Elizabeth Hickman

From Changeling Venue

Seeming	Ogre Unknown
Court	Unknown Court
Freehold	No Freehold
Player	Emily Rathwaedht

Player: Emily Rathwaedht
Sanctioned:
Regional Approvals:

Contents 1 Overview 2 Background 3 Stereotypes 4 Perceptions and Rumors 5 Contacts 6 Groups 7 Enemies 8 Character Connections

Overview

Profile: Elizabeth Hickman is sideshow entertain who specializes in routines involving glass. She both eats the stuff and indulges numerous contact routines involving broken glass as well as a few other surprising materials such as glass cleaner. The entertainer has certainly experienced more than her years warrant and the maturity this brings is often offset by her private nature, giving others a somewhat caustic if not threatening impression of her demeanor.

Mask: Elizabeth Hickman is an aged woman though she has not been aged by time. This young performer instead appears to have been aged by the weather itself. Both her skin and long black hair are weathered from too much exposure to the elements, and her eyes seem exhausted from the same hard labor that is evident within her taut and hardened shape. Even her clothes seem tired and drab-beyond-color from too much time spent living along the road. Although she is most often seen cloth in old black carhartt overalls and her yellow hoodie she is sometimes seen sporting a tired old house dress of one print or another, and always with an old beaten hat atop her thick black hair. Still most noticeable are the faint scars that decorate her body as though she had been cut apart and sewn back together once a very long time ago. Shadows seem to naturally collect around vague features that most recognize as having an almost undefinable ethnicity to them, her racial heritage concealed by the paler skin of her mother.

Mien: Slimshift or Slim appears to have been sewn together with yellowed leather for flesh and dense twine for thread. Several patches fashioned from old circus canvas have been made part of the stitching for decorative purposes as well. However the stitched together body still appears to be very much her own and it flexes and moves like any normal flesh would, exposing labor hardened muscle and bone in all the ordinary ways. Her black hair and dark eyes are natural though they too seem to have weathered over time. The stitches that hold it all together are thick and have blackened from blood and dirt both, crossing against her body and breaking her otherwise handsome appearance into a panopoly of old junked parts. Even her clothes seem tired and drab-beyond-color from too much time spent living along the road, whispered shadows collecting in the pits of her wardrobe even in the broad daylight and making the drab appear all the more fearsome. Although she is most often seen cloth in old black carhartt overalls and her yellow hoodie she is sometimes seen sporting a tired old house dress of one print or another, and always with an old beaten hat atop her thick black hair.

Background

Human History: Elizabeth Hickman was born in the dustbowl during one of the many dust storms which had hit the township of Long Hollow that season. The sun was oppressive that day and so the infant girl was born beneath the shade of circus canvas, born to a proud family of Appalachian showfolk. She was named Elizabeth by her parents and - true to the meaning of her name - her father would refer to her forevermore as his little promise. Sadly her mother would pass away not long after her birth, a mere year and one day down the line. Despite this tragedy little Elizabeth Hickman grew up quickly and in her early preadolescent years she was often caught sneaking around the sideshow freaks and carnie booths, a tall skinny thing wearing nothing but a yellow hand-me-down slip. This prompted the roustabouts who worked with her father to start calling her Slimshift which turned out to be a nickname that would stick with Elizabeth for most of her life.

By the time Slimshift had reached thirteen years old she was already flirting with danger as a budding glass eater, drawing in large crowds eager to experience the rarity of a lady geek. By the time she turned fifteen her flirtations had extended to other women - sometimes her own age and sometimes older - which prompted countless rumors about her supposedly godless perversion. Her father certainly did not agree with the behavior of his little promise but she was still his daughter and he did his best to keep all the talk about her silenced as best he could, sometimes with diplomacy and sometimes with his big roustabout hands. Most of the other carnies and showfolk were willing to forgive, of course. Elizabeth was one of the finest glass eaters to be found inside or outside of any ten-in-one no matter the state, always eschewing the gaffs and tricks of other geeks in favor of really eating the stuff put her before. On top of that she always performed her routine with the down home grace befitting a woman of her breeding, much to the delight of her otherwise horrified audiences. So most were willing to forgive, if only for the money she brought in.

