Fiers Hartwine



Human, with a muddled bloodline, possible Fae ancestry. (OOC: Maybe 17% of his DNA is Fae, and a further 3% is goblin-kind. So basically he has sizeable fairy blood, and a negligible (but still measurable) amount of orc/goblin/troll blood. Whatever denomination for that works. Shrug.)



Charismatic, generous, self-sacrificing, bleeding heart. Also tends to lend himself to causes he feels are doomed without him. Can come of as arrogant without meaning to, and has the major virtue of Charity as his muse.

Vain, expects too much, reckless, and can act thoughtlessly whilst attempting to preserve his appearance. Has the major vice of Vainglory.



Became a court bard. Accidentally on purpose made rude allusions about wives, daughters, mothers, and aunts. Subsequently catapulted from court barely escaping a death sentence, and remained on his heels when said nobility massacred his reputation. Was reduced to playing at the scummiest dives in the land, and at one point considered ending it all, having lost his ability to properly sing due to his malnutrition.

Cue the Virtuous Company. Fiers' broken song made some weep, others cringe, but all was decided when one tried to cease the singing, twanging tune, and Fier's fought back. Such was the man's persistence that he has as of yet to be interrupted again. Fiers was nursed back to health, and ever since he has become both a key reputation builder for the Company (not that they need it (and always under an assumed name, given his history)) and he has proven himself to be a fast learner in the field of dueling, which can prove surprisingly useful, depending on the Company's target. (It also makes him look really good.)



Musician of Many Talents; In-depth understanding of musical theory, vast catalogue of music memorized, and can effectively pick up any instrument and play rudimentarily. Is a self-proclaimed master of the lute, vocals, and the lyre.

Apprentice Duelist; Competent combatant with rapier, by no means mastered.

Expert Orator; Is quite skilled at moving a crowd with his words, and is doubly so when employing his music.

Disguise Artist; Is capable of changing his appearance rapidly and drastically, to the point of becoming another person. In addition, both his musical ability and fondness for acting allow him to adopt various dialects and accents, false voices being something of an amusing hobby of his.



Low-Tier;
Ballad of the Ancient Dragon - AOE that allows allies to gain increased mobility, while reducing that of foes. Effectively works like a shockwave that knocks enemies off their feet and steadies/bolsters allies.

Canto of the Forsaken Heroes - Low-tier healing spell, stabilizes subjects close to death, cleanses common poisons/toxins, and can quicken body's healing processes acting as a catalyst, however does not generally provide additional energy. Consider as a "Refresh" spell, or a "Shit, stay alive as long as you can," spell.

Lay of Castagar Ardreth - Conjures temporary illusion of medium size, with either tangibility yet immobility, or intangibility with the illusion being capable of moving location. Tangibility equivalent to leaning on a wall, will fade if forced to break in any way. Also requires constant attention of caster, or risks either fading entirely or losing its semblance to reality.

Requiem of Intent - Low-level empathic spell, invests targets (if not resistant) with emotions or thoughts chosen by caster. Can be used to ward off effects of other empathic magic, or to merely aid with more mundane forms of emotional trauma. However, due to the empathic nature of the spell, this does require the caster to take on the full force of the targets' own emotions/feelings.

Mid-Tier;
Soloist's Elegy - Allows caster to transfer voluntary traits or energies from many targets into one target. All-for-one, so to speak. Spell only affects traits/energies that both targets and target hold in common. Cannot transfer something uniquely endowed in one of the targets to another. Examples of transferrable traits: Nutrition, stored calories, warmth, wakefulness/rest, age, mental stability, endurance, etc.

Choral Symphony - Caster amplifies sonic capacity of all targets in an AOE, effectively granting the ability to emit sonic blasts for the duration of the spell. This spell also bolsters the targets resistance to sonic stress, preventing damage to hearing or the risk of internal injuries. Targets can intentionally cause Discord Bursts, which occur when two targets sonic blasts reverberate creating an explosive effect. There are also variant effects pertaining to the environment the spell is cast in, ex. High altitude, underwater, precipitation, etc.



