OOC: App
User Name/Nick: Ari
User LJ: rivin
AIM/IM: FallenSun13
E-mail: redrobin133@gmail.com
Other Characters: T'Pol, Shinzon, Tim Drake, Jack Harkness
Character Name: Imriel nó Montrève de la Courcel
Series: Kushiel's Legacy
Age: 18
From When?: At the end of the firstb ook, Kushiel's Scion.
Inmate/Warden: Warden. Imri has desires he considers dark and unwanted, at times, but his life has been ruled by a promise he made himself a s a child: I will try to be good.
Item: Canis' medallion
Abilities/Powers: He's been sorta kinda trained in the Casseline style of fighting - he can use two daggers very well, but he's better with a sword. He knows several languages, and knows some of the arts of covertcy. Imri's very good at snuffing out a lie, when face to face, and has been loosely trained to remember everything he comes across. As a member of the Shahrizai House, descended from Kushiel, he has the distinct ability to observe fault lines in other people - the things they're afraid of, the things they want. Occasionally, it makes it very clear to him that h can manipulate people into doing what he wants. He can't control this, it comes and goes and acts more as realization than an actual power - and he isn't particularly fond of seeing these things.
Personality: Goat herder, slave, Prince of the Blood, penniless gentleman scholar. Imriel has been all of these things in his short life, and every one has of them has influenced him in a great many ways. He spent his childhood in an orphanage at a temple to Blessed Elua, herding goats and not knowing what he looked like, or who his parents were. It was a sheltered, pleasant life, and he could have spent the rest of it there without objection - it taught him compassion, and love, and simple joys.
Daršanga taught him horror. Imriel has gone through a lot, at a very young age, and it left a scar - several scars, actually. He doesn't open up easily. He broods. His social graces, though extremely polite, often leave him appearing aloof and haughty to those that don't know him. When he doesn't have someone particularly bright - like Eammon - to pull him out of his own thoughts, he tends to find a niche there. Imri isn't the easiest man in Terre d'Ange to get along with.
He's not the hardest either, though. The rest of his world tends to regard D'Angelines as snobbish - and with good reason. They may be the world's newest people, relatively speaking, but they are descended from angels. They have gifts other cultures can only dream of, and many of Imriel's people enjoy lauding that over others outside their borders. Imri has never done this; though he longs for his home, longs for his people and good and everything he knows, he has never claimed supremacy by virtue of his nationality - nor virtue of his princeliness. In fact, more often than not, Imriel prefers not to remind others of his station. Though he is not as desperate as he was to remain hidden as he was in Tiberium, he prefers his name to Your Highness.
Imriel's a complexity. He wants comfort and compassion in tandem with wanting cruelness. His own desires contradict each other, frequently, and while he masks it well enough, he can't always. Imriel's got a temper, and certain things set it off. Being lied to, mentioning his parents, questioning his honor and his loyalty. He doesn't care much for that shit. His loyalty, once earned, is absolute; it can make him foolhardy and reckless, of course. But his greatest friends will always have him at their sides, where possible. Though sometimes loyalties contradict each other.
This prince is consistently extremely hard on himself. He was raised a goat herding shepherd, and now has to hear himself referred to as Your Highness; it's duties compounding duties, and Imriel is wary of his own failure. He's quick to admire kindness and courage and loyalty in others, but slow to see it in himself. It's there, of a surety - but Imri's often blind to it.
And of course, Imriel loves. D'Angelines are notorious for their acceptance of lovematches, but, that said, Imri is quite possibly one of the most heterosexual men in Terre d'Ange. He's had his issues with men, after all. But love is love, and it changes - you find it and lose it, again and again.
Path to Redemption: --
History: Once, Blessed Elua bade his children, Love as thou wilt. A traitor was no exception to that rule. Imriel's parents were traitors twice over - Melisande Shahrizai, a scion of Kushiel, and a Prince of the Blood, Bendicte de la Courcel. They plotted treason in La Serenissima, and that treason resulted in Imriel, a Prince of the Blood intended to take the throne from Queen Ysandre de la Courcel and her half-Pictish daughters.
Every D'Angeline knows this story: how Phèdre nó Delaunay, a Servant of Naamah, a courtesan, saved the Realm and the queen's throne a second time. She knew Imriel's mother better than anyone, and made a bargain with her over Imriel's safety: Melisande would nver again rise up against Queen Ysandra or her daughters. In exchange, Phèdre would take Imriel into her household.
But plans are never simple enough. Imriel had been hidden away for his own protection, hidden for a decade. He was meant to be safe. For a time, he was. He was blissful, and ignorant. Growing up as an orphan in a Temple of Elua in Siovale, where there are no mirrors, Imriel remained untouched by his treasonous past. He was not judged for it; he had a sense of belonging that he would never again feel quite so strongly. But all knowledge is worth having - sometimes even at a terrible price.
Imriel was abducted by Fadil Chouma, a Menekhetan slaver. He was taken away from everything he knew in the Temple - love, compassion, friendship - and dragged to Menekhet, where he was sold to the Aka-Magi,the bone priests of Drujan. They brought him to Daršanga.
