Aphra Marsh

Aphra Marsh is the protagonist of the Innsmouth Legacy books by Ruthanna Emrys. She is a Deep One woman who has lived in San Francisco since her release from an Oklahoman concentration camp after World War II. She works in a bookstore and, less officially, for the FBI. She is the leader of a small magical coven, known as a confluence, following the Aeonist teachings she was raised in. 
==Appearance==
Aphra is a woman in her late thirties that consistently refers to herself as "ugly." She has the "bulging eyes, thick neck, and receding hairline" associated with her Innsmouth heritage. Despite this, cover art and several characters show attraction to her in-universe. She is assumed to be of a white ethnicity despite the mixed heritage of the Deep Ones. 
==Biography==
Aphra Marsh was born in 1910 in Innsmouth, Massachusetts to Kezia and Silas Marsh. She was ten years old when the Innsmouth Raid occurred and she was interred along with her family, far away from the ocean. Despite this, she was already fluent in both Enochian (the language of the Yithians), English, and R'leyian (the language of the Deep Ones). While interred, their camp was later filled with Japanese victims of the real-life Executive Order 9066. While the majority of Deep Ones and Innsmouth residents died as a result, Aphra and her brother, Caleb Marsh, survived and were released with the Japanese residents in 1946.
Aphra would live with a Japanese family, the Kotos, in San Fransisco until 1949. She would work as a bookstore clerk for a minor occultist named Charlie Day. Aphra would keep her true nature secret from him even as she helped him in translating some of the occult works there. Later, she would be recruited by FBI agent, Ron Spector, to investigate Aeonist activity. While initially extremely reluctant, the FBI agent sharing the documentation of her mother's torture and dissection by the US government convinces her to cooperate. Aphra would investigate a minor Cthulhu cult led by Osmin Wilder and companion, Mildred Bergman, who had unwittingly been drowning their members by sending them out in parodies of the Deep Ones return to their homelands. She reluctantly has Ron Spector send the leaders of the cult to asylums for their safety. Aphra also takes her boss on as a magical apprentice. (: "The Litany of Earth")
She comes to Miskatonic University to help the FBI learn whether mind-transfer magic may have been learned by the Soviets--but also to get back in touch with her Deep One family in Y'ha-nthlei. Aphra makes contact with a Yithian possessed professor, Trumbull, as well as several students investigating the occult. She also reunites with her brother Caleb, who has been unsuccessfully trying to regain Innsmouth artifacts and books from the University. Aphra takes on an additional apprentice in Audrey Winslow and runs afoul of a rival FBI agent to Ron Spector, George Barlow. Aphra and company manage to stop a summoning gone wrong but a Miskatonic student is killed in the process. (: Winter Tide).
== Personality==
Aphra Marsh is a shy, reserved, and extremely religious young woman who believes strongly in her family's interpretation of the Aeonist fate. This teaches that reality is preset and fate is undefiable. It also reveres the Yithians despite the fact that they violate numerous religious tenants of the Deep Ones. Aphra is kind and tolerant with a strong-distaste for the US government based on her past experiences. Despite the Deep One's strong focus on mating and reproduction, she is asexual and has no interest in either romance or having a child other than for duty.
Category:Other Supernatural Beings
Category:Characters Originating From Expanded Mythos Works