Hobomancer
Hobomancers were members of a secret society of travelling wizards who rode the rail lines in the early 20th Century. Their primary mission was protecting the Songlines, seams of magical power that hold reality itself in place. Songlines that become corrupted can enhance curses and other evil magic in their proximety, embolden naturally-occuring predators, and evne cause the landscape itself to take on a sinister aspect. Weakened songlines can break down, tearing rifts in reality that allow things from other dimensions to enter our world. The hobomancers used their knowledge of The Universal Song and ritual magic to purify corrupt songlines and bolster those that had grown weak.
Career
Qualifications
In order to even be considered as a hobomancer, you must first be a hobo. According to an old saw about hobos, hobos are people who travel to work, in contrast to tramps (who travel but do not work) and bums (who neither work nor travel). Therefore, a hobomancer must first be a migrant worker who travels mainly by rail (and usually wihtout buying a ticket). Since the hobomancers were practically unkown even to other wizards when they were active, those who became hobomancers rarely set out to do so. Instead, they were selected (for reasons that ranged from hard-earned reputation to sings and omens to gut impresions) for the position by existing hobomancers.
Career Progression
While the hobomancers are led by a High Council, the council's membership is secret and the details of how new members of the council are chosen is shrouded in mystery. Aside from the council's leadership, there is no heirarchy among hobomancers. While experience, reputation, and expertise can lend weight to a particular hobomancer's arguments or suggestions, all hobomancers are considered equals. A hobomancer's success is represented by the stories they have to tell, not by a title or position.
Payment & Reimbursement
Hobomancers receive no payment for their wizardly work, but they are sometimes rewarded by those who help when their efforts are clearly responsible for a positive outcome (for example, when hobomancers rescue missing children from a monster's clutches--probably without mentioning the monster to the greatful parents). Otherwise, they work for a living like all honest hobos, thought their knowledge and power does sometimes open up new opportunties for them. For instance, hobomancers often make extra money as fortune tellers and those who have magical powers invovling animals often find work as cowpokes, circus performers, or rodeo clowns.
Other Benefits
In addition to the magical training they undergo, every hobomancer is able to call on a special power that they receive as a gift from The Kind Lady in return for promising to live according to a vow that the Lady charges them with upholding. These vows are always tailored to the hobomancer and usually have at least the potential to keep them out of trouble. The powers granted by hobomancers vary greatly, from enhanced magical powers to the ability to spontaneously genereate fire or lightning.
Perception
Purpose
In addition to protecting the songlines, hobomancers played the same role in society as rank and file hobos, providing much-needed immigrant labor to places where seasonal workers were in high demand. They also routinely found themselves involved in mundane "hero work" like finding lost children and bolstering labor strikes.
Social Status
Like their hobo brethren, hobos were always outsiders, but their status in the eyes of normal society varied over time. In the early part of the century, they were valuable migrant workers who were instrumental in the economy of many of the communities they visited. As mechanizations became more common and less manual labor was needed, they became less welcome visitors. The public finally turned on hobos as a group in the 1930s, when large numbers of dust bowl refugees led to labor surpluses that made hobomancers unnecessary.
Demographics
Hobomancers come from all walks of life, but tend to come from the lower rungs of the socio-economic ladders, since those who are comfortable where they are tend to stay there. Leaving everthing behind to take your chances on the road is usually more an act of desperation than bravery.
History
The exact origin of Hobomancers is unknown, but many people believe that they were around sometime before 1897 and were behind the establishment of the first Tourists' Local in that year. Although their work took place in secrecy, historians tend to agree that they reached the height of their power in the 1930s. Hobos became less common after World War II, when the rise of the diesel train and later the interstate highway system changed the way freight was hauled and made catching a train for a short hop much more difficult. If there are still hobomancers out in the world today, they have kept their activities a very tight secret.
Operations
Tools
Hobomancers tend to use everyday materials for their magical work. They read fortunes in the campire or the bottom of a bean can, use hobo symbols and runes and sigils, place powerful charms on wooden nickels, and generally turn trash into (magical) treasure.
Demand
The world sorely needed hobomancers in the past, but no longer relevant.
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