Suffrage Memorial, Christchurch

This past week I celebrated a range women characters with “agency” from my books, as my own personal tribute to Women’s Suffrage week, celebrating 121 years of all women in NZ getting the vote.

And before the weekend was out I promised you an Easter Egg, which in this context is an important character who wasn’t canvassed during the week. So here goes, folks:

Meet Yorindesarinen, From The Heir Of Night & The Gathering Of The Lost

So why leave Yorinesarinen until now? Readers hear about her in the first pages of The Heir Of Night, but don’t actually meet her for a while. Because here’s the thing, y’see: as well as being amongst the greatest heroes of the Derai, a really important aspect of this character is that she’s dead…

But let’s meet her now as you would in The Heir Of Night:

“A fire was burning in the center of the clearing and a figure sat beside it, wrapped in a dark, hooded cloak. “You may come closer,” the cloaked figure bade them, without turning around. The voice that spoke was a woman’s, low and clear and pleasant. “It’s quite safe.”  … The woman reached up and pushed back the hood, revealing a face that was unmistakably Derai. A net of tiny white stars held the cloud of her black hair in place, while the moonlight revealed high cheekbones above a strong jaw, shadowed eyes, and a humorous curve to the mouth. “Welcome to my fire,” she said…

…Wordlessly, she opened her cloak so they could see the mail beneath, gleaming silver in the moonlight. While they watched it became dull, hacked in a hundred places, with blood dried black around the wounds and in slow runnels across the armor’s surface. “In the world beyond the Gate of Dreams,” Yorindesarinen said, “I did indeed die long ago, slain in my battle with the Worm of Chaos, even though I killed it at the last. We did for each other, that Worm and I.” As she finished speaking, the hacked and bloodied armor transformed into gleaming silver again.”

And then again in The Gathering Of The Lost:

“Desperate, the fleeing creature plunged into a deep fog bank, flowing beneath a long-fallen tree and out the other side. The trees here were taller, their vast trunks soaring skyward around a narrow glade with a small fire burning at its heart. A woman with stars in her hair sat beside the fire, the hood of her cloak thrown back as she played cat’s cradle with the flames. The creature hesitated, but the pursuing darkness was pressing close behind, crackling out power like a lightning storm. Terrified, the creature darted toward the fire, cowering low as the woman rose. Her expression was grim as she surveyed the being crouched at her feet. “Someone,” she said, “has used you hard.”

The woman looked through the fog toward the approaching storm and raised her right hand, still with the fire in it. The flame roared, leaping skyward, then twisted into a ribbon that circled them both. In the distance, hounds howled, and the fire blazed hotter, becoming a conflagration. The star-crowned woman’s smile was thin. “Even Nindorith,” she said, “will not like to meet that hunt.” She turned the other way and the flames parted, opening onto a rugged mountainside in northern Emer. “Go,” she bade the creature at her feet. “And stay away from Derai in future, for we are not kind to those who cross either our will or our path.”

The creature slipped away, disappearing into the Emerian dusk. The fire roared again, reforming into a mirror through which Yorindesarinen’s scarred face studied Malian, who gazed back at her through the medium of the dream…”
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I hope you have enjoyed your “Easter egg.”

As for what’s with the long names—well, that’ a subject for another post. 😉

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To check out some of the other women characters, all—I hope—with “agency”, from my writing , click on:

I Celebrate NZ Women’s Suffrage—By Celebrating My Women Characters: Part 1, The Heir Of Night

I Celebrate NZ Women’s Suffrage—By Celebrating My Women Characters: Part 2, Thornspell

Celebrating Women Characters: The Gathering Of The Lost

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To read more about September 19 and NZ women’s suffrage, try:

Christchurch City Libraries: Votes For Women — 19 September 1893

Te Ara, The Encyclopedia of New Zealand: Voting Rights