- “I am relentless. I may not be as cruel as some of the others, but I enjoy breaking a man more than any of them. I love hurting my pets more than anything else in life. I live to do it. I don't give up, I don't tire of it, and I don't ease up. Ever.”
- ―Denna[src]
Denna was a young Mord-Sith under the rule of Darken Rahl. Mistress Denna was considered the best of all the Mord-Sith at training and breaking men into 'pets', who lively solely to please her in any way she sees fit. As such, she was assigned by Darken Rahl to break Richard Cypher. She broke his spirit and trained him into her broken pet with ease over the span of only a couple days. After several weeks of using him as her mate, Denna eventually fell in love with Richard, and sacrificed her life to free him by allowing him to kill her.
Biography[]
Early Life[]
- “You have no idea how good I am at training people. I have never failed to break a man. You may think you will be the first, but you will soon be begging at my feet to please me.”
- ―Denna to Richard as he is crying in pain[src]
Candidates to become Mord-Sith are selected from the gentlest and most attractive girls in D'Hara, regardless of rank, wealth or any other factors. The kindest girls always make the best Mord-Sith because they have the farthest to fall. As such, Denna was taken from her home to become a Mord-Sith at a young age. She was chosen, like all potential Mord-Sith, for being an uncommonly attractive, empathetic and loving girl.
Denna was almost deemed a failure and killed because her training took so long.
The training of a Mord-Sith occurs in three parts. In the first, the girl is broken in the same way Mord-Sith break all their pets —prolonged mental and physical torture with magic and the Agiel — in order to break her spirit. In the second, the child is forced to watch as her mother is broken and killed by another Mord-Sith, or her Mord-Sith trainer, with the aim of ridding her of empathy and compassion. Lastly, in the third, the girl must train and kill her own father to purge the fear of hurting another, and in turn, develop the Mord-Sith trait of finding pleasure in hurting and breaking men into toys.
Denna's mother was strong, and took considerable time to break, in trying to save her daughter from becoming a monster she actually had the opposite effect. Making it harder for Denna to give in and in turn insuring the process would be more painful. Denna was eventually trained by Darken Rahl himself, an event that also resulted in Denna being left unable to bear children.
Mord-Sith[]
- “Mistress Denna is the best of the best. She's Lord Rahl's favorite because of her unmatched beauty and her... talents. I had never thought it possible to weave pain and pleasure together with such mastery. And the mere sight of her is enough to make any man's knees weak. I've seen the biggest, strongest men be reduced naked, kissing the ground she walks on after a mere fifteen minutes at the end of her Agiel.”
- ―- Demmin Nass
For Mord-Sith, their main weapon is the Agiel, a foot long rod, made of the same blood-red leather of her catsuit. The mere touch of an Agiel causes unimaginable pain, able to turn even the strongest men into mindless slaves with continued use. Denna also has the power to control another person's magic and use it against them, causing pain ten times worse than what the magic itself would have done. With this magic, she can send pain to her pet at will. Once a Mord-Sith has a man under her control with her magic, the Agiel is the physical weapon she prefers to break him. Some Mord-Sith also like to include whips, and the use of their studded gloves to punish their captives, in order to include variety and punish their pets in different ways..
As a fully fledged Mord-Sith, Mistress Denna was given her own Agiel, as was custom. From then on she only wore the skintight red leather catsuits and high heeled boots of the Mord-Sith. As a result of her flawless methods of breaking even the strongest men into obedient pets, Denna was considered the most talented of all Mord-Sith. Over the years she would 'train' countless captives. All of them would break after a short time in her captivity, due to the pain of the Agiel as well as Denna's talents of keeping men emasculated and needing to please her. When Denna was done training a pet, they have become 'broken'. All their self-respect and dignity will have left them, and they will become completely obedient, to the point where they forget their past and even their own name. After a few days strung up and naked in her dungeon at the mercy of Mistress Denna and her Agiel, all that matters to them in life becomes pleasing her.
