Member
Noctis
TokyoPewPew
Chronic
Gunther
Ruiner
Varshanka
Crimson Flame
Izurich
World Traveler
Name
Bensen TullyAge: 17 (24 AC)
Appearance:
- At but 5’ tall, perhaps even a bit less, Bensen seems to lack the strong frame of a Tully in most regards. Curling, black hair parts down to his shoulders, a halo for his long nose and softer jaw, though his fair skin and bright bluebonnet eyes do mark him in his ancestry. The young Tully’s hands are worn enough from honest work, dirt forever underneath his fingernails, and he almost makes it a point to keep it so. As far as clothing, Bensen prefers to wear blacks and reds, though in a muted color. In most ways, it would be easy to mistake him for a common peasant anywhere else than the Riverlands.
- Born from Lord Tully’s brother, Karkan Tully, and a Blackwood noblewoman, Olira, Bensen grew up split between Riverrun and Raventree Hall. As the eldest son of the couple, he bore the black hair of his mother’s house, endearing many of her cousins and earning the suspicion of some at Riverrun. They spoke of mistakes, for Olira was married further into her years, of unfound maidenheads and stableboy lovers, though Karkan was headstrong against the whole of it and his elder brother forbade such hated talk. Bensen would grow to be a tolerable hunter from that young age, preferring to tend to hawks and hunting hounds about Raventree Hall, and took up fishing often at his young age. The boy tended to falter at his knowledge of houses though, near and far, the colors and names and words seeming to blend together often.
His mother would become laden some few years after his sixth name-day, when he had finally gotten his first puppy to raise into a hound, and it was explained just three times to him on what precisely it meant. Bensen had a younger brother or sister, and they were coming soon. Seven months later though, his father off to Riverrun for family business, a dam broke with blood too, and both her and child were lost despite the Maester’s best efforts. The burial was held soon after, in Blackwood fashion, buried under the dead weirwood tree, and Bensen was as numb as could be to all of it. One day she was there, as vibrant as could be, and the next…the Maester didn’t let him see her, as still as she was. He’d only heard the screams, calls for help, the rush of servants here and there. Bensen had hid away with his pup during it, he had no idea really what had been.
The death broke Karkan, though. He grew to drink heavily, confess sins to holy brothers and Maesters, never to Septons, take long walks along the river with a bundle of stones in a pack. He didn’t speak to Bensen, long gone were his smiles and laughter. Eventually, the man did speak to the Maester at Raventree Hall, having Bensen sent to live with his brother. Karkan traveled north, though, far north to the wall to take on the Black.
Bensen still didn’t understand, though Lord Tully took pains to explain it. He would soon be distracted by the careful machinations of that new protector, hunting dogs, hawks, fishing supplied alike. The young boy would be embraced by his older cousin, Abigael, as she in some ways adopted him while shielding him against the fool rumors that had begun to surround Bensen. Some of the worst repute in Riverrun called him an ill-omen, marked as he was by his black hair, one who had driven a proud Tully to run off and a Blackwood to die, though Bensen rarely noticed such as the talk notably died-down whenever he and Abigael were about. Worried as they were for the actions of her father against such, and for the actions of the Lord Tully’s daughter, such fools were loath to risk their necks.
Bensen meanwhile would grow to continue to be an even better hunter than before, a good enough hawker, and well-beloved by his hunting hounds, even taking up riding in more than a cursory fashion by virtue of long-running competitions with Abigael. Young, still incapable at the strangeness of court life, still incapable at the cruelty of court politics, he remains delightfully oblivious to many of those issues which are sure to trouble him in the future. His singular connection to the probable entrance of court life would be a strong bond with his cousin, Abigael, which continues still as the pair do at times read together.