#9 Maggie Ravenlock
Name: Maggie Ravenlock
Place of origin: Boston, Massachusetts
Occupation: Magic store owner
Legal status: Citizen of good standing of the USA
Identity: Publically known
Marital status: Married
Known relatives: None
Group affiliation: Snake and Owl Magic School
Base of operations: Forethoughts and Black Locks (a magic store in Salem, Massachusetts)
History: Daughter of a lawyer and a teacher, Maggie loved magic from a very young age. She dressed up as Miracle Mischief for Halloween, watched the Witch Force Five cartoon, and obsessively researched every non-school bit of magic that had leaked into the Shattered Earth’s universe that had been cataloged.
While much magic can only be practiced by those initiated into a school, some magic transmits so easily that they are sometimes mistaken as natural features of the world. For example, spilled salt needs a pinch tossed over the spiller’s shoulder to ward off bad luck, while rabbits feet bring good luck to those that bear them. Neither effect is part of the natural world of the Shattered Earth, but their effects have been widely transmitted throughout its universe. Many are local to Earth, but the pinch of salt actually originated off planet with a grouchy alien sea deity and some burrow-dwelling tree-climbing proto-sentients and has since spread through eight-five percent of known space.
Given Maggie’s passion for the subject, her parents took her to the magic schools around the Boston area to see if she was compatible with any of them. Magic, unlike science, is erratic in how well it works from person to person. A stapler works for everyone, but a wand often does not. She showed some promise when tested for the Snake and Owl School, although not enough to justify sending her to a dedicated academy. Instead, they enrolled her in an after-school program taught by a Master of the Snake and Owl School, Middle Witch Emily Wilson.
Maggie thrived under Emily’s tutelage. While she would never be a great power, Maggie thoroughly learned to the techniques and materials used in their magic. Maggie took over the family’s little garden to grow the plants needed for many of her spells. Soon, she was supplying most of her fellow witch students with their ingredients. By the time she finished high school, she had turned that into a business that supplied many of the adult magic practitioners in the Boston area. The things she could not grow herself, she had started to find suppliers for.
Nowadays, Maggie runs a small store in the Salem area that caters both to serious magic users and to tourists. Many regulars have their orders delivered to them by a delivery witch if they are local or by mail order if they are more remote. In addition to her main business of spell ingredients, Maggie maintains a sideline in magic books and magic artifacts.
While only marginally superpowered by her worlds standards, her business has put her in contact with a fair number of magical powers. She is unsympathetic with the criminals, but the lines among magic practitioners can sometimes get blurry, so both people like Notetaker and Patience the Ogre have done business with her before.
Despite her general dislike of criminals, she counts Googly Eyed Jones as a friend. He has helped her collect some ingredients from dangerous locations before.
She dislikes the hero Grassblade. One of his fights took place inside her store, and he never did pay her for the damage he caused.
To unwind, Maggie enjoys playing a MMORPG with her friends, which includes the astronaut Homi Kapoor.
Story role: Maggie is a bit player. As presented, she is at most a character whose connections might bring two otherwise unrelated characters together. More often, she would be part of her setting at the magic store where other characters would stop to get something they need for the story.
Height: Medium
Body type: Curvy
Known superpowers: Middling spellcaster of the Snake and Owl school of magic.
Limitations: Not particularly combat oriented and unable to reach the more powerful levels of her school of magic.
About the Author (Author Profile)
My name is Patrick Rennie. I am 36, have a day job that has nothing to do with comics, and live in Erie after growing up elsewhere. I can be found online at www.patrickrennie.com and on twitter as @patrennie. I am primarily a writer of fantasy, superheroes, and science fiction. I enjoy both short form and long form comics and have done work with both. For example, the daily strip Phantast Staffing Services that I used to do can be found here while this link leads to a more recent script for a superhero comic called Epiphany. I also prefer reading the genres I write in, although I supplement them with comedies, autobiographies, and dramas. I mostly read comics on the web, in trade paperbacks, on my iPad, and in the newspaper. I usually skip monthly comic books, magazines, manga, editorial cartoons, and children’s books.Subscribe
If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to receive more just like it.
