[center][h3][color=black][b]Ser Bagface & Sophitia Flitton[/b][/color][/h3][/center]

"They're not going to follow a man in a sack." Sophitia softly spoke. She and her brother sat in Cavernhall's gardens, surrounded by flowering bushes and trees. Sophitia had always preferred the gardens to the rest of their ancestral seat, and it wasn't hard to see why. Cavernhall was a dank, dark fortress embedded deep into the earth. Dead roots dangled from its ceilings, and cold winds slowly rolled through dark, empty halls like ghosts in the night. Unlike the gardens, it was not a place for the sun. Shrubs, trees, flowers and grasses all bloomed and grew around them, and in place of their castle's low, windy hum, the only sounds to be heard were the lilting songs of birds.

"I could be wearing my mother's flowering gown. They'll follow a knight." Bagface said, pausing before looking up from the ground. Sophitia's voice was soft and songlike, even as she spoke to her brother in conversation, but Bagface's was a hoarse, Edontian growl. His voice scraped the walls of his throat, and even through the thick cotton of his bag, it was unmistakably gravelly. He sat on a dark stump opposite his sister, who sat on a stone bench. She wore a light blue dress bordered at the hem with black threading, whereas her brother opted for a shimmering, dark blue velveteen tunic, grey trousers, and black boots. His faithful walking stick stood between his legs, leaning against the stump and loosely into Bagface's four-fingered left hand.

"A faceless knight?" Sophitia asked with a weak tilt of her head, trying to speak as gently as possible about the sensitive subject. She had been known Bagface while he was still Culven, and had sat diligently by his bedside across a divider while he healed, singing and playing her harp to ease him to sleep. He forbade her from ever seeing him during this time, before he had his infamous bags, though she did not hold this against him. She began to recall the tall, stone-faced northern mage that assisted in Culven's healing. He had a wild black beard and striking blue eyes, and he would have to bend slightly to go through Cavernhall's short, cavelike halls. He was a mage of healing who served as something of a field medic in some grisly northern rebellion and his name was either Corin or Corbin, though his name was an unimportant detail in Sophitia's memory of the man. What she remembered most, more than his height, more than his beard, was the scream he let out seeing her brother's face. Her sweet brother, who would joust with pig farmers and noblemen alike, who would braid her bracelets of grass as a boy, and who now sent tall, northern mages cowering in disgust.

"A faceless knight, aye." Bagface said with a nod. "I don't have to be pretty to lead men through the Island of Dread. A piece of that smoldering rock should sell for, what? A hundred leagues of land? Two hundred?" He grasped his walking stick and lifted himself up with a grunt, surveying the garden with his one remaining eye. "Knights love gold and they love glory, and the chance to bring back a priceless holy relic will have them forming a neat little line to kiss me on the arse if it means I'll have them on my boat." Bagface chuckled to himself, and even his sheepish sister smiled.

"Two hundred leagues of land? You really are an Edontian. You've already arranged for the boat, I take it?" Sophitia stood up as well, and the two began to walk through one of the garden paths.

"Aye. The Vivian's Mercy, captain calls it. Some pathy sailor living in Rhaetia."

"Have you sent out the letters as well?"

"Just a few days past, one to every major house asking if they've a knight or noble to spare for the holy cause." Bagface snickered again, ducking slightly over a branch.

"You don't think you'll see any exiles or lepers on the way?"

Bagface ducked under another branch, using his walking stick to momentarily guide a separate low-hanging branch away from him. "Perhaps. I might be a cripple, but I think I have a chance against an unarmed, unfed, salty old man. I've heard that those gibbering forest people use boats made from trees to get to the island and hunt them for meat, you know."

Sophitia gave him a disgusted-looking smile and snort of a laugh inherited from her father, covering her face with her palm. "Don't say such things, brother."

"Who knows? Maybe I'll bring a Hiawacan bushman home too. We could use more gardeners."




[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/NvoWCnx.png[/img][/center]
[center][h3][color=black][b]Ser Byren Hockor[/b][/color][/h3][/center]

"Wossit like in the black bog?" Russal asked from his horse. He had been Ser Byren's squire for all of two weeks, and already, Byren's patience was growing thin. Russal was a skinny young boy with a thick, round-sounding drawl and sandy blonde hair from Aaldorenfeald, whom he had been trusted with. His horse was a fat, brown speckled mare with a mottled grey and black mane, whereas Ser Byren's was a tall black stallion with thick, unwashed fur clumping around each of its hooves. Its mane spilled over its eyes, which fortunately kept the thick line of yellowing discharge around them hidden, and it was known to occasionally buck and bite -- For what it was worth, the two may as well have been riding through the forest on asses.

"Rather wet." Ser Hockor grumbled. He was a man of four and fourty, and had long-since lost the youthful energy and patience befitting a knight tasked with raising a squire. His candidacy was unknown even to him until a month prior, when he had received a letter from his uncle, the aging Lord Ferris Hockor, that a recent trade pact between Hockor and Ecefrod would be solidified with one of Lord Ecefrod's youngest sons squiring for him.

"Is it true what they say about the water, what with it burning your hand an' all?" Randall asked, tilting his head slightly. His blonde hair drooped to the side as he did, which the boy paid no mind too. He was ten and five, and had a face filled with freckles and a head filled with, mostly, air. He had a weak chin and a baby-faced softness to his features, which somehow angered Byren further, as if he was given the most greenhorned punchable squire as some test of his [i]bloody character[/i]. Ser Hockor wasn't known for being [i]handsome[/i], certainly. He had oily black hair that hung down from his head like snakes, and a hairline that had since receded to the top of his head, usually hidden by a cap or strap of cloth. The left side of his face drooped limply ever since he had suffered a fit in his early twenties, causing him to slur his words and lessen his depth perception slightly. He was pockmarked in the face, and muscular and stocky in frame, with a patchy beard that clung to his face like black dirt.

"Some parts, aye."

"Which parts?"

Ser Byren exhaled, pausing for a moment to look out at his surroundings. They were near Edontas' northern edge, with their journey's scenery mostly limited for the past few hours to pine forests and rocks. Sure enough, pine trees were all that Byren could see down the path, which curved up and down further ahead.

"The parts you don't go in."

[hider=Summary]
Bagface has sent out letters looking for interested parties to join him on a quest to the Island of Bread, where he plans to retrieve and divide the fallen shard of Elonar as a holy relic. Ser Hockor is on the road to Kedoren with his newly-appointed squire, Russal Ecefrod.[/hider]