IDENTITY

Personality And Mannerisms

As a member of the Stoneclaw Moot, Fendrak is friendly and open, at least by Crystal Raider standards. He would much rather share a drink of mead with a stranger than get into a fight, but if the need arises he certainly does not shy away from conflict. Fendrak hates bullies, and is quick to stand up for those who may not be able to do so for themselves. As he grew up on stories told to him by his grandfather, storytelling is a passion of his and once he has a few drinks in him, he will regale others with tales of great heroes and terrible Horrors.

Fendrak has a habit of scratching his beard and rubbing the back of his head whenever he is thinking about something. His history as a Theran slave is still a source of shame for him and he rarely discusses this aspect of his life.

Fendrak Loves:

Drinking mead, talking, drinking mead while talking. Telling stories. He also enjoys a good scrap and making friends, neither of which he sees as being mutually exclusive.

Fendrak Hates:

Bullies. Therans. Slavers. Horrors. Mad Questors. Taverns that don’t have troll-sized chairs.

Motivations

Naturally, Fendrak wishes to find his brother and slay him. Unfortunately he has no idea where in Barsaive his brother is lurking. As he spent two years as a slave, his brother may have certainly have a head start and possibly acquired magical power beyond what Fendrak can handle. Fendrak is also growing weary of mercenary work and longs for a cause to support. In particular, he wishes to become a hero worthy of song, and in this endeavour is keen to kill Horrors.

Fendrak has also considered questing for Thystonius, feeling a close kinship to the Passion of Valor and Conflict.

Possessions and Mount

Fendrak’s most prized possessions are his Crystal Spear, Mountain Breaker and his Crystal Bulwark, Bastion, both given to him by his grandfather. Fendrak considers it a great honour to have his grandfather’s regalia and takes pride in doing so. His Granlain horse is Named Thanadikos after the Theran lord that Fendrak stole him from. Thanadikos is not trained for battle and according to Fendrak, the horse is stubborn and lazy. As Fendrak has spent so much time travelling along he has a habit of talking to his horse, most often moaning and grumbling at him. Fendrak’s other possessions are mostly common magical goods and travelling equipment he has spent his silver on over the years.

Friends & Enemies

Valbrand Heartspear: A retired Sky Raider who mentored Fendrak in the ways of the Discipline. It is quite possible that he has died of old age by now.

Gundar Heartspear: Fendrak’s brother and Questor of Raggok. Gundar never trained to be a Sky Raider. Who knows what dark magic he has mastered since leaving the Stoneclaw moot.

N’mesi: A K’tenshin t’skrang who sold Fendrak to the Greatcrag quarry. Fendrak would very much enjoy meeting this Swordmaster in order to settle the score.

Thanadikos Medari: A Theran noble of House Medari who oversaw the Greatcrag quarry. Presumably he is still in Rugaria. Fendrak cares little either way, but would certainly seek to kill the elf should they meet once more.

Laeori: An ork questor of Lochost, Laeori is the closest friend Fendrak has ever had. While she busies herself freeing slaves across the Theran Empire, Fendrak hopes that one day their paths will cross again.

BACKGROUND HISTORY

Fendrak was raised on the sloping foothills of the eastern Twilight Peaks, his family’s moot home overlooking Barsaive’s central lowlands. From his home in the mountains, Fendrak would often gaze down upon the lands below, his eyes following the silver snaking bends of the Serpent River and the feral borders of Servos Jungle. As a child, He would imagine himself aboard one of his moot’s drakkars, raiding the lowland settlements or flying over the jungles in search of lost treasure. His lust for adventure and curiosity of the outside world was sparked in-part by the tales told to him by his grandfather, Valbrand Thunderhead Heartspear, a retired Sky Raider of great renown. During the long winter months, Fendrak would huddle around the fires of his grandfather’s longhouse and listen to tales of heroes, horrors and legends. It was Valbrand who raised Fendrak, as well as his older brother, Gundar after their parents had been killed in a raid against the Theran Empire during the onset of the Second War. While their deaths had been glorious and they were remembered in the songs sung by the moot Troubadours, both Fendrak and Gundar missed their parents dearly.

