History Webcomic / ImTheQueenInThisLife

* DefiledForever: Invoked. The reason for the Cardinal's rage at both Zanobi and Isabella after Ariadne's hunting accident is that she would be considered "ruined" if she spent the night at the forest.

* MotherMakesYouKing: Rubina pushes Cesare to reach for the crown. The reason he initially contacts Ariadne in the second timeline is because his mother wanted him to buy the Heart of the Ocean from her, a

* AbusiveParents: Lucrezia towards Arabella, her youngest daughter. [[spoiler: It eventually ends with Arabella dying from her injuries after Isabella shoves her down the stairs. The reason why she doesn't survive is because Lucrezia refusing to spend money on a doctor.]] Cardinal de Mare is more of a neglectful variety.

* CheatedDeathDiedAnyway: [[spoiler: In the second timeline Queen Margaret avoids being poisoned by Rubina.]] She's still killed later the same day.

* DefiledForever: Invoked. The reason for the Cardinal's rage at both Zenobi and Isabella after Ariadne's hunting accident is that she would be considered "ruined" if she spent the night at the forest.

** Lucrezia resentment of her status of mere Cardinal's mistress at first seems to be only caused by the fact she's not properly wed to him, since he's a member of the clergy. [[spoiler: However, it turns out to be more than that: she loved a nobleman who was Ippolito's actual father, and planned to run away with him, but got pregnant with Arabella and had to stay with the Cardinal, whom she viewed as undeserving of her.]] It also explains her hatred of Arabella.

** To a lesser extent, Cesare's mother, Countess Rubina, employing the services of a Moorish fortune-teller for over twenty years is a well known fact among society ladies. However, just because the king's mistress gets away with it, [[spoiler: does not mean the Cardinal's mistress does as well]].

* SelfMadeMan: Ariadne's father is an orphaned man of common birth, who eventually became a Cardinal. [[spoiler: He almost becomes the next pope, but has to step back due to Ippolito's crimes tarnishing his reputation. Still, in both timelines he managed to marry his daughters to the prince.]]

* AbusiveParents: Lucrezia towards Arabella, her youngest daughter. [[spoiler: It eventually ends with Arabella after Isabella shoves her down the stairs due to Lucrezia refusing to spend money on a doctor.]] Cardinal de Mare is more of a neglectful variety.

* AbusiveParents: Lucrezia towards Arabella, her youngest daughter. [[spoiler: It eventually ends with Arabella dying due to Lucrezia refusing to spend money on a doctor.]] Cardinal de Mare is more of a neglectful variety.

* AmputativeSentencing: Downplayed, since it's not a total amputation, but after Zanobi almost kills Ariadne during the hunting competition, the cardinal orders to cut the tendons in all his limbs.

* BastardBastard: Cesare and Ariadne in both timelines. Cesare is an illegitimate son of the king and his mistress (although he's publicly passed off as his nephew), while Ariadne is a result of cardinal de Mare's affair with his maid. Both are very morally dubious people, Cesare moreso, while Ariadne recovers somewhat in the second timeline.

** This is Ariadne's MO in general: earlier, she convinces a famous boutique to grant Lucrezia a rebate in order to lure her into messing with ledgers again, and to expose her to the cardinal.
* BerserkButton: Lucrezia really hates being reminded of the fact she's only the cardinal's mistress despite being a noblewoman. Queen Margaret easily puts her in her place by calling her "Miss de Rossi" instead of "Lady de Mare".

** Ariadne herself is arguably one as well, but she's not as saccharine about it as her sister is.

* ChildProdigy: Arabella is a musical prodigy. She's eventually accepted into a music college at ten as the youngest student ever.

* DefiledForever: Invoked. The reason for the cardinal's rage at both Zenobi and Isabella after Ariadne's hunting accident is that she would be considered "ruined" if she spent the night at the forest.

** Lucrezia is a villainous example, sending the money she embezzled from the cardinal to support her family.

* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: Lucrezia genuinely loves her children. Well, the ones not named Arabella. [[spoiler: Even after she realizes both Ippolito and Isabella had forsaken her to save their own skin (albeit Isabella, in a rare show of humanity, did seem somewhat conflicted on this issue) and she's forced to drink poison, she still insists Ippolito is cardinal de Mare's legitimate son.]]

* FamilyEyeResemblance: Ariadne and Arabella have green eyes like their father. Ippolito and Isabella have the purple eyes of their mother, [[spoiler: but it turns out Ippolito is not really the cardinal's son, while Isabella's parentage remains ambiguously unadressed.]]

