Name: Blaine Hallgood

Gender: Male

Age: 21

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION

Hair: Blond

Eyes: Blue

Distinguishing Marks: A multitude of scars mark the young mans skins. The most obvious ones are on his forearms, neck and across his left cheek and eyebrow.

General Appearance: Blaine is a tall lad, with wide shoulders, an open chest and long, fine muscled limbs. He is lean, and full of tightly wound energy, like a coiled spring. Which he masks behind a poor posture, hunching his shoulders and stooping his back to make himself look both smaller, and clumsier with the way he shuffles about.

He has straw blond hair, kept long and tied back away from his face. His countenance is one of sharply angled features, with pronounced cheek bones, a sharp nose and a strong chin. He has a rather handsome face, if a little unusual, and marred by the scar where a knife once nearly took his eye out.

He dresses in passable but paltry garments for a noble. A mockery really, of what a man of good standing should wear. All of them stitched together from scraps and ends of once fine clothes now worn to rags. A nobles jesters motley.

HISTORY

Personality: Blaine is often mistaken for a docile, pliable drunk. Many assume he is the fool that he is made to play. Only seeing the Bishop's jester and sinner.

The truth is, that underneath the fool there is a man of sharp wit, a curious , inquisitive mind and a thirst for freedom and adventure. His captivity however, have turned many of these traits in to a seething resentment towards his would be peers among the nobles, and a soft spot for the leas fortunate in the kingdom.

Sexual Preferences: Flexible

House (Major}: Hallgoods, defunct.

About Your character:

Blaine is the youngest son, and last borne of Duke Albrecht Hallgood and his wife Bianca’s brood of twelve. He was, as the peasants were fond of laughing, the last shake of their bag, and came to them in the autumn of their lives. The rest of his brothers and sisters were all grown men and women, or near enough that it did not make a difference to the young lad. In fact, it was to his great delight, as he had five older brothers, who all took turns teaching their brother how to ride a horse, swing a sword and shoot with bow and arrow. For he would be a squire before long, before the age of ten! Just like they all had been. From his sisters, half of them witches if you believed the tall tales, the other half all scolds or harridans, showed him how to get about the forest, which berries to pick, and which to never touch, told him which streams you could fish in, and which you should never try to ford.

The boy grew up wild and adventures and had his heart set upon knighthood.

Until an army marched through his fairytale kingdom, tore down the walls of his home, and snuffed the life out of everyone who held dear. A cruel twist of fate, and he would have joined them, had it not been for the kind “mercy” of Bishop Frollo, who spared the boy, so that he may stand as an example for the rest of the nobility. See how far you all may fall, see what happens to those that turn against king and church.

The once wild boy of the forests heart is now a man, and a fixture wherever the good Bishop Frollo roams. Most often, he is seen in the king’s court, but sometimes they will guest at this lord or that duke. Wherever he goes, the fools white painted face, and jangling crown of cloth and bells, and his nobleman’s garb made out of tattered motley is the way by which he is recognized. He is famed for the tricks that he performs, breathing fire, juggling, telling wits and jokes, and tumbling and acrobatics. He is a good laugh, and he always laughs the loudest. Less famed, but well known still, is the wicked games the Bishop allow guests to play upon his fool. They may challenge him to duels, he will fight you armed with a potlid and a ladle, and you win on first blood. Do you desire a sport upon a horse? The fool will race or joust you on a donkey. Ask him for a song and he will sing it to its end, even if you pelt him with fruit, bread or rocks. Spare it no thought, he is traitor scum, and a heretic to boot. It is mercy enough that he lives.

But Hallgood nurses his wounds and bides his time. One day his day will come, luck will fall his way. Until then he can wait, and laugh and smile.

---

Once, House Hallgood were the champions of the people, their knights errant and bands of wandering rangers traveling the length and breadth of the land to enforce the king’s peace on the roads, rivers, indeed even goats’ paths and craggy mountain trails. There was no corner of the kingdom the black clad knights with their blood red banners would not go. They would protect caravans and pilgrims, merchant trains and lone wanderers alike. And no villain was too high and no bandit too low for them to take up arms against. Not even other lords, or men of the cloth.

