Post by Ze Flying Wraithetti Monstress on Apr 21, 2009 20:46:50 GMT -5
Name:
Sthenno
Age:
Unknown, although she's most likely less than a century old.
Race:
Werecat
Appearance:
Physically, Sthenno is very odd-looking, even for a werecat. Like all of her race, she has a very small, young human form, and looks about fourteen years old. Sthenno takes this permanent adolescence in a very positive way, though, considering it a form of ‘eternal youth’. However, there are some disadvantages to it- she never grows any taller than her current height at 4’9”, and her body is stuck in mid-development. She doesn’t have much of a body, being so skinny that it’s easy to call her fragile. She has small breasts and not the widest hips, although she makes up for it with decent legs, which come in handy while out scouting. Sthenno’s skin colour isn’t one seen often in Alagaësia- it’s a pale golden colour, like most people have in the far east. Her skin is also annoyingly subject to the occasional blemish due to adolescent acne, which Sthenno either maniacally pops or hides with make-up.
Sthenno’s face is probably the strangest thing about her. She has high cheekbones and a tall forehead, giving her a heart-shaped, if flat, face. Her lips are full, hiding her sharp feline fangs, and her nose is rather flat, but they suit her face shape. Her eyes are the most noticeable- shaped like small almonds, they are framed by short eyelashes and upswept thin, dark eyebrows. Sthenno’s natural eye colour, like most far eastern people, is dark brown, and her natural hair colour is black, but for the sake of blending in with the strictly Nordic population she has tinted her eyes green with magic and she colours her hair pale blonde with dyes. Her hair isn’t particularly long, only reaching her shoulders, and is parted in the middle so that her bangs cover her entire forehead.
Sthenno strongly prefers her human form to her werecat form, so she rarely uses it. It often comes in handy, though, since she looks like a very normal kitty cat. She’s a little smaller than the average house cat and very slim, with long legs compared to her body. She’s a tabby, with pale yellow fur and orange stripes, and has large, inquisitive yellow-green eyes, which are the only indication of her human intelligence.
Sthenno pays an almost aggravating amount of attention to her human appearance. Her (mostly stolen) collection of fabrics, make-up, and accessories is enough to make most high-class noblewomen turn green with envy. Sthenno uses soot, chalk, lead, henna dyes, ground minerals and plants, plant secretions, and many other natural ingredients for her make-up. However, some items she uses, such as mercury and poisonous plants like belladonna, cause her to sometimes get very nasty skin infections. She applies it all over her face and body. As for clothing, Sthenno enjoys wearing flowing skirts and dresses that allow free movement, and doesn’t much enjoy wearing pants and anything tight. The cuts of Sthenno’s dresses usually leave her arms and legs bare, although she never wears anything revealing enough so that it slips into vulgarity. Sthenno also wears a lot of perfume and jewellery- so much, in fact, that it's very possible to smell and hear her coming long before she actually comes into view. The only time Sthenno ever wears tight clothing and no perfume or jewellery is when on her scouting missions, when she has to wear tight cloths for silently stalking through forests and fields. Although she strongly prefers thickly woven cloths, she often sticks with thick leather since it allows both movement and decent protection from weapons. Of course, Sthenno could always turn into her cat form for stalking, but it’s rarely effective when she winds up stark naked in the middle of nowhere in her human form.
When it comes to battle, Sthenno’s most effective battle tactic, by far, is to run away screaming. Sthenno only has a little bit of training from Remy, which includes stealth, archery, and knife-fighting. She knows enough to hold her ground, but only for a long enough time to scream for help or to find a breach so that she can run away from her attacker. When forced to fight, Sthenno prefers to be far away with her flat bow, which is narrow and deep at the handle to provide easier grip. It’s very small in shape, so the distance it covers is short, but it’s easier for Sthenno to carry. The bow is made out of yew for flexibility. In close combat, Sthenno employs hairpins- demure while she’s relaxing, they can be deadly weapons. But when battle is serous, she usually uses stilettos or her Misericorde dagger.
Personality:
Sthenno, despite not knowing her actual age, is very young for a werecat. Besides her appearance, her youth is very obvious in her personality, which seems to be stuck in adolescence just as much as her body is. Being subject to undying hormones, Sthenno is far more impulsive and miscalculated than other werecats. She has a very extraverted, open personality, and isn’t afraid to speak her mind. However, this usually leads to her regretting it afterward, since her tendency to constantly speak her thoughts usually ends up with her letting slip some secretive information or saying something hurtful.