** Maletta brags to Ariadne that if she were to have a child with the cardinal, it would have the same social standing as Ariadne. Ariadne internally admits that she has a point. [[spoiler: She later uses Maletta's ambitions by encouraging her relationship with Ippolito, which results in Maletta getting pregnant. Contrary to Maletta's lofty expectations, this gets her thrown out of the de Mare manor and ultimately killed.]]
** Lucrezia resentment of her status of mere cardinal's mistress at first seems to be only caused by the fact she's not properly wed to him, since he's a member of the clergy. [[spoiler: However, it turns out to be more than that: she loved a nobleman who was Ippolito's actual father, and planned to run away with him, but got pregnant with Arabella and had to stay with the cardinal, whom she viewed as undeserving of her.]] It also explains her hatred of Arabella.

* IAmNotYourFather: [[spoiler: Lucrezia reveals to Ippolito he's not really her son with the cardinal, but with another man.]]

** Later the cardinal banishes Lucrezia from his house [[spoiler: for attempting to perform a magic ritual]] in fear she would eventually attract the attention of the Inquisition and cause their entire family to be burned at stake.

* LoveMartyr: Ariadne for Cesare in the first timeline. She suffered all kinds of indignities and worked tirelessly for him to become the king while still waiting for him to make her his wife. She ends up betrayed and imprisoned (and killed, but it was more Isabella's idea) once he's done with her. Isabella lampshades this, telling her doing everything for one man and hoping for his gratitute was a terrible idea that was bound to end in tears. Ariadne takes this lesson to heart in the second timeline and resolves to never fall in love again.

** Technically Lucrezia is one as well, but since she's living with the cardinal, she and their children are his family in all but name.

** To a lesser extent, Cesare's mother, Countess Rubina, employing the services of a Moorish fortune-teller for over twenty years is a well known fact among society ladies. However, just because the king's mistress gets away with it, [[spoiler: does not mean the cardinal's mistress does as well]].
* OrderedToDie: [[spoiler: After Lucrezia's order to kill Maletta results in the death of another girl, the cardinal, to avoid a scandal and compensate the girl's father, orders Lucrezia to drink poison. She does it, after realizing if she lives longer she will be forced to confess about Ippolito being a bastard.]]

* RightForTheWrongReasons: [[spoiler: After hearing his uncle mention how not all of Lucrezia's children were born of the same man, Ippolito assumes he was talking about Arabella, due to their mother's blatant disregard for her. As it turns out, it's the other way around: Lucrezia hated Arabella exactly because she was cardinal's daughter, while she wanted to run away with her true love, Ippolito's biological father.]]

* ScrewTheMoneyThisIsPersonal: Subverted and played straight. Scampa initially refuses the generous sum of money the cardinal offers him to compensate for the death of his beloved daughter, just because it won't return her to him. However, Ariadne swoops in, [[spoiler: offering him to get revenge by demanding Lucrezia's death as an equal exchange. The cardinal agrees to it.]]
* SelfMadeMan: Ariadne's father is an orphaned man of common birth, who eventually became a cardinal. [[spoiler: He almost becomes the next pope, but has to step back due to Ippolito's crimes tarnishing his reputation. Still, in both timelines he managed to marry his daughters to the prince.]]

** Giada, Lucrezia's personal maid, ends up being this due to her knowledge of her mistress going to a fortune-teller [[spoiler: and trying to perform magic in cardinal's house]]. Ironically, this is not [[spoiler: what gets her killed: it's accompanying Ariadne to said fortune-teller for more information and overhearing the talk about "the hex of Amhara", which causes her to perish by literally turning to dust.]]

* SocialClimber: The cardinal is a lowborn man who rose to prominence thanks to rising in ranks in the clergy. He views his entire family as assets to help his public image and rise even further, which is why he agrees to pay extraordinary sums for Ippolito's education and upkeep, parades his daughters in public to advertise them as promising brides for potential political allies, is downright paranoid about his PR and constantly covers his wife's blunders [[spoiler: until he can't do it anymore and has to agree to force her into suicide to save his face and his children's future prospects]].
* SlaveToPR: The cardinal cares the most about the public image of his family. Ariadne makes it very easy to gain his favor by posing as his dutiful, sensible, pious daughter, while helping to out both Lucrezia and Isabella as petty, vindictive, immoral shrews, which eventually causes the cardinal to [[spoiler: lock Isabella in her rooms and to banish and ultimately force Lucrezia into suicide]].

