Ruling Family:
The Rawlins - Wetherell Manor

Capital City:
Highgate

Motto:
"Until the death"

Religion:
Protestant

Color:
All shades of green (ranging from forest to spring)

Standard/Flag:


Cultural Notes:
Benthey is "no nonsense" in nature and spartan in expense. Boasting the most well-managed army in all of Adesia, Benthey is known for its rigorous training of their soldiers and their constant attention to detail in all forms.

When it comes to fashion, the courtiers of Benthey prefer clean cuts and simple lines. Square necklines, close-fitting sleeves, and straight skirts are the norm among ladies' fashion. Men will rarely wear any type of frilly decoration. Unlike the other duchies, many Benthey men prefer to keep their hair shorn close to their heads. Benthey women will usually have their hair hidden beneath hoods, though those that choose to go hoodless will either have their hair up in a twist or a bun. Rarely will you ever see a woman in Benthey wearing her hair loose unless she is visiting.

Both boys and girls come of age at 15.

PM Kai (Duchess Moira/Elspeth Rawlin) with any questions or requests of the Launcelyn Family. We are currently accepting new members, PM for information and details.

Duke: None
Duchess: Duchess Moira Rawlin
Children: None
Other Members:

• Lord Thayne Rawlin, 20, Baron of Highgate
  
• Lady Violet _______, 25

Family History:
Many, many generations ago, Benthey was no more than an expanse of unclaimed wilderness, with a shore so rocky and cliff-walled that none had dared land there in centuries. When the now-defined duchies surrounding Benthey were beginning settlements and laying their claims, the animals of Benthey were still untamed, the forests still untouched by human hands and the land still unclaimed.

Around the time that Pemberton’s Sutten was becoming inhabitable, though they wouldn’t have known it, a small fleet of invading ships came from beyond the limits of Adesia, seeking treasure and glory – instead, they found a rocky shore and a wild land that they called home, even cutting back the wild forests to make a small settlement, and sending their ships back home for supplies and family. The leader of these expeditioners was Malys Benthey, a fierce woodsman and plunderer extraordinaire.

It was decades until the land was completely inhabitable, but by that time most of the men of the expedition had brought their families and friends to the new place they named Benthey, in honor of their leader. They settled a village, and surrounded it with a palisade of logs, building a sturdy gate in the center. This village no longer exists, the new Benthey’s capital city built atop it, but to give homage to their history, it is still known as Highgate.

After Malys Benthey’s death, his two sons Johne and Pate fought bitterly to keep their father’s name in power, and won. The eldest, Johne, followed in his father’s footsteps, expanding the empire to the borders of neighboring Pemberton and Marcheford in the process. And so the line continued – from son to son – until Moris Launcelyn.

Moris Launcelyn and his wife Agnes had only one child, a daughter called Elspeth, to continue their line. Agnes passed away just days after her daughter’s birth, due to complications in the birth. The duke, heartbroken, poured all his love and ability into his daughter, refusing his right to marry again, and pushing young Elspeth into the court. However, when the courtiers heard of his intentions for his daughter, now 14, to take the dukedom, they were adamant against it. They insisted she marry, and thus the Duke faced a difficult decision. Wanting to keep the duchy in the family bloodlines, he married Elspeth to her second-cousin Rechard just months after her 15th birthday. Rechard was twice her age, nearly thirty, and brought to the marriage his son, Wylyam, from his first marriage. Elspeth took to the boy instantly, but reviled her drunken and improper husband.

Two years after the marriage was completed, the Duke Moris passed away in his sleep, leaving Rechard to take the title of Duke. Elspeth became Duchess alongside her husband, and under the court’s pressuring, bore him one child – Violet. After the birth however, the courtiers ignored the presence of the Duchess’ daughter, due to the “imperfection” of her face: a port-wine birthmark which stains the left half of her face.

