Latro de Couteau
real name Finnen, or Pale-Feather
Race: Breton, Reachman
Sex: Male
Age: 26
Family Origins: Crow-Kith Tribe, Reachmen who've settled in the Druadach and Wrothgar mountains long ago
Birthsign: The Warrior
Appearance:
A young man with a fairness such that he has passed as and been mistaken for a woman on occasion. It is evident why he was given the name Pale-Feather both in appearance and mannerism. His footfalls fall near-soundless on account of his lithe but sinewy-muscled pale frame and all he does has a deliberate and gentle way to it, making even the twisting of a jar's lid seem mesmerizing with his long fingers. Crowned by a long and voluminous mane almost more befitting a court lady, colored black made all the more dark by his otherwise fair complexion, and almost always done up in a messy bun with a leather cord on which two feathers dangle- a crow's feather and a hawk's. His eyes are a copper-hue and them along with the slightly pointed ears are the only giveaways as to his true heritage in the Reach, set in his narrow face to look out at the world with an almost perpetual sadness.
High cheekbones and a soft jaw running down to a pointed chin, sensuous lips and a long, elegant nose, it is no wonder that the only way he can be told apart from the women in a tavern is to walk about pantless. He has a disarming air about him, his sad eyes either contrasting or complementing his near-permanent soft smile. He is calm, almost unnervingly so, and seemingly timid. A literal gentle man.
Equipment: Weapons – A hand-axe with an 18-inch haft, a basic knife with a six-inch blade kept near the hand-axe. Another knife is hidden in his boot, while yet another is kept at the small of his back- this one a rondel dagger with only one use, his only weapon that can't be explained away for chopping wood or bark, or chopping onions or cutting meat for the stew.
Clothing – He wears burgundy trousers bloused into leg wraps and woolen socks, with Colovian-leather boots, at least when not barefoot. When not lounging around shirtless, he wears a green short-sleeved tunic that covers down to the elbow over a tight-fitting woolen long-sleeve shirt. If he absolutely must delve down into the dungeons to retrieve plant specimens for the other alchemists and chroniclers, or ventures into climates given over to shivers rather than sunshine, he wears a fur-manteled woolen cloak.
He was given a padded cloth gambeson from the armory's stores from his friend Gunnar, a guard in the lower chambers before his passing during a cave-in.
Misc. Possessions: A lute he sometimes plucks at absent-mindedly, but when working in a tavern, he is known to sing songs of great beauty with a voice equipped with ghostly high notes and a vast repertoire of songs that capitalize on it.
A bottle of Nibenay wine, sometimes spiked with smashed narcotic poppy seeds and a pinch of moon sugar. This habit is obviously kept secret.
Smoked fish and dried meats for personal provisions.
A small kit for alchemy when away from his usual posting at his tent topside or his workstation belowground, in the first chamber.
A small polished stone he's had since his days in the redoubt, his only reminder that he was once part of a tribe and accepted.
Family and Associations:Ruddy-Bull, father, fate unknown
Witch-Mother White-Horn, mother, fate unknown
Ghost-Stag, uncle, fate unknown
Flying-Crow, uncle, fate unknown
Painted-Bear, uncle, fate unknown
Francis Martell, mentor/friend, living
Skills: Moderate: Hand-to-Hand, Alteration, Sneak, Alchemy, One-Handed
Somewhat: Restoration, pick-pocketing, Lockpicking
Spells:
Oakflesh
Stoneflesh
Ironflesh
Candlelight
Healing
Fast Healing
Healing Hands
History: The Crow-Kith Clan of the Western Reach is one of the reasons travelers are warned against taking the high passes. A tribe of hard warriors and macabre shamans that stick to the Old Gods of the Western Reachmen, and not the bastardization of Molag Bal and the Hagravens the Eastern Reachmen are given over to. A sworn enemy of many Eastern Reach clans, hardened by years of tribal warfare in feuds that have lived longer than more than a few chieftains who have spilled blood in their names, and some feuds have even lasted so long that the parties involved no longer know the original reason why they take axe to fellow a Reachman's head. The Western Reachmen have always prided themselves on being more 'civilized' than their Eastern brethren, not given over to wearing scraps of fur and forsaking any notion of metal weaponry.
