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iceandfire:adranna_lynderly

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Visual and sound in Adranna Lynderly Character Portrait And Song.

Adranna Lynderly - The known facts

When sir Jiacommo Lynderly married Lady Leytta of Braavos, he dreamed of six children. Leytta was as impolite as to supply him only with three, last of which was an arrogant, flamboyant, decadent failure named Essardo. Said Essardo was sent by his mother to Braavos in the official excuse of having to watch the Braavosi family fortune; truth was that not even his mother could stand his extravagant nature, which was clearly an impending disaster around the starched Westeros nobility. The 16 years old Essardo Lynderly then started a new life in his mother's homeland, and stood up to absolutely any outrageous expectation anyone ever had in mind for him, including being slain in a duel over a courtesan's favour when he was 31.

Having lost his wife ten years earlier to some sea-side lung disease, Essardo Lynderly left behind three things: a fair amount of scandals, an outstanding amount of money, and one 13 years old daughter.

Lady Adranna Lynderly had to take over maintaining both estate and possessions, and, being her father's daughter, failed miserably in doing so. Two years later she managed to have lost over two thirds of her fortune; she was neck-deep in unprofitable investments and manipulated by half the nobility in Braavos. It was then, when she was 15, that Adranna took a week's trip at sea aboard her Silver Viper; what happened there is unknown, but it's agreed by all of Braavos' high class that upon her return she was a different person.

She hired a battalion of mercenaries, lawyers, septons, tutors and advisers to deflect anyone who was milking her fortune; she had a few enemies discreetly-yet-clearly disposed of, entangled her unwanted suitors in endless law suits which sent most of them as arrow-fodder to some front or another, and tripled, within a year, all the gold she previously lost. She then invested most of it in various palaces around the city-state, and then - barring rare occasions - withdrew from the public eye.

About the same time, a new courtesan showed up in the overflown courtesan crowd of Braavos. The Lady Emerald had a fetish for masks and was as cheeky as she was shameless. She made both name, fortune and suitors, and used all three equally lavishly; in short, she was an all-spoken-of attraction, never even mentions in the same sentence with the paper-pushing, loner lady Adranna Lynderly.

Five joyous years of bathing in hedonism, politics and fornication came to an abrupt end when The Lady Emerald was foolish enough to have caught the eye of Lord Quando Giommi; as such things go, he proposed marriage, Emerald proposed he jump out the window, and he retorted that the choices were either marriage (which meant quitting her profession and submitting her entire fortune to him) or being the morale-support wench in a particularly distant infantry. Emerald admitted this indeed shed new appealing light on his proposal, begged a week to prepare for the marriage, discreetly exchanged all her real-estate for jewelery, declared syphilis and fled the country.

* * * *

The Munchkin trait-sheet of Doom

Adranna is highly empathic, very perceptive, a skilled manipulator, singer, dancer and musician; she possesses all the expected courtesan skills, alongside being able to maintain endless hours of smalltalk while making her partner feel clever and fantastic. She's well trained with garotte wire and various subtle ways of putting people to sleep or unconsciousness (the things you do to avoid bad-breathed lovers, eh?), and in doing so quietly enough as to leave the victim still sitting in their chair in the crowded ballroom, only to be discovered hour later by a surprised servant.

Yes, she also has flaws and fears, idiocies and weaknesses, but I already did more writing than I usually would, and besides, a true lady never mentions her faults. She also has some vague plot I'm working on in the background which is all תכך זמם, but since I'm not sure what it is myself, it'll have to wait for now.

Adranna Lynderly - The less known facts, or: Alessandra di Cezare i Liella Gondolieri

Being Braavosi isn't easy. Even if you have a merry family with five brothers, three sisters, a boat maker father and a comedy-del-arte stage-and-mask-artist mother. It can all screw up should, let's say, the plague strike, especially if you're merely eight.

And what if Cloudio Westeroso, the fat merchant who used to work with your papa, ends up finding you there, in the moldy warehouse by the water, which used to be the happy home of your family? And what if he takes you in (and takes you in many other fashions) and cares for you for years while you supply him with decorated masks, bookkeeping and occasional sex? And what if said Giuseppe doesn't even have the decency to stay alive and dies of over cholesterol when you turn 13?

At this point Sandra is a rather practical girl, and knows how the world works. She ransacks Westeroso's valuables and bribes a sailor, thus ending up as a stowaway on a ship which, she plans, will be her gateway to another life; Sadly enough though, the third night finds her bumping into someone on the stairs – and said someone not only falls back and breaks its neck, they also turn out to have been Lady Adranna Linderly, a scrawny, dumb Braavosi noblewoman who also happens to own the boat.

Being Braavosi isn't easy.

Seeing as Sandra herself is skinny and dark-haired, she quickly exchanges cloths with the body, feeds the evidence to the fish and has the nerve to impersonate as the real lady. She fakes a slight case of smallpox, hides her face and raspily demands her crew to immediately take her back to the family estate – where she fires the staff, hires a new one, rebalances the dwindling family income and comes up with the best mask ever – the Emerald of Braavos.

While the Lady persona is a bookkeeping, boring person, The Emerald serves Adranna's need to flirt with danger, whore for intimacy and achieve safety by power; but we all know fate tends to poop on her head, right? This cycle's excrement takes the form of Samuele Verdi, once a sailor who let a beggar girl onto a ship, and nowadays an assassin. He is also the only person alive knowing that Adranna is not Adranna, a fact which he threatens to publicize should she not use her fake family ties to help him down his current target, one Lord Justine Lynderly.

You don't agrue with people who know your deepest secret, hence Adranna exchanges most of her assets for other assets under many different names, spends most of her left fortune purchasing The Silver Viper and scurries off to Westerose to play jackal.

iceandfire/adranna_lynderly.1257183838.txt.gz · Last modified: 2011/05/22 07:29 (external edit)