Nicolette Mar Noyne

Nicolette Mar Noyne a noble of the Mar Noyne family in Myr. Born the only daughter of a prominent trader of the family, Nicolette was raised partially in Qarth before her father took her sailing around the globe. She has been as far as Yi Ti in the east and Ibben in the north, but has always preferred Qarth as her home.

She is the captain of the ''Windchaser. ''

Appearance and Personality
Few can dispute the mixed heritage of Nicolette Mar Noyne. Born with fair skin, Nicolette resembles neither her father’s olive-skinned looks, nor her mother’s ‘milk-skinned’ countenance. She is rather a mix of the two, and while not sharing either of her parents’ tone of skin, there are many other areas in which she reflects them sharply.

Short and slender of build, Nicolette is an agile woman, never lacking for speed or grace, standing just over five feet tall. Her hair, a deep chestnut color, is oft dyed blonde, framing a slender face with sharp features. She has large brows, which shadow her deep, amber eyes, and a long nose adorned with half a dozen piercings suited to the Qartheen style.

Though Nicolette has scarce spent more than a five years in that city, she dresses and acts much like a Qartheen might, matching mannerisms and wear, preferring light-fitted trousers and smooth robes that go long past her ankles.

History
The House of Mar Noyne in Myr has given the world spectacle and horror alike. Men who have reached the very pinnacles of society, and men who have barely clung to the rungs beneath it. Sometimes, it even gives birth to simple men, and it must be said that Sallys Mar Noyne was one of those men. Born a noble man with a merchant’s heart, Sallys was an amiable man, prone to decadence and kindness; he was equal parts charity so much as he was a barterer. Call it madness, call it foolishness - Sallys Mar Noyne was far from your average merchant-man.

A man who sailed the seas, he took charge of much of his family’s fortunes in his earliest years, sailing from Ib to Braavos to Qarth and beyond. It was through his union with a Qartheen woman - a woman he soon took to wife underneath the lush gardens of that city - that Nicolette Mar Noyne was born. Named for Sallys’ grandmother, the girl was born in Qarth, resembling neither father nor mother, save for her eyes and nose - strictly her father’s.

The year was 415 AC. The following three years saw the reformation of the Triarchy and the Festival of the Three Daughters, all of which Sallys attended, leaving his daughter to be with her mother in Qarth. Though they were not estranged, the two parents were seldom with each other for the early years of Nicolette’s life. This changed in 419 AC, when Sallys returned to Qarth from his ventures, determined to make a profit of his trade.

A man of spice, with a particular penchant for silks and those who wear them, Sallys brought Nicolette on her first voyage in 419 AC. The voyage went beyond the Jade Gates, bringing them to Yi To, where Nicolette was afforded her first glance of those strange peoples. Though Sallys commanded a strong merchant fleet, he found the eastern-most journeys pleasing, and in the following years would bring her along for many.

Nicolette was not shy of danger, it must be said. Even in her youth, she had a hot temper, and a fiery attitude. She longed for adventure, in much the same way her father did, and would oft petition him to bring her to Braavos, to Ib and the Summer Isles, and he entreated her that they would, only in time… and travel they did. The years 419 to 425 AC were spent sailing, all the while her mother arranged her tutors and scribes and learned men, teaching her the histories of her people, geography, her letters, and more. At ten, Nicolette could speak Westerosi common with ease, though hers was a slurred accent - even in Volantis, where Valyrian was the most-spoken language, Nicolette found a surprising amount of difficulty articulating words, and attributed it to her own Qartheen accent.

As she continued to learn, so did she continue to grow. Briefly, in 427 AC, Nicolette and her father visited Myr, departing again not a month later, bound for Braavos. Though wars had consumed the Stepstones, Nicolette enjoyed peacetime, and during the nights on the open sea, counted the stars night after night, recognizing some. Over the years, her knowledge of the stars grew -- until navigation was a skill timely earned. She could sail the seas much like her father, and began to beseech him for many a gift.

