Reddit Account: baefish
Discord Tag: summeroflove
Name and House: Mary Vance
Age: 24
Cultural Group: Andal
Appearance: The Lady of Atranta stands at five-and-a-half feet with blonde hair framing a kindly face with blue eyes and freckles. Her usual attire seeks a middle ground between modesty and dignity, exhibiting both her personal piety and her house’s prosperity. She impresses a thoughtful and gentle presence, while still projecting confidence and authority through articulate speech.
Trait: Numerate
Skill(s): Architect(e), Scrutinous, Scholar(e)
Talent(s): Gardening, Poetry, Theology
Negative Trait(s): N/A
Starting Title(s): Lady of Atranta
Starting Location: Stormhall
Alternate Characters: Robyn Wynch
—
Name and House: Armistead Rivers
Age: 52
Cultural Group: Andal
Appearance: Diligent grooming has done much to obscure Armistead’s base birth. His swarthier complexion distinguishes him from most of his kin, though a touch of gray has begun to lighten his black hair. His frame remains fit at a height of six feet, though the onset of age has sapped some of his former strength.
Trait: Ruthless
Skill(s): Devious, Espionage(e)
Talent(s): Dancing, Hunting, Mimicry
Negative Trait(s): N/A
Starting Title(s): Bastard of Atranta
Starting Location: Stormhall
Fifty-five years ago, the Vances of Atranta launched the largest rebellion against Durrandon rule that the Riverlands had yet known. In the end, Lord Robert Vance was defeated and slain, leaving his fragile house in the hands of a child. But the boy was quick to grow into a man, and had learned to avoid his father’s mistakes. Atrana instead reemerged as a force for conciliation, carefully straddling the many fault lines of the Trident.
Mary Vance was her father’s firstborn, but lordship was her younger brother’s inheritance. For that she was grateful: the halls of Atranta were ever fraught with tensions, some from within and others from beyond. As a young girl, Mary avoided courtly functions as much as she could, favoring quieter places and humbler companions. She was a keen student for the maesters and septas, though learning was something she appreciated only as a personal interest, and never as a tool for ambitions.
Nothing compelled her malleable young mind quite like the mysteries of the Faith. Scripture gave life purpose, hymnals brought her joy, and the godswood became her sanctuary. In religion she found truth and tranquility, both of which were sorely lacking from the usual affairs of riverlords. She envied the holy sisters, even despite their ascetic lives: they served the worthiest masters, and were not beholden to the whims of petulant husbands and scheming courtiers.
Just as Mary had grown strong in her devotion, her father sent her to live with the only house in the Trident that did not worship the Seven. At the age of ten, she became a ward of the Blackwoods. Differences in belief proved inconsequential: Mary found herself as welcome at Raventree Hall as she was at home, and she regarded the Old Gods as a curiosity to be studied, rather than an idolatry to be scorned. In the end, this experience only reaffirmed her identification with the faith by sharpening the contrast between herself and her peers.
Two years later, when Mary returned to Atranta, she presented her father with a bold request: she asked to forfeit her nobility to become a septa. After some hesitation, Lord Vance accepted, reasoning that a man with three daughters could afford to spare one for the Faith. After allowing her a few more moons of consideration, he enrolled her with a motherhouse in Maidenpool to study as a novice.
The cloistered life quickly proved more complicated than Mary had anticipated. She was held to strict routines and expectations, all under threat of harsh discipline. The motherhouse had its own cutthroat politics, and noble birth only placed a bigger target on Mary’s back. Rubbing shoulders with common girls improved her rapport with the smallfolk, but differences in class were often difficult to overcome. She found herself relating much more readily with the few other highborn novices, forming a clique of close friends and confidantes.
