Tamara Hecate

> *"Animals love me"*
>
>

Tamara with her pet duck

Sarah Hecate (daughter)

Antonio Hecate (cousin)

Orriana Hecate (sister)†

Fergus Cousland (brother in law)

Orren Cousland (Nephew)†

## Background

Born to Ethel and Ricco Hecate while Ethel was taking refuge in Antiva during the Orlesian occupation.

She was a quiet child sleeping more often than usual children, and when not sleeping she would often be growled at by animals even those whose owners claimed they never hurt a soul.

Thinking her child was cursed Ethels question were answered when Tamara accidentally froze a flower at age of 6. Soon after Tamara received lessons from an experienced apostate Ethel hired.

While learning to control her magic Tamara also enjoyed dreaming as, like any mage she could control and remember her dreams. While weary of demons she sought out spirits and talked to them. Even though she liked spirits she got bored with interaction with faith, valour, or justice. None of these virtues interested her this much instead wanting to find a spirit of wisdom. This caused Tamara to go out and fall asleep in odd places making her parents chase after her and lock her up in most extreme scenarios.

In 8:99 Tamara got a younger sister whom she adored and sometimes took with her on her adventures. (once she got old enough)

Few years after that Tamara would settle with her family back in her mothers homeland of Ferelden. Being raised in a more rural area Tamara loved the woods and it didn't take her long for her to run off and spend her time sleeping there. (After setting up wards)

There in the Bannorn she finally found a spirit of wisdom and asked all sorts of questions about nature. The spirit was pleasantly surprised by the original line of questioning being more used to mortals asking about history and magic. It didn't appreciate though that Tamara started being a bit overly familiar even giving it a name. The spirit's nature remained unchanged and it grew to consider Tamara a friend.

Hence Tamara started visiting the same spot over to visit her friend where a hunter, Merryn found her sleeping. Thinking something happened to her, or fearing something will happen to her the hunter woke her up which Tamara wasn't too happy about. But the hunter showed understanding and agreed to watch over the area while she slept since there were wolves about. Tamara agreed and ever since she had another person to spend time with. Tamara and Merryn grew to be close friend and eventually fell in love.

Tamara's mother wasn't too happy about the situation and urged her to leave Merryn and marry person she deemed suitable. Tamara refused and soon after her and Merryn ran off with their yet unborn child.

On 4th of Molioris 9:11 Dragon Tamara gave birth to a girl and called her Sarah which was the name she used to call the spirit of wisdom.

Even though she was disowned from the family Tamara kept her surname and married Merryn in a small chantry in a remote village. Being a noblelady Tamara had some trouble settling in the common life. She relied on Merryn to cook as anything she attempted to make tasted horrible since no one ever taught her how. Her family had servants for that. She adapted quick enough however and had a very functional marriage with Merryn. They both took care of Sarah, and did the cleaning. Merryn hunted game for money while Tamara had some leftover fortune she took from her family when running away. Tamara even found the time to tend to the garden growing some herbs.

Once the money she took from the family started to run out Tamara used some of the medical knowledge she learned from the spirit, supplanted by any books she could get her hands on, to work as the village healer earning some money with that and by selling tonics made from herbs she grew. When she deemed fit she'd add a little magic heal here or there in secret. Luckily her medical knowledge was enough to cover up any suspicion about how quickly people recovered after meeting healer Tamara

As Sarah grew up fearing she might develop magic, Tamara started teaching her about fade and demons just in case to prepare her. Sarah however never developed any magic and Tamara's teaching had a side effect of making Sarah think magic was something good and she should have, leading to big disappointment for Sarah when she was older, once she discovered she'll never have it. Instead Tamara decided to focus on teaching her daughter about nature, herbs and medicine which the girl picked up very well.

Much to Tamara's pride and disappointment Sarah had a gift in dealing with animals that Tamara never had being still cursed with all animals hating her for some reason. She watched from the distance when Merryn taught their daughter the bow and how to handle all sorts of animals.

One time Tamara noticed Sarah was afraid of this elderly elven lady, because the local children said she was a witch. As the elderly woman was one of her patients Tamara sent Sarah to give medication to "the witch". Sarah agreed and came back saying that "she wasn't scary at all, in fact she was nice". Tamara as a reward bought Sarah her hat.

Overtime Sarah grew more independent and Tamara had nothing to do so she chose to spend her time sleeping. And just like Tamra's parents before. Sarah and Merryn were forced to chase Tamara around to keep her out of trouble while she was sleeping

Tamara kept contact with her sister and father and when Oriana married Fergus Cousland of course she was invited to the wedding. She took Sarah and Merryn with her and caught up with her sister in person. She never talked to her parents as Oriana was unable to get them into the "noble part" of the party. but Tamara was content with that.

She took it very hard then when during the blight Orianna, her son Oren died before the start of the blight and their father was killed by darkspawn later. After the blight, when her mother finally reached out after all those years Tamara hoped they could reconcile, that she'd accept Merryn and Sarah and be a family again. But that didn't seem to be Ethel's intention and they had an argument. Few days after which Templars showed up telling her to surrender peacefully and come to the circle. Tamara accepted not wanting to get her family hurt.

She didn't enjoy the circle. The atmosphere was downright toxic with the relations between Templars and mages being low, half the apprentices were whining, half the templars were winging. The idea of the rite of Tranquility seemed... just wrong. And she couldn't sleep whenever she wanted. The Templars put her through a harrowing almost as soon as she arrived. Her experience dreaming however made harrowing an almost pleasant experience. When coming out of it she said "Is **that** all what the apprentices are scared off? No wonder my original mentor described circle mages as pathetic"

She was granted the title of senior enchanter partly due to the fact of her being a senior person. She was 47 years old at the time. She started commentating on anything she deemed inconsistent with the rules. The fact phylacteries could be considered blood magic. Use of demons on the harrowing which borders on demon summoning. Even the philosophy of "magic exists to serve man and never to rule". She argued that she can't possibly serve people by being locked up. After a while the grand enchanter and the templars were too annoyed with her and she was transferred to the white spire.

in the white spire same continued as Tamara kept arguing but higher number of philosophers and scholars in the white spire made her start losing her verbal battles. She learned of the magical animals kept in the pens and started devoting her time to "studying" them. She took some to her quarters without asking to spend time with them, though her curse of animals hating her for some reason never seemed to have worn off.

## Involvement

In Val Royeaux when the team visits the white Spire Sarah reunites with her mother spending time with her chatting, telling what she's been up to. What apparently happened to Merryn.

They spent time together until Sarah had to leave. Sarah still sent letters to the circle often and visited her mother when she could

Anais was given Tamara's travelling pass. It didn't sit well with Sarah but the pass proven pretty useless as it only managed to trick a couple of -not so bright- guards since Anais didn't look 52 years old

In the Fade, in Merryns dream, desire took Tamara's appearance as they were having a picnic like the ones they had often.

After season 1 Sarah convinced Ethel to reunite and reconcile with Tamara. And they did