In Braavos, these cries grew louder: Nicolette was fascinated by the Braavosi style of fighting, and during their months there enjoyed watching men fight shirtless, bloodying themselves upon small rapiers. She beseeched her father then, not only for a blade, but a tutor, so that she may learn the skills, and though Syllas was nothing if not a bartering man, he allowed her this, and more. Nicolette certainly had the frame and agility to wield a blade that demanded so much of it’s owner, and she proved it on the oft-rocking ship whilst sailing to Ib. Nicolette was a quick learner, exhausting herself night after night until she earned her first scar, a gash on the side that healed improperly.

It was in Ib where she began to learn the healing arts. Spending one month and a day in port, Nico took to fascination of a young Ibbish woman named Wendo who taught her of some of the odd healing ointments of their people. Though it did little to soothe her scar, it was an ebb for pain, and when they left, Nico beseeched her friend goodbye, returning therein to Braavos for no more than a week.

The bloodiest week of Nicolette’s life, she slipped from her father’s ship thrice in the dead of night, and challenged several swaggering Bravos to nightly duels -- none of them went her way, and one ended in disaster, when Nicolette returned to the ship, blood oozing from her finger. The man she had faced spat at her when it was revealed she was a woman, and had decided to take a finger, rather than an eye, or so it was said.

Though the blood was stymied, the flow lessened, Nicolette was forced to rid herself of a pinky finger in a bloody affair that both humbled and hardened her.

From then on, it was back to Myr, then to Lys and the Summer Isles, where her and her father spent three years.

The Spice Isles (430 - 433 AC)
It is known to every man far and wide that the spices of the Summer Isles are some of the most sought for both east and west of the Narrow Sea. Though Sallys had frequented the Summer Isles in his youth, he had not chanced a return since siring his daughter. When they landed in Lotus Port, it was not without apprehension from the locals, but Nicolette soon took to a young woman named Mandi, who worked the docks there.

It was because of her that their visit would change from short to long. Nico spent many a week in Mandi's company, enjoying her accent as she regaled her stories of the Isles, and some may even say that Mandi was her first lover, though they never displayed such affection in public. Mandi was able to convince Nico to stay... and subsequently her father as well, who had become enriched in the culture of the Islands.

They did not stay on Walano for long, though. From Lotus Port they travelled to Tall Trees Town, spending three months there. From then, they traveled to the Isle of Birds, then to Koj, exploring the high mountains on treacherous hikes that Nicolette liked to take alone with her friend. When they arrived on Jhala, the last leg of their journey, they spent six whole months in Ebonhead.

Their parting was to be bittersweet, and Nicolette had learned much in her time on the Isles. Mandi had taught her to dance, had taught her the healing ointments of their peoples. She had convinced her even to tattoo herself in the queer fashion of their people, in the shape of a butterfly spreading it's wings on her back. Just when her eighteenth nameday was to come, Mandi presented her with a ruby, and took her to one of the many Temples of Love outside the city.

They spent seven days and nights there, and when they found their way back, her father had another gift waiting for her. For three long years, he had been commissioning a ship of sturdy design from the Islanders in Lotus Port. Windchaser, she was to be called, and crewed by no more than twenty men: for her eighteenth nameday, her father gifted her a swan ship.

Nicolette spent several days toiling over her new acquisition, assembling a crew of like-minded adventurers with promise of payment as time went on. Those that joined her would serve her... not as slaves, but as friends. Such went unspoken, however, and Nico petitioned Mandi to join her. Initially, she refused - her home was always in the Summer Isles, she'd say, but it was said that when Nicolette kissed her, her friend changed her mind and agreed.

The following day, when they were bound to depart from the Summer Isles, she visited her father, and they both agreed that they'd need part ways. And so it would be a bittersweet parting indeed, when Nicolette promised to return to him after a sum of one year, and he would return to Myr on some merchant business. With the spices of the Summer Isles behind him, they parted ways, and Nicolette found herself once again bound for Qarth.

Decadence (434 - 438 AC)
It was early in the year 434 AC when the Windchaser docked in Qarth. Though initially planned only to be a short stop, of the like of three months or more, the Windchaser would not move for almost another four years. Taking Mandi with her, she first met with her mother, who had taken a lover in her father's absence. It was there that Nico learned of her four half-siblings, though she was far from outraged. Some might have even called her sympathetic to her mother's plight.

