Character
Louise Veneto
The one who was right from the start
Born Veneto, wife of Aurelius Alidel and mother of Aldor. She is the reason he went to the Academy at all: rather than watch a brilliant, idle boy waste himself, she sent him.
She sees him exactly as he is and says so fondly — he doesn't like working, but he's very good at eating, drinking, and talking pretty. She checks the cord of the velvet he is trying on, worries with a crease in her forehead, and drops the teasing the moment something matters: that's good, my son.
When Aldor came home from the Academy alive, she put a hand on her husband's arm and said only that she was relieved. Aurelius, who had spent the family's standing and a stack of dwarven cigars on the gamble, told her afterwards that she had been right from the start.