Calden na'Mir

[Cal]

Name: Calden na’Mir
Age: 28
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Height/Weight: 5’6”/140 lbs
Occupation: Professional Malcontent


Personality:

You don’t want to be friends with Cal. This is largely because he does not want to be friends with you—he doesn’t even like you—and has no problem making that very clear. He is not a nice man. He’s honest with himself, if only with himself, and he knows exactly what he is: a scoundrel. He is a thief and a liar, a compulsive gambler, a cheater, a poisoner and occasional assassin, a petty drug dealer, a sometime fence, a schemer, a snitch (though he prefers the term “trader of information”), a racist, a spy, and a mercenary. In a quarrel he’d rather throw a knife in your back or sneak up behind you with his garrote than square off, and if he’s forced to do so he certainly never fights fair. There have only been three people in his life he’s cared about: two are dead and the last is himself. It’s not that he’s actively mean—he doesn’t kick animals on the street or play cruel jokes on people or rape women—but rather that he doesn’t care when anyone in his way gets hurt. Or bystanders, for that matter. Ruthless, is the word.

No, Cal is certainly not a nice man. But he is very, very good at his chosen profession: general criminal and malcontent. This is pretty much the only reason others choose to associate with him at all; he gets the job done better than most anyone else can. Whether it’s thieving or picking pockets, poisoning a noble or silently taking out guards, lying through his teeth, or occasionally even being a bodyguard himself, you will have a hard time finding someone better suited to the task. (Unless it involves the ability to read, that is. He can read and write his name and usually recognize wanted posters, but he’s functionally illiterate.) And just because he doesn’t like others doesn’t mean he can’t play nice if he sees an advantage for himself in so doing. Of course, to Cal “playing nice” means not poisoning your drink or cutting your throat as you sleep—as he sees it, social courtesies are a sliding scale. Especially with elves. Cal hates elves. He can be around them and work with or for them, but he’ll never but never be polite with them.

As a gambler, he loves the thrill of taking risks, but as a thief he can watch a window from an opposing roof for hours without giving away the slightest sign of his presence—he’s learned to balance excitement with caution and apply them to the right activities. Surprisingly, given his character, he never drinks to excess. He’s worked hard to build a reputation as rude, crude, and cold, but highly competent. The one thing that breaks this general trend is his love for and mastery of the violin. He has a decent instrument (undoubtedly stolen, but no one’s ever asked), and in public he’ll readily fiddle for a bishtan or two or even just a drink. But in private, his neighbors sometimes hear slow and haunting melodies in the night, sad tunes of places far away. If he were to lose his violin he would undoubtedly find whoever was responsible and murder them with as much pain as possible—no point in retribution unless it drives the lesson home to all others. Then he’d probably steal a new one. Because, hey, it’s just a thing after all, and things can always be replaced.


Physical Description:

Whatever city Cal finds himself in, he undoubtedly makes his home in the poor quarter and certainly looks the part. His hair, though regularly trimmed with his knife (long hair gets caught on wooden window frames and such, and provides a handy grip for enemies), is unkempt and virtually always dirty, often matted. The network of several scars on his right cheek is deemphasized by his facial hair, which varies in length between infrequent shaves from stubble to a short, scruffy beard. He can’t do much about the scar across the bridge of his nose or the two long ones on his forehead, but that’s not a problem—they help him project the right image. This image is completed by his mismatched brown and green eyes, missing left earlobe, yellowing teeth, and the perpetual layer of grime and soot common to the poor quarter of a semi-industrialized city.

He has many more scars on his wiry body, but they’re covered by his ragged gray linen tunic and dark brown trousers. Black tattoos partly visible on his hands and neck trace patterns across his limbs and upper torso. He wears soft black boots that allow him to climb easily and feel the ground beneath his feet, but they can be easily slipped off for more agile work. He keeps one knife tucked in the left boot and one up his sleeve, and a satchel worn slung across his body contains his ready-made poisons, burglary and lockpicking equipment, dice, and anything else he needs to carry. Except money—that he keeps in various hidden pockets, most inside his clothing. As a pickpocket himself he refuses to make it easy for others. When not on the job he usually carries his violin in a leather case strapped over his left shoulder. He does own a tattered old gray traveling coat with a dozen hidden pockets, but generally only wears it when it’s cold enough to warrant it.

