So in Sophie's "canon" she attended a posh boarding school run by a woman named Poppy who was using it as a way to groom children and pick the most sociopathic ones to get turned into an experimental and highly illegal vampire/human hybrid. Since I want to move away from the vampire angle with Sophie in this au opportunity, I was thinking she could be running some kind of Mage school that is a cover for stealing magic from other older covens? What kinds of more dangerous and/or illegal things can be done with magic?

ETA: Okay after talking stuff over with Raile, I'm thinking maybe Poppy was preying on/experimenting with werefolk instead? Maybe she's part of a division of Torchlight specifically interested in 'curing' werebeasts, where cure is a thinly veiled way of saying 'eradicate'. Would that be something she could advertise openly in magical circles, or would that need to be a hush hush sort of operation?

Additionally, if Sophie is a ghost, but was previously a mage in life, would she retain any of her spellcasting abilities after death?