Submitted by Meredith Bell on Fri, 06/07/2002 - 10:17
Posted in
Race: Human
Sex: Female
Real Name: Catherine Aradia Eldridge-Wiccham
Nickname: Kate, Katie, Kitty, Katya
Birth date and Location: 22nd December, 1980 – Warwickshire, England
Group Affiliation: Ex-Member of The Coven of Sindell, The White Hats
Position: Wiccan High Priestess, Witch & Wife to Galen Eldridge
Catherine is played by Nicole Kidman
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Description:
Kate is 5’7” in height and weighs about 112lbs. Her build is slender and lithesome rather than muscular although it is obvious that she is in good physical shape. She has a pale complexion - although she is starting to look more tanned from the Californian sun, and has long, free-flowing red hair and dark blue eyes. Kate has a serious looking face with delicate, yet decisive features that add to an air of mystery that surrounds her.
Kate usually dresses in a rather bohemian, eclectic manner choosing clothes made from sumptuous fabrics that beg to be touched in decadent shades of red, green and azure. However, for special occasions, she will normally dress in a more classic style, favouring simple lines and monochromatic colours. She also likes to wear unusual jewellery, though her most cherished item is a small rose-gold locket that her husband gave her and holds a picture of their daughter Emma.
Attitude ~
Kate possesses a wilful and determined nature. She strives to help those who are in need often putting her own feelings aside for what she believes is the greater good. She is also very headstrong and stubborn – character traits that have gotten her into a lot of trouble over the years. But in the end she always tries to do what is best, she has a big heart and allows herself to be led by her emotions or gut instinct rather than her better judgement.
Lifestyle ~
Kate lives with her husband Galen Eldridge and her father Jack Archer in her family home in Los Angeles. The house is large and Victorian in style and furnished in a way that reflects Kate’s connection to nature. She loves to garden and will spend hours in her greenhouse, pottering away helping her plants and flowers to grow.
Recently Kate opened her own business, an alternative healing centre in downtown Los Angeles called Bonne Santé. It is here that she practices her craft, putting her years of skill and experience as a wiccan healer to practical use. As the nature of the craft doesn’t allow her to receive personal gain from her magics she cannot charge for her services, however, her clients make payments for the treatment they receive by way of donations or ‘gifts’.
Background:
Kate is originally from England, her father left when she was very young and shortly afterwards her mother, who was also a witch, died in an accident leaving her daughter under the protection of her old coven house - The Coven of Sindell. The coven placed Kate under the care of one of their retired members, a witch by the name of Mariah Jacobs. Mariah encouraged and nurtured Kate’s natural talent for magic from an early age, preparing her for her eventual entry into the Coven.
The Coven of Sindell ~
The Coven of Sindell is an ancient Wiccan order of witches who pledge their services to protect the innocent. Kate was initiated into the coven at the age of sixteen; it was soon after that she met and fell in love with a man named Lucien Aeterus. However, the burgeoning love between these two was viewed as unfavourable to the council and to one man in particular - Council Elder Serapis Aquilus. As a result Luc was later reassigned to a remote tribe of witches in Mongolia and, unbeknownst to the two lovers was kept out of all contact with his young love Catherine.
Kate was devastated by this and sought solace with her one-time rival Byron Spencer – a fellow telepath and aristocrat whose father was one of the coven’s largest benefactors. The two had despised each other for years and were widely known as enemies but under such circumstances they found themselves thrown together and soon became lovers. For many months they embarked on a heated affair, meeting in secret to pursue their lustful exploits, exorcising their demons through their lascivious behaviour.
During all this Kate also graduated into the Inner Circle at the age of 20 years. She was then the youngest ever witch to be initiated into the ‘Great Thirteen’. It was also at this time that she became good friends with fellow witch Janus Hallow – an old friend of her mother’s, and Council Elder Serapis.
Realising that her relationship with Byron was wholly destructive, Kate finally ended things between them and was later courted by a man called Logan Ultionis. A year later, at the age of 21, Kate and Logan were eventually married. By this time Kate hadn’t heard word from Luc for over three years and her every letter to him had been returned unopened. Although she was very fond of Logan, her heart still belonged to Luc, a fact she could never hide from her new husband.
