The Legacy of Olya Dragomir

[UncCre]

Olya Dragomir

Full Name: Olya Edina Dragomir
Birthdate: 12th of Midsummer
Birthplace: Kaduraas
Birthsign: The Spirit

Appearance
Age: Early twenties
Height: Average
Weight: Thin
Eyes: Light blue
Hair: Deep red
Handedness: Right
Posture: Well-trained
Hygiene: Well-groomed and manicured
Scent: Floral, faint scents of dirt or blood

Physical Description:
She stands a few inches above 5' and approximately 8 stone. She keeps a neat appearance when able, including maintaining tidy styles for her reddish hair. She is pale complected, with a faint scattering of freckles across her nose. Of demeanor, she is usually openly friendly, but capable of quickly pivoting to seriousness when needed.

Personality
General Health: Thriving, but perhaps could benefit from a good meal.
Profession: Medical Student
Faction Affiliation: None, but seeking
Languages Collatian, Decusian
Accent: The faintest Kaduraasi accent in both Collatian and Decusian
Hobbies: Reading stories of adventure, light herbalism, amateur botany

Personality Description:
Olya is vivacious and friendly. She is quick to greet a potential new friend and curious to learn the details of their life. Always happy to help and outgoing in her demeanor, she is capable of quickly compartmentalizing and attending the tasks at hand with due diligence.

History
Olya's early life is a mystery to her. She was raised in a Teramer orphanage, and from what she was able to gather, she was recused from a Tormented family in Kaduraas. She was raised piously and given her curious nature, spent much of her youth pursuing information of her lost family. To keep her distracted, she was tasked with aiding in the hospitals and pest houses. Over time, her natural aptitude toward compassion was revealed and slowly she was trained in the ways of healer.

Strengths: Outgoing, curious, courteous, friendly
Weaknesses: Naive, stubborn, resentful




Governing Virtue: Compassion
Governing Throne: Wrath

actiones secundum fidei

[UncCre]

She’d been off the train for nearly an hour now; the thrumming in her head continued, however. At least Olya now understood the name “Rumbling Pass.” The passengers dispersed about the staging area, some seeking medical attention, some assessing the goods of the Quartermaster, and a few, Olya included, headed to the exit.

She strode past the lineup with her visa confidently in hand and was guided directly to the wagon. After a short wait, about a half dozen other new arrivals joined her. They all shared the same look of mixed determination, trepidation, and outright fear. Olya thought she’d maintained a stoic demeanor until one of the other passengers offered her a quick word of comfort, with which she realized she’d been grimacing.

Leaving the Rumbling Pass was a shock. Olya had tried to prepare herself for the shock of it, but the reality was harsher than expected. As they passed a refugee camp, shouts and plaintive cries slid through the sound of the carriage wheels rolling. A few of the refugees reached for the cart as they slowed in passing. Olya made note of the location, thinking perhaps she could return to offer aid, but for now, clenched her jaw and looked away.

Fort Praesidium came into view and Olya found her breath caught in her chest. Despite the expectations, she couldn’t help but be impressed. It was very martial looking, yes, but it was farm more impressive than she’d anticipated. The vestiges of society seemed to be almost thriving within the walls. After a short stroll around to familiarize herself, she found herself a room at the tavern and fell quickly to sleep. The sheer novelty of sitting still kept her in a restive sleep until morning.

Over the following days she set herself to task, asking anyone who would listen if they seen someone matching the description of her sister. Most folk recognized the vague description but had no solid information as to where she’d be found. A few mentioned they’d seen her at the tavern, but spending her evenings at the bar offered no result. Days had passed and little success was grasped. She’d nearly given up on the Fort and was preparing to follow a lead to somewhere called Bright Lantern, despite being warned of the perilous path.

Having gotten all of her affairs in order with the bank, she stepped out on the street prepared to leave the safety of the Fort; when she saw her, she stopped. The red hair she’d expected was replaced with a nearly white blonde, and she was a bit more wan than anticipated, but the face; she recognized the face. She pulled a creased scrap of parchment from her pocket, unfolded it and compared. She smiled softly, repressing the urge to shout. Instead, she took a deep breath and strode toward her…

“Sorina?” she said, nearly losing her voice halfway through. The woman in black calmy turned toward her, and looked her in the eye.

“Yes?” she asked and stole Olya’s breath. Tears were welling in Olya’s eyes. Olya showed Sorina her parchment and watched as realization slowly crossed her face.

“This is you, no? And this is your father?” she asked, to which Sorina slowly nodded, looking more bemused by the second. “And this… is me. Your sister…” she said, through the now freely flowing tears.

“I thought you were…” but Sorina was cut off by the outright assault of Olya’s embrace. The sisters had been reunited. Sorina believed Olya had died as a child. Olya had been so young when she was taken to the orphanage, she always assumed Sorina had died along with her parents. The two spent hours reminiscing. Their reunion was joyous, however, the truth of both their existence had strained the perception each had held on the circumstances of their lives…

[UncCre]

It had been nearly two full weeks since she'd arrived. The reality of life in the First Province had been vastly different than her expectations. Life here was dangerous, yes, without a doubt; but there was life here. Aleksandrov was a moving city, but the rote daily life seemed mechanical and automated. The people, so fearful and resigned, spent their time waiting for inevitable death. Perhaps the very real threat of imminent death in Fort Praesidium forced a certain defiance.

She'd met a dozen or more new faces, nearly all of them friendly and welcoming. She'd supped on foods of her home that somehow tasted better seasoned with distance. She'd found her lost sister; she felt like home so far away. She constantly boggled recalling the derision thrown at those who'd chosen frontier life.

