Cyndane

Cyndane has worn many titles over her lifetime: heiress, hostess, mother, temptress to name a scant few. She has been both the Madonna and Whore and has risen beyond their tired tropes to be...herself. Each and every one still hangs in her closet, waiting, dry, dusty and tight with disuse til she can slip them on once more for an evening's wear. Cyndane doesn't have skeletons; she has skins.

She views decadence as a necessity rather than an evil, aristocracy as a tool rather than a cancer, and rarely wastes an opportunity. Having dragged her house from near obscurity to notoriety, she understands how the appearance of generously shared wealth breeds confidence even fearmongering cannot rival. Her public life is pristine, her private life closed behind a wall despite the sensation of it spread throughout the tabloid tongues.

After a while, the costumes become easier to slip into rather than out of them. None have completely seen the mistress of Vandet emotionally naked and only a bare handful have caught glimpses. She trusts little, even in people that she loves. Cyndane wields her ambition carefully, wary of the cuts it carves out of her own life. She is well aware of the son she has crafted, capable at the cost of being a child. She is well aware of her failure of a marriage, crippled by her own cheating. Cyndane keeps her casualties close and counts them—no name is left unsaid in her nightly remembrances. She remembers, she remembers well, but she cannot fully repent. There is no absolution she has been able to find to atone.