Magilou

Most of Magilou's Malak Artes, called such because they draw on her pacted Malak, lean towards offensive uses. If drawn into an actual conflict, these are her bread and butter. The larger an effect she wants requires a longer windup time, which can leave her open to attacks in turn. These take the form of directed rays and controlled areas of effect, as well as setting traps of energy in the ground for foes to step into. The elements she is particularly focused on are fire and water, though she has minor ability with earth and air, limited to the traps and smaller rays.

Much like her offensive Artes, Magilou's healing abilities are also powered by her pact. Unlike her offensive powers, her healing abilities are not exceptionally adept for her world, instead being the magical equivilent of first aid treatment. They can stem a wound, or make a mild difference, but if someone's at risk of losing life or limb Magilou can mostly just hold them together long enough for an actual medic to get to them.

The result of a combination of Magilou's advanced 'witch' training and other factors she won't admit to, this ability does not rely on her pact with Bienfu or another malak, instead allowing her to fuel an elemental spell with the energy of one that has been sent at her. It is something that takes an exceptional effort from her, but can turn the tide of battle. This ability only works on elemental magic that would harm Magilou, and while it drains some of the effectiveness and bite out of the original spell, it doesn't eliminate it entirely.

Another bit of magic that Magilou can work without her pact, she is able to tranform ritual paper dolls, known as guardians, to perform various close-ranged attacks. These are something of a last resort for her, however; while they might be good enough to work on many lesser threats, most of the better non-magical melee combatants will be able to dodge the admittedly slow attacks. They have considerably more force behind them than they might appear, which might catch an opponent off guard who thinks they don't need to dodge. Magilou mostly falls on these if being pressed too hard to get off even the simplest of offensive magics, or if she is seperated from her malak and unable to use them.

In addition to all her Witchy powers, Magilou had an upbringing in a traveling carnival, and has a variety of performing skills. This includes a number of sleight of hand and other minor 'magic tricks', juggling, comedy routines, and acrobatics.

Magilou has the ability to make small but very realistic illusions, such as of flowers, doves, or a small meal. While these are very limited in scope, they cover normal senses beyond just sight, smelling, feeling, and tasting real. Magilou mostly uses these to add a bit of extra excitement to her performances, rather than in any sort of cruel way. She also can't make an illusion of something she's never experienced herself; trying to get the taste right of something she hadn't eaten just wouldn't work.

Beinfu is a malak of a particular type know as 'normin'. He appears as a small creature of purple and white, with a tophat pulled halfway down his face with eyeholes cut into it. He is freely willed, and far older than his sometimes perverse and obnoxious personality would indicate. While he has exceptionally high magical potential, he virtually never directly uses it; rather, his pact with Magilou is what powers her artes.

In her past, Magilou suffered a series of great and personal betrayals, from which she has not truly recovered. She puts on an act of enthusiasm and mystery, but it's a thin veil over her rather desperate desire for a meaning she doesn't believe in. This can lead her to following around anyone who seems interesting enough, even if she wouldn't admit to simply hoping that some of their passion will be infectious.

Many of Magilou's more powerful abilities depend on her bond with a pact-partner malak. Hers for a very long time has been Bienfu, who has at times not been happy with the partnership due to what he sees as Magilou's abuse. Most notably in the past, Bienfu turned on Magilou and turned her in to the Abbey, leading to her 'prisoner' status. While Magilou could theoretically find another malak to make a pact with, she's too prideful to either let Bienfu escape her or to pact with a malak of lesser powers.

Magilou is an escaped prisoner, one who was very well known by upper Abbey leadership. She's also kept the company of daemons, in addition to being a magic-user outside of the control of the church. There's a quite tempting sized reward on her head in her home territories, though as she's particularly wanted for information on others who escaped with her this reward is much greater for capturing the witch alive.

Magilou loves to try to get a reaction, and is pretty good at getting under people's skin. She also has the bad sense to particularly enjoy doing this with the more powerful and more temper-tantrum prone, something that's earned her more than one physical repercussion in the past, though she seems to mostly take this in good spirits. Her malak familiar is equally offputting to many, in completely different ways - he acts very immature, tends to whine a lot, and has a voice like nails on a chalkboard.

Magilou would claim to not care about things happening around her, but this doesn't seem to be entirely true to those who get to know her. If she's taken an interest in events, or decided she's entitled to something, she'll risk life and limb to stay around and keep what's hers, to the point where she'll make excuses such as very small bets just to stick around. This applies even if the people she might be helping clearly don't really want her around.