Aaron David Highmore
The Omarain Bloodline
The Omarain Bloodline
At A Glance
Full Name: Aaron David Highmore
Age: 17
Birthdate: June 23rd
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Homosexual
Bloodline: Omarain
Personality
Likes: Flirting ⢠Dancing ⢠Laughter ⢠Movement ⢠Cloudless Days ⢠Starry Nights ⢠Noodles ⢠Being Barefoot ⢠Conversations ⢠Music ⢠Chivalry ⢠The works of Shakespeare ⢠Adventure
Dislikes: Bullies ⢠Sadness ⢠Boredom ⢠Being Shirtless ⢠Silence ⢠Being restrained physically or feeling trapped ⢠Liars
Fears: Rejection (itâs one of the reasons heâs never made good on any of his flirtations); Cold Iron (heâs even more sensitive to it than most Omarain, and has had near-deadly brushes with it in the past)
Goals: To complete his masterpiece, a fusion of music, dance, and illusion
There are two major components to Aaronâs personality: those parts of his mundane life that are too deeply ingrained for him to cast off, and the fae persona that he has embraced since arriving on the Isle.
Like most children with distant parents, he craves attention. His love of the performance arts is an obvious extension of that fact, but there are subtler ones as well. He wants to be liked. He wanted to be loved. He tends to find a reason to like almost everyone around him as a result, because that makes it easier for them to like him, in his mind. It isnât really a bad thing. He is fairly likable, and his habit of looking hard for admirable virtues even in those who he doesnât particularly care for can go a long way toward making up for some of the more undesirable elements of his psyche.
His experiences with his first love and the terror of his Awakening have left him on very shaky ground when it comes to romance. The idea of being spurned, or of somehow enthralling someone to the point of obsession accidentally, haunts him at every turn. Itâs difficult for him, because heâs a natural flirt. He wants people to know that heâs interested, how he feels, but when it seems like they might reciprocate he pulls back, leading to a reputation as a pre-eminent tease. He wants love badly. He wants to be courted and then betrothed before riding off into the sunset with his beloved, but he canât stand the thought that he might be forsaken or even rejected outright.
Heâs always been extremely attuned to emotions. He seems to feel them more deeply than most. When heâs happy, heâs laughing and lighting up the world. When heâs sad, he sinks into some very dark depths and can take days to emerge from them. He doesnât have a ânormalâ setting. For Aaron, there are no âmehâ days. Heâs also attuned to the emotions of others, and often reflects them. When heâs around happy people, he quickly becomes happy too. When faced with anger, heâll dig in his heels and deal it right back. It isnât anything conscious, and itâs something he canât help. He tends to keep his distance from those who are bellicose or morose by nature as a result, because heâd much rather feel good than bad.
His Awakening shattered his human identity. When he was on the Isle picking up the pieces, he developed a profound fascination with his fae side. He scoured every book in the Library on the subject, and has found a role that calls to him: that of faerie prince.
Most of his fae characteristics are things that he has to strive for, and sometimes the results are a bit ridiculous. Some of them are becoming more natural, or are extensions of facets of his behavior that already existed. He was already somewhat dramatic; now, heâs extremely dramatic. Things like affirmed vendettas against those who have wronged him or public proclamations of love are not unusual for Aaron. His outgoingness and tendency to get excited can make him hard to handle for more introverted individuals.
He places great stock in keeping promises. He endeavors to keep his own, and does not make them lightly, for fear of the ramifications of what might happen if he fails. This can lead to difficulties with others, since most people have no problem âpromisingâ something and no idea that to Aaron, they might as well have just sworn a solemn oath. People who betray the trust of others or break vows are the lowest sort in Aaronâs eyes- itâs one of the few instances where heâll no longer care if a person likes him or not.
He also tends to view almost everything as an adventure, and has begun to identify his fellows with roles in the âstoryâ that theyâre all enmeshed in. He hasnât shared these beliefs overtly with anyone, but heâll sometimes address someone in the terms he thinks of them. It seems fairly harmless, really; most people just assume itâs his dramatic nature coming out, no different from his somewhat contrived way of speaking most of the time. He does his best to sound the part of a fae prince as well, and like any proper fae prince, he dislikes being talked down to or treated like a child.
