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Post by Brandwyn on Jan 12, 2009 18:49:19 GMT -5
My characters (most started in the year 653; currently year 657):Rangers:Tory Waterton (13 in year 654; 16 in 657; 24 in 665 {2019}; 25 in 666) Ranger apr. (mentor: was Patrick Palisade and then Tandar Polaris {Tandar} assigned to Ringulf {Ringulf})(Became a Ranger in 663) She had one of the longest apprenticeships in ranger history Shanna Horsetrader (Age 27; now 31) Ranger (no fief) (Retired Oct 2010 [year 656] to marry Ian and raise babies!) Rick Greenriver (31 in 654; 33 in 657; 42 in 665) Ranger (Araluen fief) his apprentice is Tamlin Fletcher [Firehead] Bunt Levinsson (55; 56 in 657; 64 in 665) Ranger (Caraway Fief) his apprentices are Ivy Bramble and Dian Heather Oasterhoff of Heatherwood Downs (36 in 659; 42 in 665) Ranger (Heatherwood Downs Fief) her apprentice is Enya; Married to ranger Ben Skevlic {Firehead} and mother Sage Winston (17 in year 654; now 28 in year 665 {2019} apprenticed to Bunt Levinsson; now a ranger) Marcus Christopher Blackwater (23 in 658; 31 in 666) Ranger assigned to many different fiefs Royal Scouts:Brandwyn Elfstone (was 17 in 654; 20 in 657, 28 in 665 {2019}) Scout apr.(mentor: Ian MacGreggor) Ian MacGreggor (was 38 in 654, 41 in 657, 49 in 665) Royal Scout Master: Meric (married Shanna fall of 656) Araluen Army:Katrina de Montgomery (22 in 654; 25 in 657; 33 in 665) Knight Henry Dell (25 in 654; 28 in 657; 36 in 666) Currently Master-of-arms in charge of security at Castle Macindaw. (He was Man-at-arms for Katrina de Montgomery)He has still not taken a wife and secretly hopes Katrina will come back to him. Avaleah Goldsmith (Lea) (25 in 654; 28 in 657; 37 in 666) Acquisitions Expert (SWC), in love with Omensinger {Ringulf} Timothy Baskerville du Lac Noir (42 in 656; 51 in 665; 52 in 666 {2020}) Knight Errant (fugitive in Norgate) his travelling companion / unofficial squire is Roath [Ringulf] Other Occupations:Antonio de Cortona (Tony the Razor) (31 in 654; 34 in 657; 43 in 666 {2020}) Aquatic Merchant (Pirate) Captain of the Krakatowan RazorAshton Lewis Thornbury (Brother Ash) (20 in 655; 22 in 657; 31 in 666) Priest, Glorfindel Helga Theronsdottir (“Fin” or “Glory”) (28 in 656; 38 in 666) BlackSmith / Merchant; engaged to Ringulf [Ringulf] in 656. ________________________________________________ Tory WatertonAge; 13 in 654 (16 in 657); 25 in 666 Gender: Female Type of apprentice: Ranger apprentice; Ranger-silver leaf in 663 Appearance: Tory is 5’1” with light brown, but not quite blond hair that she keeps cut to shoulder length. She has blue eyes and is fairly thin. She is a bit of a clotheshorse and normally carries three or four different types of outfits rolled up in her bedroll. Her favorite outfit is a blue overlong, long-sleeved T-Tunic with a keyhole neckline outlined in fancy trim because it makes it harder for people to tell if she is a girl or a boy. She normally wears pants with ankle high soft suede boots, Tunics that cover her neck and arms and the traditional ranger cloak and Saxe knife and throwing knife. She carriers her quiver at her hip because her arms tend to be a bit short to comfortably pull the arrows from a quiver at her back. She has a recurve bow, but it is slightly less powerful than most due to her inability to draw the stronger bows. She has hundreds of whip scars all over her back and a few on her neck and arms. Personality/Attitude: Tory rarely trusts people when she first meets them, desiring to get to know them before she counts them as friend or foe. Once she does decide someone is her friend she is very outgoing and tends to prattle on and on. She is a bit boy-crazy, but becomes completely addle-brained and tongue-tied if any boy ever shows any interest in her. She considers herself to be too short and homely to believe that anyone could think her pretty, though in truth she is not homely, or beautiful, but somewhere safely in-between. She is very intelligent, though a bit naive in many respects, and very observant of her surroundings. She has an insatiable curiosity that has often led her into trouble. Her greatest fear is of drowning, though she does know how to swim. She occasionally has nightmares about being raped by huge, ugly, hairy men and wakes shaking in a cold sweat, but would be too embarrassed to ever tell anyone what her nightmares are about, or why she has them. She tries to hide her scars because she cannot stand the look of pity in people's eyes when they see them, but she considers them to be a mark of her toughness. update (excerpt from "Dear Tory"): Tory had filled out and grown into a buxom young woman who could no longer pull off looking like a boy. Her arms and legs were well-muscled and she was thin, but not overly so. She had a wild sort of grace to her movements normally, with the exception of the limp from the wound that never healed correctly in her thigh. The biggest change in her, however, was her eyes. They used to reflect a certain rebellious determination, defiance, a haunted sadness, and even a little fear, but now the haunted look was gone most of the time and they hardly ever showed fear. Now one could see her self-confidence along with fierce determination in her eyes. She still had a rebellious streak, but she had found patience and cunning along the way and learned how to cover up that rebelliousness usually. She was no longer the child that was so easily intimidated by authority figures. With her combat training, she no longer feared being violated by men. She now took charge of situations instead of letting situations blow her around like a leaf on a pond. History: Tory grew up as a maid-servant in her mother’s footsteps in a moderately sized manor. Her father is a men-at-arms in the Baronial guard, but her parents were not married so she did not enjoy any of the comforts that come with having a noble-born father. She started working around the manor at the tender age of 5, doing small jobs at first and gradually worked up to cleaning, laundry, cooking and gardening. When she turned 11, she began serving food in the main hall and that was the day her unrest with her lot in life began to take shape into a plan to escape out of the mold her mother had made. She has a habit of eavesdropping and sneaking around the manor unobserved as well as remaining inconspicuous in plain site while dusting or scrubbing the floors and still finds it amazing how nobles completely tune out the “help” while discussing important subjects. That is how she first heard about the rangers. Shortly befor she turned 14, she finally saw a ranger first-hand. She made up her mind then and there to leave her home and follow this ranger and persuade him to take her on as his apprentice. Other: Animals seem to be drawn to Tory. She has no fear of them and spends as much time as she can in the Manor stables communing with the horses, cows and sheep. She often shares her meager meals with the local dogs and cats. She even has been able to coax an occasional blue jay or turtle dove to alight on her hand to steal a lump of bread. She is also considered weird by most of the other children her age in the Manor and has only one very close friend, though she has a couple others she considers friends. She often gets into fights with the others and can hold her own usually, even against the older boys, unless they gang up on her. Ranger horse: Chocolate Chip. Chip is a leopard appaloosa coloring - white with small brown spots all over like a dalmation. Chip has a brown nose and three brown stockings and brown tips on his ears. He is 14.2 hands tall. Tory also rides her father's old retired battle horse, Dodger. Dodger is a big black fresian stallion with bushy hair around his large hooves. Dodger is over 17 hands tall. Updates:Dodger sired a colt that looks just like him and his name is Sidewinder. He is Tory’s father, Karl Waterton, new battlehorse, even though Karl rarely goes into battle anymore due to the severe hip injury he received many years ago when he was a knight. Karl gave up his knighthood to become a man-at-arms after the injury, feeling he was next to useless. He has now been elevated to Master-at-Arms over castle Meric and is in charge of the castle security forces. Tory was apprenticed to Ranger Patrick Palisade who was accused of committing a murder just prior to them leaving for an undercover job over in Gallica at the beginning of the Aslavian War. He was stripped of his title of Ranger and a bounty was set on him for a hundred gold pieces. He nearly left Tory a couple of times in Gallica, but she managed to worm her way into his affections enough that he would not abandon her in a strange country. So Tory was on the run with him, introduced to the Banished Brethren of which Palisade was a ranking member, and learned a great deal about concealing and hiding her movements and tracking others. She was forced to kill or be killed during the war and then finally Palisade arranged to drop her off with Brandwyn and Master Ian to take her back to Araluen. He went undercover after that and she only saw him one more time at the Winter Revel. Tory was then assigned to Tandar but when Tandar’s father passed away and he took a leave of absence, she was temporarily assigned to Ringulf and went to Marshwood fief. There she learned a great deal about forging from the Skandian smith, Fin and was able to create some basic items along with simple knives and even some jewelry. She is continuously improving her cartography skills and has created and purchased a rather impressive map collection which she keeps on her person most of the time in a watertight leather case. Tory was also given a Skandian Forest kitten by Battleschool apprentice Aribjorn during her sojourn with Ringulf. She named the female kitten Pounce. It is now a full-grown cat and follows her most places, but being a cat, Pounce sometimes wanders off for hours or even a day or two occasionally. Pounce is bigger than a bobcat, but smaller than a Cougar or Panther. She is a tawny cream color with mottled gray stripes and has tufts of hair on the tips of her ears and between her toes. She has a very long, somewhat bushy tail and large green eyes. Her feet are very large for her size, with thick pads and a lot of fur. They are designed to help her walk on top of the snowbanks and keep her feet from freezing while she does so. Pounce loves hunting fish and rabbits and lying in hiding so she can pounce on her prey. She often sneaks up behind Chocolate Chip and jumps on his back. Chip is used to it now. After the Ranger Gathering in 657 she returned with Tandar to Meric and on the first night back ran into her old tormentor, Korrin who is Chatelaine to the Lord and Lady Coltraine. Korrin assaulted her and she stabbed him in the side but it was a wound that would cause him to slowly bleed to death internally. Tandar discovered Korrin assaulting her and rescued Tory and they returned to his ranger cabin. Throughout it all Tory has kept a log of her life in her journal. In 663 Crowley finally agreed to let Tory test for her silver leaf. She passed all the tests he arranged for her, being far more difficult than the average ranger had to go through, and gave her the full rank of Ranger and her silver leaf. Tory was most likely the longest-running apprentice in history, taking 9 years to complete her training due to having several mentors and Crowley's distrust of her because of her loyalty to her first mentor, Patrick Palisade, whom he kicked out of the Ranger Corps. She spent a full year after that on probation, stationed in Araluen where Crowley could oversee her personally. In 665 she was assigned to a small, peaceful fief far to the south along the coast. Tory on the run: Chocolate Chip:
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Post by Brandwyn on Jan 12, 2009 18:51:49 GMT -5
Name: Ian MacGreggor Age: 38 Gender: male Profession: Master Royal Scout Stationed in the fief of Meric Appearance: He wears a white large-sleeved shirt under a brown leather jerkin and darker brown woolen pants with riding boots. He has light brown hair with the beginnings of crow’s feet around his brown eyes. He is of average height with an athletic build, but has recently been showing signs of his age with growing a bit thicker around his middle. He carries the Scout’s bow and arrows and a rapier at his hip. He also sports a large black felt hat with a large peacock tail feather tucked into the brim that is upturned and pinned on his right side. Personality/Attitude: Ian is a person who takes his responsibilities seriously, but has a warped sense of humor. He has great patience and determination, especially to complete a task once he has set his mind to it. He is fiercely loyal to the Crown of Araluen and will not tolerate those who betray their country. He fears going through his whole life without ever gaining the companionship of a wife and siring any children, but little else. He tends to get quite attached to his apprentices and will defend them to the death if necessary. History: Ian is from Norgate on his mother’s side. His father was from Hibernia. He grew up in Norgate with his mother after his father was killed in one of the battles with the Scotti. He rose quickly through the ranks of the Royal Scouts and found he had an aptitude for training new scouts. He now resides in Meric fief and is training his latest apprentice, Brandwyn Elfstone, the first female apprentice he has ever had. Other: Ian finds the rangers a bit disconcerting and likes to try to throw them off-balance whenever he can, not that he is ever very successful. He has a weakness for sweets and a passion for books, thus making him a font of information. He is also an accomplished horseman and rides a gray Andalusian stallion whose name is Bandelaro, whom he calls 'Bandit'. Addendum: Ian married Shanna Horsetrader at the Harvest Faire in Whitby (Nov 2010).
