Name: Alcyone Age: Old Contact: PM alar Other Characters: N/A Interests: I’m more interested in gray areas, situations that cannot be truly “won”, and conflicts that require more creative solutions than punch something really hard. In particular, I’m a sucker for opportunities for both character and relationship development.
CHARACTER
Name: Danica Shardae Canon/OC: Canon, the Kiesha’ra series Canon Point: Hawksong, after being shot with an arrow Journal:alar Age: 19
Canon World
A long time ago, or so the myth goes, a human child named Alasdair was raised by hawks and gifted with their form. When she returned to her people, she gave them each the form of birds too: ravens and crows and sparrows. She established a new home for them away from other humans where they could thrive. And in her goodness, she allowed the entry of others including the serpiente, shapeshifters whose second forms were snakes.
That night, the serpiente put a knife in Alasdair’s back.
The tale the serpiente tell differs. (The truth is more terrible still.) Neither side knows what happened or why. What each know well is two thousand years of war: a fight gone on long enough that each side continues fighting because it is all they know. The war, everyone knows, will only end with the destruction of one side or the other.
Until the recently crowned Tuuli Thea, the queen of the avians, exchanged marriage vows with the king of the serpiente.
History
Danica was born the second daughter to the Tuuli Thea. At the age of eight came her first brush with the war and from that moment the losses piled on. When she was ten, she became her mother’s heir when her elder sister was murdered; at fifteen she lost her betrothed, killed while defending her. Four years later, Danica would lose her brother too in a fight in which both he and a serpiente prince would perish. When Danica came upon Gregory Cobriana in the field, he was still alive, but only just. His injuries were fatal, but death would be hours in coming. Danica knelt beside him until he died, holding his hand, and singing songs and lullabies to comfort him.
This singular event proved a turning point. When Zane Cobriana, heir to the serpiente throne, learned of her actions, he sent his sister with a message of peace. Although distrusting, the avians acquiesced to a meeting on neutral land before the Mistari Disa, queen of the tiger shapeshifters. The Disa’s suggestion to end the bloodshed was simple: unite the two warring peoples by uniting the two royal houses. A marriage between Danica and Zane. Everyone was horrified. For Danica to agree would be suicide…but without another option to protect her people and despite the terror he inspired by his very presence, when Zane asked her to marry him, she agreed. On her nineteenth birthday, Danica was crowned Tuuli Thea. The next day, she snuck away from her guards to wed Zane.
Both faced considerable criticism for their decision. Danica, especially, felt isolated. She found no support in her friends or family. Her people were wary and distrusting. Complicating matters was that before the serpiente, for whom marriage should always be for love, she had to be pretend to be madly infatuated with someone who made her nervous.
Slowly, she and Zane were able to find common ground, though the way took terrible turns. Danica was accidentally poisoned protecting Zane from an assassination attempt. The second attempt targeted Danica directly: she was shot through the waist with an arrow.
As she drifted in and out of consciousness in the aftermath, she fell through the Fade.
Personality
“The hawk queen is both a golden lady and a young girl, with too much power for her years…”
These words had been written nearly two thousand years prior about Danica’s ancestor, but they could as easily have been describing Danica herself.
Become her mother’s heir at the age of ten, Danica was raised to be queen. This was a sober responsibility: she would be inheriting a kingdom in the midst of a seemingly endless war. To prepare, she heeded the counsel of her mother and her friends, but she also confronted the horrors her people faced directly. Danica would not be a queen to hide behind walls and guards; she would rather take the risk upon herself, and spare her people. Despite the danger, she would walk the war-torn fields, and kneel beside fatally wounded soldiers and civilians alike, holding their hands, and comforting them with songs and stories to ease their passing.
It was her love for her people that led her to make the choice she did: to take for a husband the enemy king in order to put a stop to the war. She knew the risks. Her ancestor had been famously murdered, stabbed in the back after trusting a cobra. To Danica, however, it was a small price to pay to keep from holding another dying child. And her people plainly loved her for it. They trusted in her enough to follow her into peace.