Lute
Lyre
Rapier, nicknamed "Beggar's Tooth"
2 spare outfits, one flamboyant, one plain.
1 disguise kit (makeup, false beards, spectacles, heels, perfumes)
1 Travel Pack
1 Survival Roll™ (Complete with bedroll, ablutions set, cooking pot, rations pack, coiled rope and full canteen!)
1 Thief's coinpurse, bulging slightly and bouncing whilst hanging from belt.
1 Actual coinpurse, concealed underneath belt.
1 Medallion worn underneath shirt, of unknown personal meaning to wearer.



Fiers has the greatest style and sense of fashion in all the Virtuous Company. Without exception. Challenges to this assertion are met with swift defeat at the hands of a beggar's tooth.



Fiers' fears (pun intended) are as follows;

Fear of failure
Fear of disfigurement
Fear of maiming
Fear of embarrassment
Fear of destitution

So in summary, Fiers's perfect nightmare would be failing spectacularly resulting in his permanent disfigurement, maiming, and subsequent public embarrassment, ultimately leading to the end of his life as a beggar on the streets wasting away. Fiers' fears are quite grounded in reality, as he has run quite close to his nightmare and the Virtuous Company helped him to escape just barely by the skin of his teeth. Also as can be noted based on his personality, his greatest fears are quite egocentric, as he is confident that he can protect the people surrounding him, and that their wellbeing is quite closely tied to his own.

"I’m a healer not your mum, now go and cry somewhere I can’t hear."




Elsie


Human, 25



Elsie can be… somewhat cold. And grumpy. And pragmatic. She doesn’t like trusting people and she doesn’t like counting on them. Even when you get to know her, she doesn’t really tend to warm up to people (although she does treat members of the Virtuous Company somewhat less disdainfully than the general populace). She generally errs on the cynical side - whilst she used to be angry and bitter, now she’s just… kinda tired. She doesn’t really have the energy anymore for righteous anger, and she knows better than to hope. She can be kinda rude sometimes( although she prefers to think of it as forwardness) even towards her patients, although some find her standoffishness to be oddly calming (at least she’s not flinching at the blood gushing out of your abdomen, or screaming.) She doesn’t tend to spare people’s feelings just because, but she doesn’t go out of her way to piss people off either.



Elsie’s is a story that’s all too common. Born in a small village on the outskirts of Auroch, when bandits inevitably raided the small settlement it was ‘too far’ for The Ruling Council to send help. Elsie, only five years old at the time, hid from them under the floorboards of the village tavern where she occasionally helped sweep the floors to earn money to help her parents. She managed to escape detection, but she couldn’t escape the truth that she was, for better or for worse, all alone in the world. Realising that there was no way she would be able to survive alone in an empty village, she packed her bags that night, and left for the Capital City under the cover of darkness.

It was a harsh journey and an even harsher arrival seeing as as a young girl travelling alone, she was an immediate target for all kinds of unsavoury characters. Through a combination of necessity and lessons-hard-learned, she developed an ability to keep quiet and keep out of sight. As she grew to be older, she learned how to make a grown man cry like a little girl with a well placed knee, and as she grew older still and fell in with the aforementioned unsavoury characters, the knee became a poisoned knife and the grown men became anyone she was pointed at by her new ‘friends’.

By the age of fifteen, she was well and truly hardened, bitter at the world and The Ruling Council for her circumstances, and unable to truly trust anyone, even if she wanted to. She was beginning to make a name for herself as a, if not necessarily brilliant, competent and reasonably talented assassin, able to sneak into places easily, assisted by the fact that she was still young and relatively innocent-looking.

And then, lo and behold, she discovered her true calling as a healer all at once. Kinda.

She had a job to assassinate one of the court healer’s assistants - a young woman relatively new to the post who, surprise surprise, looked a little like Elsie. She carried out the job with ease, and disposed of the body, and was just about to leave to collect payment when the healer, an elderly woman with rapidly failing eyesight and early-stage dementia, mistook Elsie for the assistant. Seeing an opportunity to get cosied up to a wide assortment of nobles with an even wider assortment of targets painted on their backs, Elsie assumed the other girl’s place and name (Marcy) , and thus began the most peaceful years of her life.

