Queen Nakhta de Renaud
Backstory

Species: Red fox (vulpes vulpes)
Sex: ♀
Age: 20
Height: 5ft 4in
Weight: 140lbs
Siblings: Absarren (8 years older, male), Bilba and Vilgem (twins, female and male respectively, 5 years older), and Berehn (3 years older, male); all deceased

Species and Cultural Notes

Anthro foxes in this world are born deaf and blind, although they tend to gain these senses after a couple of days.

The common folk of Vulland are relatively conservative in their political beliefs at the time of Nakhta’s life. They prefer political stability, especially so long as the taxes don’t get too high and the wars don’t go on for too long, and the de Renauds have provided that. 

They are generally aware that royal life can have its dangers, and true to their overall wish for stability, have greater respect for a monarch who has been on the throne for long enough to prove their ability to survive. However, they can be sensitive to scandals, or perceived scandals, where the monarch of the day may not have earned their position. They also prefer long reigns as these tend to mean that national policies do not tend to change very much. 

The nobles and clergy are just as prone to vying for power as the royals, and some of them do this by keeping up with the tastes and preferences of the current monarch. 

Queen Nakhta is an original character from the story Songs of Vulland (working title). [I will finalise your character's summary after everything below is completed, checked, and confirmed to be correct by you.]

Trust & Confidence
(newborn)

Nakhta was the fifth child born to King Gattrem IV and Queen Velise. Given the time period they lacked reliable means of birth control so Nakhta’s conception was unplanned, though not entirely unexpected. 

Whether Nakhta’s mother had ever been a maternal type, but she had paid the most attention to her first-born, Absarren. She hadn’t wanted to marry into the direct moral line but had not wanted to pass up the opportunity once it had arisen for lack of attractive alternative options. She found motherhood exhausting, and by the time Nakhta was born she had no care left to give for motherhood. As far as she was concerned, she had already produced several heirs to the throne so her job was done, and she looked forward to the permanent birth control that would come with menopause. 

Her father felt much the same way. 

Nakhta’s birth went as uneventfully as can be expected, although it was noticed from the day she was born that she had a slight malformation of her muzzle. This was noticeable on close inspection of the infant but not to a casual observer.

Nakhta would not be aware of this, of course, but her parents made a grand announcement to their subjects of her birth. After this, she was handed to a small group of wet-nurses and nannies to be raised almost entirely without input from her mother.

These women were older, experienced mothers, and provided Nakhta with the very best care and support they could offer. 

Nakhta opened her eyes a little earlier than most newborn fox cubs, within 24 hours of her birth. This may have been due to her being able to smell that something wasn’t right. While she would not have been able to see or hear her caregivers during her first day of life, she was able to smell them, which meant that she learned to recognise the scent of her mother immediately after her birth. When she did, she noticed the absence of that smell when she was passed to a wet nurse, and the presence of the scent of a different individual. In addition to this, Nakhta’s mother had had raised cortisol levels during her pregnancy with Nakhta, which Nakhta herself had detected in utero. This had given her a heightened sensitivity to the hormone. After she was born and noticed that the scent of her caregiver wasn’t right, her cortisol levels had risen – and with it, her stress – which had boosted her development and caused her to open her eyes earlier than an equivalent, more relaxed cub.

This reaction to stress became a long-term detail of Nakhta’s life, and she became known among the nurses and other staff for being a fussy baby.

Objectively the nurses’ care of Nakhta was very good, but Nakhta had already realised that something was not right, that these women were not her true mother. Occasionally her mother would show up and check on her, and she would reach out eagerly for her, but her mother would not return the gesture. She would cry, and her nannies would give her the hug she desired. However, she realised that they were not her mother and she often rejected their offer of emotional warmth. Before long, Nakhta stopped reaching out to her mother when she came, all together. She recognised her mother as her mother due to her scent [Just for now I’m going to hold off on writing that she recognised that her mother was her mother due to their similar fur patterns, as she has to develop neurally enough to be able to self-recognise first, which I’ll guess happens in late toddlerhood or early childhood. My best guess, based on our talk about deafness and blindness at birth, that scent would still be important to her in infanthood.], and reluctantly learned to accept her vulpine nurses. She felt distress around those of her nurses who were not foxes as they really did seem very alien to her at that point. 

