THE LADY OF VIPERS,
𝒎𝒂𝒏𝒐𝒏 𝒄𝒆𝒓𝒚𝒔𝒆 𝒃𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒌𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒓𝒏.

𝒊𝒕 𝒕𝒂𝒌𝒆𝒔 𝒆𝒇𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒕
𝒕𝒐 𝒄𝒂𝒓𝒓𝒚 𝒂 𝒘𝒂𝒓.

⤷ 𝒓𝒐𝒍𝒆
the lady of vipers

⤷ 𝒉𝒐𝒖𝒔𝒆
royal house blackthorn

⤷ 𝒏𝒂𝒎𝒆
manon ceryse blackthorn

⤷ 𝒏𝒊𝒄𝒌𝒏𝒂𝒎𝒆𝒔
none aside from royal titles

⤷ 𝒂𝒈𝒆
twenty-two

⤷ 𝒃𝒊𝒐𝒍𝒐𝒈𝒊𝒄𝒂𝒍 𝒔𝒆𝒙
female

⤷ 𝒈𝒆𝒏𝒅𝒆𝒓 𝒊𝒅𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒕𝒚
female

⤷ 𝒓𝒐𝒎𝒂𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒄 𝒐𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏
biromantic

⤷ 𝒔𝒆𝒙𝒖𝒂𝒍 𝒐𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏
bisexual

⤷ 𝒎𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒊𝒂𝒍 𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒕𝒖𝒔
widow, unmarried.

⤷ 𝒉𝒆𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕
5'5"

⤷ 𝒇𝒂𝒄𝒆 𝒄𝒍𝒂𝒊𝒎

⤷ 𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒐𝒏𝒂𝒍𝒊𝒕𝒚
QUICK-WITTED, TEMPESTUOUS, AND STUBBORN are three terms encapsulating the very essence of manon blackthorn. calm, observant, and artsy are three other ways of describing her from an outside perspective. in many ways, manon is a complex woman yet everything all boils down to one emotion: hate. manon is a woman who believes that hate is stronger than love and stronger than passion because at the end of the day, you remember what you hate more than what you love. perhaps in a better world things would be different but manon knows that the fundamental blocks of her kingdom are hate and intolerance and thus she is just as hateful as her kingdom. however, this doesn't make manon a horrible person. in actuality, manon does have a lot of love in her heart but that is not her core.

secondly, manon is sharp and quick-witted. her mind works fast and she commonly has something at the tip of her tongue at any given moment. despite her biting thoughts, manon holds her tongue. in addition, as prideful as she is, manon isn't always the easiest to get along with. even when she's not insulting someone, she has that classic arrogance that many noble lords and ladies also have. having lived a privileged life, manon knows very little of what life is like beyond palace walls. her whole life she's not had anything less than fit for a princess and it clearly shows. however, her royal duties often stunt her from pursuing passions like art but hey, she can still hire artists, can't she? so, despite some things she finds commonly unavailable to her, manon knows well enough that she should be grateful for the hand she's been dealt.

regardless, manon is a temperamental person with strong opinions and she gets along with very few people. though she may exhibit outward pleasantries, manon is in a constant state of ambivalence. though she doesn't see things as pure evil, she tends to see things in a darker light. for example, manon's brother stefan is a man she loathes and yet she's unable to hate him completely. regardless of his actions, he is still her brother and she can't find it within herself to hate everything about him. nevertheless, manon is temperamental and her emotions are constantly changing from happy to sad to annoyed to furious to calm and back to happy again. these changes are continuous as they are with others but being more emotional than logical, manon sometimes finds it difficult to bite her tongue. but she does and she always will. in addition, manon is incredibly stubborn and often refuses to change her mind or yield. once she makes a statement, she refuses to go back on it and it doesn't matter who you are to her; when she puts her mind to something, she'll do it no matter what and there's not a single way to change her mind. in many ways, manon is like stefan, only she isn't a king.

