Hadlee

Specifics

• Stats

  Acrobatics		Athletics		Intimidation
  Martial		Medicine		Perception
  Persuasion		Stealth		Survival

• Persona

  If there's anything that Hadlee understands, it's humility. She knows humility better than her own paws, and right down to the marrow in her bones.
  
  The fifth child and third daughter of a branch of the lesser house Broderick, the odds of Hadlee ever inheriting her family's barony and attached treasury are slim to none, excepting some astronomically unlikely tragedy. As such, she was painfully aware of her insignificant position in the hierarchy of a barely significant house from a very young age—and decided early on to turn her misfortune in any way she could.
  
  Having scrabbled through the ranks of the King's army and earned herself a knighthood, Hadlee has proven her tenacity as a woman to any and all who doubted it. She has also proven her mettle and competence as a warrior on the field of battle many times over, particularly during the semi-recent rebellion. If she is anything, it dutiful and loyal—and every commander and compatriot she's ever had has recognized this.
  
  In her day-to-day life, Hadlee possesses the courteous manners and succinct cordiality expected of a noblewoman. She knows how to play that game, and she plays it reasonably well—for a warrior and a lady without any real inheritance.
  
  Strangers and acquaintances might consider Hadlee stoic or businesslike. That assessment wouldn't be inaccurate, but it is, of course, only a part of the bigger picture. When in private company with friends, Hadlee is as friendly and easygoing as any other furre. It's even been long-rumored by her comrades in arms that she's a hopeless romantic at heart who scrawls her own poetry on fresh sheets of parchment in her spare time, but no such scuttlebutt has ever been proven.

• Backstory

  
  Hadlee, born in May of 1143, is the fifth child of Baron Darwyn Broderick and his wife Margaret (née Paolo).
  
  Greatly weakened by her third daughter's birth, Margaret passed in January of 1145 following the stillbirth of what would have been Hadlee's younger brother. In 1147, Darwyn remarried to Marsilia Paolo, Margaret's second cousin.
  
  Hadlee's youth was plagued with social affairs that she had no stomach for. She was incapable of enjoying ladylike hobbies or lessons on manners and history. She yearned for adventure and excitement, and languished at the notion of being married off to some spoiled brat just as bereft of an inheritance as she was. Instead, when she was seven, Hadlee made her case to Darwyn that she should instead become a page, then a squire, and finally a knight. Likely humoring the scrawny stick of a girl—already sheer inches taller than her peers—Darwyn let her undertake lessons on martial combat in earnest... which, to his great surprise, she excelled at.
  
  Hadlee continued to study under a sergeant of Darwyn's household guard 'til she was eight summers on, at which point her father sent her to Malgrave—under the auspices of Marsilia, who had family in the capital anyway—to become a page. It was a brutally dull job, consisting mostly of classroom lessons, fetching wine, and delivering messages from one knight or noble to another.
  
  When she was 14, having proven herself to be a surprisingly capable combatant, Hadlee was officially taken on as the squire of Dame Felicia of House Kithain. She served dutifully under the gruff cat 'til she was abandoned in 1157, when Felicia was forced to leave the capital to pursue the private affairs of her house—which, of course, Hadlee was not invited to take part in.
  
  Between 1157 and 1163, Hadlee squired for various knights in Malgrave: Sers Leofwin, Gervase and Rexington and Dames Constance and Helewise. In September of 1163, Hadlee was knighted—by King Constantine XII himself, per tradition—and officially enrolled in His Majesty's Royal Army as a commissioned lieutenant.
  
  Hadlee retained her station at Malgrave, serving primarily as an instructor in paw-to-paw and otherwise martial combat pursuits for noble children. On occasion, she'd trot out with a pawful of the capital garrison to handle issues afield: brigands, commoner riots, et cetera. Of note is that in 1165, Hadlee met a Catolian mouse named Beltramino—Ramin, to friends and allies—who was widely regarded to have mastered a peculiar fighting style: the use of two swords at once in combat. Striking up a friendship with the mouse, Hadlee studied beneath Ramin and learned to fight with a sword in each paw—though she preferred to keep one perhaps 3/4 the size of the other, lest they be tangled together by an offensive enemy. This uncommon technique earned her the respect of many of her peers and superiors, and gave her an incredible edge in furre-on-furre combat.
  
  In 1168, the most recent Drakorian Invasion began in Challiston. Hadlee was deployed—along with many other knights and the majority of the king's army—to repel the wyrmmes. She acquitted herself in battle time and time again, slaying many wyrmmes and helping rid her nation of its most hated invaders. Hadlee was awarded more than one commendation for her service to the country during the war.
  
  Hadlee spent the majority of the 1170s in Malgrave, much as she had before the invason... 'til "war" broke out once more—but of a much more sinister variety. The king was dead, long live the king, and Constantine's son Callistin was proving to be a proper bastard. Unsurprisingly, during the various abrupt and aggressive changes made to the kingdom, people rebelled. Hadlee, ever loyal to the crown—despite her misgivings and quiet, abject hatred of Callistin—left Malgrave to combat the rebels, hoping to quash their malfeasance before a proper civil war took place.
  
  By 1177, however, Hadlee was... weary, to say the least. Of many things. Now a Knight-Captain, she filled out the documents necessary to remove herself from battle and return to Malgrave. This raised a quiet rumor among her peers that she had lost her stomach for war, but Hadlee paid them no mind. By July of 1177, Hadlee had left Malgrave for county Aldric, and her family's barony—where her eldest brother Ranulf now ruled, as Darwyn had passed due to old age and a powerful fever in 1175.
  
  In January of 1178, Hadlee's presence was requested in Harfang by House Haala. The local Haala-by-marriage, Lady Othelia, had lost her husband in the previous year—a renowned strategist who Hadlee had served with during the invasion and the rebellion. House Haala wanted to ensure the safety of Lady Othelia and her infant daughter, and so they summoned Hadlee to Pyrite's Landing. Despite the fact that the Brodericks were officially pledged to house Carthamine, house Haala was both a great house and the house of the royal family, and thus Hadlee was obliged to obey.