Player: Luke
Character Name: Freiid Tevinser (Fray-id .. Tev-in-sir)
Alias/Nickname: N/A
Race: Human
Age/Date of Birth: 26 / Sunreign 8, 3193 ADW.
Apparent Age: mid-twenties
Sex: Male
Height:
Weight: 145 lbs
Hair Color/Style: Light blonde hair, chin length.
Eyes: Light Green
Marks/Scars/Tattoos: The scars of many years' flagellation criss-cross his back. Single battle wounds have been healed more completely by his youthful metabolism, though his skin still bears their lighter streaks and patches for mapping by the determined examiner.
Physical Appearance: Freiid is of average height for a human male. He is quite muscular, but slim of natural build, so being lithe rather than heavily set. His hair is usually clean and well looked after, but retains a trace of the wild due to his frequent travelling. Freiid has a long'ish face, a refined brow, oval eyes and a straight nose. His lips are more thin than they are thick, pale and symmetrical.
Occupation/Class: Cleric / Inquisitor Priest, 'Godsward'
Magic/Magite: Light, Holy.
Carried Possessions: Hymns and Psalms. Silver necklace. Pronged steel maul (Light magite). Fanged steel kite shield (Holy magite). Journal. Change of clothes + armour. Moderate sum of ryn.
Clothing and Armor: Casually, Freiid wears vestments of his faith or inexpensive common attire over a light chain vest. In times of battle, Freiid wears a sophisticated suit of field plate (a mixture of chain-mail and full plate), into which he has painstaking chiselled scripture across every metal surface. As a result, the suit appears highly ornate.
Weapons: Freiid wields a maul and a shield. His maul is a spiked steel head over a lead core, and its shaft is wrapped in strips of ancient scripture- most of which is bloodstained and illegible. Freiid's steel fanged kite is strapped with the arm descending, and therefore capable of making stabbing attacks.
Likes: Heroism, Study, Worship, Theology, Ceremony, Philosophy, Battle, Ethics, Discussion.
Dislikes: Demons and Demonology, Politics, Opulence.
Merits: Charismatic, Cunning, Unbending Faith, Willpower, Resilient, Gifted Speaker, Optimistic, Confidence, Gifted Warrior.
Flaws: Hubris, Manipulative, Schemer, Self Righteousness, Militant, Heedless, Law-breaker.
Worst Fear: Falling under the influence of any demon.
Personality: Freiid is a devout and pious follower of Pelorin. As a warrior, he is zealous and sometimes ruthless.. He is also a charismatic orator, a gifted leader and a shrewd tactician. Freiid is a man whose conviction and uncompromising behaviour makes the impossible ideals to which he subscribes seem attainable and liveable, a man whose presence inspires awe and hope in anybody suggestible to the gleaming surface of what they see. To them, Freiid is the warmth of the sun and the ringing of silver bells: a man who tirelessly stirs the hearts of his followers, opening the way to ever greater acts of virtue and heroism. To the astute observer, on the other hand, it seems that more might have died in Freiid's good graces than out of them.
History: The majority of Freiid's life has been spent in the service of a fringe military organisation called The Iron Circle. The Circle has existed for hundreds of years in various incarnations, it's purpose to indoctrinate and govern common people according to a strict code of ethics. The goal of this is to make aberrant, treacherous or possessed behaviour easier to detect; this process they call 'The Vigil'.
The Iron Circle has enjoyed several eras of prominence and political clout over the ages, the last having ended decades ago. At the pinnacle of its favour in Lagunis, The Circle controlled a well equipped private army of soldiers, using which it patrolled the wildernesses and more remote settlements with or in lieu of garrisons and other authorities.
It all came to an end during a conflict provoked by discord between the ethical mandates of the Circle's Council- which were growing ever more puritan and severe- and the common law. When men, women and even children were being arrested on a daily basis for transgressions that did not exist in the land's litigation, the weight of an increasingly bereaved and furious populace naturally fell on the crown.
Inexorably, The Circle and the king were drawn into a dangerous confrontation.