Another detail Nakhta could not have known at this point but is worth establishing here is the opinions of her siblings of her. Her oldest sibling, Absarren, was 8 at the time of her birth and had already developed a firm tendency to be cruel, including to his siblings. He didn’t consider Nakhta a threat due to her position so far down the sibling order. He absently decided that he would be able to outsmart and emotionally exploit her.

Bilba and Vilgem were only 5 when Nakhta was born, but Bilba understood her own world enough to recognise that having a sister would lessen pressure on her to be girly: she had already spent much of her life trying to live up to the values of her brothers and be a tomboy. Vilgem had similar feelings; while he was a boy, he had observed the court’s behavour around Berehn and understood that a new baby meant less attention for him, and he was relieved that something (or indeed, somebody) else would distract attention from him. 

Berehn was the tender age of three, and was not yet clued-in enough about the workings of his world to feel anything other than curious about his new sister. 

Freedom & Self-Determination
(toddlerhood)

[Note to self: Absarren was 9 by this point; Bilba and Vilgem 6; and Berehn 4.]

[Note to self: Absarren is assumed to be king and doesn’t let the others forget it. He actively wanted to be king and regarded the twins as the biggest threat to this, especially given that they were allied.]

Nakhta didn’t take long to develop a strong relationship with her anger, especially as her sensitivity to stress meant that she felt afraid easily. She sensed the emotional coldness and hostility of several of the people around her even before she could speak, and certainly before she could speak fluently. Even her nurses didn’t fully inoculate her against this. They were there as employees to the royal family and understood that the king and queen would not be best pleased if they raised the new princess to be too soft and gentle. Indeed, only her wet nurses were soft and motherly. After Nakhta was weaned off of those, her care was delegated to other caregivers who were far more stern and matronly. [Do you have names for any of these? Indeed, did she have a team of nurses/caregivers or just one?] These ladies were tasked with looking after Nakhta’s physical well-being but not her emotional care. 

There were a few reasons for this. Chief among these was that Nakhta was a princess, so as such, her carers were forbidden from punishing her physically. They had to find other ways, and these matronly carers found that giving Nakhta (and the other princes and princesses) ‘the eye’ if they did something wrong, or using a warning tone of voice that left the consequences to Nakhta’s imagination, were more acceptable. These matrons also understood that Nakhta would live in a harsh world and needed to become familiar with it; therefore they would not coddle her. The third reason for may or may not have been intentional, but if it was, then the royal family had hand-picked these rigid matrons to set Nakhta the challenge of learning to bend the rules subtly, if she was going to try to break them at all. 

[Re: Nakhta’s lisp. Would you say she felt ashamed of it, or angry that other people would point it out or think less of her for it? I’m guessing it’s more likely she feels angry about it because you’ve already said she feels that surely she’s the most important part of the overall household of the castle, and she’s putting herself forward a lot even as a toddler. I will keep my eyes open for her feeling ambivalent about this, or using anger to deflect any feelings of embarrassment.] She usually leaned toward anger. She tried to pretend it didn’t exist whenever she wasn’t actually learning to improve it, sometimes blatantly lying, and then snapping at the person in question if they pressed. Nakhta was aware that people thought of it as an imperfection and some even pitied her for it. What really upset her was that she couldn’t control it as a child, even though she was trying hard. Nakhta is, as we will see, happiest if she feels she has control of the situation—which she almost never does. [I see what you mean! I’m thinking about this, here. So we have worked out that Nakhta has an issue with her stress levels – whenever she produces cortisol (which we all do in stressful situations) she’s more sensitive to it, so the same amount will heighten her emotions and sensory experience more so than other people. As a result she’ll be somewhat jumpy. This is clearly no environment for Nakhta to be fearful, so it sounds like she’s overlaying that with displays of anger.

It sounds like her best way of justifying that anger is over the issue of control. Like you said, she wants to be able to control things but she can’t. She is controlled by her matrons, by her parents, perhaps by her older siblings, and even by her own body. Likely her timetable is quite rigid (even if she doesn’t understand it at this tender age, she’s going to be aware of constantly being told to “hurry up!” or that she can’t have so-and-so treat or meal or play-time yet. I’m wondering if she’s dressed in any way she doesn’t like… All in all it’s a really constricting situation that she’s in. Her body wants to do what it’s going to do, whether that’s freaking out, lisping, or anything else (sleeping, eating, relaxing, etc.) but she’s got to do what other people want all the time.