Over a period of five years, Elsie learned everything she could about healing and medicine - picking up a few healing spells along the way. Gradually, she stopped actively searching for contracts, instead preferring to spend her time learning about science and the human body, how to heal instead of hurt. She told herself that her interest was purely academic - she’d discovered an enquiring mind and keen intelligence that had been left more or less un-nurtured by her previous life, but that didn’t change the fact that she was starting to enjoy her work and spending time with the old healer, and her old skills and abilities were beginning to deteriorate through a lack of use.

And then, as things are wont to do, it all came crashing down around her ears. One night, the old healer was murdered, the next, Elsie was no longer Marcy, and had run off, back to where she came from. She was uncertain whether the old healer’s death was meant as a message for her, a punishment for leaving her old life, or if it was completely unrelated, but Elsie was certain of something- she wanted revenge. Unfortunately, she wasn’t as good as she used to be. Her disappearance meant that the hole she left in the market had been filled by a dozen younger, more skillful assassins, leaving Elsie stranded and frozen out by all her old contacts, with no means of making money seeing as her job as a healer was somewhat illegitimate.

She was homeless, jobless, and prospectless, sleeping rough and just about ready to throw in the towel when a deus ex machina arrived in the form of a couple of badly injured members of the Virtuous Company. They weren’t too fussed about legitimacy, so she offered to help them in return for a small sum. She saved their lives, and in turn, they told her about the company, and finally, she was home.

So far, she has been with the Virtuous Company for a little over four years - treating wounds and illnesses both major and minor in return for room, board, and a cut of the profits. She’s improved her physical abilities somewhat during this period in order to be able to defend herself should the need arise, but she prefers working as a healer as she sees it as more intellectually stimulating.



She worked as an assassin as a child - relying more on her ability to blag her way through closed doors than anything else, but she still has skills in the arena of hand to hand combat, using knives, and general sneakiness. She’s nowhere near as good as she used to be however, and whilst she can hold her own against an opponent who’s not too much bigger than she is and is of a similar skill level, she’s not exactly a one-woman army in this regard,

She is, however a pretty good healer. Ready with an arsenal of herbs, poultices, and magical plants, Elsie has a remedy for most things, presuming you haven’t pissed her off at any point in the recent past. On the inverse of that, Elsie is just as versed in poisons as she is in their antidotes, having relied upon them during her time as an assassin, and then later on developing a fascination for them.



Muffling Spell - A low-tier spell she learnt as a child, quiets her own footsteps so she can sneak into and out of places more easily.

Pain Killer Spell - Basically magic-morphine except without the being high part. Less painful for the recipient and less exhausting for Elsie than a standard heal spell, it’s useful in a wide variety of circumstances.low-tier

Drowsy Spell - A low-tier spell that’s useful for getting patients to shut up and stop screaming/freaking out/moving whilst she’s trying to carry out more complex procedures and spells.

Calm Spell - A low-tier spell that act to calm the immune response, which can be helpful in treating certain illnesses and injuries, and in relieving symptoms. Also helps with allergies to a certain degree.

Healing (Injuries) - A high-tier healing spell -> takes a while and is kinda painful for the patient and exhausting for Elsie, but will thoroughly heal any injuries sustained by the target so long as Elsie is aware of them and can direct energy towards them.

Cleanse (Illnesses) - A high-tier healing spell -> Purges the body of any unwanted ‘foreign bodies’ such as pathogens and toxins completely and thoroughly so long as Elsie is familiar with the thing she’s trying to cleanse (e.g. she couldn’t cure a poison unless she knew what it was). Is, again, time consuming and exhausting, and consequences for failure or misdirection can be dire, ranging from early to late stage symptoms of various autoimmune conditions that can sometimes be more devastating than the initial threat.


In her day to day life, she carries a variety of items used in her work as a healer - ranging from commonly used herbs to clean bandages and the like. She also carries a knife, which she claims is for cutting herbs and healer-y things, but is really for self defense, and in case she happens to run into her mentor’s killer.