Sthenno is used to living in more-than-decent conditions, which can lead to her acting spoiled whenever she doesn’t get something she wants by throwing a tantrum or going off to sulk. Unfortunately for her, though, while in Surda, she’s forced to live in squat little tents rather than her nice house in Urû’baen, and being detached from her wealth so often has caused Sthenno to result to stealing. She takes anything she can get her hands on, although her favourites are elegant clothing, incense, and food. Besides food, Sthenno hoards everything she steals in her bedroom in Urû’baen, which is now overflowing with stolen goods.
When with people, Sthenno can be passed off as arrogant from her vanity, how much she talks, and how spoiled she is, although she is actually very submissive. She would much rather follow someone than be a leader, and often has trouble making decisions properly. Sthenno is terrified of violence, both due to her past and her religion, which is very peaceful. However, this isn’t obvious when she talks with people, since she doesn’t like showing fear and unhappiness. In fact, Sthenno talks constantly, and always needs to be with people, often feeling depressed when she isn’t.
Sthenno’s religion is called Theravada, which literally means ‘Teaching of the Elders’, and is a very old religion that is practiced to the far east. It holds that life is permeated with suffering caused by desire, that suffering ceases when desire ceases, and that enlightenment obtained through right conduct, wisdom, and meditation releases one from desire, suffering, and rebirth. However, Sthenno is very out-of-touch with her religion, and constantly struggles to find an evasive inner peace. She has an unhealthy fear of the dark from her time in the dungeons, and she also has a complete aversion and phobia of pain, and these two fears have broken her holds on her religion. However, Theravada has a very high sense of morality and humanity, which Sthenno constantly exercises when she heals Varden warriors, and sometimes even Imperials, since Sthenno hates inflicting pain just as much as she hates receiving it.
Sthenno had very traumatic experiences in her early years, but rather than becoming bitter from it, resigning to pitying herself, or becoming completely cold, Sthenno has asserted herself and is determined to take apart the Empire for all the pain it gave her. However, she does it in a strictly non-violent way. She uses her odd werecat powers for healing, where they seem to work the best, and her kleptomania comes in handy when off robbing important documents from Imperials. Sthenno has complete confidence in herself despite her lack of inner peace, and has devoted herself to the Varden’s cause.
Sthenno also has several very animalistic tendencies. She's obsessed with catching mice, loves balls of yarn, and reacts in a very cat-like way to anger- she hisses and usually hides herself from whoever insulted her, resigning herself to glaring at them from a distance. Sthenno also has a very feline curiosity for everything, which more often than not gets her into trouble.
History:
Sthenno’s earliest memories are completely incomprehensible scraps of random information. All she knows from that time period is her name, her religion, and a far eastern language called Siamese. She has no idea of who her parents were, or even how many years it’s been since her memories make sense, so Sthenno’s birth and age are completely elusive. Her next memories are a little more comprehensive, but still very broken in places- she remembers a lot of pain, a lot of darkness, and her two sisters- Medusa, the younger, and Euryale, the older. Sthenno later learned that this place of imprisonment was the dungeons deep in the palace of Urû’baen, where she was tested on by Imperial scientists to better understand her rare race.
Sthenno’s memories become crystal clear at some point in time where she somehow ended up on the plains east of Urû’baen in the middle of a winter snowstorm, stark naked and freezing. Sthenno later assumed that her sisters had helped her escape. At this point, Sthenno didn’t know her identity, didn’t know anything about the world, only pain, her sisters, and some strange sounds that she could make with her mouth. She thought like an animal. She also had the odd feeling that someone was hunting for her, so she hid in an abandoned badger den. Soon, the scientists swept by, searching high and low for her. They kept going east, missing Sthenno entirely. Sthenno had other things to worry about, though- she was freezing, although she couldn’t stop it since she didn’t know what freezing was. However, after curiously reaching into a very deep part of her mind, she found that she could turn into a small animal with hairs all over its body that made the cold go away. She fell asleep in the badger den, and slept through the blizzard.
When Sthenno woke up, she found pain gnawing at her tummy, which went away when she felt the strange inclination to pounce on a small bushy animal and stick it in her mouth. As it turned out, the further south she went, the more tiny animals she found, and so Sthenno began making her way south out of Alagaësia. For several months, she didn’t do anything but walk and eat simply because she didn’t know how to do anything else.