History:

As it turns out, a mercenary and a whore don’t make very good parents. Especially if the former is long gone before the latter realizes she’s pregnant. Cal’s mother did what she could, but having a child underfoot at the brothel, while not uncommon, certainly didn’t help business. So when she was killed by a drunken customer in a rage, the mistress threw him out to the streets. He was nine.

As any orphaned child would do in an Eyropan city, Cal begged and stole and did whatever he could to survive. After a couple years of practice, reinforced by the harsh lessons of being caught, he became a fairly proficient pickpocket and general sneakthief.

One of the various gangs, the Bloody Boys, took him in once he’d proven his value as a potential income-winner, and here he began learning the finer arts of his profession: cat-burglary, information dealing, and murder. One of the older men had a good knowledge of poisons, though he wouldn’t say how he’d come by it, and he trained Cal as his apprentice in the craft. Knives were the preferred weapons of the street because they were easy to conceal and easy to come by, so he learned to fight in the dirty manner of those without the luxury of chivalry. While never the greatest fighter, he could hold his own against most opponents as long as he had a blade in one hand.

The Bloody Boys was where he also picked up his gambling habit; he usually won, but it became ingrained that he would never turn down a game of chance. It also became ingrained that those who did not cheat were those who did not win—he usually won because he cheated the best. But when he was seventeen he made the mistake of playing against one of the gang’s more powerful lieutenants and getting caught cheating. For this offense (getting caught, I mean, not the actual cheating itself, which was to be expected) he was expelled from the gang and told to get out of town, or there’d be trouble.

He got himself hired on a caravan as a guard, bitterly amused by the irony of the thief becoming the guard. He fell in with the mercenaries who usually took such jobs and travelled from town to town throughout Eyropa safeguarding caravans. He could reason well, and realized that while stealing from the caravans would be profitable in the short term, in the long term he would probably be caught due to bad luck and would never find a job again—no mercenary would vouch for a known thief. And humiliating as he found the job, he was learning all sorts of interesting things from those older and more experienced veterans—things like throwing knives, the fundamentals of spying, and even more interesting ways to kill other people. He even found one who could expand his knowledge of poisons, and absorbed everything he could in the month they spent together on a job. And when guarding a traveling performing troupe a kind musician taught him to play the violin; he fell in love with it so much that he stayed on with them for most of the season.

It was during this period of his life that he developed his hatred for elves. It wasn’t any particular incident that formed his opinion, but rather the general perception he had of them as a race: arrogant, overbearing, aloof. He disliked most people already (his violin teacher being a rare exception), from his youthful interactions in the streets, and he truly despised being talked down to. He learned to grin and bear it, but he’d feel a seething rage every time an elf spoke to him, or even around him.

His mercenary stint came to an abrupt end when he was twenty. He killed a man in a bar brawl. Common enough, but how was Cal to know the man’s father was a city elder? And so began his time in prison. Because the man had attacked first Cal was not condemned to death, but his sentence was harsh: twenty years hard labor. Most laborers, as he learned on his first day in chains, died within five.

Determined not to die in the quarry to which he was assigned, Cal began scheming. It took two years for him to see an opportunity—two years in which his current coldness had come to full fruition. Using a metal splinter as a lockpick and a stolen leather cord as a garrote, he escaped his chains and murdered the sleeping guard outside the stockade. He freed his fellow prisoners, too. Not from any kindness or sense of shared identity, you see, but because he figured they would provide a handy distraction for the responding guards. Rather than focusing on one escapee they had to find two dozen.

While most were recaptured, Cal and his sole friend from the quarry, a fellow thief called Mattox, made it safely beyond the Guard’s reach. They eventually reached Keltaris and settled into their former profession. With his combination of skills from the Bloody Boys and his caravan guard years, combined with his outlook on life from prison, Cal developed a reputation. He became the go-to man for most any criminal undertaking in need of a freelancer. He was a mercenary thief, assassin, or most anything else you needed and could pay for. He sold drugs and poisons and even fenced others’ stolen goods from time to time. He dealt with and did jobs for every major gang and criminal organization in the city. But while he had many contacts and associates, his only friend was still Mattox. He liked no one, and no one liked him; they only dealt with him because he got the job done.

