Characters / A Brother's Price

The Whistlers

In General

• Amazon Brigade: A family of Action Girls—every Whistler, including the boys, is trained to some degree in fighting. There's a mention once of "teams of little girls" loading and aiming rifles when they think someone's about to raid the house. And even more so than the current generation is their grandmothers, who were an Amazon Brigade of soldier-spies.
• Dad the Veteran: All of the Whistler grandmothers had been common-line soldiers, descended from soldiers, blacklisted for treason, cross-trained as thieves, and turning their hands to becoming spies. They passed their training on generationally, down to the littlest granddaughter so they're well able to defend their youngest and their menfolk. Thanks to the Whistler grandfather, Alannon, and his odd ideas, said menfolk were also somewhat trained. Jerin Whistler being an example of Silk Hiding Steel can be laid at Alannon's feet.
• The Clan: They "split" a generation ago, so there's a whole other group of Southern Whistlers that get called on during the climax.
• Coming and Going: Mother Elder Whistler was in bed with her husband Tullen the night before he fell down the stairs and died. At least she has Someone to Remember Him By, a baby boy and the last child she'll ever have.
• Constantly Curious: The little Whistler kids gleefully go through the luggage of their guests and plan to try and break open a locked portable desk. Their older sister Summer is aghast, but their family name was made in spycraft.
• Family of Choice (Implied): Eldest Whistler states that she believes the family is descended from a group like this.
  Eldest Whistler: After looking at my family records, I suspect my family started when a group of women banded together and called themselves sisters.
• Good Pays Better: Jerin's grandmothers were common thieves, until one of them was caught by some military official and argued that thieves would make excellent spies for the government. She succeeded, and after the war, the surviving sisters were knighted. The Whistlers are quite well off when the novel takes place, and while they do have the skills to be excellent thieves, they are firmly on the side of good and government.
• Gun Nut: Have this reputation locally, Captain Tern tells her princess that she suspects the girls get gun-shaped teething rings when they're tiny and start rifle training at eight. It may actually be earlier. However, the family itself is fairly varied.
• The Gunslinger: All of them. Jerin's twelve-year-old sister shoots some bandits, which doesn't surprise him much when he hears about it. Corelle later pulls off a difficult shot while under fire, taking out a conspiracy leader. The fact that they're considred skilled in a western-style world that values such things is telling..
• Hidden Backup Prince: Averted Jerin's grandfather was Prince Alannon, who was kidnapped by enemy spies (Jerin's grandmothers) before his branch of the family lost the Civil War and was executed down to the littlest toddler. However, Alannon couldn't have inherited the throne, due to an inversion of Heir Club for Men, but might have been executed, too, so he saw little use in revealing his identity. Jerin, on the other hand, does profit from his ancestry: It makes him a Suddenly Suitable Suitor to the princesses, who are descended from the branch of the family that won the war.
• Hidden Weapons: every member of the Whistler family is heavily armed, though not all weapons are hidden. Jerin, as a boy, would not normally be armed, so people are quite surprised that he has a gun. And a dagger. And some lockpicks.
• Hold Your Hippogriffs: The Whistlers have a family-specific saying, including variations on "Catch a shining coin."
• I Can Change My Beloved: Jerin's grandfather Alannon apparently succeeded in changing his wives, but they were just a little rough around the edges to begin with, and he mainly taught them proper diction, table manners and so on. And he wasn't delusional enough to do it voluntarily, he was kidnapped by them, they wanted a husband and did everything in their power to make him comfortable. Averted with Jerin himself, who, when considering the prospect of having to marry the Brindle sisters, thinks that he might be able to make some changes to their home to make himself more comfortable, but that he'll still have to live with their personalities.
• Icy Blue Eyes: Most of the Whistlers are blue-eyed, and Eldest in particular is alert and calculating and it shows. Not much gets past her.
• {{Plunder}: In the backstory, the Whistler grandmothers sneak into the palace of the Queens of Southland on reconnaissance near the end of the war, and while there they liberate some impressively elegant cutlery, jewelry, and the almost-old-enough-to-marry Prince Alannon in a bathrobe. He was not happy about this, but since the war ended and his mothers, father, and sisters were executed for treason, he made the best of things, getting his new wives to build him a bathhouse.
• Lamarck Was Right: They border on this. Sure, the grandmothers were spies and passed the knowledge on. Still, the fact that even the toddler sisters can professionally search guests' luggage (including the locked chests) for anything suspicious without being noticed, strongly suggests that, at the very least, natural selection was at work. And of course, there's Jerin, whose only experience with subterfuge is trying to get his sisters to do a part of the housework. When he's kidnapped, he instantly applies his knowledge to outwitting the kidnappers, with considerable success.
• Little Miss Badass: Once they're above eight or so, the little Whistler girls all get training to be this. They were given soldier training to better protect themselves and their brothers while their elders are gone. When a shot rings out outside of the house, the littlest ones and the boys stream in first and their slightly older siblings follow "doing a slower rear guard, scanning over their shoulders for lost siblings or strangers." Teams of mixed-age little girls load and aim rifles. Twelve-year-old Blush directs the proceedings, though she does falter a little when someone actually knocks on the door. Heria, at fourteen, is more sure of herself.
  • They also get training in espionage and thievery, the little girls report to Jerin what they found in the Queen's Justice saddlebags.
• Little Miss Snarker: The littlest Whistlers don't show this, but twelve-year-old Blush has a very sardonic remark about seventeen-year-old Corelle when she comes back from courting Balin Brindle.
• Military Brat: They're descended from soldiers-turned-thieves-turned-spies. The "original" Whistlers involved in the War of the False Eldest numbered thirty, but only ten survived to marry and became the grandmothers of the stories' crop. They passed a lot on to their children. Eldest Whistler, their oldest grandchild, expresses an interest in helping the Queens' Justice, a kind of army branch, due to her upbringing.
• Master of Unlocking: The entire family given that their grandmothers were soldiers turned thieves turned spies, the little ones look through the lockboxes of military officers and even Jerin gets in on the action.
• Noble Fugitive: Alannon, sort of. He didn't flee on his own accord, but was abducted from the castle when it was under siege. After his family was executed, there was a search for him, but he didn't see a point in revealing his identity, and chose to stay with his kidnappers, who treated him well and catered to his every whim. (They were working for the enemy, but had their own agenda, which was getting a husband. Alannon fit the job description, and might have ended up dead or worse if discovered by their superiors, so they just took him for themselves.)
• Noodle Incident: The treasonous activity that their great grandmother Elder did is never elaborated on, nor are most of their wartime exploits that reduced their numbers to a third.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: The mother Whistlers do punish Corelle for making many stupid decisions but they give her a chance to learn from those mistakes, recognizing her strength of character and natural independence as responsible for these missteps.
• Thieves' Cant: The Whistlers are fluent in thieves' cant, due to their grandmothers having been thieves, they still use a version of it to communicate.
• Walking Armory: Another Whistler habit that leads to an Extended Disarming scene when the sisters escorting Jerin visit the royal palace, and decide to really disarm, out of respect for their hosts. They have mostly guns, but also concealed knives, knuckledusters and garrotes. This isn't counting the rifles in their luggage.
  • Apparently all the Whistlers go out armed like this.
  • By standards of the world, Jerin is also this given he has a Chastity Dagger and a little concealable gun. Just in case.
• Wartime Wedding: The Whistler grandmothers married grandfather shortly after the War of the False Eldest. This is the reason why their bridegroom's ancestry is not mentioned in the papers, and only few know that he was actually a prince of the realm