What happened to him there, in the zenana, the harem of the Mahrkagir, Imriel has told in full only to one person; Phèdre survived a good deal of it with him, after all. To others, he has spoken in pieces: to Helena Correggio, daughter of the Prince of Lucca, he told an abridged version, saving her some of the horror. To Eammon mac Grainne, Prince of the Dalriada and Imriel's greatest friend, his sworn brother, he told somewhat more. He shared some of the horror that was Daršanga and felt lighter for it - but some of the things he endured will be known by none after Phèdre.
But he was rescued. When all the world feared Drujan and the Mahrkagir, feared his bone priests power and their caveat of ill thoughts, ill words, ill deeds, when all the armies of Khebbel-im-Akkad were destroyed by this new Kingdom and their dark presence threatened to envelope the world, Blessed Elua sent a courtesan and her Casseline warrior to bring it down. And they brought Imriel out.
His adventures weren't over; he traveled to Jebe-Barkal, and Saba, where Phèdre found the Name of God. He traveled to the Straits between Alba and Terre d'Ange, and heard the Name spoken. Though he can't say it himself, though he doesn't possess the name, he heard it, and knew that God's name is love. Everyone on board the ship that witnessed it heard their language's word for love; Imriel will never forget it.
He returned to Terre d'Ange with Phèdre and Joscelin, her consort. They adopted him into their house household, Montrève, a Siovalese country estate. For several years, he was happy there.
Then his mother disappeared from her forced imprisonment at the Temple of Asherat-of-the-Sea, and Imriel's name was besmirched as he was framed for his own treason. He did stupid things, he was rude, he acted recklessly, and he tried so very hard to be good. He met his Shahrizai cousins, and liked them despite himself. He met Eammon mac Grainne and though their first meeting became a duel, it ended with them as nigh brothers. He turned sixteen and spent a night at Balm House with an adept named Emmeline, who taught him that the body was sacred and that sex, too, could be sacred. It was healing.
He developed a close relationship with the queen's younger daughter, Alais, who he looked on - and would always look on - as a sister. Her elder daughter, however...For a very long time, Imriel was not fond of Sidonie at all. Then, as it usually does, passion blossomed between them, abrupt and unexpected. Neither acted on it.
When he reached his majority at eighteen, Imriel was ready to leave Terre d'Ange. He was anxious, restless; he wanted to join Eammon at the University of Tiberium. And he most certainly didn't want the Queen and her husband the Cruarch strong arming him into marrying.
So he left, traveling to Tiberium with his horse and a single companion as a guard, Gilot. Gilot would suffer for it, later. Imriel learned a good deal there - he found Eammon, and joined his class with Master Piero. He made a good friend, Lucius Tadius da Lucca. And he made a good affair with Lucius' sister, the married Claudia Fulvia. She taught him many things - chiefly, she taught him of the Unseen Guild. A group of conspirators, largely unknown, who had the power to sway nations to war or against it, to change the flow of politics in favor or against it. And they wanted Imriel to join.
It was a difficult decision, but he declined it.
He traveled with Lucius and his friends to Lucca, to see Lucius wed; and there, he lived through a siege, and the dead rising and possessing Lucius and the people of Lucca; he saw Gilot die. He saw a river's course averted to break through Lucca's walls. And he killed. He killed a good many, and he still dreams about them. but he saved Eammon's life, and his life was saved, and eventually, he was able to return home.
His mother was still missing, however, and he feels a duty to find her.
Sample Journal Entry: I have been aboard many ships and seen many wonders at sea, but I don't believe any of them have quite prepared me for...for this. All knowledge is worth having, certainly, but how this is managed may be beyond me. Phèdre would want to know.
This is altogether fascinating, this ability to travel between the stars. Perhaps this is the path to the Terre d'Ange-that-lies-beyond. I am most intrigued - but forgive me, I owe an introduction. My name is Imriel nó Montrève [there's a short pause, and then he adds, very slowly,] de la Courcel.
Sample RP: He sat at Phèdre's desk, staring at the crinkled, aged letters that laid on its surface. It was old, brittle, as if it would crumble if not handled with care. He did handle it with care - though there were scorch marks around the edges from when he'd thrown it in the fire as a child, things were different now. He understood somewhat more about his mother - of course, knowing that much more raised even more questions.
Melisange Shahrizai was an enigma - but she was one he intended to figure out.
It was hard to read his mother's writing. He'd spent so long hating her that to set aside his anger toward her was difficult. It was more difficult now, knowing that Canis was her man - knowing that she had sent someone to watch over her. It complicated an already extremely complicated situation.
It was easier, hating her. But now she had piqued his curiosity, and though that made the anger burn hotter, it was not the anger of a scarred and tormented child. He no longer yearned to throw the pile of unread letters into the fire place. The temptation was there, though. It would always be there, with others.
Imriel closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair, his hand pressed flat against the letter. It obscured her words, kept him blinded to it as if by blocking it out, he could block out what he'd come here to face. Behind closed eye lids, he could see Lucca, and the cracked mask of Gallus Tadius. He could see men dead or dying, he could see Canis with a javelin protruding from his chest.
