From Changeling Venue

Seeming	Fairest Draconic
Court	Summer Court ••••
Freehold	Nomadic
Player	Darcey Kunigisky

Contents 1 Overview 2 Into the Ragged Meadow of Her Soul 2.1 I'm Bleeding to Death - Everything's Fine! 2.2 I Think I Made You Up Inside My Head 2.3 No Day But Today 3 Associates and Acquaintances: Connections of Many Ilks 4 Character Inspirations 5 Soundtrack 6 Quotes 7 Rumors 8 OOC Notes

Overview

Alias(es): Siwan, Siwan Tudur, Joanne Tudor, Seonag
Location: Nomadic
Age:
Seeming/Kith:Fairest Draconic
Court: Summer
Concept:Lost knight looking for a Cause
Motley:
Mien:
Mask:

Into the Ragged Meadow of Her Soul

The girl known now as the woman Siwan had a life with little excitement and neither tragedy nor chaos. Her parents were middle class, her mother the manager for a local clothing store and her father a director of regional sales for a beverage company. They ensured their four children had everything they needed growing up; sometimes it wasn’t entirely what they wanted, but they had a yard to play in rather than tarmac streets, ice skates (albeit second hand), and a roof over their heads and warm food in their stomachs. Life wasn’t perfect, but it was good.

Isabelle grew up the third of four, and when it came time to pick her ‘hobby’, she picked horseback riding. She worked at the stables part-time to help pay for her lessons, mucking stalls and helping when it was a show-day. Isabelle grew to be an avid equestrian, and everything looked on the up and up for her. It was possible, her instructors told the young girl, that if she kept up her good work she might be able to eventually join the Olympic equestrian team.

She was riding by the river that bordered the stable, and had turned around a bend. It was an ox-bow, and soon enough she would be back in view by those who surreptitiously watched her. The only problem was… she didn’t turn back into sight. Investigation showed that the bay mare she'd taken out had been walking down the path—her tracks were clear—and then suddenly disappeared.

I'm Bleeding to Death - Everything's Fine!

Isabelle was taught to fight both on the jousting field, the tourney circles and in gladiatorial pits. She was capable in combat, meeting many Changelings, winning many bouts, and losing some as well. She has never claimed to be perfect, but the life as a warrior has left her with more than physical scars. For Siwan, she doesn’t know how long the time in Arcadia was. There were battles that went on for only a day by the sun in the sky, but her circadian clock told her must have truly been three or four; there were marches that should have taken weeks that she felt may have gone quicker for ‘cinematic effect’. The fae that kept her is one known as the Armsmaster, interested in combat and the arts of war and weaponry.

It was in the pits that she met Laine, another Changeling. Paired in combat by their Keepers, Laine killed Siwan in their first bout. Raised from the dead, Siwan was sent in to fight again, again and again. Whenever she was paired with Laine, the two found chances to speak even as they fought; eventually, the two would seek each other out in the common areas of the arena and spend time together. There was a slow but steady movement towards intimacy, and the pair fell in love over the turn of what seemed like several years. Eventually, the two could not take the torments of Faerie and the fighting any longer. While they were good experiences, the pain of the the deaths, the torment and the pain overtook them. There was no way that they could truly love and be together in the miasma of Faerie, and there was only one option left to them: escape.

When the pair fled the realm and the arena, it was with fingers twined tightly together, and hope and faith resonating in their hearts. They'd fought each other, nearly killed each other, and would escape together. When they came to the Hedge, fighting through the brambles, all their plans came to naught. The baying of the hunting dogs soon echoed close to them. To this day, Siwan doesn't know who let go first, her or Laine; convinced by years of anguish and frustration, Siwan is convinced it's her. As each fought to pass through the brambles and thorns and free themselves from Faerie, the two women moved further and further apart. The dogs grew louder and louder, the bellowing and baying almost at their heels.

When Siwan emerged, she was standing on the edge of an open field, no one in sight. Scratched, torn and battered, her tunic in tatters, the emptiness and the sound of the birds was a mixture of bliss and misery. She was free from the grasp of her Keeper—but Laine was gone. The first moves made to integrate with Fae society were attempts to find her lover, seeking her in every Court and every Freehold she saw. No one had word of the other woman, and it brought the new Lost to eventually realizing that she had to choose her own path in order to survive—she could keep looking for Laine, but she'd do her love no good if she was dead.