but now that we've gone through all of her internal thoughts, manon is a woman who doesn't behave half as aggressively as she thinks. in most places, manon is calm and mild-tempered. though witty and occasionally sassy, manon is rarely what she believes when in a public setting. when in private with those she trusts and even sometimes with family, manon is certainly more different. at these times manon has a shorter fuse but doesn't act out completely. her words are certainly more harsh but her demeanor remains calm enough even when she's obviously angry. so to speak, manon has a cold kind of anger and she's able to appear calm at all times although sometimes her words come out different depending on her feelings.

lastly, manon is ambitious and refuses to do anything without ulterior motives. of course, there are times where she does things for fun or does things for herself but most times she wants to get something out of it. as of now, manon has brought in her half-sister to serve as a kind of bait for the king to rant to instead of her or her brother. constantly machinating schemes is difficult when stefan has to get into everything. so, yes, manon is sometimes self-centered but she sees it as justified. and yes, manon truly is trying to fix things despite how she acts so oddly in her brother's favor. in fact, if you were to ask her why eliya died or what truly happened to kylla, she'd reply easily with a simple: eliya committed treason and was executed accordingly and kylla was assassinated by a contract killer hired by an enemy of the crown and of house marsei. perhaps you'd even get a more truthful answer with a: that's the story he's written for them. so, yes, manon is trying to play to stefan's favor although it is not because she agrees with him and it'll never be for that reason.

⤷ 𝒐𝒑𝒊𝒏𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔 𝒐𝒏 . . .
the witch hunts — manon doesn't have a too strong stance on it since she's not the one being targeted. plus, manon's got bigger things to worry about. however, she does empathize with the magical people since it must be awful to be targeted based on what you are. at least she's not in the position to die for harboring magic.
sexism — manon is strongly against it. she's a person with ambition, confidence, and strong opinions and she wants to be able to do exactly as she pleases. of course, she can't. and though manon acts her part, she has no intention of playing this charade her whole life. even if she gets executed, she'd rather die trying than die having wasted her life away. in fact, dying by the sword is much more honorable than dying a miserable old woman.
homophobia — though she doesn't say it, it absolutely appalls manon. why can't people just mind their own damn business without meddling in others' affairs? does one man's affection for another wound their "great nation" or their reputation? no, it does not and don't fucking contest her or you'll wind up in a sickbed for some less than satisfactory reasons.

⤷ 𝒑𝒐𝒘𝒆𝒓𝒔
none

⤷ 𝒃𝒂𝒄𝒌𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒚
MANON WASN'T AN ANGRY CHILD growing up. in fact, she was a more calm girl when she was young. though that does show often in public, manon's become a woman filled with resentments. however, manon grew up without her actual parents. raised by members of her mother's staff, manon had always been disconnected from her actual family. with her brothers being twenty and eight years older than her, it was difficult to bond with either. in particular, stefan wanted nothing to do with her and aries was simply too old to play with her. naturally, manon amassed her own friends and learned the ways of feminine politics as she grew.

and since her eldest brother was twenty years older than her, manon grew up around all of his wives. being about seven years old when kylla was sent away, manon never felt much attachment to her if she felt anything at all. then stefan had a new wife, eliya, whom manon had always liked. in fact, she looked up to her as a role model of the perfect female specimen. she was beautiful, intelligent, and brimming with confidence. of course, that was part of what got her killed five years into her reign when manon was twelve years old. then, the king's next wife was erina, whom manon would tease for being so weak. being young and petulant, manon was not the nicest to the gentle wife of stefan. she never liked her and purposefully ran into her or played pranks on her. though erina was never short-tempered with her, manon liked to watch her try to keep her calm. and though she regrets it now, manon used to tell erina that her brother would kill her once he got bored and manon had always speculated that the time would come soon given how dreadfully boring erina was. however, manon's brother did not have erina killed. instead, she died during childbirth.