Opening his eyes, Imri lifted his hand and stared at the letter. Whatever he may believe about the Unseen Guild, his mother was a part of it. And he needed to know more.
Special Notes: Uhhh Kushiel's Legacy is pretty damn sexual in its way. Just. Fair warning, I guess?
Name: Ari
User LJ: rivin
AIM: FallenSun13
E-mail: redrobin133@gmail.com
Other Characters: T'Pol
Character Name: Imriel nó Montrève de la Courcel
Series: Kushiel's Legacy
Age: 18
Taken from: End of the first book, Kushiel's Scion.
What does his/her journal look like? Keep in mind that the ship isn't the kindest ship in the universe, and it occasionally likes giving Puritans Blackberries to use. Or blood-fueled journey books to people from the twenty-fifth century.
Skills and abilities: He's been sorta kinda trained in the Casseline style of fighting - he can use two daggers very well, but he's better with a sword. He knows several languages, and knows some of the arts of covertcy. Imri's very good at snuffing out a lie, when face to face, and has been loosely trained to remember everything he comes across. As a member of the Shahrizai House, descended from Kushiel, he has the distinct ability to observe fault lines in other people - the things they're afraid of, the things they want. Occasionally, it makes it very clear to him that h can manipulate people into doing what he wants. He can't control this, it comes and goes and acts more as realization than an actual power - and he isn't particularly fond of seeing these things.
Personality: Goat herder, slave, Prince of the Blood, penniless gentleman scholar. Imriel has been all of these things in his short life, and every one has of them has influenced him in a great many ways. He spent his childhood in an orphanage at a temple to Blessed Elua, herding goats and not knowing what he looked like, or who his parents were. It was a sheltered, pleasant life, and he could have spent the rest of it there without objection - it taught him compassion, and love, and simple joys.
Daršanga taught him horror. Imriel has gone through a lot, at a very young age, and it left a scar - several scars, actually. He doesn't open up easily. He broods. His social graces, though extremely polite, often leave him appearing aloof and haughty to those that don't know him. When he doesn't have someone particularly bright - like Eammon - to pull him out of his own thoughts, he tends to find a niche there. Imri isn't the easiest man in Terre d'Ange to get along with.
He's not the hardest either, though. The rest of his world tends to regard D'Angelines as snobbish - and with good reason. They may be the world's newest people, relatively speaking, but they are descended from angels. They have gifts other cultures can only dream of, and many of Imriel's people enjoy lauding that over others outside their borders. Imri has never done this; though he longs for his home, longs for his people and good and everything he knows, he has never claimed supremacy by virtue of his nationality - nor virtue of his princeliness. In fact, more often than not, Imriel prefers not to remind others of his station. Though he is not as desperate as he was to remain hidden as he was in Tiberium, he prefers his name to Your Highness.
Imriel's a complexity. He wants comfort and compassion in tandem with wanting cruelness. His own desires contradict each other, frequently, and while he masks it well enough, he can't always. Imriel's got a temper, and certain things set it off. Being lied to, mentioning his parents, questioning his honor and his loyalty. He doesn't care much for that shit. His loyalty, once earned, is absolute; it can make him foolhardy and reckless, of course. But his greatest friends will always have him at their sides, where possible. Though sometimes loyalties contradict each other.
This prince is consistently extremely hard on himself. He was raised a goat herding shepherd, and now has to hear himself referred to as Your Highness; it's duties compounding duties, and Imriel is wary of his own failure. He's quick to admire kindness and courage and loyalty in others, but slow to see it in himself. It's there, of a surety - but Imri's often blind to it.
And of course, Imriel loves. D'Angelines are notorious for their acceptance of lovematches, but, that said, Imri is quite possibly one of the most heterosexual men in Terre d'Ange. He's had his issues with men, after all. But love is love, and it changes - you find it and lose it, again and again.
History: Once, Blessed Elua bade his children, Love as thou wilt. A traitor was no exception to that rule. Imriel's parents were traitors twice over - Melisande Shahrizai, a scion of Kushiel, and a Prince of the Blood, Bendicte de la Courcel. They plotted treason in La Serenissima, and that treason resulted in Imriel, a Prince of the Blood intended to take the throne from Queen Ysandre de la Courcel and her half-Pictish daughters.
Every D'Angeline knows this story: how Phèdre nó Delaunay, a Servant of Naamah, a courtesan, saved the Realm and the queen's throne a second time. She knew Imriel's mother better than anyone, and made a bargain with her over Imriel's safety: Melisande would nver again rise up against Queen Ysandra or her daughters. In exchange, Phèdre would take Imriel into her household.
But plans are never simple enough. Imriel had been hidden away for his own protection, hidden for a decade. He was meant to be safe. For a time, he was. He was blissful, and ignorant. Growing up as an orphan in a Temple of Elua in Siovale, where there are no mirrors, Imriel remained untouched by his treasonous past. He was not judged for it; he had a sense of belonging that he would never again feel quite so strongly. But all knowledge is worth having - sometimes even at a terrible price.
Imriel was abducted by Fadil Chouma, a Menekhetan slaver. He was taken away from everything he knew in the Temple - love, compassion, friendship - and dragged to Menekhet, where he was sold to the Aka-Magi,the bone priests of Drujan. They brought him to Daršanga.
