Emily VanderSant

## Relationships

### Family

William VanderSant (Father) Eliza VanderSant (Mother) James VanderSant (Brother) Lewis VanderSant (Brother)

## Introduction

Born into the aristocratic VanderSant family in New York City, Emily VanderSant left her life of being a wealthy socialite in order to explore her own path. She dreamed of becoming a renowned writer and novelist, as well as seeing what remains of the wild frontier of Odessa.

## Biography

### Early Life & Travels

Emily is the second born child of the VanderSant family.

The VanderSants were Dutch immigrants who came to settle the new world in the 1600s and the colonies of New Netherlands, eventually settling in New Amsterdam, which eventually became New York after the revolutionary war. Her family has fought in most major wars for the country, and helped the early economy prosper, ensuring their legacy as one of the major aristocratic families in the New World.

They have heavy ties to political families in New York City, and founded the VS Banking Firm - one of the first privatized, non-Federal, banking establishments, started by her grandfather. Legacy and family mean everything to the VanderSants and their name.

Except Emily...

She was a beautiful, and considered to be well educated, socialite who had many suitors, but rejected them all. Instead, Emily dreamed of far away lands, romanticized stories of self discovery, and beautiful places.

Discontent with the idea of living a life of luxury, where her fate was pre-determined to be prosperous with an arranged marriage to the son of a local Senator, Richard Ives, Emily left her home behind.

She took a train from New York City to St. Denis. While there, she enjoyed the sights and stories of the locals. Eventually, she met people and traveled with them across Odessa, but Emily quickly learned that she wasn't built for the wild nature of Odessa.

Others learned that she was stubborn, impulsive, and naive about the world around her, having lived in a sheltered domestic life of luxury and leisure.

### The VanderSant Chase & Return Home

Once her father, William, discovered that she had gone missing, he sent agents to look for his daughter, and return her to the family for a modest reward. At the time, Emily was traveling with two men, one being David Durant, who guarded her from the agents.

After Emily parted ways with the men, and writing their tales in prose and short story form ("The Man with the Eyepatch"), the agents found her and returned her to the VanderSant estate in New York City.

Emily was constantly reminded of her foolhardy ways, and that she was to be wed to Richard Ives, living up to the VanderSant name. Richard was a kind man, although Emily didn't love him. This caused strife within the family home.

Around this time, her younger brother, Lewis, who was a known philanderer and drunk, left home for Gnome, Alaska, citing Emily's foray into the world as his inspiration for leaving and making his own way for himself. This didn't sit well with the family.

The VanderSant home was also seeing additional tension around finances and government agents. Emily had seen her father meeting strange men at night at the back of their estate, speaking quietly of things. These men weren't her father's normal associates or friends - they were large, dressed in black, and spoke very little.

Emily overheard her father speak to them about payment for removing a professional rival, to continue ensuring his family fortune. Suddenly, things took a very dark turn for Emily as she realized her father was corrupt, and would stop at nothing to keep his family name in power.

Still refusing to resign herself to her fate, especially after tasting her own sense of freedom, Emily hired someone to poison her fiance, Richard, so the wedding would be called off. The plot was successful, and no one discovered Emily's connection, thinking it was a political rival who must have done the deed. In her heart, she knew that Richard didn't deserve it, but her autonomy mattered more.

### Returning to Odessa & Sickness

After some time, Emily left again, this time ensuring that she covered her tracks so she couldn't be found. Emily made her way to Blackwater in Odessa; where she did her best to settle in and offer her services to others as a traveling companion: aid, cook, scribe, etc.

She traveled with many others - sometimes staying on a local homestead and helping to tutor children in how to read and write. Other times, she traveled and explored the great wilderness, looking for rare specimen and game to hunt.

Emily was also invited to stay with a native tribe, albeit very briefly as an outsider, in order to share and document their stories, how they lived, and record their tales before their oral history was extinguished and lost to time.

She published the journal, "The People of Odessa" under the pen name of Eric Stevenson.

Her travels showed her that romanticized ideas of Odessa, and the remaining frontier, were mostly fiction. She had seen how hard life was for these people, firsthand. She had seen people die, children born, towns built, and towns destroyed. Over the years, it changed her perspective, and made her more aware of the conditions these people lived with. It forced her to learn how to survive, how to shoot a gun, and travel light.

Over time, Emily started to realize that her vitality was waning. She slept longer, and some days felt chronic fatigue. She gained a chronic cough, which she tried to hide, in fear of people thinking she was sick with something contagious like Scarlet Fever. Doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with her, as her symptoms came and went, but they did give her some tonics to help control the symptoms.

Being her stubborn self, Emily utterly refused to admit that she's ill. Instead, she declared that she's cursed, and must have done something in her life to earn the ire of someone who did this to her.

The illness changed her perspective on life - as she doesn't know if this will be a lifelong condition, or one that will cut her life short. She changed her goals from being a novelist, to trying to find a cure for her ailment. Emily has spent much of her remaining fortune buying herbs, tonics, and seeking medical guides.

One day while traveling near Rhodes, she saw someone rob the bank. Watching this event unfold in front of her, impacted her. She knew that she may not have long left in her life, and it made her think: Why still be fearful? Why not try to push her limits and actually live? Why not have her remaining days be lived in excitement?

A few days later, she met a man named Marshall Holcolm, who was stealing horses from locals outside of Blackwater. Not telling the law, she revealed to him that she had seen his actions, and decided to help him. She then convinced him to rob the Blackwater Bank with her - noting that she was an imaginative person, and recently had wanted to try something exciting.

They did it, and they fled, with the Sheriff of Blackwater Jane Reilly chasing after them and exchanging gunfire, but never confirming their identities.

Marshall and Emily were now living on the lam. The two avoided the town, and tried to avoid any additional encounters with Sheriffs and Deputies. They ran out west to New Austin, where they found themselves in Tumbleweed. They ran into the Del Lobos who tentatively accepted them, noting that those who ran from the law were welcomed west. The two didn't stay long, as the dust caused breathing problems for Emily.

Cascabel, the leader of the Del Lobos, did offer some tonics to help her, noting how she was respectful towards them, and that she wanted to go west at times to look for healing herbs for remedies. He easily saw through her ruse that she was looking to aid her own ailments, and not generously try to aid the ailments of others, as she claimed.

Emily and Marshall settled at MacFarlane's Ranch, renting rooms there, in exchange for helping to keep the wildlife at bay, and Emily tutoring the residents in how to read and write.

Emily's "curse" is noted by some, including Marshall. There is a running quip, that her curse seems to be attracting cougars and wild predators, as they seem to follow and attack her constantly. So far, repenting and rabbit's foot charms haven't helped.

One day while heading to Strawberry, Emily was attacked by a cougar. Sheriff Thomas Hoop found her, and brought her to the doctor in town. He then asked a man to help him, since the doctor was out. This man was David Durant - and the two seemingly reconnected, years later, albeit briefly, as he saved her from bleeding out from the cougar attack.