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@deeprun, thank you!

@claire-h, I understand your situation (or at least I think I do). Rest for the Wicked began as a very different (and very generic) fantasy novel with a similar set of characters – then after many failed attempts to produce a novel, that turned into a fantasy cop drama not-even-totally-slightly-almost-completely-influenced-by-NCIS-and-Discworld, I took a break with a different setting to practice.

Funnily enough, that setting was also early 20th – 1914 to be precise, in the year leading up to the First World War, though in an alt-universe setting where Sigmund Freud basically discovered psionics, ushering in a “Second Scientific Revolution” – basically the discovery of magic, usable by any and all people with the time and money to study it. Naturally, the mafia came to be involved.

Ooh, knits and wool? I find your design philosophy interesting. You take the most flamboyant period in American history that wasn’t high for the entire party and you put your MC in a cardigan.

I like it. (No seriously, she seems really interesting. I took another gander at your Chapter 1 earlier today and I like how you echo her voice / thoughts in the narrator – the eloquent but matter-of-fact upper crusty way she analyzes her surroundings was very amusingly 1910s/20s.)

 

ANYWAYS, back to your question.

 

Myrrha (The Sorceress)

Clothing wise, she’s probably the most extravagant out of all of them. While she starts out in rags, when she enters Kyreleis’ service, she is given the best clothes and food, an apartment all to herself – Kyreleis basically indulges all of Myrrha’s material desires to keep her appeased, content, and ideally, dependent.

Fashion-wise, I’ve always seen her as the more bohemian type (which is confusing since she is also ethnically Bohemian, as is about half the cast) – more audacious in her clothing and less concerned about fashions since she can’t ever allow anyone to see her without using her magic to obscure her true appearance anyway.

So… honestly, kind of anachronistic but I’ve looked more at the 16th and 17th century for her clothing. Low bodice, light corset (she cares about comfort too), slashed, tight sleeves,  high waist, elbow-length gloves.

 

Regarding the horns and the hair…

As I’ve seen them, the horns extend from the side of her head, about where her ears would be, and roughly the same diameter as her ears would be. They’re not ribbed like a ram’s horns (at least I don’t remember them so), but they curl forward and out so that they are to the side of her face, not in front of it. (link below to the example I’m looking at)

Hair:
It’s a bit of a puzzler to me too what to do about the description. It’s not the most essential part of her character, but it still feels somehow integral to her sense of otherworldliness. I dunno.

What I’ve done has been to give her more stylized curls – an entire head full of ringlets, since she has the world’s springiest hair – literally. If I were her, I would definitely find a way to control my hair’s length because having 2-3 feet of copper filigree hanging from my head would give me serious neck problems (on top of a pair of iron horns).

But if I need to rethink her physical description because it’s going to make the reader’s brain hurt, that’s an important thing to know too.

https://meridianjacobs.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/dsc_1961.jpg?w=584