What happened to him there, in the zenana, the harem of the Mahrkagir, Imriel has told in full only to one person; Phèdre survived a good deal of it with him, after all. To others, he has spoken in pieces: to Helena Correggio, daughter of the Prince of Lucca, he told an abridged version, saving her some of the horror. To Eammon mac Grainne, Prince of the Dalriada and Imriel's greatest friend, his sworn brother, he told somewhat more. He shared some of the horror that was Daršanga and felt lighter for it - but some of the things he endured will be known by none after Phèdre.
But he was rescued. When all the world feared Drujan and the Mahrkagir, feared his bone priests power and their caveat of ill thoughts, ill words, ill deeds, when all the armies of Khebbel-im-Akkad were destroyed by this new Kingdom and their dark presence threatened to envelope the world, Blessed Elua sent a courtesan and her Casseline warrior to bring it down. And they brought Imriel out.
His adventures weren't over; he traveled to Jebe-Barkal, and Saba, where Phèdre found the Name of God. He traveled to the Straits between Alba and Terre d'Ange, and heard the Name spoken. Though he can't say it himself, though he doesn't possess the name, he heard it, and knew that God's name is love. Everyone on board the ship that witnessed it heard their language's word for love; Imriel will never forget it.
He returned to Terre d'Ange with Phèdre and Joscelin, her consort. They adopted him into their house household, Montrève, a Siovalese country estate. For several years, he was happy there.
Then his mother disappeared from her forced imprisonment at the Temple of Asherat-of-the-Sea, and Imriel's name was besmirched as he was framed for his own treason. He did stupid things, he was rude, he acted recklessly, and he tried so very hard to be good. He met his Shahrizai cousins, and liked them despite himself. He met Eammon mac Grainne and though their first meeting became a duel, it ended with them as nigh brothers. He turned sixteen and spent a night at Balm House with an adept named Emmeline, who taught him that the body was sacred and that sex, too, could be sacred. It was healing.
He developed a close relationship with the queen's younger daughter, Alais, who he looked on - and would always look on - as a sister. Her elder daughter, however...For a very long time, Imriel was not fond of Sidonie at all. Then, as it usually does, passion blossomed between them, abrupt and unexpected. Neither acted on it.
When he reached his majority at eighteen, Imriel was ready to leave Terre d'Ange. He was anxious, restless; he wanted to join Eammon at the University of Tiberium. And he most certainly didn't want the Queen and her husband the Cruarch strong arming him into marrying.
So he left, traveling to Tiberium with his horse and a single companion as a guard, Gilot. Gilot would suffer for it, later. Imriel learned a good deal there - he found Eammon, and joined his class with Master Piero. He made a good friend, Lucius Tadius da Lucca. And he made a good affair with Lucius' sister, the married Claudia Fulvia. She taught him many things - chiefly, she taught him of the Unseen Guild. A group of conspirators, largely unknown, who had the power to sway nations to war or against it, to change the flow of politics in favor or against it. And they wanted Imriel to join.
It was a difficult decision, but he declined it.
He traveled with Lucius and his friends to Lucca, to see Lucius wed; and there, he lived through a siege, and the dead rising and possessing Lucius and the people of Lucca; he saw Gilot die. He saw a river's course averted to break through Lucca's walls. And he killed. He killed a good many, and he still dreams about them. but he saved Eammon's life, and his life was saved, and eventually, he was able to return home.
His mother was still missing, however.
Sample Journal Entry: How is this possible?
I have been aboard many ships and seen many wonders at sea, but I don't believe any of them have quite prepared me for what I see beyond the windows. There is no sea that I know that brings us this close to the stars - and unless I am mistaken, there seems to be no sea at all.
How is this done? Is it merely an illusion? All knowledge is worth having, after all, and I can't begin to understand this on my own.
Sample Log : He sat at Phèdre's desk, staring at the crinkled, aged letters that laid on its surface. It was old, brittle, as if it would crumble if not handled with care. He did handle it with care - though there were scorch marks around the edges from when he'd thrown it in the fire as a child, things were different now. He understood somewhat more about his mother - of course, knowing that much more raised even more questions.
Melisange Shahrizai was an enigma - but she was one he intended to figure out.
It was hard to read his mother's writing. He'd spent so long hating her that to set aside his anger toward her was difficult. It was more difficult now, knowing that Canis was her man - knowing that she had sent someone to watch over her. It complicated an already extremely complicated situation.
It was easier, hating her. But now she had piqued his curiosity, and though that made the anger burn hotter, it was not the anger of a scarred and tormented child. He no longer yearned to throw the pile of unread letters into the fire place. The temptation was there, though. It would always be there, with others.
Imriel closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair, his hand pressed flat against the letter. It obscured her words, kept him blinded to it as if by blocking it out, he could block out what he'd come here to face. Behind closed eye lids, he could see Lucca, and the cracked mask of Gallus Tadius. He could see men dead or dying, he could see Canis with a javelin protruding from his chest.
Opening his eyes, Imri lifted his hand and stared at the letter. Whatever he may believe about the Unseen Guild, his mother was a part of it. And he needed to know more.
