Sigrid Årud

Sigrid Årud
Full name	Sigrid Årud
AKA	Jegerdatter
Physical information
Species	Human
Gender	Female
Hair color and style	Blonde
Eye color	Blue
Skin color	White
Biographical information
Father	Harald Årud
Mother	Ulvhid of the Tuktuvut
Date of birth	13.XIII.1627
Place of birth	Rural Normark, Elijah's Rest
Date of death	1736 AN (109 AN years)
Place of death	Elijah's Rest
Nationality	Normark
Allegiance(s)	Tuktuvut Confederation, EHS
Occupation	Politician, Community Leader

Sigrid Årud (1627-1736), also known as "jegerdatter". Resistance Fighter and leader of the Kildin-Sodank Clan in the Tuktuvut Confederation of the Reindeer Herders. Prime Minister of Normark (1679–1685), Speaker of the Nordisketing (1664–1679, 1685–1703), Steward of the Elwynnese Republic from 1684–1698. Deputy Prime Minister of Normark, 1703–1719.

Biography

Born the daughter of Harald Årud, a charismatic, respected frontiersman and hunter living in the rural south of Elijah's Rest, and his wife Ulvhid, the sister of a sharman in the Reindeer Herder Tribe. Raised in a loving and devoutly religious family, Sigrid, in spite of her tempestuous three younger brothers, developed a sensitive but wilful character, often defying her family and causing her mother no end of grief by refusing to marry. At an early age, she was exposed to various tragedies; foremost being the crippling of her father in a skiing accident and the death from measles of her youngest brother. This double calamity, which occurred in her twelfth and thirteenth years respectively, threatened ruin upon the family of hunters and trappers, and set the stage for an attempted rape by the owner of a neighbouring farmstead with whom the family traded furs for provisions. Assailed in the farm's forge she was able to ward off her assailant by brandishing a red-hot iron, after which she fled into the long arctic night. Pursued by the farmer's sons and assistants, who believed her to have been caught in the act of stealing metal tools, she fled deep into the forest. With no way to defend herself and with the cold and exhaustion taking a mounting toll, Sigrid was only able to escape by wading into a small stream, following its course upstream a short but punishing distance, before clambering out to hide under the branches of a fallen white spruce tree, where she spent the long hours of darkness continually rubbing her hands and feet in a desperate attempt to ward off hypothermia and frostbite. In spite of this, she would still lose a toe after succumbing to the fateful urge to sleep. Curiously her pursuers returned to the farm after encountering a prowling wolf, a detail of which she remained oblivious.

She was sent at the age of fourteen by her father to live with her uncle's people, the reindeer herders, as he would have been unable to defend the family in the event of a bloodfeud. Her mother was meanwhile left to sustain the family livelihood, whilst her father sank deeper into an alcohol induced misery of despair at being unable to resolve his grievance against the farmer, Bjorn Erlender.

After being caught alone by blizzard on the edge of the boreal forests, Sigrid was rescued by passing herdsmen of the Chap-Mok Clan who warmed her by their fires, fed her warm broth, bestowed upon her a hooded cloak made of reindeer leather and sinews, and sold her to Gaup of the Tuktuvut who was in need of a wife.

Later life

On account of her advanced age, she was, in spite of nominally remaining Deputy Prime Minister during the reign of Tarjei Thorgilsson, spared from the indignity of arrest during the 1719 Normark coup d'état.