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Old 12-29-2003, 08:54 PM   #27
Elora
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Location: Kalrienmar
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Character Description Form: Adanel Luinlil

NAME: Adanel Luinlil

AGE: 31

RACE: Mannish (Shape Changer)

GENDER: Female

WEAPONS:
Adanel carries a small dagger in a discreet location. Should if be seen on her person, her life is forfeit as is her honour and possessions.

APPEARANCE:
Adanel has dark hair that curls thickly to her waist. When in sunlight, her hair is lit by lighter, chestnut gleams of colour. Usually her hair is bound into a thick braid that either hangs free down her back or is wound about her head in the heavy heat of the South. It is let to fall free whilst she is performing. Her skin is lightly tanned, the colour deepening when exposed to protracted sunlight. Her eyes are green. She stands at 5’4”, and is described as comely for her face and graceful form.

She is usually garbed in the clothing of her craft, Desert Dancer. This varies according to the customs of the place she is performing in and whether she is on stage or not. Her performance costumes vary widely from wildly colourful and tasselled dresses, with bright beading and ribbons adoring sleeves, bodice and the ruffled skirts of the inland tribes of the South to the more ornate, elegant and sheer costumes of the costal tribes. When not on stage or performing, Adanel wears comfortable and practical clothing. She is rarely found in trews. She favours wide skirts and light blouses. She is often barefoot, but wears soft soled calf boots when not dancing.
Like most dancers, Adanel is often seen wearing scarfs and veils, with dangling and chiming jewellery at her brow, ears, neck, wrist, hips and ankle. Her wrists are hennaed in the sigils of fortune born by all Dancers and that of her own Clan, the Kestrel. Her eyes are often outlined in kohl and her generous mouth highlighted by a stain made of crushed berries.

PERSONALITY/STRENGTHS/WEAKNESSES:
Adanel is a practical and analytical woman. She is calculating and spends much time in forethought. It rare for her to act thoughtlessly. She has mastered the stage presence of allure, mystery and grace. Often she uses that as a mask for her activities. Adanel is a woman who is well aware of the power and drawbacks of her femininity. She has a formidable grasp of clan customs and law throughout the Southern Lands, as a Desert Dancer is expected to. She knows each leader, their descent and heirs/contenders. Adanel is an accomplished Dancer who travels freely from Clan to Clan, unheeded on the basis of her craft, to attend public ceremonies such as harvest and planting ceremonies, ship namings, business openings, births, marriages, naming ceremonies and so forth. She cultivates actively the persona of dancer, grace and feminine softness of manner and movement.

Adanel is physically fit, as one would expect of a professional dancer, flexible and strong. Theft and information gathering are but two strings to her bow. She has a social and diplomatic flair that is often called upon given her activities, dancing or otherwise. Adanel also has a strong love of gold and other forms of wealth. This can be seen in her costumes, which are renowned for their luxuriant vivacity.

Adanel’s weaknesses are considerable. She is a proud woman, who thinks herself above most others. It is hard for her to accede to another’s power or authority. She finds it hard to answer to her superiors and chafes at confinement of service, duty or location. Adanel is a woman who cannot remain idle and her patience is legendarily as brief as her temper is explosive. She is known to adhere to the practise of revenge and bears a grudge indefinitely. Forgiveness and mercy are not qualities she admires.

Accustomed to doing for herself, Adanel will grudgingly accept company provided her own status is not impeached. She rarely forms bonds with others for any other than self-serving and practical reasons. Adanel’s ambition burns hot and has done so since she was a child. She is manipulative and not to be trusted for any reason. Adanel is a brightly coloured viper, for all her beauty and femininity.

HISTORY:
Adanel was born into the Kestrel Clan, located on the coast of Harad. They are a small holding, fishing folk for the largest part, and dependant on trade and alliances with other clans for their survival. She soon found this to be a cloying and suffocating environment and Adanel was known to be an agitant for discord and trouble from an early age. Despite her wayward behaviour, Adanel proved bright and rapidly acquired language and mathematics. Her mind was ever hungry for more and soon the horizons of her village closed in around her.