It was the Crow-Kith Clan, the broad-shouldered and dagger-eyed stock of Witch-Mother Ghost-Pale that the fair-featured, skinny runt named Pale-Feather would be born into. And his father hated him for it. The first of his children to be borne from Witch-Mother White-Horn's blessed womb. Ruddy-Bull, Pale-Feather's father, was the warrior of Witch-Mother White-Horn's husbands. He was hoping for a strong son to be a warrior and picked by the next Witch-Mother to be chosen, just as he was picked by White-Horn. Instead, the gods mocked him with a runt. He had no lack of resentment for the boy, forsaking him not a day after his birth.
White-Horn and her other husbands took to the child much more readily than his father though, naming the pale, near-sickly baby Pale-Feather. Pale, for his complexion and Feather, for how soft-skinned and weightless he was. Even so, despite all the love shown to him by the others, he would never forgive his father for not loving him. He would grow into a man still befitting his name, but with hard eyes and furrowed brows and deep frowns for his father and the world around him. A want to prove himself more than his father guided him moreso than any loving words would.
He took to the lessons of reading and writing well enough, but he plunged himself into the lessons of fighting with hand and knife and axe and spell, swimming through them with the ease of a strong salmon through a calm river, much to the chagrin of his father. Never picking fights with the other children, but seeing more than his fair share through to the end made him like a war-dog. Calm one moment, but like a spring coiled tight, leaving men leaking in the next if they so wanted it. Many a time, he was confined to the steam-house, locked away to contemplate his choices amongst hot coals and near-blinding steam.
When he clawed through life to age of a fledgling man, he was sent out to walk his Lone-Path and discover himself in the mountains, surviving alone. He walked far on his lonesome, until he happened across a peculiar few men camped on a ridge overlooking the Eastern Reach of Skyrim. They bid him come sit at their fire and asked of him his name. He spoke freely with them and heard their tales of the hardship and injustice that the Nord inflicts on the Reachmen of the East. A stifling of their culture, their language, their clothing, their very being. They asked him what he thought of that, and he gave his answer. He had found what he wanted of life on this Lone-Path of his, but it would not lead him to places he would want to be, he would find.
These men he'd found took him in and fostered his wily nature, teaching him the ways of cloak and dagger, the skills of a poisoner. He took their oath, pledged himself to their way of life, believed their beliefs. He was Forsworn. He carried out the killings of many a man in the name of Reachman retribution, in the name of vindication. His blood would not stop roiling like a geyser until the Eastern Reach was free of the Nord oppressor. His knife, his axe, his poison were his tools and his quiet footstep was the trial, death was his sentence.
For the first time, Pale-Feather felt in control of life.
A Markarth night would change that. A plan to kill the Jarl and the whole of the Silverblood Nords would be carried out that night. His knife and axe were sharp, his poisons were made and stored and ready, his mind tuned to the quietness that brought judgement on the Nord. It was all for naught, his companions were captured and hanged, himself next on the list to be found. Alone in the maze-city of Markarth, he ran. He did not stop until he passed Markarth's gates and even then, he ran. He found no quarter, his camp sacked and comrades put to the sword.
He ran all the way back to the Crow-Kith Clan's mountains, his clan's mountains. Little did he know, Witch-Mother White-Horn's ears could hear many things from a great distance, and she knew what her beloved son had turned into. Using his skills for the enemy, the lowest scum in the Eastern Reach. The Forsworn were shown no love by many Reachman Clans, much less the Crow-Kith. White-Horn renounced Pale-Feather, just as his father did. He would hate her and the others for years to come.