Notes: --
User LJ: rivin
AIM/IM: FallenSun13
E-mail: redrobin133@gmail.com
Other Characters: T'Pol, Shinzon, Tim Drake, Jack Harkness
Character Name: Imriel nó Montrève de la Courcel
Series: Kushiel's Legacy
Age: 18
From When?: At the end of the firstb ook, Kushiel's Scion.
Inmate/Warden: Warden. Imri has desires he considers dark and unwanted, at times, but his life has been ruled by a promise he made himself a s a child: I will try to be good.
Item: Canis' medallion
Abilities/Powers: He's been sorta kinda trained in the Casseline style of fighting - he can use two daggers very well, but he's better with a sword. He knows several languages, and knows some of the arts of covertcy. Imri's very good at snuffing out a lie, when face to face, and has been loosely trained to remember everything he comes across. As a member of the Shahrizai House, descended from Kushiel, he has the distinct ability to observe fault lines in other people - the things they're afraid of, the things they want. Occasionally, it makes it very clear to him that h can manipulate people into doing what he wants. He can't control this, it comes and goes and acts more as realization than an actual power - and he isn't particularly fond of seeing these things.
Personality: Goat herder, slave, Prince of the Blood, penniless gentleman scholar. Imriel has been all of these things in his short life, and every one has of them has influenced him in a great many ways. He spent his childhood in an orphanage at a temple to Blessed Elua, herding goats and not knowing what he looked like, or who his parents were. It was a sheltered, pleasant life, and he could have spent the rest of it there without objection - it taught him compassion, and love, and simple joys.
Daršanga taught him horror. Imriel has gone through a lot, at a very young age, and it left a scar - several scars, actually. He doesn't open up easily. He broods. His social graces, though extremely polite, often leave him appearing aloof and haughty to those that don't know him. When he doesn't have someone particularly bright - like Eammon - to pull him out of his own thoughts, he tends to find a niche there. Imri isn't the easiest man in Terre d'Ange to get along with.
He's not the hardest either, though. The rest of his world tends to regard D'Angelines as snobbish - and with good reason. They may be the world's newest people, relatively speaking, but they are descended from angels. They have gifts other cultures can only dream of, and many of Imriel's people enjoy lauding that over others outside their borders. Imri has never done this; though he longs for his home, longs for his people and good and everything he knows, he has never claimed supremacy by virtue of his nationality - nor virtue of his princeliness. In fact, more often than not, Imriel prefers not to remind others of his station. Though he is not as desperate as he was to remain hidden as he was in Tiberium, he prefers his name to Your Highness.
Imriel's a complexity. He wants comfort and compassion in tandem with wanting cruelness. His own desires contradict each other, frequently, and while he masks it well enough, he can't always. Imriel's got a temper, and certain things set it off. Being lied to, mentioning his parents, questioning his honor and his loyalty. He doesn't care much for that shit. His loyalty, once earned, is absolute; it can make him foolhardy and reckless, of course. But his greatest friends will always have him at their sides, where possible. Though sometimes loyalties contradict each other.
This prince is consistently extremely hard on himself. He was raised a goat herding shepherd, and now has to hear himself referred to as Your Highness; it's duties compounding duties, and Imriel is wary of his own failure. He's quick to admire kindness and courage and loyalty in others, but slow to see it in himself. It's there, of a surety - but Imri's often blind to it.
And of course, Imriel loves. D'Angelines are notorious for their acceptance of lovematches, but, that said, Imri is quite possibly one of the most heterosexual men in Terre d'Ange. He's had his issues with men, after all. But love is love, and it changes - you find it and lose it, again and again.
Path to Redemption: --
History: Once, Blessed Elua bade his children, Love as thou wilt. A traitor was no exception to that rule. Imriel's parents were traitors twice over - Melisande Shahrizai, a scion of Kushiel, and a Prince of the Blood, Bendicte de la Courcel. They plotted treason in La Serenissima, and that treason resulted in Imriel, a Prince of the Blood intended to take the throne from Queen Ysandre de la Courcel and her half-Pictish daughters.
Every D'Angeline knows this story: how Phèdre nó Delaunay, a Servant of Naamah, a courtesan, saved the Realm and the queen's throne a second time. She knew Imriel's mother better than anyone, and made a bargain with her over Imriel's safety: Melisande would nver again rise up against Queen Ysandra or her daughters. In exchange, Phèdre would take Imriel into her household.
But plans are never simple enough. Imriel had been hidden away for his own protection, hidden for a decade. He was meant to be safe. For a time, he was. He was blissful, and ignorant. Growing up as an orphan in a Temple of Elua in Siovale, where there are no mirrors, Imriel remained untouched by his treasonous past. He was not judged for it; he had a sense of belonging that he would never again feel quite so strongly. But all knowledge is worth having - sometimes even at a terrible price.
Imriel was abducted by Fadil Chouma, a Menekhetan slaver. He was taken away from everything he knew in the Temple - love, compassion, friendship - and dragged to Menekhet, where he was sold to the Aka-Magi,the bone priests of Drujan. They brought him to Daršanga.