When travelling, she carries a backpack of standard supplies - water, cured meat in case of an emergency, a change of clothes, rope, a herbalist’s almanac, a notebook and writing implement. She carries a separate pack with a more comprehensive first aid kit.


Abandonment/Betrayal - There’s a reason why she doesn’t let people in. She’s experienced this far too many times from far too many angles to trust that it won’t happen, and it’s something she’s always looking out for. When it does happen, she tries not to let it get to her, but inside, she’s devesetated every time.

Small Spaces - Hiding under the floorboards whilst everyone you ever knew gets brutally murdered will do that to a person.

Being Alone - As much as she pushes people away, being completely alone hits a little too close to home.

"..."

Alya Eloen

Race

Half Elf

Age

25

Personality

Alya is not a totally attentive person, yet she still remains quite 'down to earth' to a certain extent. Some might say she's aloof, and some might say she's just a quiet, and shy woman. Neither are wrong nor completely right. Rather than quiet, she cannot speak for she is mute. She has trouble expressing herself due to this, usually prompting her to stop trying if someone doesn't understand her the first time. While she isn't the most trusting of people, she extends kindness towards those she is able to through music. Overall, Alya is generally a peaceful person that spends most of her time playing music. The songstress lives freely, going where the wind may take her.

Backstory

Born a mute, most might say that Alya's parents bardic legacy would be in ruins as their only child was unable to sing as beautifully as they could. However, common folk usually misunderstand that singing is not the only thing that a bard has to offer. While Alya was unable to sing, let alone speak, her ability to learn and play a wide array of instruments was nothing short of fascinating. Her songs, along with her half-elven charm, captured the hearts of many; from local taverns to lavish banquets, Alya performed. Her reputation spreading throughout the land. She is often sought after by suitors for this reason, but the young songstress always shows disinterest as they try to put her on a pedestal

Most wonder how such a peaceful maiden became part of the Virtuous Company, however those who wonder never remember that her parents were already part of the Company, working as entertainers as well as supportive combatants. Very few know that the Eloen family's music carries innate magic that affects those who listen. Influenced by the bard's very soul.

Physical Talents

Alya while excels in the art of music. 'Physical talents' is not really something you'd associate with this diminutive character. At most she's able to keep her balance due to her dancing practice, but other than that, her strength is completely lacking in every way.

Magical Talents

While Alya's innate magic may sound very convenient, it is a very dangerous kind of magic to possess and use. Her mute nature, coupled with natural genius in the art of music has further enhanced this magic. The magic of the 'Song Weaver' is governed by the emotions of the Musician; as the Weaver plays their songs, they slowly mold their listeners emotions to match their own or what they intend, more-so than any other bard. Should a Song Weaver lose control of their magic, it could have devastating consequences for everyone within the earshot of the song. Losing control means to get lost in one's own music; unintentionally hypnotising themselves or suffering a complete mental breakdown. A Song Weaver's music is able to pierce through even the loudest of noises as if to make sure that it's audience is listening. With concentration, this magic can be directed at will.

Song Weaver's Hymn[Passive] - Due to her innate magic, Alya's music will always affect her listeners more than a normal bard's music would, regardless of whether or not she's casting a spell. Due to her generally peaceful mind, her music usually has a calming effect on her audience, while captivating them nonetheless.

Equipment

Outside of the clothes on her back and a traveler's cloak, Alya doesn't really bring much on her travels. Of course, she carries her favoured flute and a warhorn that her parents had entrusted to her. She carries a small satchel that holds her ink pots, quills and pieces of parchment which she may use to communicate with others.

Other

• Alya is quite short, standing at around 5'2"
• She favours the flute over most instruments.
• Alya is quite famous, known by most of the members in the Virtuous Company as well as the Ruling Council.

Fears

Alya fears her own magical power. She fears for the time that she loses control and nobody is there to help her break free of her own curses. On the same coin, she doesn't want to stop playing music nor does she ever want to be separated from her instruments, for she feels that she is nothing without them. This dependency and attachment to her instruments and music makes her vulnerable, but also strong.

Like any other person ill-suited for combat, Alya fears killing and being killed. While blood is spilled around her, she herself does not want to be the one to spill it.