* TooDumbToLive: Maletta is really, really dense on top of being malicious, and she ''never'' learns from her mistakes. Early on she runs her mouth in front of Ariadne, bragging how she might seduce the cardinal one day, which results in Ariadne repeating it to Lucrezia and Maletta getting lashes as a punishment. She thinks she will become Isabella's lady-in-waiting after the latter becomes a queen despite only noblewomen being allowed that position, later assumes [[spoiler: de Mares will show any regard to her and her child with Ippolito,]] even though Ariadne and her mother were just sent to the countryside, where Ariadne's mother eventually died, not to mention Lucrezia openly despises Maletta and is physically abusive to her. After she's [[spoiler: thrown out and ]] brought by Sancha to Rambouillet Shelter, she still does not understand her situation, [[spoiler: even though she's well aware she has nowhere else to go,]] and throws tantrums at people who basically saved her life. When Ariadne interrogates her, she just lists a handful of completely irrelevant facts and gossip and only accidentally mentions [[spoiler: the topic of Ippolito's illegitimate birth]]. (Amusingly enough, she figured it out before Ippolito, who thought it was Arabella.) Then she runs away from the shelter, [[spoiler: only to get gruesomely killed almost immediately afterwards]].
** Lucrezia going to a fortune-teller is risky enough, but her [[spoiler: attempting to perform a magic ritual in cardinal's house in broad daylight]], when the Inquisition could arrest and execute their entire family, is downright criminally stupid and gets her banished from the manor. [[spoiler: She's eventually forced into suicide by the cardinal to appease the angry mob after her order to kill Maletta results in another person getting murdered.]]

* TheUnfavourite: Arabella to both her parents. To cardinal because she's just another girl he has to prepare dowry for, to her mother because [[spoiler: her pregnancy with Arabella prevented her from running away with a man she actually loved]]. This ends up [[spoiler: with Arabella dying after her sister pushed her down the stairs while Lucrezia refused to call a physician, because it would cost money. Nobody in the family except for Ariadne even attends her funeral.]]

* YouAreGrounded: The cardinal orders Isabella to be confined to her rooms for a long time for almost ruining Ariadne's reputation during her hunting accident.

* BadBedroomBadLife: Downplayed. After arriving at de Mare household, Ariadne is initially given a very modest bedroom in the attic. After she wins the queen's favor and is given very expensive presents along with a safe, her panicked father orders her to be moved to Ippolito's (who's currently away at the university) luxurious rooms, to not make it seem like he's giving his other daughter worse treatment than his legitimate children. This sticks even after Ippolito comes back home.

* DeniedFoodAsPunishment: In addition to locking her in her rooms with no luxuries for trying to tarnish her sister's reputation, Isabella is also only given food and water for sustenance.

* GoodWithNumbers: In her first life Ariadne used to manage the royal palace's budget, which is why she's very adept at bookkeeping. When her father gives her a very modest sum to organize her own debutante ball, she surprises him by not only doing it, but also still leaving some spare money. This leads to her eventually running the De Mare's household ledgers and wrestling even more power away from Lucrezia.

* SocialClimber: The cardinal is a lowborn man who rose to prominence thanks to rising in ranks in the clergy. He views his entire family as assets to help his public image and rise even further, which is why he agrees to pay extraordinary sums for Ippolito's education and upkeep, parades his daughters in public to advertise them as promising brides for potential political allies, is downright paranoid about his PR and constantly covers his wife's blunders [[spoiler: until he can't do it anymore and has to agree to force her into suicide]].
* SlaveToPR: The cardinal cares the most about the public image of his family. Ariadne makes it very easy to gain his favor by posing as his dutiful, sensible, pious daughter, while helping to out both Lucrezia and Isabella as petty, vindictive, immoral shrews, which eventually causes the cardinal to [[spoiler: lock Isabella in her rooms and banish and ultimately force Lucrezia into suicide]].

* BurnTheWitch: Any association with magic is bound to eventually attract the unkind attentions of the Inquisition. Fortune-tellers operate on the fringes of society and end up at the stake as the scapegoats every time some large-scales calamities happen in their area. The Cardinal becomes absolutely livid [[spoiler: when Lucrezia attempts to perform some magic at home]], since it would get their entire family executed, and [[spoiler: banishes her to the countryside]].

* DancesAndBalls: Plenty, most notably Ariadne's debutante reception, [[MasqueradeBall the masquerade]] and the ball at which [[spoiler: Lariessa publicly [[LoveConfession confesses]] to Alfonso]].

* CheatedDeathDiedAnyway: [[spoiler: In the second timeline Queen Margaret avoids being poisoned by Rubinia.]] She's still killed later the same day.

* DefiledForever: Invoked. The reason for the cardinal's rage at both Zenobi and Iabella after Ariadne's hunting accident is that she would be considered "ruined" if she spent the night at the forest.

* TheMistress: Countess Rubinia, Cesare's mother and king's favorite mistress. However, while he prefers her over his wife, he still favors his legitimate son over Cesare.

** To a lesser extent, Cesare's mother, Countess Rubinia, employing the services of a Moorish fortune-teller for over twenty years is a well known fact among society ladies. However, just because the king's mistress gets away with it, [[spoiler: does not mean the cardinal's mistress does as well]].