Eldest

Eldest Whistler

• Aloof Big Sister: (Zigzagged): Both played straight and subverted—it comes with being Eldest, but she has softer moments at well, and is intensely loyal to her family.
• Big Sister Instinct: Particularly protective of Jerin and her younger sisters, even if they're technically half-siblings their society makes no distinction. When Jerin gets married this attitude extends to her new sisters-in-law — as she declares, "We Whistlers have an unbreakable rule — you mess with one of us, you mess with us all!" This is quite a turnaround as before when she believes he was raped by the crown princess Ren, she plamned to kill the woman but is enough of a Reasonable Authority Figure to listen to him.
• Call on Me: On his wedding day, she tells her brother that their family will always be there for him if he needs them.
  Eldest: Chin up. Eyes front. Show no fear. You're a Whistler—and your family will always be there if you need us.
• Effortless Amazonian Lift: After returning to the apartment after a reconnisance mission went deadly Jerin gives his sister as she comes through the door, and responds by returning it, picking him up and walking him through back into the suite.
  • With Cullen—it's the first time Jerin's seen his sister blush.
• Even the Girls Want Her: Ren finds Eldest Whistler almost as striking and beautiful as her brother Jerin.
• Hand on Womb: Upon their arrival at Jerin's wedding, Cullen is seen doing this to Eldest Whistler.
• My Biological Clock Is Ticking (Downplayed): Eldest Whistler, twenty-eight years old, would like to have one child before menopause. Having seen her mothers pregnant she's aware that sometimes they seem miserable, other times they almost glow, and she wants to experience it once.
  Eldest: I'm glad that we're able to afford more than one husband. I'd hate it if I had to wait a whole month for one night of pleasure, and only twelve chances a year to catch a baby. Years go quickly when measured in twelve days. I don't have many years left before my time of change comes.
  Jerin: I didn't think you'd like having babies.
  Eldest: [shrugs] I'd like to have at least one, to see what it was like. Our mothers seemed so miserable pregnant—puking in the morning, bloated up like something dead left in the sun too long, and waddling around like a force-fed goose. [mimics the walk] I don't know why anyone would want to live through it. Yet, at times, it seems like that's when they were the happiest. They'd get that smug, satisfied smile, and practically glow. [reflects a moment, and then nods] I think one baby will be enough to leave me content, more than happy for my sisters to bear the rest.
• Take a Third Option: In regards to Eldie at the end.

