Character Profile: Ephemia of New Pittsfield

On Mondays I post <a href="background essays on my fantasy series-in-preparation, the Shine Cycle; often this has been character profiles like this one, but this is the last for a while.

Ephemia – Countess of New Pittsfield, in unicorn country (which I wrote about last week), Unicorn Knight, and bard. One of the most trusted leaders of the people of unicorn country as well as the Imperial liaison to them.

A somewhat short woman, with long hair of a dusty blonde color and a build that is almost but not quite stocky. She has cultivated a non-athletic appearance, since it gives her an extra advantage in any competition or in combat, and has adopted the standard native costume, a variation on robes that works well for most occupations. Her robes are generally black to contrast with the white coat of her unicorn.

As soon as the world of the unicorns was (re)discovered (a few sectors from Elvida (?)) in 114 she was sent there as the Empire’s liaison. The Bardic College and the Academy also sent committees to determine whether institutes up to the Imperial standard existed (they did). Once the committees left and the celebrity status that came with being associated with the Empire had worn off, she began to climb the ranks in each of the local ladders: bardic, crafthall, academic, magecraft, Manors, unicorns. She reached Master rank in bardic and crafthall circles, was knighted by the Academy branch and given a doctorate in strategic analysis, and was recognized as a great-mage. When she came to the Manors she was content to become chief adviser to an important Manor and to be trusted by many other Manors because command of each Manor is hereditary. Soon after she reached that post a neighboring nation, which claimed that previous dragon invasions had been unique events or had not occurred at all and wanted more territory, attacked, and she took part in the battle and bonded with a unicorn whose rider was killed. After she became commander of a unicorn hall, she put her by-then immense Power (supplemented by her unicorn) to work on the dragon problem and determined that they came from the Dragon Empire. When she presented her findings at a meeting of all the leaders (bardic, craft, academic, mage, Manor, and unicorn rider alike) which she called using all of her titles together, the assembly created a new Manor in the territory won in that war, gave it to her, and named her to command their next defense against the dragons. When it came in 185, the Empire condemned it and demanded that the Dragon Empire cease the invasion; when the Dragon Empire denied its involvement, the Empire sent a few reinforcements. The Dragon Empire demanded that they be removed, but the Empire reminded it of its denial of its involvement, and after the incident was over in 205 it accepted a request made (at Ephemia’s suggestion) by the assembly of leaders and made the district a protectorate, naming Ephemia’s Manor an annexed county, New Pittsfield, and elevating her to the Bench of Nobles.

Character Profile: Flavia

On Mondays I post background essays on my fantasy series in preparation, the Shine Cycle, thus far largely character profiles like this one. As always, I welcome your feedback on this or any other part of my work.

Flavia – Duchess of Avalon, princess at large, journeyman mage, and a senior analyst in the King’s personal service. Little is known of her because she rarely leaves the island that is the district of Avalon, but the consistent stream of thorough, insightful, and generally correct analysis she produces has endeared her to her superiors.

A somewhat tall woman with thick but not long blond hair. Because of the climate of the island of Avalon, her skin is thoroughly tanned. When she arrived she preferred to keep up with Earth’s fashion trends, but as she grew into her responsibilities she more and more adopted the local version of formal robes.

When she arrived she applied for Imperial Service assignment, was assigned to the mostly unpopular district of Avalon, an island in the northern half of the Continental River, and left the capital in the few days before the Wild Mushroom Kingdom incident unfolded sufficiently to justify concentrating resources on it. Once there she conducted a rapid survey of previous data, used local instruments and local mages to collect new data, and sent in a very insightful report on the current conditions in the Dragon Empire, with an attached memorandum requesting a more powerful, more defensible observation platform. When her analysis was confirmed the request was granted and a generous allocation of funds came in; a full castle with a world-class Power-enhanced observation platform were completed by the end of the war well under budget, and the extra funds were used to build an improved power plant and several coastal defense platforms. In 113 she ran for governor of the island, was elected by a wide margin, and was made duchess by the federal government. After data from her castle saved the Empire a substantial amount of money in its extension of the Castle Line in 122 the Parliament voted to make her a princess at large. After the next war she took a leave of absence to attend the Academy, where she proved to have a strong aptitude for the Power and thus declared it as her primary concentration of study, graduating as a journeyman in 148.