Like most Mord-Sith, she also favored taking the most handsome pets in her service as mates, essentially using them as sex toys. Being a mate also takes the next step in the torture - sexual torture. A pet is mate for life, until she tired from them, killed them and chose to train another male to keep a constant circulation of fresh pets in her service. Denna favored relinquishing control in the bedroom once a man had been fully broken, letting him dominate and please her, knowing that he was completely tamed and obedient and no longer posed any danger to her gave he her the ability to enjoy unlimited sexual access to any man she wanted after only a few days of training them with the Agiel. She finally fell in love with Richard once they had sex without the Agiel.
Denna felt an immense deal of arousal training her captives. She looked forward to her pets showing resistance towards her, because it only meant she could get to take more time and pleasure in breaking him. Despite preferring to train handsome muscular men, some more than twice her size, Denna always allowed her pets to hold on to their knife or sword, because they are no danger to a Mord-Sith, and one day they may be used by the pet to protect his Mistress once he is broken. Keeping the weapon on their belt is also a constant reminder that the pet is helpless against her.
Final pet[]
- “I want you to learn. Learn that I can do whatever I want, and there is no way for you to stop me. You must learn that you are totally helpless, and that if you enjoy any time without pain, it is only because I choose it. Not you.”
- ―Denna, on training Richard[src]
Denna easily captured Richard Rahl near Tamarang with help of the magician and artist James, shortly after Richard had stolen the final box of Orden and sent it to Westland. Mistress Denna was ordered by Darken Rahl to train and break Richard because she was a Mord-Sith who enjoyed administering pain to her pets, and never grew tired of it. The tall busty young Mord-Sith had also never failed to break a man, which solidified her as the most talented of all Mord-Sith. She captured the magic of his Sword of Truth when Richard tried to use it against her, and used it from then on to cause him excruciating pain if he ever did anything that she did not command him to do.
There was absolutely nothing he could do to fight back against her magic, or resist her. As such, he was helpless to stop her from training him with the tiny leather Agiel. She forced him to think sexual thoughts of her to keep the pain away, conditioning him to become openly lusting for her. Meanwhile she brutally tortured him in order to break him mentally as well as physically. Richard failed to resist, and despite being the mighty Seeker, he was quickly begging like a dog for the privilege of pleasing his mistress. The small red leather rod combined with Denna's talents for pain and pleasure left him as docile as a puppy within only a few minutes.
Denna subjected Richard to all forms of training a Mord-Sith could possibly give her pet, including putting her Agiel in his ear. She used the Agiel to train him, and used the pain of the magic to keep him subservient to her wishes. In order to train him, she kept him naked, while she remained fully clothed in her skin-tight red leather catsuit. She also had him either shirtless or naked, collared, chained up, unfed, and sleep deprived. He was also forced to say devotion to her and Darken Rahl, which he soon did without hesitation to avoid the pain of the Agiel. When he failed to please her enough he was given a more painful training session next time.
After only a couple of days of intense training, Richard's spirit was broken. He became her willing pet, begging to do whatever his Mistress said in order to not be hurt. Denna killed Richard many times over the course of his training, only to bring him back with the Breath of Life every time. Despite the fact that he partitioned his mind, Richard always had a hint of madness in him after his time with Denna.
Denna was touched by the compassion and understanding that Richard showed her when she told him how she had been made into a Mord-Sith, and also by the care he gave her when she was beaten by Darken Rahl. Denna took Richard for her mate, and protected him from the brutality of the Mord-Sith Constance. Eventually, Denna fell in love with Richard and wished to be free of the curse of Mord-Sith. She therefore allowed him to kill her by turning the blade of the Sword of Truth white with forgiveness. She bequeathed her Agiel to Richard before dying; he (and subsequently his wife, Kahlan Amnell) wore it around his neck as a gesture of respect and remembrance.
