ARCANARUM APPLICATION

[nymeriarya]

PLAYER
Name: Caitlin
Age: 21
Journal: I don’t have one; I use my tumblr: http://billspreston.tumblr.com
Contact (MESSENGER/E-MAIL/ETC): AIM is itariapantsu!

CHARACTER
Name: Arya Stark
Age: 10
Canon: Game of Thrones (TV)
Canon Point: Directly after the events of 1.02 ‘The Kingsroad’, where Arya runs to the forest with Nymeria.
History: http://gameofthrones.wikia.com/wiki/Arya_Stark

Personality:
The first thing you need to know about Arya Stark is that she is a girl, but she is not, by any means, a lady. No, you must be mistaking her for her older sister, Sansa. Arya is the quintessential tomboy, excited to go off on adventures, sneaking about, getting her hands dirty, and learning how to fight with her brothers. She’d much rather become a night than the head of a household, and use a sword rather than a needle.

Unfortunately (or, in some cases, fortunately), she’s a highborn Stark of Winterfell. This means that she’s taken care of by a Septa and taught manners and courtesies, taught to sew and act as a lady of the court. She takes no interest in any of this, but will go through the motions begrudgingly.

Arya is a stubborn girl, and can be a bit rude. She’ll ask you a lot of questions and pry into things she shouldn’t, and unless you’re her father or the situation is particularly dangerous, she won’t take no for an answer. She’s also got quite a bit of pride on her. Regardless of her role at home, she is a Stark and will remind you of that, often and proudly. She relates more to her father, Ned, and is a bit of a daddy’s girl, especially since she knows he has a soft spot for his two daughters.

She’s naturally curious and loves to go exploring, though not as much as her little brother, Bran. Speaking of which – family is important to her, even if it doesn’t seem like it. (She gets that from her mother – after all, the Tully words are ‘Family. Duty. Honor.’) She’s close to her half-brother, Ned’s bastard Jon Snow, and is sad to see him go off to join the Night’s Watch. Although she won’t ever admit it, she also cares for her Sansa. The two girls tend to fight a lot, however, since they are polar opposites and don’t often see eye to eye. She enjoys her younger brother Bran, and can tease him a bit, since she’s a better marksman than he is.

Abilities/Strengths:
Arya, at this point in the series, has little fighting training, despite what she may tell you. She owns a sword, which she and her half-brother Jon have named Needle. She is able to pick it up and hold it without hurting herself, as well as use it to disarm and knock down an older boy (whether this boy is actually any good at fighting, however, is debatable). She is also competent at archery from short distances.

She is also good with animals. She is followed at all times by her faithful direwolf, who she calls Nymeria after a famous female warrior. Nymeria, although sometimes confused, mostly responds well to Arya’s commands and is not afraid to protect her mistress.

Another ability of hers is to be mistaken for a young boy. Despite her protests of ‘I’m a girl!’, her appearance allows her to go unnoticed in some situations as needed.

Weaknesses:
Arya is stubborn and unwilling to follow other people’s commands, unless they are from people she greatly respects. She has a strong desire to follow her own path in life, and will stop at nothing to be set free.

Her appearance is both a strength and a weakness. Due to her unwillingness to wear feminine clothes and hairstyles (like her sister Sansa) she is often mistaken for a young boy. She is upset by the constant misgendering, but uses it to her advantage to survive day to day life.

She is quick to judge people and holds grudges for a long time. When someone wrongs her or her family, she will not hesitate to exact revenge in her own way.

ARCANARUM
Story: The Wizard of Oz
Story Character: Dorothy Gale
Plans:
Arya’s 2 biggest similarities to Dorothy are that she has a canine companion of some sort and that she puts forth a lot of effort to achieve her goals. Other than that, they’re starkly (excuse the pun) different characters. She will undergo mental changes, such as Dorothy’s acceptance of fantastic creatures and people, as well as her belief in and understanding of magic, but she will do her best to resist these thoughts as stubbornly as she can. All shoes that she wears will glitter, and she will, in time, be able to click her heels together and teleport somewhere – an ability of Dorothy’s that I can see her using to her advantage. She’ll also notice some changes in Nymeria, in that her larger wolf will grow smaller and smaller, and, to her horror, more dog-like instead of wolf-like as time passes on.

SAMPLES
First Person:
(I have two first person samples for you – one’s a meme post to show her interacting with a non-canon character, and the other is a bit more general.)

http://bakerstreet.dreamwidth.org/681497.html?thread=445714713#cmt445714713

[Arya’s walking through the royal procession down the Kingsroad, Nymeria at her side. It’s early morning, so they’re still camping, but the hem of her dress is already dirty from going around, inspecting all the goings-on. She’s already seen the King’s blacksmith’s tent, having rooted through his collection of warhammers he brought for King Robert – just in case – and found none to be to her liking. She’d never gotten the hang of warhammers, after all – clubbing your opponent to death just seemed so…brutish. Not that she’d ever say that aloud, especially in front of her father, and doubly in front of King Robert.

Admittedly, she’d like to see if the king could still use one. She’d heard he and her father joking about the King’s weight, but she’d heard so many stories about how Robert fared on the Trident with his hammer…]

I hope Mycah won’t be too busy today. Yesterday he’d been slicing up a great big boar with his father…maybe we can practice at swords today, if I’m lucky.

[That was a good idea, actually. She began running towards the butcher’s tent. If Mycah wasn’t awake…

Well, he’d just have to deal with that himself. She had bigger fish to fry, and those fish included hitting him repeatedly with a stick.]

Third Person:
She’s so shocked when it happens, she can barely breathe. It’s not even a slow change, something that she can learn to deal with over time. No, they just wouldn’t be that nice to Arya Stark, would they? No, of course not. Nymeria just had to shrink two sizes down overnight.

The direwolf was growing so fast, too. Arya had seen to it personally. Back at Winterfell, she’d made sure she fed Nymeria the healthiest food she could fine – plenty and often, too, and she went out running with the wolf when she could sneak out of her sewing classes. Mother would often comment on how they would run out of room for the six wolves, soon.

And then, they had to go off on the road, and the entire ordeal with Joffrey happened, which was of course unavoidable. Arya had ran off into the woods, desperate to save Nymeria’s life…but she ran to a light, and Arya ran after her, fearing for the direwolf’s life.

She’d ended up here, in unfamiliar clothes, Nymeria at her side. They’d handed her glittering red shoes – the only good end of the deal, if you asked her – and a basket, and sent the little girl on her merry way.

At the time, she didn’t know what the basket was for, of course. This story was just one that wasn’t told back in Westeros.

Now here she is, staring at the little direwolf who’s all but a puppy again, with a pair of teleporting red shoes and a basket. Arya is alone, without her sword at her side to help her make people see things her way.

She scoops up her wolf into the basket, jams her feet in the ruby slippers, and runs out the door, on her neverending quest for answers about this place.