Character Profile: Jeannie

On Mondays I post background essays on my fantasy series in preparation, the Shine Cycle, thus far largely character profiles like this one.As always, I would like your feedback on this or any other part of my work.

Jeannie – Bard, in the Queen’s service in the Imperial Service. She makes her music her primary vocation, with Imperial Service duties a hobby, and is well-known in academic circles for her mastery of piano, harpsichord, clavichord, organ, and lute, and her dedication to them even in the presence of Power-enhanced instruments. She served the Countess of Calahur for a decade and remains her close confidant.

A somewhat short woman with thick dark brown hair extending to her waist. She is usually seen in loose, comfortable but fashionable semi-formal dark-colored robes, often a particular lush shade of dark red.

Soon after she arrived, she took an aptitude test to place her in the Imperial Service. When the results arrived they noted a high probability of bardic talent, but as this was after the beginning of the term at the Bardic College and the school already had too many students due to the unexpected arrival of the Chosen, she instead entered the Service and was given an entry-level position as a ladies’ maid. Within the year she was offered a position by the Countess of Calahur, which she accepted. She remained at that post until the Countess was given a castle in the extended Castle Line in 122, when she was released. When the 123 term began she entered the Bardic College, where she became the first student in the half decade since the invention of the Power-enhanced keyboard to name the piano as her primary instrument. Because she insisted on also mastering harpsichord, clavichord, and, more to the point, organ and lute, it took her a full fifteen years to be named journeyman. On the other hand, because of all that preparation she was named Master by the end of the decade. She then entered the Imperial Service again and was within two years summoned to the Queen’s service.

Character Profile: Catherine

For any new readers: On Mondays I post background essays on my series of fantasy novels in preparation, the Shine Cycle, often character profiles like this one–each of which consists of a summary “entry,” a brief description of the character’s appearance and manner, and an outline of the character’s history in the world in which the series is set. As always, I welcome your comments on this or any other part of my work.

Catherine – Bard and Visiting Scholar, in the Queen’s service in the Imperial Service. Known for her passionate intensity of interest on whatever subject catches her attention, making her a valuable ally in any project despite her only minor strength of Power.

A somewhat tall woman with straight chesnut-brown hair cascading over her shoulders. She prefers loose, flowing robes in rich colors, usually red, and moves with a fluid grace.

History: When she arrived she applied for an Imperial Service position and was placed in the Ministry of Public Health, where she worked in the research division. After being given seniority in 120 that time she took a leave of absence from the Service and applied to the Bardic College, where she was accepted and began her studies in 121. Since she took few classes beyond those necessary for her primary and secondary concentrations in voice and keyboard, respectively, she was named journeyman in 125, earlier than most. After she was named a bardic Master in 130, she returned to the Service and was in 132 transferred to the Starshine Kingdom, where she was given general research duties. In 140 she was recalled and promoted to the Queen’s service, where she continued her research in the Palace library and was granted seniority there in 148.

Character Profile: Judith

On Mondays I post background material for my fantasy series in preparation, the Shine Cycle, largely character profiles like this one. I always welcome your feedback on any part of my work.

Judith – Bard, princess at large, journeyman mage, in the King’s service in the Imperial Service. She is of the highest order of mages, bardic or otherwise, in terms of sheer power and reserves, and in addition has a nearly unique talent for mixing her Power with others’ and enhancing the mixture beyond its normal possibilities, but in terms of skill she has less aptitude than most for nearly every area of the Power except music.

A somewhat short woman with an earnest smile and wavy, almost curly, dark brown hair. She favors loose robes in unusual, but usually bright, colors.

When she arrived she applied to the Bardic College, but the recruiter saw great potential in her and recommended that she attend the Academy and study the Power more generally than the College would allow, then attend the Bardic College later. She took that advice and entered the Academy in 111. She found early success in her studies there, due to her immense depth of Power capacity allowing her to “brute-force” problems that her peers had trouble with, but once she reached her level she had much more trouble and began to specialize in techniques to maximize power throughput, relying more on her peers for direction and solutions to specific problems. Because of this approach she took several years more than usual to graduate from her program, but she finally was named a journeyman mage in 130. She immediately applied to the Bardic College, where she was accepted and began her studies in 131. She took much less time there, since she only concentrated in voice and she had experience from the Academy, graduating as a journeyman in 137. After a whirlwind tour of Sunshine Kingdom and the capital cities of the other kingdoms in the Empire, she was named a bardic Master in 144. At loose ends, she applied to the Imperial Service and accepted a position in the embassy to Arcadia. During the Reignalmia incident she took a leave of absence and returned to the Academy to write a report on the impact of the founding of the interuniversal organizations on international relations. This paper brought her to the attention of both King and Parliament, who named her a princess at large, and she was also summoned to the Queen’s service in 152. After the annexation of Greyhawk in 158 she was promoted to the King’s service and sent there.