Life in the Twilight Peaks was hard. Even the gentler eastern region was relatively sparse of life and Fendrak’s clan, the Heartspear, were forced to raid their lowland neighbours frequently. The clan drakkar, Skycutter, sometimes sailed as far south as Vivane Province in search of plunder. From an early age, Fendrak showed promise in following the Adept’s Way. Learning the basics of the Sky Raider Discipline from his grandfather and then honing his skills once old enough to take part in his clan’s raids. While Fendrak lost himself in pursuit of his Discipline, Gundar instead retreated into a pit of bitterness and rage. Unable to accept the death of his parents at the hands of the hated Therans, Gundar pursued a reckless path of destruction. He refused to take part in any raid that did not promise the chance to engage the Therans, and on the occasions that he did, he threw himself into battle with wild abandon that not only endangered his own life, but also that of the crew. Fendrak feared that his brother was falling under the spell of Raggok, and inviting the Passion of Pain into his heart. Gundar’s outbursts grew so violent that Eventually, Dannas Firetongue, the beloved captain of the Skycutter, forbid him to step foot aboard her ship.

Disgraced, Gundar vowed vengeance, and sure enough to his word, he sneaked into the captain’s longhouse that very night and slit her throat while she slept. He then fled the moot home, vanishing into the night. The next day the clan informed its chieftain, Gartan Strongfist, of the betrayal. As a devoted Questor of Thystonius, Gartan too believe that Gundar had fallen to Raggok and in doing so he had besmirched the honour of the whole clan. There could only be one way to avenge such a slight, and that was to track the vile killer down and deliver him to Death’s Kingdom. After a moment of silence, Valbrand took a step forward. Realising what the old man was about to do, Fendrak strode forward first and agreed to embark for the lowlands in search of his fallen brother.

Fendrak’s last night in his moot home was a solemn one. As he packed his few belongings in preparation for the difficult journey ahead, he hardly noticed his grandfather leave the moot home briefly before returning with a bundled package in his arms. He bid his grandson sit with him by the longhouse’s fire pit, as he had often done so as a child. He then slowly unfurled the bundle. The violet flash of living crystal danced across the flames and upon Fendrak’s face.

‘’This is Mountain Breaker’’

Spoke Valbrand, revealing a colossal shard of crystal fashioned in to the shape of a large crystal spear.

‘’This blade was crafted by the fabled Weaponsmith Karr Stonecarver. It has served me well, now it will serve you’’.

As Fendrak picked up the blade to test its weight, Gundar reached down once more, picking up an exquisite set of crystal bulwark.

‘’And this, is Bastion. It has saved my hide on more than one occasion, even turning back the claws of a Horror. It will keep you safe on your journey. Fight with honour and allow no darkness into your heart. I have already lost one grandson to the Great Betrayer, I do not wish to lose another’’

The rest of the evening passed quickly, as Fendrak and Valbrand shared many a drink and a tale over the fire pit. When the morning came, the whole clan had assembled to see Fendrak off on his quest. As the sun rose over the Twilight Peaks, its light illuminated the living crystal deposits that dot the cliffs and bluffs, bathing the mountains in the glow of a million stars. For the first time, he felt a sense of longing for his home, but determined to bring his brother to justice, he stepped about the Skycutter once more. The crew embarked for the lowlands, dropping Fendrak south of Kratas, a few days journey from the infamous City of Thieves. As the drakkar ascended and slowly disappeared into the sky above, Fendrak made his way north and towards Kratas, for if his brother truly was a servant of darkness, he would surely have found succour in that den of depravity.