What happened to him there, in the zenana, the harem of the Mahrkagir, Imriel has told in full only to one person; Phèdre survived a good deal of it with him, after all. To others, he has spoken in pieces: to Helena Correggio, daughter of the Prince of Lucca, he told an abridged version, saving her some of the horror. To Eammon mac Grainne, Prince of the Dalriada and Imriel's greatest friend, his sworn brother, he told somewhat more. He shared some of the horror that was Daršanga and felt lighter for it - but some of the things he endured will be known by none after Phèdre.
But he was rescued. When all the world feared Drujan and the Mahrkagir, feared his bone priests power and their caveat of ill thoughts, ill words, ill deeds, when all the armies of Khebbel-im-Akkad were destroyed by this new Kingdom and their dark presence threatened to envelope the world, Blessed Elua sent a courtesan and her Casseline warrior to bring it down. And they brought Imriel out.
His adventures weren't over; he traveled to Jebe-Barkal, and Saba, where Phèdre found the Name of God. He traveled to the Straits between Alba and Terre d'Ange, and heard the Name spoken. Though he can't say it himself, though he doesn't possess the name, he heard it, and knew that God's name is love. Everyone on board the ship that witnessed it heard their language's word for love; Imriel will never forget it.
He returned to Terre d'Ange with Phèdre and Joscelin, her consort. They adopted him into their house household, Montrève, a Siovalese country estate. For several years, he was happy there.
Then his mother disappeared from her forced imprisonment at the Temple of Asherat-of-the-Sea, and Imriel's name was besmirched as he was framed for his own treason. He did stupid things, he was rude, he acted recklessly, and he tried so very hard to be good. He met his Shahrizai cousins, and liked them despite himself. He met Eammon mac Grainne and though their first meeting became a duel, it ended with them as nigh brothers. He turned sixteen and spent a night at Balm House with an adept named Emmeline, who taught him that the body was sacred and that sex, too, could be sacred. It was healing.
He developed a close relationship with the queen's younger daughter, Alais, who he looked on - and would always look on - as a sister. Her elder daughter, however...For a very long time, Imriel was not fond of Sidonie at all. Then, as it usually does, passion blossomed between them, abrupt and unexpected. Neither acted on it.
When he reached his majority at eighteen, Imriel was ready to leave Terre d'Ange. He was anxious, restless; he wanted to join Eammon at the University of Tiberium. And he most certainly didn't want the Queen and her husband the Cruarch strong arming him into marrying.
So he left, traveling to Tiberium with his horse and a single companion as a guard, Gilot. Gilot would suffer for it, later. Imriel learned a good deal there - he found Eammon, and joined his class with Master Piero. He made a good friend, Lucius Tadius da Lucca. And he made a good affair with Lucius' sister, the married Claudia Fulvia. She taught him many things - chiefly, she taught him of the Unseen Guild. A group of conspirators, largely unknown, who had the power to sway nations to war or against it, to change the flow of politics in favor or against it. And they wanted Imriel to join.
It was a difficult decision, but he declined it.
He traveled with Lucius and his friends to Lucca, to see Lucius wed; and there, he lived through a siege, and the dead rising and possessing Lucius and the people of Lucca; he saw Gilot die. He saw a river's course averted to break through Lucca's walls. And he killed. He killed a good many, and he still dreams about them. but he saved Eammon's life, and his life was saved, and eventually, he was able to return home.
His mother was still missing, however, and he feels a duty to find her.
Sample Journal Entry: I have been aboard many ships and seen many wonders at sea, but I don't believe any of them have quite prepared me for...for this. All knowledge is worth having, certainly, but how this is managed may be beyond me. Phèdre would want to know.
This is altogether fascinating, this ability to travel between the stars. Perhaps this is the path to the Terre d'Ange-that-lies-beyond. I am most intrigued - but forgive me, I owe an introduction. My name is Imriel nó Montrève [there's a short pause, and then he adds, very slowly,] de la Courcel.
Sample RP: He sat at Phèdre's desk, staring at the crinkled, aged letters that laid on its surface. It was old, brittle, as if it would crumble if not handled with care. He did handle it with care - though there were scorch marks around the edges from when he'd thrown it in the fire as a child, things were different now. He understood somewhat more about his mother - of course, knowing that much more raised even more questions.
Melisange Shahrizai was an enigma - but she was one he intended to figure out.
It was hard to read his mother's writing. He'd spent so long hating her that to set aside his anger toward her was difficult. It was more difficult now, knowing that Canis was her man - knowing that she had sent someone to watch over her. It complicated an already extremely complicated situation.
It was easier, hating her. But now she had piqued his curiosity, and though that made the anger burn hotter, it was not the anger of a scarred and tormented child. He no longer yearned to throw the pile of unread letters into the fire place. The temptation was there, though. It would always be there, with others.
Imriel closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair, his hand pressed flat against the letter. It obscured her words, kept him blinded to it as if by blocking it out, he could block out what he'd come here to face. Behind closed eye lids, he could see Lucca, and the cracked mask of Gallus Tadius. He could see men dead or dying, he could see Canis with a javelin protruding from his chest.
Opening his eyes, Imri lifted his hand and stared at the letter. Whatever he may believe about the Unseen Guild, his mother was a part of it. And he needed to know more.