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Post by Brandwyn on Jan 12, 2009 18:55:07 GMT -5
Name: Brandwyn Elfstone Age 17 (she is 20 now) Gender: Female Type of Apprentice: Royal Scout School Appearance: She is 5'7" tall with long blond hair that is normally tied back with a blue ribbon. She weighs around 150 lbs., and has an athletic build. Her eyes are blue and her complexion very fare - too fare, for She gets sunburned easily. People say she moves gracefully, though She doesn't really see it herself. She is usually wearing black leggings with calf high black riding boots, a long, poofy-sleeved white shirt and a royal blue vest with matching leather archer arm guards. She has a heavy dark green wool cloak with a deep hood and carries a 45 pound recurve bow with a double quiver of arrows (32 arrows) and a saber strapped to a belt around her waist. She also has a variety of knives concealed on her person. Personality/Attitude: She is generally an easy-going, friendly person, but can sometimes be a bit too serious, especially around strangers. She dislikes being in crowds - especially in small rooms and enclosed spaces (like jail cells or small caves) give her the creeps. She loves horses and archery and snooping where She doesn't belong, but gets the most joy from fencing. She tends to make friends or acquaintances quickly, but doesn't let many people get to know her deeply. She really hates spiders - She doesn't really fear them - She just loaths them. She has above average intelligence and tends to get very frustrated with people who have no common sense. Some have even called her "stuck-up" on occasion because She just ignores people who are just plain stupid rather than deal with them. History: She is a very recent ward of the Baron of Meric after her mother recently died from an infection. Her father had passed away two years earlier in an accident with one of the battle horses. He was a horse master in the Baron's stables. The Baron took her and her younger brother in and offered them places in an apprentice school. She chose the Royal Scouts because She work well with horses (having had some experience from helping her Dad) and likes to wander around sticking her nose where it doesn't belong. Her second choice would have been to follow in her Dad's footsteps and apply for horse-school, but She figured they would think her too weak or small to train the battle horses. Other: She enjoys doing riding drills - where the horses are all lined up and they move as a unit across a battlefield providing support for the foot soldiers. Just a side note: Her mother would never have approved of her joining any apprentice school. She had hoped to marry Brandwyn off to a wealthier noble family. Brandwyn is not particularly interested in getting married and having babies - at least not yet anyway. She wants a life of adventure before settling down. Brandwyn rides a firey bay arabian mare whose name is Asfala. The horse has a redish brown coat with dark brown mane and tail and four dark brown stockings and her nose are dark brown. She has a white star and thin stripe going down the center of her forehead with a little snipe over to her left nostril. The mare is high-strung and easily spooked, but very fast and can travel for hours at a fast pace. Addendum: Brandwyn has fallen in love with Ranger Tandar Polaris and is hoping they will get married some day (how fickle the female mind is when it comes to boys!)(Dec 2010)
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Post by Brandwyn on Jan 16, 2009 20:40:18 GMT -5
Name: Shanna Horsetrader (Retired! She married Ian MacGreggor and they are working on a family.) (Oct 2010) Age: 27 Gender: Female Type of Apprentice: Retired Ranger – gold leaf Appearance: Shanna is rather short, around 5’2” and just slightly plump, but it is hard to tell if the plumpness comes from a wee bit of extra fat or from her rather substantial muscles. She wears loose clothing, usually in greens or blues to disguise just how fit she really is. Most of them are noble ladies dresses or casual hunting garb. She has one close-fitting outfit that is mottled black and dark green for nighttime operations. She has red-blonde hair that falls down to just below her bottom and often keeps it braided or bound up in a snood (Note: a snood is kind of a fancy hair net worn by ladies in the Middle Ages). She is often working “undercover” and so is rarely seen in the traditional ranger cloak, though she keeps it with her always in case she needs it. She keeps a variety of knives concealed on her person at all times and is quite skilled in many ways of their use from throwing them to filleting a fish in seconds. She normally carries her ranger bow with her, except when it would blow her cover. On those occasions she has a special longbow that is disguised as an ornate walking staff and she will often pretend a limp so the staff will not look out of place. She has very pretty, bright blue eyes and few men can resist her smile when she lays on the charm. Personality/Attitude: Shanna generally has a very bubbly personality and tends to make friends very easily. On the surface she appears to be very open and honest and people tend to trust her. Somehow she manages to appear this way even while she is undercover and gathering information or working on some mission. She loves to sing and has a pretty decent voice and she plays a small travel harp. She is a hopeless romantic and die-hard optimistic – always seeing the good in situations and the best in people and uses that insight to manipulate them to get the information or action she wants from them. She is a creature of comfort and dislikes sleeping outdoors on the ground, especially in the cold or rainy weather. She fears snakes and slimy, crawly things as well as growing old and is rather vain at times. History: Shanna grew up on a horse farm Her father had a variety of horses on the huge farm, from battle horses to racehorses to plow horses. She learned how to care for them and about their breeding and how to cure them of many illnesses and ailments as well as how to sell them and what prices to get for each type and training level. She loved the horses, being around them and everything about them. She was very surprised to learn that her father had paid an exorbitant amount of money to enable his daughter to participate in “Choosing Day” when she was 13, figuring she would follow in his footsteps as a horse trader instead. It was not normal for the merchant class to become apprentices in the nobility’s trades like Diplomacy, Battle School, Royal Scouts or Rangers. She was even more surprised to be chosen by a crusty old ranger, Berrigan to be his apprentice. She never understood what he saw in her to make him pick her that day. She had just completed her apprenticeship and was on her first mission – the first away from her Master – when he got into the battle with the Skandians that cost him his leg, and his active duty ranger status. She still feels that if she had been by his side, it never would have happened. Berrigan taught her to play the harp and how to earn a living as a minstrel. She is not assigned to any fief, but reports to Crowley directly for her missions. Recently he had been suggesting that it was about time she started training an apprentice. Other: Shanna has a sorrel colored ranger horse that is almost a pony actually, whose name is Kookie. Kookie got her name because she loves to eat sweets, especially the sweets that Shanna herself really enjoys, and the horse is a bit of a Kook. She also has a male greyhound named Solo. Solo is part of her guise as a huntswoman, but is actually trained to track in addition to providing income by winning races.
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Post by Brandwyn on Feb 1, 2009 8:03:35 GMT -5
Name: Richard “Rick” Greenriver Age: 31 in 655 (age 42 in year 666) Gender: male Type of apprentice: Silver Leaf Ranger Appearance: Rick is tall (6'2") and lean with a wiry build and is very graceful, especially for a man. He has long black hair and high cheekbones with intensely green eyes that give him a hawk-like appearance. He wears his hair in a braid or ponytail secured with a rawhide thong and decorated with crow feathers. He has three scars on his back and a very faint one on his face from the Kalkara attack when he was a child. His favorite outfit is a pair of soft suede doeskin pants with a tight-sleeved T-Tunic, usually in a dark color with a black leather jerkin over the tunic. He wears his ranger cloak over that and carries a powerful longbow and the traditional ranger knives. He has one set of arrows he napped himself from flint as well as a traditional set of arrows with metal points. He makes all his own arrows, using crow feathers usually for the fletching and stains the shafts very dark brown. Personality / Attitude: Over the years Rick has learned to hide his emotions, for the most part, but he is actually a fun-loving guy. He takes his ranger job very seriously but also likes to take time to step away from the job and relax and have fun every so often. He enjoys other people’s company, especially women, and is rarely found completely alone for any length of time. He loves adventure and the adrenaline rush that comes with danger and often takes unnecessary chances because he enjoys it, or to gain some vital information. He has a martyr complex and will throw himself into danger to save another person and always feels he has to help people. He is a powerful friend and ally, but has trouble maintaining any lasting close relationships, preferring to live life fully in the moment and not think about the future too much. History: Rick grew up on the northeast edge of the Solitary Plains and in the rolling foothills of the mountains that border it. His family moved around with a small group of other families, following the pastureland for their sheep and goats from season to season. He has expert tracking skills, possibly the best in the whole Ranger Corps, that he learned from his grandfather by the time he was 8. When he was twelve the Kalkara attacked his tribe. Only he and one girl from another family survived the attack. They were later found by a ranger and taken to Araluen where he eventually became a ranger apprentice. He is currently assigned to Araluen fief on temporary assignment while the regular ranger for that fief is on another mission. Other: Rick has a lynx that follows him around, but it is not exactly tame. He found it when it was young and it had been mangled nearly to death by some other animal, possibly a bear. He nursed it back to health and now it seems to think that Rick is its human. The cat usually will not allow anyone except Rick to touch it and it comes and goes as it pleases. It normally will not go into highly populated areas (like cities), preferring to wait until Rick heads back into the countryside to hook back up with him. Kira is half wild. Rick only has nominal control over her. She is about two feet tall and three feet long if you count her tail. She is a greenish tan color with dark brown spots running in striped patterns all over her. She has tufts of hair on the tips of her ears and her cheeks and big green eyes. Her ears are large and she has big feet for her size. It has been a good three years since his last apprentice earned his Silver Leaf, and so Rick was happy when he ran into Tamlin Fletcher in the city and helped the lad get away from the Theif Lord. Now Tam is his apprentice. His ranger horse is a lined-back buckskin with four black stockings, black tipped ears and a black nose. The horse is half mustang and half steppe horse, thus giving it an exotic appearance. His horse’s name is Domingo.
