Chouette Marcabru Bio

Personality: Chouette loves seeing the sights of Vanadiel! Beauty is very important to her. She is helpful but has a horrendouly bad sense of direction. She tends to bring intensity to whatever she does, although she can be a little flighty at times. She is friendly for the most part and likes to help people.
Chouette has many nieces whom she is frequently asked to babysit. Because it is hard for her to say no, she tends to skulk around Windurst when she is there^^

History: (This is a story I wrote a while back. It doesn't give details about her family situation in the present, but I think it does a pretty good job of giving an idea of who she is. If this is too long, I apologize! I can post it elsehwere, if you want.)

Story of a Name

Chouette ran her fingers across the creased leather cover of A Song of Love, the lurid romance she’d just tracked down in Sandoria for the library. She huddled in a corner table at Timbre Timbres Tavern. Anonymous in her mithran separates and unlikely to be noticed in the busy establishment, Chouette opened the small volume partway, respectful of the fragile binding. There on the first page the bewitching Cho Farnatti beguiled males of several species. Chouette reddened, thankful she’d changed her name. Cho was an unusual name to be sure; why had Sadhi Marcabru, her birth mother, saddled her with it? Many older mithra would grin as soon as they heard it. “Haha, named for that lusty Cho Far-something or other, right? The gal in that romance my mother took away from me,” old Pohta Pihrana had commented with a chuckle.
“Cho winked and waved her tail sinuously at Bergotte LoManu, resplendent in the stately armor of the paladin, which invariably bespeaks nobility of heart and the utmost courage,” went the opening line. Chouette winced. She was no writer, but she knew bad prose when she read it. Other passages continued in like manner but with various other males mentioned. “Is she ever going to get any?” Chouette wondered as she skipped through the novel. Then she held open the book. “Ah, yes, she is…..” Chouette scanned the passage. Cho’s “awakening to the ways of love” was described in overly generous detail. She shut the book and turned it face down on the table.
She thought of ‘sieur Raimond, who had found her mother’s copy of the very same book, one that the six-year-old Chouette had lost. “This is a bad book, Cho,” he told her as he placed it in her hands. “But it is much loved by your mother, so you will return it to her.” He paused then added, “You were named for the Cho in this novel, weren’t you?” Looking back, she saw how well Raimond had understood her mother. “Remember,” he continued, “that that Cho does not love, she needs. That is all. You are better than that.”
“So a name is not destiny,” Chouette mused, but in ‘sieur Raimond’s case, had it been? A younger son of the Sandorian nobility, Raimond had been destined for a career as a knight, but a scandal involving him and a lady of higher rank had ended in his disgrace. Raimond’s family had disowned him. She never learned his surname, nor she guessed, did anyone else.
In the troupe where they had met, all the members performed and took care of everyday tasks. Among them, Raimond would recite passages of Sandorian classics and took on various roles in plays. Chouette’s mother danced the Raksa Irkash, a form developed by those of her ancestral village and little known except in a few mithra families. The snap of her finger cymbals and sinuously graceful moves always drew in more of a crowd. Chouette, the only child among them, did some basic cleaning but mostly tried to stay out of the way.
In his spare time, Raimond would strum on an aged maple harp and sing courtly melodies. Chouette loved to listen to him, and would sit at his feet with only minimal fidgeting. There was one song he loved, or seemed to because he played it often. The Lai de Bertran et Amelie told in plaintive verse the story of two lovers forever separated by the ambitions of his family. Unlike the free-wheeling Cho Farlatti, Amelie never surrendered her love, though she married twice and bore six children. The adult Chouette still liked Amelie’s devotion and the counter-balance of her ability to make do with the life she had. Amelie was unafraid to love, and the young Chouette wanted to sing of the woman’s great courage.
One night she did. Only the two of them sat at the small fire by Raimond’s tent. Raimond carried on with the song when Chouette joined in and even modulated the pace to better accompany her. He regarded her intently when the song was done. “Cho, your love of this song…. I can feel it. To convey passion is a gift,” he said and bowed to her. Then he added, “But you must learn ….euh….. grace of delivery.” Carefully he explained what he meant.
Chouette threw herself into practicing yet grew more and more frustrated with her inability to create the lovely sounds Raimond thought necessary to the song. One night she burst into tears and stamped her foot. “I can’t do it!” she shouted. Raimond sat and looked at her calmly as the other actors peered out of their tents and her mother hissed at her to be quiet. Then when the others lost interest, he wiped the tears from her cheeks and took her hand in both of his. “Not all have the same gifts. Not all can do the same things at the same times. You feel strongly, and of this you must never be afraid.” He smiled. “And now you must keep on singing.”
The next night after Chouette shouted Amelie’s love for her Bertran, Raimond laughed and held out his arms to her. She ran into them and he whispered to her, “Ma petite Chouette.” Later he told her it was the name of an owl famous for its shriek. “I say this, mon petit chou, because even with a shriek can one sing of love.”