Jerin

Jerin Whistler

• Bleed 'Em and Weep: Does not take his first kill very well at all.
• But I Would Really Enjoy It: Cira and Jerin, up until the very end.
• Comforting Comforter: Jerin carries a wounded soldier to the family farm, and tucks her in, in his sister Corelle's bed, to take revenge on Corelle for not being there, as would be her duty. It still emphasizes his caring, nurturing personality, which makes him attractive to potential wives… and the soldier herself, Odelia.
• Contrived Clumsiness: When Jerin gets disarmed and his lockpicks confiscated. He "accidentally" blunders into the woman who took his derringer and palms it with sleight of hand while she enjoys it, then repeats the "mistake" with the woman who took his lockpicks.
• Crush Blush: He blushes profusely at thoughts of Ren, and especially at innuendo. He's blushy in general, once flushing after a bath is prepared for him because of the idea that strangers have paid that much attention to a place where he is to be naked. He's complimented on it by Lylia.
• Deliberately Cute Child: He deliberately starts using childish words when he's kidnapped, in order to make himself seem more harmless. He's 15, but boys are extremely culturally sheltered so it's somewhat believable., especially to people who don't know him. He never tries to pull this off in front of his own family, probably because they were all taught by the same spying grandmothers.
• Distressed Dude: Jerin, several times. He's not entirely helpless in these situations, but he'd have been in very bad shape without assistance. On the other hand, his resourcefulness and unusual skills seriously impress Cira.
  • Dude Out of Distress: When he's taken captive, his own skills and his initiative are vitally important to effecting his escape.
• The Dutiful Son: Jerin in spades; he cooks, he cleans, he takes care of his little sisters and brothers and he worries about making a good marriage that will benefit his family.
• Everything's Sparkly with Jewelry: He owns one piece of jewelry passed down from his grandfather. Ren sees it and believes it's the Emerald Hart, which was worn by the Prince Alannon when he was abducted.
• Farm Boy: Is introduced on the farm he's lived all his life, which he leaves relatively early in the plot. He has a storied ancestry, his grandmothers helped win a Civil War, and stole his grandfather a prince during it.
• Friend to All Children: Jerin is good with kids but doesn't let them walk all over him, even the little princesses, which makes him look that much more suitable as a husband.
• Gaining the Will to Kill: After he was kidnapped, his rescuer is almost killed by the kidnappers so he has to step in. He doesn't like it, but makes no resolution to not do it again, either.
• Gibberish of Love: Poor Jerin manages to stay on topic when ambushed by a princess, but he still babbles and knows it.
• Hates Baths: The younger sisters are very unhappy when bath day is announced. Could be partly due to the fact that they have no running water and have to carry it to the tub in buckets.
• Identical Grandson: Jerin resembles his grandfather enough to prove that they're related. Apparently, that's where Jerin gets his good looks from.
• Innocent Blue Eyes: A excellent example, He's very innocent, and prone to blushing. While not as sheltered as most boys in his culture he is by most western standards.
• Letting His Hair Down: Jerin usually keeps his hair in a practical braid. He gets to "let it down" at a royal ball, where it is decorated with flowers and jewelery, and arranged so that it cascades down over his shoulders. There's also the incident when Princess Lylia talks him into kissing her. She undoes his braid, a physical symbol of the unchaste act she got him to commit. Princess Ren re-braids it later, after scolding Lylia.
• Like a Duck Takes to Water: He's a country bumpkin, and when he receives an invitation to spend some time at the royal palace, he is bored at first, because there is absolutely nothing to do. Then, as tends to happen in such novels, he finds out about an intrigue against the royal family, and puts to use his hobbies, which include code-breaking and lockpicking, as some of his ancestors were spies and the family upholds traditions.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Is the last one to be told that Princess Ren intends to make an offer for his hand in marriage. Justified in that it is a very good match, more than he could hope for, and no one wants to get his hopes up in case it doesn't work out in the end.
• Long Haired Prettyboy: His hair is long enough to be braided, and he dresses well. Almost all women who are not related to him make at least one comment on how pretty he is. Paying lots of attention to his appearance is part of his culture, but the beautiful face is genetic.
• Marry for Love: What Jerin really wants is to marry into a family he'll love instead of simply enduring. He gets his wish, falling in love with all the princesses.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Given that men are rare and considered more emotionally fragile and less intelligent and driven than women. When kidnapped and tied to a bed, Jerin tries to take advantage of this by whining and using the 'baby words' of bodily functions to make it easier to believe that he's too helpless to try and escape.
• Obliviously Beautiful: At the beginning of the novel at least. This is mostly due to his being extremely sheltered — his sisters would not approve of strange women telling him that he's pretty, and he doesn't see many men to whom he could compare himself. Only when his old teacher warns him to not walk around unveiled on the ship on which they are traveling, as some women could be tempted to abduct him, does he realize that he is not just average-looking.
• Promotion to Parent: When his father Tullen Whistler née Beawater dies, Jerin steps into the child-nurturing and house-tending role, and does well at it, since he'd been helping and learning from his father all along. The downside is that when they hear he's leaving to be married, his youngest sisters react as if losing another father.
• Security Cling: Near the climax Jerin is trying to escape on horseback. A woman on another horse comes up alongside, grabs him by the waist, and tries to jerk him onto her horse. He could fall to the ground and possibly be trampled, or he could end up in front of her on the saddle; to his shame, his body chooses the latter and he clings to her, terrified.
• Serial Romeo: He falls in love easily and frequently. Luckily for Jerin, all of the women whom he gets attracted to turn out to be the royal princesses.
• Sex God: Jerin's father and grandfather considered it advisable to give him tips on how to keep all his spouse happy given he's societally to marry all the sisters in a family too. His wives, who are not at all inexperienced, are indeed very happy with his skills.
• Silk Hiding Steel: Prince Alannon passed it down to him.
• Technical Virgin: Jerin after being seduced by Ren. He has angst over it, worrying if it means his mouth isn't virgin now, or if it's a whole package deal. Deconstructed during an STD scare, when they realize that it could be enough for him to get infected.
• Tender Tears: Jerin cries several times over the course of the book.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: Tomgirl And Girly Boy — Jerin and Cullen. Cullen, despite growing among the noble folk is rather wild and contemptuous of the rules. He's bored and longs to do more adventurous things, like riding a horse. Jerin in turn, who's grown up in a farm and got to do such "unladylike" things in his life, is much more proper and calm.
• Trouser Space: Where he keeps his lockpicks, and apparently his Chastity Dagger, though he can remove that without too much indecency.
• Underestimating Badassery: While his kidnappers are clever enough to search Jerin for hidden weapons, and even find his set of lockpicks. They still end up underestimating him, as he pretends to stumble against them, and steals his stuff back just moments after they took it.

Corelle

Corelle Whistler

"Either Corelle, Heria, or Blush will be Mother Eldest for the younger sisters. You can't make good decisions as an adult if you were never allowed to make any decisions while you were a child. Now is the time for Corelle to learn from her mistakes. [...] Where Corelle leaves, the others follow. We only need to teach her to lead wisely."

