Name: Francis Martell

Race: Breton

Family Origins: Born to a family of farmers in the Principality of Camlorn in High Rock

Appearance:
A slightly more haggard Francis. He cares not for the care of his facial hair and has stopped going through the pains of curling his mustache or shaving his jaw and cheeks.

Age: 30

Equipment: Armor/Clothing: Thick white cloth shirt, chainmail hidden underneath, brown leather gloves, long wine-red cloak, Thick black fitting trousers, leather Knee-high boots, black wide-brimmed hat with one red feather and another yellow. A half-moon pendant suspended from a leather cord, a keepsake.
Weapons: Small dagger hidden in boot, long dagger sheathed on lower back, bastard sword sheathed at left side of hip.

Miscellanea(Kept in Pack): Ten lockpicks
Two Potions of Minor Healing
Two Potions of Minor Magicka
Two Potions of Minor Stamina
Lusty Argonian Maid, vol. I
Whetstone
Six large strips of dried meat
One Bottle of Alto Wine, Half-Full and recently liberated from the Golden Gale’s storeroom
One vial of poison, snatched from Krieger’s lair
Favored Skills: Moderately Proficient: Two-Handed, conscripted into the army of Camlorn, he was trained in the use of the War-Knife and the poleaxe
One-Handed, trained in maces and falchions, as well
Alteration, The Principality of Camlorn fields a lot of battlemages, it so happens that Francis was one
Somewhat Proficient: Destruction, you know, battlemage.

Background and a "brief" history: Francis was born in the Principality of Camlorn in 4E178 to a married couple of farmers. From a young age, he helped around the farm. Help constituted as jumping in the puddles with Anna in the field and making sure the family dog was entertained while his parents worked. It was this time that he cherished the most, if asked today, and for good reason. It was a simple time where he had nothing to worry about except waking early enough to make sure his parents wouldn’t find out he slept in the barn again or was climbing around in the rafters or on the windmill. Francis found great fun in testing his dexterity by climbing from one thing to another and scaring his sister by dropping a clump of mud atop her golden hair.

He hadn’t had any time to pursue his great skill of climbing and perhaps becoming an acrobat, as by the time he turned ten, his father ruled that he was old enough to work in the fields. So, for a few weeks, he managed on in the farm, taking over the work of his father while he took over his mother’s tasks and also cared for her, as she had grown ill after giving birth to a girl, Annaliese. His father was not a praying man, but he managed to give in and utter frequent prayers to Arkay to beg that his daughter would live without illness and his wife would recover and to Stendarr, to show him mercy if this was indeed a punishment for the life he had lived.

Only a small part of his father’s prayers were made good on. For the next five years, Francis worked the field and helped care for his sister after their mother’s death. The crops did not yield much in those years, gradually becoming more and more sparse, and not to mention, Francis had not been taught, as his father was too preoccupied with caring for his sister and late mother. After his mother’s death, his father grew distant until finally he had become bed-ridden of his own accord. His father became extremely reclusive and Francis was forced to grow into a man at a younger age than most. With a bag of gold, clothes and food, Francis left with a heavy heart filled with equal parts sadness and anger, carrying his sister with him.

When they arrived in Camlorn, the capitol city, Francis bought a room and begged for a job at the local tavern. He got what he wished for and he and his sister had a place to stay. As he worked at the tavern, cleaning tables, cleaning glasses and taking orders from patrons, he couldn’t help but feel like there was a bit more to life. He didn’t want to end up like one of the poachers, sitting at the bar and drinking away their septims. On the one hand, he was earning a steady amount of coin to feed him and his sister, but on the other, he could do so much more. By the time that his sister was ten, he had left her in the care of the tavernkeeper, a woman with graying hair and a warm heart. Francis left to enlist in the service of the King of Camlorn’s army.

It was here that Francis met his closest friend, Vendel, a Nord who had been abandoned by his merchant parents in Camlorn. Vendel had seen none of his family’s money, nor their faces, and so decided to join the army at the youngest age possible as a source of income. Francis hit it off with the young Vendel and the two developed a strong friendship that lasted through their years of trying to find a place to piss while on watch, trying not to piss their armor while the King threw his parades and Royal Balls, and pissing off the Watch-Captain when they were caught away from post while pissing on watch. Francis was able to keep in contact with his sister due to the fact that he was never put on duty beyond the walls of Camlorn.

Francis was picked as one of the candidates for battlemage training through what was probably some bureaucratic mix-up with assignment papers. He utterly failed at trying to produce any of the great and powerful spells of destruction that were being taught to the prospective mages, but he had somewhat of a knack for alteration.
After a few years in the army, keeping watch at the countless numbers of festivities the King threw every year, Francis and the King’s daughter grew fond of each other. Once the King had found out about the love affair a commoner was having with his own daughter, one born with higher blood, the King struck Francis with the crime of treason and the punishment of death. Francis fled Camlorn with Vendel in tow and his sister following close behind. Francis took them to Wayrest, which had since been taken over by Corsairs, renegades and vagabonds, where they lived for a few years. Francis made his way through life as a duelist-for-hire, settling disputes and urging people to pay their debts.

Two years prior to the Dwemer Return, a notable Necromancer by the name of Cleric Krieger who served as Pirate-Lord Hilaire’s Court Wizard murdered the man’s daughter and fled Wayrest with his faithful conspirators. Francis had heard of this, but he never expected close friends of Hilaire to take him on as one of their chosen crew to track down Krieger and exact revenge on behalf of the King, who was much too sorrowful to carry the deed out himself. He was offered money and riches upon his return on behalf of Hilaire and his vast amount of wealth and plunder, and so with a tight hug and a parting glass with his sister as well as her crescent-moon pendant, he and Vendel left Wayrest with the great Captain Alaire St. Tarley on a two-year hunt for Krieger.

On Stros M’kai, two years later, he had a brief stint of service alongside the Hero of Tamriel, Gorzath, in which he and Gorzaths’s party managed to kill Krieger and escape his lair. Dark things happened under the Mausoleum. Francis still refuses to speak of what he had to do to survive, of what was done to him and what he learned, but ever since then, there has been a blaringly loud voice in his head telling him to hug Vendel, kiss his sister on the cheek and follow the Heroes of Tamriel on their quest before life goes black for him and he’s stuck regretting anything he had or had not done.

Fighting Style: Francis is an adventurer and a duelist, pretty handy with a longsword. In close-quarters, he could use every part of his longsword to effect or pick from the dagger on his back or hidden in his boot. If hard-pressed and sufficiently drunk, his fists, knees, feet, forehead, teeth and elbows could work.

Personality: Some might see Francis as a dashing adventurer with a thirst for life and living it. Nothing could be farther from the truth, though. Francis is an apathetic man who lived out his time in the army of the Principality of Camlorn and was forced to flee from home and the only girl he’s loved, never finding himself lucky enough to find another for whatever reason. He’s a vagabond with as many homes as he has motivations. None. He lives for himself, now that his sister is a grown woman, and wanders because he hasn’t found it in himself to settle down. He accepted the contract that led to his current position in Hammerfell with a shrug given two years ago and regrets it to this day. Though he is largely apathetic and sometimes floating through life, he feels a supreme urge for something more, and his time on Stros M’kai has only made it more severe.

Font Colour: Plain ol’ regular coloring.