Character Profile: Edna of New Lancaster

On Mondays I post background essays on my fantasy series in preparation, the Shine Cycle, largely character profiles like this one. I’d love to hear what you think about anything I write.

Edna – Duchess of New Lancaster, former Academy Education Department chair, and Imperial Deputy Minister of Education. Founder of an unprecedented number of teachers’ colleges across the Empire. Possibly the cause of the success of the reconstruction of the Wild Mushroom Kingdom after the Fifth War of the Dragon.

A somewhat short woman, she keeps her straight dark brown hair pulled back out of her face in a simple knot. She generally wears brightly colored robes, often signed, handprinted, or otherwise marked by children as a matter of personal style as well as of political symbolism.

After spending the two and a half years of the Fifth War of the Dragon and the First Barbarian War in the full cultural introduction and pre-Academy class offered by the Imperial government, she was provisionally granted a rank in the Imperial Service and sent to the Wild Mushroom Kingdom as part of the reconstruction team. After her team leader was assassinated, she took command of her team and made education, which had been extremely neglected by the government for all but the first half-decade of the kingdom’s membership in the Empire and for a half-century before, her first priority. The results were astounding, so in 116 she was assigned to a problem district in the Kingdom of the Power of Light. In 122, after similar success, she was promoted and transfered to nearby New Lancaster, where she was elected mayor in 123. In 126 she was re-elected and made baroness. Two years later she broke ground on a teachers’ college, funded entirely by (low) tuition and by the local government, which opened in 134. It became so popular that she was forced to open a new campus in 137, and New Lancaster was increased to a county in 141 when she opened yet a third campus. Anticipating a demand for similar colleges elsewhere, in 144 she entered the Academy, focusing on education, administration, and governance. She graduated from that program in 150, first in her class. After founding a campus of her teachers’ college in Capitol in 151, she was asked in 154 to join the faculty of the education department of the Academy. She was granted tenure in 158, and had risen to vice chair of the department by 163 and to chair by 169. She took a leave of absence from 176 to 180. During this time New Lancaster was increased to a duchy, in 177. After returning, in 184 she left the Academy and accepted the position of deputy minister of education in the Imperial government.

Character Profile: Claudia

On Mondays I post background essays on my fantasy series the Shine Cycle, including character profiles like this one. As always, I eagerly welcome your comments.

Claudia – One of the chief bards of the Empire, and member of the trio that jointly holds the post of court bard. She was one of the first to complete bardic training after the end of the Banishment. Also princess at large, in the King’s service in the Imperial Service, and knight.

A tall athletic brunette woman. She is equally at home in the light armor she favors, in formal bardic robes, and in the sparkling silver robes she sometimes wears to sessions of Parliament.

When she arrived she applied to both the Imperial Service and the Academy, but before she received a reply from either the war began. She immediately volunteered for duty and was placed in a unit sent on loan to Held. Her unit saw no major action but engaged skirmishers often; she became a trusted tactical adviser to her unit commander, but her unit was not important enough in that front of the war, and was too close to that of Victrix, for her name to become well known to her less immediate superiors. When the war ended she planned to enter the Academy, but at an informal party to celebrate the end of the war held in a ballroom in the palace she sang in an impromptu talent show and was noticed by an off-duty recruiter from the Bardic College, who convinced her to apply for admission. She was accepted and flew through the curriculum, graduating as a journeyman in 117. She observed the first few months of the Council of Capitol, then left to begin her tour as a journeyman. She was named a Master and ended her tour early in 121, entering the Academy within a year. At the Academy she changed her mind about what she wanted her primary and secondary concentrations to be several times, extending her stay somewhat; the Registrar finally forcibly graduated her from the first phase with a concentration of “interdisciplinary” in 140 when the war began. She was sent, with the rest of her class, as a corps to the Transylvania border, where she served with distinction. Months into the war she told her commander about a flaw she saw in the enemy line, and that insight would have given her unit a hundred miles or more of unobstructed passage into the Dragon Empire had the cease-fire not been signed within a day. After the war she was knighted for her contribution. Since the associated reputation expanded her career prospects considerably, she took a year to reorient herself, choosing at the end of it to enter the Imperial Service at the bottom. Within the month she was promoted to Palace service, and she rose through the ranks at a somewhat slower but still meteoric pace from there, being given seniority in 145 and entering the Queen’s service in 148. She was invited to join the King’s service in 155. He encouraged her to focus on further training at the Bardic College. When the First Galactic War began, she was sent to Newfoundworld with a bardic corps, in which she met Mary (then baroness of Afton Valley), with whom she was thereafter associated.

