[hider=Húldas, son of Hárlas][center][img]http://i.imgur.com/FzeYfgf.jpg[/img][/center]

[b][u]Name[/u][/b]: [url=https://youtu.be/TwfMvrtgegg]Húldas "Brighteyes", son of Hárlas Elftongue[/url] 

[b][u]Age[/u][/b]: 26

[b][u]Race[/u][/b]: Man of Rohan 

[b][u]Sex[/u][/b]: Male

[b][u]Personality[/u][/b]: Húldas is still, at heart, a young man, though he is both a husband and a father. He is in turns brash, quick to anger and violence, nonchalant, charming, and callow, immature; yet he can be quite serious as well. He is perhaps overeager to prove his worth--in the relatively peaceful times of the Fourth Age, there have been precious little chances to gain glory and perform feats of heroism such as are celebrated in the legends of the Horse-Lords. The epic deeds of the riders of Rohan at the close of the Third Age are lauded in verse and song, yet the Men of the Riddermark now rest on their laurels, growing fat in times of peace. Húldas, although a man grown, although possessed of a loving wife and strong son, is restless. He feels as if he's settled---as though he was funneled into such a life without trial or error,without kicking or screaming, as a sheep follows behind the shepherd's crook, because it was [i]expected[/i] of him. Just like any proud man of Rohan, he has a strong will and the stubbornness of an ox. He feels as if he [i]must[/i] do something, though just [i]what[/i] it is he must do he cannot say. Something, anything, before settling for the life that was thrust upon him. Something, anything, that he can say that he did because he truly wanted to.

[b][u]Appearance[/u][/b]: Húldas is tall and broad of shoulder, with a strong and well-defined frame. His nose is somewhat large---as a child, some of his fellows gave him the epithet "Hawknose", to his dismay---and presides over high cheekbones, bright green eyes, pert lips, and a somewhat weak jaw, which he disguises with a long and curly beard. His hair is similarly long, cascading in streaks of umber and auburn to his shoulders. As an [i]éored[/i] rider, he goes about clad in the tooled leather and chain armor of his station. 

[b][u]Backstory[/u][/b]: Húldas was born in FA 193 to Hárlas "Elftongue" (thus named for his mastery of Sindarin), son of Théomax, and Délba. Since the War of the Ring and even before, his family had lived in Aldburg as riders in the [i]éored[/i] of the household of Eorl, whose sons have since been Marshals of the East-Mark and even kings of Rohan. Húldas' great-great grandfather, Éothain, was an [i]éored[/i] rider and captain in the company of the later King Éomer Éadig, and had even participated in the great Battle for Helm's Deep. But Éothain and Éomer had a falling out (over what, however, is a well guarded family secret, though there are some whispers of cuckoldry that are unsubstantiated and considered to be in bad taste) in the wake of the War of the Ring, and his name was disgraced. Éothains' house has felt the sting of that rebuke in the decades since. The feud between the House of Eorl and the line of Éothain has been kept alive through petty squabbling, calculating snubbing, and brazen insults. What's more, to a certain degree, Éothains' line must weather it, for they are vassals to the royal house. Éothain's descendants have tried to take it in stride, not surrendering their pride but not committing any act of disloyalty, but the snubs have caused them to lose some face and influence at court, though it is widely recognized that the feud is nothing more than juvenile foolishness. 

It was into this atmosphere that Húldas was born, and he has been under its influence for as long as he can remember. "Keep your head low"; "Weather all injuries with humility and grace"; "Strive to be a man of integrity and honor"; "Do nothing untoward". These have been the refrains of Húldas' life, and both he, and his brother Dúnmer, have raged against these constraints of iron since the very moment they first had reckoning of them. Hárlas expected nothing less than perfection from them, and if they failed to reach it, then it was the birch for them, and torrents of derision. In shouldering them with great expectations, Hárlas ensured that his sons would eventually come to resent him. Yet it was Dúnmer, the heir to the line, and not Húldas, who would rebel against their father. Though a gifted equestrian, warrior, and poet, Dúnmer in his teenage years gradually devolved into a drunkard, a miscreant, and a womanizer. Hárlas was distraught, but felt as if he was powerless to change anything. It was only after Dúnmer killed a fellow [i]éored[/i] rider in a drunken duel that Hárlas could stand no more; he offered the life of his son as [i]weregild [/i] for the life of the man he had killed, but it was soon discovered that Dúnmer had fled the Mark, whence no one could guess. In Dúnmer's stead, Hárlas offered his wife; this was accepted, Délba was taken to serve as a servant in the deceased's household. All of this happened when Húldas was little more than a boy of ten. 

Hárlas was devastated by the loss of his wife; now he would be the one to raise his only remaining child. With the experience of Dúnmer still fresh in his mind, he was even stricter with Húldas. Growing up, he was incessantly torn between a sense of great obligation to his father and his line and a desire to carve his own niche in life. Secretly, just as Dúnmer had, he began to resent his father's ceaseless chiding; yet he never went against him, always did what he asked, and, in his own estimation, lived up to his father's expectations for him. Despite the family's reputation, Hárlas was able to secure Húldas a fine match in Éolyn. He is the father of two---the eldest, Hárwyn, a girl, and the youngest, Háma, a boy. 

[b][u]Reason for investigating the silent colony?[/u][/b]: In FA 216, Húldas received a letter from his elder brother Dúnmer informing him that he was in Mirkwood, working in the mining colony of Dôr-min-Taur. He was evidently doing quite well for himself: he was married, had a young daughter, and supposedly had put aside the bottle. However, knowing how bitterly his father resented Dúnmer, and how he would demand that he return to Rohan to answer for his crimes, Húldas hid the letter and began a secret correspondence with his estranged brother. It was through this correspondence that he first heard of the worrisome return of Orcs to Middle-Earth, and the spider attacks in Mirkwood. Earlier in the present year, FA 219, Dúnmer wrote him, saying, "Something foul and fell is afoot, brother. I worry for the colony more and more. If you don't hear from me within the matter of months, then something's gone wrong. We cannot flee. The road through the wood is too treacherous, and ill beasts creep in the gloom. We call for aid, yet none will come to us; no one wishes to tread on cursed ground." Húldas wrote a hasty reply and sent it off, but, as he had feared, received no answer. He rode to Gondor, seeking news of the colony, but just as his brother had written, no one had heard from Dôr-min-Taur for some time, and it was widely suspected that something had happened to the colony, and nothing good. It was only then that Húldas told his father that he had known the whereabouts of Dúnmer for some time. Hárlas, just as he had expected, was wroth, and demanded that Dúnmer be brought back to Rohan. And this was precisely Húldas' gambit: he would travel to Dôr-min-Taur in order to discover his brother's fate, under the false pretense that if Dúnmer was found alive, he would be dragged back to Rohan to answer to his father. Of course, Húldas intends to do no such thing. Rather, he sees this as perhaps his only chance to do that [i]something[/i] that he so longs to do, to satisfy the appetite that constantly gnaws upon him, to fulfill his greatest dream: to be his own man.       

[b][u]Other[/u][/b]: Húldas is an [i]éored[/i] rider, and thus adept in horsemanship. He is likewise an able-bodied warrior, and is particularly skilled in the use of the spear and the short sword. Instead of a bow, he wields throwing spears in ranged combat, which can serve a dual role as melee weapons in close-quarters.[/hider]