Old Bill Hickman turned out to be on the right side of God for silencing all of the talk about his daughter and his goodness was repaid exactly as he had hoped, for her fifteenth birthday proved to be a major turning point in the life of the young carnie woman. After performing her routine for the local rubes - eating a few light bulbs while dancing about suggestively on a bed of broken beer bottles - his daughter ran off for a spell and could not be found for what seemed like a terrible hour. When she finally did return it was with an apology and a promise that everything would be better from then on, that her father would finally have the proper daughter he had always wanted. His beloved daughter straightened out and married one of the more handsome roustabouts when she turned seventeen, and although she never produced him any grandchildren he was happy and fulfilled all the same. Old Bill even found a loving safe haven in the care of his daughter and his son-in-law once he became too old to work, and he never did stop calling her his little promise straight through to his dying day.

Arcadian History: The fifteenth birthday of Elizabeth Hickman really was a major turning point in her life. The afternoon when she performed her glass dancing routine for the rubes was the last performance she would ever offer to such a mundane audience. When the curtain dropped she turned only to find the red canvas curtain behind her as well. That was when she heard the voice, the voice which claimed that her private fear of life off the stage had wounded those around her. She fired back by telling the disembodied voice that it was the rumor mongering and whispers which kept her distant even from her father, that what kept her cold to those around her were the endless nights spent hating herself for the pain her behavior brought upon her family. The voice professed not to care and as Elizabeth turned to flee through the curtains she found herself caught within them instead. Like a winding sheet the red canvas curtains constricted around her and soon the still-young Slimshift felt herself being dragged across the ground, sharp thorns and brambles cutting through the fabric and tearing at her skin. It was agony, an agony far worse than that felt by many with experience of the Hedge for unlike them her entire life had been built around the prospect of being unharmed by things that cut. More important to her than the stripping of her soul was the stripping of her one and only claim to fame.

Life was not any easier on the other side of the ordeal and her suffering did not lessen, though it did offer rare moments of respite. Slimshift learned over time that the man who had kidnapped her was in fact a formerly human servant much like herself and that he served a faerie master with whom her father had struck a bargain long ago. She also learned that this faerie master had no need for her and that she was instead to be sold for a high price to a showman who was called Boss Wiley by the local denizens. Presumably she had been purchased for thirteen catskins and a contract with steam, the value of which was lost on her at the time though it would later be impressed upon her quite thoroughly by her new keeper. Boss Wiley was a cruel and bitter master without an ounce of kindness in all his being, an old withered man with a mighty arm of steam driven clockwork and an all-seeing mechanical eye from which she and her fellow prisoners could never escape. He kept Elizabeth and the others locked away in wheeled cages like those used by the circus to put dangerous animals on display and the bar were wrapped with cruel biting thorns. It was hell, a nightmarish perversion of the very life she had grown up within.

The show that Boss Wiley owned and managed was a travelling show like all circuses and sidwshows, and it felt as though she and her fellow captives were expected to perform a thousand times nightly. At first her ability to walk upon and consume broken glass provided impressive entertainment to the true fae and hobgoblins, none of whom believed that a creature as weak as a human could accomplish such feats, but over time the audiences began to call out for greater feats than those which she had been taught to perform. Boss Wiley was more than happy to oblige his paying customers and after several years on the road it had become a matter of course for her Keeper to force greater and greater physical torments upon her, torments that regularly flayed the very skin from her body. It was during those moments that she received her respite, for among the captives was a toughened brute of a woman with the most gentle hands Slimshift had ever known. Each night after her daily obligations to the show were completed this woman - whose name Slimshift never dared ask for fear of speaking it too kindly before their mutual master - would gently stitch the lost skin back into place. The process was certainly painful but the gentle touch of the otherwise fearsome enforcer soothed her to degrees beyond pain. Those precious few moments were the only acts kindness she ever received.

Five years passed and by the age of twenty her own flesh had slowly toughened into leather through the constant process of removal and return alongside the rigors of the road. Those pieces of flesh which had been lost were replaced with bits and scraps of canvas, quietly cut into diamonds by the gentle-handed enforcer. She became stronger through the labors she was expected to perform when building up and tearing down the circus tents and stages. But beneath the exterior known as Slimshift there still beat the heart of Elizabeth Hickman and the only thing she looked forward to more than the hands of the circus enforcer was the day when she would return home. That day came soon and with the help of her gentle-handed friend she made good her escape, running as fast as her bare feet could take her through the Hedge and beyond the steamdriven grasp of her cruel captor. But it was not easy for Boss Wiley had his all-seeing mechanical eye and he could follow her anywhere with his gaze, always knowing exactly where to send his minions to reclaim his very expensive investment. For seven days and seven nights she ran through the Hedge from the servants of her Keeper and the creatures of the wild, her gentle-handed companion was even captured but still Slimshift pressed onward. Finally she escaped into the mortal world and claimed her freedom, tainted as it was by the uncertain knowledge that the gaze of her Keeper may very well extend beyond the faerie realms.

