Prudence Virginia Scott
What an ironic name for the mate of a demon. It was as if her parents had doomed her to act against them. What did they expect? For her to be declared a saint? To be a nun?
Not that her parents were saints either. Something that made her namesake even more nonsensical.
Lady and Lord Scott were the throne's tie to the supernatural. Prudence does not understand how they operated on that level of defense because of her parents vanishing from the court in her early years. Her father felt the underground of England was no place to raise a child, and even more so when his wife Emily was murdered due to loose ends not being tied off. In his grief and passion for his wife, Lord Arnold Scott III hid young Prudence away in the countryside. Most men would hand the child off to family, usually women, especially if said child was a girl.
But Arnold knew something was special about Prudence, and it wasn't just her bright red hair she had inherited from her mother.
When the babe was born, the Lady and Lord were overjoyed. She came out healthy, beautiful, and barely even cried. There was only one thing wrong. One thing that has stricken fear into the couples soul.
A version of Solomon's pentagram scarred into the infant's forearm. The syllables indecipherable. Its origin inexplicable.
Her father had a few theories, but none of them could lead him to a straight explanation. The two had pulled themselves away from their "area of work" to prevent whatever bad omen the demonic scar represented. Lady Emily had not survived the withdrawal.
In her name and memory, Arnold raised his daughter in isolation, keeping contact with only his closest friends, Earl and Countess Phantomhive.
Prudence grew up without a mother or even a nanny. She was very much a tomboy. Her father taught her how to fight, win an argument, and handle a sword. The daughter had learned many forms of defense, but her strongest category was judo because of her size and interest, feeling it was the most practical and the most useful.
She also learned to wear long sleeves.
While her father tried his best to keep her away from the lore that consumed his earlier life, it was in her nature to snoop and study. She eventually came across her father's collection of books and rituals and learned to resent her mark as much as her parents.
Her mark made her evil. It made her tainted, cursed.
But no one had to know that.
So many times she tried to scrape the mark off with abrasives and the like. One day she had attempted to cut the mark from her skin completely.
She took a small dagger and attempted to scrape off the top layer of skin, leaving her in a bloody mess. With haste, she bandaged the spot and went to sleep. (She was drained from the loss of blood.) The next morning she removed the bandage to view the damage and she shrieked in surprise.
Her wound had healed! But how?!
Something even more peculiar: the mark was now a black, bold line instead of a faded, scar-like mark. She wasn't sure what was worse: a gruesome infection or the mark making a bolder comeback.
She stroked it slightly and drew her hand back from the sharp shock it sent through her fingers. It wasn't painful, just… surprising.
Almost as if it had consciously reacted to her touch. Like it knew what she'd done.
She considered cutting off the limb altogether, but she figured her father would notice something like that. She was lucky she wouldn't have to continue her training with such a wound anyway, it could have been so much worse, and she was sure she'd have been punished for harming herself in such a way.
Still, she couldn't believe the demonic mark had come back. The nature of it all proved it to be something supernatural and not just a coincidence, and she wasn't sure if she wanted to know the explanation behind it.
From there on she left it alone, wearing practical long sleeves with fastening to her sleeves down. Unfortunately, that wasn't the end of Prudence's trepidation.
At sixteen, her father had contracted smallpox. Having beat it when she was younger, Prudence was immune. Her father in his forties was no match, however, especially without the more experienced doctors that nobles normally had.
He eventually passed away. He had told her to travel to London to meet their only allies. Family was out of the question, as they were either unaware of her existence or untrustworthy.
Though. it seemed his good friends had met a similar fate of that her mother. The lively couple and their only son and heir had died in a house fire about a week prior. No doubt a result of foul play.
That was her luck.
Her father confident in his decision, dictated in his will the house to be sold as to remove any evidence of their secret life away from the crown. She was only thankful to keep her more important keepsakes and was allotted the money from the sale. At this, she headed into town with no exact plan in mind. The house was small and unnoticeable, so she didn't get too much from it. She had maybe enough for rent for four months and minimal food, meaning she would have to get to work.
She considered being a maid, or a nanny, but she had never even met another child except once years ago, and her household skills were subpar. It wasn't lucrative anyway.
Prudence considered a few less than respectable jobs that went along with her skills. Her training was impressive for what it was:
"Up. You have five minutes before you get dragged out of bed," her father said commanded, leaving as quickly as he came in.
She couldn't believe he was going to teach her! He had told her only last year she would have to wait until she turned 16, but due to his paranoia and her persistence, she would celebrate her twelfth birthday a little unorthodox.
"You will do as I say, without complaint, exactly how I say to do it until I decide we are finished. Do I make myself clear?" her father asked in an intimidating voice. She had rarely seen this part of her loving father.
But this was what she wanted, and she would do as he said.
"Yes fa-sir!" she said correcting herself. He had told her prior to this he was to be called "sir" during training.
He nodded his head. "My first task for you will be to climb this tree. You will need to do it in under 15 seconds. If you do not complete the task how I say, you will be punished with a lash from this switch right here " he said coldly. Prudence's eyes went wide. She had forgotten about this from her father's stories of his own training, however, his trainer used whips.
He was going easy.
"Y-yes sir," she said trembling.
"Do I hear doubt? An assassin does not show fear! Again!" He held the flexible wood, ready to strike.
"Yes, sir!" "Time starts... Now!"
She rubbed her arm at the memory. That stupid tree branch had her sleeping on the cold floor because her body burned so bad of her mistakes, not that it was her father's fault. She had begged and pleaded for him to continue. Even after the first day when he himself wanted to stop.
So he had continued on every day until she was 15. He then made her do drills once every three days, trusting her to keep herself sharp.
Prudence wasn't sure where to begin for the job she was considering. She was an orphan with no family, so upper society would be tricky. She wasn't a respectable lord or lady like her late parents. Her work would have to be skillful.
It would have to be useful.
An assassin?
That was insane. Why on earth had that been her first thought? She could never kill someone willfully... could she?
She had thought of it. Quite quickly, she might add.
If she was being honest with herself, she wasn't great at much else. Her domestic skills were mediocre at best, and she doubted she could handle being barked at in such a way before she slipped from her false obedient persona and bit the perpetrators head clean off with sarcasm and insubordination.
She would have to have control.
Intel? She simply didn't have the connections.
Groundskeeping? She was a woman.
Anything with children was out of the question, as were most learned jobs, as she again, was a woman.
...tailoring!
The one domestic skill she had a leg to stand on was sewing. She had made most of her own clothes due to her precision and lack of pants made for women. She wasn't allowed into town often, and her father, bless his heart, couldn't begin to understand women's clothing and comfortability. She had made and tailored many things to her liking, mostly trousers and skirts.
She had decided she would go into town the next morning to find a shop willing to take her on.
This was a start.
