Birna

Birna Bran, self-styled Queen Mother, is the wife of King Bran Tuirseach and the mother of his son, Svanrige.

When Geralt of Rivia arrives in Ard Skellig to meet up with Yennefer, King Bran had passed away. Birna Bran was among the many to attend his funeral.

During the wake, Birna is discussing with Yennefer her distaste for Skellige's tradition of electing a king rather than through hereditary like the monarchs of the Continent.

Birna later schemes to remove the other claimants to the throne by spiking the feat's drinks with a mixture of blood and mushrooms, causing the unfortunate victims to transform into bears, so that the competition would be eliminated, paving the way for Svanrige to claim the throne. The bears were fought off, but the incident has the jarls blaming Clan An Craite.

If Geralt chooses to help Cerys an Craite investigate the attack, eventually discovering Birna's involvement. But when the issue was brought before the jarls, Birna smoothly denied their accusations, but then Svanrige realized she sent him out of the hall before the bear attack and asked the jarls if they would give credence to a man who turned on his own mother. This caused Birna to inadvertently admit her guilt, prompting the jarls to sentence her to death. Later Birna's body can be found chained to a rock on a small isle, confirmation of the jarls decision to execute her.

If Geralt chooses to help Hjalmar, you will follow him to Fornhala, home of the Vilkaarls. Fornhala seems abandoned at first until Hjalmar and Geralt find a bloody corpse near an altar to an outlawed deity, Geralt then uses his Witcher senses to figure out what happened, this leads him to a cave.

Inside the cave The Witcher and Hjalmar witness the Vilkaarls ritual conducted by a druid, this ritual is used to transform normal men into berserker which grants them the ability to transform into bears. When the ritual is finished our heroes confront the druid, the druid explains the vildkaarls willingly executed the massacre at the feast so that they could support their king but refuses to name his king and a fight breaks out. After defeating the druid you find a letter on his corpse, the letter is unsigned but it confirms Geralts suspicions that the vildkaarls were only working for the real mastermind.

Journal entry

 * It can be difficult for a woman to gain the esteem of knights and warriors not accustomed to seeing female hands on the reins of power. It helps little when, like Birna, widow of King Bran of Skellige, the woman seeing power is filled with acrid disdain for her countrymen and their customs. One might argue that disdain is a valid reaction when, in the case of the passing of a man of power who embodies tradition, those customs call on her to follow along since outdated ritual and cast herself upon her husband's funeral pyre.


 * Justified or not, Birna's desire to rewrite age-old Skellige traditions put her at odds with the jarls and made it unlikely she would be remembered alongside Calanthe of Cintra or Meve of Lyria as a successful and revered ruler.


 * Birna likewise refused to hide her disgust with the custom of choosing a ruler by vote of the jarls. She dreamed of establishing a hereditary kingship in Skellige and thought the ideal dynasty to hold it was her own, starting with her and Bran's son, the young Svanrige.


 * In all probability it was this longing for power that drove Birna to concoct the conspiracy that ended in the massacre at Kaer Trolde.


 * The evidence gathered by Geralt and Cerys sealed Birna's fate.

Associated quests

 * The King is Dead – Long Live the King
 * King's Gambit

Blood and Wine Expansion
With second expansion for The Witcher 3 a gwent card with her likeness appeared.

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