Kratas was not a welcoming place to a naïve highlander. By the time Fendrak had reached the first tavern in the city’s Green Markers he had been pick pocketed of what silver he had. Highland honour dictates that what one wants, one takes, but the lowlands are not so accommodating of this custom. Penniless and friendless, Fendrak was forced to offer his sword arm for sale in order to fill his belly and fund his search, falling in with several shady characters. Bodyguard work for wealthy merchants was by far the easiest way to earn a living, being large, even for a troll, Fendrak found that his mere presence was often enough to deter would be assassins, but on occasion he had to draw Mountain Breaker to make a point. While the silver was enough to make sure that he did not starve, Fendrak soon grew weary of Kratas life. More and more he was pressed into accepting ‘’wetwork’’ and debt-collecting. Soon enough, he fell out with his employer, a local gang lord Named Kosto, over one heated argument too many and smashed the little dwarves’ teeth in. Kosto, vowed that the Sky Raider would be dead within a week. Luckily, one of Fendrak’s less villainous acquaintances, an elven Thief Named Adreena, had managed to dig up a lead on Gundar, explaining that a troll matching his description had been recently seen leaving Kratas. This troll had joined a company of particularly bloodthirsty band mercenaries and were headed to Vivane Province in search of work. Not wishing to had his throat opened by a would-be assassin, Fendrak packed his goods and made his way south.

Despite Thera’s defeat in the Second War, Southwest Barsaive had remained an active hotbed of imperial activity. Slavers, still eager to earn Theran silver still maintained several outposts on the Vivane / Barsaivian borders and would strike at unsuspecting villages in order to supply Thera with fresh blood. As fate would have it, Fendrak never made it to Vivane city, instead he was captured while attempting fend off a band of slavers attacked a local hamlet. The leader of this group, a vicious and cruel K’tenshin t’skrang Named N’Mesi, took great pleasure in subduing they would be hero. To a Sky Raider, death was far more preferable to servitude. Better to fight alongside Thystonius in the Paradise of Swords, than spend twenty years breaking your back on behalf of the Empire.

When Fendrak awoke, he first thought himself dead. That illusion was quickly dispelled with the first crack and lash of a whip across his back. It would be the first of many. The Sky Raider found himself at a limestone quarry outside of the Rugarian capital city, Bukara. Alongside hundreds of deshelled and malnourished Namegivers, he was fated to heave rocks from the bosom of the Greatcrag Mountains for as long as his body would hold out. The shame of defeat and capture seared itself into Fendrak’s soul. With each lash of the whip, with every taunt hurled at him by his captures, with every poor soul around him who died from exposure, his anger grew further.

After two years of back-breaking work, Fendrak had given up hope of freedom and of finding his brother. He prayed to Thystonius for courage, for the strength to continue, but he knew in his heart that death was closing in.

One day, after taking a record number of lashings from his master, the Theran noble Thanadikos Medari, Fendrak vowed to go down fighting. If he was lucky, he could crush at least one guard’s head with a mighty rock before he was subdued. This time however, he would not submit to the whips. Even if they had to lash him to death, he would die this day and be free at last. As he contemplated his next move, a nearby Ork slave shoved into him, snapping him from his thoughts of revenge. She was a newcomer, Laeori was her Name, a captured Scorcher from Cara Fahd. Frowning at the Ork, Fendrak’s brow raised sharply as the chains binding the Ork woman to the stony ground simply broke away. Confused, Fendark looked down to see his own shackles spit and fall to the ground. All around him, cries and cheers erupted as more and more slaves found their chains broken. Laeori jumped up on to nearby pile of quarried stone and with a voice that boomed and filled the slaves with burning courage proclaimed that Lochost was with them.

The resulting riot led to the wholesale death of the quarry guards, only Thanadikos managed to escape. While dozens of slaves had also lost their lives in the conflict, they had died with a weapon in their hands and that, as far as Fendrak was concerned, was reward enough. Laeori vowed to hunt down Thanadikos, but not before she had led the newly free slaves east, across the Aras Sea and away from Theran lands. Fendrak, feeling a debt of honour to be paid, offered to accompany them on their journey and the two quickly grew to be close friends.

Once the motley band of freed Namegivers reached the port of Urupa, it was time for Fendrak to say his goodbyes and resume the search for his brother. Unsure if Gundar was still in Barsaive, Fendrak said his goodbyes to the Questor and watched the ship carrying her and her charges sail across the Aras, until it was nothing more than a tiny speck on the distant horizon.

With no leads to follow, Fendrak was once again forced to become a sell sword, accepting various jobs and mercenary work across Barsaive, all the while keeping an eye and an ear out for a troll matching his brother’s description.