Post mortem[]
- “Yes Mistress Denna, no Mistress Denna, forgive me Mistress Denna, thank you Mistress Denna for hurting me, thank you Mistress Denna for taming me.”
- ―Richard during his 'training'[src]
After the second tearing of the veil of the underworld, Denna returned as a spirit to save Richard from both his own gift and from the mark of the Keeper placed on him by Darken Rahl. She removed the mark by taking it on herself, meaning that she will suffer for eternity at the hands of the Keeper of the underworld. However, her act of sacrifice on Richard's behalf "disgusted" the Keeper and he refused to take her, thus allowing her to join the ranks of the good spirits. When Richard and Kahlan were later separated and sought to know if the other is alright, Denna appeared and caused a rift in time to briefly reunite the lovers.
After Richard entered the Temple of the Winds, he was visited by many spirits. Denna was one of them. She helped Richard finally decide to leave the temple and return to world of the living. She did this by forcing Richard to remember the events and emotions of what it was like to be under her control as the pet of a Mord-Sith, so he could understand that pain may be an expression of love and the comfort one in a dark place can gain from the smallest cares.
Denna appeared as Richard's guide of the Underworld, when he traveled there to obtain what he needed to use the power of Orden to reverse the chainfire spell and to vanquish the beast, sent by Jagang's Sisters of the Dark.
Personality and traits[]
A tall, fit and breathtakingly attractive young woman, Denna's most noted physical characteristic is her statuesque beauty. She has soft, piercing brown eyes. Her long, auburn hair is pulled back into a tight braid, a mark of her profession as Mord-Sith. She always wears the skintight blood-red leather catsuit of the Mord-Sith, which reveals the exquisite shape of her body. Denna is never without her Agiel dangling from the gold chain in her wrist. Richard notes she has a 'childlike beauty' to her face. Several characters describe her as "the most beautiful woman of they had ever seen". Her fellow Mord-Sith sisters thinks "no man could ever forget a woman like her". Even Kahlan is awed when she sees Denna's spirit from the Underworld, alluding to her being the embodiment of "perfect female beauty".
She is considered special by Darken Rahl as she was so difficult to break. When she first meets Richard, she is a sadistic nympho who finds a great of sexual pleasure in the training and breaking of men. She finds arousal in hurting Richard and sometimes holds back out of a twisted caring for him, and other times feels she is sharing her feelings by doing her worst to him. In the end she shows compassion, love and loyalty when she lets Richard kill her so he can escape.
Behind the scenes[]
The television portrayal of Denna is slightly different from the Sword of Truth books. Denna is portrayed as having blonde hair while the books state she had auburn hair, and what took 3 weeks in the book version was condensed in the television episode to happen within two days. The main difference between the two versions was that unlike the book incarnation, Denna did not die to safeguard Richard even though, like her book incarnation, she was openly attracted to him. Instead, Richard killed her to save Kahlan, whom Denna had also caught and intended to train. Denna was revived by fellow Mord-Sith Constance with the "Breath of Life" a form used to retrieve a person from the edge of death. She later reappeared to capture Richard's half sister Jennsen, before being allowed to flee with her life by Richard; from him and Darken Rahl. She again appeared in season two, taking the compass and later capturing Zedd. While in captivity, Zedd tried to convince Denna that she could be a better person. Just as it seemed Zedd was getting through to Denna, Cara and Kahlan caught up with them and Cara killed Denna with an arrow in the back.
Actress Jessica Marais portrayed Denna in the episode of the same title. She later reprised the role for the episodes "Bloodline", "Resurrection" and "Light".
Appearances[]
Books
- Wizard's First Rule (First appearance)
- Stone of Tears (Appears as spirit)
- Temple of the Winds (Appears as spirit)
- Confessor (Appears as spirit)
- Warheart (Appears as spirit)
Legend of the Seeker Episodes[]
- 1.08: Denna
- 1.16: Bloodline
- 2.07: Resurrection
- 2.08: Light