History Characters / SwordOfTruth

Also known as Lindie, Jennsen is the illegimate, pristinely ungifted daughter of Darken Rahl, and half-sister of Richard, Oba, and Drefan Rahl. Due to Darken's policy of [[OffingTheOffspring eliminating all ungifted offspring of the House of Rahl]], Jennsen has spent her life running and hiding from quadsman. As a pristinely ungifted one and Pillar of Creation, Jennsen cannot be harmed by magic. She is convinced by the Imperial Order that Richard, as the new Lord Rahl, is out to kill her just as Darken Rahl was, and as such, plans against him. After meeting Richard in the flesh, she realizes she has been deceived, and becomes his ally.

* AttemptedRape: Tries to rape Kahlan. Fails horribly.

* UndyingLoyalty: [[spoiler: To Richard, after her redemption. Zedd notes that Nicci would go the underworld itself to rescue Richard if she had to.]]

* WhatBeautifulEyes: often remarked upon.

* AccidentalMarriage: Twice. Neipther one was really more than a formality that Richard mostly ignored from that point on, but they caused some trouble in the long term by [[spoiler: making it possible for Kahlan, as Richard's third wife, to summon the Chimes.]]

* WorkplaceAcquiredAbilities: She attributes her skill with creating magical locks to having to spend so much time teaching young wizards at the Palace of the Prophets.

* WorkplaceAcquiredAbilities: "I used to teach young wizards how to behave at the Palace of the Prophets. I know how to create locks that can't be picked."

* AccidentalMarriage: Twice. Neither one was really more than a formality that Richard mostly ignored from that point on, but they caused some trouble in the long term by [[spoiler: making it possible for Kahlan, as Richard's third wife, to summon the Chimes.]]

* PinkIsForSissies: She hates the color, partially because [[WomanInBlack it isn't really her color]] and partially because one of the Mord-Sith keeps putting a pink dress on her when she's knocked unconscious.

The Mother Confessor, leader of the Confessors and final authority in the Midlands. After escaping the genocide of the Confessors at the hands of Darken Rahl, she fled to Westland, where she met Richard and Zedd and recruited them to help save the lands of magic from Rahl's grasp. She is Richard's primary love interest and one of the main characters, second only to Richard in importance.

* PluckyGirl: To an almost insane extent. Her willingness to die for Richard, or for her cause, is a little extreme to say the least.

* {{Narcissist}}: His idea of "honoring" the death of his bodyguards Edward and Haley is to have a bunch of people chant a refrain of devotion to the house of Rahl. He pretty much associates everything good, noble, and true with himself.

* DepravedHomosexual: He mockingly tells Kahlan, about the most beautiful woman imaginable, that she isn't his type. His preference seems to be for young boys. He claims to have molested and killed somewhere between 80 and 120 boys in his life, but can't remember the exact number. The dead ones, according to him, are the ''minority''.

!!Richard Cypher[[spoiler:/Rahl]]:
The Seeker of Truth. Originally a woods guide from the mostly pastoral nation of Westland, Richard was drawn into the struggle against Darken Rahl when he met Kahlan and Zedd named him the Seeker to oppose the Prince of Lies. Since then, Richard has discovered himself to be [[spoiler: TheChosenOne, the first War Wizard born in 3000 years, and the next in line to the throne of D'Hara]].

* CainAndAbel: He's Abel . . . several times over.

* ScrewDestiny: He hates prophecy and goes out of his way to avoid it, though he often ends up accomplishing what prophecy predicted in an entirely different way.

* ThePowerOfLove
* TheScottishTrope: Defied.

* [[spoiler: ConvenientMiscarriage]]

* GroinAttack: What she does to Demmin Nass . . . isn't pretty.

The former First Wizard of the Midlands, who led the battle against Darken Rahl's father Panis when he tried to invade the Midlands years ago, earning himself the nickname, "The Wind of Death." After the war, he became furious with the Midlands council for their actions, and decided to go into hiding, erasing everyone's memories of his name and posing as a harmless but eccentric old man in Westland. When Kahlan comes to Westland seeking the aid of the great wizard of legend, he returns from retirement to help in the struggle against Darken Rahl. He is also [[spoiler: Richard's grandfather on his mother's side.]]