As her waning affection became increasingly pronounced, Logan’s true violent nature also became manifest. Only six months after their marriage Logan changed from a likeable and caring man into a brutal tyrant who sought to control every aspect of his wife’s life from the company that she kept to where she went and even how she dressed. Outwardly they continued to appear as the devoted couple but behind closed doors they grew to despise one another. Eventually this hatred turned violent and Logan began to beat his wife, doing everything in his power to break her independent spirit.
Ashamed and embarrassed that she had allowed this to happen, Kate continued to suffer in silence. But Logan’s brutality only continued to increase, cumulating his dominance over his wife in the depraved sexual attacks that he inflicted upon her on a nightly basis. Kate became withdrawn and isolated from her friends, placing herself ever more at the mercy of her cruel husband.
It was two years after her marriage to Logan that Luc finally returned to England. Kate was now 23, and was plunged into an even deeper despair. But strengthened by the return of her first love, Kate finally began to stand up for herself. She begged the Council for a separation from Logan but was denied on the grounds that such a divide would corrupt the purity of the Inner Circle.
Discouraged by this series of events, Kate and Luc continued to keep their reunion a secret from the Council of Elders. Although they had to meet in secret the two young lovers were happy for the first time in years and looked forward to a promising future together.
However, more dark clouds were gathering upon the horizon. One night, three months later, Kate discovered her friend Janus attempting to open the Abyss of Talkon, a direct portal to Hell. In striving to stop her, Kate and Janus became engaged in a fierce battle. That was all that Kate remembered until she was found by the Sindell Guard lying next to Janus’s dead body.
Unable to remember the events of that night to plead her innocence, Kate was charged with the murder of her fellow sister and sentenced to death. With Luc’s help, Kate escaped her execution and fled to Los Angeles, America – and the home of her mother.
Season One, Midseason One:
Season One ~
The first season saw Kate struggling to make a living working in Bob’s Bar in the Alhambra district of Los Angeles. Her life had been reduced to a mere existence, remembering with longing the friends and loved ones that she had to leave behind in England. However, she soon became aquatinted with a series of similar loners - vampire hunters, demons and fellow witches who had all been drawn together in the city by the power of the Cloch Cosan – a collection of nine crystal shards that when combined opened the Nether Arch, a portal to another dimension.
Also at this time, Serapis cut all his connections with Sindell and hunted Kate down to Los Angeles. There he became head of a secret underground coven bent on capturing Kate and resurrecting their leader Janus from the dead through a ritual of transpossession in order to regain the lost Rites of the Cloch Cosan that would bring all the shards together in one place.
The first part of his plan complete, Serapis kept Kate locked up in the basement of his mansion, awaiting the time when the astrological correspondents would be aligned for his mystical workings. In order to prepare her for the ritual of transposition, Kate endured a painful torture that left her on the verge of death.
It was also in this time that the true extent of Serapis’s manipulations became revealed. How her marriage to Logan had been little more than a sham, a fabrication to keep Kate in the coven until the time was right. And also how Serapis had blocked out her memories of Janus’s death in order to turn the coven against her and to force her to abandon the safety they might have provided.
As the night of the ritual arrived, the friends that Kate had made in the short time that she had spent in the small community of East Los Angeles came to her rescue. They attacked at the forest clearing and a battle ensued. However, there were many casualties; almost all of the wiccan resistance were slaughtered including their leader Serapis. The so-called ‘white hats’ also sustained personal injury, the greatest being the death of Catherine’s lover Lucien.
Shortly after Luc's death Kate began to find herself attracted to the FBI agent Galen Eldridge whom she had been locked in Serapis' basement with for a short while. Confused over her feelings, and still feeling the pain of losing Lucien, Kate decided to return to England with her young ward Inanna Fairchild. Although Kate's trip was only supposed to be a short one, she quickly became caught up with all the problems that her old coven was experiencing in the aftermath of Serapis' actions. Bound by a sense of duty Kate resolved to remain in England and help Sindell through the ongoing investigation.
