blood is running deep

Any wounds inflicted on her are also inflicted on her opponent.

⇓in character⇓

PHYSICAL AFFECTION: Not until she knows you very, very, very well and don't mind working to earn it. Even then, it would likely be limited to the occasional hug unless you're playing Alistair

PHYSICAL VIOLENCE: Mariaine has a kill count in the thousands, they're welcome to try? however, I have no problem with her losing due to insert reason here. no killing, though, not unless we've talked about it extensively and it makes sense within the RP

ROMANCE/FLIRTING: Absolutely! Yes please! She'll have no idea what to do with it!

SEXUAL CONTENT: No, unless you're playing Alistair

PSYCHIC ABILITIES: None. But there's a heavy stigma against that kind of power as it's seen as only achievable by blood magic

MAGIC/POWERS: she's a Grey Warden, leading to enhanced stamina, speed, and strength

MEDICAL INFORMATION: She's a Grey Warden, meaning she's been tainted by drinking darkspawn blood. Eventually, this will catch up with her and she'll have to go to the Deep Roads to die fighting.

OFFENSIVE SUBJECTS OR TRIGGERS: being talked down to as she's endured more in her seventeen twenty years than most people do in their entire lifetimes, talking casually about what happened at Highever, cruelty for the sake of cruelty

⇓out of character⇓

BACKTAGGING: Absolutely!

FOURTH WALLING: Please don't.

THREADHOPPING: Go for it!

CONTENT I ABSOLUTELY NEED WARNINGS FOR, BUT CAN STILL PLAY: For me, nothing.

CONTENT I ABSOLUTELY NEED WARNINGS FOR AND THAT I CAN'T PLAY: Harm to cats.

ANYTHING ELSE: I'm pretty easy-going! Even heavy subjects like rape don't bother me. The only thing which flat-out sends me into an anxiety attack is harm to cats.

This is Mariane Cousland. Please leave a message. Thank you.

PLAYER
Player name: argustar
Contact: argustar on plurk
Characters currently in-game: George Lass, Margaery Tyrell, Laura Palmer, Tinya Wazzo

CHARACTER
Character Name: Mariane Cousland
Character Age: 16
Canon: Dragon Age
Canon Point: as she goes to greet the crowds assembled to greet the Hero of Ferelden
History: Mariane is the youngest child of Teryn Bryce Cousland and Eleanor Cousland, the highest ranking non-royalty in Ferelden. She was raised with the expectation of making a good marriage and settling into the life of a lady of Ferelden. However, even the most ladylike ladies of Ferelden are taught how to defend themselves. Mariane never grew the stature needed to become a warrior, so instead she was trained as a rogue, to use stealth and trickery over brute strength. She excelled at her training and took up the sword and dagger as her weapons of choice.

Her life was upended when Duncan came to Castle Cousland looking to recruit a Grey Warden and Rendon Howe attacked in the middle of the night. She was forced to fight her way through the castle to find her mortally wounded father accompanied by Duncan. Mariane's mother refused to leave her husband and Mariane initially refused to leave her parents. It was only the prospect of living to gain revenge on Howe that got Mariane to leave and agree to Duncan's offer to become a Grey Warden.

After the disaster at the Battle of Ostagar and being rescued by Flemeth, Mariane was set on fulfilling the treaties signed by the Circle of Magi, the Dalish, and the Dwarves. She travelled first to Redcliffe to see about getting Arl Eamon's aid and became caught up in the problems with Eamon being in a coma and his son, Connor, being possessed by a demon.

As a result, she took the group to the Circle of Magi to both gain their cooperation and see about getting someone to break the demon's hold on Connor. When Mariane found out that the Circle was under seige, she volunteered to go and save as many of the mages as possible, thus gaining their cooperation.

After that, she went to Honnleath after encountering a peddler with the control rod for a golem. She rescued Amalia from the demon, killing it. She then brought the mages back to Redcliffe to break the demon's hold on Connor and kill it. After that, she was sent on a quest to find Andraste's ashes to cure Eamon.

