Cassandra Montelius

**Nation**
 **Born**
 **Titles**
 **Beliefs**
 **Signature**
 **Relatives**
* Vallien Montelius (Father) †
 **Coat of Arms**

**Cassandra Montelius** is the head of the House of Montelius and the Countess of Tourroux, a vassal under House Laurent within the Duchy of Alcestenne, she is a woman of great faith, experience and loyalty, that has been entrusted with many of the religious affairs of the Duchy. Elevated to matriarch of her house at a young age in the midst of conflict, Cassandra has been tested by war and grown into a shrewd and calculating ruler.

Serving as one of the chief feudal rulers of the Duchy of Alcestenne, Cassandra and the House of Montelius are reputable and notorious, especially in Baloric politics, but rough years have befallen the Montelius family, with a diminished lineage and a still-wartorn countryside left in the wake of constant conflict, Cassandra forges ahead into the future with a steely gaze and quiet determination to raise herself and her family to prominence once more.

## Personality & Beliefs

Quiet and measured, Cassandra presents a deceptive face as a quiet and matronly woman, though in reality she is a capable and cunning leader that dares not tolerate thought nor action that might be considered the least bit seditious, brooking no disloyalty within her county.

With a firm belief in the Holy Light and the old traditions of the Kingdom of Stormwind, Cassandra aligns with much of the Duchy of Alcestenne's nobility, that the Kingdom must return to the old ways and cast off the new, reactionaries to their core. For Cassandra this manifests best through the doctrines of the Holy Light, her county being largely responsible for the isolationist and reactionary regional doctrines that have spread through northern Balor.

She is a critic of the current order of things within Stormwind, believing that inaction and errancy from the traditions of Stormwindian culture have resulted in tragedy after tragedy, and the gradual moral dissolution of the Kingdom.

## Description

An older woman with an average, matronly physique, Cassandra looks her age, but bears it with grace, olive skin complimented by dark hair and eyes to match, covered by half-moon spectacles with golden rims.

Her attire is largely fitting of a Countess and a Priestess both, with exquisite ornamentation in white and gold over dark blue fabrics, while silver jewelry is inlaid with vibrant sapphires, a display of ostentatiousness from a woman of otherwise quiet demeanor.

The expensive sense of style is accompanied fittingly by an outwards aloofness, her expression metered and without too much expression that she might seem overly concerned with whatever is presented to her in that moment.

## Biography

Born to Helene IV Montelius and her husband Vallien, the birth of Cassandra was considered a good omen for all of the County of Tourroux, as the birth of a Montelian girl meant that the tradition of matriarchical rule could continue for yet another generation.

Since her youth, Cassandra was considered a blessed woman, with vivid hallucinations plaguing her that foretell vaguely of the future, telling portents of doom regularly, and fortune rarely. Of course, the good fortunes of her birth were not long to last, as in her early teenage years did her mother die giving birth to another child, Lyvvon IX, and only a few years after that was Balor attacked by hordes of Orcish invaders after the opening of the Dark Portal.

Within the first waves of the dark-magic wielding attackers did Vallien fall, leaving Cassandra to take up the title of matriarch of House Montelius at the young age of fourteen. She would inherit a faltering house, a younger sibling and an occupation by otherworldly invaders that sought to erase everything that she and her family stood for.

In the next years she would serve in the northern Baloric resistance led by the Laurentians, and in this time she would manifest her deep connection to the Holy Light into the world after she was tossed aside into a stone wall by an Orcish raider, calling upon the Light to smite the Orc as a bolt of divine energy fell from the heavens to sear the raider to ash.

When the occupation was finally broken, and Balor was once more a free land, Cassandra found herself bittersweet about the outcome, with the aid offered by the Alliance not being enough to properly expedite the rebuilding of the Kingdom of Stormwind, and the aid offered by the Crown of Stormwind not enough to rebuild Balor, leaving many of the Baloric lords and the Baloric people to pick up many of the pieces themselves.

As she, alongside her people, returned to the ruined city of Tourroux, Cassandra wept upon casting her eyes to the stones first laid by her ancestor, Catherine Montelius, mourning the defilement of the Orcish Horde.

Popular stories from Tourroux tell that yet another ray of Light broke through the clouds again here to shine upon Cassandra and the rubble, granting her a vision of her ancestor that would bid her to rebuild Tourroux, and to build a new Cathedral in the place of the old one, bigger than before and named Saint Catherine's Cathedral to commemorate strength in the face of overwhelming loss.

## Titles

### Countess of Tourroux

Cassandra is the ruler of the County of Tourroux, the western third of the current Duchy of Alcestenne, and the heart of spiritual affairs in Alcestenne and much of northern Balor.

### Bishop of Alcestenne

Serving also as the Bishop of Alcestenne, Cassandra is of high standing in the Church of the Holy Light and bears great religious importance in the local affairs of Balor.

## House

Cassandra is the head of House Montelius, a stringently traditionalist and ecclesiastical house that has served along House Laurent for generations in the wake of the Stormwindian War of Independence.

## Relationships

### Trant Laurent

Friend and liege-lord, Trant and Cassandra are of roughly the same age, both sharing the experience of taking command of their respective houses too young, and in times too turbulent. In the years since have they proven trustworthy allies to one another in the courts of peerage and on the field of battle alike, dueling against political rivals and existential threats side-by-side on various occasions.

## Gallery

Cassandra MonteliusSignature of Cassandra MonteliusHouse Montelius Coat of Arms