Leslie Whitcomb
From DevilshireWiki
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 Tilda Swinton as Leslie Whitcomb | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Background
Leslie Clifford Whitcomb was born in 1960, the daughter of a well-to-do Boston mercantile family. Whitcombs has been a reputable clothier for men and women since the 1930s. They have two very important secrets. The first is that they are a reputable mystick family in the New England area, brokering in information and artifacts. The second is that they've been cursed, by Aleister Crowley no less, to produce sorcerors who can only cast while wearing cross-gendered clothing. Needless to say, both secrets are guarded carefully.
Leslie ended up being no exception to the rule. She and her brother Atticus, born two years later, are both skilled in the arcane, but she and he had to switch wardrobes to be effective. And so the two siblings became intensely trained in the mystic arts and in the legitimate family concerns. Atticus proved to be a wonder in the art of fashion design, much to the joy of the more mundane Whitcombs and the chagrin of the occult side of the family. When he came of age, he left to go to fashion school in London, opening a branch of the family business there as a trendy boutique that became quite profitable.
Leslie missed her brother greatly when he left Boston, but she had ambitions of her own. She was already at Harvard in pre-law, with aspirations of becoming a sharp and powerful advocate. Considered almost painfully brainy by her classmates in high school and undergrad, she was well on her way to showing her brilliance in court. But she still had her responsibilities to her family's occult legacy.
It was the summer after getting her BA that she visited her brother in London. There, Leslie and Atticus happened upon their Great Idea. Instead of treating the Curse with shame and subterfuge, they decided to meet it head on. They decided to crossdress in public, hoping to remove the shame and stigma of the curse and perhaps to destroy it. Atticus, in his role as trendy boutique owner, was already known to wear daring outfits, so he had a 'cover' for his change to women's clothing. For Leslie, it would be a more daring change and perhaps the death of her career as a lawyer. But, after a few purchases, the siblings were on their way.
Back in Boston, the Harvard Yard was abuzz with the news about the tall rangy redhead in law school who preferred suits to dresses and wingtips to heels. Leslie bore up under the pressure from her classmates and from her family with grace, turning that energy into her classwork. There was one horrible incident when a group of drunken young men beat her badly because they thought she was a gay man. Instead of using her magic, she took them to court on assault charges and won.
But it was this attack, coupled with the lack of offers after her graduation despite her stellar grades, that led her to stay in the ivory tower and get her Masters and finally her PhD, specializing in Criminal Law. She became the eccentric professor, hard but fair, by day. By night, she was involved in the secret occult societies of Harvard, protecting her alma mater and the student body from supernatural threats.
Leslie had settled into a fairly comfortable life, for a crossdressing law professor/sorceror. Tenure wasn't far away. And then /she/ came into her life. Dr. Felecia Jordan was a law professor who had recently joined the staff at Harvard. She was pretty and feminine and had a very handsome husband and wasn't so harsh to the students. She even drank with them. And Felecia didn't like Leslie. It didn't take long for Felecia to insinuate herself and become popular. She gained the upper hand with the Administration and cast aspersions about her rival, claiming that she was disruptive to the learning process with her wardrobe, and perhaps a lesbian Communist front for Al-Queda. No one really believed the more radical accusations. But when Leslie was up for tenure, and it was not granted, she took this as a sign that her political fortunes had changed at Harvard, and quietly resigned.
Personality
Leslie is hard, but fair with her students. Leslie's theory is that if she doesn't put her students through the wringer, they will be unprepared with the real trials and tribulations of the courts. In her dealings outside of class, she has the prickly attitude adopted by some geniuses who grow impatient with others. The eccentricity of her clothing adds to this, making her quite the odd and distant duck.
Powers and Abilities
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People
Friends
Jack Moore - Jack is a former student and a fellow member of the Rubrum Sodalicium (a secret occult society) at Harvard. He is probably the only person she implicitly trusts outside of her own family.
Acquaintances
Shari Taniguchi - She thought that Leslie was Clay Aiken. After that little identity crisis was cleared up, Leslie found Shari to be a bright, colorful, and cheerful young woman.
Shelby Stone - Shelby is an intelligent pre-law student of Leslie's who just happens to be blind. Leslie recruited Shelby for the intern position at Jack Moore's firm.
Adam Camden - Flirt Number One, with a bullet. Even when Leslie let him know that she was actually female, he insisted, with a sleaze level that was off the scale. She's a little sorry that she recommended Jackson Moore for whatever legal assistance Adam needed...
Duke Alocer - Flirt Number Two. Much nicer than Adam, what with the flowery language and all. But it was all due to a wish spell.