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Post by Brandwyn on Mar 9, 2009 16:20:35 GMT -5
Katrina de Montgomery or Age: 22 (now 33 in 665) Gender: Female Profession: Battleschool - Knight of the Silver Unicorn Appearance: Katrina is about 5' 11" with deep auburn hair that goes down to her shoulder blades and green eyes. She is well muscled after her years training in the Battleschool and keeps herself very fit. She wears black and silver outfits most of the time, except when at festive occasions at the Royal Court or at Baronial Court functions. Her armor breastplate is distinctively shaped to distract her opponents with her female form. She wears her armor most of the time, even sometimes sleeps in it so that she is completely comfortable in it when it comes to fighting. The armor is black boiled leather with silver plates, silver elbow and knee cops and a black Basinet type helm with silver accents and silver unicorn's etched into the sides of the helm. Her breastplate also has a unicorn etched into the silver plates, filled in with black. She carries a shield with a charging silver unicorn on it, which is the coat of arms she was granted when she was knighted. She uses a longsword most of the time, but is also skilled with two shortswords, a two-handed great sword, a lance and a spear. Personality: Katrina is a very reserved person. She does not make friends easily and so only has a very small group of close friends, most of whom are knights near her own age. She doesn't care much for socializing and avoids people outside the Battleschool generally. She takes her job seriously, a little too seriously actually, but is very good at it. She likes to intimidate men, especially the normally large, muscle types in the Battleschool. She has a strange sense of humor that most people just don't get. Being one of very few women to go through Battleschool and become a knight, she learned to be tough and to act like and blend in with the men though she likes to flaunt her femininity on the battlefield because it gives her an edge. Women at court tend to shun her and most men find her strange, so she does not normally elicit much interest from the opposite sex. That suits her just fine, since she feels that she will never get married or have children. That is not to say she does not enjoy male company, but she tends to be very cavalier with her relationships, not wanting to get any more involved than a few "tumbles in the hay", which is another reason that she is not considered to be of "marriageable quality." That attitude of other people towards her amuses her greatly. History: Katrina was an only child and had the misfortune to be born a girl when her father wanted a son. He therefore raised her as if she were a boy, despite her mother's protests. She managed to convince her father at an early age that she wanted to become a knight, so he paid an excessive amount of money for her to begin training at age 9 as a page and then moved up to squire at the early age of 12, after already learning the basics of swordplay and riding. She was knighted in Norgate at the age of 17 after rescuing a group of men-at-arms and three other knights who were pinned down and cut off from the rest of the army in a particularly nasty battle with the Scotti. She got the charging Unicorn as her device because of the ferocity of her charge in that battle and because she did not give up until she had opened up an avenue for them to escape. Additional Information: She has a reputation of being fearless, but what she fears most is letting her guard down with other people and making herself vulnerable. Battle horse: Katrina rides a large white Battlehorse mare that has two black socks on her back legs and a black diamond shaped star on her forehead. Her horse's name is Ace of Diamonds, or "Ace" for short.
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Post by Brandwyn on Mar 30, 2009 14:30:44 GMT -5
Avalea Goldsmith or "Lea" (Lee-ah) Age: 25 Gender: Female Profession: Acquisitions Expert of the SWC - trainee Appearance: At only 5' 3" and 115 pounds, Lea is small and agile. She has a thin frame and is very flexible along with a perfect sense of balance, which makes her an exceptional acrobat. She keeps in excellent physical condition and is able to climb nearly anything exceedingly fast. She has short blond hair that generally sticks up on the top and she keeps it cut only long enough to cover her ears and the back of her neck. She has blue eyes, but they change to a stormy gray when she is angry and are more of a steel blue when she is in a good mood. She is not particularly pretty with a face that people tend to forget after she is gone, but is one of those faces that always remind people of someone else. She wears tight fitting clothing most of the time in dark blues and greens or black. She has knife sheaths in all sorts of places, usually carrying 8 to 12 knives on her person at all times. She doesn't use a sword and is only moderately accurate with a bow, but is deadly with a knife. She wears a very dark brown cloak, which is useful for both daytime and nighttime operations to blend into her surroundings. She also carries some other specialized climbing and scouting equipment. Personality: Lea has a quick wit and is highly intelligent, but not educated beyond some rudimentary reading and math skills. She loves a good fight and a challenging stealth job. She lives life on the edge, taking risks, being reckless and even being a bit of a dare devil as long as it doesn't risk her teammates. She loves heights and swinging through trees or from a rooftop to the street on her silk rope. She flirts with just about every man she comes across and will take the flirting as far as the man wants to go with it. She has no qualms about one-night stands. In fact she prefers to keep her relationships without any strings attached. She does not trust people when she first meets them and is suspicious of everyone's motives. She has come to rely on her team in the SWC, but is having issues with trusting them completely. She is often accused of being insane or at least slightly imbalanced and has a bit of a bloodthirsty, ruthless streak that will come out when she is furious at someone. She has an obsessive-compulsive type personality, but has managed to stay away from alcohol or drug addictions. She doesn't like to loose control, so that is why she rarely drinks. Her obsessions are stealing, playing with knives, adrenaline rushes and sex. History: Lea lost her parents and siblings to a plague that wiped out most of her village when she was 12. She never got sick from it and spent days burying the dead with the few others that survived the disease. She left the village and headed into Caraway, living on the streets. She had to work as a whore to survive the first few years but eventually learned to persuade men to take care of her. Lea kept moving from city to city and fief-to-fief as she conned men to take her around the Kingdom. She has lived in almost every fief's capitol city at one point or another and knows her way around all of Araluen. She learned to steal from a particularly adept thief's guild in Drayden fief and it was there that she honed her climbing skills too. In Greenfield fief she took up with a master knife fighter for almost a year when she was 16. He taught her how to throw knives and do hand-to-hand combat. Lea would have stayed with him, but he was killed in a street fight one night when a deal went badly wrong. He took four of them with him before they got him. She killed two more defending him, but in the end there were too many and she had to flee and leave his body behind. She made her way back to Araluen fief after that. She got into trouble for stealing, caught by a ranger at age 17 and was given a choice of going into the army or going to prison. She chose the army. She figured she would hate army life, but was surprised to find out she actually liked it. She rose quickly through the ranks because she followed orders precisely and swiftly and she took chances. She found the men in her unit often turned to her for guidance, though she really didn't seek out to command them. Her superiors noticed it too and promoted her up to corporal at an early age of 22 in spite of her coming into the battleschool later than most. Lea could not keep her old habits in check, however, and often performed some nighttime operations of her own. Sometimes she purloined items from supply for her bunkmates. Often she went scouting around the city, keeping tabs on the lowlife's activities, and sometimes she eavesdropped on her superiors. She usually found out very interesting tidbits of information about the army and learned a lot about its internal politics that way. That is how she found out about the Special Warfare Corps, the secret group of elite scouts headed up by a large man named Captain Dougal. She snooped some more and found out as much as she could about them before she confronted the Captain. She was determined to join them, but wanted to make sure he wouldn’t turn her away because she had also found out he was very distrustful of women. She had applied for the job through normal channels, but was turned down because she was a woman. So far he had not chosen a single woman to be in his Corps and she had decided that she would be the first, whether this Captain Dougal liked it or not. She spent weeks setting up her plan and waiting for the Captain to come back to Araluen to report to Commander David or the King. She finally got her chance late one night when Captain Dougal and two of his men entered the city and got a suite at one of the seedier inns in a bad section of town. Lea took out his first man who was keeping watch on the door by dropping on him from the ceiling of the hallway when he opened the door to her "knock." She hit him upside the head with the butt of her knife and rendered him unconscious. The only sound was of his body hitting the floor. It was enough to alert the other man inside the room, but she didn't give him a chance to react. She did a series of back flips across the room, stood on her hands and wrapped her legs around the man's neck and flipped him sideways head first into the wall. He too slumped to the floor unconscious. She swiftly picked the lock on the door to the inner room where Dougal was presumably sleeping. She figured he would be awake by now and so pushed the door open and rolled into the room down low. Dougal was waiting for her, but his swing went way over her head as he was expecting a man standing upright. She swept her leg out and brushed him off balance, but he didn't fall all the way down. She'd given herself just enough time to regain her feet and pull her long knife in one hand and a thick bladed heavy knife in the other hand. She used the long blade as a shield, keeping the flat of the blade along her forearm and striking out at Dougal with the hilt of the knife, not wishing to truly injure him, but showing off that she could be slicing him up if she chose to. "The name's Lea Goldsmith." She said as they did a dance around each other, exchanging blows. "You should have chosen me." She said evenly and punched him in the stomach with her knife. He landed a blow on her cheek that made her reel, but she moved with the punch, spun around and hit him in the kidney with the butt of the heavy knife. "You should have chosen me." She repeated. And so the fight went for several minutes, neither of them was gaining the advantage, neither trying to kill the other. With every blow she repeated, "you should have chosen me." With every blow from Dougal, he left a serious bruise, but the beating didn't seem to faze her much. Finally Dougal growled at her, "No women in my unit," as he punched her hard in the stomach. At least he tried, she had already done a back flip and landed just the right distance from him for a good kick - right in the groin. As the kick landed, she said, "why? Can't you handle one woman?" She smiled sweetly at him. Dougal fell to the floor, clutching his groin, but Lea was already gone out of the room, the echo of her voice came back to him, "you should have chosen me." A week later, still nursing some severe bruises all over her face and body, she had her transfer orders into the SWC. That was when her life really got tough. Now she was past the halfway point in her training and still holding her own against the men in the SWC. Captain Dougal was twice as hard on her as any of the other recruits, but she welcomed the challenge. Additional Information: Lea's Gear: In addition to the normal scouting gear, Lea carried the following: Grappling bow: This is a mini crossbow with a special grappling hook that folds up to look like a cross bow bolt with a string tied to the back end, but when the bolt begins to drop, the air forces the three hooks open so it can grab onto things like window ledges. The rope is a thin, strong cable made from silk threads. It is strong enough to support Lea's weight and a bit extra, but probably not strong enough for a very large man. Lock-pick set: This is a set of tools useful in opening a variety of locks and defusing traps on locks. Make-up: She carries a special make-up kit that contains dark green and tan colored make-up so that she can camouflage her face, or darken it so her pale skin does not show up at night. Climbing shoes: These are special soft boots with supple reinforcement in the toes so that she can grip stone walls with her toes without tearing up the toenails and they give her added traction when scaling just about anything. The big toe is separate from the rest of the toes in the shoes. They are made of layers of soft doeskin. Skull cap: She has a black, tight fitting hood that she pulls down over her light hair and neck for nighttime operations. The hood is made from linen. Rope: She carries a hundred foot long silk rope that is a quarter inch in diameter. It is normally coiled up around her torso from one shoulder to the opposite hip when she is on a mission. She can ride a horse, but is not exactly comfortable on them. She normally prefers to walk or run instead of riding.
