Mosh

Mosh
Mosh, from Ultima VII Part Two
Species:	human
Appearances
Ultima VII Part Two Location: Moonshade

Mosh is a homeless woman (also known as "The Rat Woman") living in the city of Moonshade on the Serpent Isle. She appears in Ultima VII Part Two.

Description

Mosh was the twin sister of Columna, the Green Enchantress, who went on to steal the Comb of Beauty from Lady Yelinda of Fawn. Using its powers, Columna made herself look unnaturally young and desirable and went on to deny that she and Mosh were related. In addition to this, Columna also used magic to seduce Mosh's beloved, a young mage named Trulacci.

It is unclear how Mosh became homeless. When the Avatar met her, she was sleeping in the gutters, with her only "friends" being the rats she fed and cared for. She had a gruff demeanor and initially had little to say to the Avatar, as the hero had no spellbook and even in her fallen state, Mosh had little respect for "mundanes."

Once the hero was a proven magic-user, Mosh proved more receptive. She related her story to the Avatar and would gift him or her with a magic harp after the hero charitably gave the old beggar woman some fish to eat. Using the harp soothed the violent temperament of the ratmen which dwelt in the catacombs, causing them to sleep and allowing the hero to pass through their dwellings unscathed.

When Shamino the Anarch later overtook Moonshade, Mosh died in the resulting chaos.

Lore

“

Sitting in the street was a rather ugly old beggar woman with something in her hands. I asked her where I might find an inn. She blinked up at me with a lost smile and told me her name was Mosh. She then held out her hands and asked if I'd like to pet her friend. I was rather taken aback when I realized that her "friend" was actually a very large rat! She rattled on about rats and men and how much they love music. By then I was very sure this pitiful woman was quite mad and I said good-bye. – from Balancing the Scales (Ultima VII Part Two)

Trivia

• The model for Mosh's character portrait is Elizabeth A. Ward.
• Mosh mentions that Trulacci's son "now languishes in the depths of the Mountains of Freedom", although the identity of this child is never explicitly revealed.
• According to the original design documents for Serpent Isle, Mosh was to have given the Avatar a magic compass for navigating the Moonshade catacombs if she was given additional food (in the final release, this compass is instead found inside a chest in the Seminarium's dormitory). Furthermore, she was intended to survive the coming of Shamino the Anarch, and could be found gleefully murdering cats with the Death Vortex spell in her excitement over the abolition of restrictions on magic use in the city.
• All the inhabitants of Moonshade have Italian or Italianish names. The name Mosh sounds very similar to the adjective "moscio", Italian for "limp" or "dull".

Gallery

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  The magic compass