Peia D'Marothek

> *"You can't possibly be- that's **my** surname. I'm Mariss D'Marothek. You can't be- oh, god, what has he done?"* (Mariss, to Peia, shortly after they were introduced, session 19)
>
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**Peia D'Marothek** (pronounced /pɑːi-jɑː d-mɛər-oʊ-θɛk/ *PAHEE-yah d-MAIR-oh-thek*) is a human commoner. She is Jasper D'Marothek's mother and Shulssu D'Marothek's wife.

## **Description**

Peia D'Marothek is a human woman who stands at 5 foot 10 inches (177 centimeters) and weighs 165 pounds (77.8 kilograms). She is pale and has neatly brushed brown hair that falls down her back. She has kind, brown eyes and a soft face, narrow nose and thin lips.

Peia is not very athletic or strong, and is a bit on the heavier side. She wears typical commoner dress, wearing a white blouse, a plain corset and a brown skirt. She occasionally wears jewelry and makeup that she gets as gifts from her husband.

## **Personality**

Not much is known yet about Peia's personality, but she appears to be a devoted wife and mother. Her appearance at the Awning Portal and her insistence for an audience with her stepson Mariss D'Marothek was not borne out of anything aside from genuine curiousity about who her son Jasper had befriended, and a desire to keep her son safe from a previously unknown possible danger. She is also unflinchingly loyal to her husband, Shulssu, and initially would not stand any criticisms about her husband.

Peia is not ignorant to reason, however, and when hearing Mariss's story, understood his sincerity and was willing to allow Mariss to prove to her her husband's guilt. When he did, she also easily relinquished the lipstick she had, Haldeth's Sleeping Death, realizing that its poisonous nature made it extremely dangerous to keep around her and her son, and left it in Mariss's more capable hands.

Peia is generally polite and holds conversations pleasantly.

## **Abilities**

Peia is a mundane commoner and housewife, and has no combat abilities.

## **Possessions**

Peia, for a period of a few days, was in possession of Haldeth's Sleeping Death, a poisonous tube of lipstick that had been a Haldeth family heirloom for centuries. She was given this lipstick by her husband, Shulssu D'Marothek, who stole it from his previous wife Najhia. She gave this lipstick to Najhia's son Mariss on July 30th, 1492.

## **History**

Peia was born to two humans in the city of Waterdeep during the year 1464. She grew up in modest comfort. When she was young, she was promised her father's inheritance, likely a large sum of money.

In 1481, when Peia was either 17 or 18, she met Shulssu D'Marothek, at the time 37, and they began a relationship. Soon after, they got married. To Peia, Shulssu was a simple sailor who made a pittance; unbeknownst to her, Shulssu had many secrets. One such secret was that she was simply an affair; Shulssu had a wife and an eleven-year-old son back at home in Chult, in the city of Port Nyanzaru, and neither Peia nor Najhia knew of Shulssu's double life. The other secret he kept was that Shulssu was not poor by any means; rather, Shulssu was quite wealthy and this deceit caused Peia to live in squalor while Shulssu lived in decadence in secret. Peia never discovered this.

On December 26th, 1483, at the age of 20, Peia had her first and only son Jasper. She raised Jasper almost entirely alone, as Shulssu would disappear for days at a time for work and only return during short periods of time. Peia could only give Jasper as much as she was able, but she loved her son and provided for him the best she could. Unfortunately, her young son eventually took a job of his own, which would eventually lead to the undoing of her marriage.

In July of 1492, her son came home from delivering mail to tell her that he met "someone who looked like him" while delivering something for Mirt. He returned once more and continued to sing praises of this unknown individual, causing Peia to become suspicious. She accompanied her son to the Awning Portal on the 30th of July, and met Mariss D'Marothek, her stepson, for the first time. When she introduced herself as Peia D'Marothek, he immediately began getting shaky and nervous, and revealed to her that Shulssu was his father. She agreed to accompany him to the second floor lounge while her oblivious son ran around and played with Pog.

Mariss revealed to her something horrifying: that Shulssu D'Marothek had another wife, Najhia Haldeth D'Marothek, who he married back in 1469 in Port Nyanzaru, and that eventually, in 1488, Najhia took ill. When she fell ill, Shulssu took everything valuable that belonged to her and fled, heading north. Najhia died because of this. Mariss also revealed that one of these things that he took was a tube of poisoned lipstick, called Haldeth's Sleeping Death, which appeared as an obsidian-crusted tube of lipstick in a shade of a bright, poisonous blue with a white sticker with red Shou characters on the top. Peia recognized this instantly as a tube of lipstick that Shulssu had given her mere days prior as a gift, that he claimed to have gotten from Port Nyanzaru recently. Peia revealed that Shulssu was bothering her father about her inheritance, as she had not received it yet, and this made Mariss even more upset. He told her that she needed to get that lipstick to him, so he could prove how dangerous it was, and that she was herself in danger. She took Jasper home with her, retrieved the lipstick, and returned.

Noonan Lockheed, Reverence and Tribula Cochlea escorted Peia to Mariss's room, where he and his boyfriend Krebbyg Masq'il'yr were waiting for her. She gave the lipstick to Mariss, who instantly recognized it as the dangerous poison that it was. He gave it to Rev, who applied it to prove its danger; the poison immediately set in and she fell unconscious. Noonan, as planned, cast *lesser restoration,* curing her of the poison. Overcome by some sort of bravery, Peia put it on herself, and suffered the same fate. She was revived by Noonan, and immediately discovered that Mariss was telling the truth. She relinquished the Sleeping Death to him permanently, and returned home, horrified by the truth that now lay in front of her: that Shulssu D'Marothek wanted her dead.

## **Relationships**

### Jasper D'Marothek

Peia considers herself to be the breadwinner due to Shulssu's deceit. She believes she makes a little more than her husband makes, and because of this, she can't always find time to be there for her son. In the past, she believed she was helped, as Shulssu was there, but as of recent, Shulssu has been taking longer and longer trips, leaving Jasper with no one. She's not as close to Jasper as Najhia was with Mariss, but she cares for him deeply and tries to be there when she can.

### Shulssu D'Marothek

Peia loves Shulssu and trusted him to her core. She believed wholeheartedly that he was trying to do what was best for his (second) family until Mariss shattered everything that she knew and loved into tiny pieces. Rightfully, as everything that Shulssu told her was a lie.

### Mariss D'Marothek

Peia is rightfully rattled by Mariss, both by his existence creating all of the worst possibilities and his earnest honesty and logic confirming them as the truth. He met her and immediately came to the realization that Shulssu had pulled the wool over both their eyes, and took everything that Peia had security in and shattered it. She knows he's telling the truth, and she wishes that both her stepson had never met her and that he had been there the whole time.

## **Appendixes**

### Trivia

* Peia and Najhia share several narrative parallels. Both married Shulssu D'Marothek, an older man, in their late teens and had their first and only son, a yuan-ti pureblood, at age 20. Both of their children are loners, they both came from old money and their lives were endangered by Shulssu's actions in some way. They also both had the Sleeping Death in their possession at some point. They are not identical, however; Najhia was a stay-at-home mom and heiress, while Peia was a working woman. Najhia also died, while Peia survived.