Wild beasts wearing human skins

Rifthold

She is in Arobynn Hamel's orbit before Aelin ever notices her — a courtesan, sold young, and a rival protégée in the loosest sense. Their first meeting is infamous: Lysandra snatches something of hers and gets beaten with a fan for it. She is also Wesley's lover — Arobynn's bodyguard — and when Wesley uncovers what Arobynn did to Sam Cortland, Lysandra is the one who carries the letter. That is the first thing she does in the series that costs her something, and nobody notices at the time.

Arobynn

Arobynn sends her to Aelin's apartment with Evangeline in tow, as a messenger, because a courtesan is a safe thing to send. It is the last mistake he makes about her. She lies down beside him while he sleeps, takes the knife he keeps under his own pillow, and cuts his throat with it. Afterwards Aelin hands her paperwork releasing both her and Evangeline from every debt owed. Two women who were bought, unbuying themselves, in one night.

What she actually is

When the clock tower's Wyrdstone is destroyed and magic comes back to Erilea, the thing she has been holding down her whole life comes up. She manifests as a ghost leopard and fights her way out of the castle in it. She had already told Aelin what she was, and neither of them knew it: *you and I are nothing but wild beasts wearing human skins.* The eyes stay green in every form. That is the one thing about her that does not change.

Wearing the queen

Aelin's contingency, agreed long before it is needed: if she dies sealing the Wyrdgate, Lysandra is to become Aelin permanently, marry Rowan, and hold Terrasen. When Maeve takes Aelin instead, Lysandra executes it early — living full-time as the queen, in public, leading the allied armies north. Aedion learns what she has agreed to and is cruel about it. She has been a body other people decided the use of since she was a child, and the one time she chooses it herself, the man who loves her calls it a betrayal.

Perranth, and after

At the Battle of Perranth she drops the disguise. Grievously wounded, she holds off two ilken alone to stop them reaching the people behind her — and then she goes and finds Aedion, and refuses to be dismissed. *I have been degraded and humiliated in so many ways.* She is not asking. At Orynth she fights through form after form — wyvern, sea dragon, whatever the minute needs — and takes her sea dragon into Erawan's fleet and Maeve's armada and destroys both. She survives. In the epilogue she is Lady of Caraverre, with a ring bearing a ghost leopard and a key, and she marries him.