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Post by Brandwyn on May 26, 2009 4:34:39 GMT -5
Henry Dell Age: 25 Gender: Male Profession: Soldier: Man-at-arms; Sargeant-at-arms in 657; Master-at-arms in 666 Appearance: Henry is 6’3” tall with sandy blond hair and sparkling brown eyes. He is trim, yet muscular with washboard abs and not an ounce of fat on him, but is not your typical hulking fighter. He normally is clean-shaven, but his beard grows fast and so he often has that five-o-clock shadow look. His face has that rugged square jaw, high cheekbones, and a straight nose, and is considered to be quite handsome by most women. He wears typical soldier clothing most of the time, but for fancy occasions, he has a couple of very nice outfits, one in blue and one in green, both with gold trim. He normally wears leather armor and carries a long sword on his hip and a short sword between his shoulder blades along with a couple of daggers. His shield now has Katrina’s badge painted on it and his fighting over tunic is black and silver to identify him as her man-at-arms. Personality: Henry is honest, straightforward and trusting. He loves to have a good time, but does not like to be in the limelight. He prefers to sit back and observe people, especially in formal social situations. He comes from a family of cow herders and loves animals. He is very polite and formal to most women and finds their attention a bit embarrassing. He was initially attracted to Katrina because she treated him the same as his army buddies did and ignored his good looks. Later he wished that she had shown more interest in him. He is intelligent and a quick learner and fiercely loyal, first to Katrina and secondly to the Crown. History: Henry grew up on a farm in southern Norgate in a good family with a bunch of brothers and sisters. He yearned for adventure, so when he turned 14 he joined the army. He quickly made friends and became the guy in the unit that everyone could count on to back them up and the one who helped his classmates when they fell behind or needed help on the obstacle course or the runs. He often mediated disputes between his army buddies and rarely got involved in arguments or confrontations through school and even afterwards. He was stationed in Macindaw Castle just recently where he admired Katrina from afar until his first mission with her. He went on a border patrol with her and three other men and she nearly ran them all into the ground with forced marches and endless days of hiding, spying and hiking through the wilderness with little or no sleep. The other three men were heartily glad to return to Macindaw and do what they can to avoid being assigned with her again because she was such a hard taskmaster, but Henry worked out a deal with another man and got a second patrol with her. Now he is Katrina’s man-at-arms and is generally pretty happy. Additional Information: Henry is now Katrina de Montgomery’s personal man-at-arms and is responsible for her safety and ensuring she has what she needs to do her job. He is hopelessly in love with her, but doesn’t figure he has much of a chance with her because he is a commoner and she is nobility.
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Post by Brandwyn on Aug 10, 2009 12:21:26 GMT -5
Antonio (Tony) de Cortina (Alias: Tony the Razor)Age: 31 Gender: Male Profession: Sea-faring merchant specializing in acquisitions Appearance: Tony has tanned skin (Mediterranean) with black hair and a bushy mustache but no beard. His hair is kept neatly trimmed to his collar-line and his mustache is immaculately groomed. He has startling blue eyes and a long hooked nose and high cheekbones. He has a short scar under his right eye, shaped in a crescent moon, turned on its back. He sometimes wears an eyepatch over that eye even though he can see out of it just fine. Tony wears sailor’s breeches and a poufy sleeved shirt with a black vest with gold trim and a red sash around his waist over his belt. His shirt is normally unbuttoned showing off his well-muscled chest and trim body. He normally goes barefoot when on a ship, but wears thigh-high black leather boots with wide brims and a soft sole on land when not disguised as a noble or merchant. Around his neck is a pure gold chain with a gold medallion of the face of a primitive island king stamped on one side and an eyeball stamped on the other side. (He has never revealed where he got the medallion, but guards it jealously, never removing it.) He carries a Scimitar in a scabbard hanging from the belt around his waist and a dagger in each boot as well as one on his waist and sometimes carries small throwing daggers tucked in various locations of his clothing. He has a wide-brimmed leather hat with a band around the crown with two long peacock wing feathers died bright red stuck in the band and a pin in the shape of a hawk pinning up that right side where the feathers are tucked in. He also carries three or four pouches on his belt under the sash. One of those pouches contains tiny sharp blades that are not long enough to kill a person (unless used on the jugular) but can create nasty cuts bad enough to leave scars. He had them specially made by a blacksmith friend. The pouch containing his money does NOT hang off his belt on the outside, but is often tucked into his shirt where it is tucked into his breeches or the inside pocket of his vest – or so he would have you believe. Personality: Tony is generally in a good mood most of the time but does not joke around overly much. He is very charismatic and his men will follow him to hell and back if he asked them to. He is well-liked by nearly everyone in his crew. He is a fair captain, spreading the loot around and punishing those that try to hoard some for themselves. He can be very cruel when provoked, but can also be very generous when pleased. If he is pushed by someone he will push them back and make their life so miserable they will normally decide to stop messing with him. He is very smart and knows the seas inside and out between Toscano, Araluen, and Skandia. He is also great at disguises and blending in with various elements of society from the streets up through Royalty. His specialty is running cons on rich people, so he spends a lot more time listening and studying people than he does talking or revealing things about himself. He loves the sea and hates being caged. He doesn’t trust “landlubbers”, dogs, politicians or lawyers. He is an excellent swimmer but can’t ride a horse very well at all. He fears sea serpents, giant octopus and mermaids and swinging from the end of a rope around his neck. He tends to believe most of the old sailor’s superstitions and in magic. He believes that having a woman onboard a ship is bad luck for the crew, but not necessarily bad for the ship itself. History: Tony was born in Toscano along the coast in a fishing village. His father was the local Baron and had always expected Tony to continue on in his place over the fief. However, when Tony was 11 he was in the wrong place at the wrong time and was accused of killing a visiting dignitary from Gallica. There were people who bore false witness against him and he was sentenced to be hanged. He escaped on a ship and soon became a favorite of the captain and crew of that ship and worked his way up quickly from Cabin Boy to Sailor and eventually to First Mate. Whenever they put into port in Gallica or Toscano, he stayed aboard ship, not taking any chances that he was still on a wanted poster somewhere. The ship he lived on was called The Krackatowan Razor (named after a Volcano), and it was a merchant ship, hauling cargo from Toscano around to Araluen, Celtica, Pict and sometimes up into Skandia and Tuetlandt. His Captain was quite old, but an honest, decent fellow. When the captain died from a fever in one trip up to Skandia, the crew voted Tony their captain. Tony continued on with legitimate cargos for a couple of years but realized that there was significantly more profit to be made in smuggling illegal cargo. Since he was already an outlaw, he figured he didn’t have anything to lose, so he got rid of crew members who objected and took on a more ribald crew and soon became known in the underworld as the man to have to haul your illicit cargo. He was dependable and soon was getting bonus money for bringing in rare cargo through customs in all the countries without detection. He managed to maintain a legitimate merchant image under his adopted name, Antonio de Cortina to cover for his illicit activities under his other, more widely known name of Tony the Razor. Eventually, he (Antonio) was commissioned a Letter of Mark from the Toscano King that allowed him to search and seize any cargo ships coming out of Aslavia or countries farther east that were in Toscano waters. A percentage of the cargo seized was given to the Toscano King and he kept the rest. His wealth increased, as did that of his crew. His ship became known and hunted in Aslavia as did his name, Antonio de Cortina. But business was so good that he eventually took to seizing cargo ships from any country that were in Toscano waters and keeping all the loot for him and his crew if they were not Aslavian ships. The only ships he did not prey on were those flying Toscano colors. Eventually, the King got wind of his new activities and put a price on his head and Tony was forced to spend less time in Toscano waters. He now operates around Araluen, Celtica, Gallica and sometimes Skandia. He has a hideaway port on a decent-sized island in the ocean where he can sail his ship into a cave to moor it to be safe from storms and prying eyes. He is wanted under either one or the other of his names, if not both in Toscano, Gallica and Aslavia. Additional Information: He now owns The Krackatowan Razor and is very proud of his cargo ship. It is one of the fastest cargo ships around, though military ships can outrun it when the hold is full. He has made many modifications to it, such as a reinforced hull to withstand harpoon and catapult fire longer and the addition of three ballistas on each side and one aft. He increased the sail so it would catch more wind so it would go faster and he installed oars that he can run out if the weather grows calm. The oars are not as effective as those on a Skandian wolf ship and are used only for emergency situations. The oarsman hold is very tight and cramped, not leaving much room for the men to row. There are only 8 oars on each side. He has a small black cat with long legs and tail and a long triangle-shaped face with golden eyes that he named Spook. Spook likes to ride on his shoulder most of the time and wrap her tail around his neck. She weighs about 7 pounds and is a dainty little cat. Tony believes she is part Siamese because of the shape of her head and her loud meows. She has one front paw that is white and a white tip on her tail. The Krackatowan Razor’s Crew:Captain: Tony the Razor First Mate: Mortimer Kinkaid (Mort) (Tony’s right-hand man – over everyone except the Captain) Quarter Master: Leroy Levane (Lee) (played by Cutebaby’s) (In charge of the cargo and supplies) Sail Master: vacant (previous Sail master was killed in the last raid) (Sail Master is in charge of keeping the ship underway and gives orders to the crew) Shipwright: vacant (repairs the ship when damaged and is in charge of all maintenance. He may order the crew to perform maintenance or repair tasks.) Cook: Wenton Rothburn (Burn) (in charge of feeding the crew) Sailors: (full crew complement is 25 sailors. Names will be added as they come up.)