Changeling History: The world had changed considerably in her absence but Slimshift had grown up as an entertainer and developed an open mind as a result, with her time in Arcadia only broadening her ability to expect the unexpected. Certainly the automobiles looked different and television was coming in full color now but the rural people of the United States had remained largely the same. People were significantly more accepting of strange behavior, and Slimshift seemed to slip into the world largely unnoticed except for her spectacular working build and her ability to still charm the pants off any rube who came upon her. Rubes were still rubes after all and that would never change, nor would the patent pending charm that all carnies grow up with.

However she still had to worry about Boss Wiley and his pursuit. He had spent a considerable small fortune on her and she knew that he would not be so willing to let his investment slip between his fingers. Furthermore she had no idea if her gentle-handed savior was still alive or if she had been murdered as punishment for her complicit role in the escape. Slimshift had to keep moving and so she hit the rails and began hopping freight trains across the country. The experience of freight hopping was not hard to master and it even provided Slimshift with an ironic sense of having a normal life again. The hobos reminded her of the very same hobos who had sometimes worked in the carnival, and she felt a strange kinship with the politically-minded crustie punks who also rode the freight lines and their empowering perspective on issues such as sexuality. The ogre took many lovers on those trains and loved them all.

It was one of those lovers who eventually clued her into the existence of Gibsonville and its role as the retirement community for all the great sideshow freaks and carnival workers. Without hesitation Slimshift rode the rails into Florida and made her way to Gibtown where she immediately felt at home, even if the track houses seemed more like tombstones and the sight of worn down ferris wheels made her heart sink rather than fly. Slimshift wandered the streets alone and found a free warm meal in the local diner, noting that some of the more elderly looking rousties seemed to almost recognize her. Eventually one of these old codgers approached Slimshift and asked her if she was related to Old Lizzie Freeman by any chance. She was not sure who this Old Lizzie was but he told her where she lived anyway and for some compelling but unknown reason Slimshift found herself walking toward an old large house on the outskirts of town, by the river.

The door was unlocked when she came up to the house. To the left of the door was a graveyard and she could not help but notice the name on one of the gravestones. It was the name of her father. Confused by peculiar feeling pounding in her chest she burst through the door, following the odd sensation up the stairs. It was almost as though her body had been possessed and she was moving based upon pure instinct much as she had when she fled through the Hedge during her painful escape. At last the sensation guided her to the attic and there she found Old Lizzie sitting at a vanity mirror decorated with old photographs and mementos. Before either of them even spoke Slimshift knew who Old Lizzie was and she howled in anger at the ancient woman, who sat placid and calm and unconcerned.

The fetch woman called Old Lizzie sat and quietly told the ogre the story of their life. Slimshift gazed upon photographs of herself and a young man she had known at the carnival, learning that he later became her husband. Her stomach turned but so did her heart. She saw the old pipe her father had always smoked and tears filled her hardened yellowed eyes for the first time since the gentle touch of her first true friend. A life unlived swam before her as Old Lizzie spoke and the only wall holding back the tide of rage within Slimshift was the bittersweet sorry of her loss. At last Old Lizzie told her the true reason for her kidnapping, that it had never been about Slimshift but had instead been about their father. Long ago he had made a deal with a faerie creature in exchange for a child who would always make him happy and never bring him shame. The realization came, the realization that she had been kidnapped and replaced with this fetch because Elizabeth Hickman had ceased to make her father happy and that instead she had brought him shame.

The pain was enormous.

Some storytellers claim that the enormity of her pain surpassed even the tortures that Boss Wiley had inflicted upon the entertaining ogre, and as Old Lizzie stood before the seething creature she offered only the comfort that she had lived a full life even if it had been lived through proxy. With that Old Lizzie walked down to her bedroom on the second floor and passed away from the age that had been threatening to claim her for the last few days. In the attic the rage of Slimshift finally exploded and it is said that all the windows in the house exploded inward at her cry, save those of the bedroom in which Old Lizzie lay dead and fulfilled. Slimshift does not remember when she left the house at last but she does know that she left the buried remains of Old Lizzie in the family graveyard, next to the father whom Old Lizzie had made so happy and proud. The remains had not even turned till the first shovel of dirt hit the pinebox in which they were buried. Afterward the ogre named Slimshift returned to the rails and travelled in silence for a very very long time, alone with her thoughts and at last a creature alone amongst humanity.

