[i]
“Knife-work is a red business, maggots. With the knife you cut meat, slice it up close, lay it to the bone and swim in whatever comes out. The screams are in your ear, in your head. The hurting trembles through your sharp and quick blade. You’re not just a butcher, slugs,… you’re an artist that paints in red.”
[/i] – Orthaug’s speech to recruits to slap off the green

[b]Name:[/b] ‘Red’ Orthaug, TBD

[b]Age:[/b] 23

[b]Appearance:[/b]
Many may not look their part: a foolish smile might hide wisdom, crying eyes might cloak bravery. Orthaug though, is a pure-blooded orc. Sharp and blunt features are meshed together amidst the puckering of old scar tissue. Dark, small eyes flicker with an impersonal malice and cunning from under a thick, bony brow. Black hair bristles across the thickest of skulls containing a violent mind occupied with thoughts of opportunity and gain.

Orthaug is not a particularly large orc. That is of course not to say he resembles the smaller versions of greenskins like goblins or the even tinier maggots. Muscles lay thick like ropes on his bones, rippling under a leathery green skin, scarred and weathered in most places.

[b]Skills/Abilities:[/b]

Please list with most potent skills first. 

- [b]Up close and personal![/b] Orthaug is not bad with conventional weaponry, but his true skill lies in the wielding of short-hafted axes, dirks and knives. Few would live to tell a tale about a one on one fight with this brawler.

- [b]Where’s the chink?[/b] Orthaug knows armour and is able to get to those hard to reach spots with surprising swiftness and accuracy. His hands are quick and clever, and his fingers nimble.

- [b]Quick on his feet:[/b] Being smaller than most of Orc-kind, has forced Orthaug to adopt a more agile and fleetfooted style of fighting. While still packing quite a punch, especially compared to pathetic humies, Orthaug has learned the hard way that he’d better dodge blows in a fight.

- [b]Did you hear that?[/b] Possessing excellent senses, Orthaug is a specialist in laying ambushes for enemies, preferring backstabbing tactics in spite of being able to hold his own in a pitched battle. Shadows are his friends, as is the cloak of night.

- [b]Opportunist:[/b] Orthaug’s opportunism spans further than simply the battlefield. He is known to quickly discover and assess chances, followed by a determined and calculated action. While he has no great mind for strategy, he is an apt tactician, able to quickly adapt to situations.

- might add?

[b]Equipment:[/b]

- Brigandine. It is a rather unconventional garment for orcs, generally crafted with canvas or leather, lined with small oblong steel plates riveted to the fabric. In Orthaug’s case heavy leather and metal were the materials used. The brigandine is sleeveless, not hampering him in movements while still providing ample protection. Should a pitched battle take place with the entire company in the field, the brigandine is replaced by a cuirass. Reinforced leather faulds and culets are attached to either, protecting the haunches and lower back. Underneath, he wears a padded arming doublet.

- Reinforced leather [url=http://www.blog.voluspa.org/images/AE1700.jpg]gorget[/url] for neck and throat protection. Orthaug is good at finding chinks in armour, and therefore tries to have few of his own. A vital thing for survival, the part of your body attaching your head to the thorax, is something Orthaug would not leave unprotected. 

-For a helmet Orthaug wears a [url=http://www.longbowandarrow.co.uk/ekmps/shops/richardhead/images/-open-sallet-archers-helmet-%5B2%5D-12124-p.jpg]sallet[/url] usually worn by archers, evident from the lack of a frontal piece or visor. Being quick means Orthaug needs a good and wide vision of the field of battle. Additionally, the sallet has a neckguard, protecting him from sneaky slashes or stabbings from the back.

- Additional protection comes from [url=http://www.darkbladeuk.co.uk/uploads/images_products/splint%20vambraces%20--362.jpg]vambraces of splinted armour[/url] and armour to protect the joints such as cowters for the elbows and a modified poleyn for the knees. These latter are the few pieces of armour made out of steel plates. Orthaug’s left shoulder is encased in a steel pauldron, while the right is only protected by a chainmail and leather spaulder.