This had been their charge since the earliest days of the kingdom, when the wild men from the deepest and darkest northern ranges of Valgrene came creeping out of the from underneath the shadow of the mountains and the trees, to bend the knee. Their task was done admirable, and the house was famed for its noble warriors, but also their hospitality. It was said that all roads eventually lead to the Goodhall, the ancestral hall of the Hallgoods, and a castle made for hosting feasts and friends from far afield. It sat nestled deep in the heart of the boundless forest, and any traveler was welcome underneath it’s roof.

But times changed, and the Hallgoods did not. Or they did. It depends on who bends your ear to tell the tale. Either the men of the cloth grew tired of the last Duke of the Goodhall, who would not relent in his pursuit of their excesses and overreaches, or his dogged mission to hold his fellow nobles to their charges. Or the black knights grew to bold, and greedy, and showed their true faces when they began to raid monasteries, robbing their fellow nobles, and plot sedition and rebellion. It came to a head, when the Duke and his heir were called before Bishop Frollo, and would not bend the knee, or beg excuses for a wrong that’s been lost to time. The pair were the first among the Hallgoods to be branded heretics and executed for their crimes. It was not long after that, that the Bishop convinced the King and the nobles that the Hallgoods could be borne no longer, and had to be razed, lest they ruin the whole kingdom.

Most call it a war, a rebellion, and a great victory for the king. Some, in Valgrene, call it a butcher’s errand. But now there are no more Hallgoods, save the one.

The Dead (Age given is at time of death.)

Duke Albrecht Hallgood 64 – a cold, hard, brooding man committed to little else but his duty and the land that had been in his ancestors care since before there was a Kingdom to bestow titles or draw borders. His devotion came at the expense of any warmth towards his children, or care for any living soul around him.

Duchess Bianca Hallgood 52 – A warm, kind soul, capable, practical, and full of strange wisdoms and curious practices, and many agreed the true mistress of Goodhall. The Lady of the house traced no noble lineage herself, but was, as was often said in reverence of those who hailed from unknown parts of the Valgrene, “of the forest.”

Vala Hargrave (nee Hallgood) 30 – The spitting image of her mother, a practical, hard nosed woman who wed a landed knight and bore him two children. The indisputable leader of the sibling brood, and the one who told them all the fairy stories and the legends of their homeland.

Dromen Hallgood 28 – The heir apparent, but not the favored son. A haunted man, who lived his life in his father’s shadow and never truly managed to measure up in his eyes. He had too much compassion for others, was too sentimental, and worked too hard to present himself as the equal to his father and younger brother.

Garith Hallgood 26 – A absolute brute of a man, a savage warrior who famously eschewed armor in favor of the blood red and coal black war paint of their ancestors. Their fathers favored son, only kept in check and saved from being an utter animal by his love for his brothers and sisters. The latter addition of his daughter softened him further.

Kargil Hallgood 24 – A studious young man, who loved reading and drawing maps. Shy, and awkward, he had meant to go off and join the clergy, but was staunchly forbidden by their mother to take the cloth.

Horace Hallgood 23 – A rogue and a no-good scoundrel, famed through the Valgrene for gambling, drinking, and his stunning singing voice and handsome face.

Gayla Hallgood 22 – Horace’s favorite accomplice in all his adventures, a famous beauty who swung  a sword and a lance as well as any of her brothers, flirted outrageously with the other Ladies of the royal courts, fought duels and danced and sang in taverns as readily as in a ballroom.

Larian Hallgood 22 – Valgrene twin of Gayla, born in winter while she was born in early spring, and like her a champion of arms, but more modest of manner, the most knightly one of all the brothers, and the master at arms of Goodhall.

Magda Hallgood 21 – A witch, that’s what everyone said of Magda, a young lady with a wild mane of hair, a grim expression and who roamed the deepest and darkest woods at her leisure. She learned arts of healing and midwifery from her mother, and while she did not have her warm nature, had her devotion to such crafts. Married her father’s game warden.

Roona Hallgood 20 – As a girl she had been an absolute wild thing, following her older brothers out in to the forest on their adventures, but with age she came in to the manners of a “proper” lady. There were plans to arrange a marriage for her with the heir of a great house, but it never came to be.

Deidra & Dora Hallgood 19 – the twins were sweet young women, funny, always laughing and coming up with jokes and pranks to play on the rest. But despite being like two berries on a branch in appearance and humor, they could not have been more different in interest. Deidra spent her time either with Magda or Kargil, learning from them and their books, while Dora had all the intention of following in the footsteps of Larian, Garith and Gayla.