She refused the cultists' offer to taint the ashes and killed the High Dragon and returned to Redcliffe to cure Eamon. Then, she went to fulfill the treaty with the Dwarves where she resolved the succession crisis by backing Bhelen and sided with Caridin, killing Branka and destroying the Anvil of the Void.

Then, she approached the Dalish about their side of the treaty. After finding out the truth about the werewolf curse, she tried to initiate negotiations between Zathrian and the Lady of the Forest, but Zathrian attacked the party and Mariane was forced to defeat him, finally convincing him to end the curse and his own artifically extended lifespan.

When Mariane went to Denerim, she became fully embroiled in Ferelden's civil war. She rescued Anora from Rendon Howe and finally obtained the vengeance against him she sought by killing him with her own hands. When the time came to choose Ferelden's next ruler, she backed Alistair's claim to the throne, announcing herself as his queen in the process.

When offered the Dark Ritual to save herself and Alistair, she chose to accept Morrigan's offer, though it pained her greatly. As a result, Mariane was able to survive killing the Archdemon, ending the Blight.

Personality: Growing up, Mariane always assumed she would marry well and spend her life as one of Ferelden's nobility. She had ambitions beyond a simple life, but knew that as a Teyrn's daughter, and the second child at that, there wasn't any higher to go in terms of rank. She had also wanted to fall in love and choose her husband herself, rather than marry simply for an alliance, but she knew that such a love match was highly unlikely. So she tried to content herself with the idea of life as a Bann's wife and the mother of his children and heirs.

This restlessness was a big part of why she tried so hard to excel at learning a rogue's tricks. She started learning very young. While most children had games to play at, Mariane had lockpicking and stealth and learning to evade an attack and turn the attack against them. She loved it and took to her training like a duck to water. Around the same time, she adopted the dual wielding style of swordplay, depending on her small stature and speed of attacks to see her to victory.

Mariane was born with what Fereldans call melancholy, but what we know as depression. This has colored her entire perspective, giving her a pessimistic outlook on life. It also causes her to dwell on past mistakes and wonder what she could have done to make the outcome "better." During the year of the Blight, it took all of her self-control and determination to not let her condition get in the way of what needed to be done to save her home country. She did her best to repress her negative emotions when dealing with the people she had to interact with and project an image of calm serenity. She was successful in doing so. She knew that if she showed any weakness or hesitation, all could potentially be lost.

The loss of her family hit her incredibly hard. As a result, Mariane bonded very closely to her companions.

Leliana was like a sister to her, thanks to her kind and supportive nature. When she was around Leliana, she didn't feel like she had to keep up the front of being completely in control of herself and her circumstances quite so much. She could talk about "girly things" with Leliana, like shoes, hairstyles, and pretty clothing without feeling as though she was being frivolous and she loved to listen to Leliana's stories. Mariane was very glad that Leliana trusted her in return when it came time to deal with Marjolaine, although that again put Mariane in the position of having to be the strong one for someone else.

Sten at first was a challenge, what with his insistance that women couldn't fight. She found herself having to stand her ground with him when she spoke to him about everything from the role of mages to the Qun. This challenge was actually good for Mariane as it forced her to defend herself as a fighter worthy of the Wardens and a leader worthy of following. In Haven, Sten challenged Mariane's leadership and she was forced to fight him in one-on-one combat to get him to back down. When she won handily, no one was more surprised than Mariane herself. This helped her self-esteem grow in that she was reassured to herself that she was capable of leading the fight against the Blight. Ultimately, Sten grew to trust her to the point of being willing to accept her aid in finding his sword and again, she proved herself worthy of his trust by finding it. As Sten and Mariane talked further, she grew to understand the importance of the Qun in Sten's life and beliefs and had she not fallen in love with Alistair, she likely would have accompanied him to Seheron.

