Cresanda

Cresanda
Personal details
Species:	San'Shyuum
Gender:	Female
Eye color:	Greenish-brown
Political and military information
Affiliation:	Covenant

"Mken, it's always a risk to start a family. Everything joyous is a risk. Only in fear is complete safety. And then one lives in its jaws forevermore. You and I will not live that way."

— Cresanda, to Mken 'Scre'ah'ben.

Cresanda was a San'Shyuum who was the spouse of San'Shyuum politician Mken 'Scre'ah'ben.

Biography

At some point, Cresanda married Mken 'Scre'ah'ben, a San'Shyuum politician. In 850 BCE, Cresanda entered a rare fertility cycle, a time of Reproductive Yielding. After Mken returned from a meeting with several Ministers and the Sangheili treaty commission back to their residence in the Compartments of Comfort, Cresanda and Mken discussed the establishment of the Ministry of Anticipatory Security, ministered by Mken's political rival R'Noh Custo. When she informed Mken that she was fertile, he was reluctant to start a family out of fear that Custo would use it and his history on the Roll of Celibates against him. However, Cresanda pledged that they would not live their lives in fear, and ultimately Mken succeeded in impregnating her that night. Mken's fears were later realized when Custo discovered that Cresanda was pregnant. The newly appointed Minister threatened to have Mken placed back on the Roll of Celibates if he did not carry out an expedition to Janjur Qom; Mken reluctantly accepted to prevent Custo from blocking Cresanda's right to have a child.

Mken returned from the mission, and he successfully convinced the Hierarchs to forget his history on the Roll and allow Cresanda to give birth. Cresanda was assigned with taking care of the female Stoics that Mken had retrieved from Janjur Qom and ensuring that they fit into their new life on High Charity. Under her guidance, the females decided to remain on High Charity and marry other San'Shyuum. Cresanda introduced them to the San'Shyuum of High Charity, and though the females were "appalled" by the males' physical appearance, they were intrigued by their politeness and gentleness. Mken later returned to his spouse and told her that he would be leading a fleet to destroy the Ussans at the Refuge. Cresanda and Mken would later bear at least one child, and one of their descendants, Zo Resken, would be a prominent politician in the final years of the Covenant and would encounter the Ussans that Mken had seeming destroyed centuries earlier.

Personality and traits

Cresanda was gentle and graceful. She had an interest in politics and often listened to news concerning High Charity and the Covenant from Mken 'Scre'ah'ben, her spouse. Cresanda deeply cared for Mken; she enjoyed intimacy with him and longed to start her own family. She was bold and refused to allow fear to rule her and her spouse's life.

While in her residence in the Compartments of Comfort, Cresanda typically wore a blossom-filigreed antigravity belt over her robe. Like Mken, she rarely used her anti-gravity chair—especially in the privacy of their own home—as she enjoyed using her muscles. Later, when she aided the females retrieved from Janjur Qom, she had to wear a maternal wrap since she was a married San'Shyuum that was leading unmarried females.

List of appearances

• Halo: Broken Circle (First appearance)