Azaiah is especially one thing: very mysterious. He shows up and goes whenever and wherever he wants, he never seems to stay long in one place, adventures always seem to call him to another spot on earth. He rarely speaks to others when not in business, in general he almost never can be found doing anything but that. This leads of course to the fact, that nobody knows much about Azaiah, if anything at all, which makes him talked about wherever he goes. Stories and rumours follow him everywhere and it is no surprise if others even talk about him years later still. He always seems to smile, but the look in his eyes tells a different story; he can be a friendly fellow, though, if he actually wants and tries, he just prefers not to be, especially because he does not care. He charms his customers, but he has very little real friends and for most others he just doesn't care, as long as they don't bother him.
If you came to observe him for a while, you would notice, that he can be indeed a quite charming fellow, especially when he tries to lure others into buying his goods and services. It would also not stay unnoticed, that he is very manipulative and knows, without a doubt, how to make others believe or do what he wants. He is quite aggressive, too, really not a fan of running away from his problems, but instead always facing them. If needed, he would fight with claws and teeth, but thanks to his exraordinary mind, Azaiah knows better than this; so instead of engaging in a fight, he will destroy you with any of his secrets weapons - and he has alot of those in store for sure. Overall, Azaiah is very intelligent, he knows several languages, including the languages of the dead and the stars, and he possesses a worrysome talent for alchemism and various magical practices - although it is to consider, that he still makes more than enough mistakes, which are probably more worrysome right now than his actual talent. He also has a great love for poetry and literature in general, especially those dating back to the fifteenth to nineteenth century; as well as a big interest in the supernatural.
Years ago, a young Viscet, barely an adult, fell into a swamp - the result of his own, reckless behaviour. But not as expected, the swamp did not devour him, but instead spit him out again. Only completely changed.
The swamp has merged himself with the once dull-brown Viscet to create something new: the skull of an alligator became one with the Viscet's skull and all the bones of drowned animals and people fused together to build a shield ouf of bones, which traded place with all soft fur there once was, to protect the Viscet's body. The will-o-wisps attached themselves to these bones, so that the Viscet would forever be a guiding - or rather misguiding - light in the dark; and the souls of the deceased decided to rise out of their graves, together with the reborn Viscet, who kept nothing but his name, when leaving his pack, as they now believed him to be the embodiment of evil.
Once, I was young, adventurous and especially reckless. I am not pretending that I ain't like that anymore - but I learned my lesson. I loved doing whatever I wanted, not listening to older Viscets and always looking for trouble. Even back then, I showed great interest in the supernatural. Even though we were quite wild Viscets, stories of magic and magical creatures came to my ear and I started wearing bones in my mane and collect dead forest dwellers, in order to try to resurrect them. I must say, I still feel bad for my mother - I must've been a horrible child to be responsible for. Well, and at nights I used to sneak away from our camps, roaming around the forest just after midnight, trying to find the creatures I've heard of - the Wendigo, the Werewolf, the Jackalope, faries, gnomes, ghosts; whatever. Only using the moon as my guiding light, I rarely could see where I put my feet and it never was for a surprise, when I fell and hurt myself, which happened quite often.
But one night, I was especially careless. I had heard about a monster living in the swamps and as curious as I was, I decided to investigate. And while I was listening to the sounds around me and staring at a weird figure in the distance, I suddenly lost the ground under my feet and slipped into the cold water. I tried to get back onto hard ground, but all my paws could grasp was soft mut; and I couldn't swim. This was the first, and last, time of my life, that I had been scared. I fought and tried for a while, but then I started to get weaker; I tried to look at the night sky for one last time, but everything I could see was darkness. I opened my muzzle and breathed in water. The last thing I remember was thinking »I don't want to die.«
Then I could feel myself gasping for air, feeling sweet life filling my loungs. I opened my eyes, glancing at a starry sky, and I realized: I lived! I was alive! I looked around in search for my helper, but I was alone. Coming from the forest, I could hear an owl screaming and the wind blowing in the leaves. I took another deep breath, slowly rose and made my way back to the camp, where my pack currently stayed. As for now, I had not noticed that I had changed. I felt different, but I blamed this to the fact, that I had almost died. How could I possibly have known, that it was the swamp, who saved me? How could I possibly have known, how it changed me?