Zevran, she was initially unsure of how to deal with. His assertive flirting wasn't something she'd ever experienced before, but once she made it clear that she was only interested in friendship, both were able to drop their defenses and become close.
The two bond especially strongly after Zevran tells her the truth about why he had taken the contract to kill her and Alistair, that he had intended it to be a suicide mission. While Mariane's depression has never taken her that far, even under the strain of being a Grey Warden and coping with the loss of her family, she can empathize with her friend's sense of despair and hopelessness.

Wynne was the grandmother Mariane never had. Both of hers died before she was born, so she never really had the bond that a girl has with an elder woman. She knew that she can count on Wynne to be her solid moral center. She was initially hurt by Wynne's early reaction to Mariane and Alistair's romance because she really wanted approval of their burgeoning relationship, but she was forced to grow up a little more and realize that friends can have differing opinions and still be friends.

Shale was unlike anyone Mariane had ever known, being a golem. It confused Mariane greatly at times, due to its insistance on calling Mariane an "it" and its seeming bloodthirstiness. Mariane was never particularly bloodthirsty. She fought because she had to and because she was good at it, not necessarily because fighting was the driving force behind her life and ambitions. However, taking Shale into the Dark Roads to confront Branka helped her understand Shale. Mariane would have fought on Caridin's side to destroy the Anvil of the Void merely because of the vast possibilities for misuse in the hands of someone like Branka, but Caridin and Shale's relationship made it an even easier choice of who to side with. Mariane also felt obligated to help Shale recover as much of her past as possible, given that Mariane's own past of losing her family is such a driving force in what she does.

Ohgren came into the party late, but due to Mariane's endless curiosity about people and what makes them tick as shown by her relationships with her other companions, she's able to befriend him in rather short order. She empathizes with him over the loss of his wife and his house, given the fact that she has also lost family. She works to reunite him with Felsi, a previous girlfriend, because she believes that almost everyone is worthy of love and that Ohgren deserves a second chance at happiness after losing so much.

But of all of her companions, it's Alistair and Morrigan who make the strongest impressions.

Alistair's sense of humor and his warmth was like a balm to her soul. He kept her company, he knew what it meant to be one of the only two Grey Wardens in Ferelden, and his sweetness, genuine, and attentive nature was unlike anyone she had known before and she found herself falling for him without even realizing that's what she was doing until he gave her a rose and called her beautiful. The two of them fell in love and into a relationship as sweet and deep and easy as the love she'd always dreamed of. The age gap between the two didn't bother Mariane in the slightest since she'd always assumed she'd marry an older man and in her opinion, four years isn't that much of a difference, given Alistair's lack of experience in love as well as her own.

Finding out that Alistair was in fact the bastard son of King Maric was a shock, but after knowing the truth, she felt as though part of her mission to save Ferelden also involved preparing Alistair to take his place on the throne. She knew that he was uncertain of his place in the world of politics, but Mariane was born and raised to be the wife of a powerful man and felt that she could help him acclimate himself to the part and there was also the fact that Mariane had grown up with ambitions driving her forward.

When it became time for Mariane to settle the dispute of who ruled Ferelden, it was an easy choice to put Anora aside and name Alistair and herself as king and queen. Intellectually, she knew that marrying Anora to Alistair and remaining Alistair's mistress would have been the wiser choice, but Mariane has a selfish streak and didn't like the idea of sharing Alistair with anyone and felt that she would be a better choice for queen than Anora who Mariane felt was derelict in her duties towards Ferelden for her inability to rein her father and Rendon Howe in.

Over time, Mariane grew very close to was Morrigan. Morrigan's upbringing was strange, in a way unlike anything Mariane had ever known, but in another way very familiar. Both young women grew up with closely regimented training to become strong, but they had very different trainers with very different motivations. Mariane learned her skills from her parents who had given her positive reinforcement when she succeeded and love when she failed. Morrigan learned from Flemeth, who belittled and put her down at every turn. Despite the differences in their upbringing, Mariane and Morrigan were able to find common ground and become close friends, each being the other's first true friend.

