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Moroccan 4 Falus coin: minted circa 1873 CE, these coins bear the Seal of Solomon and will deter lesser demons as well as decrease efficacy of demonic powers if worn or kept on one's person.

Filipino amulet: known as an agimat, bertud, or anting-anting, this charm deflects physical harm in battle. Comes with a small booklet which is supposed to be read at specific times. Tends to work better for people of southeast Asian descent with roughly equivalent blend of cultural and Catholic faith.

a Pandora box: the magical, fatal equivalent of a snake in a can. Bigger on the inside than it is on the outside, possibly holds something of value, but also a horrible magical deterrent triggered by opening it. The question is, does this one still have someone's revenge in it? It's very heavy for its size. This item comes with many legal documents releasing Leander of any liability.

a plank from the Argo: or maybe it's just a piece of wood that likes to give prophecies. Depressed, tends to give the most negative reading possible. "You're gonna win the lottery. I'm sure the media attention won't lead to you being mugged or robbed, and of course you'll invest it wisely and not drink yourself to death." Accuracy said to be decent, but skewed.

gutta-percha gun: looks a little like a tommy gun, but fires natural latex produced from the sap of the Palaquium gutta, which turns whatever it hits into small wax figurines. Including people. Leander is not gonna sell this to just anyone.

stone with a hole in it: Leander thinks this is a good luck charm. It is in fact an aid which helps people to use magic, albeit not in a very organized way. It responds more to emotions and talent than formal spell use, and allows people to do magic they wouldn't consciously be able to do. The better you know how to use magic, the worse it works for you, though you could use it to add extra punch.

bell which wakes the dead: gentle ringing allows limited communication with, perhaps a raising of a spirit. Progressively stronger ringing will, with enough time, piss off these spirits, causing them to devour/haunt/poltergeist the fuck out of you.

astrolabe for an alien world: no one has yet figured out where this world is or who lives there.

personalized Tarot deck: does not contain the usual four suits, and not always the typical major arcana, but shows different drawings based on who is reading and/or who the reading is for.

portable doorway: a tiny door which can be placed into any wall. It then grows large enough to accomodate all those who would pass through that wall. (The door only creates a door through a wall, not to anywhere else. So far.) Approximately a tablespoon of human blood is required to make it work. This totally probably has some long term repercussions, so Leander suggests only using it for emergency burglaries.

death mirror: the properties and origin are debatable, but standing in front of this narrow, full body mirror is said to reveal the likelihood that you will die soon. If anything appears in the mirror other than you, that is not usually a good sign. There is a lot of argument as to how to interpret any mirror apparitions (what do they look like, how close are they, what are they doing, etc.) and it does not seem to work well, or at least, not work the same way, for people who are dead, undead, or have died before. It is NOT recommended that such people use the mirror, which comes with a cover.

cat's eye: a cat's eye preserved in amber. Holding or wearing it produces a general sort of magic detection effect. Magic and supernatural things take on a dark, emphasized look, like they're more real than anything non-magical around them. Prolonged use tends to make this look stay, and may induce mental/emotional disconnect with the rest of the world.

face of a stranger: the flayed face of someone nobody knows. Wearing it renders one not invisible or undetectable, but completely ignorable. People will still be aware that there is someone there, but they will be unable to describe or pay attention to the wearer. In as far as they can acknowledge the wearer is or was there, they will think the wearer is someone unimportant but not out of place. There is a limit to which this can be pushed, obviously, such as in a high security situation where there should only be a very small amount of people, all of whom are well known to each other. (Someday, unbeknownst to Leander, the entity that owns this face will want it back...)

wind-up beetle: a mechanical toy which produces an odd buzzing when its key is wound. The buzzing appears to grate on some supernatural creatures, though not all. Of course, it also grates on anybody who is forced to listen to it buzz for longer than 10 seconds because seriously, fucking stop it.

fey food: stored in a 50s style metal lunch box, these food items are purportedly from Faerie and though they appear slightly withered, have remained in this condition without any outside preservation for some number of years. There is an apple, a thermos of unknown liquid, some sort of flat cake wrapped in leaves inside of a sandwich baggie, and a fancy wrapped red sweet. The cake has one bite taken out of it. The food is said to cause delusions and/or induce longing for another world.