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Post by Brandwyn on Oct 12, 2009 17:16:20 GMT -5
Ashton Lewis Thornbury"Brother Ash" Age: 20 Gender: Male Profession: Priest Appearance: Ash is tall and lanky, but moves gracefully with smooth elegant motion in everything he does. He has very long, very blond hair that he sometimes wears loose flowing down to his waist and sometimes braids into one or several pigtails. He has blue eyes and thick, dark eyebrows. His eyes are almost more of a gray than a blue, like a mountain lake during a thunderstorm. He has long, elegant fingers with perfectly manicured nails. Ash wears floor-length, loose-fitting white robes required by his order. Under those robes he usually wears a long-sleeved, light-weight linen shirt and linen leggings. Most often he wears midnight blue slippers with hardened leather soles, but for nasty weather, when he is going to be out of the Monastery, he has a variety of boots, all in midnight blue. He keeps his clothing immaculately white and hates getting dirty. His facial features are nearly identical to those of his mother and with the long blond hair, he is often mistaken for a woman. He does nothing to dispel the illusion. Personality: Ash is a scholarly sort, always with a book in his hand and a serious look on his face. He rarely laughs or smiles, unless it is something he is reading about in a book that strikes him as funny. He doesn’t like being around people and finds most people stupid and inferior. He has no interest in developing friendships or more intimate relationships, preferring his books over living beings. He is highly intelligent and has studied a wide variety of subjects intensely, becoming very “book” smart, however he is lacking in many basic social skills. Besides the books, he enjoys the lessons in kung fu and “centering” that allow him to feel peace and deal with his inner turmoil. History: Ash is the 11th son out of fourteen born to Count Arthur Thornbury III. His mother was the Count’s fifth wife and she despised her cruel and power hungry husband. Arthur Thornbury, Ash’s father, is known throughout Araluen as a very astute business man. What is not known about him is that he made most of his fortune through underhanded, clandestine deals and double-crossing his friends and enemies alike. He has many connections to the underworld and organized crime. Other than his two oldest sons, which he is training to take over the family ‘business’ Arthur despises his 21 other offspring, both boys and girls. The girls he uses to further business deals and alliances by marrying them off to whomever he thinks will benefit himself the most. Thornbury has a history of using up his wives by keeping them pregnant until they die in childbirth or from some similar complication and then moves on to a new wife, repeating the cycle. Ash’s mother managed to keep control of her children and taught them to read and write and gave them a thirst for knowledge, knowing that they would have to fend for themselves once she was gone. She also instilled in them a deep sense of honor and the ability to tell right from wrong. With that came the understanding that their father was a truly evil and selfish man. Ash grew to hate him as he listened to his father beating his mother night after night. One night, when he was 10 his father went too far and Ash saw his mother beaten to death right before his eyes. His heart turned to stone that night and he vowed his father would suffer horribly. He followed the plan his mother had already made and drilled him on and escaped the Thornbury castle that night with his twin sisters who were only seven. For two years they lived on the street, Ash providing for them the best he could and protecting them from the street gangs. Eventually he found a nice country family that was willing to take them in and he stayed with them for a couple of months, but never felt like he belonged. He gravitated towards the local priest because of his love of books and the faith that his mother had in the church. He ended up joining a monastery where he could study and secretly plan his revenge on his father. His sisters still reside with the family in Redmont Fief. Ash’s two full-blooded sisters are the only other people in the world that he cares about. Additional Information: His sisters are Arielle and Anyia (Thornton) Compton. Staying with Farmer Compton half day due west of Redmont Castle. Ordained priest of the Order of the Benedictines
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Post by Brandwyn on Apr 11, 2010 18:53:59 GMT -5
Glorfindel Helga Theronsdottir (“Fin” or “Glory”)Age: 28 Gender: Female Profession: Merchant: Blacksmith and Jeweler (former mercenary) Appearance: Fin has russet red hair and bright sparkling blue eyes. She is 5’10” tall and her muscular, solid Scandian build is a result not only from her heritage, but from several years training as a fighter and more years wielding the blacksmith’s tools. Though she weighs 190 pounds, there is not an ounce of fat on her, the weight is all muscle. She wears her hair pulled back in a long braid that reaches down well below her buttocks and is tied up with a leather thong normally. On special occasions she wears it loose as is common for an unmarried woman from her country. When working at the forge, Fin wears a heavy, brown leather apron that covers her from chin to knees over a brown leather halter top that supports her ample breasts but leaves her arms and belly exposed. The outfit is designed to relieve some of the heat suffered from the forge, but it also has the added affect of showing off her considerable muscles. She wears dark brown leather knickers that go to just below her knees where they meet up with light tan leather boots that are laced in a criss-cross pattern from ankle to knee. When she is just selling her wares in her merchant wagon, she wears the traditional Skandian woman’s underdress and overdress often in shades of blue with two large brooches (one at each shoulder). The overdress is just a rectangle piece of material that is pinned at the shoulders and the underdress is a light colored material with tight fitting sleeves and a scooped neckline. The hem that falls down to her ankles. She likes to slit the skirt up the sides for ease of movement. Often she wears her fur boots, a fur lined hat with a bell on the point and a fur vest during the colder weather. She is always armed with at least one sword and dagger suspended from a brown leather belt around her waist. She also has a pair of wooden shoes that she wears when there is a lot of ice on the ground. These allow her to skate across the ice without falling down. A very long leather bull whip is coiled and tied to a loop on her belt. Personality: Fin is an outgoing, lusty, life-loving woman who generally prefers the company of men to that of women. She enjoys the more bawdy and surly type of men who generally make up the majority of sailors and soldiers. She has a quick wit and a ready sense of humor. She loves a good joke told well almost as much as she loves a pint of good ale or honey mead. If not for her obvious feminine appearance, she could be mistaken for a man based on her behavior. Most men find her very easy to talk to and get along with – up until they try to take “liberties” with her. Fin has always fought against the traditional role of a woman of Skandia, so she has never married. She wants to see the world and she has no desire to settle down in one place for the rest of her life. She does long for male companionship, however, and occasionally even has thoughts of desiring children, but she feels she would have to give up her life of travel if she were to get married. She would be very happy if she found a man willing to put up with her roving lifestyle. Fin is great with people and a shrewd negotiator. She is very artistic and pours her soul into every piece of jewelry or weapon she creates and has a talent for tailoring commissioned items to their owner’s personalities. She also gets along very well with most animals, especially horses and dogs. She has a fondness for bears resulting from a particular incident in her early childhood. She is very competitive and athletic and often rises to challenges and dares, risking herself on bets when a good profit can be won. She is fearless to the casual observer, but once someone gets to know her, they can see her softer, more feminine side and the fact that her greatest fear is dying alone on the trail with no one to mourn her or care that she is gone. She also has a fear of snakes and some insects of the deadlier variety. She is not really fond of big cities, but has gotten used to them through her interactions as a merchant. She hates war and the gore and death of battles and does not understand why people can’t just work out their differences without fighting. History: Glorfindel was born and raised in Skandia in a sea hold called Bruinheim, along the Stormwhite Sea not far from Hollasholm. Her mother calls her “Glory” while everyone else calls her “Fin”. Her father was a blacksmith, and although her mother tried to birth several children, Fin was the only one who survived beyond the age of 10. Her father began teaching her the basics of smithing, since he had no son to pass the business along to. At age 14 she followed an impulse and stowed away on a wolfship, hiding in the forecastle until they were so far out to sea that when she was discovered four days later, suffering from dehydration and hunger, it was too late to take her back to Bruinheim or even Hollasholm. So they were forced to take her with them on the raids. A couple of old sailors took her under their wing and treated her as if she were just another young lad on his first voyage. They taught her some basic fighting skills with sword and axe. She had made herself some basic armor that fit her well, but was not of the highest quality workmanship since she was still learning the finer points of weaponsmithing, armouring and forging. Although this first voyage exposed her to many things and she gained a vast amount of experience in a short time, she discovered that she loathed the idea of her people stealing from other lands’ hard-working peasants who were only trying to scrape out an existence for themselves. She felt no remorse over taking from the wealthy however. But she began to develop the idea that trade was a much more savory way to earn a living than raiding. After that raiding trip, she returned to her father’s forge and set her mind to learning as much as she could of the trade as quickly as possible. She began to develop ideas for jewelry and other marketable items based on what she had seen in her travels and from visiting merchants. She decided that she wanted to travel the world, see the sights, and make money all at the same time and determined that the merchant life was the one for her. So she set about building herself a wagon that would be pulled by four Skandian draft horses and would house living space and her merchant wares and her forge and tools. She built the wagon with only a little help from a wainwright and her father. It, along with the traditional crafting of ones smithy and tools were her “exam” and defined her graduation from apprentice to journeyman as a blacksmith. She spent a couple more years plying her trade and skills both as blacksmith, Ferrier, and fighter until she had enough money to purchase the draft horses to pull her wagon. At age 19 she set off in her wagon, bound for Tuetlandt and the lands beyond. She travelled the main land for several years and never grew tired of life on the road, seeing new places and meeting new people. She was welcomed in most places and even developed a circuit for three years, returning to the same places, carrying goods for other merchants from place to place in addition to her own wares. Eventually she desired to see Araluen and the island countries and so she found a ship that could transport her horses and wagon and set off for Marshwood Fief. She fell in love with the land there, it being similar to her own home of Bruinheim. She now considers Marshwood to be her home and divides most of her time between the towns surrounding Marshwood Castle and Stoneheath Castle. She travels in her wagon during the summer months through Caraway, Araluen and Norgate and even up into the Scotti Mountains and then back to Marshwood on the Scotti side of the border, trading, smithing, and selling her armor, weapons, jewelry and other trinkets. She generally spends the first half of the winter in Marshwood and the second half in Stoneheath and frequents the Ruddy Duck and the Dancing Bear inns for companionship and to keep up with the news outside of the Fief. Additional Information: Her four horses look like Shire horses, being black and white pinto colored with huge, shaggy feet and long shaggy manes and tails. They are now in the prime of their life at around age 13 and have many more years ahead of them. She knows how to fight with two short swords, a long sword and dagger, a two-handed bastard sword and with Florentine axes or one-handed battle axe, but she is not a great fighter. She is adequate – maybe slightly above average, but certainly not highly skilled. She carries a dagger at her belt and normally one in each boot. She has been known to use red-hot pokers as theft deterrents on occasion.
