The curious case of Lucinda Aurelius, Duchess of Condamner, Baroness of Bleakland, and the wife of the former interim King of Pandezia captivated the conversations of the gossipy ranks of Partum’s nobility for years. Lord Tubicus Aurelius never had the slightest moment of doubt about his beloved Lucinda, and yet this didn’t prevent anyone else from speculating wildly about the mysterious woman that so enthralled the paladin. The reality of her origin was so completely bizarre and fantastic that it only fueled the rumors that Lucinda couldn’t be taken at face value.

To understand Lucinda, one had to understand that Lersha von Slothjem, one of the royal offspring of the Queen of Slothjemia, was once a terrifying threat to the wildspace illithid when Lersha was an officer in the Slothjemian Navy’s spelljamming forces. The illithid had so much difficulty in combating the Slothjemians that they determined to clone Lersha in order to completely understand their foes. After what seemed to be a foiled attack the illithid and their allies were able to obtain some of Lersha’s blood sufficient to create a magical replica of her. Using psionics to magnify the dark sorcery of this endeavor, the illithid managed to create “Special Project Drar’goroth #7 for the purpose of deeper comprehension”. This lengthy and clinical description was Lucinda’s original name and was tattooed in the illithid language on to her neck. The illithid referred to her as simply “Number Seven” and over the course of three years artificially aged her to the age of twenty, which is when she made her escape from their mad schemes and found herself in the strange and mystifying terrestrial realm of Lotharingia. Aided by some nuns that gave her the name “Lucinda” she lived with them for some time before being captured by the authorities on the presumption she was a witch.

After her rescue by Lord Tubicus Aurelius and a handful of his adventuring companions, Lucinda’s existence took a radically different turn. The paladin almost immediately began to court this mysterious young woman, and soon a number of interested parties began to contemplate and examine Lucinda’s origins and possible motives. Lucinda had lived for a long time among the silent illithids, so her ability to speak was limited enormously. She also didn’t do well in the bright light of day and preferred the night or darkened rooms. Equipped with a pair of goggles used by metal workers who operated the blast furnaces of Renatus’ iron smelters, Lucinda took to wearing floppy wide brimmed hats to help ease the glare of lights either natural or artificial. On her first trip to Slothjemia in the company of her then-suitor Lord Aurelius the powers that be were immediately intrigued by the young lady’s uncanny resemblance to their own Princess Lersha. They were able to determine that Lucinda was in fact created by the illithid but the reason and rationale for this was beyond their ability to discern.

The mystery of Lucinda hadn’t been made any clearer when she married Lord Aurelius, and they began a family. But it was after the birth of their first three daughters, identical triplets, that the family accepted an invitation to join the Archduke of Renatus and his wife, Lersha, in traveling to Slothjemia to have a special visitation with Queen Reichsha and her husband the Herzgraf. It was then that Queen Reichsha made it official by her own decree that Lucinda was to be considered one of her own children. Although technically a clone of Lersha she was younger than Prince Bortimer, the youngest of the Queen’s children, and her role in the line of succession was to be after Bortimer and his children should he and his wife, Duchess Seraphina Thorngage, choose to start a family. While there would always be those that didn’t trust Lucinda it wasn’t a problem for Queen Reichsha.

While physically there were few differences between Lersha and Lucinda it was in their personalities that they were most easily identified. Both were shy in social settings, but Lersha could be gregarious when the mood struck her, and the people present were well known to her. Lucinda preferred to not engage in conversation at all but used her abilities as a psionicist to communicate telepathically. Both women delighted in plants and wildlife, but Lersha used her witchcraft to encourage flora and fauna around her whereas Lucinda liked to keep plants and small trees in ornate planting areas atop the sprawling castle of Xubrelle, the capitol of her husband’s realm. Lersha always knew where things were in her home but only by virtue of the fact that she understood the chaos of her home and her family. Lucinda kept everything around her neat and tidy to the point that it required a small army of household servants to keep it organized. Lersha was the embodiment of Chaotic Good, and Lucinda was Lawful Good. In their own quirky way, they each exemplified the ideals of the realms they lived in. Renatus a land of joyous and cheerful chaos. Condamner a land of rigid lifestyles propelled by optimism.

These two women weren’t created as sisters, but they became every bit as close as sisters as the years went by. The most perplexing aspect to this to the confused and somewhat appalled gossip mongers in foreign courts of royalty was that the Slothjemian imperial bloodline had just been expanded in a disturbingly effective way to give them control over not just southeastern Partum but also in central Partum as well.