During this time, Kate received word that her old friend Amanda Blaise was in danger having fallen under a spell at her family’s ancestral castle in Ireland. Bound by the bonds of a devoted friendship, Kate travelled to Ireland where she found that Amanda had fallen under a spell that had her trapped in a dream world. Fearing for Daye’s life, Kate created a potion that allowed her to astral project into her dream and return her to the waking world. The two witches then enacted a ritual to free the spirits of the Blaise matriarchs from the castle and set them to rest. Unbeknownst at the time the ritual also released another spirit, a malevolent goddess called Mother Mariah.
After a heart to heart with Daye, Kate realised the extent of her feelings for Galen and that she couldn’t allow her sense of duty towards Luc and the coven to stop her from pursuing another relationship. Upon her return to England, Kate was offered the position of Council Elder by the remaining Elders, Hestia and Christian. However, she turned them down and instead severed all connections between herself and the coven, returning to her new ‘home’ in Los Angeles where she hoped to be reunited not only with her old friends but also with Agent Eldridge.
Season Two, Midseason Two:
Season Two ~
In Season Two Kate found herself at somewhat of a loose end. Alone in Los Angeles and without a job Kate found herself and Galen growing much closer. Despite warnings of caution from her friends and her own reservations Kate realised that she was falling in love with Galen, her strength of feeling growing with each passing day.
Yet, unknown to Kate a web of conspiracy contrived to keep them apart. Galen’s involvement with covert government agency Majestic 12 demanded that he keep the true nature of his job a secret from the woman he loved. His entanglement in an on-going investigation into a project known only as Lazarus, and an internal struggle for power between his fellow conspirators saw him caught in the middle while trying desperately to keep Kate safe from any repercussions.
However it wasn’t long before the secrets and lies that were a part of Galen’s life were brought to light after Kate found out that her home had been ‘bugged’ by the Majestic agency. Realising that he could no longer keep the truth from Kate, Galen confessed all. Kate was stunned by this revelation and felt hurt and angry that he had lied to her for so long. Needing some time to work things out in her head, Kate broke things off with Galen and moved into Poplar Avenue while her home was being ‘de-bugged.’
During this time apart, Kate was cloned by the Evil Entity in Poplar’s basement which had been making dopplegangers of her friends for months now. Confronted with the clone, Kate attempted to destroy it and ended up being thrown in the path of an oncoming car and was subsequently rushed to hospital where she found out the shocking news that she was several weeks pregnant.
Meanwhile, as Kate struggled to come to terms with the news of her pregnancy she happened upon a newspaper headline reporting the shooting of an FBI agent at Galen’s apartment building. After finding him, Kate sat at his bedside watching him sleep, seeing him so vulnerable and knowing how close he came to dying made her realise just how much she actually loved him. As he awoke she confessed her feelings for him and told him about her pregnancy. Galen was overjoyed and, after a touching reunion, they decided to move in together.
Midseason Two ~
In Midseason Two, Kate became increasingly worried about her best friend Daye and the strange behaviour that she’d been displaying recently. She accepted a job working at The Bibliophile so that she would be able to keep an eye on her albeit covertly.
However, there were surprises in store for Kate when she was reunited with her long lost father Jack Archer - a man whom she had not seen in almost twenty years. Archer had only just received news of his daughter’s existence, having believed that she’d died with her mother in a horrific accident. Disbelieving him at first, Kate gradually began to accept the man as her father, learning that Serapis and Janus had been responsible for their estrangement all those years ago.
Gradually Kate began to rebuild her relationship with her father, and Jack even saved her life after a frightening encounter with Ryan, who, mistaking her for Daye tried to drain her life essence. Jack took Kate to her home where he was finally introduced to Galen and found out the surprising news that he was also to be a grandfather.
As the problems with Daye began to escalate, Andrew Langley came to Kate once more to beg her help. At the same time, Alicia Wyldling was told by the spirits of Daye’s ancestors that Kate was to be the bearer of the Arthach Anam Iomai – an amulet that holds the souls of Amanda’s family and would assist her in helping Daye in her hour of need.