* PersonOfMassDestruction: Would you believe that this skinny old man earned the title, "The Wind of Death" and was feared even by his own side during a previous war? Or that he is almost singlehandedly responsible for the death of several hundred thousand Imperial Order troops?
* PityTheKidnapper
* PlayingWithFire

A Sister of the Dark who served as one of Richard's instructors while he was at the Palace of the Prophets in the Old World. Nicci was the daughter of one of the members of the Fellowship of Order, and thus was indoctrinated from an early age in their ways, and experienced a very unpleasant [[DarkAndTroubledPast early life]]. [[FaceHeelRevolvingDoor She has served the Fellowship of Order, the Sisters of the Light, the Keeper, and the Imperial Order at different points in her life]]. She eventually took Richard prisoner by casting a maternity spell on Kahlan, in an attempt to learn from him. [[spoiler: Ultimately, being with Richard changed her mind, and she renounced her previous affiliations(including to the Sisters of the Light) and became one of Richard's primary supporters.]]

* AscendedExtra: She was originally a minor character in ''Stone of Tears'', a secondary antagonist, but when ''Faith of the Fallen'' came around . . .

* BerserkButton: Nicci is somewhat . . . touchy regarding matters of sex. On one hand, men "assuming they had a right to her body" really, REALLY pisses her off.(Though [[ExtremeDoormat she doesn't ever complain]], seeing it as her duty to sacrifice herself for others.) On the other hand, she also explodes in anger when she makes an advance on a male character and he refuses her.

* DistractedByTheSexy: When she locks her eyes with Richard, he has difficulty remembering how to breathe. Imperial Order troops have the same problem when Nicci uses a slightly more . . . obvious invokation of this trope.

* TheStoic

* JackBauerInterrogationTechnique: “I've twisted a few fingers. Twisted hard.”

* CombatSadomasochist: Pain, killing, near-death experiences . . . "It can have a pleasure all its own."

* [[spoiler: HighHeelFaceTurn]]

* [[spoiler: RedemptionEqualsDeath]]

* PetTheDog: he seems to genuinely care about stopping the plague, and shows concern for those afflicted.
** His concern for children also seems quite genuine.

* [[spoiler: DrivenToSuicide]]

* [[spoiler: FaceHeelTurn]]

* ItsAllAboutMe

* [[spoiler: DrivenToSuicide: After he realizes that his beloved wife is cheating on him.]]

* TheDreaded: The Keeper was this for a young Kahlan when she heard a poem about him. "The Screelings are loose and the Keeper may win, his assassins have come to [[FlayingAlive rip off your skin!]]"
* TheManBehindTheMan
* TheScottishTrope

* HeroicBastard: What the author thinks he is.
** BastardBastard: What he actually is.

** BloodKnight: Kills with a very high level of eagerness.
* HowDoIShotWeb: Most of the time, he can't even use his magic. [[DeusExMachina However, when he needs to, it snaps into working order and he becomes pretty much unstoppable.]]
* IdealHero: [[ProtagonistCenteredMorality What the author thinks he is.]]
** TheSociopath: [[DesignatedHero What he actually is.]]

* LikeFatherLikeSon: [[ProtagonistCenteredMorality And nobody notices.]]

* MurderIsTheBestSolution: [[EvilCannotComprehendGood He thinks mercy is an evil concept.]]

* ColonelKilgore: Several of Kahlan's sayings about warfare ("The purpose of war is singular: to kill," "If war is brought to you, then it is incumbent upon you to show no mercy...let there be war like your enemy has never imagined in his most frightening nightmares,") and ordering her soldiers to kill innocents passing through the area on the off chance that they might be spies, can certainty give this impression. Given that most of these ideas come from what her father taught her, it probably applied to him as well.

* KnifeNut: In the last few books.
* KnightTemplar

* LineInTheSand: Everyone loyal to her goes on one side. The ones who question her authority go on the other. Later, the ones on the first side have to kill all the ones on the other side, on Kahlan's order, based on the (eventually proven correct [[AssPull but still a leap of logic]]) assumption that the dissenters were going to sell them out.