Finally, heâs preoccupied with the idea of beauty. He values it in all its forms, and can find it in almost anything or anyone. Of course, the more obviously aesthetic aspects of life are easier for him to enjoy, and he can come off as very shallow, even insensitive, at times. He holds his singing and dancing very close to his heart, and it causes him quite a bit of sorrow when he accidentally hurts someone with the power that they can have.
Overall, he seems quite strange to most, but his good-naturedness and optimism make him easier to get along with than he might otherwise be. He tries to be as kind as he can and is a steadfast friend. Heâs also extremely entertaining, always up for a conversation or a game. Awkward silences cannot exist in his presence.
Appearance Notes: His eyes are a very bright violet. He keeps them hidden, but he has straight-line scars approximately one inch thick running vertically up his back. They resemble severe burns, and stretch from the small of his back up to his shoulders, spaced a precise eight inches apart.
Capabilities
Bloodline Gift: Glamour. Like all Omarain, Aaron is preternaturally alluring and possesses a very definite presence. His charms are at their most potent, though, when he's performing. A sorrowful song from his lips can cause even the most hard-hearted to get a bit misty, and can drive those prone to depression into its throes. His powers of illusion are quite basic, since his fears led to him trying to gain better control of the other aspect of Glamour, but he is reasonably good at sound-based ones.
Bloodline Weakness: Bane of Iron. Aaron is terrified of iron, and much more susceptible to it than most of the Omarain. He finally discovered the reason why, not too long ago, when he was looking through old heraldry and genealogy tomes: he is descended, fairly directly, from one High King David of the fae, and most of the other Omarain who awakened in his family tree share the trait. Contact with any iron causes him excruciating pain and causes permanent scarring, and an actual injury from cold-forged iron would almost certainly be fatal.
Other Skills:
- Triple Threat- Aaron is a skilled actor, dancer, and singer. He's trained in a variety of dance styles, supplemented by a few years of gymnastics that when coupled with his Omarain grace lead to a simply fantastic control of his own body.
- Fencing- He actually took lessons in fencing prior to Awakening, and is fairly good at it. Of course, it isnât the most practical sort of fighting style, but it does play to his advantages.
Biography
Aaron hails from an offshoot of an Omarain bloodline that flourished in France and managed to remain remarkably pure through the centuries thanks to a preponderance of faerie-blood accumulating in that particular country. It diverged in the late 17th century when a daughter of the bloodline eloped with a British soldier, but genealogy can be traced backward quite a ways, to a bloodline rumored to have been established by a one-time High King of the fae.
The Highmoreâs are a wealthy family who manage to keep out of the public eye. Their fortune was made shortly after the American Civil War, and his since been steadily growing and diversifying without making too many waves. That wealth afforded Aaron quite a few privileges, but it also left him a bit wanting for parental affection. With his father globe-trotting for the sake of the familyâs various financial interests and his mother involved in every charity group under the sun, most of his upbringing fell to a never-ending procession of nannies, house staff, tutors, and when he was lucky, his grandmother. She was a kind woman, too verging on senility to care for a young boy by herself, but when she visited she would spend hours with little Aaron on her lap or at her side, telling him fantastical stories.
Those stories, akin to the fairy tales that all children experience but different, the details a bit darker and more surreal, meant much more to Aaron than he realized. When he began his education, he saw even less of his family. The boarding school he was shipped off to was a wonderful place, but it meant that he only returned home for breaks, holidays, and birthdays.
Fortunately, he flourished in the environment. He was amongst the most popular boys in the school, with many friends from a variety of backgrounds and cliques. He was talented, even in his childhood, enthusiastically participating in the schoolâs chorus and theatre program. He even picked out a sport to excel at (gymnastics, since it was akin to dance, and he wasnât fond of the more conventional ones).
He surprised absolutely no one when he came out of the closet at the age of thirteen, and doing so didnât diminish his popularity at all. To his chagrin, there really werenât any prospective love interests for him, but he had a lot of fun flirting with straight classmates and reigning over the schoolâs drama and dance programs. He did have one friend whom he was deeply in love with (in a dramatic, early teenager sort of way) named Kyle. He didnât flirt with Kyle, for fear that his true feelings would be revealed; he didnât want to damage their friendship with some sort of love-stricken confession.
