Ryathane Azor Goldwell
Thane, though he has found only one person in his recent travels whom he trusted enough to give his real name to.
Aliases: Eli Grimm and Shade Thatcher are his favorites, but he will, however, use as many he feels he needs.
Age: 19
Race: Just an abnormal human, as far as he's concerned, but plenty of others like to claim otherwise. Which is just fine by him.
Appearance: His medium-length hair is mostly a dark brown that sometimes looks black, though a few lighter spots streak through the strands. His eyes are heterochromatic, one a piercing blue and the other an eerie red, and often gain him unwanted attention. He has a handsomely strong, angular face, and well-toned muscles, though it’s difficult to tell the latter from beneath his normal clothes wear. He has more of a neutral skin tone, his hands are semi rough and calloused, and he stands at about 5’ 9”.
Clothes Wear: He always wears a loose black hooded scarf, which he usually keeps up to hide his face from people in towns. He wears black gloves with metal bracers over them that look layered, tall boots, and a knee-length coat tied with a thick, blue fabric belt, the coat’s uneven hem tattered from ware. He also wears a leather belt over the fabric, around which he keeps a short sword, a quiver full of arrows, and a small leather pouch. In the pouch, he keeps his money and other small trinkets for quick use. He also has a backpack in which he keeps a couple spare clothing items, a small medical pack, and food when he has it to spare. He hates carrying the pack around with him in towns, so tends to hide it either outside a city/town or somewhere in the building where he is staying.
Weapons: He has collected quite a few through the years. A small but powerful recurve bow and arrows for hunting, a short sword that that curves to create triangular point near the hilt in the otherwise straight blade, two stiletto daggers—one hidden in each boot—and a couple throwing knives tucked in a thin sheath designed to be hidden beneath his arm bracers.
Abilities: He has unusually quick reflexes, is very agile, has considerable strength, and has honed his senses to a great capacity. He is an expert marksman, hunter, fighter, and thief, and has uncanny night vision.
Personality: Though he often appears laid back and relaxed, even cocky at times, he is always on alert, ever vigilant of any who might recognize him or mean him harm. He is calculating and a loner who usually trusts no one but himself, often making him seem cold and distant. He is also a proud soul, and hates to admit defeat or outright accept help. However, to the few friends he has scattered over the land, he is loyal and even playful, and would watch their back as long as they watched his. He commonly does things based on the gain it would have for him, but, deep down, he has a kind heart and hates to see people, especially children and women, hungry and begging on the streets. He is always on the move, and takes up various jobs wherever he can to make money and get food and other supplies —that is, when he doesn’t steal it first.
Major Negative Traits: Major problem with authority. Cocky, and even a little overconfident. Doesn’t trust people, and hates admitting when he needs or receives help.
Major Positive Traits: Compassionate toward children and (some) women, though he won’t admit it. He knows well how to survive on his own. Loyal… on the rare occasion when he finds someone to give his loyalty to. Playful.
Quirks: Having spent so much time alone, he tends to talk to himself. He often fiddles with something, whether that be his weapons, a long blade of grass, or whatever is in his immediate reach.
Cherished Object: Hidden in a pocket on the inside of his pants, he keeps a pendant he believes to be a red diamond, a tarnished silver wire winding intricately around the teardrop-shaped stone. Even when he needed the money the most, he refused to sell it; it belonged to his mother, and serves as a reminder of the woman’s kindness that still clings to his memory in wispy strands.
Distinguishing Marks: Many scars mark his chest, arms, and back, each a reminder in itself of only a few of his hardships. The oldest ones from when he was a child training in combat are little more than just-visible silvery lines, while the newest of the collection are about a year old.
Bio: Born to a farming family on the outskirts of a village, Ryathane lived the first four years of his life with his loving parents. Until, one fateful night, three men clad in cloaks attacked the family in the dead of night.
Despite the attackers’ shocking skills, he and his mother managed to escape. However, the woman had been wounded and died before the night’s end. Through luck and perseverance, the child managed to reach the nearest city.
Though he was too young to fully understand what was happening around him, nightmares of the men who stole his family from him would haunt him for years to come, in later years driving him without success to search for the murderers. He has spent many years pondering over the question of who they were, those people who turned his life upside-down and inside out, and why they had chosen to attack them.
In the city, an older man in little better living state than Ryathane found the exhausted, starving boy and took him under his wing, teaching the child in the ways of a thief. Even at a young age, Ryathane displayed a talent in stealth and thievery, which the man used to his advantage. Once a well-renowned fighter, the man, who went by Nathanial Bates, also taught Ryathane how to fend for himself, his tactics brutal but effective.
When Ryathane turned eleven—his aptitude for fighting and hunting already surpassing the man’s—he discovered the man planned on selling him for a handsome price to an organization of rebels who claimed to be seeking the downfall of the royal family.
Feeling betrayed, the boy ran away, taking whatever he could carry and getting as far from the man as possible. Using his natural intuition and other skills, he managed to survive on his own, his duo-colored eyes making it difficult for him to blend in and remain unnoticed for long within the crowds of cities. He began picking up odd, even shady jobs, stealing for others for pay and other necessities.
Sometime after he turned fourteen, he banded with a small group of teenage thieves. Though they had been wary at first, his skills and budding reputation gained him at least some sliver of their trust. He spent about a year with them, and they became as close to a family as he had had in ages. He had even begun to fall deeply for one of the two female members of their ragtag group, and she for him.
Alas, when Ryathane was fifteen, the girl, Reza, betrayed him and the others of the band of thieves, turning them in.
Seemingly by accident, the authorities found them after they succeeded in pulling off a particularly large heist. Only Ryathane and, with his help, the eldest of the band—a boy two years older than Ryathane who went by Fox—escaped.
Though they tried to free the others, their plan went wrong, sabotaged by Reza, who had stayed with the others, her involvement unknown to her former companions, in case the two decided to attempt a rescue. Of the five captives, the guards killed two and severely injured Fox in the crossfire as they tried to apprehend Ryathane.
Even outnumbered, Ryathane managed to escape, carrying the wounded Fox with him despite the older boy’s protests of leaving behind his friends. They left the city that night and hid in the shelter of the forest.
The next morning, the living three of the band were hung for their “crimes against the crown,” while Reza was granted clemency and a golden reward.
The two boys stayed together only until Fox was capable of fending for himself again. Abiding by Fox’s request, the two boys parted ways.
Over the next four years, he continued to hone his skills and never stayed long in any city, town, or village, authorities forcing him to either leave or risk arrest. He lived a life filled with betrayal and pain, but still tried to find some good wherever he went. He made very few close friends and allies, but hundreds of acquaintances and even more enemies.
Rumors even began to spread of him:
A boy with duo-colored eyes who could fend off and slip out from beneath the noses of even the most skillful fighters. Who could track and kill nearly any kind of animal—magical or mundane—for the right price. A boy capable of stealing the coat from your back without you noticing until he was already long gone.
