Isabella Este

Isabella Este
Story Role
POV Role	None
Appears In	Shadow of Rome
Naming Conventions
Title	Official Titles Lady of Farmagusta
Nickname	{{{Nickname}}}
Vital statistics
Born	Placeholder
Religion	R'hllor
Status	Alive
Allegiance	Family Loyalties House Este
Racial Statistics
Maternal	{{{Maternal race}}}
Paternal	{{{Paternal race}}}
Family
Parents
Father	Stefanos Este
Mother	Evangelina Este
Siblings
Siblings	Full Siblings Beatrice Este
Internal Family
Spouse	Issac Conmenus
Children	Placeholder

Isabella Este is the daughter of Stefanos, and Evangelia Este making her a member of House Este.

Isabella Este was born the second child of Stefanos Este and during her youth she was doted on by her father of whom she originally had a very strong relationship with, but this relationship diminished as his abuse of her sister Beatrice increased causing her to begin to resent her father. Isabella Este would become enamored by Issac Conmenus when he arrived at her home, but at first she didn't want to dishonor her father so she kept somewhat at a distance of Issac, but eventually as her relationship with her father deterioted completely following his beating of Beatrice following her becoming pregnant it would be Isabella that would also become intimate with Issac also becoming pregnant.

History

Early History

Isabella Este was born the second child of Stefanos Este and during her youth she was doted on by her father of whom she originally had a very strong relationship with, but this relationship diminished as his abuse of her sister Beatrice increased causing her to begin to resent her father.

Time with House Este

“Love is a strange thing. It makes you do terrible things you thought you would never be capable of. Everything you do is driven by it, and there is simply no pulling back..”

— Issac Conmenus

When he was nine he was sent to squire on the eastern coast of Cyprus with House Este of whom had the most wealth on Cyprus outside of House Conmenus. Spending time with the family he grew very close to the two daughters of Denmus Este in the form of Isabella and Beatrice Este. His relationship with the two while at first being simply a very strong friendship while they were young it slowly grew into something romantic as the three got older and came to understand the difference. Despite the two siblings both loving him he refused to pick one, and instead was able to convinse the two girls that they could all be together despite what anyone else might think.

Bastards

As time went by he would father two bastards with the sisters of House Este in the form of Isabella, and Beatrice Este of whom both loved him and fathered his children instead of aborting the babies as their father demanded.

Beatrice sent away

“I was a child back then Beatrice. I should have killed your father the moment he threatened to take you away from me.”

— Issac Conmenus

At seventeen his affair with the two Este daughters ended when their father married Beatrice to a Greek noble in secret. Issac learned of this only after the Greek members came to the city and his guards learned why they were there. Enraged that Beatrice might be taken from him he would storm into the mance of her father and threatened him death if Beatrice left but he was laughed at by Denmus as he believed he was beyond death due to his power, and Issac wasn't willing to kill him so the bethrothal continued. It was only weeks after this that she was shipped away to Greece leaving their child behind with him where he would send it to his family in the capital of Nicosia. It was during this time that he sought out Isabella and finding her in the small Temple of R'hllor in the city he would for the first time be introduced to the religion, and also realized how he had neglected Isabella when he learned he didn't evan know that she was a believer in R'hllor.

Command

Issac would be commanded to return to Nicosia following the birth of his second child with Isabella and thus at the age of eighteen he would become the commander of the Royal Guard of Nicosia.

Taking Charge

Converted to R'hllor during his time in the Royal Guard of Nicosia he would become the center of the religion in the Kingdom and would shortly afterwards marry Isabella Este before murdering her father for attempting to send her away. 

To Greece

Issac following the murder of Denmus Este would travel to Greece with his wife and there he would conspire and bribe his way to the murder of Beatrice's husband and stole her back to his side and on the sacred hill of Rhodes would marry her taking his second wife.

Byzantine Expansion

The Expansion of Byzantine It was of vital importance to the long term strength of the Empire that we controlled the coast lines. The Empire of Nehekhara may be unaproachable on the ground, but it would be interesting to see long term how they did if we cut them off at every one of their ports, and starved off their trade routes.