One day, when they were both fifteen, Kyle surprised Aaron by asking him if he wanted to sneak off the schoolâs grounds one night to go to a lake where students often partied and swam. Theyâd both been there together before, but always with friends. Aaronâs mind was whirling with possibilities, but if anything, Kyle seemed more reserved around him than ever. Whatever purpose heâd had in asking Aaron to the lake he couldnât seem to go through with, and the tension between them escalated until they finally just decided to head back to the school. Aaron was carrying his shirt and shoes, not wanting to get them wet, when they got to the gate and found it locked. An argument developed between them about who was supposed to have gotten one of their friends to open the gate, but they were really fighting about something else. Aaron, overcome with emotion, kissed Kyle, and for a few magical seconds it seemed like everything would be alright.
Kyle pulled away, aflame with confusion, and gave Aaron a rather vicious shove. Aaron stumbled, and fell back against the gate, only to find himself subject to the most intense pain heâd ever known. The bars were wrought iron, and the magic inherent to a first kiss had led to the beginning of his Awakening. He screamed bloody-murder, leaving Kyle alarmed and even more baffled, and then fell to the ground, so overcome by the blinding pain that he lost consciousness.
He awoke in a hospital three days later. The doctors were calling it a âsevere allergic reactionâ, but obviously had no idea what they were dealing with. Whatever the case, Aaron would bear the scars of that day, physical and emotional alike, for the rest of his life. The places on his back where flesh had met iron were marred by two perfectly straight one inch thick scars, angry looking and painful to the touch for weeks afterward. They were ugly and shameful to Aaron, who had previously loved showing off his body. Thereafter, he was the sort of boy who would go swimming with a shirt on and never change in front of anyone else.
When he went back to school, things only began to get more strange. Occasionally, heâd glimpse strange lights that no one else could see, or hear whispers on the wind. Convinced that he was losing it, he threw himself into classes and extra-curriculars. Heâd had some training in stage-fighting, and elected to join the schoolâs fencing team as well. He began spending more and more time alone, reading and re-reading his favorite plays and devoting himself to stagecraft and hours of dance and voice practice. It helped, but only so much.
The strangeness reached a boiling point when he took to the stage in a performance of Brigadoon. In the midst of the musicalâs love ballad, things got very weird. The entire auditorium went incredibly silent. The orchestra had stopped playing. Even his fellow actors were frozen in place, gaping at him. The girl playing Fiona suddenly kissed him, hard on the mouth, and then people were getting up out of their seats, women mostly, but a few men as well, some students, some the parents of students. They were shouting to him, proclaiming their love, begging him to choose them. It was like a nightmare come to life, and Aaron fled the stage in tears. He took refuge in the prop closet, locking the door, and caught sight of his reflection in a mirror from an old set. His eyes, formerly brown, had become an incredibly vibrant purple.
Confused, terrified, and hurt, he huddled in a corner and wept. Someone knocked on the door, but he ignored it only to have an unknown woman step through a few seconds later. She was beautiful, with eyes of silver, and she simply knelt beside him, rubbing his shoulders and reassuring him that everything would be alright. When heâd calmed down, Michaela explained the situation to him in brief and asked if he wanted to go with her to a place where people like him could be themselves without fear. She was so reassuring and convincing that he agreed readily, hardly suspecting that heâd just fallen prey to the same Glamour that had so enthralled his audience.
Michaela made the arrangements with his family and then they were off. He arrived on the Isle about four months ago, and saw his seventeenth birthday pass just a few weeks ago. It took a while for his shock to wear off. He was afraid of being around the other charges, afraid of what might happen if his Gift ran amok again, and so he spent a lot of time in The Library, reading far more accurate âfairy talesâ and poring over genealogy books. He traced his family line back centuries, and came to embrace the much more alien accounts of the fae in the same way that he embraced Shakespeare or Wilde in school.
He emerged from the Library transformed, no longer a sorrowful boy afraid of interaction. He was a faerie prince, after all, and the tale of his own adventures was only beginning.
