Approved White Tower Bio for Ranine Alsufai - CC'ed by SC

[Sirayn]

Username: Ranine Alsufai

Handle at DM/WT: Oregon

Email: oregonstatejesus@hotmail.com

Physical Description: Delicate and proud, Ranine Alsufai sees herself as more pretty than beautiful. Her deep brown eyes are always in motion, as if constantly searching for...something. She Her close cropped hair is lost in the netherworld between red and brown. Between her short hair and heigh (barely five feet tall in shoes), if one didn\'t know better, it wouldn\'t be hard to mistake Ranine for a young boy. She would sneer at the notion, but do nothing to correct it.

Place of birth: South of Shienar

Age: 17

Character History: oregonstatejesus@hotmail.com

 

“Pride, my daughter. That is your greatest sin. You may have the bearing of a princess, but the blood that flows in your veins is cruder stuff.â€

 

Such were the words of Maicel Alsufai to his only daughter, Ranine. Maicel did his best to provide for Ranine, but life had done him no favors – in his mind. He was a cautious man, to the point that his neighbors mocked him – openly and to his face – calling him Mistrustful Maicel amongst other, crueler, things. They whispered none too softly about his ineptitude as both farmer and father. As the years passed, his bitterness grew. All his carefully sown seeds had yielded what? A failing farm south of the borderlands, and a dead wife. And of course, Ranine.

 

Maicel loved her dearly, of course, and did everything he in his power to provide her a comfortable childhood. Even in the best of times, however – from which these were far removed – as many of his crops failed as not. An empty belly and shivering cold became as much the staples of her early years as grain and meat. His paranoia extended to the point that he would seldom let her play with the children of neighboring farms. He contrived every excuse to keep her close to him at all times, and as she grew he began to lean on her ever more to keep even their meager existence afloat.

 

Perhaps it was inevitable that a young girl’s devotion to a beloved father would twist and changed as the years shaped them both. Ranine was growing into a pretty young woman – eyes turned ever towards the horizon – and he…he was drawing ever further into himself, and his bottle. Now when Ranine looked upon Maicel, she saw him not as a doting father, but as he truly was: unhappy, overcautious, and increasingly enfeebled by age and drink.

 

By the time of her eleventh name day, Ranine was speaking openly of a desire to go into the world, and these words filled her father with an icy dread – both for her sake and his own. He was loath to let her venture even as far as their nearest neighbors, for fear she would never return; the tighter he squeezed, the harder she pressed against the bonds. Ranine began wishing – furtively, but truly – that one day when she woke up, that her father would, simply, not.

 

Their last years together were terrible for father and daughter alike; as Maicel’s need for his daughter increased, Ranine’s need for a father – especially this father – declined. Sometimes, she would steal away in the night, as much to hurt her father as to visit friends. As these absences grew longer and more frequent, and he could contrive no way to keep her near him, his thoughts fled down a desperate path.

 

Steeling himself to the pain, telling himself it was for the good of his daughter, Maicel brought the wood axe down on his knee, rending flesh and bone alike. His screams were fit to wake the dead but, Maicel knew, now Ranine could never leave him. What daughter could abandon a crippled father? It was all as he planned, except one thing. Ranine had awakened early that morning – who can say why? – and witnessed the whole thing.

 

Disgust and terror flooded through the girl, still weeks short of her fourteenth name day – if he was willing to do this, then of what else might he be capable? Turning a deaf ear to the screams of her father outside, she packed what little she cared to retain of this life and – hesitating – her father’s few coppers. Shedding not a tear, she stepped out the door. Even half-crazed her father could understand the meaning of her pack and the way she avoided his gaze. Speaking not a word, she stepped past him.

 

“You’re leaving?! You can’t! You can’t leave! I’m dying! I’ll die!â€

 

These were the last words she would hear him speak, except in her dreams (and then only seldom). Briefly, guilt consumed her, but Ranine was never one to fret for too long. She had made her choice and now it was time to live with it – if possible. She wasn’t blind to the fact that she had little in the way of experience in the world, and littler still in terms of resources. Heading south, she earned what money she could by scouring pots and pans in inns, and singing in common rooms. What she couldn’t earn, she stole. It wasn’t long before she realized that taking was easier than working, and she abandoned earning all together.

 

If it wasn’t a glamorous life, neither was it her father’s life. She planned to find her way to Cairhien and settle there for a while. As luck – and her errant sense of direction – would have it, she soon found herself standing outside a different city all together: Tar Valon. She knew little of the fabled city, or the even more fabled inhabitants of its imposing Tower. Winter was coming, however, and she didn’t fancy trying to pick her way across the countryside amongst fierce storms. So it was by happenstance she first arrived inside the walls of the city she would soon call home.

 

Within days of her arrival, she took ill. Huddled in an alley behind a bank, she might’ve died, if not for the kindness of a stranger who bundled up the wayward and hauled her to the White Tower for Healing, if it could be had. One Healing and one testing later, Ranine found herself much restored, deeply confused, and on the way to the office of the Mistress of Novices.

[Kaylan]

CCed by the Seanchan!

[Taei]

*bumps back in order*