Stereotypes

Perceptions and Rumors

Perceptions

Untrustworthy Flaw: There are precious few changelings in the world who trust Slimshift after any fashion. Most say this is because she is one of the courtless, while others claim it is because she still uses the name of her keeper as one of her surnames. But the truth of the matter is that she spends an uncommon amount of time around children and in the places where children gather. Many have been the nights when she has been late to an event only to offer up the excuse that she was busy with a child, never explaining further. The fact that the following morning often reveals a crime of great violence targeting children only makes other changelings even more uneasy around the leathered carnie.

There are some who speak up for her, however, and her friends often know that Slimshift has in fact sworn herself to the protection of children from the unseen monsters of the world. Primarily because they remain her favorite audiences, though some believe there to be a deeper reason as well. Unfortunately few are willing to believe even those friends who speak uninvited on her behalf. The behavior of Slimshift is simply too ... too ... too guilty to be overlooked, and her unwillingness to ever explain more fully what she has been up to just smacks of criminal behavior to anyone who does not know her well. Naturally the tough but outgoing Slimshift is quite comfortable allowing the other changelings their gossip. She grew up surrounded by the hurtful whispered words of others, and weathering such slings and arrows is second to her nature.

Rumors

• She eats more than just glass. She eats the parents of children. While the children are forced to watch.
• She and Luna Max are really sisters.
• She and Max are not sisters, they are the same soul, torn in two by their Keeper.
• She is actually a spy for the winter court and claims to be courtless to avoid suspicion.
• She is actually a loyalist and wears the name of her Keeper like a badge of honor.
• Heard a rumor? Leave it here.

Contacts

What She Says About Others

• PC: Althea Sexton: I think I performed for her once, way back when I still called that old cage home. Something about her felt awful sad, and I remember wishing just then that mine was the sort of performance what could make folk smile. Never did make her smile and I reckon that I never will, even if I did know where to go looking for her.
• PC: Harlequin: Yeah, we grew up together in the same family circus back before either of us had been stolen away. What are the odds, right? I was older and she was prettier and that sure hasn't changed one bit. Topping that off? She's STILL the same self-indulgent upstaging glory-hog that she's always been, if not a bit worse. Pretty marvelous girl, if you ask me.

What Others Say About Her

• PC: Nycto Feraz: She only needs to learn to come out of her sister's shadow.
  
• Something to say? Say it here.

Groups

Who She Associates With

• Cirque Nocturne: I done worked with these cirkies a few times. They got a weird modern aesthetic going on but they put on a pretty grand show all the same. Grand enough that I'm lookin forward to working with them again sometime, anyhow.

Who She Observes

• Mammetum Entertainment: Well, I suppose they have quite a bit of sense for the business. Still, daresay its hard to find work for a lady geek like me these days. Even for folk with more than their fare share of sense.
• Boulder Spring Court: Well I don't much care for their fun, though I daresay they got some big ideas ... and at least a few of them are sly, if you happen to catch my meaning, which counts for something I suppose.

Enemies

• NPC: Boss Wiley: This Gentry ringleader is a cruel and bitter master without an ounce of kindness in all his being, an old withered man with a mighty arm of steam driven clockwork and an all-seeing mechanical eye from which his sideshow prisoners can never escape. Boss Wiley manages his travelling circus and sideshow with a heart as cold as his metal parts and a calm temper as heated as the steam which powers them. In this circus one will find strange hobgoblins and other peculiar denizens capable of providing a diversion, as well as unfortunate changeling entertainers who are often subject to unspeakable humiliations and manipulations. These changeling entertainers are purchased from others amongst the Gentry and Boss Wiley keeps these unfortunates locked away in wheeled cages, like those used by the circus to put dangerous animals on display. Naturally the bars of these cages are wrapped with cruel biting thorns to discourage attempts at escape.

Character Connections

Definately looking for character connections. Different possibilities exist. Obviously anyone could have shared the experience of being a captive of Boss Wiley or even been a captive of the original True Fae who had her kidnapped to begin with. If you are playing an Ogre then you could be the very Ogre who dragged her off to Boss Wiley for his master, or if you are playing an Ogre or one of the Wizened you could be the gentle-handed woman that helped her escape and for whom she still holds the truest of fond feelings. Other possibilities for connection could involve her time riding the freight trains if your character was doing the same, or if you are playing some kind of circus or carnival oriented character she might know you from her human days or her time after the escape. Email me and let me know!