About six months after her escape, Sthenno found herself at the southern tip of the continent that makes up Alagaësia, a country called Graeca. It was currently locked in a battle with a country even further to the south called Agypt. Sthenno managed to wander near one of the Agypten commander’s tents, where an officer saw her, picked her up, and took her to the safety of his tent. In Agypt, cats were very sacred and considered divine protectors. When Agypt won against Graeca, the thrilled officer took Sthenno home with him to the southern continent of Africay. When they landed, Sthenno was faced with a massive desert. It was so hot that she decided to change into her human form. When the officer saw this, he was speechless. He immediately wrapped Sthenno up in cloth and dragged her to the nearest temple.
There, Sthenno was suddenly heaped with jewels, food, and worshippers. Sthenno didn’t know why this was for several very long months, in which the Agypten priests took it upon themselves to teach her. As it turned out, they thought she was the cat goddess Bastet, the divinity of protection, come to earth in human form. After some more basic teaching, Sthenno managed to unlock her coherent human thoughts, and she realized that she wasn’t Bastet. Still, she enjoyed the attention, and for several years reclined in total luxury.
However, the ‘goddess’ didn’t maintain her divine duties. Believing that Bastet was backing him, the Agypten pharaoh had his armies assault every neighbouring country, resulting in colossal damage to his armies, economy, and very few victories. At first, the Agyptens thought that this was just because they weren’t giving enough offerings to Sthenno, and they plied her with even more wealth. But after some time, rumours appeared that she was a fake goddess. Soon after these seeds of suspicion were sowed, the Imperial scientists appeared in Agypt, with a full description and picture of Sthenno, and a reward for her capture.
The Agypten priests decided to do a test. They pricked Sthenno’s palm with some glass to see if she really was a goddess. She bled, obviously, which confirmed that she was a fake. She was happily handed over to the Imperials, who stuck her in a crate and put her on a boat back to Alagaësia. Sthenno docked at Teirm after two months at sea, and was trundled back to Urû’baen, where she was met with a new doctor who mentally introduced herself as Dr. Ramakrishna. Sthenno was once again placed in a very dark cell, where she awaited her fate. She isn’t sure if her sisters were there or not, since she never saw them during her second imprisonment.
Sthenno first had to undergo a basic physical exam to check on her health, which was done so by a very bored, irritated elf who treated Sthenno like a stupid animal. He considered her so stupid, in fact, that while he examined her, he didn’t bother to shield his mind. Curious, Sthenno tapped into his brain before he had a chance to stop her. Even though she didn’t understand the common tongue at that point, she saw through pictures that the elf, Remy Kamenwati, was an ex-Rider and a spy for something called the Varden. Even though Sthenno didn’t have a clue about what Riders or Vardens were, she sensed that they were important and secretive information. She got an idea to make a deal, and, with pictures, broadcasted to Remy that if he didn’t help her escape, she would reveal his secrets. Remy, furious, grudgingly agreed.
After Remy finished the exam, he smuggled Sthenno in cat form under his coat, took her out of the dungeons, out of the palace, and into the streets of Urû’baen, where he dumped her and mentally ordered her to scram. Sthenno happily did so, but before she’d gone two steps she realized that she was in danger of capture again. Besides that, she was alone in a strange country where she knew nothing of its customs or spoke the language. She came rushing back to Remy and threatened him again unless he gave her a place to stay. He shook her off, but Sthenno followed him home. He threatened to kill her, but when she still failed to leave he reluctantly allowed her to stay. Sthenno was put up with her very own room, and she settled in quite nicely.
Remy taught Sthenno some of the common tongue in the following weeks as well as about the Varden rebellion and himself- there was no point in trying to keep his identity a secret when she already knew everything- which prompted Sthenno to make the decision to join the Varden. She wanted the Empire to pay for what it had done to herself and her sisters. So, on Remy’s next trip to Farthen Dûr, Sthenno signed up as a healer for the Varden. This was Sthenno’s only job for several years, but then her kleptomania kicked in. Remy caught her one time and handed her over to Ajihad, hoping to get rid of her. Instead of being punished, though, Sthenno was given the task of recovering several documents stolen from the Varden in Gil’ead. When she did the job with very minor problems, she was granted the title of official ‘thief’ of the Varden, with the job of recovering stolen possessions or ‘borrowing’ items from the Empire. This, and healing, has been Sthenno’s job ever since.