—Mother Eldest

• Big Sister Bully: Corelle is nasty toward Jerin in the first chapter—but then she's suffering from teenage hormones for the Boy Next Door. She gets better.
• Big Sister Instinct: While all of Jerin's sisters are like this to some degree, even those younger then him, Corelle is also this despite the above trope.
• Black Sheep: Definitely, but handled constructively, instead of side-lining her the mothers recognize a strong character under her Jerkassery, decide it's vital for the family's interests, and straighten her up. After having her give away some of her favorite possessions first.
• Disappointed in You: Corelle's punishment for irresponsible behavior is very calmly delivered. The Whistlers don't yell at kids or beat them... they just strip Corelle of all possessions she doesn't need to survive. As they're not rich, and are a large family, Corelle doesn't have much to begin with, but it's still a harsh punishment.
• Hypocritical Heartwarming: Corelle has lots of complaints regarding her brother Jerin. He talks too posh, he doesn't wear the right clothes ... but when some woman dares imply that Jerin would be lucky if a noblewoman like her would deign to marry him, Corelle is enraged. Justified in that this is an insult to (social standing of) the whole family, but it's also clear that Corelle won't let someone outside the family insult her brother.
• Idiot Ball: Corelle starts the story grabbing this and running. "My mothers and elder sisters are away, and told me to not leave the farm, not even to mend the fence ... guess what, I'll go and visit the neighbor boy, and take the other middle sisters with me ... after all, what could possibly go wrong?" Yeah. What could happen is that some bandits who have no qualms about killing men pass by, and Corelle's innocent virgin brother has to go out, only guarded by a preteen sister, and carry a strange woman who was wounded by the bandits to safety.
• Jerkass: She gets better later, but her personality remains on the rougher side. Her default conversation tends to be acerbic.
• Literally Loving Thy Neighbor: Corelle has a crush on Balin Brindle, the neighbor boy, even growing her hair out for him. Many of her sisters don;t get what she sees in him.
• Middle Child Syndrome: Corelle seems to have a bad case of this. The idea that she will be the Eldest to the younger sisters helps her get better.
• Naughty Is Good: Justified She has the strength of personality to get her sisters to join her in doing things they're not supposed to. She is severely punished for leaving the family farm unprotected, but it is mentioned that she is to be raised as a future leader of a family unit, because her strength of character, together with some more commonsense she still has to gain, will make for a good authority figure.
• Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: When left in charge of the family farm while the mothers and elder sisters are away. Corelle chooses to do the one thing she was not allowed to do: leave the farm unguarded while she visits the pretty son of their neighbors. When the actual authorities return, they are not amused.
• What Does She See in Him?: None of her siblings can understand what she sees in Balin Brindle, who is fat and ugly like the rest of his family and implied to be sleeping with his mothers, she claims he has beautiful eyes. Her mothers hope that she’ll see there are more worthwhile men than him. Considering her oldest brother is married to the princesses and her older sisters are married to the princesses’ full cousin, she probably will.

Summer

Summer Whistler

• Beauty Is Best: Jerin considers her the most beautiful of his older sisters which is why he recommends her for the group going to Mayfair, she likely is given no one gainsays his estimate.
• Cool Big Sis: Not to the extent of Eldest but she's the one that sends candy back to her youngest sisters and is always there for Jerin to talk to about his fears.
• The Heart: Does the most to keep the four Whistlers together during their adventures in Mayfair.
• Names to Trust Immediately: She's very sweet, and Jerin considers her the prettiest of his sisters, arguing that they want the future husband to consent to the match, best foot forward and all that right? Granted, he could just be saying this because he likes her and going to the city would be fun for her.

Heria

Heria Whistler

The eldest of Jerin's younger sisters, who is very willful and Wise Beyond Their Years

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• Hot-Blooded: She is quick to grumble about things she dislikes or tattle on sisters who annoy her, spends a solid minute swearing after one of her younger sisters won't let her inside without a password, and eagerly grabs her rifle and marches off to investigate when she hears suspicious noises in the nearby woods.
• Pragmatic Hero: She is a decent person, but she's not above snooping through guests' belongings to learn more about them and mainly argues in favor of rescuing Odelia due to the legal penalties the family might face for failing to save her.
• Small Role, Big Impact: She disappears from the story after Jerin leaves for the capital barely a quarter of the way through book, but she is the one to rescue Odelia from the raiders, bringing the Whistlers and the Royals into contact and setting the plot into motion.

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The Royal Family

In General

• Emasculated Cuckold: Gender Inverted and Played for Drama, with Keifer cheating on his royal wives in his bed in the palace, with his own sister.
• Guess Who I'm Marrying?: The Idiot Ball was held by the siblings, not the parents, with regards to marrying Keifer. The Porters did everything they could to make it happen, including extramarital visits by Eldest. Keifer turned out to be a Self-Disposing Villain but he took out quite a few family members, including the Eldest Princess and Eldest Porter thanks to his stupidity.
• I Want Grandkids: Queen Elder explicitly tells the protagonists that her family's numbers are reduced, and she wants grandchildren. Justified in that she is one of the Queens, and there need to be heirs of the throne. She doesn't pester her daughters about this, though - they know what is expected of them.
• Life Saving Misfortune: Three of the four older sisters who survived the opera bombing all only did so due to circumstances that would have otherwise been completely unpleasant: Odelia being grounded for a minor act of misbehavior, Trini being bedridden after Keifer beat her, and Ren getting upset because the opera performance was based on a dark moment in her family's history and running outside crying.
• Modest Royalty: For the entire family really. Odelia gets mistaken for a common soldier on first acquaintance and the rest of the royal family seems to dress like this, too, as no explicit mention is made of extravagant dresses. It was even a major source of friction with Keifer when he wanted extravagant private rooms.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: The Queens don't do much, being largely retired, but all the princesses are highly active in the running of the kingdom. Much of what they do is political, even the youngest princess is expected to attend when they sit in judgment at the royal courthouse, but two of them start off the book trying to help part of the armed forces track down some stolen experimental cannons. Further, the adult sisters have dedicated offices where they seem to spend a good deal of time.
• Significant Green Eyed Redheads: From the very beginning, you can tell the girl they found in the creek is important because of her coloring. In fact their hair coloring is called "Royal red" only half in jest.
• Verbal Judo: Comes with the territory of being a politically active royal. When Princess Ren hears that the Whistler family, who saved her little sister, has been found to be armed up to the teeth (though they did turn in all of their weapons), she tells a servant to make sure her mothers know that Jerin was in incredible danger just a short time ago, to make them look like innocent victims, anxious for the safety of their brother, instead of the Badass Family they are.
  • They show this in arguments between themselves and their mothers too, such as when discussing the possibility of marrying Jerin.
• Unexpected Successor: The royal family traditionally rules as a unit (especially after the last time they tried to "split" the royal family as some large families do, two generations back, led to civil war). Nevertheless, the Eldest of their family, like any other family in this setting, holds particular authority. When ten of their older sisters are killed in a theater explosion, all of them are given a step up in importance especially Ren being thrust into the role of Eldest without having been raised to prepare for it. There's the expected drama about her being an Inadequate Inheritor, made worse that the vanished Halley is seen as ​a better fit.
• Violently Protective Girlfriends: Kidnapping Jerin angers all the adult princesses, who nearly get into a brawl in public over who's going to do what to rescue him.