It was at the Festival of the Turtle, celebrated annually when the prized giant sea turtles came to shore to lay their precious eggs, that Adanel saw her first opportunity for escape. A Desert Dancer had come, to dance for good fortune and blessing of the Kestrel Clan. Adanel was fascinated by the spectacle of the dancer. The visitor was treated with deference and respect, and she commanded the attention of all within the Clan, man, woman and child. To Adanel’s young perspective, the dancer had luxury, respect, power and prestige. Adanel resolved to accompany the Dancer when she left the village at the conclusion of the festival. The village had some doubts, but on the whole were pleased to see Adanel at last find some productive, respectful target for her energies. They apprenticed her gladly and Adanel bid farewell to Kestrel Clan and her parents without so much as a second glance. The freedom of the wide world had captured her attention.

As with most things, the glamour of Desert Dancing was soon exposed for the myth it was. Adanel found herself immersed in a gruelling craft fraught with peril and labour. Her indenture was seven years long, an eternity to 8 year old Adanel. In that time, she had to serve her mistress and her fellow dancers as common slave. When the cooking, cleaning, laundry and endless sewing for the costumes was done, there was the exhausting training that is required to master the art of the fluid, graceful, floating, sinuous Desert Dance. There were the histories and legends told through dance, for each clan and momentous epoch in the South. There was the music and the customs of hospitality to learn also. Desert Dancing was often politicised, given its role at official ceremonies. It was regulated by law, especially concerning the diplomatic nature of the Dancer. A Dancer was sacrosanct, and could not be attacked nor ransomed as hostage in hostilities. Neither could she carry a weapon nor commit acts of violence.

Adanel was nearly 16 and again suffocating in the strictures of her heavily regulated profession when at last she attained the rank of Desert Dancer. But this was only the beginning. Adanel had a long road ahead of her. She had to form a reputation so as to win appointments to prestigious and well paid events. What that meant for Adanel is many appearances at taverns and new businesses, where the official customs concerning Desert Dancers and their status were conspicuously absent. She had to compete with other new Dancers, an often vicious game of sabotage and cruelty to ensure other dancers were unavailable to perform at sought after engagements. There were also the usual dangers of a young woman without the protection of her family. Desert Dancers belonged to all Clans at once, so Adanel was effectively alone in less than seemly taverns, docks, ships, inns and so forth.

All in all, it was a much needed lesson in survival. Adanel did more than survive. Her quick wits, analytical mind and pragmatic nature meant that she formed alliances to suit her as quickly as she broke them. She also, very early on, carried a small dagger. Forbidden as this was, and dangerous for her longevity professionally or otherwise, her dagger won her a path out of unfavourable binds on more than one occasion. Adanel thrived on the competition and challenge and her ambition was to carve out a place for herself unassailable by Clan Leaders, merchants, sailors and the rest of societal scum, as she had come to view her audience.

Her beauty along with her command of stage presence and dancing ability ensured that she achieved exactly this. By the time Adanel was 25, she had established a veritable empire. Desert Dancers were one of the few women permitted to own wealth outright, including property. Their kinless status meant that there was no clan to lay claim to it over her. Adanel amassed wealth from patrons and suitors, allies and enemies (with judicious black mail that only a Dancer familiar with the intimate workings of a clan’s inner life). She established an estate on the outskirts if Umbar. There she held court, acquired staff in various ways and lead the decadent lifestyle she had always longed for. What lead Adanel further into peril was her curious predilection for trouble. Adanel could always find it.

From her erstwhile court at Umbar, by the wild coast, Adanel found her drawn into the intrigues of power between the Clans of her kin, the Shape Changers. She became aware of an emerging power in one Wyrm, a power that could soon reach her own enclave. Adanel was forbidden to hold a position of leadership by her profession. Dancers are rankless and clan-less. However, she found herself alternately perturbed and fascinated by what was unfolding. In typical calculation, Adanel resolved to ally herself with Wyrm. It never entered her arrogant mind that such an alliance would put her in a position of servitude once again.

Adanel made her way with her retinue of musicians, escorts/guards and attendants to see about her alliance. She met with a rude shock when none of this made any impact on the Wyrm. So long had Adanel divorced herself from her kin, she found herself unprepared for their ways and expectations. Adanel was not, however, willing to fall back and return to her estates in defeat and rejection. She began to cultivate ideas about her usefulness and verifying her Shape Changer heritage. What Adanel was most successful in achieving was perverting the office of Desert Dancer to spy and covert agent.

