Description: Tall and lean with corded muscle, Cassandra cuts a stark figure, composed and controlled. She carries herself like a weapon, with pride and strength in every stride. The bone structure of her face is both hard and elegant, with a fierce strength to her jaw beneath the planes and angles of her face. Her cheeks and the bridge of her nose reflect a fine dusting of tiny freckles. The slash of a scar is written across her cheek and jaw, further emphasizing the angles of her face. She keeps her dark hair clipped short, the roundish shape of its cut tapering to a feathering over her ears and at the nape of her neck.

Personality: The first word that encompasses Cassandra Laurent is passion. She is driven, fierce and unyielding, with a will as strong as her jawline. Her faith is unshakable and her demeanor is one of cool reserve, brushed with irony. A private person by nature with whose reserve conceals a depth of quiet idealism, Cassandra is a woman of deep personal strength and occasional, obscured insecurity. Her sense of personal honor exists, but it is subservient her sense of service to a higher cause. Her sense of humor doubles as a finely honed sense of the ridiculous, often encompassed by little more than the quirk of a sardonic eyebrow, but she shields from view a deep inner romantic that, very occasionally, can make itself known in small, private ways.

Background: Cassandra Laurent was born to lead and she never doubted that. She never doubted her duty. She knew that she would be the Duchess of House Laurent, and that she would serve her family, and that she would serve House Valardin. But life, and the gods, had other plans for her. She was drawn early to the faith. At first she was merely a lay sister, dedicated to Gloria, to whom she felt called. But at the age of 20, while riding hard for her father's men in pursuit of a group of Shavs who had killed a priest and desecrated a shrine in one of their raids on a surrounding village, she was knocked from her horse and fell in battle. She fought her way clear of the Abandoned, but fell unconscious in the valley, separated from the others. Before she was recovered, she had a dream she attributed to Gloria, and when she woke, she knew that she could not remain the heir to her father's ducal seat.

But she did something that she would never again do in her life: afraid of the reactions of her family, of her father and brother, she temporized. She hesitated. She kept finding excuses, putting off her passions for another day. When her father was in the midst of brokering a potential marriage alliance for her, however, she could no longer bear the silence. The lay dedicacy was not enough; she would serve the Faith, called to another duty than the one she had first been born to.

Cassandra threw herself into the priesthood with her whole heart. She studied and worked and threw every ounce of her will behind serving the faith. It is possible that her connections to a Valardin ducal house -- godsworn though she was -- helped her in her climb through the ranks, but Cassandra liked to believe it was her passion and dedication that eventually made her the Archlector of Gloria. The pinnacle of her ambition is to be the Sword of the Faith -- and her eye lifts ever to that horizon.

Relationship Summary

Family:
Friend:

Sydney - I have watched you grow from a cocksure braggart to a confident warrior. You make me a proud Mother.

Preston - The goal of every precocious young man should be to become a wizened old one.

Norwood - My oldest friend and my most reliable. Somehow teasing you is even more fun now that we're both ancient.

Sibling:

Cristoph - I am proud of the leader that my brother has shown himself to be.

Jael - I cannot grieve someone whom I do not know for sure to be dead, yet still the weight of loss bears down.

Aeryn - My sister has long reminded me that sweetness is not weakness.

Colette - As quiet as she kept in life, it's knowing that I will never hear that lack of sound again that breaks my heart.

Protege:
Parent:

Lorraine Laurent - My mother. Duchess Dowager of Laurent. Her disappointment in my choice to join the Faith still hangs over me to this day.