Lady Alexandria

Lady Alexandria of Broadtower. Born 1066 in Penhaven, Hardnit, Alexandria’s name should probably have been Alexandra, but that was how her illiterate father, a strong-built smith, insisted he wanted it. Her mother, who had been an assistant to a traveling apothecary, knew how to read and write, and taught all her children. Alexandria’s three brothers all wanted to be smiths like their fathers. She, however, knew that she would be a wizard all her life. When she failed the Kartrian magical aptitude test in 1083, she was puzzled, but accepted the outcome. Instead, she was apprenticed with the Koiran wizard Dundlebust. And though he might not have given her the rigorous training she had hoped for, he most certainly reckonized her talent and showed her how to put it to the full.Between the ages of 25 and 35, she enjoyed a glorious adventuring career, and was involved in several ‘police actions’, working for the higher ranks in Hardnitian society. And in 1101, she was granted a fief of her own, the tacit understanding being that she would serve a kind of ‘minuteman’ wizard, moving quickly to counteract any developing crises. For this reason, she has retired from active adventuring but does not shy from it when her friends call for her. When outside the heat of battle, Alexandria has a reputation for being thorough even to the point of obsessiveness, but once comitted to combat she fights with icy determination.She is known never to have spoken a word in haste, or out of order. Yet though she is herself a strict follower of rules and customs, it seems that the yardstick she truly judges others by is one of competence. If a person is capable, manners are of little consequence to her. Thus she befriended Mathias the Vain despite what would appear from afar an unsurmountable barrier in the difference of attitudes.Her unstinted service to Hardnit during the Troll Wars won her the gratitude of King Hendrick, and when Baron Belhar retired from the King’s Advisory Council in 1108, he instated Alexandria in the baron’s place. From this platform, she has shown considerate political acumen and has grown into one of Hardnit’s most important power brokers.
Past the age of 50, Alexandria has retained most of the jet-black hair of her youth, though now tempered with speckles of silver at the temples and a spreading widow’s peak, although the latter is considered a tad too spectacular to be natural by other ladies of the court.Though rumors abound that she is romantically involved with Baron Arno, the dashing hero of Skolopendria, the truth seems to be that they are merely allies. In fact, she appears to have resigned herself to a future without a man.