Though Kate was sceptical she took the Arthach and set about trying to find Daye with Drew’s help. However the two were unsuccessful and it wasn’t until the spirits of the Arthach eventually made contact with Kate through her dreams, bestowing her with the knowledge to stop Mother Mariah that they were able to finally make their move on the evil child goddess.
With Drew and Alicia’s aid, Kate and Galen gathered a small force and set out to save Daye and put a stop to Mother Mariah’s harmful schemes. They were all in for a shock though as during the battle Daye began to go into labour. While the rest of the combatants fought with Mariah’s brotherhood of willing acolytes, Kate stayed by Daye’s side while Sam, assisted by the Arthach, brought the child Maia into the world.
With the threat of Mariah finally behind them, Kate and Galen returned to their regular lives, eagerly awaiting the birth of their own daughter, Emma.
Season Three, Midseason Three:
Season Three ~
The beginning of Season Three saw Kate and Galen blissfully content in their new family, the birth of their baby girl Emma, only reinforcing the bonds of love between them. Realising that Kate was the only woman he wanted to spend his life with, Galen proposed to her. Kate was reluctant to accept at first, fearing that by marrying they would be tempting the Fate’s to throw more obstacles in their paths. But after some persuasion she finally agreed to marry him and the two of them hurried off to Las Vegas for a hasty union, completely unaware of the chaos that was brewing back home.
While attempting to find out what had happened to their friends, Kate and Daye met a demoness called Alessa Hunt who arrived one day in the Bibliophile with a diary containing a spell to defeat the elder vampire Dathan. Together, the two friends performed a spell of their own to remove the protection magic that prevented them from reading the diary. With the spell decoded and their missing friends returned to the earth dimension they began to make preparations for a final battle against The Brotherhood.
Midseason Three ~
Midseason Three began with the mourning of those close friends lost in battle with a special memorial by the ocean. Inspired by a posthumous letter from Sorrow, Tash decided to begin a weekly session of The White Hats.
It was also during this time that Kate met and became close friends with ex-Russian mobster Nikolai Makarov, and helped him to complete his process of ‘merging’ with the soul of a Xangyarj demon.
The end of Midseason Three saw the culmination of The Ministry’s tests (during which Kate was temporarily rendered blind) and the arrival of Elliot Zimmerman, the mysterious leader of The Ministry of Magic.
Season Four, Midseason Four:
Season Four ~
Season Four saw Kate facing her greatest challenge to date – the death of her beloved daughter Emma. At the season’s commencement, the child contracted a lethal strain of Meningitis and was admitted into hospital only for her to die in the early hours of the following morning. Kate was devastated and thrown into a deep depression only made worse by the fact that her husband; Galen secretly blamed her for the death. Tensions ran high in the Eldridge household for a while before a heated argument sent Kate seeking comfort in the arms of Nikolai’s friend Damen Kirk.
When Galen found out about her drunken moment of weakness he moved out, leaving Kate to come to terms with the consequences of her infidelity as well as struggling to cope with her grief. Desperate to find solace, Kate turned to her oldest friend Daye only to find out that the witch had seduced her husband in a moment of vulnerability. In a state of bitter despair and following a conversation with an emissary of The Ministry – Dragomir Der Drahtzheir (a demon of manipulation able to force people into an unwitting sense of sorrow and loneliness) Kate suffered an unexpected miscarriage and was rushed to hospital by one of her few remaining friends Darian Gray.
While struggling to come to terms with her overwhelming sorrow, Dragomir continued to prey on Kate’s vulnerable state by taking the form of her first husband Logan and using her memories of him to drive her to the very edge of sanity, so much so that she tried to take her own life. With Kate completely isolated from her friends and family, The Ministry took control of Kate’s mind, implanting several suggestions in her head, the foremost being that the only way for her to solve her problems was to bring her daughter back from the dead.
Returning home from a business trip, it was Jack Archer who found Kate in a near mad state, fearful for her own safety and rambling incoherently. Afraid for his daughter’s sanity, Jack contacted a witchdoctor called Carlisle to come and see her before going to seek out Kate’s estranged husband himself. Galen was beside himself with guilt when he saw the state Kate was in and horrified to hear the way in which she’d learnt of his infidelity with her best friend. Wishing to make amends for his abandonment he promised to stay with Kate and take care of her until she was well again.