Finally, after seven excruciating years, Duke Rechard was found dead in a slush of vomit and ale. Some still whisper that Elspeth, 22 at the time, had poisoned her husband. Since this time, Elspeth had been fighting like a wildcat to keep her title and her ancestral land. It had been little more than a year, and Wylyam was now 14, soon to come of age. In six months time, on Wylyam’s 15th birthday, the court would come together to decide whether or not he is fit to take the Dukedom.

However, there were more hardships and surprises to come for the young Duchess. A lifelong friendship with her spymaster, Sir William Rawlin, eventually blossomed into a passionate but forbidden romance. Elspeth's third-cousin Ambrose rose in power to become King, and with her blessing and promise of troops, the King took his position practically unopposed. Under the reign of the new King and the pressure of dissent from the other duchies, Elspeth was commanded to take a husband -- but someone had other ideas. In a near attempt on her life, a servant working for an outside force poisoned the duchess and stabbed her and her spymaster Rawlin, nearly fatally wounding them both. After this incident, when Rawlin was found alone with the duchess in her bedchamber, suspicions began to rise. The courts of Adesia were abuzz with the gossip -- but only King Ambrose knew the truth behind the rumors. Behind closed doors, Elspeth and William had promised themselves to one another; a secret engagement.

Enraged at Elspeth's blasphemies, King Ambrose took an unexpected route, and demanded that Elspeth marry him in order to have control over the unpredictable woman. She refused, instead marrying her spymaster less than a year later.

After six months of blissful marriage, the Duchess and her consort conceived. Only three months into the pregnancy, however, the uprising of the citizens of Adesia called William away to fight. He never returned -- only his body, battered and lifeless, was recovered to present to the pregnant widow. Devastated and alone, Elspeth retreated into herself. Her court relented in their constant attacks on her title, allowing her time to grieve and give birth to the child. Everyone prayed that the child would be a girl, so that Wylyam would take on the Benthey dukedom as his own. They got their wish -- partially.

On the way back from the Festival of Friendship, the caravan of Benthey's nobility was attacked by bandits. Most of the nobles fortunate enough to be on horseback escaped and rode to Benthey without further hindrance. Elspeth, however, was trapped in a slow carriage due to her heavy pregnancy. Then the worst happened: the stress of the events forced her labor, and in a broken carriage in the midst of a wild forest, Elspeth gave birth to a baby girl, tiny and dark-haired, who she later named Moira after her grandfather. That should have been the end of things -- but less than an hour later, as her labor continued, Elspeth gave birth to Thayne, Moira's twin brother and a son to save the Launcelyn legacy. She should have rejoiced.

After the birth of her children, however, Elspeth fell into a second bout of depression, and it seemed none could wake her. She was particularly vulnerable at this time, which is why it was chosen as the prime moment for a second attempt on the duchess' life. Again, the assassin took it upon himself to murder the widowed duchess. This time, however, the would-be murderer was not a stranger, but her own step-son. Wylyam organized the attempt on Elspeth's life and would have seen it through to the last moment if not for one thing. Some say it was his conscience, some say it was nothing more than insanity, but in the end, it was Wylyam himself who defended the duchess to his last breath. While Elspeth did survive the second attempt on her life, she was irreparably damaged. Her physical health never quite recovered, nor did her emotional well-being, after losing her step-son and very nearly her own life in one fell swoop. To this day, she is forever grateful to Wylyam and extremely regretful of their relationship, which eventually lead to his demise.

Elspeth, now merely a shell of her former self, lived on to raise her children. Daughter Violet, now 25, married out of love as Elspeth had promised she would, and retired to the Ashton countryside with her Lunan husband, Antony. Moira and Thayne, now 20, both reside in Wetherell manor with their aging mother. Although Elspeth currently retains the title of Duchess, she is about to step down and declare one of her children as the heir to the dukedom. Which will she choose -- Moira, the eldest: a young, beautiful, and independent woman? Or Thayne, her younger son: intelligent but impulsive, and the polar opposite of his father?

Only time will tell.


Family Estate: Wetherell Manor