About Lady Gabrielle d'ApcherLady Gabrielle d'Apcher is the daughter of Lord Thomas d'Apcher, Marquis de Margeride, and Lady Florianne d'Apcher, originally of House Eiredor. Her hair is a fiery red, which she often wears in a tangle of ringlet curls, as an accompaniment to the pale skin of her face. Her eyes are greenish-blue, and lie behind a pair of curved-rectangular eyeglasses. She carries an average-sized slender frame, though it is often masked by the clothing she typically wears. In keeping with the fashions of the Empire of Taldor, the outfits she wears are colorful and elaborate, a testament to her faith in Shelyn, and thanks to some magic, always kept tidy. She also always carries with her a ladies' fan, which she uses to keep herself cool on warm days, and she often gestures with it, as if it were a conversational aid. Lady Gabrielle enjoys mingling in the social circles of Oppara, with all its garden parties, theater outings, and masquerades. She is an avid reader of adventure novels, a student of cultures, an exemplar of etiquette, and an avatar of elegance. She appreciates rich, well-crafted things, like fine jewelry and exquisite meals, deriving a sense of value from the effort required to create something. Naturally, she avoids shoddily-made things, tasteless foods, dirty places, and especially people who have not yet developed a respect for anyone but themselves. Gabrielle is also an accomplished actress and opera singer, volunteering in dramatic productions whenever she has the chance. Though she is certainly within the culturally-appropriate age of marriage, she has never been known to engage in romantic contact, even though several eager suitors have expressed their affections in the past. The Lady appears as a pleasant face in conversation, and is an intelligent contributor on many topics. She can be a very warm and generous friend to those who make the effort to be a friend to her, but she has little tolerance for others who do not. When Gabrielle feels slighted, the grudge she holds remains for an eternity. She often examines situations for clever solutions, and makes sure to keep herself informed of the larger consequences of her actions. Her cleverness does not imply cowardice, though: in desperate circumstances, Lady Gabrielle has found deep wells of courage within her, as her life experiences and her private faith in the vengeful Calistria have left her with strong reserves of willpower. character history:
In her teenage years, she devoted herself to the Opparan theater, often acting on a volunteer basis for the grand productions her mother was always eager to sponsor. It was the least the producers could do for their most generous donor. Over time, Lady Gabrielle actually became pretty good at it, to the point where she achieved prima donna status for several productions. Of course, her status as the blossoming daughter of the Marquis de Margeride was only a benefit to the young diva, though she was too naive to sense that the attention she received was motivated by more than her stage prowess. It was this naïveté which led to the life she enjoyed all being taken away from her by the mother who had provided it for her. In the Gilded City, dreams granted by others are always fleeting.
Though Lady Gabrielle makes sure to never speak of it, her family estate faces financial difficulty. Her mother's lavish parties, extravagant lifestyle, and frequent donations to Opparan opera, though typical of a lady of House Eiredor, have generated expenses significantly greater than the March of Margeride's incomes. Not wanting to see her pleasures interrupted, Lady Florianne used her family connections to arrange a suitable match for her daughter, as a way of providing credit for the family's outstanding debts. Perhaps due to Gabrielle's youthful rebelliousness, or perhaps due to her total lack of desire for her match, the young lady would have nothing of it. So Lady Florianne found a different solution. She sent Gabrielle across the world to stay with relatives in the Taldan colony of Amanadar, where her childish pleasures would be deprived. Gabrielle was to return a woman grown, a Lady receptive to her duties to her family. When she arrived in New Oppara, Lady Gabrielle did not know how to seek entertainment and companionship in the faraway city. became mystified by acrobats and martial artists, fascinated by both the physical empowerment and the grace and discipline of their movements and actions. As Amanadar's culture was more martial culture than Oppara's by necessity, her relatives were quite amenable to her wanting to train physically while receiving instruction in wifely subjects like etiquette, modesty, falconry, and the running of a household. Within the monastic setting, she found others who were interested in inner peace and self-improvement, and she quickly began spending all her time finding her own path to self-perfection, finding acceptance amongst her training partners along the way. Gabrielle would never be strong enough to wield a sword and she had no knack for magic, but when surrounded by the calm of a Tian monastery, what mattered was the development of her own martial style. Due to her graceful movements and relaxed stance, as well as the smiles she started to display while in training, she was given nicknames like "Lady of Spring" and "Lady of Blossoms." As she had with her acting career, over a long enough time of martial training, Lady Gabrielle learned that she was actually pretty good at it. She was even able to receive instruction in ways to incorporate her talents for theatrics and deception, as well as her quick wit, into her martial style. This fulfilment she received from her training was reflected in other aspects of her life, and her relatives became impressed with her perfect poise, charming demeanour, and physical prowess. Her time in Amanadar came to a close, and she returned home an elegant Lady ready to be presented in Oppara for courtship and marriage once more. When Lady Gabrielle was reintroduced to her home culture, she found it different than she remembered. Nothing had actually changed, but it was as if the hidden layers of Taldan social interaction became revealed to her. She could sense others' emotions, desires, and weaknesses while speaking to them, just as she had learned to read her sparring partners. Situations that used to make her overflow with anxiety no longer made her feel so nervous, and she found it easy to surround herself with friends who admired her, which her mother certainly appreciated. Once Lady Gabrielle realized that she could get what she wanted in high society, she started to apply herself toward goals she set out to accomplish, the primary one being to maintain the freedom she enjoyed as an unwed Lady of the Empire. She had yet to meet a suitor who could satisfy her intellectually, and she dreaded a future of subservience and solitude. She knew that she could accomplish anything she wished with a focused mind, and discovered that she could achieve lifelong independence if she overcame two obstacles: her older brother Gerard, and her own mother. Gerard was more interested in reliving the glories of the Empire through expeditions to the far corners of the world. He even joined a foreign group called the Pathfinder Society in order to expand his opportunities for adventure. This meant that he was a distant impediment, one to be bypassed rather than confronted. Her mother, however, with her constant demands for marriage, she would need to be the focus of Gabrielle's efforts. The family estate, Margeride, is a decently-sized province which lies on the Sellen River north of Cassomir, bordered by the Verduran Forest to the north and the nation of Andoran to the west. Trade with Andoran and the harvesting of Verduran lumber provide the bulk of Margeride's incomes, which, though substantial, have been harried by the ruthless business tactics of Andoran's Lumber Consortium. After the People's Revolt, the organization became unhindered by the Chelish authorities, and two generations later, Margeride, bound by both morality and diplomacy, is now in financial trouble. Gabrielle's grandfather held the line against the Revolt and the Consortium's interest, and the Consortium has slowly strangled the Apcher family since. The talented Lady Florianne has done an excellent job of covering up the financial strain with apparent opulence, and her plan to reinforce the estate with a marriage to a powerful family is a worthy one, but her daughter has refused to passively accept the situation. Lady Gabrielle believes that opposing her mother directly is a fool's errand. Instead, she has secretly worked to address the matter of Margeride's difficulties, by identifying corrupt aristocrats to whom her family is indebted, uncovering their secrets, and exposing their corruption to the authorities. Not only are Margeride's creditors removed, but the more of Margeride's debts she quietly claims for herself, either legally or through thievery, the more of the family title she will possess for herself. If Lady Gabrielle, under the cover of her position as a talented actress, opera singer, and friendly socialite, can root out enough of her family's more corrupt creditors and earn a large enough sum of gold to settle with a good amount of the rest, she can rescue her home from ruin and claim the family title for herself. |
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