The Byzantine Empire had once stretched across all of Greece and into parts of Croatia, but over the years revolts, and rebellions had led to all of Greece falling out of the hands of Byzantine. “My father was a great man. He should be remembered as a great emperor. His legacy will be this moment right now. I owe him everything and I will make sure everything I do from this point forward only adds to his legacy.” — Antonio Constantine IV. Having crushed the Turkish Rebellion and been crowned the emperor of the Byzantine Empire the control of the empire and all that meant was firmly at the palm of Antonio Constantine IV. When Constantine IV took power there was a general sense that this man was someone who was very expansionist, and almost an extreme nationalist in his leanings. For the powers in Constantinople this was great, as they always wanted more. But when he did come to power and was in place for good, the nobles of Constantinople begin to realize that they were dealing with a very calculating leader, who was extremely charismatic, and intelligent. In his early days he begin several high profile meetings with the power bases in the Empire in an attempt to galvanize support for the campaigns he was planning to undertake. For thos being met with it became clear that you were either with him, or very much against him. He proved this point when he had the third most powerful house in Constantinople completely destroyed after they were involved in a plot against him. With this action it became clear what he was capable of and the rest of the nobles fell quickly into line. With his powerbase under control, he went about planning for his expansion into the surrounding regions. Constantines desire to expand the Empire led him to many expansionary strategies, of which the first stage of which was the control of the eastern Mederateranian. Expansion “The control of the Empire of Nehekhara had gone unchallenged for far too long, and I was going to make sure that they understood this wasn't their land.” — Antonio Constantine IV. Tony Constantines desire to expand the Empire led him to many expansionary strategies, of which the first stage of which was the control of the eastern Mederateranian. In this regard he pushed his internal allies very hard to build up their strength, and he built up a large navy which he knew would allow him to gain the initiative in the area. His other goal during this period was the growth of the Ostrogoths in Anatolia of whom he was preparig for his eventual movement into the lands of the Empire of Nehekhara. In order to do this he sent in a large number of his intellectuals into the region of Anatolia where they proceeded to even further advance the urban growth of the Ostrogoths, and in this way also increased their industrial properties allowing them to make their military forces stronger then what they were at the time. So as the expansion prepared to move forward it was with complete shock that the surrounding kingdoms had no idea that any of this was even going on. Western Expansion “The Greeks were so foolishly devided that you told one of them the other one hated him and they just killed eachother without even checking.” — Antonio Constantine IV. In order to do this he went about campaigns against the Greeks and the Bulgarians. Moving large forces to these borders he used a strategy of infiltrating the goverments of these areas to turn their own forces against themselves, to the point that they were fighting themselves more then they were fighting the encroachment of the Byzantines. In only 2 years he pacified greece and expanded his holdings in Bulgaria to the point that he was heralded in the streets for the largest expansion of the Empire since the Civil War.

The Island Wars Greece fell two years quicker then I would have thought. Seeing their failure gave me increasingly bravery towards the islands of the eastern Mediterranean.

Fall of the Mediterranean “You caused all of this brother. Once father gets better there will be consequences for all of this violence.” — Nella Constantine His next step was to get Cyprus and Crete into his realm of control along with Rhodes. Constantine sent his greatest servent Basil Arygros to Cyprus in the hopes of creating the annexation without any bloodshed. When Basil arrived on the island he was greeted by the entire nobility of Cyprus, and before he had a chance to even offer terms the King bid Basil to tell his Emperor that he would be coming to Constantinople to discuss things. The Kingdom of Cyprus was already close with Byzantine and greatly feared the Nehekhara so it agreed to an alliance that made them a nearly independent nation. During these negotiations Tony became very close with the King of Cyprus at the time, and this relationship would become a very important one for Tony in later days. Crete quickly as well saw an advantage to joining up with Byzantine after the quick fall of Greece left them very exposed. "We needed an oppurtunity to show the islands of the south that resistance was futile. Rhodes gave us the perfect excuse to show our power in the region." -Basil Arygros Rhodes held onto its independance and for its resistence the Byzantines launched a massive armada to the small island and quickly overwhelmed them. With their defeat the Byzantines brought in Houses from there expansion territores who would rule over rhodes. In this way they rewarded their allies and at the same time destroyed the Rhodes Elite. Crete quickly as well saw an advantage to joining up with Byzantine after the quick fall of Greece left them very exposed. Crete would resist to some extent but Alberto had already been given assurances that their main military force would be placed in the wrong places thus assuring a swift victory. Being forced to use force for the first time the Byzantine fleet would utterly decimate the defences surrounding the capital of Crete, and then land within the capital where they sacked the parliment, and killed much of the rebellion's leadership. With the resisting members of the Cretian leadership dead, the sympathisers would be placed in key positions while themain force of leadership was handed over to Ostrogoths, and Italians brought in from the mainland.

Family Members

Evangelina Este - Mother

Stefanos Este - Father