I went back and forth on this a LOT. Realistically, I thought Jayd would use some sort of alias here. But this was a new character who only previously appeared on one page in Chapter 1, so I thought it would be confusing to have her second appearance paired with a totally different name. So in my original version, for the sake of clear storytelling, I ditched the alias idea and had Ril introduce her as Illaryn Jayd.
As I got further into Chapter 2 and 3, it just started bugging me though. I wanted Jayd to have a bit of a reputation that preceded her. I could buy that people would not necessarily know what she looked like, but they might at least know her by name. So it didn’t make sense that she’d be using her real name in this situation. As such, I went back and decided to go with the alias after all, for believability’s sake.
As a little in-joke, “Kei’ama Tensaf” is an anagram of “It’s a fake name.” To clarify, it’s not supposed to be an in-world anagram, where Jayd herself is trying to be funny or clever. It’s just something I thought would be funny for readers to know that that’s how I personally came up with the alias for her. I always loved that on the TV show LOST, there was a mysterious guy who showed up, trying to pass himself off as another passenger, when he actually wasn’t. The name he gave was Ethan Rom, which was an anagram for Other Man.
I know that expression in the last panel is to mean something else, but I saw it and my first thought was, “And it was at that very moment, Jayd realized she was a lesbian.”
Bwah ha ha! Now I can’t un-see it. 🙂
It’s Sky so I totally believe that could happen.
It only makes sense that she would use an alias.
Imagine the conversations they’ll have later. Hey Ril, remember that time you brought that assassin on board?