Ren

Princess Rennsellaer

• The Chains of Commanding: Justified Ren isn't really keen on all the responsibility that comes with being Eldest as she hadn't been born nor raised to that role, so she's having a hard time adjusting. Her sister Halley, who was more respected, vanished and left her to do the job, but they both were born as younger sisters and didn't expect to ever have to shoulder that much responsibility. Halley later reveals that she vanished on purpose, at least partly in order to make people look up to Ren more.
• Cool Aunt: Ren is this for little Eldie Porter, who calls her "Auntie Ren". Ren is a princess, which makes her even cooler.
• Flashback Nightmare: Ren dreams sometimes about the moments before — and just after — a theater exploded. Sometimes they're Anxiety Dreams and details are mixed around, new characters added, but other times they're pretty true to life. They were under control until Halley leaving started them up again.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Odelia and Ren. Odelia is happy-go-lucky and would rather kiss pretty boys than take up any royal duties, while Ren—not so above kissing pretty boys herself—is a Proper Lady.
  Ren: I'm frightened for your life and you're ogling farmers' husbands?
• Hat Damage: Princess Ren gets tackled by Eldest Whistler and saved from a Booby Trap; her hat is less fortunate.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: If Ren hadn’t confronted Kij about Keifer’s lover, The Porters would have been none the wiser, and could have been quietly rounded up after Eldest Whistler’s letter identified them as the culprits.
• Questionable Consent: her first face-to-face encounter with Jerin, 15, as he's trying to get a midnight snack, has her kissing and groping him despite his initial reluctance. Although she stops just shy of intercourse (because it would be rude to do so in his mothers' home) and Jerin later tearfully tells his eldest sister he enjoyed it, the latter rightfully reminds him the woman should have stopped at his first no.
• Reluctant Ruler: Played With, she always knew she was to be one of the queens and she seemed to have accepted that, what she didn’t expect was to end up their leader after her older sisters died and Halley ran away.

Halley - Beware of unmarked spoilers!

Princess Halley/Cira

• Beneficial Abandonment: A sororal variation Halley was the natural leader of the surviving princesses, but she wasn't the eldest — and by the traditions of this world, the eldest has to rule the family; especially the royal family, which has a recent tradition of turning into a Civil War over this point. Halley disappeared Because You Can Cope and to try and force her eldest to step up and take more responsibility.
• But I Would Really Enjoy It: Cira and Jerin, up until the very end.
• Chekhov M.I.A.: Princess Halley is conspicuously absent for most of the book, until it's revealed she was Cira all along.
• Covered with Scars: Cira only has one visible on her face, but they're also all over her back, just covered by her coat.
• Dye or Die: To keep the Significant Green-Eyed Redhead thing from letting anyone know she's royal.
• Exact Words: Cira tells a group of women intending to group together to start a new family of "sisters", which she's been invited to join, that she's "done second in line" and that "some" felt she "was usurping my sister's authority", so she left. Details she's leaving out include that she's Halley, currently, the second eldest living princess, behind Ren, that she was the natural leader of her age group among her sisters, and that she was the one who felt she was getting in the way of her current Eldest's authority, since most found it more natural to look to the more dominant Halley for leadership over the less confident Ren.
• Freakiness Shame: Doesn't like the scars she's collected from the theater bombing even confessing her belief that she's repulsive thanks to said scars. Her female lover refused to touch her after she was scarred. Jerin says different and actually believes it as he thought the scars gave her otherwise plain face character when she first saw her.
• Good Scars, Evil Scars: Cira has an enormous silvery scar on her face that healed well, so it's not raised. She also has similar scars all over her body. In-story she's seen as ambiguous for quite some time, and it turns out that she's the missing princess.
• Glad-to-Be-Alive Sex: Cira tries to invoke this with Jerin after a narrow escape from death but he refuses given he's engaged to the princesses, and is ignorant of her real identity.
• Guile Hero: The reason why she is tipped to be the leader of the sisters with the death of their sister Eldest. She proves this by going undercover with no backup into the underworld to find her families killers.
• Have I Mentioned I Am Gay?: Cira mentions her girlfriend, who left her some time ago. Later on, she again refers to said girlfriend to emphasize that she's really, really gay. She just pretends, because some women want to rape Jerin, and she wants to take the fun out of making her watch. She's actually bi, and eagerly kissed Jerin earlier.
• I Am Not Pretty: Cira has a prominent scar on her face, and under her clothing she is Covered with Scars. She doesn't find herself attractive, and mentions a lover who had lost interest in her after she acquired those scars. Jerin thinks she would be plain and unremarkable unscarred, but the scars add character and boldness to her appearance.
• I Did What I Had to Do: Cira says this a couple of times while rescuing Jerin from kidnappers, some of whom she kills. She would, of course, normally not have exposed a delicate young man to such cruelty. In the backstory, some princesses, after seeing a play about a civil war, at the end of which toddlers were executed, reason that their ancestors did what they had to do, as any survivors would have led to a You Killed My Mother situation. That said, when faced with a similar decision at the end, they ultimately choose to Take a Third Option to avoid either option.
• I Wished You Were Dead (Zigzagged): Halley said she wished Keifer was dead the moment before a bomb went off in the theater he—and several of her older sisters—were inside of. Zigzagged in that she really did wish he was dead, but felt awful about her sisters getting killed too.
• Rugged Scar: This captures her character very well, given the scar that goes across her face, the hidden ones on her back and her tough-as-nails demeanor.
• Strong Family Resemblance: Being the only princess to avert this trope, using Dye or Die to occlude the Significant Green-Eyed Redhead thing, is what helps sell Cira as a different person then Halley otherwise she doesn't look much like her sisters.
  • Played straight though with her cousins. After she reveals her true identity to Jerin, he realizes that she looks just like the Moorlands and she must’ve taken after their father.
• What Beautiful Eyes!: When Jerin first sees Cira, he's struck first by the scar on her face, then by the fact that it gives her face a degree of character and boldness that it otherwise lacks, and then she lifts his veil:
  Her eyes were green, green and changing as summer wheat, one moment dark as velvet, next light as silk, with long thick dark eyelashes. Gorgeous eyes. How could he have thought her plain with such eyes?

