Mini reminder: this image is very much not mine and I take no credit for it, that goes [url=https://www.deviantart.com/zephyri/art/Lanyra-698641148]here[/url], to the best of my knowledge.

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[center][img]https://www.allastria.com/uploads/1/2/5/1/125196250/published/tribal-warrior-14.jpg?1558962919[/img]
[h2][color=7ea7d8]Banou Adiah[/color][/h2]
[h3][color=7ea7d8]A Savage Turned Patriot, Eager to Serve the Land that Saved Her[/color][/h3]
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[color=7ea7d8][b]Age:[/b][/color] 18
[color=7ea7d8][b]Height/Weight:[/b][/color] 5'4", 125 lbs
[color=7ea7d8][b]Race:[/b][/color] Varyan, Ice Piratean - just don't call her [i]Godless[/i]

[color=7ea7d8][b]Appearance:[/b][/color][indent]
With pale gray eyes called, by turns, 'piercing' and 'unsettling' (or just 'haunting' if the mood is right), Banou is easy to overlook but difficult to forget. Her thick, dark hair is nearly always braided and twisted into a neat, no-nonsense bun, and her armor covers most, but not all, off the tattoos marking her body. The war paint itself was tattooed onto her skin as a young child, a process no doubt as barbaric as the people who birthed her. Fortunately, Banou isn't the type to dwell overmuch on the past, particularly her own, and so does her best to pretend the marks are little more than a sign of how far she's come in her time serving Varya.
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[color=7ea7d8][b]Personality:[/b] [i]Patriotic | Reserved | Selfless | Loyal[/i][/color][indent]

For as long as she can remember (she does not count what little comes from those dark years on the plains), Banou has been happiest when she's working. Granted, it would take a close friend or confidant, of which very few exist, to distinguish a happy Banou from an angry Banou, or a desolate Banou, or a sleeping Banou. She is a soldier first and last, and if she feels she has a greater need to prove her loyalty to the empire than her more blood-worthy countrymen, well, it could only make her stronger -- like near everything else she does.

But.

Woe to those who attempt to draw shady lines between her childhood as one of the godless people on the plains. Banou has abandoned that life and title as cleanly as it abandoned her. Though she is slow to anger in most things, you'll find a quick and dangerous enemy beneath insinuations that Banou would do anything less than die for the Empire who has raised her.
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[color=7ea7d8][b]Background:[/b][/color][indent]
As far as she's concerned, Banou's life began when she was five years old. On that day, she remembers vividly emerging from a ceaseless dark and cold into the unyielding, unforgiving, and yet ever-steady arms of the Varyan Empire. On that day, an Imperial scouting party met its quarry - a small and vicious band of Ice Pirates - and saw fit to rescue the lone survivor.

Banou's memories of her time before the Empire are few and fragmented, sharp and cold as shattered ice. She speaks very little of it, but in her dreams, she catches glimpses of who was, who her people were -- had been -- before her rescue. She does not speak of these dreams, or of who she was before. She does not remember, and does not want to. 

It has been her life's goal ever since to prove her undying loyalty to her rescuing nation. And perhaps also to herself.

From the moment she arrived in Varya, Banou was reminded at every turn that she'd not been born of the people who rescued her from the ice. Out of gratitude or desperation (she's not quite sure herself which, though most who have known her even a little could guess easily enough), she has worked her whole life to be made worthy of the sacrifice that freed her from the plains. She worked in the stables and kennels of the Seculary Army training grounds until she was old enough to be conscripted for her own training at age twelve. It was not an easy life, made more difficult by foreign blood, but Banou only ever let the other children's taunts drive her harder, and by sixteen, she was fighting at the top of her cohort. 

Even so, her captains rarely let her on the battleground, more often assigning her to grunt work, guard duty, escort service, and worse. Banou managed it all without complaint, quietly content to serve how she could. 

She was escorting a small cadre of Order officials through a crowded market one day when she saw a woman not much older than herself being taunted by a handful of drunk men. Banou intervened quietly, quickly, professionally, and returned to her post, while old eyes watched from afar. 

Three days later, Banou was discharged from the SA and abruptly employed by one Mother Yonah Levshin, again in service to Varya, though as she learned soon after, she would be far from the land she had learned to call home.
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[color=7ea7d8][b]Talents/Ethereal Abilities:[/b][/color][list]
[*][color=7ea7d8]Combat[/color] - If Banou wasn't the strongest or fastest soldier in her class, she was undoubtedly the most resilient. She is far from fearless, but nonetheless exudes unflappable calm on the battlefield, and is generally able to think a few steps ahead of her opponent. She's skilled with a number of weapons, both ranged and close combat, but her [url=http://knightsofvasteel.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Frostbite-Spear.jpg]ice spear[/url] is her favorite, and she is deadly with a bow.
[*][color=7ea7d8]Ether'd Combat[/color] - She's no inquisitor, but years of practice and an indomitable will have made Banou slightly more gifted than the average soldier in manipulating her shallow store of ether. When in battle, she is somewhat stronger, and significantly faster, than her stature would have you believe. She also once staved off what would have been a killing blow with a paling that left her unconscious for two days. When she is not in battle, she practices smuggled secrets from the Seminary itself (or so she's been told) to keep her ether abilities sharp.
[*][color=7ea7d8]Cold-Blooded[/color] - Banou maintains a stubborn, and not entirely unsubstantiated, belief that she can handle cold better than the average Varyan. Whether this is true, or she's just stoic and willful enough to make herself and everyone around her believe it is yet unclear.
[*][color=7ea7d8]Luck[/color] - Alright, so it's hardly a talent, but Banou [i]does[/i] have an uncanny way of just...knowing things. She considers herself competent, intuitive, 'not fucking blind', and sometimes, yes, even lucky.
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[color=7ea7d8][b]Personal Seal:[/b][/color]
A crescent moon over two hounds. Or something like [url=https://dzasv7x7a867v.cloudfront.net/product_photos/29490756/THE-MOON-TAROT-PRINT_original.png]this[/url]. 


[color=7ea7d8][b]Character Relationships:[/b][/color]
- [color=7ea7d8]Mother Yonah, Sixth Dominion of the Divine Order:[/color] Banou's new employer. The two have not known each other long, but Banou has found herself growing increasingly loyal -- and fiercely protective -- of the woman who gave her a way to serve Varya without having to defend herself from...Varya.
- [color=7ea7d8]Mal, Mother Yonah's handmaid:[/color] Not that she's ever needed any sort of rescuing, but Mal has remained quite close with Banou ever since the day the other woman spotted her in that market.