I Think I Made You Up Inside My Head

Siwan has never given up hope for finding Laine, though she knows it’s rather a hopeless case. She has held relationships of varying spans since emerging from Faerie, believing she has to find a way to keep her heart and the idea of romance alive so that when she finds Laine again, she can remember what love is like. Some relationships are successful, and some not so much; sometimes it’s been deliberate sabotage, sometimes unconsciously sabotaged by fear or worry, but nothing lasts forever, and Siwan’s perpetual comparison of everyone and everything to the hope and bliss she had stolen in the time with her lover is never quite met by what she finds in the Real. At times, Faerie and Laine are like a dream, and she despairs.

Like most Lost, Siwan has a case of post-traumatic stress disorder; combined with a solid dose of paranoia and accompanied by a chaser of obsession, she carries baggage to any sort of relationship. She enjoys quoting the musical Rent, and saying she's looking for baggage to match her own. Rumour has it that if someone can bring her solid word of Laine, Siwan will agree to Pledges or give boons to the one who brings her true word.

No Day But Today

In the world of the Real, as she calls it, Siwan hasn't got much going for her. She is martially trained and inclined, along with skill with horses. She has found herself taking several different roles in the new world she inhabits; socially, she participates in the Society for Creative Anachronism with a focus on the equestrian; otherwise she earns her income working at a stable and helping train horses as well as their potential riders. It doesn't earn her lots of money, but enough to rent a small apartment, buy the things she needs to survive, and to keep her head above water when things get tight.

Within the Lost society, she lingers on the fringe of many things. She is idealistic and has a healthy dose of chivalry, whether it's in her best interests or not. She is willing to raise her sword and fight for goals and reasons; in fact, many have realized that since she is looking for a Cause, her almost callous willingness to fight can be capitalized on. Some have expected she would join The Tolltaker Knighthood, and others The Sacred Band of the Golden Standard, but Siwan has yet to align herself with any Entitlement. Ostensibly, Siwan is a member of The Praesidium, but she doesn't quite seem to fit their stereotype. She has been out of Faerie for just over ten years, having emerged in 1995--yet somehow, she still has adjustment issues.

Siwan is known to frequent the Tomnahurich Market, taking advantage of the social events and those who ply the trade of rumour--and even slaves--to seek out traces of Laine. She's only rarely brought things to sell, usually uniquely American goblin fruit or objects to trade.

Associates and Acquaintances: Connections of Many Ilks

Gaius Arctorus
die Rattenkonigin
Myo

Character Inspirations

-Kerowyn – Mercedes Lackey's "Tales of Velgarth"
-Kethryveris of House Pheregul – Mercedes Lackey's "Tales of Velgarth"
-Red Sonja – Roy Thomas (NOT Howard's pistol-wielding Sonya)
-Zenobia (historical figure Queen of Palmyra as well as Conan’s wife)
-Britomartis – Edmund Spenser's "The Faerie Queene"
-Bradamante – Ludovico Ariosto's "Orlando Furioso"
-Belit – Robert E Howard's "Conan the Barbarian"
-Gaita of Lombardy (historical figure)
-Achillia – female gladiatrix (historical figure)
-Delilah – Jennifer Roberson's "Tiger and Del" books
-Brienne of Tarth - George RR Martin's "Game of Thrones" series

Soundtrack

-"Without You" – RENT
-"Angel" – Stabbing Westward
-"You Complete Me" – Stabbing Westward
-"I Remember" – Stabbing Westward
-"Isabella" - Mediaeval Baebes
-"Strange Glue" - Catatonia
-"Nothing Hurts" - Catatonia
-"Only In My Dreams" - Debbie Gibson

Quotes

• "Our baggage doesn't exactly match but it travels well enough together for a bit." - die Rattenkonigin

Rumors

OOC Notes

‘Into the ragged meadow of [her] soul’ – e.e. cummings’ “If I have made, my lady, intricate”
‘I think I made you up inside my head’ – Sylvia Plath’s “Mad Girl’s Love Song".
'I'm bleeding to death - everything's fine!' - Tracy Bonham's "Mother, Mother"