Odelia

Princess Odelia

In this remarkable house, instead of lying dead in woods, her charmed younger sister found refuge. It figured. Ren laughed aloud as it occurred to her how typical the event was of Odelia's life.

—Ren

• Damsel in Distress: The first major action Jerin takes is to go out, pick the princess Odelia up out of a river, and carry her home. His sister Heria found her but wasn't big or old enough to carry her so far herself, and sending out the other middle sisters to get her would leave the boys and the littlest girls mostly unprotected, so Jerin went with Heria to protect him.
• Florence Nightingale Effect: Odelia feigns being more badly hurt than she actually is out of a hope for Jerin to keep tending her, fantasizing about stealing a kiss from him. She later mentions how good he was at comforting her when she first woke up.
  Ren: Odelia, I can't believe you were beaten half to death, left to drown, and all you're concerned about is the handsome son of poor landed gentry.
  Odelia: I'm still alive. The bruises will heal. Why dwell on the past? The future holds the chance to steal a kiss or two from the prettiest man I've ever seen my whole life. [...] Maybe he'll come check on the poor unconscious princess. Don't tell them I woke up.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Odelia and Ren. Odelia is happy-go-lucky and would rather kiss pretty boys than take up any royal duties, while Ren—not so above kissing pretty boys herself—is more of a Proper Lady.
  Ren: I'm frightened for your life and you're ogling farmers' husbands?
• Love at First Sight: Odelia sees Jerin's face for some seconds when (after she was unconscious for a time) she opens her eyes, and he murmurs something comforting. That's enough to make her decide that she must, if not more, at least get a kiss from him. Justified by the lack of men, and Jerin is rather pretty. It's left unclear how strong her feelings are, exactly (not that she'd be able to judge it, she can't have much experience with love), but she's willing to pretend unconsciousness, which must be quite boring, in the hopes that he will spend more time with her.
• Plot Armor: In-Universe, Ren remarks that Odelia seems to have this. She gets beat over the head with an iron rod, very nearly killed and left for dead, then rescued by the grandchildren of knights and their beautiful brother, and Ren says that's about typical of Odelia's luck.
• Undressing the Unconscious: Had to be undressed while unconscious after she's picked up from the river by Jerin, as her wet clothes could get her sick.
• You Are in Command Now: When Ren goes off to save Jerin she swats Odelia and appoints her Eldest while she's gone. Odelia is not happy about this.

Trini

Princess Trini

Ren had no fears that Trini could act as Elder Judge; her sister was quietly stubborn—no one would be able to bully Trini into a decision.

—Ren's thoughts on her sister.

• Cassandra Truth: She was the only one of the princesses who saw Keifer as the monster he was and tried to block the marriage, but as she was only thirteen at the time, she was overruled.
• Defrosting Ice Queen
• Does Not Like Men: For very good reason. This unfortunately places her in conflict with her sisters, since they want to marry Jerin and she doesn't want to marry at all.
• Holding Hands: What happens when Trini finally warms a bit to Jerin.
• Never Be Hurt Again: Trini's reluctance to marry again is part of a larger coping mechanism.
• Kindness Button: She's rude to Jerin at first, but turns out to be very altruistic when she thinks he is in danger.
  • The moment that first seems to soften her impression of him is when the family is discussing what to do with the late king consort's clothes. Jerin suggests sending them to his own family, either to repurpose into items for the younger sisters or to provide Cullen with the royal wardrobe his new wives otherwise wouldn't be able to afford; some of the other princesses laugh at this idea, but Trini immediately insists that Jerin is right. The aforementioned Holding Hands moment happens shortly afterward.
• Knight in Sour Armor: Trini is very pessimistic about Jerin's character, pointing out that her sisters were deceived before. Eventually, though, when she is told that he might be in danger, she quickly forgets about her former suspicions and decides to marry him so that the family of her ex-husband doesn't get him. It could be partly revenge, but she is also shown to be quite aware of the issue of poverty in her realm, so it is reasonable to believe that it was mostly selfless.
  Trini: I wouldn't give a dog to the Porters.
• Love Is a Weakness: Thinks that love is merely an expression of physical desires and not much else, given her own prior experiences.
• Rape as Backstory: Keifer was awful to all of them, but the episode with Trini was especially bad.
  Ren: He hit her in the head with a paperweight and, while she was stunned, dragged her to his bed and tied her there. He beat her and—and serviced her, and everything else he could think of to hurt her.
  Odelia: He broke her nose and blackened her eyes. He broke two of her fingers, and burned her on one hip, like a cattle brand, for calling him a cow. He was threatening to cut her face when Eldest showed up.
• {Woobie: Her father was poisoned, she was raped and beaten by a husband that she had specifically warned her family against marrying, got told by her eldest sister that it was her own fault said assault had happened, and lost half of her sisters in the same incident that mercifully killed off her husband. Small wonder that when the story begins, she has absolutely no interest in trusting another man, let alone marrying again.