Adanel’s access to all areas, special privileges and freedoms, made her ideal to venture into all clans. Her years of blackmail demonstrated her wiles and expediency. Her willingness to work determinedly to see advancement achieved, for herself through the Wyrm, was never doubted. The Wyrm quickly saw how easily it was to control Adanel, using her pride and vanity. But most of all, Adanel could be placed nearly anywhere, at any occasion, to there observe and work behind the guise of Desert Dancer – sacrosanct, untouchable, unquestionable.

Adanel, for her part, soon perceived the scales of power tipping in the fledgling alliance towards Wyrm, who had never been overtly welcoming towards Adanel. Adanel, used to charming all who crossed her path through wile and manipulation, was disconcerted at first and then growingly concerned. By the time she perceived that she was chained to Wyrm’s ambitions, it was too late to cut free. Adanel was more firmly enslaved by her own hand now than ever before. Her only freedom lay in Wyrm succeeding her ambitions of power and conquest and Adanel would allow nothing to stand in their way.

So it was that Adanel’s petty follies fell deeper into malice and evil, down the slippery slope of amorality, greed, and pride. Murder, direct or otherwise, she added to her talents. She would betray the confidence and hope of those who had confided in her as Dancer whenever it behoved her. She was never without an ulterior motive in the past. Ironically, Adanel’s professional star started to burn all the more brighter. Her peers became afraid of her, and few contended with her for coveted engagements. Adanel secured a place at Minas Arnor with little competition from other Dancers when the position was made available. From there, Adanel served on all errands, large or small, commanded of her by the Wyrm. She found herself dancing for ignorant northerners on the one hand and running treasonous, dangerous or plain demeaning jobs on the other.

When the command to return came, Adanel did so gratefully, ashamed by her eagerness to return like a whipped cur nonetheless. The yoke of service sat uneasily around her neck, but it sat nonetheless. She took berth upon a ship making for Umbar, where she was to remain until further instructions. No sooner had Adanel ensconced herself in the luxury of her estate did command arrive.
Adanel was to perform at the Great Hall of Lord Falasmir. He was to be hosting a dinner for foreign persons of some note. His guests were to then travel on with a caravan that was to arrive some time in the coming three days. Weary as she was, doubting ever more the wisdom of her service to the Wyrm, Adanel prepared herself for the evening and set out. Her instructions were to perform as requested and ensure she secured a place with the caravan. As Dancer, she could travel as she wishes. Wyrm was sure to specify that Adanel must supply her own needs from her own coffers – something that rankled with the avaricious dancer. Her coffers had dwindled too fast, Wrym skimming from her earnings for the better part of the past 4 years. The evening and caravan, with its attendant performances, had best prove worth Adanel’s while, else she would soon turn on her mistress as she had on her unfortunate hosts of the past years.


First Post

The sun was sullenly hovering overhead, burning without care all beneath without thought for those that suffered, or so Adanel thought as she waited in stifling heat before the gates of Lord Falasmir’s Estates. One of her retinue, a tall bald man who carried an imposing set of curved sabres at his back, had knocked on the high gates an hour ago, or so it seemed to Adanel. The Dancer quashed the urge to wipe at the sweat that was beading her brow beneath her veil. She failed to curb the impulse to tap one dainty foot rapidly, pace building to a crescendo that would accompanied by her vocal disapproval if the gate was not soon opened. What sort of barbarian would fail to provide shade for those waiting to enter his estate? Her other attendant, a plainly dressed woman, shifted her weight from her left foot to her right beneath the sun’s glare.
“Cease your fidgeting,” Adanel snapped at her through the pale violet silk of her veil. The woman bowed her greying head, familiar with her mistress’s waspish tongue, and said nothing but thought much. Adanel, who had never dreamt of what her woman might actually think of her, switched her rising ire back to the escort who had knocked at the gate.

“Do so again, and properly this time,” she commanded. He raised a wide fist to comply as the window port was flicked open.

“Yes,” a harried man said through the small space.
“Adanel, Desert Dancer,” said her guard in a rumbling baritone. The man flicked a gaze past his broad shoulder to the woman that stood mysteriously swathed in silk, the weak breeze eliciting a faint chime from somewhere beneath the folds of her veil. His gaze returned to the obviously armed guard with considerable doubt.

“Indeed, and what need does a Desert Dancer have for am armed guard.” It was, after all, widely known that Dancers had no need for personal protection. The potential for insult to her host’s honour loomed dark over this meeting.

