Angoulême

Angoulême (d. ) was a fair-haired girl who Geralt initially mistook for Ciri due to her appearance. The illegitimate child of a Cintran noblewoman, she wound up forming a gang with a group of orphans before joining the Nightingale gang. Through a turn of events, she later sided with Geralt and joined his company to find Ciri, feeling obligated to pay off her debt to him for saving her life.
== Biography ==
Her mother had been from a high-ranking Cintran family but Angoulême was disowned by the family as she was an illegitimate child, likely fathered by a stablehand, and so she was placed in the care of distant relatives. While her new family wasn't horrible to her, they constantly reminded her she was a bastard child. Her own mother used to visit occasionally but without warning just stopped coming by.
When she was around 15 years old, war broke out with Nilfgaard and her relatives lost everything. As they already had three children of their own to care for, they gave Angoulême to an orphanage. However, this orphanage turned out to use children for sexual exploits, particularly the younger ones. Teaming up with 6 others that were around her age or older, and driven by the desire for adventure and pillaging, the group killed two of the visiting pedophiles and several of the priests that ran the orphanage before running away. At one point they joined up with Homer Straggen (known as Nightingale) and his gang, who were a lot more successful as bandits.
=== Meeting Geralt ===
While she was with them, in early September , Homer was approached by Schirrú to kill Geralt, who would be passing through the area in a month and supplied them detailed information about the group. The gang was then to wait in Belhaven, as the witcher would have to cross through the city to see a group of druids. However, the former group of orphans split off and Angoulême stole from Homer before making their exit. They were caught a couple weeks later by Governor Fulko Artevelde's men, who killed everyone in the group save for Angoulême to try and get information out of her. While she couldn't save herself from being killed, if she gave enough information, she could make it a less painful death for herself and thus revealed to Fulko the plans to kill Geralt. When Geralt then passed through Riedbrune, Fulko had a private meeting with the witcher, introducing Angoulême as the one who told him about the waiting ambush, wanting to seize on this opportunity to kill the Nightingale gang. Geralt, realizing they'd kill Angoulême regardless, made it part of his conditions to help that he be given the girl, sparing her from the gallows. Grateful to the witcher for saving her life, she joined his company to find Ciri.
Despite joining the group though, she initially rubbed some of them the wrong way, especially as she called all the men "uncle" and women, like Milva, "aunty", infuriating the archer. Milva, in her rage to stop Geralt and Cahir from fighting each other by striking them repeatedly with her belt, also struck Angoulême after being called aunty again. However, feeling guilty at her striking the girl in anger, the archer then hugged the crying Angoulême.
=== Fighting in Belhaven ===
A couple days later the company split into two groups, with Angoulême, Geralt, and Cahir headed out to Belhaven to find the half-elf who put out the kill contract and Milva, Dandelion, and Regis towards the Sansretour valley, near Toussaint's border in hopes of finding the druids they were seeking there. One night on their trip, after Angoulême told the two about her past, she then insinuated she'd have sex with the witcher as a way to show her gratitude to him for saving her life but Geralt immediately told her to not ever mention the word or ever bring it up again with him.
However, instead of going to Belhaven, where two of them would be immediately recognized by either Nightingale's gang or their informants, she instead led them to one of the mines, as she recognized the odd red material on the half-elf's boots when she had seen him as from the local mines. At the first one she spoke with a friend, Golan Drozdeck, but the dwarf wasn't forthcoming of information until Geralt threatened him, and he revealed the half-elf had been at the Rialto mine.
The group headed there to learn more but instead ran into a group from Nightingale's gang that ultimately led to the trio fighting and killing the 5 gang members. Impressed, a half-elf appeared and used the guise that the trio had said they'd killed Geralt earlier to have them come in to talk about the reward. Instead, the half-elf, now revealed as Schirrú, took them by surprise, having immediately recognized the witcher and was soon joined by Nightingale, more of his gang, and a band of corrupt Nilfgaardian soldiers. Just as things looked dire for the trio, freedom fighters of the Slopes disrupted the mine and starting fighting the soldiers, giving the trio time to escape on horseback.
However, Cahir, who'd nearly been scalped by a thrown hatchet, couldn't even stay up in the saddle and Geralt's horse, having pushed to gallop for too long, was near death, all the while knowing their pursuers weren't far behind. After a quick decision, Geralt ordered Angoulême to race to the other half of the company near Toussaint as they needed to know immediately about Schirrú and Nightingale while Geralt and Cahir would hide in the woods and make their way once Cahir was better. With that, she raced to Toussaint, with the half-elf and the gang following after her, not realizing they'd bypassed Geralt in the woods. Luckily, Angoulême reached the other half of the company in time and explained to Regis what'd happened.