Character Profile: Cassandra

On Mondays I post background essays on my fantasy series, the Shine Cycle, including character profiles like this one. As always, I eagerly welcome your comments.

Cassandra – Princess at large and an analyst in the King’s service in the Imperial Service. Perhaps the Empire’s most insightful analyst of short and very short term trends; she provided the tactical insight behind the battle that made Victrix a household name, predicted several major events in general terms years in advance, and shut down an attempted enemy guerrilla strategy in the Sixth War of the Dragon.

A somewhat tall, statuesque woman with plaited golden hair running down her back. She favors long, loose flowing robes in dark pastel colors, but in the field wears mail and carries a short sword. In Parliamentary sessions she wears a silver circlet and a signet ring.

When she arrived, she applied to the Imperial Service and was assigned to a signals corps in the army when the war began. During the unnamed battle on the Dragon Empire’s border she helped put together the tactical information that allowed the heroics of Victrix to be the catalyst of victory rather than a dramatic last stand. After the battle she was transferred to the officers’ corps, at the rear of the army. In the Battle of Aquatia she gave a similar performance, so when the war was over she was hired by the Imperial Service in 113 and given analysis tasks. It soon became apparent that her gift lay in short-term memory and insight and that she was wasted on general analysis, so in the following year she was promoted a grade and set to identifying patterns in news and intelligence data as it came in, before the analysts had a chance at it. In 117 she suggested an Arms Limitation Treaty after noticing several trends in the Dragon Empire’s economy and government. In 122 she predicted the spacetime race, and when it began in 125 she was promoted two grades in the Service. After she predicted in 138 that the Dragon Empire would soon attack somewhere by land and it occurred in 140, she was promoted another two grades and made a princess at large to give her a seat in the House of Peers. She asked for a wartime assignment and was placed in Aquatia, where the Dragon Empire had sent only a token force, which was using hit-and-run tactics as a distraction. She outlined a strategy that caught and defeated the enemy in the field several times. For this, after the war she was promoted to the Queen’s service. In 144 she predicted that the enemy would do something soon that would prove a major disruption, and was proved right by the Reignalmia incident. In 151, when her prediction came to light, she was given seniority in the Queen’s service. In the same year she recommended that defenses against the enemy be increased, causing the increasing of guards on the Dragon Empire’s borders and on the walls of Vaynaheim; after the Gate Confrontation she was promoted to the King’s service.

Character Profile: Victrix

On Mondays I post background essays on my fantasy series the Shine Cycle, including character profiles like this one. As always, I eagerly welcome your comments.

Victrix – Princess at large, bard, and great-mage. A heroine of the Fifth War of the Dragon, she volunteered for research duty later and became an expert in computing networks.

A slender woman of medium height with short, straight light brown hair. She generally favors the comfortable robes popular in the Imperial Service’s research laboratories, though she has them in a cut closer to those favored by bards and mages and prefers brighter colors than many of her colleagues.

