Ezio Santino [Adult]

Face Claim & Picture:
Josh Hartnett

Canon Character or Original:
Canon

Name:
Ezio Santino

Age:
34

Blood Status:
Muggleborn

Wand:
Cherry – Dragon Heartstring – 11” – Swishy (Click for Pic)

Gender:
Male

Orientation:
Straight

Magic School They Attended:
Homeschooled

What Job Do They Have:
Auror

Personality:
Ezio is one of those eccentric hermits with hundreds of strange quirks and peculiar habits that used to give wizards in the dark ages such a bad reputation. Talking to himself, thinking out loud and always tapping the doorframe four times before entering or leaving a room are but a few of the endless list of strange customs he features. That need for control and the inevitable paranoia that comes with the job has resulted in a compulsive disorder that dominates every aspect of his daily life…

Many believe he cracked under the pressure, that the stress of the job finally got to him and yet despite those rumors Ezio remains a man in perfect control. Calm, patient and above all terrifying insightful in the psyche of the criminal mind, he’s a man who despite all his flaws can still outwit his enemies. In the Auror office they have a saying about Ezio: “He never gives a damn about justice. It’s always about retribution for him. Hurting people who hurt people”. Cruel as that may seem, it’s how Ezio justifies the things he does and how he can cope with the things witnessed in the line of duty…

But he wasn’t always like this. Brought up in privilege when firs the arrived at the Auror’s office, he was an ambitious young lad with a brilliant talent for catching the bad guys. Some thought him addicted to the hunt, others called him a danger-junkie but when he came home, he set left that baggage at the front door. To his family he was the helpful yet quiet son with the strange talent, the one capable of sitting for hours just listening to your troubles. In a way he’s still that person, just more damaged, sleep deprived and slowly drowning in his own sorrow that’s sought at the bottom of the bottle…

Political Alignment:
The Ministry, the Auror’s Office and his personal vendetta.

Special Ability or Trait:
Raised by a Linguistics Professor, Ezio early on in life developed a talent for foreign languages. Today he’s one of the few in England who speaks, writes and reads in eleven languages fluidly: English, Gaelic, French, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, German, Greek, Swedish and topping that extensive list is the guttural goblin tongue known as Gobbledegook.

Ever a fan of puzzles and riddles, Ezio at the start of his Auror career dedicated much time and effort to cryptography. Detecting hidden patterns in written messages, cracking codes and solving complex clues hidden in newspapers allowed him to catch a number of dark witches and wizards. Unlike most his greatest talent lies in reading between the lines and outwitting his marks.

During his Auror training, Ezio discovered his talent for tracking and detecting traces on places exposed to magic, especially of the “Dark” variety. Finding them has always been his forte while having to catch them in a rush never suited his style. Ezio favors the ambush style, cleverly laid out plans to entrap his enemies and then skillfully subdue them preferably with a full-body bind curse.  

Family History:
The Santino’s once were a humble family back in the glory days of the Roman empire. The first of their name was a common foot soldier serving in the legion XVII garrisoned at Sicily. Back in those days a man could elevate his standing in the world through hard work and sheer good luck and that’s what happened to Gaius Santino. From infantry grunt to camp prefect in ten years, it was the plot of land given to him upon retirement that eventually led to the Santino’s amassing a significant fortune. Granted Isola Maddalena – back then deemed a barren rock between Corsica and Sardinia – the largest of seven islands in the Maddalena archipelago, Gaius build a small monastery that eventually grew into a large commune for Benedictine monks. With those monks came a fortune in knowledge that later became a financial fortune when many of the monasteries were abandoned along with countless rare and irreplaceable volumes of hand-copied manuscripts and biblical scriptures. It were those precious books that were eventually auctioned that supplied the Santino’s with their substantial fortune.

Born and raised on the Maddalena archipelago the Santino family greeted their first son after four daughters barely two years apart. His father Professor Estefan Santino was a renowned Linguistics expert who guest-lectured as a professor at universities worldwide while lending his skills to Muggle law enforcement agencies, nationally and internationally. His mother Anna-Maria was a philanthropist, a socialite who generously spent her husband’s wealth on supporting young artists and a large number of wildlife protecting charities. For that reason Ezio and his four sisters seldom saw their parents, being raised by nannies and other caretakers that came and went like the turning of the seasons. In a sense his oldest sister Helena acted as Ezio’s mother, being there when he scraped his knees or had a nightmare. His other sisters, the twins Juliette and Nicola remained a mystery to him, ever abroad at some boarding school or participating on some athletic summer program. Claire, the sister only two years his elder was his one true friend growing up even after his talents were discovered, a sentiment not shared by all Santino’s.