So yes, I’m wondering if she finds her lisp frustrating because it sounds like something her family don’t want her to have, but she can’t just not have it. Almost like the people who are controlling her are arguing with her body and she, as the middle-man, doesn’t even get a say, just gets commanded to make her body obey by pronouncing her S’s. How frustrating for her!

Would you be happy for me to write in the above explanation for her early anger?]

[Also, can I guess that tears were not particularly well-accepted? “Strong princesses don’t cry” or something like that? Speaking of which, did she learn any particular phrases at this time? Many people have some phrase or other that they remember from childhood, that they were told a lot. “boys don’t cry” is one, but the same sentiment might be conveyed with different words, such as “don’t be such a girl”, which can have different connotations for that child in later life. So is it possible that Nakhta may have been told something like that – perhaps “Only weaklings cry”?]

As Nakhta began to learn how to talk, her nurses and family members noticed that she had a lisp, thanks to her malformed muzzle. This became something of a focal point among her siblings, and Nakhta remembered several times when her siblings used it to embarrass her into compliance for the rest of her life. Nakhta herself didn’t pay her own speech much attention until she began to be humiliated for it, but once that began to happen, she felt the shame acutely herself. Even her parents made it clear they were displeased with the presence of her deformity. The other members of her family were in perfect physical shape.

Despite this, once Nakhta learned to speak she talked a lot, partly due to her tendency to feel agitated easily. As a result of this she resorted to denying the existence of her speech impediment, as denying it was easier than remembering to keep quiet or obeying the implied rule of “don’t speak”.  

Ambition
(young childhood)

[Note to self: Absarren was 11 by this point; Bilba and Vilgem 8; and Berehn 6.]

Between them, the oldest siblings thought their youngest sister posed little threat to them or their career prospects. They were aware that she would probably try to build a spy network to help herself get ahead, but they didn’t think she would be effective in this and decided not to prevent this. 

Most of them thought the small, awkward youngest sister posed little threat and let her try to build a spy network if she wanted to—it existed mostly in her head, and she never made any moves directly against them, even though they openly talked down to her, which seemed to imply cowardice. In return, she believed what she was doing would go right under their noses and put her in a position of influence without needing to directly oppose or hurt any of them and without the stresses of actually ruling. After all, she was the most important one and then everyone would have to acknowledge that.

All that, of course, would be coming later in childhood when she became aware of these struggles.

Bilba and Vilgem also both wanted to rule, but were prone to allyship. They took their cue to do this from a historical precedent of sibling co-monarchs. Bilba, despite being female, was brawny while Vilgem had a keen intelligence, especially for numbers. Despite their action plan, they never explicitly stated between themselves that they would share power if anything happened to Absarren. 

Absarren, who had a high degree of charm, tried more than once to suggest that Bilba should be sent to the continent to strengthen diplomacy there, and to put Berehn into the clergy to thus remove him from succession. For his part Vilgem vacillated on his attempts to muscle into the throne, all but saying he would accept Absarren’s primacy whenever things looked difficult for him, much to the aggravation of the aggressive Bilba. Berehn actually took to religious studies at a young age, becoming very zealous and renouncing political struggles, which unfortunately alienated him from Nakhta, despite her attempts to get close to him as the closest in age. (The religious structure of Anochism is similar to that of Roman Catholicism, though the actual religion is different in tenets.) Most of them thought the small, awkward youngest sister posed little threat and let her try to build a spy network if she wanted to—it existed mostly in her head, and she never made any moves directly against them, even though they openly talked down to her, which seemed to imply cowardice. In return, she believed what she was doing would go right under their noses and put her in a position of influence without needing to directly oppose or hurt any of them and without the stresses of actually ruling. After all, she was the most important one and then everyone would have to acknowledge that.]

[You said, “Whenever she accomplished something, she expected adoration and praise, empty or not, and conversely if she failed her goal she would stew about it and blame herself internally while blaming everyone else externally, feeling a need to measure up to the longstanding De Renaud dynasty’s name.” Can I guess that the greatness of the de Renaud dynasty was foisted on her – paintings of her ancestors in the hall, Latin mottos she’d be expected to understand and remember from young, that kind of thing?] It absolutely was. A thousand years and more of the same family, how they’d never allowed the country to be taken after her ancestor, Reynard, drove out the occupying empire; their great achievements; etc. Even the castle in which she grew up was built by successive generations and served as a constant reminder of the dynasty’s presence and prestige.