When the Fifth War of the Dragon began, she was assigned to an archery regiment which was sent to the northern border of the Dragon Empire. The unit saw very little action, but in their one major battle her unit — and demonstrably her actions — turned the tide from a disastrous defeat to a crushing victory. After the war she applied for admission to the Bardic College in 113, but her entry was delayed two years due to the overwhelming volume of talented applicants. Since she had bardic talent but little musical skill and less aptitude than some, she had not completed her preliminary studies when the Empire called for volunteers to work in the research industries in 130. At that point she answered the call and was placed in an entry-level position in one of the major computing labs in Capitol, which was near enough to the Bardic College that she continued her studies with night classes. Within the year she had been promoted to team leader at the lab and was being encouraged to learn system administration; two years later she became a junior administrator of the lab. In 136 she became a senior administrator, and in 139 she was appointed head of the lab when her superior was called up. When the war began she was given the choice between returning to her old post in the field and remaining in the lab, and chose the latter. After the war she oversaw the installation of the first such lab in Diamonddom, but then she began to shift her specialization to networks, supervising the extension of the Castle Line’s computer network. During the Reignalmia incident she returned to full-time study at the Bardic College, being made journeyman in 147. She took a long tour of the Castle Line, returning to active duty in the lab (with her title of bardic Master) after the Gate Confrontation in 154. When Greyhawk was annexed she advised the King on the computing aspects of that decision, and during the arms race she moved there to take command of its premiere lab, which under her direction contributed some essential code to th invention of the spider-ship. When the war began she moved back to Capitol and took a position in a government lab, where in 166 she finished an algorithm to increase the safety limit on spider-ships’ speed by 50%; in gratitude Parliament made her a Princess at large. In the arms race that followed the war, her lab produced several minor but useful inventions, and she herself contributed a bit of code later used in the Force Screen. When her prediction that the Space-Wall would lead to war came true, she was examined by the Academy’s College of Mages to see if she was a latent seer. Their tests were negative on that count, but they determined she had a strong potential for the Power, so she entered the Academy in 180. She was made journeyman in 194 and Master in 205.

Character Profile: Cadwallader

On Mondays I post background essays on my fantasy series, the Shine Cycle, often character profiles like this one. As always, I eagerly welcome your feedback.

Cadwallader – Knight, bard, great-mage, and Visiting Scholar. The most famous castellan of the Castle Line, and perhaps the most trusted general of the Empire, with a reputation for creating victories under impossible conditions.

A somewhat tall, slender man with short, messy brown hair and a smile on his face. In peacetime he wears a usually gray robe in the style favored by mages, but in wartime he wears armor even in the capital. That armor is usually as light as he feels he can safely wear, but is decorated around the shoulders with colorful engraving.

In the war that began soon after he arrived, he was placed at first in one of the castles of the Dragonsbane Castle Line, but then he was transferred to a more active unit, where he was promoted to Sergeant on the field and then, when the Battle of the Great River turned against them and all officers of higher rank within earshot were killed, he scraped together the remnants, took command, counter-attacked, and accepted the surrender of an army five times the size of his own. He was posted back on the Castle Line when the war ended, and his district became noted for innovations that usually became standardized along the entire Line. When the Dragon Empire attacked Held and Arcadia in 140, he raised a regiment of infantry and sent it to the front, and when the Castle Line was attacked elsewhere he raised another regiment and led it into what is now Diamonddom to take the pressure off the Line. He was finally given charge of his own castle when the Line was extended after the war, where he routed several attacks by supposed bandits. After the Gate Confrontation he began an Academy correspondence course in strategy, but when the First Galactic War broke out he was abruptly transferred to the capital, given a crash course in spatial warfare, and sent to break the siege of Oceanus, which he achieved with a complete victory, capturing nine-tenths of the enemy’s capital ships. As he was making his way back circuitously and slowly, trying to avoid the fighting, he suddenly came upon the enemy headquarters, which had just been assaulted by allied forces but which had withstood the attack. Here he contributed the captured ships and his own forces, making a siege feasible and causing the end of the war. During the peace that followed he advocated applying the principles of standard international relations to the spatial environment, but until the Force Screen was invented in 174 his ideas were deemed too costly; after that the ship-watch and space-wall projects were begun at his urging, and he declared himself satisfied and retired to his castle to enjoy peacetime. When the Second Galactic War began he immediately left for the capital and placed himself at the King’s service. He was sent on a fast ship to Greyhawk, where he deflected the enemy’s first thrust and masterminded a total victory by bringing in reinforcements at every point of the battle’s perimeter on the spider-ships. By the time he returned to the capital, the war was over, and he returned to his castle. The outbreak of the Second Inter-Universal War interrupted his peacetime project, a verse novel which he planned to publish under a pseudonym; he left it for criticism with his friend the editor of the Capitol Times when he was sent as an adviser to the New Roman Empire with a minimal escort. In the Battle of New Herculaneum, even though he was officially only an adviser and though he had only one ship with proper armament, his escort disabled the enemy orbital support and space transport, pinning the enemy army on the ground and enabling the local forces to capture it intact. When he heard that Allied Headquarters was besieged, he led the local space navy (including the captured ships) to its relief in the Battle of Lightning.