The glowing markings on Azaiah do actually glow, which is especially visible in the dark. So do the ghost-like shapes on his body, which happen to be actual ghosts; souls of deceased that lost their life in the swamp, that granted a new one to the Viscet. When he rose out of the mutty water, five souls followed him and attached themselves to his body, providing their new master with magical powers beyond belief. These five souls are known as the spirits of five pasts, each of them representing a different history of magical practices and similar powers, including fortune telling, potion making and possession over living creatures. This concludes, that should they ever be completely removed from Azaiah, with them he would lose all of his powers too.
The ghosts can easily detach themselves from Azaiah's body and will do so, if he commands or gives them any orders. He also has begun to enjoy to use his spirits in order to make a better sensation out of his fortune telling services and therefore luring more customers in.
On the left side of his body, you can see two of them, on the right side the other three - two smaller ones on his upper body, just under the rip cage, and a bigger one on his hip, stretching out onto his tail.
They went at me, as soon as I passed the dead tree, that our leader had marked for being the beginning of our territory. I am Azaiah! I called out to them, only my new gained shell proctecting me from their wrath. You certainly are not! Some said. Leave, creature, before we avenge our son! All of them believed, that Azaiah, which is the name I still bear, had drowned and that an evil force has taken his place. What can I say? Maybe they weren't that wrong.
But I had to leave, as for there was no place for me in the rows of my old pack anymore. Back when, while retreating, I still did not understand what had driven them to believe me to be an evil spirit, possessing the body of a dead. Only after hours of walking, when the sun, instead of the moon, was lightening my path, I came across a river and got down to drink - this was, when I first saw my new appearance with my own eyes. I certainly can say, that I was at least surprised, but I felt no terror nor actual confusion or anything similar. I must admit, that I felt a certain thrill when realizing, what had become of my dull brown fur and mane - I had become one of the supernatural beings that I was so interested in. Although, for now, I did not yet know about the supernatural powers I now possessed. Even the five spirits, that I would later learn to control, appeared to me as nothing more but part of my new fur.
Currently, Azaiah is pretty much living anywhere and everywhere. Most of the time, he travels alone (except for his animal companion, a black cat), sometimes he travels together with groups from circuses or carnevals. He has a habit of staying somewhere for about one or two months, if he really enjoys the place, he might even stay up to half a year, but he has never before stayed anywhere any longer than that.
He will always either set himself down close to a big road or a city, where he can be sure, that others actually come across his caravan; or, when he happens to join groups, he will stay with them and offer his services wherever they happen to settle down.
Most of his money Azaiah makes with fortune telling, important to consider is, that he is no fraud. His tellings always reflect the truth in some way and whatever he sees in his crystal ball is the actual fortune his customers will sooner or later be confronted with. His crystal ball is in some ways special - it changes it's colors according to the person it's closest to, although it seems not to react to Azaiah himself. Each color has a different meaning, which Azaiah always further explains, together with any visions the crystal ball might grant him. Those visions show themselves to Azaiah as pictures, mostly, sometimes there might appear short flashes of movement. The picture he sees only gains real meaning by the dominant color, which is always the same the crystal ball shows too. Azaiah will either draw these visions or describe them in detail and then telling his customers what they mean.
His visions are indeed a real thing and there is not one occassion where they didn't turn out to be true, but he still loves making a show out of his fortune telling services. So sometimes, he will manipulate the light of his wagon, to create a creepy atmosphere, or command his ghosts or the will-o-wisps to detach from his body in order to scare his customers.
Azaiah also makes money by selling various goods for young and old. For example he sells balls, made out of stone and beautifully painted, that make music, similar to the sound of bells, when you shake them. These things are especially loved by younger customers and Azaiah loves to say, that each sounds different and reflects the melody of the owner's soul. He also sells weak potions for the little kick, talismans and charms, candles, small paintings on a piece of cloth, dream catchers, painted masks and other things; some of these just little trinkets, wheras others do indeed contain a piece of the creator's magic. You certainly cannot argue, that Azaiah is very creative and artistic and if you were to watch him while he was doing his work, you would notice that he loves doing it, he has great fun in even creating the smallest things.
A female Viscet was looking through all the different kinds of trinkets that I had for sale. She seemed especially interested in my shawls, which would indeed suit her marvellous fur pattern. I was hiding in the shadows, waiting for her to speak, smiling.
