Sweet Sorrow is a Haunter and the head of the Haunter Alliance known as the Bedlameers.
Biography[]
The woman known as the Grandmother of the Haunters is perhaps the oldest existing member of the Guild. Her opinion is dogma, her advice scripture, and her support is nothing short of a blessing.
Sweet Sorrow's legacy is a private one, and began when a child named Dido was born with a caul that covered her face. She grew up with the ability to see spirits, and for the remainer of her life was haunted by this gift. In 146 B. C., Roman forces razed Carthage, Dido's home, and this event sounded the end of the Third Punic War. The horrors Dido witnessed, however, involved far more than the brutality of the advancing Roman army. She also saw hundreds of ghosts who descended upon the dying with wild abandon, and who pulled away the souls of the newly slain for their own pleasure. Dido was so paralyzed by the terrors she witnessed in both worlds that she never saw the blade that bit into her back and sent her spiraling into the Shadowlands. Once there, Dido was Reaped and enslaved by the Empire. She became a Thrall within Stygia itself, a place built on the legacy of the Roman Republic. She spent her existence growing to hate all wraiths for the atrocities she had seen them commit at Carthage, and the Empire (later the Hierarchy) for its support of Roman ideology. She began plotting her revenge, but knowing that patience was her best chance for freedom, endured her time in chains stoically. It took several centuries, but the wait was worth it. Rome fell to the barbarian hordes in A. D. 476, heralding the First Maelstrom. It was a fitting end for Carthage's enemies, and the perfect point for Dido's new beginning. Her master was destroyed during the Maelstrom, and she (having barely survived herself), took the opportunity to escape in the confusion. Now a freewraith, Dido allied herself with a Circle of escaped Thralls, and managed to survive in the Shadowlands while learning all she could about the various Arcanoi. This quest for knowledge brought her into contact with Pandora Skia and other proto-Haunter alliances, who had a certain something that encouraged her to look at them more closely. Although she liked these wraiths no better than any of the others she had encountered, their interests did capture her attention. The efforts of Pandora Skia and other such alliances to diversify and study the nature of their powers rather than simply reveling in them set apart from groups like the mercenary masters of Moliate or the calculating lords of Usury. As groups began to polarize around various Arcanoi, Dido remained with the Haunters and became known as Sweet Sorrow (for the sadness that wraiths saw reflected in her eyes).
Over the centuries, Sweet Sorrow has emerged as a powerful figure within the Guild while remaining a virtual enigma to anyone outside it. She was instrumental in helping form the Haunters (not due to any interest in their well-being, but because she saw them as her instrument for spreading chaos), and acts as a trusted consigliere for the members of the Guild. She keeps the Haunters divided by playing the alliances against one another, but does this merely to keep them in line until the time it is necessary to unite them for her own use. She tried something similar back in 1598 in the wake of the failed coup, but has long since come to the conclusion that she acted prematurely, a mistake she does not intend to repeat.
Sweet Sorrow is currently trying to foster better relations with the Laughing Lady through the Bedlameers. She believes she can further her dreams of toppling the Hierarchy if she finds a way of usurping the Laughing Lady and assuming her position. Sweet Sorrow also holds the secret of Midian's identity, having spoken to the wraith responsible for driving the man once known as Brother Pallin to suicide all those years ago. Of course, Pallin's murderer isn't around to share his knowledge any further; Sweet Sorrow destroyed him in order to monopolize his information. She plans on using Midian's secret to win his support for her bid for the Seat of Succor; failing that, she may reveal his humiliation in an attempt to unseat him as Guildmaster.
The one matter that troubles Sweet Sorrow is the presence of the Order of the Glass Menagerie, which steadfastly resists her followers' attempts to infiltrate it. She suspects, however, that the Menagerie has links to the mysterious Council. While she has not yet been able to determine who occupies the Council seats, she knows that these Haunters distrust her intensely. She has tried instigating rumors concerning the Council's "membership," but moves carefully in this matter lest she alienate those Haunters who are firmly in the Council's camp.
References[]
- WTO: Guildbook: Haunters, p. 67-68