In the long years she'd been gone, not much had changed in Qarth, though the dynamic between her and others shifted frequently. She would attend balls and feasts, and cavort with the warlocks, lost in fascination. Mandi was quickly tossed to the wayside. Those she'd considered friends on the Windchaser soon turned to begging as they were almost forgotten - until one night when a fire was started on the boat, and Nico named her crew guilty. Half were put to death, the other half sold into slavery, to serve however their masters may please.

In the months preceding, Nicolette had grown decidedly cold towards her young friend. Though romantic, their relationship had taken a turn for the worse when Mandi caught her in bed with three other nobles. Nicolette would have no more of her, and as talks grew fiercer, and shouting matches erupted between the two, Nico ordered her mother's guards out the tongue of her years-long friend, and ordered her to be put in chains, so that she may serve her day and night without question.

And so she would. Nicolette promised her fire and fury if she tried anything: she would have her hand off, or mayhaps her eyelids, or she would ruin her woman-parts, or slice off her nipple. Threats given that Mandi did not once test the validity of.

From thereon, Nico had Mandi's name changed: Pepper, she had named her, a suitable slave name to be certain, and not without merit.

Nicolette was not an inherently cruel woman, it need be said. She did enjoy wounding cocky boys in sparring matches, however. The men of Qarth could weep at will, it was said, but she made three weep with caustic words and delightful illustrations with her blade.

By the year 436 AC, Nicolette had been through an assortment of lovers. More prominent than all the others, however, was a man named Xalar, who in his time convince Nicolette to pierce herself as so many Qartheen did. Though she initially objected, persistence won out. In that same year, Nicolette had her nose encrusted in red and gold and violet, rubies and opals and amethyst that glittered upon her pale skin.

She did not stop there, however. She allowed her torso and lower body to be decorated, though surely such details should not be spoken of.

Following this transformative time, Nicolette began to take part in the decadence of the city, taking part in many feasts and balls, orgies and more. This had become her life for the better part of two years, when in early 438, her mother took to a sudden illness and passed within a week of the affliction's first signs.

438 AC
The time of her mother's generous allowance was at an end, and the man who inherited her fortune would have no more of Nico's presence. Instead of chaining her, however, he offered her mercy: three slaves of any of her choosing, a fortune to last her to Myr, and a crew for the Windchaser, freshly repaired. Furthermore, he beseeched her never return to Qarth on pain of death.

Nicolette agreed, if reluctantly. She chose three slaves: Pepper, Butterfly, and Sapphire, her personal favourites.

And so it was that in the 2nd Moon of 438 AC, Nicolette departed Qarth under oath never to return. The Windchaser stopped briefly in Astapor, then Meereen, and Volantis thereafter, eventually heading to Lys for a fortnight before returning to Myr.

The home Nicolette would return to had changed, however. Indeed, last she had been in Myr, a Mar Noyne had been Prince-Admiral, and things had been different. The worst ache of all was the knowledge that she had not spoken to her father in four years, only to return to find that he had been dead for two…

Family

 * Mercurio Mar Noyne (b. 359 AC)
 * m. Tyanna Narratys (b. 363 AC d. 423 AC)
 * Elyas Mar Noyne (b. 382 AC d. 436 AC)
 * m. Salma Vashar (b. 384 AC)
 * Darion Mar Noyne (b. 404 AC)
 * m. Elara Staegone (b. 409 AC)
 * Idris Mar Noyne (b. 427 AC)
 * Andros Mar Noyne (b. 430 AC)
 * Nymon Mar Noyne (b. 387 AC d. 436 AC)
 * m. Lysara Nahar (b. 394 AC d. 436 AC)
 * Norah Mar Noyne (b. 414 AC)
 * Laena Mar Noyne (b. 417 AC)
 * Tormo Mar Noyne (b. 420 AC d. 436 AC)
 * Corlys Mar Noyne (b. 425 AC)
 * Sallys Mar Noyne (b. 393 AC d. 436 AC)
 * m. Vila of Qarth (b. 397 AC d. 436 AC)
 * Nicolette Mar Noyne (b. 415 AC)
 * Craghas Mar Noyne (b. 361 d. 405)
 * Descendants of Craghas