At the climax of the resulting stand-off, the king made a dangerous decree: The Circle's army was to be dissolved, the domains under its supervision were to be returned to the care of Lagunis's conventional forces and many of The Circle's barracks were to be closed and seized in the stead of a fine, primarily as a means of cutting back their presence and influence. In addition, the Council would have to make way for their pre-determined successors.
It is still widely regarded as a miracle of diplomacy that a small war did not ensue. Public anger and unrest was slow to subside. Many of those abducted by The Iron Circle never resurfaced. Freiid is such a one.
Precisely how Freiid came into the employ of the new Council, what he came from and why he was initiated rather than abandoned or slain, he doesn't know. He recalls no rebelliousness on his part, suggesting that he must have been young indeed.
As one of the temple's small cadre of remaining soldier-agents, an inquisitor priest known generally as a 'Godsward', the focus of Freiid's life has changed gradually along with the new Council's revisions of their organisation and The Vigil itself.
The most recent and decisive move by the Council came following news of a demonic host assaulting far-off Sheridan. This development, followed by sensational rumours of abductions by demons within Calora itself and running battles in its streets served as the perfect backdrop for a private return to the militant old ways, and a repurposing of The Vigil from a means of managing the conduct of people, to direct opposition of demonic incursion.
The Iron Circle rapidly made knowledge of the Israidian intrusion public, and made it known (not truthfully, on the whole) that its Godswards were being deployed individually against significant threats all over the kingdom of Lagunis. It may yet have been dismissed as rabble-rousing, if not for the imminent assault on Emarbeldon...
Freiid had been stationed as a Godsward at Emarbeldon for five years already,and in that time had transformed bored ignorance and irritation toward his presence into an enormous quantity of respect, a wealth of friends and even a small imitative following. He was the settlement's good-doer, unofficial peacekeeper, arbitrator, councillor, exorcist and soldier.
He regularly drank with the captain of the garrison, a weathered fellow with a little grey hair, a little charm and a knack for rudimentary leadership called Edgarl Redward. Leveraging this friendship, Freiid had his hangers-on inducted into an equipped force of at least two dozen men whom he trained, disciplined and initiated into The Circle himself.
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The attack perpetrated against Emarbeldon was catastrophic. An infighting demonic trio laid waste to the port town's militia and filled the black sky overhead with wild and terrible energies. Freiid gathered his devotee soldiers in what was fast becoming the ruins of the city's barracks; there he was planning to wait, searching for an opportunity to strike against whichever was the survivor. It was not an inspired plan, but even the preternaturally keen Freiid had been caught unready by the night's carnage.
Before the time came to move, word began to arrive of an assault on Emarbeldon's docked ships. Freiid continued to watch the movements of those doing battle in the crumbling settlement and, gradually, he saw the running battle for what it was. A new plan took shape in his mind. What would follow was to cost every one of his followers and others beside them their lives- whether it killed them or not...
This was some time ago, and common-knowledge details are scarce. Freiid's forces rescued and then commandeered a ship in order to pursue the party responsible for Emarbeldon's near destruction to whatever safe haven might exist for them. That pursuit took the isolated band of soldiers north into the lands of chill. Freiid returned to Emarbeldon weeks later, his forces in tatters and all in the custody of the regular navy.
In a highly illegal act, Freiid and a few others were seized as they disembarked by a score of cowled, plate wearing warriors, who claimed to act on behalf of the The Iron Circle. They threatened violence if their organisation was "refused the opportunity to deal with its own", and the public of Emarbeldon, whose high regard for Freiid had not much dwindled in his absence, seemed in danger of turning against their sovereign's soldiers.
The men of the army were forced to return to Calora without their prisoner, unwilling as their captain was to draw steel in a city where support for The Circle had quietly grown so fierce. Freiid spent days recovering, recounting his exploits and refining his excuses in the familiar shelter of The Circle`s capital barracks.
Recently, Freiid has been sent away from Emarbeldon, in order to protect him from immediate official inquest, and to get him seen by the common folk in a light that will credit him when he is eventually taken to task by the lords of Lagunis.
His instructions are simple- to assume the role of an old Godsward, and to follow the particulars of that duty up to and perhaps beyond the kingdom's boundaries for as long as there are no orders to the contrary.