Dignified and refined, she exemplified all the qualities of an avian lady. She kept a strong check on her emotions, displaying a cool poise and aloof manner. Avians were raised not to suffer outbursts. Even in the midst of grief and rage, she rarely allowed those emotions to show or to guide her actions. That was not to say she was unemotional; she felt, keenly. But in order to cope with the magnitude of loss, she needed to compartmentalize. While this helped her retain control even during stressful situations, her fear and anger leaked out in other ways, particularly dreams. Danica was prone to lucid nightmares, often replaying traumatic scenes in her sleep.
In many ways, Danica remained an innocent. Sheltered and naive, especially on the subject of romance, she could not be teased without blushing. She was ready to fight, to the death if need be, but preferred to extend a hand in friendship first. She would go out of her way to help someone in pain, even if it was just acknowledging the hurt. She found the wonder and beauty in her former enemies, and thus won them over. Her dreams were vast and, once her trust was earned, her faith unshakeable. Her experiences made her cautious, but she never lost her good heart.
Strengths & Weaknesses
A queen, Danica has been extensively educated on various subjects, especially leadership, diplomacy and combat. While not a soldier herself, she was taught hand-to-hand combat and practiced with the elite avian soldiers. She is described as not being able to best them, but her skills were extensive enough to surprise them. Her people are also experienced archers and Danica learned to use both the avian bow and the more difficult serpiente longbow. Last, but definitely not least, Danica is an avian shapeshifter. This means she has three possible forms.
The first is that of a human woman with golden hair and eyes. Golden-brown feathers grow at her nape, which can be seen depending on how she styles her hair. These feathers are not decorative. Should an avian's feathers be shorned, they will be permanently grounded, incapable of flight.
Her second form is called the Demi-form. Danica can grow massive hawk's wings on her back when she chooses, allowing her to fly while retaining a mostly human appearance. Her kind mostly use this form in combat where they can use it to fire a volley of arrows on the enemy from above. With the Demi-form, she also acquires a hawk's excellent sense of vision, allowing her to see further and with a clarity otherwise impossible.
Her final form is her pure animal form, a hawk with golden-brown feathers. It has the benefit of being the fastest and most efficient flyer, allowing her to cover vast distances in a matter of hours.
In all forms, Danica has the highly efficient respiratory system and rapid heartbeat (200 bpm) of birds. (The drawback to this is her susceptibility to poisons as her heart will pump it throughout her body in no time.) Her bones are hollow, making her very light. If she suffers a fractured wing in her Demi or animal form, she cannot shift back until the bone heals. Were she to shift back to human form with a broken wing, it would never heal and she would be essentially locked out of her winged forms. This isn’t typically a problem as she heals very quickly (at a rate described as miraculous to humans), but it nonetheless makes her cautious. She also runs very warm, radiating a constant circle of warmth in her vicinity.
Suggested Nerfs
Flight is incredibly important to avians, to the point that a flightless individual is looked upon with pity or revulsion. Not being able to change form is also viewed akin to mutilation. Therefore, while it is important to the character that she maintain access to her forms and flight, she will still be subject to distance limitations (being unable to spend too long far from other anchors, which in her case will also put an upper limit to how high she can go and how long she can spend at great heights) and, unlike before, shifting will take a toll on her energy (i.e. can only shift twice in a battle).
Arrival Inventory
Silver-and-gold necklace with a hawk pendant.
Signet ring inset with a rare golden onyx.
Slender boot knife etched with avian symbols for luck.
Burgundy silk dress in the avian style (conservative neckline, low back to allow for the growth of wings).
Humanization
She has a human form. As her non-human attributes (the feathers under her hair) in this form are subtle, I’d love for her to keep them.
