Jane is the middle child and only daughter in the Drew family. She is also sometimes called Jenny or Jenny-o by Bran Davies.
Family[]
She is one of three children in the Drew Family; her older brother is Simon Drew and her younger brother is Barney Drew. Her mother is a painter and her father is a doctor. The family resides in London.
History[]
Warning: this section contains spoilers.
Jane first appears in Over Sea, Under Stone, the first book in the series. She, with her family, are on vacation in the Cornwall town of Trewissick with Merriman Lyon, a mysterious professor who has been a friend of the family for so long that they call him Great Uncle Merry, or Gumerry for short. While they are in Cornwall, the Drew children discover an ancient map in the attic of their rented house. Immediately, mysterious characters begin trying to take the map from them, including Mr. Hastings, Mr. Withers and Polly Withers. Gumerry reveals to them that the map leads to a grail, a relic from the time of Arthur, and that the grail, the dark figures following them, and he himself are part of a cosmic struggle between the Dark and the Light. The Drew children agree to help find the grail. They finally locate it hidden in a cave; unfortunately, the manuscript necessary to translate the cryptic but vital markings on the grail falls into the sea. The children donate the grail to a museum.
Jane next appears in Greenwitch, the third book in the series. After the grail is stolen from the museum, the Drew children return to Cornwall with Gumerry to locate it. They find they are to be sharing the task with Will Stanton, who turns out to be much more than he seems. In this installment, the Drew children focus on finding the grail and the manuscript that was lost in the first book. Jane plays a vital role in this when she, by virtue of being female, is allowed to view a local tradition, the making of a sort of sacrificial wicker creature called the Greenwitch (thing) which is then dropped into the sea. Haunted by a sadness emanating from the Greenwitch, which no one else seems to be able to feel, Jane impulsively wishes that it could be happy. This becomes vitally important when Gumerry and Will discover that the Greenwitch, brought to life by Wild Magic, has discovered the case containing the missing manuscript on the bottom of the sea. Delighted with having a secret of its own, the Greenwitch guards the case zealously, refusing to give it up to Will and Gumerry. However, when it discovers that Jane, the only human to ever think kindly toward it, wants the manuscript, it gives it to her. When the grail is recovered, the manuscript is used to translate the markings on it, revealing the next part of Will's quest.
Jane's final appearance is in Silver on the Tree, the final book in the series. The Drew family is vacationing in Wales when Jane hears a hunting horn blown; answering the call, she finds it is Will Stanton, gathering her and her brothers for a final quest. It is revealed that the Drew children are three of the Six who will help drive back the Dark in the final confrontation; they are spoken of in the prophecy "When the Dark comes rising, Six will turn it back / Three from the circle, three from the track." The Drews are the three from the track, being the three mortals in the group (the three from the circle are Will, Gumerry and Bran Davies). Attempting to solve part of a prophecy stating that "The mountains are singing and the Lady comes," they travel with Bran and Will to Cran March Arthur. There, Will makes the mountain sing and the Lady appears to Jane, giving her a message that dictates the next part of Bran and Will's quest, to find an important sword. The Dark immediately sends an afanc, a lake monster, to try to scare her into revealing the message, but she resists. After Bran and Will return with the sword, Jane and her brothers travel with them, Gumerry, and the rest of the circle to the final conflict with the Dark. Along with the rest of the Six, Jane holds aloft one of the Six Signs (in her case, the Sign of Bronze) to drive back the forces of the Dark while Bran waits for the proper moment to defeat the Dark. After the Dark is driven back, Jane, along with Simon, Barney and Bran, is caused to forget all that has happened. The book ends with the five children together in Wales, with only Will remembering what has occurred.
Personality[]
Jane is neat and kind. Naturally cautious, she serves as a voice of reason for her brothers, who often want to rush headlong into danger. Although she is very good and comes to fight fiercely for the Light, she is at first often cautious about getting too involved in things they know little about, being usually concerned about the danger involved. Once she has decided to help the Light, however, she is very courageous. Despite her young age, she is frequently described as having strong maternal instincts, usually for her brothers but sometimes for other members of the Six, including for Gumerry, despite his being several millennia her elder. Despite being generally good-natured, in the fifth book she is, for a time, strongly beset by the Dark, causing her to be unusually irritable.
Role in the books[]
Jane's position as the only female among her siblings and in the Six frequently plays an important role. She is the only one allowed to view the making of the Greenwitch, as it's for females only, and in the fifth book, the Lady speaks to her and her only because of the bond they share in being female. The Lady also suggests a deeper bond - calling her, "Jane, Jana, Juno" similar to the way the name Merriman Lyon is changed to Merlin (or vice versa) by Barney. Jana and Juno are both names for Roman goddesses. At other points in the book the Lady shows a slight but marked preference for Jane.
Jane is also important among the Six because she is very sensitive to the feelings of others. This compassion leads her to pity the Greenwitch, leading in the end to the recovery of the manuscript. Like her brother Barney, she is, despite being a mere mortal, sensitive to feelings from the Dark. This, in combination with her thoughtfulness and calmness, often causes her to be privy to experiences her brothers don't have; for instance, in the third book, she is the only Drew child who witnesses the haunting of Tressiwick by the Greenwitch, because her brothers fall asleep but she is more aware of the fact that something strange is about to occur. She is also the only one of her siblings who thinks there is something strange about Will, and, as such, is the only one who knows that Will is an Old One at the end of Greenwitch. In the fifth book, she is the first to answer Will's calling of the Six, because her brothers are tromping about elsewhere and she's the first to hear and understand there is something significant about the call.
Physical Appearance[]
She is frequently described as wearing her hair in a ponytail bound back by a ribbon, which she is fond of tugging on. Bran describes her as pretty.