- Orthaug uses a variety of weapons, while having access to the company steel and armoury, his personal choices are a duo of stilettos for stabbing purposes should he need to get through or under armour, and a [url=http://www.hawknknives.com/knives/knife-PNWBowie-2.jpg]single-edged knife[/url] fitted for long thrusting, carving and cutting.

- Larger personal weapons include a [url=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fc/War_hammer2.jpg]war hammer[/url] with a pick on one side for piercing plate, and a heavier hatchet which never leaves his belt.
 

[b]Personality:[/b]
Orthaug is reliable and will get the job done. Turning his smaller size to his advantage, he profits from potential underestimations among friends and foes alike, biding his time. Deadly in a quiet moment, Orthaug leaves –whenever possible-, little time between a mistake and retaliation. He is able to harbour and nurture a grudge for a long, long time. He is surprisingly patient for an orc, as he has learned to think in longer terms than his brethren.

When in battle, Orthaug possesses a clarity that both terrifies and lays waste. Though in all else he is confused by his own contradictions. First of all he has a survival instinct, yet the need to be loyal to an ideal. Secondly, his urge for survival also conflicts with his inherent fatalism. There are bouts when some sort of insanity takes over, Orthaug speaking in riddles or starting to giggle incessantly. Some orcs claim he is not right in the head, while in fact it is merely his morbid sense of humour.

[b]History:[/b]
The lands Orthaug called home are landlocked consist of rocky hills whose flanks are covered by dark, glum pine with the occasional stretches of inhospitable bedrock higher up the slopes towards where the land grows mountainous. As a scion of one of the orc clans scraping a living together, carving out life from the Eldjokr Highlands, Orthaug was taught how to track, set snares, fish, build quarters and live off nature. Additionally, Orthaug learned how to fight from his immediate male relatives so as to make a contribution to the war-packs every Spring.

With Spring came thaw and thaw meant blood, for the clans were consumed by inveterate and ancient hatreds towards one another. Orthaug killed his first enemy at the age of 13, with a rock. He doesn’t even remember how things exactly transpired, losing coherence in the heat of battle.

However, as the years progressed and he reached adulthood, Orthaug started to realise the futility of the feuds that gripped the Eldjokr Highlands. After a disastrous skirmish, in which Orthaug’s mate was killed, he set out into the world.

For a few years he travelled the highways and roads, poached and robbed to stay alive before becoming ‘affiliated’ with a gang of orc bodyguards -a small pack of sell-swords who offered their services as caravan guards or personal security details. Not feeling at home, he even had a short spin in the gladiator rings of the Eastern Freeholds, but got out before he lost his head.

Eventually he signed up with the Nar Mat Kordh-Ishi company. By then, the company had been around for a few years, making a name for itself. Orthaug recognised a chance when he saw one, and after hearing they were taking in new recruits turned his back on playing glorified bouncer for pinks or point-ears.

Like any other recruit, Orthaug started out in the pikes, adjusting with difficulty to the strict discipline and new style of fighting. Operating as part of a bigger unit was something strange to him, and only through a high amount of smacks against the head, lashings and subsequent change of mind did he learn to become an effective element.

His true genius however lay in keeping his wits about him when things went south. On top of a good mind for tactics and a slowly built up reputation of being solid, Orthaug had an artist’s soul when it came to close combat. After making the rank of sergeant he was put in charge of teaching the raw recruits, the green worms, how to grapple, throttle, slash and stick if the lines should fail or the situation dictate. The skills he picked up in his early and robbing years also came in handy for patrol and scouting duty.

[b]Relationships and Acquaintances:[/b] Perhaps some of the characters know one another, list those acquaintances here. Talk to each other in the OOC about it.

Open to suggestions!