Tsovinar, the Witch of the Waves
My birthday is the last day of March and to honor myself I am posting one of my own favorite OCs every day of March: The OC Jubilee.
When I explained this plan to my discord, they said "you're just going to post Tsovinar 31 times, aren't you." No! No. But... Tsovinar does get to go first.
“I AM TRYING TO READ.” Tsovinar’s voice shook both of the girls down to the ends of their hair. “And if both of you do not leave, I will splatter you against the walls of the library. I will shatter the bones of anyone who comes to stop me. I will upheave the mountains to wash away this whole town into the river and down to the sea if that is what it takes to FIND SOME TIME TO READ THESE BOOKS IN PEACE.”
The first thing you need to know about Tsovinar: her name is not fucking 'Tsovinar' and she's judging you for calling her that. Her name is Dzovin-nar-Izael, which you could also render as "Izael, Servant of Glory." When she left her homeland with Vlinder vander Vrie and went to the land of windmills and tulips, the locals there consistently mangled her name until she was known far and wide as Tsovinar, and it's too late now. Even most people who knew her when she was young call her Tsovinar at this point. Any Asram speaker knows to call her Dzovin-nar-Izael, but there are few people still alive indeed who address her to her face as simply Izael.
The second thing you need to know is that she has slam dunked men directly into active volcanoes. She has brought down tsunamis on a besieging army and drowned them all. She would appreciate it if you did not bring up the adventure novels she wrote when she was a teenager smitten by a dashing swordsman. This is a threat.
The third thing is that puppy dog eyes totally do work on her when you need something heroic accomplished.
Tsovinar is the Goddess of Waves. This does not mean the goddess of water, but the goddess of crashing sea and shaking earth and resounding cry. Most people will only see her make very subtle, restrained use of her power – muting all sound around them or raising the volume of her voice until the whole castle can hear her. She only uses her full power very reluctantly, considering it obscenely dangerous and ill-advised to do so. She never set out with any desire to be #1 on the global kill count leaderboard, but the only other contender would be Clarion, who has an 800 year head start. Those who knew Izael when she was young describe her as having been very soft, gentle, sensitive, and hesitant. Those who did not meet her until later cannot imagine that could ever be true. She is cold, hard, brutally honest and readily violent. But if you happen upon her when she is with her books, you may be honored with a glimpse of what she has struggled so hard to suppress about herself. She was hurt too many times in too short a timespan and came to dread any sort of emotional attachment to others.
Shanlar was utterly unaffected. “Come now, did you see how that priestess looks at me? I am still a man worth breaking oaths over, my dear.”
Izael’s eyes sparked as she stood. “If you lay a hand upon Serriden, I will break every bone in that hand ONE at a TIME.”
Shanlar snatched his hand to his chest, leaning as far from her as he could – a most welcome change. “Yoooouuu were not this scary the last time I saw you, Dzovin-nar-Izael.”
All this – the name mangling situation, the drastic personality shift, the self-imposed isolation from others – might explain why the one person who's been turning the earth upside down looking for her long-lost best friend has not noticed that Izael is now one of the world's most famous people. Tsovinar was found half-dead in a graveyard when she was about 14 years old, and was strangely confused and could not explain where she lived even though she vaguely recognized her surroundings, nor did anyone ever claim to recognize her. Salazeel, the God of Place, made a strange observation that he kept to himself for many years: "She is displaced on an axis I cannot measure." She was not yet a goddess; Clarion is the one who suddenly shoved a star in her after the girl was taken in by the odd collection of gods and their sidekicks who found her, and Tsovinar has never forgiven her for it.
She honestly hasn't been doing great, mentally, when she's first introduced to the story at age 38. She's been obsessed with trying to find a way to ensure she never becomes immortal and she's running out of time to prevent it. The men and women she fell in love with when she was young (oh she's bisexual as hell) are growing old without her, raising children that she never had. When her old acquaintance Queen Deloram writes to her and asks her to help explain to her husband King Eodar just how stupid he is being, Tsovinar does go and yell at him, but she dislikes that she's exposing herself to these old entanglements again. Man, it sure would be a shame if some painfully earnest plucky teens tumbled into her life and forced her to confront the fact that she still has emotions, wouldn't it?
Tsovinar/Izael is one of several characters in this story who is very explicitly a plural system. Part of the reason she stopped fighting people on the name thing is that she associates "Izael" with the side of her she's trying so hard to keep locked up in the dark. Being unexpectedly addressed that way can cause... an unpleasant jolt inside her.
Ziazan calmly waved for silence. “I don’t think it’s honestly any of your business,” she said with a sweet smile, “Izael.”
Tsovinar’s eyes widened but her face stayed set in its stern displeasure. “Houri, Serriden,” she snapped, turning away. “Come.”
Tsovinar certainly did not anticipate coming to respect and value either Hayr or Barsamin when she first laid eyes on them. The first time she saw the little priestess Serriden, she did immediately see something in this girl that she thought worthwhile – a fellow soul that values abstinence and restraint. But... now that Serriden has pledged her service to Tsovinar, and has become the one who knows her better than anyone else... sometimes Tsovinar gets the feeling... that this humble girl is outgrowing the need for her own goddess. And that scares her.
Vibe Music:
Majora's Mask Stone Tower as arranged by Rozen
Morrowind - Nerevar Rises, a version with female choir
The extreme swing from brooding and contemplative to extremely forceful and majestic in this arrangement of Stone Tower captures Tsovinar perfectly. The Morrowind theme reflects what she's like when she's alone or with someone who has really, truly won her trust.
And she does have an official theme song by me.