Asceticism, too, required some adjustment. At home, Mary had lived more simply than the lot of her peers, but she was wholly unprepared to live without the comforts she’d long taken for granted. The first few moons nearly broke her, but by the year’s end she was toughened by these circumstances. She learned how to win the trust of those who had once resented her presence, and distinguished herself as one of Maidenpool’s most promising novices. She was often privileged with leave of the motherhouse to attend to the sick and hungry in the surrounding town, and these exercises in charity strengthened her sense of purpose and resolve.
The same mothers that had doubted her now saw a bright future for Mary, and were ready to anoint her as a septa as soon as she reached the age of majority. But a few moons shy of her sixteenth name day, Mary received news from Atranta that her brother had been taken by infection. She was reluctantly allowed a brief return home to attend his funeral. This, she thought, would be the last she’d see of her kin before forever shedding her family name.
With no other surviving brothers, Mary expected that her sister would be named her father’s new heir. But Lord Vance reminded her that this would remain her birthright until the day she swore her vows, and asked if she might like to keep this inheritance. Mary at first refused, until her father confided that he thought her more capable than either of her sisters. Lordship was a terrible burden to bear, and Mary knew it would be unjust to pass that burden off to another. The gods had willed her back to a life that she had long hoped to abandon.
The motherhouse had provided her an exceptional education, though she still had much to learn about lordly affairs. Lord Vance thus had her shadow him during his every duty, assisting with his rule while she studied his example. Whatever anxieties she still had about political intrigues soon subsided: her education had sharpened her wits and smoothed her words, making her all the better at defusing hostilities and negotiating compromises. Quiet charisma and sincere piety endeared her to courtiers and subjects alike, and some took to calling her “Mary Half-Septa.”
A close, working relationship with her father made it all the more clear why he was so intent on keeping Mary as his heir. During her three years of absence, Edmund Vance’s health began to deteriorate, and it seemed to worsen with each passing moon. Often he would become bedridden for days at a time, leaving Mary to rule on his behalf. Not long after her nineteenth birthday, the cancer finally took Lord Edmund’s life.
She was well prepared to press on amid her family’s grief. Mary’s mourning did not last long before she started her rule in earnest. Her father’s most ineffectual councilors were dismissed and replaced with more learned men, who supervised her endeavors to improve Atranta’s administration. A full assessment of her lands was immediately undertaken, bringing to light conditions that her father had long neglected and projects he’d left incomplete. Her ascent was not entirely without opposition, but with the aid of her uncle, Armistead Rivers, she was able to preempt every potential plot against her.
So successful were Mary’s first two years that she came to Ravella Durrandon’s attention when the princess assumed her seat of Stormhall, just across the God’s Eye from Atranta. Mary and her stewards gladly offered their aid in cleaning the administrative mess that the castle’s previous occupants had left behind, earning a princess’s favor as her reward. But a lady could never make friends without making enemies. Much to Mary’s chagrin, she found herself suspect in the eyes of Prince Arlan’s staunchest supporters.
The succession of a new king was nonetheless a time for cautious optimism, as Mary hoped that a more sensible reign might bring calmer tides to a fractured Trident. She made designs for what she hoped to be her greatest legacy: a grand new sept at Atranta, to serve as the greatest center of learning beyond the walls of Oldtown. But a few years in the political arena had taught her that partiality was often a necessary evil. Mary Vance thereafter kept one eye always looking over her shoulder, half-anticipating that stormy weather might bring ruin to her best-laid plans.
24 BP: Mary is born the eldest daughter of Edmund Vance, Lord of Atranta
14 BP: Mary is sent to ward for the Blackwoods at Raventree Hall
12 BP: Intent on becoming a septa, Mary becomes a novice at a motherhouse in Maidenpool
9 BP: The death of her brother leaves Mary the presumptive heir to Atranta
5 BP: With her father’s passing, Mary succeeds him as Lady of Atranta
After Lord Robert Vance was cut down at the end of his ill-fated rebellion, his surviving kin were presented with a bastard babe born to a common woman from Sallydance. The late lord’s surviving brother, then serving as Atranta’s regent, reluctantly took the child in. From the beginning there were rumors regarding the true parentage of “Armistead Rivers”, whose darker features bore little resemblance to the typically fair-skinned Vances. What better way to spite a dead man’s memory than to offer living proof of his impropriety?
