Valeria Partinax

Valeria Fedorian Partiniana Hierina is the daughter of the infamous Valerio Partinax and his estranged wife, Officia Hieraen. She is the older sister of Mehraxes Partinax and the paternal niece of the hated usurper, Antraxes Partinax. She was once married to Reganltus "Regi" Fedorian II, the son of the late Primarch Regnaultus Fedorian I of Palaven and by his second wife, Melaira Mehrkuri, but their marriage was formally dissolved by House Fedorian, as it was no longer considered to be politically viable in the wake of her uncle's death. Despite being forcibly wed to a new wife, Regnaltus continued to associate with Valeria, who would later become his mistress. Valeria and Regnaltus have a daughter together, born during the time of their marriage, whom Regnaltus named Melaira in honour of his mother. 
While she still outwardly denounces her family in public, Valeria continues to secretly mourn for them in private. This is especially true regarding her father, with whom she was extremely close. To this day, she adamantly believes that he did his duty on Taetrus and that he was not the monster the Taetrians make him out to be, citing the fact he gave his life to protect them during the Reaper War. 
== Biography ==
=== Reign of Antraxes ===
As a collateral relative (not a direct descendant or ancestor), Valeria was not considered part of the Imperial Family of Antraxes Mehrkuri upon his ascension to the throne. Her uncle, however, chose to elevate her and her brother to imperial status in memory of their father, granting them the right to wear purple. Valeria enjoyed her uncle's favour for the entirety of his reign and spent a lot of time with him in the early years. Antraxes would publicly refer to her as his "beloved niece" and she was second in seniority only to Erinia Mehrkuri, his own daughter. 
Valeria's husband, Regi, considered Antraxes a usurper and refused to acknowledge him as primarch. As the son of a former primarch and Antraxes' niece by marriage, Regi was near untouchable and thus could afford the luxury of such traitorous talk. His stepfather, Achaeus Corinthus, was not so fortunate. When Antraxes placed Achaeus, the rightful heir to the Aurelian Throne, under house arrest and threatened to have him executed for inciting civil disobedience, Regi begged Valeria to intercede with her uncle for his stepfather's release. Valeria did as she was bid, beseeching Antraxes to pardon him for the sake of their familial ties. Antraxes refused her heartfelt request, telling her that he could not pardon a traitor, no matter how close they were to his family. 
It was then that Valeria secretly learned of her uncle's plan to publicly execute Achaeus to reinforce his legitimacy as a ruler and take his wife, Melaira, as his own. When she stated that marrying Melaira would be impossible because he was already married to Fidellion Victus, Antraxes told her that he planned to have Fidellion killed, both to send a message to his rebellious family on Bostra and to allow him to wed a fresh-widowed Melaira, whom Antraxes had long desired due to her striking resemblance to his deceased bondmate, Astraea Mehrkuri. Valeria was horrified by her uncle's intentions. She decided to confront him, not wanting to believe he had sunk so low. But when she did, Antraxes confessed the truth to her, stating that it was for the good of their family and the empire. Valeria threatened to tell Regi the truth of Antraxes' ill intentions towards her husband's mother and stepfather, to which Antraxes told her that she would remain under guard in the Imperial Palace and one day she would understand the grim necessity of his actions. 
=== Relationship with Regnaltus Fedorian II ===
==== Marriage ====
==== Divorce ====
After Antraxes' death, House Fedorian saw no further use for Valeria and desired to distance themselves from House Partinax to curry favour with the new Victus regime. Regi's parriarch promptly ordered the dissolution of the marriage and marry another woman of their choosing. Regi attempted to push back on the issue but was unanimously overruled by the rest of his blood relatives. Valeria was distraught, both at the danger of having to survive without the political protection that her husband's family provided her and the reality that she would be losing custody of their daughter. Regi, in an attempt to minimise his now ex-wife's distress, refused to let his family have anything to do with Valeria whilst she was in the process of moving, helping her to box up all her belongings himself. While he had been ordered to ensure that she kept no possessions which had been gifted to her by House Fedorian, Regi discretely disobeyed this order by allowing Valeria to keep all the jewels he had personally bought for her. 