next was meira rayne. meira was almost like kylla, in a way. she was no eliya, much to manon's disappointment, but meira wasn't half bad. though she was not a person sixteen year old manon looked up to, she was someone manon could be truthful with and could speak to as a true equal. meira was neither above nor beneath her and something about that was comforting. however, meira was sentenced to death two years later when manon was eighteen years old and then her brother married his fifth wife, kathryn bellevae. of course, manon never had much of an opinion on the girl as she'd only known her for a short period of time before she married into the khalidan royal family.

in khalidi, manon never felt truly comfortable as this was nothing like the environment was used to. however, she had to admit that she liked khalidi. being an elyrian in this kind of place was strange, of course, but not a totally awful experience. though manon never loved her husband, she figured they could've gotten along well enough. she planned to have a few children and then, if she wasn't in love with him yet, she'd have her own mistress or whatever male mistresses were called. perhaps a mister? honestly, she never figured that out. however, her husband died shortly before their first year anniversary and manon only remained in khalidi for a few brief months before returning home. however, during her marriage, manon learned a bit about how to fight considering it was expected of her to conform to khalidan customs (which she was more than happy to adapt to). in her husband's kingdom, manon gained more liberties than she'd had her whole life and for it to be stripped away from her just like that made her more bitter than she'd ever been. still, she had gained new knowledge and new skills she never would've learned before. and though these things served as something nice to check off of her bucket list, it really didn't do much beside fuel her contempt.

reluctantly returning to elyria, manon arrived shortly after the executions of kathryn and kasmira. the story saddened her but it was easy to look past once stefan had married his sixth wife. more than fed up at this point, manon barely interacted with zarya aside from a few factual words. she never teased or ridiculed zarya but she never helped her either. when the woman would ask questions, manon would cut her off. questions never did help a queen, anyways. so to speak, manon never had a true relationship with the queen. she knew her brother well enough to understand that zarya would not last so manon did everything to keep zarya away because she knew it would hurt if she cared for her. however, years of seeing her around led to a bit of an attachment. though it wasn't a strong emotional bond, manon did find herself sometimes concerned for the woman.

of course, there came a time when stefan began his scheming again. he'd recently brought in a new mistress and manon was certain he was to make her his new wife. but that made no sense because stefan would never marry a mistress when he could have her without the commitment. confused, manon went along with the foolish games stefan played and had a little bitter laugh about how lords and ladies fell over themselves to validate the king. manon always found powerful fools to be the deadliest kind of imbeciles. they would do just about anything even if it went against the common person's moral code. and so, here we are today.

⤷ 𝒑𝒆𝒕𝒔 / 𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒑𝒂𝒏𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔
none. of course, she goes horse
riding but she doesn't have her
own designated horse.

⤷ 𝒂𝒍𝒊𝒈𝒏𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕
chaotic neutral

⤷ 𝒆𝒙𝒕𝒓𝒂
• manon doesn't like many people although she tends to lie and say she does. manon has to play her part and so she will no matter how badly she wants to jam a dagger into their stupid faces. oops.
• when manon likes someone, she'd do almost anything for them although her morals would contest or halt certain actions. of course, she would totally kill for someone if warranted. or would she? she's never killed before so how could she say she could when she isn't in the moment?
• manon is a skilled but unpracticed painter who is too impatient to hone her craft. though she does idly paint in free time, she doesn't take the time to improve it.
• manon likes to write to vent her feelings and then she likes to burn it. she writes letters and stories and rants and then burns them all. not a letter sent or a story told. she likes to watch them turn to ashes for some odd reason.
• manon's very ambitious and though it doesn't always show, she's usually only doing something to get something out of it. there's no way she's wasting her time talking to a servant when she could be chatting with some lord or lady.
• manon knows how to wield a sword but she's no expert. she's definitely a little rusty by now, though.
• she also knows a bit of archery but archery is a tedious sport. she was never good at it so being unable to continue training in elyria has since caused her to lose almost all the skill she'd acquired.

𝒘𝒆𝒓𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒈𝒍𝒂𝒅 𝒘𝒉𝒆𝒏
𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒚 𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒃𝒖𝒓𝒏𝒆𝒅?

TO KILL A KINGDOM.