“My path took me through the markets, Master, and sometimes in the heat of trade the old customs are forgotten for a moment.” Adanel’s voice was smooth and honeyed. The man examined the forbidding mien of her maidservant a moment longer, eyed her guard’s weaponry and came to a decision.

“The staff entrance is to the side,” he said brusquely and with that closed the portal. Adanel stiffened in rage and insult for a moment. Behind her veil her lips formed a thin vertical line as she ground her teeth over the hot words that burned in her throat. Silent, she spun and stalked towards the staff entrance, leaving the other two to scurry after her. The blessing of the staff entrance was that it afforded a modicum of shade, but Adanel was not minded to be grateful. She was not staff! She was Desert Dancer. Somewhere in a small corner, a voice uncomfortably reminded her that Desert Dancers were not murderers and agents of politics or conquest. Adanel ignored that voice as she did the shade.
The gate was open, her arrival expected, and she was greeted by the man who had turned her back from the main gate. He was tall and thin, his face lined with the experience of the years. She inspected his appearance from the safety of her veil. This time, he bowed, though not deep enough by far.

“Greetings Desert Dancer. We have been expecting you.” Adanel swept through, jewellery chiming with each fluid, determined step. From behind her, the man continued.

“There is, ah, one difficulty. We cannot allow your guard to enter so armed.” The note of disapproval in the man’s voice was clear. Adanel turned in a rush. Her eyes were bright with anger that would slip loose as would her dagger any moment now.

“I would be interested to see you disarm him, Master.” The honey had faded now. The guard in question merely stood where he was, arms by his side, eyes alert and slipping from side to side.

“I must insist, Dancer. Such an impost to Lord Falasmir’s hospitality is intolerable. As you can see, we are well defended and safe enough.” The sound of men gathering behind Adanel merely proved the suggestion more than mere talk. Adanel refused to grant him the satisfaction of turning to view the guards that ranged behind her.

“I have learnt many a strange custom in my recent time spent in Minas Arnor, but this is beyond unusual. I did not know it to be intolerable to allow a Dancer to bring her personal musician with her to her performances.”

The man’s doubt ratcheted higher instantly. With a flick of her wrist, Adanel had her maidservant reveal a small tabla drum from the pack she carried.

“I trust Lord Falasmir has musicians of his own to cater for the pipes and strings.” The honey had returned to her voice, along with a certain smugness. Adanel could either be called a liar, and her untouchable honour impeached, or allowed to proceed. The scowl on the man’s face was as deep as her satisfaction as he stalked forward, muttering “Very well, but his weapons will remain in the custody of my Lord’s guards. If will be so good as to follow, I shall show you to your rooms.”

“Of course,” Adanel murmured smoothly as she fell in behind him. Lord Falasmir’s man disposed of her swiftly once they reached her temporary quarters.

“If there is nothing else, I shall leave you to your peace. Dinner will be at six bells. Lord Falasmir expects you to perform after the repast has been eaten.”
“Naturally,” Adanel said in a somewhat bored voice. “Shall I be seeing Lord Falasmir prior to this evening? It is not uncommon for my patrons to make specific requests of me.”

His retainer swallowed an impatient reply at being tutored in customs of dancing.
“That, I am afraid, shall depend very much on Lord Falasmir’s schedule. His has little free time to squander. Good day,” he replied stiffly, with an even slighter bow.
Adanel swept into an elaborate curtsy as he firmly closed the door behind him. She rose as his footsteps receded down the hall and unwound the veil from her head.

“Unpack my belongings, Irdrain. The emerald costume with the gold and pearls will suffice for this evening’s guests, methinks.”
“Yes, milady.”
Adanel turned to her musician.
“As for you, you have work to do. Return to the markets and see what you can learn of this caravan.” Grared bowed wordlessly, sheathed still in his silence, and withdrew.

“Draw me a bath, Irdrain,” Adanel commanded as an afterthought, shedding her layers as she crossed to the generous tub to there wait imperiously.
__________________
Characters: Rosmarin: Lady of Cardolan; Lochared: Vagabond of Dunland; Simra: Daughter of Khand; Naiore: Lady of the Sweet Swan; Menecin: Bard of the Singing Seas; Vanwe: Lost Maiden; Ronnan: Lord of Thieves; and, Uien of the Twilight
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