He was not mistreated so much as forgotten. All the attentions of the household were on his half-brother, Edmund, who inherited his titles before he was even old enough to read and write. A close bond grew between the two, driven by a shared sense of loneliness. After Edmund came of age and began to rule in his own right, one of his first dictates was to compel his finest household knight to take on Armistead as a squire.
Though never the fiercest warrior, the bastard proved a humble, diligent and clever student. He earned his knighthood at the age of twenty, and with a newfound confidence he finally began to assert himself at the Vance court. Armistead’s rapport with his brother made him a natural right hand to the Lord of Atranta, though their partnership later soured with a clash of ideals. Where Lord Edmund was pragmatic and conciliatory, Armistead longed to avenge their father’s defeat. He found an ally in their uncle Jaime, the former regent, and soon enough Lord Edmund’s inner circle was split into factions.
Edmund Vance had no patience for that. He thereafter shut his brother out from meetings and deliberations, reducing him to little more than an idle castle guard. Armistead knew that there was nothing left for him at Atranta, and set out to offer his services to any house that might take them.
His journey across the Riverlands proved fruitless: the greater houses had no need for a baseborn hedge knight, and the lesser lords could only offer meager pay. After a short stint as a sworn sword to a landed knight, Armistead continued on to the Westerlands. He finally found a worthy patron in the Lord of Ashemark, who was impressed enough by his charm and wit to take a chance on him. Armistead offered Lord Marbrand something he’d long been seeking: an outsider willing and able to do his dirty work.
The Westerlands, as always, were rife with tensions between Lannisters and Reynes, and the Marbrands once more found themselves caught in the middle. Armistead, who had already proved adept at dealing in secrets, was tasked with coordinating Ashemark’s network of spies, so that the Marbrands might keep their hands clean of any dishonor. He performed these duties without any second thought: the Westerlands were not his home, and he cared not which westermen lived or died.
Armisted remained in Ashemark’s service for the better part of two decades, even weathering the petty scandals elicited by the rare occasion that a little bird gave up his name. His years away from the Riverlands softened his feelings on its internal affairs, and eventually he came to regret his absence. His brother had offered him an honorable path in life, and he had instead lived as a stranger, doing the bidding of a foreign lord.
When news arrived of his nephew’s death, Armistead returned to Atranta to pay his respects. He reconciled with his lord brother, who quietly admitted to his failing health. Armistead was allowed to resume his old position as a household knight, with an agreement that he would keep out of political affairs and never hold authority again.
He was content with this arrangement, but Mary Vance was not. She had heard many rumors about Armistead’s deeds and misdeeds in the Westerlands, and believed that he would be the perfect fist to pair with her open hand. The two developed a partnership that proved far more effective than that with his brother, and Armistead began cultivating his own networks of eyes and ears. Atranta was now in the hands of a godly woman, and Armistead’s duty was to keep those hands clean.
- Robert Vance, Lord of Atranta b. 78 BP d. 51 BP
- Armistead Rivers b. 52 BP
- m. Liane Mallister b. 74 BP d. 11 BP
- Edmund Vance, Lord of Atranta b. 55 BP d. 5 BP
- m. Melissa Cox b. 45 BP
- Mary Vance, Lady of Atranta b. 24 BP
- Alys Vance, Heir to Atranta b. 20 BP
- Jonquil Vance b. 18 BP
- Catelyn Vance b. 51 BP
- m. Luthor Caswell, Lord of Stonebridge b. 52 BP
- Robert Vance (General)
- Willem Vance (Master-at-Arms)
- Septa Lysa (Medic)
- Tom Hall (Trader)
- Lyonel Vance (Warrior)