Personal History
While the Santino family has been around since Roman imperial days, they’ve ever been free of magical talents as far as they’re aware. The same could be said about his mother’s family which with the exception of a distant uncle and several far removed nephews a number of generations removed, remains magic-free since their origins in 1803AD. It evidentially was a big surprise to find out when the youngest Santino proved magically blessed; a realization that occurred on a rainy autumn evening when Ezio played his father in a game of chess. Every night after his father came home, they had this silly tradition of playing a game in the parlor. When Ezio was three, the game had been tic-tac-toe; by the time he turned five the “X” and “O” marks were replaced with the black and red pieces of checkers. At his ninth birthday checkers became chess and it was during one such games that year that Ezio showed his first magical hiccup. Always favoring the offense as a kid, Ezio was mid-progress of the infamous Stonewall Attack when a horrible coughing fit came over him. Shaken by sudden onset of coughing, his hand pushed against the table holding the chess board and sent it toppling over. Why it happened Ezio never understood but mid-air the pieces suddenly froze and the fall was reversed as if having been targeted by a Momentum-reversing spell…

That evening marked the end of their ‘normal’ life as Ezio and the entire Santino family for that matter. His father took the whole display as a strange matter, a subject to be studied, to be carefully examined in order to understand the mechanics and science behind what had happened. His mother, religious as she was, thought it a blessing from God, a sign in reward of her dedication and faith. His sisters didn’t know what to make of it and reacted as so many Muggles do in the face of magic: confused and somewhat jealous. Only Claire held fast to her fondness for Ezio, something he immensely appreciated in these confusing times. For a while Ezio was started practicing under the tutelage of his father, who used the strangest of methods in the hopes of unraveling magic’s secret. They’d sit in the parlor, objects getting dropped, tossed or hidden and Ezio had to stop, catch or find those items without using ‘ordinary’ means. They did so with little success as only in a moment of strong emotion Ezio managed to do something ‘magical’. Never what he wanted though, for glasses falling sometimes turned into something else, objects thrown sometimes exploded and hidden objects sometimes vanished into thin air…

By the time he’d turned eleven Ezio had started noticing strange things, oddities once mistaken for just bizarre events proving to be something else entirely. Owls flying to certain homes on the island in broad daylight, flashes of green light in homes with fireplaces. What it meant Ezio would only find out years later as unawares his father had been keeping the existence of the magical world from him. Somewhat embarrassed the man had kept the acceptance letters to Beauxbatons from his son and decided to see to his son’s education on his own. After two years of failed attempts, his father reached out to ‘so-called’ wizards, the first bunch being all charlatans but then he stumbled on a figure going by the name Alonso Roberto de’ Pazzi, a retired Auror in service of the Italian Ministry of Magic. It was Alonso who took Ezio under his wing, getting special approval from the Ministry to educate an underage wizard outside an official school. Visiting the hidden magical district of Rome, Ezio was supplied with his first wand, broom and other supplies that most wizards were introduced to in an educational institute like Hogwarts. Alonso taught Ezio everything, focusing on the various classes required in Auror training since the boy too shared those ambitions. Ezio had a talent for solving near-impossible riddles, managing to unravel the various crime cases presented to him in mere days while trained Aurors struggled for months on those particular cases…

When Ezio was free of the Trace, his tutor Alonso decided it was time for the young wizard to test his knowledge and skill in a realistic setting. For that he brought Ezio to the Italian Ministry of Magic to take his N.E.W.T.’s. Few homeschooled wizards and witches ever passed those rigorous tests but when Ezio was subjected to them, he did the impossible. First he demonstrated a perfect Transfiguration on himself into a scarecrow, a coat hanger and lastly into bronze elephant sculpture. To display his Potion brewing ability, Ezio brewed a batch of Amorentia so potent its perfume nearly intoxicated all the members present for that test. His spell work was even more impressive at the successful performance of a Corporal Patronus charm, a non-verbal Disarming charm upon four trained wizards simultaneously and a wand-less Shield Charm strong enough to resist a potent Blasting Curse. That day he became the first homeschooled wizard in Italy to acquire six N.E.W.T. Outstanding scores including all five recommended Auror classes in addition to Astronomy. All other exams taken that day including History of Magic, Arithmancy and Ancient Runes were concluded with Exceeds Expectation grades. Upon that conclusion all present that day agreed to let Ezio enroll in the rigorous program to become an Auror…

