Editing CharacterD&D 5E: Trickster's Gambit - 5 (section)

==Backstory==
: Keresen is the daughter of a wealthy but aging merchant from Opalcliff, in the Underhall, Branok Yorick.  Her mother, Sowena, is missing.  This is important to remember.  Keresen is the <i>only surviving child</i> of Branok and Sowena (née Akreyn), and that gets even closer to the heart of the thing. Their first child, a boy named Arthek, succumbed to scarlet fever when he was only four, and the grief caused Sowena, then pregnant a second time, to abruptly miscarry. Keresen's own birth was marked by ill omen: a new, green star appeared in the constellation of the Dreamer almost at the moment of her crowning, surprising sages.  No tragedy immediately struck, but Sowena felt no relief and could not bear what she thought was just awaiting the inevitable. She vanished from her bed one night, not two weeks later. Keresen—or a babe that looked enough like her—turned up in the shop, of all places, nearly two months later.  She needed a new diaper but was contentedly waving a locket containing a faded portrait of her mother.  Sowena herself was never located.

: The girl was all that remained of her mother, and she took after Sowena so much that sometimes her father could not look at her for grief.  But she was also all that remained of the family line, and Branok was extremely anxious that she be married into the highest station his money could seduce.  He sank no small portion of his fortune into the salaries of guards, private tutors, a larger household staff, and anything else that might keep her securely at home.  Keresen was attended by <i>someone</i> responsible at all possible times.  And somehow, she still managed to periodically slip away unseen and get up to trouble. The reminder of her mother's disappearance aged poor Branok a full three years on the spot, every time it happened.

: Her escapades dropped off for a time as she neared eligibility, but as soon as proposals began to actually come in, she disappeared again. She has now been gone a month, although she was first doing being having already gone over a decade ago at least, and she still will be having been.  Poor dad hasn't come out of his room in a month, and that's a terrible way to make a new heir.  He's lucky she's gone, though.  They all are.  A frightened woman desperate to keep her child safe; a star that no longer shines and never should have; a seed growing in the foreign soil of a mortal soul, the price of a better fate; a dream more real than the dreamer.  She's coming of age.



<u>Personality Traits</u>: Keresen doesn't exactly think she knows best.  Rather, her willful drive is strong enough that when she recognizes a path to her goals, she starts moving in the same instant.  She responds well to reasoned exhortations to wait, or revise her plans, but trying to impose unilateral authority on her is like trying to hold a handful of water by squeezing it tightly.

<u>Ideal</u>: Respect. Keresen craves her father's respect.  She doesn't realize that's what it is, but even more than the personal sweetness of having her freedom, ''being trusted with'' her freedom would fill an emotional need she has never really confronted.  Of course, he's not here.  But that isn't going to keep her from trying to prove her competence to the critical voice in her head that sounds like him.  At the same time, she is still essentially naïve.  Her life has been safe.  She's chasing the breathless thrill of adventure, and she's had about all the For Your Own Good she can stomach.

<u>Bond</u>: Keresen wants to <s>grow up to</s> be dramatic and important and famous.  Keresen wants adventure and novelty and excitement.  Keresen wants that pastry, and you <i>will</i> enjoy just giving it to her.  Keresen wants to pick her own suitor, and she has no idea what she wants from <i>that</i>, but it isn't hiding away in a gilded cage, permitted no higher ambition than birthing an heir.  Keresen would squeal for joy to become a pirate captain.  Keresen has <u>no</u> idea what any of these things would actually be like.

<u>Flaw</u>: Keresen has a just atrocious jealous streak.  She doesn't like having rivals of any kind, for any thing, at any time.  And she's prone, as you'd expect, to taking action to best them before really considering what "best" means in a given context.