Special Notes: Uhhh Kushiel's Legacy is pretty damn sexual in its way. Just. Fair warning, I guess?
Name: Ari
User LJ: rivin
AIM: FallenSun13
E-mail: redrobin133@gmail.com
Other Characters: T'Pol
Character Name: Imriel nó Montrève de la Courcel
Series: Kushiel's Legacy
Age: 18
Taken from: End of the first book, Kushiel's Scion.
What does his/her journal look like? Keep in mind that the ship isn't the kindest ship in the universe, and it occasionally likes giving Puritans Blackberries to use. Or blood-fueled journey books to people from the twenty-fifth century.
Skills and abilities: He's been sorta kinda trained in the Casseline style of fighting - he can use two daggers very well, but he's better with a sword. He knows several languages, and knows some of the arts of covertcy. Imri's very good at snuffing out a lie, when face to face, and has been loosely trained to remember everything he comes across. As a member of the Shahrizai House, descended from Kushiel, he has the distinct ability to observe fault lines in other people - the things they're afraid of, the things they want. Occasionally, it makes it very clear to him that h can manipulate people into doing what he wants. He can't control this, it comes and goes and acts more as realization than an actual power - and he isn't particularly fond of seeing these things.
Personality: Goat herder, slave, Prince of the Blood, penniless gentleman scholar. Imriel has been all of these things in his short life, and every one has of them has influenced him in a great many ways. He spent his childhood in an orphanage at a temple to Blessed Elua, herding goats and not knowing what he looked like, or who his parents were. It was a sheltered, pleasant life, and he could have spent the rest of it there without objection - it taught him compassion, and love, and simple joys.
Daršanga taught him horror. Imriel has gone through a lot, at a very young age, and it left a scar - several scars, actually. He doesn't open up easily. He broods. His social graces, though extremely polite, often leave him appearing aloof and haughty to those that don't know him. When he doesn't have someone particularly bright - like Eammon - to pull him out of his own thoughts, he tends to find a niche there. Imri isn't the easiest man in Terre d'Ange to get along with.
He's not the hardest either, though. The rest of his world tends to regard D'Angelines as snobbish - and with good reason. They may be the world's newest people, relatively speaking, but they are descended from angels. They have gifts other cultures can only dream of, and many of Imriel's people enjoy lauding that over others outside their borders. Imri has never done this; though he longs for his home, longs for his people and good and everything he knows, he has never claimed supremacy by virtue of his nationality - nor virtue of his princeliness. In fact, more often than not, Imriel prefers not to remind others of his station. Though he is not as desperate as he was to remain hidden as he was in Tiberium, he prefers his name to Your Highness.
Imriel's a complexity. He wants comfort and compassion in tandem with wanting cruelness. His own desires contradict each other, frequently, and while he masks it well enough, he can't always. Imriel's got a temper, and certain things set it off. Being lied to, mentioning his parents, questioning his honor and his loyalty. He doesn't care much for that shit. His loyalty, once earned, is absolute; it can make him foolhardy and reckless, of course. But his greatest friends will always have him at their sides, where possible. Though sometimes loyalties contradict each other.
This prince is consistently extremely hard on himself. He was raised a goat herding shepherd, and now has to hear himself referred to as Your Highness; it's duties compounding duties, and Imriel is wary of his own failure. He's quick to admire kindness and courage and loyalty in others, but slow to see it in himself. It's there, of a surety - but Imri's often blind to it.
And of course, Imriel loves. D'Angelines are notorious for their acceptance of lovematches, but, that said, Imri is quite possibly one of the most heterosexual men in Terre d'Ange. He's had his issues with men, after all. But love is love, and it changes - you find it and lose it, again and again.
History: Once, Blessed Elua bade his children, Love as thou wilt. A traitor was no exception to that rule. Imriel's parents were traitors twice over - Melisande Shahrizai, a scion of Kushiel, and a Prince of the Blood, Bendicte de la Courcel. They plotted treason in La Serenissima, and that treason resulted in Imriel, a Prince of the Blood intended to take the throne from Queen Ysandre de la Courcel and her half-Pictish daughters.
Every D'Angeline knows this story: how Phèdre nó Delaunay, a Servant of Naamah, a courtesan, saved the Realm and the queen's throne a second time. She knew Imriel's mother better than anyone, and made a bargain with her over Imriel's safety: Melisande would nver again rise up against Queen Ysandra or her daughters. In exchange, Phèdre would take Imriel into her household.
But plans are never simple enough. Imriel had been hidden away for his own protection, hidden for a decade. He was meant to be safe. For a time, he was. He was blissful, and ignorant. Growing up as an orphan in a Temple of Elua in Siovale, where there are no mirrors, Imriel remained untouched by his treasonous past. He was not judged for it; he had a sense of belonging that he would never again feel quite so strongly. But all knowledge is worth having - sometimes even at a terrible price.
Imriel was abducted by Fadil Chouma, a Menekhetan slaver. He was taken away from everything he knew in the Temple - love, compassion, friendship - and dragged to Menekhet, where he was sold to the Aka-Magi,the bone priests of Drujan. They brought him to Daršanga.