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Post by Brandwyn on Oct 16, 2010 9:04:36 GMT -5
Bunt LevinssonAge: 55 Gender: Male Profession: Ranger Appearance: Bunt is a very tiny man standing at barely 4 feet 11 inches tall and weighing only 123 pounds. He is thin and wiry, almost to the point of being skeletal, but he has amazing arm strength for his size, given that he has pulled his 80 pound longbow for the last 40 years. He has dark brown hair that falls straight and neatly to the middle of his back and green eyes with crow’s feet at the corners. He has a grizzled looking face and often there is a shadow of razor stubble on his chin and jaw. There is a very old scar running from his left eye down his cheek and back to the base of his ear in the distinct shape of a large horse shoe. He wears black or dark brown linen pants with an alternating long wool tunic that goes to his knees, normally worn over a dark blue or green long-sleeved under tunic with a high neck line. Often he wears a white linen shirt under the tunic for warmth. He always looks like he is cold, even in the heat of the summer. He wears the usual ranger gear and weapons along with a small double barrel crossbow and a long black quarterstaff carved by his hand from a black walnut tree. The staff has runes and primitive-looking animal carvings its entire length and each end is encased in bronze up to about 3 inches from the ends of the staff. Most often he uses it for walking, but it is actually his weapon of choice if he is forced to fight in close quarters. He has a holster for it slung over his back that attaches to the quiver so he can carry it while still using his bow. Normally he will have either the bow or the staff in the holster and the other weapon in his hand. He generally has a very serious look on his face, some would even say a sour face and he often walks like a weary old man just so no one will know that he really can move like lightening when he needs to. Personality: Bunt likes to keep people guessing about him and his intentions. As he has gotten older, he has really played on the “old man” look and often tries to depict himself as being closer to 70 years old. He makes people think he is a crotchety old man who is very bitter and looks on most everyone as a nuisance. He talks very little, often just grunting or saying as few words as possible, but his eyes can convey volumes, especially to someone who is pestering him. Occasionally one could hear him muttering under his breath when he is displeased about something. He appears to be absorbed in his own little world, oblivious to what is going on around him. In reality Bunt is very quick witted and observant. He hardly ever misses anything that is going on around him. He makes a note of something and can remember it to the most minute detail months or years later after having only glanced at it once. He has always been very reserved and quiet and does not interact well with people outside of his professional ranger demeanor- meaning he does not socialize when he is not on duty. In his mind he is always on duty. He is fiercely loyal to the Ranger Corps and secondly to Araluen and the King. He is suspicious of most women upon meeting them at first, but there are certain ones he has come to know that he would trust with his life. This suspicion comes from having his heart broken when he was in his twenties by a beautiful fiancé. So he has a tendency to believe a man over a woman in most arguments brought before him. As he neared adulthood and it became apparent that he was not going to grow any taller, he was teased mercilessly by his siblings and their friends and so he withdrew from people, tending to adopt his mentor’s way of hiding in the background and going unnoticed. He learned to keep people at a distance and therefore he does not make friends easily. Despite that, he is very caring and sensitive and a giving individual – once a person gets to know him. But he is very reclusive and withdrawn so getting to know him is not an easy task. He also has a sweet tooth, loving confections and since he cannot seem to put on any weight no matter what he eats, he will avail himself of sweet cakes and confections whenever they are available. He is leery of most horses, with the exception of his own ranger horse, which is the third one of his career, having lost the other two previous ones – one to old age and the other to a mountain lion attack. He also is not fond of heights and hates climbing. He is deathly afraid of scorpions and not all that fond of spiders or most other insects for that matter. Water predators like crocodiles and water moccasins also un-nerve him. History: Bunt was actually born in the southeast of Araluen to a family that raised horses and named Timothy Jarvis Levinsson. His family, the few who are left, still calls him TJ for the most part. He earned the nickname ‘Bunt’ from his oldest brother and his friends when he was 11 and got kicked in the head by the family plow horse. The kick nearly killed him, breaking his jaw and cheek bone and nearly caving in his skull. But he recovered from the kick with only the dreadful looking horseshoe shaped scar on his face to show for it – and the nickname 'Bunt' his brother gave him for getting bunted in the head by a plow horse. Much to his dismay, the name stuck until everyone but his mother and sister were calling him Bunt and he eventually accepted it as his own. At age 13, his father started putting him on race horses because he was so small and lightweight. He won many races for his father and increased the value of their breeding stock considerably over the next two years. However he did not like being around the horses since he had developed a fear of them from the near-death experience, so he declared his intention to seek an apprenticeship at the age of 15. His father was against it, but in the end his mother persuaded his father to let him attempt it. Neither believed a trade would accept him as an apprentice and felt he would return and resume his duties on the horse farm. At Choosing Day, he was just as surprised as his parents when the local ranger agreed to test him to see if he had any potential as a ranger. He had never seen a ranger before and only heard stories about them being sorcerers and such and so was not very happy with the selection. He had been hoping to get into the battle school but figured he didn’t have much chance of that. As it turned out within a few weeks he was happy with the ranger training and his mentor was able to work around his fear of heights and horses to mold him into a ranger with keen observation skills. He picked up the use of the bow easily as well as the knives. He seemed to have a natural aptitude for using weapons and his mentor often commented that it was a shame he was so small or he might have made an excellent knight. He made friends with a battleschool apprentice named Bill Temple and learned enough basics with a sword to be able to pick one up and use it, though he is not skilled with the blade. When he was twenty-three he ran afoul of a gang of outlaws, one of which trounced him good with a quarterstaff. They captured him and held him for three days before he managed to escape. Once the tables were turned, and he had the man who had beaten him so badly in his control, he made a deal with the outlaw that if he would teach Bunt how to use the quarterstaff, then Bunt would let him go with a fine and a warning that if he were caught again, he would go to prison. He spent three months then going to the outlaw camp and learning the finest points of the quarterstaff until he became nearly an expert with it. During that time he actually befriended many of the outlaws and was able to get jobs for many of them and restore them to productive members of society. Although some of his ways were rather unorthodox at times, he excelled as a ranger and soon had gained the confidence of the Ranger Commandant and his peers. He has been assigned to several different fiefs over the course of his career and trained many apprentices, though he has never stood out in the Ranger Corps as being remarkable in one area or another. He is content with the lifestyle and proud of his career and plans to die wearing the silver leaf, never retiring to the gold. Additional Information: Bunt’s ranger horse is called Low Belly because the horse loves to eat. Unlike his master, though, Low Belly has a tendency to gain weight, especially in the spring and fall when the new grass comes up. Bunt usually calls her LB or Low Ball and they trust each other implicitly. Bunt constantly has to pull LB off the grass or out of a manger full of hay.