It was actually Mattox who gave him the biggest shock of his life. After a theft they did together, Mattox claimed he’d finally figured it out, that Cal was only better then he because he was cheating. While Cal had no objection to cheating and always sought any advantage he could find, he honestly had no idea what his friend was talking about. “You’re such a good thief only because you go invisible!”

At this explanation, Cal was unsure whether his friend was crazy, messing with him, or simply an idiot. But it turned out he was telling the truth—Cal had an innate, and hitherto unrealized—ability to subtly bend the light around him when focusing on not being seen, giving him a chameleon effect that made him very difficult to spot. This actually almost provoked a crisis of confidence for Cal, as he’d always thought he was just better than anyone else. But then he realized that it was simply another advantage, and he’d be stupid not to use it. Who cared if it was skill or a natural ability, as long as it worked?

The two of them were in Keltaris for five years. Then, of course, things happened, as things are often wont to do. In a single month Mattox was killed by a fellow criminal he’d managed to anger for one reason or another, and Cal himself accidentally killed another man in a brawl. Again. Well, not accidentally; he meant to kill him, he just hadn’t meant to fight him in the first place. But how could he have known his opponent would respond so angrily to losing so much money at dice? Don’t gamble with those who cheat better than you if you expect to win.

For once Cal’s reputation worked against him; he knew it would be only a matter of time until the guard came looking for him as they asked around. He gathered up his few belongings and turned once again to guarding caravans. He chose to get out of Eyropa for the first time in his life, to get out of Keltaris’s sphere of influence. The only caravan at the time leaving the empire was heading for a tiny city he’d never heard of called Marn. He took the job anyway.

Cal’s now been in Marn for nearly a year, residing in a shack on the outskirts of the Historic District. He does exactly what he did in Keltaris, hiring his services out to any and all who have need of criminal skills and can pay, but on a far smaller scale. The Guard here is too efficient to risk getting the sort reputation he had back in the Empire. Of course, he’s not hard to find if you know whom to ask or what to look for. He spends most evenings keeping his head down, possibly playing for drinks at the Drunken Rat or the other taverns downtown. All other times he’s either on a job, doing a job for himself, or finding a game of chance to tip in his favor. It’s a living.


Powers/Strengths:

Chameleon: his only known magical ability, which developed without conscious effort as a young street urchin. When focusing on not being seen the light around him bends. It’s not so much that he becomes invisible as that those looking in his direction see what’s behind him, with a distortion due to it being refracted around his body. It won’t work against anything that sees with magic, and anyone paying close enough attention can see the distortion of his body as he moves.

Other than that, he is an excellent thief and criminal, with a highly developed ability to sneak around quietly, throw knives, use a garrote, create and employ various poisons, and cheat at most competitions. He can lie extremely well, though he’s never been a con artist, and while he’s not much of a stand up fighter he can handle himself with his knives. He’s also a proficient fiddler and violinist.

Weaknesses:

Above all his personality is a major drawback in social interaction. He doesn’t like people, and often shows it unless he’s trying to get something, which tends to make them not like him. His physical appearance exacerbates this, as does the smell of a man who rarely bathes. His racism against elves presents unique problems in a town with such a large elvish population. Having seen the effects of poisoning on others, he’s profoundly afraid of them being used on him—this makes him test every food and drink he consumes, and he usually has a large supply of antidotes on him at any given time. And while he still loves the thrill of crime, he is terrified of going back to prison. He has the extreme paranoia of the career criminal, with virtually no capacity to trust anyone. Without his knives or garrote he’s practically worthless in a fight, as his style depends on speed and striking vital points, which does him little good without a blade.

Possessions:

In addition to the clothes described above, he owns two knives (both small, about four inch blades), a wire garrote, a lockpick set, a pursecutter, a supply of assorted poisons/antidotes and further ingredients, a set of dice, a few dozen bishani, and his prized violin.

[Vexako]

After you get approved, I'm stealing you. That's final.

[Niabi]

Hehehe, Kat and I were talking in chat about how much we love this character. Approved. Welcome back to Thar.