When Mariane found out the truth about what happens to the Warden who kills the Archdemon, she was devastated but again she cannot let it show. Her depression, which she'd been trying so hard to repress, comes roaring back to the surface and she was determined that she should be the one to kill the Archdemon and die in the process. She could never allow it to be Alistair. she loved him too much and refused to imagine a world without him in it. At the same time, she realized that Alistair feels the same about her and she knew that he would never let her sacrifice herself.

This knowledge sent Mariane into almost a fugue state where she can barely remember who she is or what it was she has to do. This was how Morrigan finds her when she proposed her ritual. In the state that Mariane was in, it became easy for her friend to convince her to convince Alistair to go along with the ritual. The inner revelation that Mariane had fallen in love with her best friend as well as with Alistair was another stunning revelation in the wake of all that she's been through. Unlike with Alistair, Mariane made the choice to keep her love for Morrigan a secret as she knew that Alistair would react poorly. She spent the night of the ritual curled up in a ball in her room, agonizing over the fact that she'd forced the man she loves to sleep with a woman he certainly didn't love, that she herself loves, all for the sake of saving their lives. During the course of the night, she was plagued with second thoughts and guilt over what she has allowed to happen.

After the ritual was performed and Mariane and Alistair both survive the final battle, Mariane was harrowed by a sense of loss after Morrigan leaves and a sense of dread over what she may have allowed to happen. She tried to put it out of her mind as she's soon to become queen and marry the man she loves. All of her childhood ambitions were to be fulfilled, but the sense of loss remains. She knew that she'd have to remain strong in order to see her new responsibilities and duties through, but she was secure in Alistair's love and feels that she'd be able to move on with her life with his help, love, and support.

In the final analysis, what carried Mariane through, despite her self-doubt and depression, was a sense of duty. Duty to her parents to survive and make the life they died to preserve worth living. Duty to the people of Ferelden to end the Blight and settle the civil war. Duty to her companions to see things through, no matter what obstacles were in their way. Duty to herself, to prove that she was stronger than she gave herself credit for. In the end, she fulfilled her duty and was finally ready to rest and try to enjoy the life that had been preserved against all odds.

Besides, it's not as though she had a choice. Fate intervened in the life of Mariane Cousland, when Rendon Howe betrayed her family, when she alone survived to become a Grey Warden, when Flemeth rescued Mariane and Alistair from Ostagar. She didn't know why exactly she'd be the one so singled out by destiny, but she knew she couldn't run from it. And she didn't.

Inventory: She brings her pet Mabari, Chance. She also brings Maric's Sword, augmented with a Grandmaster Ice Rune and a Grandmaster Paralysis Rune, and the Dead Thaig Shanker, equipped with the same runes. Her armor is the Shadow of the Empire with Red Jenny Seekers gloves and Bard's Dancing Shoes boots. She's also wearing the Guildmaster's Belt, the Mark of Vigilance, the Wicked Oath ring, and the Key to the City.

Abilities: Mariane is a highly skilled dual weilding rogue. She can pick the trickiest locks and disarm the hardest traps. She was trained in being a Duelist by Isabela and as an Assassin by Zevran and she had ample opportunity to hone those skills.

Flaws: Mariane is ambitious. She wanted more than marrying a Bann and bearing his heirs, but until she found out that Alistair was Maric's bastard son, she felt that those ambitions would never be realized. When she does find out, she begins subtly guiding Alistair into accepting his place in Ferelden's power structure. She also purposefully sets Anora aside, despite her qualifications as queen, partially out of revenge for her father's actions at Ostagar and his choice to hunt Mariane and Alistair down and partially because she refuses to share Alistair by marrying him to Anora.

SAMPLES
Action Log Sample: here