Not all was roses and gold, however. Since discovering the existence of Sorina, Olya had assumed it was a mistake that separated them; the revelation that she had been lied to her entire life weighed heavy upon her. Mentors, caretakers, and guardians had deceived her for her entire life. She was not sure they were all fully aware of how she came to be in the care of the orphanage... but the spark of doubt given appropriate tinder can grow raging.

So she gave way to the bottle. It was a tactic she'd learned from the doctors in Aleksandrov to rinse away the horrors of the day. Sadly, she learned to late, that overindulgence was perhaps a bond she shared with her late father, who she'd now been forced to mourn twice.

Olya was more than capable of sharing a casual public drink without any undue attention, given her age and general demeanor; and she used this to her advantage. Ones so young and pretty never have such real problems.

It was as the night ended where she would sneak off with a relatively believable excuse:
"I'll stay in the camp and tend the refugees" or "I'll find a spot at the inn to get an early start in the morning."

Then she would find herself again clutching her knees in an alleyway, quickly diminishing bottle beside her, mired in memories and questions of what had gone wrong or how she had failed.

Careful as ever, she'd rise from her stupor early enough to clean herself up before anyone close enough to notice could see. Despite her realizations of the frontier, this had recurred more nights than she cared to count.

[UncCre]

It had been nearly two months. Another morning, or more likely afternoon, slowly coming to in a dank room that would be insulting to flophouses to call it as such. She spits on the stone floor, blows her nose on what passes for a sheet, and dribbles the warm remnants of whatever liquor she'd managed to medicate herself with the previous evening into her dry mouth.

She'd spent her days practicing her medicine on the pitiful refugees outside the Rumbling Pass. The fact that some days she couldn't even keep her hands steady without a sip from her flask was either unnoticed or simply did not bother the otherwise forgotten refugees. Little need for delicate care when more than half her patients would perish before morning anyhow.

The rift had come from a very vocal argument between the sisters. Sorina insisted Olya spent her life sunken into a cheap bottle, and offering no aid in finding vengeance for their family. Olya, on the other hand accused her newfound sister of having been warped to madness by the burning hatred in her heart; "What's even the point of this if we lose ourselves in the process? she'd manage to slur out, as her sister's assessment of her drunkenness was obviously accurate.

Gazing with scorn on a face fit only for Torment in the dirty and cracked mirror, she decided she'd had enough. Fixing herself to something close to presentability, she set herself on the road to the home she'd shared with her sister, at least until Olya decided she'd had enough some weeks ago. Thoughts ran rampant through her mind, and there were several that likely mumbled out under her breath without her even realizing.

What would she even say to Sorina to begin mending this tear in their all but brand-new relationship? Should she continue to push in hopes of drawing Sorina from the end, or should she acquiesce and apologize forthright?

The decision was made quickly for her as she found the cabin abandoned. It was still in its typically orderly state, however, dust had settled, the air smelled stale, and the perishables in the pantry had putrefied. Not a good sign, but it wasn't abnormal for Sorina to camp far afield for a few days. So she discarded the rot, swept the floor, and let the windows breathe in fresh air.

She'd tempered he drinking while she waited for her sister's return, though mostly due to lack of supply more than actual intent. It had been nearly a week and a half of waiting when she happened upon the note in the study; her face fell as she read her sister's practiced script. She packed the meager belongings she could truthfully call her own and headed back to the Fort.

[UncCre]

It had, of course, occurred to her that her sister had not fled but been killed by murder or misadventure, but she supposed the thought was suppressed. At least until the past evening's conversation. She clung to the belief her sister had abandoned her, likely out of self-preservation.

As she stood over the wash basin scrubbing the dried blood from beneath her fingernails, she pondered the deeper truths of her new venture. Was the blood on her hands following a medical procedure of any elemental difference than blood spilled in violence? Truly not, but did the intent by which it stained her cuticles matter? She supposed that was the question.

Of course she knew the difference between right and wrong; the morality of it all. The question she struggled with was whether the difference truly mattered.

She'd sat silently in the sauna for likely far too long; the warm, humid air had made her lightheaded while she wrestled herself internally. She was barely cognizant of the conversation she'd had with the young girl who lived outside the Fort. Her reality slammed down like a portcullis when she heard herself say the words allowed.

"My family is dead." She dressed and departed quickly after that. She'd have to find the girl and apologize later, but she was still struggling to find footing in her own thoughts. The only things stopping her from the difference were gone; wrenched from her hands. So why bother?

It seemed easy to reach for the bottle tonight.

[UncCre]

It had been weeks now; she thought it was weeks, at least. Recent events had left her with only a vague grasp on the passage of time. The sun rises and falls but she finds herself typically incapable of more than staring at the window. At times, she forces herself down the stairs and along the road to tend to the poorly at the Hospital, but she'd find herself quickly hastening home.

It had not all been bad for her, recently; it even seems if one were to count her gains, she'd be well ahead of where she started. She should be happy. Knowing that, however, only seemed to deepen her feeling of hopelessness. She wasn't even capable of joy any longer?

She would attempt to be candid with the few friends she had made and trusted, but some perverse form of self-preservation (or self-destruction) would take over and steer her away to polite conversations.

"I'm well, just tired."
"Oh, you know, with everything going on around here..."
"I was just on my home to take supper."

Excuses and half-truths. That seemed to have become her trade.

She pulled the curtain and returned to sleep.