The long night held sway over the lands north of Darkhaven. Pain was the
first order of business, any day that the peasantry awoke. The martial law
imposed by the Legion was absolute, giving praise to their Princess of
Darkness and her Master, Darkhan. Any rumblings of discontent and the
riders would come forth, slaughtering entire swathes of the small villages
that dotted the countryside. These times of tumult made even the most
stalwart of companion turn against their neighbors, if they felt the edicts
were violated. Even so, some still practiced the old religions. They gave
praise to the seasons, worshiped the growing things and were thankful for
any small favor of the fates.
One family, the Trochiaks, were often found to be creating their effigies
and leaving offerings of fruit and sugar upon their sills. Each was
supposed to bring good fortune, but it was truly the smallest of tokens of
thanks to the Light that they were still fed and clothed, that the fields
were still green, despite all else that befell them. Being that the father,
a man of good breeding fallen upon hard times, also happened to be a smith
of renown from the West, these small offerings were overlooked. And so, the
family of three, mother and father and boy child, were left to their
devices, content in their simple existence under a dark tyranny.
As with all such stories, the dark turn came when the child was heard to
exclaim to Sarich during a childs game. A small thing, but the guard took
the butt of his spear to the child, breaking his arm and hands. The father,
hearing of this, took his hammer and found the guard, murdering him
outright. While most stories, at this time, would take a far darker turn,
this one leaves off with somewhat of a twist. You see, the boys parents
were no fools. To kill a guard was surely death, so they fled, back to the
West, from whence they came. They came upon a grove, where men were in
prayer and also in martial training. Hearing of their need and their
flight, they took the children in and the bald men who were their guardians
turned their pursuers away, by force. The boy child was given to their
tutelage and even now, the sound of the smithy hammer rings out, forging and
taming the wild of nature, into order.
Description:
Tall with long limbs which are too long for his body, this man has a
black receding hair line, which only serves to strengthen the feeling that
everything about him is stretched. His face is shorn clean of any hair,
though that may be the only homage to ritual cleanliness with dirt clinging
to his face and skin. It seems fresh, as if he has constantly upon some
journey and the road dust has become a stubborn companion. Dark eyes look
out from the worried lines of his face, over the top of an oft broken
crooked nose. Tracing down his long arms, his spindly fingers look
calloused, even to cursory inspection, with the worst of these being upon
his knuckles. They are not sunken in, instead each piece of rough skin
makes a neat circle directly over the center of each knuckle.
