Bride of the Earl of Dunmarch, and the most recent quarry of the Red King.

Diera comes from the barony of Dahia, one of the smaller southern holdings, and her betrothal to Earl Aldhelm of Dunmarch was a political match, the kind that passes for diplomacy in a kingdom without a king. She arrived in Heathford on the eve of the wedding with a modest retinue, and by morning she was gone.

She was found days later in a barrow deep in the Gravehills, in the chamber of a Velgrym known as Caedwin the Red King. Whether she walked there herself under some compulsion, or was carried, she could not clearly say. A party of adventurers descended into the dark and brought her out.

Those who saw her after the rescue described a woman physically unharmed but shaken in a way that seemed to go deeper than the experience alone. She has said little about what passed in the barrow, and no one has pressed her hard on the matter. The wedding to Earl Aldhelm proceeded, but she has retained little semblance of her former self.

What, if anything, the Velgrym wanted with her, whether she was one more in the long line of brides the hills have claimed, or something more specific, remains an open question.