[You said, “That was the pressure that had been put on her shoulders and it drove her to fear, as she would for the rest of her life, that others were watching her, plotting against her, wanting to criticize or to hurt her. Paranoia, many would call it, but nobody tried to treat it in a family that really was full of a history of assassinations and backstabbing.” It sounds like she’s already keenly aware of how her family treat one another, but I’m wondering where her nurses are at this time. Have they been dismissed already, are they too afraid to try to teach Nakhta any different, or are they doing their best to no avail?] At that point, she’d been moved away from the small cadre of nurses to just one or two. They were kind to her, but were unable to offer any real help despite genuine emotional support. They did tell her moralistic fairy tales when the king and queen weren’t watching, but observation of actions spoke louder than her nurses’ words, and either way she was keen to not be seen as a baby anymore. (As queen, if any of them are still alive, she intends to reward them for their efforts, though, because she has a sense of loyalty to anyone she thinks really meant her well.)

The relationship between the various Athelings was complicated and deeply unhealthy. Nakhta was really the only one of them who actually loved all of her siblings unconditionally, and that was despite the frustrations and anger of how they would treat her. The cognitive dissonance was not something she could put a name to, but present. 

Productivity
(older childhood)

[Note to self: Absarren was 14 by this point; Bilba and Vilgem 11; and Berehn 9.]

[You said, “She learned all the appropriate vixenly arts, including sewing, dance, etiquette, calligraphy, and even the reading of long and complex histories” How did she feel about that history? I’m guessing a big part of it was her lineage and the lineages of other royal or noble families. It sounds dull for a girl of her age, and I’m wondering whether she felt proud of her heritage when she read it or whether she resented those people. And, did any of the figures inn those books pique her interest? It strikes me that the ones who are dead and gone would be easier for her to idealise and use as imagined role models.] The dustiest old tomes did soon bore her, especially the recitation of her heritage and of those around her. Thankfully, whenever she started to get annoyed by learning how long so-and-so lived and what they accomplished, or anxious about the weight of all those dead ancestors looking down on her and judging her, she could turn to the histories that had been made into exciting stories. They’d all been lionised, like Markrin II who had defeated a foreign invasion that had briefly occupied the eastern shores of Vulland, or Aalredta, a queen who had held the kingdom together during a dangerous period of civil war. These were people she could be excited about! This soon translated into a love of actual fiction, which mostly consisted of song cycles but the novel was just starting to come into vogue in the period before she was born. This meant she was often reading things above her ‘grade level’, but it did help improve her vocabulary, at least. It also meant she likes to think of things in terms of narratives and causes, also caused by the aforementioned paranoia.

Child to Adult Transition
(adolescence)

[Note to self: Absarren was 21 by this point; Bilba and Vilgem 18; and Berehn 16.]

[You said, “It was hard for Nakhta to leave behind childhood, admittedly. She still hasn’t completely to the present day, tending to prefer old habits and companions to anything new.” It sounds like she hasn’t resolved something in childhood. I’ll watch out for clues about what, and will keep this comment in situ as a reminder to myself to make a point of this.]

[I’m interested in your comment here: “The nobles and others she mingled with seemed to accept her as at least a functional and reasonable member of the royal family, too childish and petty to be a ruler but at least not embarrassing herself in public too often.” Especially in light of the previous comment about her feeling she hasn’t finished her childhood properly yet. I’d expect someone who isn’t done with being a child to be insecure, and therefore to appear fickle or over-reactive to real or imagined slights, which is in sharp contrast to being reasonable. Would you say that she mostly absorbed her angry feelings and did her best to appear mature and level-headed, or was she unreasonable but also appeared to lack the power to do anybody any real damage?] Oh, she was certainly insecure and bristled quite a bit if insulted, but given how overwhelmed she was emotionally and obviously unprepared, the nobles thought she was (as they preferred) mostly a danger to herself. This was someone who they thought could be used, possibly by feeding her false information through the network of informants she was continuing to try and cultivate—her “special diplomatic service”, as she liked to refer to it. “Teasonable” I meant here meaning “unlikely to destabilize the kingdom”. Not that she wasn’t trying to be a good queen, to be fair and regal, it was just that her emotions tended to get the better of her at least initially. (The story of how she overcame that is going to be a major part of what I end up writing. It’ll involve a major crisis and those nobles and their scheming.)