A little vain, a little unreliable, a little lazy, a little more of a taker than a giver. A guy who has a lot of seemingly small faults but is otherwise reasonably moral, well-intentioned, and genuinely nice. The thing is, those faults add up to a significant amount. This is a guy who shrinks from responsibility and commitment, who can be kind and generous but is often too self-centered to see that those qualities should be used more often. He doesn't have much ambition, he's reflexively cynical as a way of remaining passive and not fighting for change of any sort. He's capable of hard work and bravery, but it would take a crisis to bring that out. If he were truly put to the test, there's a good chance he would come out the better for it, but for the most part, there haven't been any real tests for him, and he avoids situations that would lead to that because he's afraid of it and of change. He would rather fuck around with his little pawn shop and eat well and go to the gym and live comfortably in as much style as he can afford.

His mom is like UGHHHHH WHY, which is completely justified and not Stereotpyical Asian Mothering, though in fact she WOULD enjoy grandchildren or something to brag about to her friends. Instead, Leander brings her nice antiques. In contrast, his older sister Cassandra (MOM WHY) is a hard-working, successful lawyer. Cassandra didn't want to do magic, though she has the potential. Leander did, but doesn't really have innate ability. She only managed to teach him one thing really well, which is the finding thing. That's the only thing he ever worked on, first because it was a private game for them, later because it was useful.

His family is in America: parents west coast in California, sister in St. Louis. He was in Chicago for a while, then SHIT WENT DOWN (it does have to do with a former partner, but it's not the same events as before) and he hopped a plane to London some years back because he did not wish to be associated with whatever happened. THUS FAR his involvement has either not been discovered or people are keeping quiet about it, but there are people who suspect he did have something to do with it, and he is in some very few underground circles persona non grata due to that. However, he picked London because he has some influential friends there, people who may not really be able to protect him but who seem to like him well enough that Leander is more useful alive. Then, of course, he really IS useful because of his finding ability. Now he has lots of clients and connections, though he tries to be discreet. If he's TOO useful, then people will want more and more from him, and may make him a point of contention or a pawn to be manipulated (like if there is a SUPER DESIRABLE artifact floating around, there might be conflict, etc.). In fact there is no way to avoid something like that happening, apart from occasionally letting people down on purpose. But then he genuinely likes many of his clients so he can't bring himself to do that very often.

Honestly the whole scheme here of just floating through life happy-go-lucky is in this world always about 2 minutes from going to hell, yet he doesn't want to change, make preparations, be more careful. In the Apocalypse universe he's dead. The most he does in this world is have one of those bags packed by the door with cash and a bad fake ID, because he'd rather run if he had the choice.



His finding ability is much stronger than he's ever let on to anybody other than his mom and a few of his partners. It's because it's the only thing he's ever worked on, it's like a ridiculously overdeveloped muscle, until now at this point in his life, he'll most likely never be able to learn/do anything else ever again. He'd have to study tons or be modified in some way, and he doesn't want to do either. He just likes having this one talent.



Leander's mom is Cantonese and from Hong Kong, a witch descendant of the old line whose given name is He Lin. She also uses the English name Ada. He Lin grew up speaking Cantonese and English, and was alternately cosseted and raised strictly by her mother, also a witch, who had large ambitions and wanted her to be intelligent, accomplished, and tough. She didn't use physical abuse to drive He Lin on, but rather, implied judgment/shaming tactics: "well if you can't/don't want to, you don't have to, if you can't handle it, of course I'm not disappointed, it's okay if you can't measure up like your sisters, we'll still love you [for now]."