Lylia

Princess Lylia

Lylia had turned sixteen at the beginning of the year and was eager to speak her mind. Unfortunately, her mind was filled with odd notions and sweeping reforms, some of them far from practical.

—Ren

• Chivalrous Pervert: Lylia smuggles her cousin Cullen lewd tintypes and educates him on what she knows. They have a pact that whoever has sex first tells the other everything. Jerin finds Lylia slightly threatening in an exciting way.
  Cullen: We've got a vow that whichever of us has sex first, we'll tell the other everything.
• Internal Reformist: Very strident political opinions and has a clear eye for the problems of Queensland society.
• Practice Kiss: Cullen and Lylia have tried it, but since they're cousins who were raised together, Cullen cheerfully admits that it was like kissing a sister.
  Cullen: One time, we practiced kissing. [shrugs] But it was like kissing your sister.

---

The Moorlands

Eldest

Eldest Moorland

• Friend-or-Idol Decision: Eldest Moorland is confronted with the option to marry her brother Cullen to the Whistlers who he loves, and get little in way of a "brother's price", as the family is poor, or sell him to the highest bidder, so to speak. She chooses Cullen's happiness over the money.

Cullen

Cullen Moorland

• Chivalrous Pervert: Lylia smuggles her cousin Cullen lewd tintypes and educates him on what she knows. They have a pact that whoever has sex first tells the other everything. Cullen is seen as harmless and kind of adorable.
  Cullen: We've got a vow that whichever of us has sex first, we'll tell the other everything.
• Covert Pervert: Somewhere between this and a true innocent. He's very interested in the pornographic pictures his cousin Lylia gives him, but when he's sharing them with Jerin, he comments at one point:
  "Why would anyone want to put his mouth there?"
• Curtain Camouflage: Cullen uses this trope in order to listen to what his sisters have to talk about with Eldest Whistler. He leaves his hiding place to hug and kiss Eldest Whistler when he hears that she plans to marry him.
• Every One Loves Blondes: It's actually muddy blond but it gets dyed a very appealing honey blonde for the ball.
• Fallback Marriage Pact: Discussed and averted, his cousins the princesses are all very fond of him and at least one of them would like to have a such a pact with him. But it's pointed out he's too close of a relative.
• Forbidden Fruit: Lampshaded by Cullen who's introduced sneaking into Jerin's room, telling him that "even the air smells better" now that he is in a place where he decided to go. (While not technically forbidden from talking to Jerin, he was supposed to stay in his own room at that point in time.)
• Gilded Cage: Cullen feels like he's in an, albeit mild, version of this. He sneaks into Jerin's room and comments that "even the air smells better" when he is where he decides to be, instead of where his family decides he should be.
• Handsome Lech: Thanks to the tutelage of his cousin Lylia, Cullen is shaping up this way. He's entirely fascinated by sex, but because it's important that he remain a virgin until marriage, the best he can do is flirt, which he's become good at. Eldest Whistler finds him harmless and charming.
• Keet: Cullen is rather excitable, and can't keep a dignified look on his face for more than ten seconds - when Jerin meets him all dressed up for a ball, he ruins the impression by making grimaces.
• Practice Kiss: Cullen and Lylia have tried it, but since they're cousins who were raised together, Cullen cheerfully admits that it was like kissing a sister.
  Cullen: One time, we practiced kissing. [shrugs] But it was like kissing your sister.
• Sheltered Aristocrat: Cullen is exceptionally sheltered even by Queensland standards and cannot wait to cook, clean and take care of his home and wives like other men—also learn to ride.
• Spoiled Sweet: Cullen is like this.
• Tomgirl And Girly Boy: Jerin and Cullen. Cullen, despite growing among the noble folk is rather wild and contemptuous of the rules. He's bored and longs to do more adventurous things, like riding a horse. Jerin in turn, who's grown up in a farm and got to do such "unladylike" things in his life, is much more proper and calm.

---

The Porters

In General

• Distinguishing Mark: Many of the Porters have 11 toes. Having a different father from her siblings, Kij doesn’t but her daughter does, the latter being a significant plot point.
• Rich Bitch: The Porter sisters get a lot of status from being the princesses' in-laws. Kij's sister seems to be in the habit of telling everyone their whole family history, lest anyone forget that they are important. Hilarity Ensues when Kij asks Corelle: "Do you know who I am?" to which Corelle replays by repeating everything Kij's sister just told her about the family.

Kij

Kij Porter

• Action Mom: Kij Porter, a mother, a badass and a captain of her own ship. And the Big Bad.
• Big Bad Friend:
• Deliver Us from Evil: Averted, Falling pregnant does not stop her from continuing to work evil plans. To be expected, as she doesn't view herself as evil, and would want her child to follow in her footsteps. So if anything it's motivation.
• Entitled to Have You: Kij feels entitled to a second dance (and more flirting) with Jerin because she's a noble. When Corelle comes to fetch him, stating that other women want to dance with him, too, Kij asks her: "Do you know who I am?"—then Corelle shuts her down.
• Never My Fault: When confronted by Jerin and Cira at the end of the book, Kij claims that all of her own and her family's misdeeds—which at latest count include treason, murder and attempted murder (including members of her own family), piracy, kidnapping, and smuggling—are actually the fault of the royal family, because the Porters lost money and property in the War of the False Eldest.
• Villainous Incest: Kij and Keifer Porter were culturally brother and sister, genetically full cousins. They had sex and even conceived a daughter before Keifer was killed.