However, Kate was still desperate to bring her daughter back from the dead. With the manipulations of The Ministry still fresh in her mind, Kate sought out the necromancer Marcus Dalton who agreed to help teach her how to conduct the ritual that would bring Emma back from beyond the Great Divide. For many weeks the two met in secret to practice their lessons with Kate casting sleeping spells on her husband and father to keep them from finding out about her midnight rendezvous with the necromancer.
Accepting the assistance of fellow mage Cole Matthews who had promised to help divert the ‘cost’ of her unholy rite, Kate was ready to begin the ritual. However, as the spell was almost complete, Marcus realised that it was Cole’s plan to divert the cost to him. Furious with what he saw as a betrayal of his trust he ended the ritual and sent Emma’s spirit back across the Great Divide, an act that devastated Kate while also leaving her channelling high volumes of magic that left her fighting for her life. After confessing her questionable activities to her husband and father, Kate collapsed with a high fever. Galen sat by her side all night and day, nursing her back to health while confessing his love and vowing never to leave her again.
In the aftermath of these events, Kate returned her focus to finding out all she could about the mysterious virus that had infected a number of her friends. But it was not until her old friend William Travers arrived at her home with news from the Watcher’s Council that the pieces of the puzzle started to fit together. Realising that Ambrose Delancre was the source of the Hyde virus, and after a visit from Drew and Ryan requesting her help in rescuing Amanda from Delancre’s mansion; Kate and Galen travelled across the Atlantic to England, hoping to secure the support of the Coven of Sindell in the fight against the evil Watcher.
However, there were problems on the horizon as Delancre learnt of Kate’s arrival at Sindell and commissioned one of his spies to get rid of her. Though his plan failed, it provided the Elders with the evidence they needed to obtain the assistance of the Watcher’s Council and after receiving an informative phone call from home, Kate was finally able to devise a cure for the Hyde virus with the help of biochemist and doctor Jillian Lennon.
Returning to Los Angeles, the final stages of the plan to rescue Daye and the subsequent ritual to drain the mana from the infected in order to cure them of Hyde were put into place. With the help of her compatriots from Sindell, Kate managed to cure her friends and together they worked to formulate a battle plan to stop Delancre once and for all.
Midseason Four ~
In the fallout of Season Four, Kate found herself struggling to come to terms with the impact that the Hyde virus had made on her life especially in regards to her friend Daye’s affair with her husband Galen. Her feelings of bitterness were only further antagonised when Daye announced her impending marriage to Drew. Realising that her lingering resentment would eventually destroy any chance of a friendship with Daye and could maybe even lead to the breakdown of her marriage, Kate cast a spell to remove all her ill feelings towards Daye. The spell was successful but backfired when it created a demonic entity made entirely out of all her bitterness that was hell bent on physically destroying Kate’s life – starting with Amanda herself.
Confronted with this entity, Kate was forced to finally acknowledge her feelings – a revelation that allowed her to destroy the demon and begin to rebuild bridges with her friends. Feeling more like her normal self, Kate agreed to be Daye’s maid of honour at her wedding, and despite her own worries about her friend’s reasons for marrying Drew so hastily, resolved not to interfere.
Sweet’s appearance in Los Angeles and the musical phenomenon that followed did little to disturb Kate and Galen’s little world. In fact, unlike many of their friends, it managed to bring them closer together as they sang songs of their love and commitment – feelings that only continued to grow as they celebrated their one year anniversary of being husband and wife.
But their blissful contentment would prove to be short lived when, after a night out with her friend Marianne, Kate was drugged and raped by Galen’s new partner at the LAPD, Tony Green. Yet there was more to this act of violence and depravity than what appeared on the surface. Tony was in fact the only son of the late director of Majestic, Anthony Constillias, and his attack on Kate just one in a long line of vengeful achievements designed to claim retribution for his father’s death.
Barely escaping with her life, Kate could not face revealing such information to her husband, she wanted to protect him from the knowledge that it had been his part in Constillias’ downfall that had brought his son to their door. In any event, such circumstances were soon eclipsed by the death of their dear friend Andrew Langley at the hands of Natasha – who had been embraced and turned into a vampire.
