Aridarye Brokengulf

Lady Aridarye Brokengulf, formerly Aridarye Phylund, was a noble in Waterdeep in the latter part of the 14 century DR.

Description
Lady Aridarye was devastatingly beautiful with high cheekbones, sharp features, pale skin, warm brown eyes, and a dazzling smile. Her bell-like laugh was almost her trademark. She had dark hair long enough to reach her waist, but she usually wore it up in a fancy coiffure held in place by a golden headpiece. Often judged younger than her actual age, she was slender and curvaceous, standing and weighing. She favored blues and purples for the extravagant gowns that accentuated her figure. She was rarely seen without her elaborately decorated dagger in its equally ornate scabbard. Many who were the target of her ire said that her eyes flashed scarlet in her fury.

Personality
Aridarye was the quintessential noble, observing every social protocol with impeccable manners and grace tempered by flirtation. In the business world, she had a reputation for good financial sense. She kept her own counsel, never revealing her true thoughts in social situations. Behind the perfect public facade, she was demanding, controlling, and rigid toward her servants, family, and close business associates. She governed herself with discipline and disciplined those she governed. When things were going the way she planned, she indulged in hedonistic pastimes, mostly centered around promiscuity. When thwarted, she calculated her revenge and retribution carefully, waiting for the best opportunity to strike.

Abilities
Lady Aridarye was an astute businesswoman with an eye for market trends up and down the Sword Coast. She was an expert bookkeeper and knew more about that side of business than most nobles bothered to learn (she could also forge documents if needed). She was good at appraising the value of things that other nobles wore or displayed. She was well versed in the gaming pastimes of the rich and could hold her own on the dance floor. Lady Aridarye wielded her beauty, charm, wealth, and business acumen like weapons to carve out more of the world for herself, lying and manipulating people as needed to raise her station.

Possessions
She wore a +2 ring of protection and her dagger was a +1 dagger of venom.

Relationships
Lady Aridarye came to Waterdeep as the consort of a successful trader from Amn and quickly adapted to the noble life in the City of Splendors. After her husband was killed during an apparently shady business deal, she soon married Lord Urtos Phylund I, patriarch of the Phylund family. She had a son by him, Urtos III, and then she was widowed again when Urtos I was killed by an accidentally released owlbear. Her stepson, Urtos II, was already reported to have been killed on a hunting expedition, so she was set to take over the family businesses and become regent for her infant son, but Urtos II appeared within a tenday of his father's funeral and claimed the Lordship. She was coolly tolerated in the family villa by Urtos II and his new wife Lythis. Lady Aridarye had many suitors, the most notable being Prendergast Brokengulf, a former rival in business, whom she later marred.

Other business rivals included the Lords Gundwynd and Ilvastarr. She reportedly had two husbands before the trader from Amn.

History
Lady Aridarye arrived in Waterdeep in Alturiak of the with her husband, the Amnian trader. After getting a sense of the social environment and finding an easy target for her charms, she sabotaged one of her husband's business deals by replacing the gold pieces he intended to use as payment with counterfeits while he was asleep. He was killed in a back alley in the Southern Ward for his attempted swindle. Aridarye played on the sympathies of her noble acquaintances for luxurious room and board until she caught the eye of Urtos Phylund I, an elderly widower with a lucrative business in monsters and exotic creatures.

Her business advice to Lord Urtos proved sound and increased the family's fortunes and social prestige. They were married in Ches of the. For the next five years, she and the elder Urtos were stars in Waterdhavian social circles, hosting ostentatious parties with expensive themes, even through her pregnancy and the birth of their son, Urtos III, in the. This lavish lifestyle disgusted Urtos II and he spent more and more time at the Phylund Hunting Lodge in Ardeep Forest, hunting and hosting monster safaris for the jaded nobles in the big city. This suited Aridarye just fine because, once she secured another heir, she intended to rid herself of the old Lord and her stepson and take over the family as regent for the infant Urtos III.

In Alturiak of the, she subverted a servant to do her bidding and gave him a scroll to read when a hunting party led by Urtos II was deep in the woods. The scroll summoned a huge pack of wolves that slaughtered nearly every hunter (including the disloyal servant). The sole survivor finally made his way back to Waterdeep and reported the deaths of the entire party including Urtos II. This was a terrible blow to Urtos I, despite their estrangement, and he was grief-stricken. Aridarye had used her wiles to turn business rival and famed gladiator Prendergast Brokengulf into a devoted lover since 1364 DR and she manipulated him into arranging the owlbear escape that killed Urtos I and six other beastmasters, making it appear that the old Lord had gotten careless in his misery.

Her plan nearly succeeded, but during the mourning period in Tarsakh, just after the funeral for Lord Urtos, her stepson reappeared in Waterdeep, alive and apparently fully recovered from the wolf attack. Much to her fuming frustration, he rightfully claimed the Lordship and moved back into the family villa on Copper Street. His miraculous escape was orchestrated by an unknown agent and, unbeknownst to any but one trusted servant, he had been afflicted with lycanthropy.

In the, the new Lord Phylund married Lythis Mhairuun (who found out he was a werewolf but married him anyway) and they eventually had three sons, any of whom would have been in the line of succession before Urtos III except the Lords of Waterdeep mysteriously declared them unfit to inherit the title. Urtos II suspected it was because of his affliction, but he blamed Aridarye for this and most every other misfortune that befell his family since she arrived in town, but he was not able to find solid proof.

In the, Aridarye married Prendergast and continued to plot ways to take over the Phylund clan, as her son was destined to be the next Lord Phylund.