This character was created for a tabletop role-playing game set in the Warhammer Fantasy world. It was written in August 2011.
Name: Ileana Vittoria Letizia Valeriani "The Tempesta"
Origin: Tilean
Career: Pit Fighter
The two men came at her, their ragged figures and tattered clothing contrasting sharply with her fine, if practical clothing. The Tempesta spun towards the first of the two, batting aside his club with Allegro, an exquisite ornate falcata. Her following movement brought her ostentatiously engraved rondache, Exodus, forcefully in the man's face, knocking him back stunned and with a ruined nose. Twisting, The Tempesta swung her blade in a horizontal arc, biting deep between the shoulder and collar bone of the second man. As he toppled over, she began hacking at the first man, who was still recovering. Moments later, only a bloody mess remained. Under the few cheers and more numerous jeers, she walked out of the dirt ring.
“Disastrous! Simply Disastrous!” Muttered a pudgy balding man with a thing brown goatee streaked with white.
“How so? They got their bloody show.” Ileana asked, idly flicking blood off Allegro.
“Too fast. They don't cry out for the Tempesta anymore. Your slaughters are not entertaining anyone.” He told her curtly.
“Not my fault, Marcus. They need to get better fighters.”
“You've already killed the better ones, girl.” He frowned.
They entered a nearby small wooden house and Ileana instantly dropped sword and shield in a heap, while Marcus stood propped against the door, arms crossed. There was nothing in the room but a few benches and various pieces of shoddy fighting equipment strewn about.
“If this keeps up, soon no one will want to watch you fight.” Marcus continued while she removed her mail shirt. “Its not hopeless though...”
Ileana, her back to him, turned her head halfway in his direction. “What are you plotting now?” Her voice was a mix of curiosity and exasperation.
“We could present you in a different light. A warrior princess in exile.” Marcus made a grand gesture as she rolled her eyes.
“I told you, my father was Prince of Tobaro before he was murdered, but I never had any such title.” Ileana replied coolly as she removed a fine linen shirt damp with sweat.
“That doesn't matter.” He brushed off the comment with a brusque wave of his hand. “We want to capture their imagination. If there is a truth to the story we create, it is simply easier....”
He paused to leer at her near naked athletic form as she bent over to remove her leggings and boots. If Ileana noticed, she paid no head to him.
“Then we will add that you are wild and and filled with bloodlust, but you were tempered by Estalia's finest swordsmen.”
As she twisted on herself, looking for bruises or minor wounds, Ileana snorted in a most unladylike fashion.
“By 'finest swordsmen' you must be meaning the score or so of drunken bravos who taught me the rudiments of swordplay while harbouring not so secrets hopes of bedding me.”
He ignored her comment this time. “And now, being destitute and desperate for coin, you lower yourself to fight for the amusement of crowds.”
Ileana slipped on a fresh linen shirt. “Speaking of coin, I've yet to see any of the gains of the scores of matches I've fought. Any reason for not sharing 'our' gains?”
“Well, know they are costs, entry fees, bribes and...” Marcus began stammering.
“You're holding back on me Marcus. That's very stupid of you.” Suddenly she leaped into motion, pinning him against the door. “I expect you to start giving me my share or our 'relationship' is going to end on very bad terms.” There was a murderous glint in Ileana's eyes.
“You wouldn't dare!” He exclaimed.
“I would.” She simply replied. Staring at her eyes seemed to convince him.
“Alright, alright!” At that Ileana let him go and moved back, casually starting to put on a fresh pair of leggings. “You know, you'd have some of the coin now if you hadn't rejected that man I sent you.”
“Don't go there.”
“But, its the truth...” Marcus tried, nevertheless.
“I'm not a whore!” She snapped back. “Just because I fight and kill people for coin does not mean I will do anything for a few coppers.”
“You know, he paid half in advance.”
“Give him back his coins then.” She replied, unconcerned, while she finished bundling her arms, armor and soiled clothes in dirty blanket.
He flushed at that. “I don't have the coins anymore!”
“Not my problem.” Ileana started to move for the door, the bundle held over her shoulder.
“Wait!” Marcus exclaimed as he refused to get out of her way. “The fighting pits are closing for a while... I guess they need to get new fighters. But I have something else for you, there's this job...”
She stopped in her tacks. “I collect the whole fee.”
“How about thirty-seventy?”
Ileana simply glared at him. “All.”
“Alright, alright!” He relented and she dropped the bundle to her side.
“Tell me more about this job then.” She gave him a thin smile, knowing at last that her fortune would soon be changing.