It took the White Hats many days to finally track down their leader Natasha, when they did, the confrontation turned into an all out battle for their lives. Kate, hardened by her recent trials took it upon herself to finish the deed and fight her old friend. However, letting her emotions get the better of her, Kate was led into a trap by the vampiress. As Tash prepared to feed from her, Kate had almost accepted her fate when she was rescued by Nikolai, who was the one to stake Tash… turning her to dust.
Several days later Kate was arrested for the murder of Tony Green following the retrieval of planted evidence set up by Majestic operative Jennifer Lawson. Kate was interrogated and imprisoned awaiting a bail hearing. Unfortunately, the next morning the entire 52nd Precinct was subject to an unexplained arson attack in which all the prisoners died… except Kate who, unbeknownst to anyone, had been lifted by The Ministry.
Midseason ends as Kate awakes aboard the private jet of Elliot Zimmerman and Galen, who refuses to believe that his wife is dead, sets out on a long journey to find her.
Powers & Abilities:
Telepathy ~
[serif]The psychic phenomena by which communication occurs between minds, or mind-to-mind communication without using sensory perceptions but as by the exercise of an occult power. Such communication includes thoughts, ideas, feelings, sensations and mental images.[/serif]
Kate is easily able to read surface thoughts without the need for physical contact. She can also deeply ream a person’s mind with or without their consent although this requires a higher level of concentration. As a child Kate was unable to control her 'gift' this was a painful experience that she found quite disturbing as she could hear the random thoughts and sense the emotions of everybody who crossed her path. As a member of Sindell Kate learnt to control her powers to such an extent that she is now able to 'shut off' her telepathic abilities at will.
Telekinesis ~
[serif]Refers to the phenomena of moving objects from one place to another without using physical contact by scientifically inexplicable means. It also means re-shaping of objects using the mind's energies, such as bending a spoon, or key, by just holding it and focusing as by the exercise of an occult power.[/serif]
Kate has the power to move and levitate objects using only her mind. The simple act of moving objects takes little or no concentration, although generally Kate has to be able to make eye contact with the object she wishes to move. Sometimes however, when Kate is feeling particularly emotional or unfocused a kinetic disruption may occur. This disruption can manifest itself in many ways; most common are flickering lights, general electrical interference, random movement of objects, etc.
Clairvoyance ~
[serif]A form of extra-sensory-perception, clairvoyance is the supposed power to perceive as though visually, distant objects, persons or events not discernible through the ordinary sense channels but instead by acute intuitive insight or perceptiveness.[/serif]
Kate has been clairvoyant from an early age. Normally such visions of the future or past occur while in the Dream State although Kate has had conscious visions – often prompted by a specific place, person or object of significant power. Visions are random, often fleeting and confused making little or no sense. The experience of receiving such a vision is terribly disturbing, in a dream it manifests itself much more forcefully as a physical nightmare. If Kate is conscious when she has a vision she is normally held in terrible pain for the duration, and then left incredibly weak for a short while afterwards. Despite years of training with Sindell Kate is still unable to control the occurrence of such visions.
Knowledge ~
Amongst her active powers Kate also has an extensive knowledge of the Wiccan tradition, spell-casting and of fighting the forces of darkness from her years within the Coven of Sindell. She is an accomplished healer and knows much about the power of herbology.
Her weaknesses lay in her lack of training in physical combat. Kate has had some tuition in self-defence using objects such as the quarter-staff but generally depends upon her magical abilities in a combat situation.
Items:
Kate is also co-owner of Bonne Santé - a healing centre providing holistic treatments based upon the traditions of herbalism and Reiki. The shop used to be home of a coven of witches called The Circle of Hecate whom were all slaughtered in 2005 by a vampire warrior called Cian. Several months later after a failed police investigation into the murders, Kate happened upon the building while searching for members of the disassembled coven. Eight months later Kate purchased the property and began refurbishment’s to the building. The renovation was completed in early 2007 and lay abandoned due to ‘unforeseen circumstances’ until mid-June when Kate and her business partner and friend Marianne Freemont finally opened for business.