»Oh, those are wonderful. Are they handmade?«
One step and she could see me, still smiling, nodding. Even though she probably already heard about my appearance, she drew a step back. I tried to appear friendly. »They indeed are. Can I help you with anything else, dear?« She got calmer, my smile seemed to convince her, that I'm harmless. She came close again, choosing one of the shawls, when her eyes catched my crystal ball, resting on a beautiful dark blue satin cushion. As soon as it had her attention, it turned into a soft pink color with pastel blue clouds. Interesting. She was obviously surprised, making a slight jump back again. »What is this?« She asked. I laughed. »My crystal ball.« Now she certainly appears very surprised. »A crystal ball?« She repeated. I nodded. »Does this mean that you are a fortune teller too?« I could feel that she was very interested, at least curious. They all are, but her especially. »It indeed does, my dear.« She was still looking at my crystal ball. »What does this mean?« - »Without a vision, I cannot tell. Colors can mean alot.« I could tell, that she'd swallowed the bait. »Oh I wish I had some more time!« She said, and then added: »May I come back later?« I granted her one last smile, while she was handing me the money for the shawl. »You certainly might.«
Azaiah possesses quite a big range of magic and magical practices, but no one actually knows indeed what he can do. This is especially because he does not openly show most of his power to anyone and right now does only seldomly use it to do anything really bad - if you exclude some things, but at least he hasn't started to kill for fun yet, or anything like that, at least he is not into others suffering yet. But what Azaiah himself does not even know yet - he has a feeling though - is the fact, that his quasi-death in the swamps did not only change his appearance and powers, but also his personality. This change, although, comes slowly; and it is mainly due the fact that the five spirits slowly devour his heart and soul in exchange for their powers. And while as for now, Azaiah might be a little less friendly and selfless than he used to be before his accident - although nobody can claim that he has ever been selfless anyway, his heart and soul get more and more corrupted by every minute passing. And there might be a point where he will change completely and turn himself to the dark side, with no coming back. Considering his powers and abilities, we should hope that this lies in a distant future.
But what exactly are Azaiah's abilities, or better to say: the abilities the spirits grant him? First of all, he is a fantastic fortune teller, which is also actually the only power he masters so far. He does not need his crystal ball for this, but he still uses it, since it makes things a little easier for him. Second, he is able to cast any spells you could think of - fire, light, proctection, levitation and so on. With spells especially, he is still learning, and there are surely quite a few he does not know yet and even more he messes up all the time. Furthermore, he is able to brew a variety of potions and create loads of magical artefacts that other magicians or alchemists could've only dreamed of. Does not mean that all of them end out being perfect, of course. He also can speak the languages of the stars and has the ability to communicate with many animals, ghosts, spirits and demons and there is, of course, the controlling over his five spirits. But there is also another power, which is without a doubt the darkest he possesses: possession of living creatures. Just naming it says all - Azaiah has the ability to take over another living creature's body. There is two ways of him doing it: with and without consent of the creature being possessed. If the creature gives consent, just as his black cat Salem does, their mind does not get pushed aside and you could say that Azaiah takes the role of a co-driver - seeing what the other creature sees, but having no or very few influence in their actions. Possession without the other creature, on the other hand, can be very fatal. The other creature's mind gets pushed aside and he would take over their body as a whole, being able to do whatever he wants, while the other mind is locked up in pain and darkness as long as he stays inside of their body. As for now, although, since Azaiah has not yet being corrupted by the darkness of his powers, he would never possess another one without their consent.
You might believe that my life has been quite good, since I almost drowned, right? Magical powers, a new look, a new life in general. Who wouldn't want that? Well, you aren't wrong, but let me tell you this: It's a burden. Since I have died and came back, I feel an emptiness in my heart, that I can't describe. It's not depression, it's something deeper. Sometimes I feel the urge to end it all, but not through suicide, oh no. I look at someone and I feel the urge to command my spirits: »Occidere!« [Kill!]
I remember that I once met a strange creature in a forest. A moose like animal, calling himself Keanu. He was told to be the wisest forest guardian, that's why I seeked him out and asked for advice. He only told me this: »Fight.« Back then, I had no idea what he was talking about, but now I do. Without a doubt, the swamp never intended to actually save me. He always wanted to devour me and he did it. He gave me powers I couldn't resist and now I can feel him inside of me, waiting to take control. And the worst of all? I don't care. It feels good.
Art by 