Unlike most Aurors in training, Ezio had no trauma to motivate him upon his chosen path; no grim encounter with death nor the horrid memory of losing one to Dark magic to guide him and yet Ezio had a talent for Auror work. Applying the scientific Muggle methods to place himself in the shoes of dark wizards and witches and his inherited fondness for the complexity of the written word, he became one of the most talented trackers in the history of the Italian Auror’s office. What set him apart was his unconventional motivation, something his fellow Aurors described as “He never gives a damn about justice. It’s always about retribution for him. Hurting people who hurt people”. Loving the challenge of going up against the criminal and deranged minds, outwitting them or simply besting them in their own game became his own motivation for the job. For ten years Ezio hunted the predators of the magical community, catching nearly every mark without fatalities and minimum casualties. During the chase he stumbled upon something else that complicated things as Ezio met his “Maggie”, the beautiful British liaison of Magical Law Enforcement Margaret Sinclair…

Their relation was a strange one, distant to the point of platonic and yet more sincere than anyone could ever grasp. While most found intimacy through physical closeness, Maggie and Ezio came together by a fondness for literature, poetry and politics. They’d spent their nights discussing all sorts of topics, heated arguments that many might mistake for verbal fights and yet they both enjoyed those moments more than anything else. But Aurors in love are bound to make mistakes and his occurred in a particularly dangerous hunt of a wanted wizard who killed in nine countries throughout Europe. Maggie was sent from the UK to support the Italian Auror’s office in this search for the dark wizard in question was born and raised under the Union Jack. Laying the perfect ambush Maggie, Ezio with the support of three hit wizards cornered their suspect who grew desperate. Lashing out the dark wizard wielded the Imperius curse and hit Maggie with his accursed magic. Using Maggie as a shield between himself and the Aurors Ezio faced an impossible decision. To let the man walk, would end his career; to attack regardless would put Maggie at harm and yet Ezio made the call regardless. Three on one seemed sufficient so when he gave the signal the hit wizards attacked. So did the dark wizard who in his desperation opted for vengeance instead of freedom. With Legimency he invaded Maggie’s mind and left her forever ‘damaged’. The chaos of it all caused Ezio to forfeit protocol, abandoning his position to come to Maggie’s aid which allowed the culprit to get away…

For two years Ezio took a break from Auror work to take care of his beloved who since that day was on the verge of madness. Completely catatonic and beyond his reach, Ezio did all he could to aid and to no avail. Every day he’d sit by her bed, talking in the faint hope that the conversation would reignite her spirit. And yet she laid there, eyes blankly staring ahead of herself out the window, no movement other than the subtle heaving of her chest with each breathe. He brought her back home to the place where he grew up in the hope the serene setting would soothe whatever demons that heinous man unleashed in her head. And while doing it all, his grasp on the world slowly started slipping. He began talking to himself having the same conversations he used to but without the partner. He began controlling every aspect of his life, displaying obsessive compulsive tics and other bizarre characteristics. The nights he actually slept, he did so drunk on the armchair in Maggie’s room; the nights he didn’t, were worse for it allowed his mind to drift into the psyche guilty of this intrusion on his “perfect life”. If not for an unmarked letter Ezio would have spiraled into madness himself but one frigid winter’s eve a courier dropped off an unmarked package holding pictures of a certain dark wizard in the heart of London. That day Ezio picked up his wand again, wrapped that grey trench coat around his shoulders and headed for Rome. Favors were called, paperwork was shuffled on some desks and after a year’s worth of bureaucracy a talented yet vindictive Italian Auror was sent to the UK as part of the international collaboration status. Now Ezio assists the UK Auror’s office in their attempts to catch Dark wizards and witches while pursuing one mark in every available moment of his own time…