Character from The Locked Tomb by Tamsyn Muir
The golden twin who was supposed to be the necromancer and wasn't — a princess whose entire identity was a performance, now finding something real in the resistance that wants to burn her empire down.
Coronabeth is the performance of a lifetime sustained across an entire life. She was raised as the Third House's necromancer — the talented twin, the heir, the golden girl — and she is none of these things. She has no necromantic ability at all. Ianthe is the real necromancer, and they hid this for twenty-two years because the Third House needed their princess to be powerful, not correct. Stripped of the lie, Corona is terrifyingly directionless. She has charm, beauty, physical talent, and absolutely no idea who she is without Ianthe defining her by contrast. Her journey through the series is the slow, painful process of becoming a person rather than a reflection — joining the Blood of Eden, fighting against the empire that raised her, and discovering that she is brave in ways that have nothing to do with magic. She falls in love easily and completely, is loyal to a fault, and has a desperate need to matter that makes her both sympathetic and dangerous. She's the kind of person who will follow you into hell if you make her feel seen.
Everything Ianthe is not: golden, radiant, and built like a classical statue. Curly blonde hair that catches light like it was engineered to, violet eyes that sparkle with genuine warmth, and the kind of beauty that makes entire rooms go quiet. She is tall, athletic, tanned where Ianthe is pale, and carries herself with the effortless charisma of someone who has been adored since birth. She makes sword fighting look like ballet.
Also known as: Corona, Coronabeth, Crown Princess of Ida, The Golden Twin