#{{ sense is n.o.n.s.e.n.s.e to a fool }}

[metpo-avthpwnou]

Her Majesty Diana

Diana Valois-Orléans, the 46 year old, is the queen regent of Naples, but the old world knows her as Mania. She is known to be decisive. Rumor has it, however, she also has a tendency to be unpredictable.

THE BASICS

Name:  Diana Valois-Orléans

Occupation: Queen Regent of Naples

Title: Her Majesty

Personification: Μανια (Mania)

Age: 46

Hometown: Florence, Italy

Relationship status: Widow

Current family: son Leonardo II ; daughters Emilia & Lucrezia

Friends: x

Other close relationships: x

A BRIEF LOOK

Religion: Catholic

Attitude to religion: Dismissive

Favorite pastime: Chess

Hobby: Music (lute)

BIO

Diana was the eldest child and only daughter of Reynaldo Sforza, duke of Milan. He was known to be a ruthless and exacting man, a formidable enemy both in negotiations and on the battlefield, and a merciless ruler. Because Diana was his only child until her 12th year, it was her to whom he first passed on all his ambitions, techniques, expectations. He was easy to disappoint, and brutal when it happened, and Diana quickly learned that she would need to be tough, ruthless, even savage to survive her father’s tutelage, to survive in the world, to be impressive, even. And so from a hard-hearted man was born an even harder-hearted daughter.

Diana is calculating, cold, and her decisions are swift and decisive. She is accustomed to getting what she wants, because she learned long ago how to terrorise people into doing what she wants. At the age of 15 the blood of innocents was already on her hands after her father gave her command over a small battalion in his army during their invasion of Genova and she ordered that any civilian they came across were to be slaughtered if they could not run--to send a message. This cold-blooded savagery is the only constant aspect of Diana’s character; on the whole she is erratic, unpredictable in her decisions, clever though the are. She tends towards the unexpected, even one might tend to think he knows what to expect.

She was neither happy nor unhappy in her marriage to Leonardo; the marriage itself little mattered to her but for the power and prestige that her new position brought her. Diana quite bold-facedly took lovers and favourites even when her husband was alive, but because he was a timid man and wary of Diana, she was allowed to carry on as she pleased. Her confidence was and remains a disconcerting aspect of her presence to the men who surround her, for her confidence borders on fearlessness, a sense of seeming invincibility. Indeed, at times Diana thinks of herself as invincible, even immortal. 

She never really got on with her brothers-in-law, but since her husband’s death when she made a quick and vicious grab for the regency, things have gotten much worse. They are constantly at each others throats, and because Diana is so unpopular in the court because of how fearsome most of the nobility find her, she has to fight hard and smart to keep her hold on power. Sooner or later, she knows, she will have to take drastic measures to consolidate her power, or risk losing everything she’d worked for since birth. 

AMBITION: to eliminate her brothers-in-law as competition to the throne of Naples, and her blood brother as duke of Milan, so that she can inherit and unite both under her rule.