=== With the druids ===
Regis set out to find Geralt and Cahir while Angoulême, Milva, and Dandelion took refuge with the druids in Caed Myrkvid, with the belief that the Nilfgaardian soldiers wouldn't dare cross over the border due to jurisdiction. They soon learned though that wasn't the case with this group and everyone in the forest found themselves under attack. The three took refuge in a house in the forest with some pilgrims, and, while under attack, Angoulême learned exactly why Dandelion had feared entering the duchy: he had apparently wooed the Duchess Anna Henrietta and her husband, on finding out, meant to kill the troubadour but Dandelion had managed to escape the country before that could happen.
Shortly afterwards Geralt arrived and, with help from several knights errant, saved those inside and Angoulême and Milva joined Geralt in tracking down Schirrú and Nightingale in the forest. However, the outlaws had ran further into the forest, crossing into a sacred area that even the knights weren't allowed to enter, despite knowing the bandits were going to continue killing. The group quickly realized though that the druids could handle themselves: using their own magic, they used tree creatures to gather all the trespassers in the sacred area. Unfortunately, this also meant Angoulême, Geralt, and Milva, who were unceremoniously caught and taken to the center of the circle. Thankfully, the flaminika, Regis' friend, let them go after learning who they were.
=== Wintering in Toussaint ===
Now in early October and in Toussaint, the group was invited to stay however long they wished by the duchess, as she was still rather fond of Dandelion. Angoulême, along with the others in the company, attended various feasts and balls held by the duchess at the palace, with her commenting she'd like to open a high-class brothel in Beauclair once they found Ciri. However, she, Regis, Milva, and Cahir soon became disgruntled, wishing to continue traveling but couldn't, as Geralt had sprung up a romance with the visiting sorceress Fringilla Vigo, a cousin of the duchess, and soon the mountain passes were blocked by the winter snow. Just as January came around though, with the rest itching to travel, Angoulême had another problem: Geralt had voiced concerns that he wanted her to stay in the duchy once they started traveling again, as she was safe from Fulko Artevelde finding and killing her. However, Geralt suddenly changed his mind on everything and in early January ordered the company to be ready to head out within the hour, including Angoulême.
=== To Stygga Castle ===
As it was in the dead of winter, the group had to travel through a blizzard in Malheur pass. At one point Angoulême spotted horse tracks that started out of nowhere and Milva confirmed they were, indeed, horse tracks. After a short tracking though, the hoofprints suddenly stopped in the snow and the group turned back to the trail they'd been on, not realizing how close Ciri had been nor Ciri realizing they'd been just behind her.
The group eventually arrived at Stygga Castle and stormed the fortress, with Angoulême putting her sabre to good use. However, they were soon pinned down by archers and Milva began to deftly take them out until she and a rival archer fired off arrows simultaneously, mortally wounding each other. Angoulême and Cahir were then sent off to another part of the castle where Ciri, having also escaped, ran into them with mercenaries on her heels. Angoulême helped fight them back behind a solid door and barred them out, but not before she was stabbed in the thigh. Before much else could be said, Leo Bonhart appeared and Cahir sent the two women running while he tried to hold off the bounty hunter.
Unfortunately, Ciri and Angoulême couldn't get far with the latter's leg injury and, not able to continue, she fell down from the blood loss. She then told Ciri how she didn't believe they'd actually find her before asking if she, the queen of Cintra, could make her a countess. She then died in Ciri's arms.
Her body, along with the rest of the fallen company, was later buried outside Stygga.
==Trivia==
* Within France there is a city called Angoulême.
* Her mother's family's coat of arms is described as a "sea-cat". Sea cat (Meerkatze) was a name given by medieval German and Polish sailors to species of monkeys known as guenon. Sailors used to domesticate these monkeys for fun. However, in the 16th century Polish heraldists were no longer aware about the origin of this coat of arms and started to depict the animal as actual cat. Andrzej Sapkowski's bestiary in Manuscript Discovered in a Dragon's Cave has an entry on the Sea Cat, which is stated to be other name of the guenon.
==Gallery==
TTotS angouleme interrogation Denis Gordeev.jpg|Angoulême, Geralt and Fulko Artevelde
TTotS at the mines Denis Gordeev.jpg|Golan Drozdeck being threatened by Geralt
== References ==
== External links ==
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