Fit
I want a more fantasy setting for Danica. Her world is a very fantastical 700s BCE so it will be fun to navigate what is familiar and what is different. She will be of the "never give up finding a way home" type, but with her own experiences of war she also will not ignore the realities of Thedas and want to do her part.
danica shardae / the kiesha'ra
Name: Alcyone
Age: Old
Contact: PM
Other Characters: N/A
Interests: I’m more interested in gray areas, situations that cannot be truly “won”, and conflicts that require more creative solutions than punch something really hard. In particular, I’m a sucker for opportunities for both character and relationship development.
Name: Danica Shardae
Canon/OC: Canon, the Kiesha’ra series
Canon Point: Hawksong, after being shot with an arrow
Journal:
Age: 19
Canon World
A long time ago, or so the myth goes, a human child named Alasdair was raised by hawks and gifted with their form. When she returned to her people, she gave them each the form of birds too: ravens and crows and sparrows. She established a new home for them away from other humans where they could thrive. And in her goodness, she allowed the entry of others including the serpiente, shapeshifters whose second forms were snakes.
That night, the serpiente put a knife in Alasdair’s back.
The tale the serpiente tell differs. (The truth is more terrible still.) Neither side knows what happened or why. What each know well is two thousand years of war: a fight gone on long enough that each side continues fighting because it is all they know. The war, everyone knows, will only end with the destruction of one side or the other.
Until the recently crowned Tuuli Thea, the queen of the avians, exchanged marriage vows with the king of the serpiente.
History
Danica was born the second daughter to the Tuuli Thea. At the age of eight came her first brush with the war and from that moment the losses piled on. When she was ten, she became her mother’s heir when her elder sister was murdered; at fifteen she lost her betrothed, killed while defending her. Four years later, Danica would lose her brother too in a fight in which both he and a serpiente prince would perish. When Danica came upon Gregory Cobriana in the field, he was still alive, but only just. His injuries were fatal, but death would be hours in coming. Danica knelt beside him until he died, holding his hand, and singing songs and lullabies to comfort him.
This singular event proved a turning point. When Zane Cobriana, heir to the serpiente throne, learned of her actions, he sent his sister with a message of peace. Although distrusting, the avians acquiesced to a meeting on neutral land before the Mistari Disa, queen of the tiger shapeshifters. The Disa’s suggestion to end the bloodshed was simple: unite the two warring peoples by uniting the two royal houses. A marriage between Danica and Zane. Everyone was horrified. For Danica to agree would be suicide…but without another option to protect her people and despite the terror he inspired by his very presence, when Zane asked her to marry him, she agreed. On her nineteenth birthday, Danica was crowned Tuuli Thea. The next day, she snuck away from her guards to wed Zane.
Both faced considerable criticism for their decision. Danica, especially, felt isolated. She found no support in her friends or family. Her people were wary and distrusting. Complicating matters was that before the serpiente, for whom marriage should always be for love, she had to be pretend to be madly infatuated with someone who made her nervous.
Slowly, she and Zane were able to find common ground, though the way took terrible turns. Danica was accidentally poisoned protecting Zane from an assassination attempt. The second attempt targeted Danica directly: she was shot through the waist with an arrow.
As she drifted in and out of consciousness in the aftermath, she fell through the Fade.
Personality These words had been written nearly two thousand years prior about Danica’s ancestor, but they could as easily have been describing Danica herself.
Become her mother’s heir at the age of ten, Danica was raised to be queen. This was a sober responsibility: she would be inheriting a kingdom in the midst of a seemingly endless war. To prepare, she heeded the counsel of her mother and her friends, but she also confronted the horrors her people faced directly. Danica would not be a queen to hide behind walls and guards; she would rather take the risk upon herself, and spare her people. Despite the danger, she would walk the war-torn fields, and kneel beside fatally wounded soldiers and civilians alike, holding their hands, and comforting them with songs and stories to ease their passing.
