5e Ivana
Ivana Boritsi is a villainous NPC from Ravenloft, the horror setting of Dungeons & Dragons. She is the the darklord of the domain of Borca, where she rules alongside her cousin Ivan Dilisnya.
Description[]
Ivana is a lovely woman with deep blue eyes and black hair that tumbles over her shoulders in waving tresses. Although Ivana is now well into her sixties, she still looks she is in her twenties. She dresses in alluring clothing, both accentuating her beauty and masking the black heart within her. Her innocent appearance reveals nothing of her power, and she uses this to cruel advantage. She loves nothing more than to enter a crowded tavern, play the helpless female, and incite several men to fight to the death for her favor. Unfortunately, the victor is not likely to enjoy the fruits of triumph for more than a few minutes. Her kiss is as poisonous as that of a black widow.
Due to her curse, Ivana lips and fingernails are a deep blue, but she is a master at makeup, so few have ever even noticed this. When she sleeps, Ivana takes on the outward appearance of a victim of her own poison. Her skin becomes a mottled gray, her throat and face swell, and her veins protrude, leaving a dark maze of lines over her body.
History[]
Ivana is the daughter of Klaus Boritsi and Camille Dilisnya. Her mother was the first lord of Borca, and Ivana was born five years after the domain joined the Core in 684 on the Barovian calendar. Ivana never knew her father. He was one of her mother's many husbands who disappeared due to Camille's habit of poisoning her men when they angered her.
As she grew up, Ivana's mother taught her to mistrust males, yet there remained in her heart a yearning to love and be loved. At age seventeen, she met a young bard named Pieter and was fascinated by his gift for verse and recitation. Even more interesting to her, Pieter loved art above all else and seemed unimpressed by Ivana's startling beauty. She began to woo him in earnest, but to no avail. At last, attempting to understand the power art and poetry had over him, she became smitten with the purity of his artistry. She saw in it a charm and grace that she could never hope to find in herself and fell madly in love with Pieter in the process. When Ivana learned to love his art, Pieter finally began to love her back.
It might have been a happy ending for the pair, but Camille jealously put an end to the young lovers' bliss. She came to Pieter's bed in darkness and tricked him into believing she was her daughter. As they lay together, Ivana came upon them and was shattered by the perceived betrayal of her true love. Camille insisted that Pieter had seduced her and expected Ivana to follow in the family tradition and kill him. She was not disappointed.
Ivana bought a magical contact poison from a necromancer, which became toxic when mixed with the natural fluids of the user's body. It had no effect on her when she wore it, but it was horribly noxious to anyone else. She applied it to her lips and then poisoned her lover with a kiss. Camille sneered at Pieter's "unfaithfulness" and told Ivana that murdering him was the right thing to do. She ignored her daughter's resentment toward her in the matter, and it festered until Ivana at last poisoned Camille in the year 711. The dark powers were well pleased with the depth of her wrath, so they rendered her mortal kiss permanent and made her lord of Borca.
Before the Grand Conjunction, Ivana had but one person she counted as friend. She first met Ivan Dilisnya when they were both children and had steadily corresponded with him over the decades. When the Grand Conjunction came to pass, Ivan sought her out. He was frightened by the apocalyptic earthquakes that shook the land, so he sought her comfort. Ivana, fearful that her subjects would take advantage of the chaos to rise up and kill her, welcomed his soothing presence and took him into her arms. As the Grand Conjunction collapsed, the two lords were in close proximity, so their domains combined. Ivana's is the more dominating personality, so the realm retained the name of Borca, while Ivan's domain of Dorvinia disappeared.
Since then, the two lords live in their manors at opposite ends of the domain. Where once the two would exchange letters about poisoning techniques, the finer points of creating new venoms, and the sadistic joy they both felt in poisoning their adversaries, they now constantly bicker and plot against one another. Their differences started when Ivan insisted that Ivana share with him the secret of her apparently eternal youth - a secret which Ivana truly does not know - and deepened when she insisted that he make himself useful as head of her police force. Each of them constantly seeks a new poison that will kill the other, yet both remain immune to every toxin, leaving only the people of Borca (and its visitors) to scream and convulse under the effects of each new venom. Both separately and together, they rule the land, rendering Borca doubly dangerous.
Personality[]
Ivana is bitter to the core. She destroys relationships wherever she goes and poisons all men who court her. In the meantime, she lives an excessively luxurious lifestyle, supported by her phalanx of "rent collectors", who are nothing more than thugs running a protection racket. She strings them all along by promising that the man who makes her wealthiest will be her consort. When any of them becomes troublesome, she declares him to be the winner. She then poisons him and tells the others that he was untrue to her. They believe her because they each want to be her next lover, ignorant of the fact that even a single kiss from her is lethal.
Ivana publicly disdains romance and love, yet secretly she still longs for companionship. Her curse is to forever pine for another Pieter, but inevitably poison every man she loves.
Powers & Abilities[]
Ivana is not skilled in the arts of war, relying on hired goons and her poisonous kiss to defend her. Her innocent appearance softens the heart of even the most brutal warrior. Those whose hearts cannot be softened often still fall victim to her deadly kiss.
The poison that Ivana used to kill her true love is still active in her system. Anyone who kisses her must make a saving throw with disadvantage. Success means the poisoned character dies a slow, agonizing death. A failed saving throw means that the character dies instantly. No antidote or magic can cure this poison.
Closing the borders[]
Any drink in Borca, even water from a stream, can become a poison that imprisons characters in this domain. Imported beverages act the same. When either Ivan or Ivana wants to seal Borca, a change takes place in the fabric of the land and air at the edge of the domain. The borders become a catalyst for the drink. When someone leaves Borca, the drink turns to lethal poison. The victim immediately feels feverish and woozy and will die in a few turns unless he reenters the domain. The drink remains potent for forty-eight hours and can be triggered as long as the borders are active.
Trivia[]
- Ivana is likely based on the short story Rapaccini's Daughter.