The Gifted

 Mask making has been a long standing tradition in Venice, worn throughout the Carnevale festival. Since the Rent opened, the city has become even more secretive with citizens donning masks at all times of the day. 

 Roll up! Roll up! Get your tickets here for the matinee to end all matinees! Starring the finest actors from Venice and beyond, this show is sure to dazzle and decapitate! Uhh... I mean fascinate! Half price today only - see this show and you’ll never see another! 

 The Rent in the Sky touched some more than others, giving them otherworldly powers, but cursing them to a life of madness. The Commedia dell’Arte are blessed with eldritch skills but cursed to slowly turn into the very characters they portray on stage. 

 Venice is home to many artists, but almost none of those are part of the Gifted. The Artist Maria Fioritura however has been affected by the rent and is now capable of bringing her paintings to life! 

 Everybody forgets about Pierrot, the Commedia dell'Arte member that blends into the crowd. This everyman is able to be seemingly everywhere, always with the same blank expression on his face. It is his face, right? 

 The Ospedale San Servolo is a terrifying place for the residents of Venice. The idea of being sent there is akin to a death sentence. The Doctors help residents as best as possible, but anyone too far gone is relocated, and rarely seen again. For the safety of everyone, of course. 

 The Harbinger, the Herald, Prophet... lots of names for the same being. This strange figure appeared in places around the world simultaneously, but only in one was he murdered. The assassin's blade tore open the Harbinger's chest, a gouge that tore open the heavens and reality. 

 Mario Petralone was a Venetian-born Nobleman. That is until he was caught in Florence during the appearance of the Rent in the Sky. He did not perish in that moment, but existed in a space between realms. Driven by grief and rage Mario possessed his own son. 

 Known across the city as the Demolitionist, Boomer, Mistress Flame, or any number of other synonyms, this is no woman to mess with. Cursed with an unnaturally strong constitution by the Rent in the Sky, she barely feels pain, but is also stripped of many other senses.  

 White Dove was the very first Gifted to reveal herself. In a daring attack on a ship full of spies, White Dove flew out to the harbour and blasted it apart in a fiery cavalcade of white hot beams summoned from the aether. 

 See the dancing, daring performance that the whole city is talking about! The boy who cannot die! See him jump from rooftops, leap across canals, cartwheel down the street, and even fall from the tallest tower without harm! Come today and reap the rewards! 

 The Duke is a man of opposites. His duality knows no bounds - offering service to those who need it one night, then turning on them for coin the next. Although obviously Gifted by the Rent, his powers are relative unknowns too - able to blend into his surroundings and disappear at will. 

 This resident of the Ospedale reacted to treatment in a way previously unseen by any of the Doctors. The patient mutated and erupted into a mass of tentacles, destroying the lab and slaughtering its captors, leaving none alive that would be able to repeat the procedure. The creature disappeared into the night, with no witnesses to speak of. 

 There are few tales as strange as that of Divuorafuoco and Burattino. So it goes that distraught after his family died in the calamity from the heavens, Divuorafuoco turned inwards to his craft. Left old and alone, he tried to recreate the happiness of a family, making a new son from the same tree as that which stood on his family burial ground. 

 A mysterious woman from far off lands, Fadhila keeps her private life exactly that. While she is the very life of parties (parties she's paid to attend), her history and true self are reserved for only her closest confidantes. Unlike her powers! Projecting protective bubbles she is able to shield those close to her from harm, and is always keen to show off her gifts. 

 It's not known who Fate nor Justice were before the Rent in the Sky opened. Whether they were simply people changed by the opening of that celestial rip, none will know.

Given their stoic and universal nature though, it's highly likely that these beings have existed for eons, and the magic of the Rent has simply given them corporeal form, or tied their essence to unlikely bystanders. 

 Dabbling in magic is never an exact science. Every time a mage peers through the Rent in the Sky to draw eldritch energies from beyond, there’s a chance that the spell will do something else entirely, even when performed perfectly.