It was her love for her people that led her to make the choice she did: to take for a husband the enemy king in order to put a stop to the war. She knew the risks. Her ancestor had been famously murdered, stabbed in the back after trusting a cobra. To Danica, however, it was a small price to pay to keep from holding another dying child. And her people plainly loved her for it. They trusted in her enough to follow her into peace.
Dignified and refined, she exemplified all the qualities of an avian lady. She kept a strong check on her emotions, displaying a cool poise and aloof manner. Avians were raised not to suffer outbursts. Even in the midst of grief and rage, she rarely allowed those emotions to show or to guide her actions. That was not to say she was unemotional; she felt, keenly. But in order to cope with the magnitude of loss, she needed to compartmentalize. While this helped her retain control even during stressful situations, her fear and anger leaked out in other ways, particularly dreams. Danica was prone to lucid nightmares, often replaying traumatic scenes in her sleep.
In many ways, Danica remained an innocent. Sheltered and naive, especially on the subject of romance, she could not be teased without blushing. She was ready to fight, to the death if need be, but preferred to extend a hand in friendship first. She would go out of her way to help someone in pain, even if it was just acknowledging the hurt. She found the wonder and beauty in her former enemies, and thus won them over. Her dreams were vast and, once her trust was earned, her faith unshakeable. Her experiences made her cautious, but she never lost her good heart.
Strengths & Weaknesses
A queen, Danica has been extensively educated on various subjects, especially leadership, diplomacy and combat. While not a soldier herself, she was taught hand-to-hand combat and practiced with the elite avian soldiers. She is described as not being able to best them, but her skills were extensive enough to surprise them. Her people are also experienced archers and Danica learned to use both the avian bow and the more difficult serpiente longbow. Last, but definitely not least, Danica is an avian shapeshifter. This means she has three possible forms.
The first is that of a human woman with golden hair and eyes. Golden-brown feathers grow at her nape, which can be seen depending on how she styles her hair. These feathers are not decorative. Should an avian's feathers be shorned, they will be permanently grounded, incapable of flight.
Her second form is called the Demi-form. Danica can grow massive hawk's wings on her back when she chooses, allowing her to fly while retaining a mostly human appearance. Her kind mostly use this form in combat where they can use it to fire a volley of arrows on the enemy from above. With the Demi-form, she also acquires a hawk's excellent sense of vision, allowing her to see further and with a clarity otherwise impossible.
Her final form is her pure animal form, a hawk with golden-brown feathers. It has the benefit of being the fastest and most efficient flyer, allowing her to cover vast distances in a matter of hours.
In all forms, Danica has the highly efficient respiratory system and rapid heartbeat (200 bpm) of birds. (The drawback to this is her susceptibility to poisons as her heart will pump it throughout her body in no time.) Her bones are hollow, making her very light. If she suffers a fractured wing in her Demi or animal form, she cannot shift back until the bone heals. Were she to shift back to human form with a broken wing, it would never heal and she would be essentially locked out of her winged forms. This isn’t typically a problem as she heals very quickly (at a rate described as miraculous to humans), but it nonetheless makes her cautious. She also runs very warm, radiating a constant circle of warmth in her vicinity.
Suggested Nerfs
Flight is incredibly important to avians, to the point that a flightless individual is looked upon with pity or revulsion. Not being able to change form is also viewed akin to mutilation. Therefore, while it is important to the character that she maintain access to her forms and flight, she will still be subject to distance limitations (being unable to spend too long far from other anchors, which in her case will also put an upper limit to how high she can go and how long she can spend at great heights) and, unlike before, shifting will take a toll on her energy (i.e. can only shift twice in a battle).
Arrival Inventory
Humanization
She has a human form. As her non-human attributes (the feathers under her hair) in this form are subtle, I’d love for her to keep them.
Fit
I want a more fantasy setting for Danica. Her world is a very fantastical 700s BCE so it will be fun to navigate what is familiar and what is different. She will be of the "never give up finding a way home" type, but with her own experiences of war she also will not ignore the realities of Thedas and want to do her part.
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