a suitable, low cost replacement. Talky... that is what you're looking for. And yes, it describes me. That will be two cents, thank you."
  
• "We hold these truths to be of the most grave nature. First, that the living wish to be deceived. Second, that the dead often do not wish to be living once more. And finally, that we, those trapped between life and the lack thereof, understand with much greater clarity the gentle bloom that is life than any of the rest." - Excert from a lecture presented to a gathering of the College of Worms.
  

Words Are Tiny Scalpels

OOC: Want to say something about Cordelia? Feel free to add it.

• "Destiny and dreams. Fear, in some ways, rises from a sense of deficiency, incompleteness. When we are together, there is no fear." - Alexander Delapore
• "The horror genre has been clamoring for decades over who will be the natural successor to writers like Lovecraft, Derleth, Bloch ... I wouldn't call K.D. Mason a successor, so much as a new visionary. Lovecraft feared taking you through the door ... Mason walks you to the couch with a smile, gives you a bowl of popcorn, then cuts your head off. The woman is MAGIC." - Joey Shears, in People Magazine when asked about what he likes to read.
  
• "I don't know her, not really. But I've got family that does and they speak for her. Most of the time the Booga-Booga court's philosophy and my philosophy don't get along, using the tools of the Others just shows what you fear and what you desire and in some cases that's the desire to be like the Others. But I don't get that from Cordelia and that means something." - Gilded
• "She needs no Magic to give you nightmares." ~ Nycto Feraz
• "Her work was pointed out to me by a friend, and several of her stories stuck a cord in me, especially By Degrees and The Coming Night. She is a brilliant author, and her work is masterfully written and deeply moving." ~ Twinge

Rumors

• She didn't really kill her Fetch like that. She just tells us that so we'll think she's a bad ass.
  
• I heard she tried to eat someone once...
  
• She keeps a gag handy, on her person... just in case.
  
• Nycto tracked her down, and forced her to join the Autumn Court on fear of Death.
  
• She tracked Nycto down, and forced him to admit her into the Autumn Court on fear of Death.
  
• Her books are filled with secret codes that can unlock a trod that leads to Arcadia.
  

Out of Character

Character Inspirations

Movies

• In the Mouth of Madness
  
• Event Horizon
  
• Hellraiser (the first one)
  

Literature

• H.P. Lovecraft
  

Soundtrack
Lazy Eye - Silversun Pickups
Wandering Stars - Portishead
Red Water - Type O Negative
Sour Girl - Stone Temple Pilots
Valerie - The V for Vendetta Soundtrack
Pepper - Butthole Surfers

Credits

Art

• Ben Templesmith - From the cover to 30 Days of Night.
  
• Estrum - From one of the band's posters, the woman walking against a red background.
  
• Timothy Lantz - From his website, listed in the enlarged picture.
• Rachel Engel - Feed the Birds image.