==== Mistress of Regnaltus Fedorian II ====
Feeling remorse for not being able to support her better, Regi bought Valeria a one-bedroom flat in the Uchaldan district of Cipritine, contracting the services of a volus financial advisor to keep the transaction off the record. He hoped that, by living amongst her own people, Valeria would be afforded the protection and anonymity she needed to survive, and that she would still be able to discretely see their daughter. He kept in contact with her despite his family's strict ban on any contact between them, meeting with her in person a couple of times a week. Valeria, knowing that Regi was her only lifeline left, used his guilt over his family's exploitation of her former imperial status to seduce him, ensuring that she would retain him as an influential ally. Over time, however, she began to feel remorse for using him and confessed the truth of her actions to him. Regi then surprised her by telling her that he had always been aware of her motivations and, in light of her circumstances, accepted them as an act of survival. 
Regi's openness and understanding of just how precarious her situation was moved Valeria greatly. She and Regi would continue to see each other in secret, reminiscing on the lifetime they had spent together and ruminating on how their families had used them both as pawns for power. This shared realisation of the tragic reality of their lives caused the pair of them to grow closer, their friendship slowly developing into something much deeper than it had ever been during their marriage. On the eve of Regi's wedding to his new wife, he found himself in bed with Valeria, the pair of them tearfully professing that, for better or worse, they both still needed one another. Valeria fully embraced her status as Regi's mistress, sharing with him a level of emotional intimacy that his new wife could never hope to match. Regi's mother would eventually unearth the pair of them, her motherly instincts leading her to suspect her son was having an affair. Having been in an unhappy marriage before her marriage to her second husband, Melaira fully empathised with her son and permitted him to continue with Valeria, provided the pair of them remained discrete. 
Valeria, knowing that both Regi's reputation and her very survival rested on their discretion, fiercely guarded the secret of her relationship with her ex-husband from the outside world. However, when she was alone with him, she dressed as if she were still his wife, wearing the expensive fabrics and jewellery that he continued to purchase for her, with the aid of his volus financial advisor. Her brother, Mehraxes, encouraged her to continue the affair for the sake of their family's survival, reminding her: "He might wear the Fedorian name but it's Mehrkuri blood that runs in his veins; he knows where his ancestral loyalties lie." 
When Regi became the parriarch of House Fedorian, he had finally earned the power to do as he pleased. He used it to provide Valeria and her brother with two much larger residences, one on a remote island in Palaven's Silver Sea and a second on Epyrus' tropical southern continent. He and Valeria were able to be slightly more open about their relationship, allowing the pair of them to message one another openly and spend time away together. Regi kept holos of her as encrypted files on his omni-tool and personal terminal, including several more risqué images - one particularly intimate file contained a holo of Valeria sitting on a window seat in her bed-chamber, wearing nothing but a gaudy gold and diamond necklace bearing the sigil of House Fedorian around her neck, which Regi had gifted to her on their wedding day. 
Not wanting to hurt his wife, Regi voluntarily supplied her with every comfort she could ever wish for and permitted her to take a lover of her own, provided that any such arrangement produced no illegitimate children. This understanding between Regi, Valeria and his wife worked in everyone's favour; Valeria and her replacement would even eventually become friends, hosting social functions together on behalf of Regi's relatives and peers to further his political career. People soon learned that if one wanted to get close to Regnaltus Fedorian II, one first had to obtain the respect of his mistress, Valeria Partinax. Once reviled as the daughter of a war criminal and niece of a tyrannical usurper, Valeria once more wielded true soft power via her romantic connection to her ex-husband. Regi's mother would later remark that her former daughter-in-law was a "tenacious survivor" whom she admired for her mastery of the political game. 
== Trivia ==
=== Character colour palette ===
* Plate colour: Storm Dust (#626366) 
* Skin colour: Boulder (#787B7D)
* Eye colour: Green Leaf (#546505)
* Markings colour: Rich Maroon (#AE305E)
Category:Characters
Category:Turians
Category:Females
Category:House Partinax
Category:House Fedorian
Category:Imperial Family of Regnaltus Fedorian I
Category:Quattuor nomina