What happened to him there, in the zenana, the harem of the Mahrkagir, Imriel has told in full only to one person; Phèdre survived a good deal of it with him, after all. To others, he has spoken in pieces: to Helena Correggio, daughter of the Prince of Lucca, he told an abridged version, saving her some of the horror. To Eammon mac Grainne, Prince of the Dalriada and Imriel's greatest friend, his sworn brother, he told somewhat more. He shared some of the horror that was Daršanga and felt lighter for it - but some of the things he endured will be known by none after Phèdre.
But he was rescued. When all the world feared Drujan and the Mahrkagir, feared his bone priests power and their caveat of ill thoughts, ill words, ill deeds, when all the armies of Khebbel-im-Akkad were destroyed by this new Kingdom and their dark presence threatened to envelope the world, Blessed Elua sent a courtesan and her Casseline warrior to bring it down. And they brought Imriel out.
His adventures weren't over; he traveled to Jebe-Barkal, and Saba, where Phèdre found the Name of God. He traveled to the Straits between Alba and Terre d'Ange, and heard the Name spoken. Though he can't say it himself, though he doesn't possess the name, he heard it, and knew that God's name is love. Everyone on board the ship that witnessed it heard their language's word for love; Imriel will never forget it.
He returned to Terre d'Ange with Phèdre and Joscelin, her consort. They adopted him into their house household, Montrève, a Siovalese country estate. For several years, he was happy there.
Then his mother disappeared from her forced imprisonment at the Temple of Asherat-of-the-Sea, and Imriel's name was besmirched as he was framed for his own treason. He did stupid things, he was rude, he acted recklessly, and he tried so very hard to be good. He met his Shahrizai cousins, and liked them despite himself. He met Eammon mac Grainne and though their first meeting became a duel, it ended with them as nigh brothers. He turned sixteen and spent a night at Balm House with an adept named Emmeline, who taught him that the body was sacred and that sex, too, could be sacred. It was healing.
He developed a close relationship with the queen's younger daughter, Alais, who he looked on - and would always look on - as a sister. Her elder daughter, however...For a very long time, Imriel was not fond of Sidonie at all. Then, as it usually does, passion blossomed between them, abrupt and unexpected. Neither acted on it.
When he reached his majority at eighteen, Imriel was ready to leave Terre d'Ange. He was anxious, restless; he wanted to join Eammon at the University of Tiberium. And he most certainly didn't want the Queen and her husband the Cruarch strong arming him into marrying.
So he left, traveling to Tiberium with his horse and a single companion as a guard, Gilot. Gilot would suffer for it, later. Imriel learned a good deal there - he found Eammon, and joined his class with Master Piero. He made a good friend, Lucius Tadius da Lucca. And he made a good affair with Lucius' sister, the married Claudia Fulvia. She taught him many things - chiefly, she taught him of the Unseen Guild. A group of conspirators, largely unknown, who had the power to sway nations to war or against it, to change the flow of politics in favor or against it. And they wanted Imriel to join.
It was a difficult decision, but he declined it.
He traveled with Lucius and his friends to Lucca, to see Lucius wed; and there, he lived through a siege, and the dead rising and possessing Lucius and the people of Lucca; he saw Gilot die. He saw a river's course averted to break through Lucca's walls. And he killed. He killed a good many, and he still dreams about them. but he saved Eammon's life, and his life was saved, and eventually, he was able to return home.
His mother was still missing, however.
Sample Journal Entry: How is this possible?
I have been aboard many ships and seen many wonders at sea, but I don't believe any of them have quite prepared me for what I see beyond the windows. There is no sea that I know that brings us this close to the stars - and unless I am mistaken, there seems to be no sea at all.
How is this done? Is it merely an illusion? All knowledge is worth having, after all, and I can't begin to understand this on my own.
Sample Log : He sat at Phèdre's desk, staring at the crinkled, aged letters that laid on its surface. It was old, brittle, as if it would crumble if not handled with care. He did handle it with care - though there were scorch marks around the edges from when he'd thrown it in the fire as a child, things were different now. He understood somewhat more about his mother - of course, knowing that much more raised even more questions.
Melisange Shahrizai was an enigma - but she was one he intended to figure out.
It was hard to read his mother's writing. He'd spent so long hating her that to set aside his anger toward her was difficult. It was more difficult now, knowing that Canis was her man - knowing that she had sent someone to watch over her. It complicated an already extremely complicated situation.
It was easier, hating her. But now she had piqued his curiosity, and though that made the anger burn hotter, it was not the anger of a scarred and tormented child. He no longer yearned to throw the pile of unread letters into the fire place. The temptation was there, though. It would always be there, with others.
Imriel closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair, his hand pressed flat against the letter. It obscured her words, kept him blinded to it as if by blocking it out, he could block out what he'd come here to face. Behind closed eye lids, he could see Lucca, and the cracked mask of Gallus Tadius. He could see men dead or dying, he could see Canis with a javelin protruding from his chest.
Opening his eyes, Imri lifted his hand and stared at the letter. Whatever he may believe about the Unseen Guild, his mother was a part of it. And he needed to know more.
Notes: --