Keifer

Keifer Porter

• Beauty Is Bad: Keifer, who is described as having been very beautiful, but also stupid and cruel.
• Brainless Beauty: According to pretty much everyone who knew him Keifer was very, very pretty but also very, very stupid.
  Odelia: I've seen dogs smarter than him. But he was beautiful.

Even Kij, who loved him, called him stupid.

Kij: Keifer, dearly as I loved him, was an idiot.

• Conspicuous Consumption: Keifer planned to have the floor ripped out and replaced by the most expensive marble, and have the ceiling gold-plated, but he died before he got around to actually doing it - the princesses didn't approve of so much luxury, as they're aware that they're already living in much more comfortable surroundings than their subjects.
• Cuteness Equals Forgiveness: Played for Horror He got away with beating and raping Trini, who was only thirteen years old at the time, so badly that she's confined to her bed for weeks. When Eldest caught him red-handed he smiled sweetly and claimed poor Trini had "provoked" him. Fortunately, he died before Trini had recovered from her injuries.
• Dumb Blonde: Had golden hair like the rest of his family, but unlike them was pretty stupid.
• Dumb Is Good: Keifer hid behind this trope. Everyone who knew him agrees that he was very, very dumb. That enabled him to get away with quite a lot of deception — no one thought he was clever enough to be evil.
• Easily Forgiven: Constantly, a standout among his crimes was hitting the thirteen-year-old Trini over the head, chaining her to his bed, beating her bloody, and servicing her. It was only Trini's eldest sister who forgave him, though, Trini never forgot it.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: He's the prince consort who's expected to be enticing. He's repeatedly described as acting childlike which is helped by his blue eyes and blond hair. He looks so innocent that he got away with torturing the thirteen-year-old Trini, even though he was caught doing it by her eldest sister. Apparently, he managed to convince Eldest that he'd been provoked so it was all her fault, really.
  • This is all before we find out about his role in the various assassinations the Royal family has had to deal with.
• Gold Makes Everything Shiny:: Keifer intended to have the ceiling of his rooms gilt, this is on top of having mirrors over the beds and new marble on the floors. It shows off his decadence and wasteful mindset compared to the royal family's pragmatic attitude toward things.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Keifer was assigned to have the older princesses go to a theater so when it caught fire they would be killed. It was specifically chosen so he could duck out the back and escape, but he missed his cue and stayed; Eldest Porter came to fetch him but was killed as well.
• Innocent Blue Eyes: Subverted, he exploits his appearance to make himself seem innocent, but was anything but.
• Interplay of Sex and Violence: Keifer liked hurting his wives during sex, even if it was their first time and especially if he thought they slighted him somehow. It's one of the many reasons why no one is sad he's dead.
• Lysistrata Gambit: Keifer often withheld sex in conjunction with throwing raging fits in order to get his wives to go along with whatever he wanted. His older wives were madly in love with him, so it tended to work. And he cheated on them anyway with his tantrums mostly as cover for his trysts.
• Manipulative Bastard: Was no bright light, but he was clever and manipulative and very, very beautiful. He withheld sex and threw tantrums and at times was very sweet to the elder princesses to the point where they supported him when he really hurt Trini, and all along he did as his much more intelligent family wanted.
• Meaningful Name: In German his name means "the one who nags" how apropos.
• Posthumous Character: A right bastard and remembered as one even several years after his death.
• Psychopathic Manchild: While more intelligent than he appeared on the surface, at his core he was basically a spoiled five-year-old in a grown man's body who used his good looks and status a a prince consort to get his way.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Beautiful!: Got away with severely injuring and involuntarily servicing Trini because his beauty helped in convincing Eldest that his victim "provoked him".
• Villainous Incest: Kij and Keifer Porter were culturally brother and sister, genetically full cousins. They had sex and even conceived a daughter before Keifer was killed.
• Why Did You Make Me Hit You?: He raped and tortured Trini but he was still able to get away with it thanks to his hold over Eldest and her elder sisters. This was after Eldest came in and caught him red-handed.

• Would Hurt a Child: He was even mean to little Cullen.
  Cullen: Keifer? Oh, I hated him. He used to lie to me and make me cry. I was only nine or ten at the time. He told me that my you-know-what would fall off because I ate too many cookies. Then one day he smacked me. I forget why—actually, I'm not sure there was even a reason why—but we didn't come back to the palace again until after he was killed.

Eldie

Eldie Porter

• Cheerful Child: One that's wormed her way into her Auntie's hearts too
• Dye or Die: At the end, to help her fit in among the Whistler children, they dye her hair so she looks more like her new adoptive sisters.
• Extra Digits: Eldie has an extra toe on one foot, polydactyl isn't unusual for the Porter family.This tips off Eldest Whistler to the paternity of Kij's daughter, Eldie, who was sired by Kij's brother Keifer, given her having such a trait is evidence of incest. This had happened while Keifer was married to the princesses.
• Deceptive Legacy: She and everyone else is told that her father was some guy in a so-called "crib", a kind of brothel where women pay for a try at getting pregnant. However, it turns out that she was fathered by a man that is regarded as the brother of her mother. It is not actual sibling-incest, they're cousins by blood, but socially it's a different matter.
• Happily Adopted: By the Whistlers at the end.
  Eldest: There is redemption for the innocent.
• In-Series Nickname: As the oldest and only child for the latest Porter generation she's "Eldest", already being raised to be the leader of subsequent sisters. At the moment she's only five years old is affectionately called Eldie by her 'aunt' Ren.
• Meaningful Rename: Little Neddie was not born with that name. She was adopted in order to save her from being executed with her family, as she was a toddler at the time. Her adoptive family renamed her.
• Someone to Remember Him By (Implied): The official reason of her existence is that Kij went to a crib to cope with Keifer's death, the day after the bombing. To be born in the right timeframe to make this believable, she must have been conceived very shortly before he died.
  • She also has eleven toes, something only Porter children from Keifer’s father’s line have, not Kij’s.