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Post by Brandwyn on Dec 21, 2010 12:10:43 GMT -5
Sir Timothy Baskerville du Lac Noir Aliases: Timothy of Norgate, Timothy du Lac Noir and possibly others Age: 30 (41 665) Gender: Male Profession: Knight Errant (Fugitive: wanted for murder in Norgate) Appearance:Tim is 5’11” tall with wavy dark auburn hair that he is letting grow out long and it now reaches down just barely between his shoulder blades. He normally wears a circlet made of a narrow band of brass with a knotwork design etched into it. At regular intervals around the circlet were six set-in sapphires. He wears black trousers with a black wool under tunic. Over that is a dark gray tunic with long sleeves made of soft leather he tanned himself and dark gray riding boots that laced all the way up to his knees also made by him. His hands are normally covered in black suede leather gloves and over everything he wears a black woolen cloak with a wolf fur trim that hangs all the way to the floor. He has it clasped at his neck with an elaborate cloak pin in the design of a falcon with tiny sapphires for the eyes. The sapphires match not only the stones in the circlet but also the bright blue of his eyes. The woolen clothing used to be of high quality, though it was a bit travel worn and there were mends in several locations where the rents in the fabric most likely were caused from battle. His craftsmanship with the leather items is quite good. His face is angular with high cheek bones, straight forehead and a long straight nose. His chin is slightly rounded, and his lips are full and expressive. Overall he is quite pleasant to look at. At first glance most women would find him attractive, but with his normally guarded expression, they would deem him unapproachable unless he is trying to be friendly or charming and then he is quite likable. He sometimes has a beard and mustache and at other times he is clean shaven. When he does grow a beard he lets it grow long, but keeps it trimmed nice and shapely so he still looks tidy. He wears very fine plate armor of high quality steel that has been blackened to make it harder to see at night. The armor is definitely made for him as it fits him perfectly and he is very comfortable in it. On the chest plate is etched a knotwork design sporting two falcons, one on each breast that are facing to the center. His right shoulder is adorned with a leather pad hooked to his armor, the kind a bird of prey would sit upon when not in-flight. On close inspection of his gloves, one can see that the right hand is reinforced with thicker leather so that a landing falcon would not tear into his hand, yet the fingers are not hindered by the thickness of the leather. The sword at his hip is a longsword of highest quality and has a very elaborate hilt. The pommel is in the shape of a falcon and there are sapphires set into it for the falcon’s eyes, matching the cloak pin. The cross guard is wide and has gold filigree knotwork on both sides that trail down onto the wide base of the blade. There is writing on the blade in flowing script that is in Gallican. The writing on the blade is: Montent libre. Vivre avec noblesse. In dur! Which means: Soar free. Live nobly. Die hard! The scabbard is black with reinforced black studded leather tip and accents. He rides a huge black warhorse that has long, narrow yet sturdy legs with big bushy fetlocks. The horses black tail falls in gentle waves all the way to the ground. His arched neck is completely covered by a long wavy black mane that falls down to the horse’s knees. The forelock goes all the way to the nostrils. The horse has a very intelligent look in his eye and is very docile around Tim, but will not let anyone else near him. He wears a black leather bridle with silver studs inlaid with tiny sapphires. The breast strap and padded saddle match. The saddle is a custom design with a moderately high back, but a lower, hornless pommel. There is a split in the seat, but each side is highly padded and the underside is soft leather with wool padding. This allows the horse to feel the slightest shifts in Tim’s balance or leg positions, even to the contraction of certain muscles that cue the horse as to his rider’s wishes. The blanket under the saddle is black wool and tied to the back of the saddle are a set of large black saddle bags with silver buckles. Between the saddle bags is a bedroll and on top of that is a hard, waxed leather case containing a hurdy-gurdy that Tim often uses to accompany himself when visiting Inns or Taverns when he is in need of some extra cash. The instrument case is waxed on the outside to keep out the water. A black waxed leather water bladder hangs from a loop on the front of the saddle and a horseman’s crossbow hangs from the loop on the opposite side, along with a double quiver full of bolts. Personality / Attitude:Timothy is a tortured soul and as a result can be very moody swinging dramatically from jovial to morose with the slightest of stimuli. His life is ruled by guilt over a terrible act he committed in his youth. To atone for that act, he feels that he must help the feeble and battle evil wherever he can. He does not accept much in the way of payment for these services, only the barest minimums to live on such as food or clothing or services if he cannot pay for them. Normally he will turn down offers of coin when he helps someone unless he is really desperate. He can be very charming and fun-loving at times, particularly if he is in an ale house enjoying the company of the fairer sex, or trying to persuade a potential foe that they do not want to cross blades with him. He is very charismatic and enjoys manipulating others and swaying their opinions to match his own although he does not have a great deal of opportunity to interact with people on a daily basis. A great deal of the time he is somber and enigmatic, preferring not to speak and sulking in some dark morass of fear and guilt and self-loathing. A haunted look often occupies his face when he is remembering the past and then it is swiftly followed by a look of guilt. He has nothing to lose, so he is fearless in battle, figuring that he will one day die by the sword. He is at peace with that and he is surprised that he has survived this long. He often tackles impossible odds when he is in a dark mood so that some might think he has a death wish, yet his sense of self-preservation is exceedingly high. Timothy is also very intelligent and loves the finer things in life and to study books of science and philosophy. He likes to figure out how things work and how he can improve upon designs. He is an excellent artist and carries a hand-bound book of parchment that is filled with all manner of sketches of animals, people, landscapes and studies of various subjects. His creative side is often at war with his analytic and scientific side, just as his emotions rage back and forth within him. He is a man wound very tightly and with his knowledge of weapons, warfare, strategy and the baser arts of thievery, outlawry and banditry, he is a dangerous man, although he considers himself a victim of his circumstance and that he was forced down the path he is on. History:Timothy was born in Norgate to a wealthy, noble family. His father was a Knight as was his father before him and so forth back as far as anyone in the family could remember. They did not hold any lands granted to them by the Baron or the King, but over the years the family had made several good businesses and they now owned a couple of estates, land and several mills dotting the Norgate countryside. Timothy was the 5th child and the 2nd son born of his father, Thomas Baskerville and his Gallican mother, Gabrielle Du Lac. He was raised as a page to the Baron of Norgate until he reached the age to enter the battleschool. His mother taught him Gallican and he learned to speak, read and write Araluen, Gallican and Pictish, and studied all manner of topics with the local monastery while he was a page and in his early years as a squire until his battle training took precedence. He excelled in the battleschool, having a great deal of natural ability, undoubtedly handed down from years of military service. He could ride the feistiest of stallions with ease and won many a competition with sword and lance during his five years as an apprentice. His future was very bright and all laid out before him in a neat little package on the day of his graduation and his knighting ceremony. He was eager to follow that path and everyone thought he would have a long and prosperous life. It wasn’t until two years later when his entire life unraveled with a single, rash act. He committed murder, driven by rage and betrayal. The act was particularly vicious and the authorities were going to hang him for his heinous act. Timothy managed to escape the night before he was to be executed, with the help of a friend from battleschool. He ran from the castle, taking his armor, weapons, horse and a small number of personal possessions including his instrument of choice, a hurdy-gurdy. Disowned and shunned by his own family, he had nowhere to turn but into the deep woods of Grimsdale. Posters went up all over Norgate and then a bit later, he found out as he travelled farther away from home, all over Araluen. Several times he was recognized and nearly caught until he finally grew a long beard and mustache and dyed his hair a lighter color for many months. Pursued by rangers and guardsmen, he stayed on the move, living off the land and occasionally singing for his supper or a room to sleep. Eluding capture time and again, he kept to himself as much as he could until a couple of years had passed and the wanted posters faded and were not replaced. He learned to melt into the forest, leaving no trace, much like a ranger can do. He felt terrible that he had killed two people and knew he was damned. .Because of his guilt, Sir Timothy felt that he needed to atone for his sins and so he decided that the only way he could do that in his current situation was to use his sword for good. He now roams the country, mostly in Norgate, ridding the area of bandits and outlaws, but also helping the oppressed live better lives, defending the border against Scotti invasions, rescuing people when he happens to be in the right place at the right time and other general good deeds that involve not only his sword, but also his strength. Sometimes he will help bring in a crop or raise a barn or house or plant the fields or deliver a cow. Whenever he is able to right a wrong he does so, even to the point of risking capture on occasion. After 15 years or so of living by the sword, Timothy has grown into an expert swordsman and hunter. He is very adept at tracking animals or humans through the wilderness as well. He goes by the names of Timothy of Norgate or Timothy Du Lac now, to avoid being recognized. Though it has been so long, there are few left who know or care about him or his heinous deeds when he was young and foolish. He has not seen an updated wanted poster on him in over 15 years and wonders if he is still hunted. Occasionally he has gone back to Norgate castle during some holiday or celebration and checked on his family. It has been 7 years since the last time he had done so and at that time he had made contact with the first girl he’d ever known to be admitted to the battleschool. Timothy had known her father when he was a child and had looked up to the now Duke as a hero, following the Duke around and soaking up all the information he could while acting as a page for Duke Montgomery. Timothy had befriended young Katrina and given her some private swordsmanship lessons in their arranged meetings out in the wilderness for the first two years of her apprenticeship while he was a fugitive. In return she kept him informed as to the happenings in the castle. They’d had to end their sessions, however when her duties as squire heated up and she no longer was able to sneak off into the woods on a regular basis. Other:His original horse was killed by mountain lions and he managed to purloin a colt from the battleschool stables in Norgate, leaving behind all the gold he had at the time to pay for it. The amount was probably not half what the horse was worth, but he had been forced into the action, needing a battlehorse in order to ply his trade as a knight errant. The colt he stole is now over 15 years old and is Timothy’s closest friend. His horse’s name is Tonnerre which means ‘thunder’ in Gallican. He also has had a couple of different hunting birds over the years. His current bird is a female Peregrine Falcon he calls Fléchette which is ‘dart’ in Gallican.