[What does she admire about her father? Same question for her opinion of her siblings.] Aside from more frequently making time for her and seeming willingness to actually listen, Gattrem was a man who knew how to make tough choices and did so without hesitation or regret. He was decisive, in other words, and even if unexpected consequences reared their heads he was able to pivot and take advantage of the situation, being flexible. (What Nakhta doesn’t know, or at least doesn’t believe, is that he also arranged the murder of his elder brother when he first came to the throne, much earlier [he had children late in life], but this was to prevent said brother from launching an ill-advised war. People eventually got over their dislike of the deed, but they believe, like father, like daughter.) Her siblings all make her angry in their own way despite her love for them. Absarren never lets her forget her place as the youngest, and mocks her for her lisp, her size, her bookishness, her need for praise—really, anything to remind her how they’re not on equal footing, and so she’s stopped trying to impress him. Instead, she’s thought of him as someone she has to be as good as even if she won’t be the queen…while secretly hoping that he’d come to her to repent everything and they’d make up. Bilba, a big sister and possible feminine role model, instead chose to be physical and strong, not unheard of in Vulland but uncommon among the noble class. Still Nakhta admires her strength and sheer determination, though her more forthright bluntness contrasts with Nakhta’s preferred manipulation and verbal self-glorification. Vilgem is careful and diligent with money and keeping accountable, but she’s unimpressed with his flip-flopping of allegiances at the first sign of danger. Both of them also regularly join in taunting her. Berehn is an especially frustrating case, because she tried multiple times to bond with him, only to get mostly ignored; not taunted or warned, like the others, but given the cold shoulder by someone who’s channelling youthful energy into intense religious study.

[You mentioned that she’s intelligent, which admittedly isn’t the same as knowledgeable, but can you tell me what she did to impress people with her intelligence?] Most people don’t doubt that she’s sharp, only whether she’s stable. Just for a couple of examples… She’s actually written a fair amount of commentary on histories in the course of her studies, but more dramatically she would often be with her father when he presided at trials on special judgement days in the capital (a Vullish tradition). Also by tradition, the royals are allowed, if not entirely encouraged, to chime in with their own opinions to try and sway the king, and she was often quick to spot lies based on factual errors. Kind of a petty thing to do, but she was also hoping to impress her father as usual, hoping to get an acknowledgement of how bright she was to have noticed these things. (Also, it was a chance to get outside the castle, which she didn’t often do.)

[You mentioned that Nakhta feels overwhelmed by the thought of running a whole country. She ends up having to do that anyway of course, but I wonder whether there’s anything more to explore about her feelings of overwhelm. Was she not given the same grooming for the role as her older siblings (perhaps just Absarren), or did she get the same grooming but got the occasional talking-to from one or another of her siblings to damage her self-confidence and convince her not to want the role? This sounds like something a competitive older sibling might do.] It was always assumed that she would at most be marrying the younger sibling of a noble or someone similar and at most managing that household. She was never properly groomed, no, that went to primarily Absarren and to some extent Vilgem as the ‘spare to the throne’. They still liked to encourage her to remember her place—above everyone else, but least among equals, so to speak, and to not think of ever trying to become the sole ruler. The death of her family, aside from the sheer grief, also left her in a panic realizing that she was now responsible for everything else with only advisors around to help – and who knew if she could trust them?

Closeness in Relationships
(young adulthood)

[Note to self: Absarren was 27 by this point; Bilba and Vilgem 24; and Berehn 22.]

[Note to self: Nakhta kills her siblings at age 20 when Absarren was 29 by this point; Bilba and Vilgem 26; and Berehn 24.]

Passing on Responsibilities
(older adulthood)

End of Life
(old age)

Credits

Based on theory by: 
Erikson, E., (1951) 'Childhood and Society', W.W. Norton & Company, Inc. chapter 7. 

Nakhta de Renaud is © Occam
Artwork by Jamilsart and badroy and used with their kind permission. Sounds good, but if it’s specifically a headshot you want, here’s an additional one that might work (by AustinPikachao on Twitter)! https://www.furaffinity.net/view/34884707/ [Thanks for pointing this one out! The issue with that is that my headshots are circular so if an anthro character’s ear-tips are right at the top of the image (like Nakhta’s is in that picture) then I have to choose between having a colourless section at the top or cropping the tips of her ears, neither of which look great. I usually pick an image to make into a headshot based on how flattering the image is and how many Faves it got, so I know people already like it.] That’s a fair point! Hmm, I’m not sure I have any good ones for headshots that don’t end at her ear tips…
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