Name: Valen Alveul
Race: Dunmer
Birthplace: Morrowind, Solstheim
Appearance: Standing tall for a Dunmer, Valen is quite the specimen. Having spent most his life the bodyguard of a important and often beset public figure and then over a decade fighting bandits and raiders, he is now covered in scars. The most obvious being a long gash down his face and across his eye. He has the usual red eyes of his race, and the elongated ears. Several metal rings pierce his right ear, from tip down to the earlobe and his face is sharp and distinguished. He has his raven black hair in a bun at all times to keep it out of his eyes.
He wears a mask as part of his helmet, it is mainly there to keep his face safe but it also work as a form of intimidation. Over his body he wears a thick weapon coat in the style of a gambeson. It's colored wine red and and it is fastened with a large, broad and black leather belt around his waist. His legs and arms are more often then not armored. This armor, aside from the protection of his gambeson means he wear light lammel styled plate that is fastened to his shoulders and upper arms as well as his thighs. His fore arms are armored with a pair of metal arm guards. His chin is similarly protected with a pair of greaves that terminate below his knees.
Age: 56
Equipment:Horn Bow; Short, compact and powerfull, the hornbow is a kind of shorbow made out of, you guessed it, horn. They are commonly used by horseback archers and nomad people due to their compactness. Valen is something of a virtouso with the bow.
Dunmer Half Spear: A shorter spear meant to be used together with a shield, it allows for easier control and positioning of the spear then a pike or a full spear.
Round Shield; A medium sized, leathercovered shield, round and made out of wood. hangs by his hip. Is used together with the spear and is meant more for bashing and deflecting then blocking anything head on.
Dunmer Gambeson; A long gambeson that reaches from a highcollar down to his knees. Its thickness is padded with horshair to help resist slashing weapons better.
Segmented plate armor: Covering his arms upper arms, legs are a few plates of steel.
Miscellaneous: Memento Ring: A silver ring given to him by Aivilo shortly befoe their affair was discovered. He hands it in silverchain around the neck. It is notably the only jewelry he wears.
Wineskin x 3
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Waterskin x 2
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Flint and Tinder.
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Thirty arrows:
15 Spadetip Arrows: A broad, spade shaped kind of tip that is meant to slice and cut. It is less effecient against armored targets but cuts deep and broad swathes into softer opponent.
15 Narrow tipped: The opposite of the Spadetipped arrow, the narrow tip is meant to penetrate thicker types of armor. Its smaller and terminates in a needlesharp tip. It is meant to punch trough, rather then tear.
Valen keeps half his arrows in the quiver, and the rest in bundles tied to his packing, secured with his bedroll usually. Usually, he has a mix of arrows in his quiver.
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Pipe and Tobacco
Skills
Expert: Bow
Adept: Shield, Spear
Apprentice: Medium Armor, Shortsword, Athletics, Speech
Novice: Mercantile
WeaknessesNight terrors – Watching people he care for die before his very eyes so many times, combined with waking up the face of Argonians slaughtering his mentor has left him with a difficulty to sleep. Something that further leads to his worn out presence.
Alcoholic – Valen is drinking his lfe away, bit by sullen
bit.To him it is a crutch and a copying mechanism.
Racist: Having fought argonians for most his life, he consider them below all other races.
Unstable – To call him ill tempered is likely a insult to ill tempered indiviuals. His fuse is so short, his penchant for violence so great it is a small wonder he has not been killed yet. A lot of this is classical behavior of a long time alcoholic.
Character Background: Born to one of the smaller families of the He was meant to be a cog in the machinations Dunmer nobility. Becouse even if the kingdom of Morrowind has being brought back into glory, ambition never rests. The lone child of his family, he was groomed to become the bodyguard of a up and coming nobleman. Valens father was a ambitious and often times petty man, who's drive to establish a legacy and uplift his family came before all else.
And thus, Valen was raised from early age to be a man of of the sword as well as the tongue. He was trained by numerous men and women in the arts of combat as well as etiquette. He spent many a night studying the ways of the lower courts as well as the higher Houses machinations. During the day he was put to through the paces, training with the spear and the sword. He was meant not only to be a warrior meant to protect his charge but also to use his position to influence him and to provide council. And as the plan was to insert him in governmental position once his tenure as a bodyguard was over, he needed to be a good talker as well as to command the respect of his peers. He was presented as a man of honor and skill, and they banked pretty hard on him. But as history likes to remind you, never put all your eggs in one basket.
Valen met Aivilo when they were both on the cusp of adulthood. This was the practice, as they were meant to form a brotherly bond. Valen was meant to sacrifice his life for Aivilo after all. The difference between the two could not be overstated. Valen was tall, strong, and with a stoic manner that would make a statue proud. Aivilo however, was languid and sharp witted, a born talker and a poet to whom words were tools and weapons as deadly as a bow or a sword.
As he grew up, Valen and Aivilo grew closer than anybody could have realized ahead of time. The solemn and duty full Valen was enticing to Aivilo who spent all his time with ledgers and tomes, and rarely had the time to entertain himself. And to Valen, Aivilo was one of the most brilliant men he ever met. But there was something else at play as well. There was tension, a spark between the two that threatened to become a flame.
The two would became best friends as they weathered the machinations of the Houses and eventually became lovers. The latter part was of course, secret. It would not do for a man who was meant to marry into politics to be known to screw his own bodyguard after all. But as their night time escapades grew more common, so was the inevitable failure of such a candid relationship growing closer.
If people had realized that occasional didn't mean commitment, then maybe things would have ended on a more positive note. But alas, it was not to be for poor, stoic Valen. Aivilo, was a man of great appetites and his indiscretions were starting to grow bolder and more frequent. Even as he was paired with a daughter of a allied house, he still came to Valen. And even as Valen realized he was putting everything at risk, he was helpless against Aivilos charm.