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Post by Brandwyn on Nov 9, 2011 19:52:32 GMT -5
Heather "Lightfoot" Oasterhoff Age: 36 (in the year 657) Gender: Female Profession: Ranger - Silver Leaf Appearance: (OOC: Heather “Lightfoot” Oasterhoff is pronounced ‘owe-stir-hawf’) Heather is rather short, at five foot three inches tall and has reddish blond hair that she keeps trimmed to just below her shoulder blades and often wears it in a ponytail or two Gallican braids one on each side of her head and tied up with knotwork beads and a leather thong. Sometimes she curls the braids into tiny buns right behind her ears, but most of the time she just has it in a ponytail at the base of her head in the back. She has blue eyes with long lashes, high cheek bones but a rather oval face and high forehead. She keeps her bangs long so it is nearly in her eyes most of the time. She is rather thin, but not skinny weighing around 135 to 140 pounds and very athletic and limber. She steps so softly she can sneak up on people easily and that earned her the nickname of “Lightfoot” in the Ranger Corps. She also gets that from her ability to climb trees like a monkey and mountains like a goat. She likes to wear earthy browns and greens but the style of clothing varies. She is comfortable in her brother’s farm clothes, but she likes to dress up like a girl every so often. When on duty she is most often seen in loose brown pants with ankle high soft suede leather boots that have a thick sole with a pointed toe and large cuff just above the ankle. They are dark brown. Her undershirt is often green, but occasionally she has a dark blue one on. All her undershirts are of lightweight linen and have long sleeves, though loose they are not exceptionally large and poufy. The outer tunic she wears depends on the weather. In the summer they are sleeveless jerkins, usually made from leather thicker than suede, but thinner than saddle or armor leather so they move and bend easily. She prefers them to be very dark brown or deep dark green. In the winter she has two very heavy long-sleeved leather jerkins padded with black wool on the inside for warmth. One is very dark brown and the other hunter green. The jerkin buckles up the front with dulled copper buckles and leather straps. It is loose enough so that she can move easily and to provide an air cushion for warmth and the leather is soft and supple rather than stiff so she can bend and move however she needs to. She normally doesn’t wear a hat, except when she pulls her ranger cloak hood up to ward off the rain, cold or conceal her face. When she needs to hide or blend into the terrain, she has a neck band she knitted from black and gray wool that she can pull up over her nose and mouth. When it is too warm for that, she has been known to paint her face in mottled patches with green and black face paint (medieval make-up). She got the idea from having seen the plains people paint their faces when they were warring on each other. She carries her long bow, a quiver of arrows on her back and keeps two extra on her horse and her saxe and throwing knife. She also has a spear with a square pike point rather than the traditional leaf shaped point. The spear has special holster behind her saddle on the right side that allows her to grab it and push the peace-tie knot off the holster with her thumb which then opens the holster up freeing it in one swift motion so she can draw it and throw in a matter of a couple of seconds if she needs to. She also uses the spear as a walking stick, it having a metal band on the opposite end, especially when she goes hiking in terrain too rough for her horse. Her other gear consists of the usual camping gear and standard ranger gear along with a brown belt sporting two pouches and her pouch of money she keeps inside her tunic tucked in her bosom nice and safe. She has a bedroll, saddle bags, and a center saddle bag that rides on top of the bedroll behind the saddle. This houses her clothes, personal items and a few books. This center saddle bag is large and made of oiled and waxed leather and is designed to shed rain so the contents stay dry in all but the most horrendous weather. She has a hand-made solid silver mirror and hair comb that were given to her by her mother and have been in her family for generations and she considers them to be her most valuable possessions. Personality: Heather is polite and friendly on the surface and generally gets along well with most people, but she doesn’t let people get to know her real well or open up to the majority of people. She has a wide circle of acquaintances but very few really close friends. She is a determined and tough individual who is generally fearless and adventurous. She will try most anything once, unless she feels it is truly stupid or suicidal or someone is trying to get her to do something just to win a bet. She has a hard time fully trusting people, especially other women. She is far more likely to make friends with men than she is with women. She doesn’t like being used by other people and when she gets angry she gets very quiet and reserved. It takes a lot to get her truly angry, however, but when she does get pushed past her limit, she explodes and generally most everyone around her ends up taking damage. She also tends to distrust the nobility and rich people in general and is secretly very envious of their wealth and status, though she doesn’t even admit that to herself. Most of the time, however, she is fairly friendly and for those in her close circle, she will talk their ears off. She is very intelligent and fairly observant and prefers to sit back and gather information than be in the limelight. She tends to examine problems from every angle and play devil’s advocate before reaching a decision on important issues. She is often sought out for her leadership abilities and her wisdom by her peers and even some of the nobility she interacts with as a ranger. People tend to look to her for guidance during a crisis and when in crisis mode she can quickly assess the situation and make snap decisions that benefit the majority of the people involved. She is shy about her appearance and thinks that she is rather homely and average in appearance. She even has some self-esteem issues in some areas but is rather arrogant when it comes to her intellect. She tries to be a good person, but occasionally finds herself torn when she has to do something bad for the greater good. She does not believe the ends justify the means, but finds she is often placed in that dilemma as a ranger, so she struggles with it daily. She fears dark, damp holes full of creepy crawling critters but she doesn’t mind exploring caves. It really depends on the cave though. She loves to climb trees and rock formations and she loves to swim and ride horses. History: Heather was born on a farm in the southern edge of Heatherwood Downs Fief along the eastern shores of Araluen. Her father had a warped sense of humor and thought that naming her Heather from Heatherwood was hilarious. Her mother was forced to go along with it and hoped it would make her daughter stronger. Most of the holdings in the area were either horse farms or cow farms but her holding was mostly agricultural. Her family did not own the land they farmed. They were tenants for the local Lord who actually owned the land. He was a good man, however, and did not interfere in his tenants or even his serfs’ lives or livelihood as long as they faithfully tithed two-thirds of their crop to him. Half of what he brought in each harvest from all the tenants and serfs went to pay the Baron who he was sworn to. They raised vegetables, apples, cherries and other fruits and berries and had a few milk cows, pigs and chickens for their own use to provide milk, eggs and beef. They traded for other goods like wool, leather and metal. They also grew flax plants and her mother and sister spun it into fine linen. Heather learned to die the linen in many bright colors and it was one of the main crops that supported her family. They were poor country folk, but never lacked food or a place to sleep under a roof, so overall they were not that bad off. She grew up in a large family that was about as normal as any farm family can be. She has three older brothers, one older sister and two younger sisters and one younger brother. She used to have four older brothers, but one of them died when she was 11 in an accident. Stuck smack dab in the middle of the brood she never received a great deal of attention and learned to sit back in the shadows and go unnoticed most of the time. She liked it that way, for she was far more able to get away with forbidden activities than some of her siblings. This of course solicited a lot of resentment among some of them and they tormented her mercilessly as a child and even into adulthood. All of this teasing, tormenting and often physical fighting toughened her up and she learned to shrug off a lot of discomforts and to bottle up her feelings inside. She encased herself in a protective shell which very few people have been able to penetrate and which became very prominent on the days immediately following her brother’s death. She learned to take care of herself and not depend on anyone to get her out of situations that her siblings got her into. Her mother was very loving, but did her best not to show favorites among any of the children. She had certain activities she shared with each child that they came to appreciate as adults. For Heather it was horseback riding for out of all the kids, she was the only one that shared her Mother’s love for horses. She never remembered learning how to ride for her mother had her on a horse before she could even walk by herself. It was the same with swimming. For all she knew she was born being able to do both. Her father taught her farming and harvesting and her two older brothers taught her to hunt. She is not particularly good at hunting though and hates to kill animals, although she knows how to live off the land if she has to. When she was 15 she attended the fief’s Choosing Day Fair with her family. They had gone to sell their vegetables and fruit and were taking turns minding the booth. She happened to wander up near the court area where the Choosing was taking place and unknowingly positioned herself at the end of the line of candidates so she could watch the proceedings. The Battlemaster came up and looked over the candidates and asked for those that wanted to become knights to step forward. A good portion of the group near her did so and he went through and selected several from the bunch, asking some of them questions. The same procedure followed for the couriers, but a far smaller group volunteered for that job. Next the local ranger came forward and he didn’t say a word. He walked up the line and then back down the line, ending up only five feet from where Heather was watching with interest, not quite sure what the ranger actually did in the fief, but knowing that a great many people either feared him or respected him, or both. She looked down at her toe, digging a hole in the dirt and sighed wistfully, wondering what that kind of life would be like but knew that she would grow up as a farmer like everyone else in her family. When she looked up again she jumped back, startled that the ranger was standing in front of her. “I choose you. Come with me.” Heather just stared at him with her mouth open and then tried to explain that she wasn’t among those who wanted to be picked for an apprenticeship. He refused to take no for an answer and so she ended up becoming his apprentice and after five years, a full ranger. Later he said he had seen her climbing trees and shooting her brothers with acorns from a sling and had been impressed by her climbing skills and her accuracy with the sling. She was now stationed back in her home fief of Heatherwood Downs and liked the fact that she saw her family regularly again, but still had the ranger cabin and lived apart from them. They now noticed her and even looked at her with a bit of fear or apprehension at times. Heather did nothing to ease their tension around her and rather enjoyed the attention she now received. Her brothers no longer picked on her in a mean way, although they did tease her about her profession and her clothing. Her sisters teased her about not having a husband and her being an old maid but Heather didn’t mind that. She really didn’t want to have children and certainly didn’t want to be tied to a farmstead like her parents were. Although she loved her job, she had been through many tough times and adventures that had nearly broken or killed her and from each incident she grew tougher and stronger and more withdrawn emotionally. She thickened up that shell a bit more with each passing year and now wore it like a badge of honor. Among the Ranger Corps she was generally well-liked, but she wasn’t particularly close to many of the rangers. She liked to be alone, as so many of them did. Still, she often found that she was restless, bored or possibly even depressed and found herself asking if this was all there was to be of her life. When she asked herself what more did she want, however, she didn’t have an answer. Additional Information: She knows how to use the spear on horseback and how to use it as a quarterstaff in close combat on foot, having learned a few tricks from her ranger mentor and a battleschool friend. She also has a sling tucked into one of her saddlebags and occasionally uses it when she remembers she has it or is out of arrows. She has a piebald appaloosa horse that has one green eye and one blue eye, the blue being on the white side of the horse’s face and the green being on the red roan colored side. The horse’s nose is dark brown and the rest of her coat is a hodgepodge of colors ranging between brown to roan to tan and interrupted with large white patches. Inside the white patch on her rump is a whole spattering of small brown spots and even smaller roan spots. She looks like a white horse that someone splashed brown and red paint all over. The horse is partly from ranger stock and partly from the plain’s ponies but it was ranger trained. The mare’s name is Shasta. She is a smart horse and has a good temperament but is a little too fearless and curious for her own good. Of the two of them, Shasta has more sense to know when to avoid trouble than Heather does, but both of them tend to rush headlong into disaster without fear. Heather and Ben's mountain cabin:
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Post by Brandwyn on Feb 12, 2019 23:04:53 GMT -5
SAGE WINSTON: Age: 17 (in year 654) {Rebellion in Gorlan} Age 28 in 665 (2019) Gender: Female Profession: Ranger Apprentice (Ranger in 665) Appearance: Sage has very long blond hair that falls down to her buttocks. She often wears it pulled back in a pony tail with a few flowers tucked in. She has blue eyes and sun-darkened skin. Sage is of average height around 5’5 and looks thin at first glance, but has honed her muscles to fine athletic form. She moves gracefully and is very pretty. She wears traditional ranger apprentice clothing, carries a bow, a sling and 2 knives. Personality: Sage loves nature and being outside. She communes with the trees, birds, flowers and animals, or at least that’s what it appears she does. She can climb trees with ease and swims like a fish. She always sees the good in every situation and in most people. She smiles a lot and loves a good adventure. She is a little bit on the wild side. Sage normally makes friends very easily and gives generously of herself. Her wild side often gets herself into hot water and often her friends right along with her. History: Sage grew up in a nice cottage on the outskirts of a large village in a small southern fief. She was the daughter of an artist and a cow herder. Her father spent most of his time out with the herd, moving it from one grazing area to another or taking the cows to market. He was not home much, but he did take her on trips occasionally and taught her how to ride, rope, and camp in the wild. He tried to teach her to hunt, but she refused to kill any animals. Sage’s mother crafted amazing stained glass for the noble’s castles and several churches. She inherited her mother’s ability to see the beauty in everything and her father’s wanderlust making her a very good candidate for a ranger. She was pampered and well cared for and grew up in a loving, eccentric home. She was chosen by Bunt as an apprentice after he caught her releasing the animals in a traveling circus. He only caught her after a thorough investigation and was impressed with the way she planned and executed her illegal act. When he confronted her, she admitted it openly and he gave her a choice of becoming his apprentice or turning herself over to the Baron for punishment. She was now nearing the end of her apprenticeship and it was likely she would face the trials at the next Gathering. Additional Details: Her ranger pony is a shaggy brown and white paint mare with big feet named Acorn.
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