* NoSympathy: Kahlan threatens to throw the queen of Galea (a traumatized rape victim) back into the Rape Pit (yes that's its name) because said queen doesn't want to obey her. Oh, and then she kills a good and honest man who was acting as the emissary of said rape victim because that [[SarcasmMode was objectively the morally correct thing to do.]] The queen of Galea and her emissary were both half-sisters of Kahlan as well which is just the icing on the [[TheSociopath psychopathy cake.]]

* NuclearOption: He finds a [[FantasticNuke colossal light spell]] in the Wizard's Keep, while the Imperial Order army is nearby. AMillionIsAStatistic ensues.

* HeroicBastard

* HotBlooded: His main tool, the Sword of Truth, works through anger. This is sort of to be expected.
* HowDoIShotWeb: Most of the time, he can't even use his magic. However, when he needs to, it snaps into working order and he becomes pretty much unstoppable.

** SociopathicHero: [[DesignatedHero What he actually is.]]

* NuclearOption: He finds a [[FantasticNuke colossal light spell]] in the Wizard's Keep, while the Imperial Order army is nearby. Awesomeness ensues.

* LineInTheSand: Everyone loyal to her goes on one side. The ones who question her authority go on the other. Later, the ones on the first side have to kill all the ones on the other side, on Kahlan's order, based on the (eventually proven correct) assumption that the dissenters were going to sell them out.

* WouldHurtAChild: In the first book, she says that she would kill an innocent child with her bare hands if she thought it would somehow stop Darken Rahl. She feels guilty about saying this later, though, and falters in her conviction when [[spoiler: Shota reveals that Kahlan will have a son who will one of the AlwaysChaoticEvil male Confessors, and asks Kahlan if she would be capable of killing him, or asking Richard to do it, if she had to.]]

* CantHaveSexEver: Or the man she sleeps with will be Confessed. Sorry, Richard, none for you. [[spoiler: Until he finds a way around that pesky problem, that is.]]

* AttemptedRape: Many, many times, by many different people, including, [[spoiler: quadsmen, Demmin Nass, a red-haired man from Westland, Prindin, several D'Haran and Imperial Order commanders, Darken Rahl, Drefan Rahl, Oba Rahl, Emperor Jagang, and Samuel]]. No one actually manages to succeed, though, unless you count the time when [[spoiler: Nicci linked herself to Kahlan and then got ''herself'' raped, forcing Kahlan to feel every sensation as if she were the one getting it.]]

* BerserkButton: Nicci is somewhat . . . touchy regarding matters of sex. On one hand, men "assuming they had a right to her body" really, REALLY pisses her off.(Though [[TheStoic she doesn't ever complain]], seeing it as her duty to sacrifice herself for others.) On the other hand, she also explodes in anger when she makes an advance on a male character and he refuses her.

* AGodAmI: When he [[spoiler: uses the boxes of Orden. However, he does give the power up shortly after.]]

* NiceJobBreakingItHero: Let's take a tally, shall we? [[spoiler: Killed Darken Rahl in the wrong way and ripped the veil to the underworld, ripped the veil even farther and freed Darken's ghost by calling a gathering at the wrong time, destroyed the barriers that were keeping the Imperial Order at bay, etc.]] Pretty much every book's resolution leads directly into the next book's conflict.

* RefusedTheCall: Initially, he didn't want to be Seeker, or the Lord Rahl. In the latter case, he eventually becomes . . .
* ResignedToTheCall

* BigBadassWolf

* AWizardDidIt: Giller turned him into a wolf by magic.

* KickTheDog: While he does plenty of puppy-kicking all through ''Wizard's First Rule'', the moment that stands out is when he [[spoiler: kills Brophy in a fight.]]
** That can be argued. Some will say that's the one case in the book when he ''wasn't'' obviously evil, since that was clear self defense.

* MagicKnight: He prefers using the Sword of Truth, but his magic is, if anything, even more deadly.

* MagicKnight: He is a wizard, but also likes carrying a sword with him.

* FauxAffablyEvil: He doesn't have a single redeeming trait compared to his numerous KickTheDog moments, but his self-righteous and blatantly disturbed way of thinking still makes him incredibly amusing.

* JustAddBitch: His dialogue when talking to women contains generous helpings of the word.