It was only a month prior to Aivilos wedding that the two were caught. Not wanting a scandal on their hands neither house could afford the two to stay together. And Valen, who was ever the man of honor realized his life might be over. However, sensing their intent Aivilo pulled every string he could to stay Valens fate. But it was not to be, Valen was found to have compromised his vows to protect Aivilo and with it had sullied his familys name. Valen, realizing just how badly he messed things up, went to the elders to ask for mercy and promised to keep away from the young noble if only this would not go out over his family.
Their response was to send him him south to the borders between Dunmer and Argonian lands. Here he joined a undermanned and underequipped unit that did everything they could to keep the peace even as Argonian raider and skirmishers took potshot at them. The situation wasn't helped by the fact that the Argonians were mighty angry due to the previous slaver raids.
He soon found that he had been sent to a place were doomed men went to die. There were other parts of the border he could have ended up where the fights were as fierce, but the outpost he found himself on was set up to be the first to fall in case of a invasion. It was meant to hold with as little resources as possibly while the heavier forces were mobilized. Here he found a strange sense of comradeship with a fellow political outcast. Melvar was a Dunmer who had sided with the wrong house years ago, before the Oblivion crisis. He had however, been a man of indisputable honor and to kill him would have made him a martyr in the eyes of many who were undecided as to where their loyalties lay. Melvar saw much of himself in Valen, and took to teaching the young man what he knew. Valen learned quickly that engaging the Argonians in close combat was far from preferable as they were quick and cunning and their raiders were far to agile a force to be dragged into a melee fight. Instead, Melvar taught him in the art of archery. Valen protested at first, wishing to engage the enemy eye to eye. But he relented in time. As with all his preconceptions about combat were challenged, even his sense honor and loyalty was slowly eroded by the company he now kept.
As years passed, bitterness crept upon his soul. He realized he had been sent there to die, the hope was for him to fall in combat to repair his family’s honor. He began to seethe and stew in himself. He told himself he would give them no such honor, no such pleasure. He kept escaping death time and time again while his once proud spirit and sense of loyalty dwindled. The last straw came late into his eleventh year.
A group of Argonians sneaked past the perimeter guard and got so far as to the barracks where Valen slept. The Argonians launched an attack on the helpless men and women, with spears and arrows. Among these were Melvar, who Valen had to watch as the man was run trough repeatedly. The attack was brutal and senseless. While they won, half the garrison was dead by the end of the night. The Argonians had sent their message alright. And for Valen it was the signal to leave it all behind.
He bided his time and during another skirmish he used the chaos to slipped away. He stole one the lizards they used as mounts and hid it with supplies in a place where he often patrolled. Then, when the main force was busy mounting up for a revenge excursion into Argonian lands, he just didn't return from his patrol.
He travelled deeper into the Empire, to whom the Dunmers relationship was teneous at best. Living as a vagabond was hard, and many dirty looks were thrown his way as he kept on travelling, away from his past.
Another two year passes before he finally arrived in Skyrim.
Fighting Style: ”A blade is useless when its wielders head rests on a pike”
Valen is a warrior of many talents but prefer to keep enemies at a distance. While he fights well with a spear and posses a round shield, he is more the type to keep his distance. He is much more comfortable his bow as result. When fighting in formation, his old unit would move around and take turns weaving and out from flanking position while the other fire arrows. Valen is as a skirmisher, opting instead to pepper his enemy with his arrows before finishing them off with his spear. He is useful as reinforcement to the heavier front line.
Personality:Valen is the definition of down on his luck. A man who spent his entire life living by a code of conduct, has seen that code broken and disregarded so many times his world is hard to define. Like any individual, Valen is a complex creature. The dual nature of most civilized races is evident in spades. While he was raised to be a stoic man full of honor and dignity, that is all but forgotten now. A pride for his family and a pawn in the great games of Dunmer House politics he now finds himself without that pride, without that dignity. Where once he was known for honor, integrity and stalwart poise, he is now known to easily take offense and getting in fights.
His temper is an ugly thing, and he will deliberately seek out men and women willing to thrown down. He derives meaning from the pain and the exhilaration of a good fight. When he isn't slamming his face into someone’s fist, he is drinking and being a general nuisance. This translates into ugly snark and personality with enough thorns to make a rosebush proud. It should be noted that his sexuality, despite being the reason to his downfall, is something he doesn't try to hide or excuse. That bit of pride he maintain at the very least.
Despite having grown disillusioned with the world and wanting nothing to do with it for the most part there are some things that he cling to, even in the drunken haze of bar brawls and senseless violence. Poetry is one of these things. He never had mind for writing and putting his thoughts on paper himself. He could write a report fine enough but the arts escaped him. He is the physical kind of man who rather hold the wooden shaft of his spear then hold a pen. Yet Aivilo would read to him his poems and the warrior would grow found of it. In a way, poetry is the only connection left to his past. For this reason, he keeps a little notebook of sorts where he jots down poetry he encounter.
When in a fight, a different side of him comes alive. He is a vicious, ruthless creature when you put a spear or a bow in his hands. His eyes seem to shimmer and his entire body moves like a big cat on prowl. He suddenly seems to have a purpose in everything he does when he fights. As if to him, everything starts to make sense when he has to defend himself.
Should you catch him in the unlikely state of being stone-cold sober and not consumed by his own self-pity, you'll find a man with a story to tell and surprisingly calm demeanor. He has a sharp mind, despite doing his best to dull it, and is willing to listen and offer advice when applicable .
Sadly, he is so deep into his alcohol most of the time that you have to deal with the nasty drunken bastard.
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