Alone, he wandered south to Bangkorai, lost. He found a bed at a roadside inn, the Frothing Flagon, and stayed there for a few days. He found a tenuous friendship with the owner and a few of the regular patrons, slowly opening up to them over the course of his stay there. It would only serve to break the pieces of him even finer when his new friends became his captors. Slavers. On a night out drinking, he awoke with a headache and in a puddle of his own vomit in chains. They sold him to a smuggler heading to Stros M'kai and he learned what his life was worth- fifty septims. Had he been a weaker man, he would have turned his knife on himself.
For many moons, he walks with others in chains under the cover of night, sleeping with others in chains during the day. They get to the shore and he is forced into a place at the oars of the longship these slavers owned. The meat and bone and soul of him was property as much as the wood of the ship was. How had he fallen so? Upon arrival to Stros M'kai, he is given his first meal in days, scarfing down the slop like a gutter orphan.
That night, they are put on auction. Some of his fellow slaves are bound for Morrowind, others the land of the Altmer, a few go to the plantations in Argonia or the sugar fields in the Khajiiti lands, some to Hammerfell. Him, though, he would go back to High Rock. He was bound with his new owner for Wayrest, a brothel.
He is stripped of his pride, or whatever residue of it that was left on him. Taken shamefully, roughly, forcefully by rough sailors that fancied long, raven-haired girlish lads. Nights of this, he endured, broken down to the lowest dregs of what a human being was. Until something in him reawakens. On one horrid night, he lay awake next to his most recent client, snoring with the conscience of a saint. His body sore all over and hazy from the drugs, but fingers sure as they could be in their goal, he plotted. Poison would be too quick and too anonymous. Knife or axe, even, was not enough to sate his thirst for blood. Finally, he knew, and he carried out his plan. Whether he lived or died that night was of no concern to him, just that they knew beyond a doubt the face of their killer.
He bound and gagged both his client and his owner, tying them to a two-horse-drawn carriage parked at the stables. He used an oil lamp to set fire to the brothel, dragging the two men he hated most behind that stolen cart, horses at a full gallop through town until he was free to do as he pleased with them. And he did.
Every degrading thing done unto him, he made them do unto each other under threat of death. Little did they know that nothing could save them. In the end, they both died. He might have felt some measure of peace, some glint of justice, scrap of retribution. It was not enough to make him whole again. Still, as he always did, he clawed his way through life and trudged on along the road.
He takes residence at another roadside inn, eager for another slaver crew to try to take him. None did, not that he ever met any. He played a lute he'd had since the brothel, earning money in a better way with his singing. For the second time in life, he felt in control.
A man named Francis rents a bed at this little roadside inn and Pale-Feather is admittedly smitten with him. Francis was everything he wanted to be, kind, confident, dashing, ambitious. Francis asks Pale-Feather his name.
Latro, Pale-Feather answers,
Latro de Couteau. Latro was not a Reachman of the Crow-Kith Clan, Latro was not a Forsworn, Latro was not a slave or a whore or a poisoner. Latro was a simple alchemist and traveling bard.
Francis and Latro became better and better friends as the days went on, leaving the roadside inn a few days after their meeting there. The two of them wandered from town to town and Latro would watch Francis and his masterful swordsmanship in practice, as well as his handiness in tavern-brawls and bareknuckle rings from Rihad to Riften. The days turned to weeks, turned to months, and Francis agreed to teach Latro his ways and Latro would take the lessons and adapt them to his own style. Using the defensive spells of hardening the flesh to cleverly make maces of his fists, clubs of his legs, and axes of his hands in a way- not able to pierce flesh, but a solid chop could break ribs or collarbones, necks, faces, or wreak other mischief.
His Lone-Path this time taught him other things, better things. Pale-Feather the Hateful was no more, only Latro remained. Even if a small part of his violence remained in his hands and feet and head, he did his best to use it as his very last choice of tool. Violence is to be abhored, the last tool of simple minds, Francis would tell him. Ironically, albeit, but the words still struck a cord in him. He and Francis would part ways in Bruma, Latro going his way and Francis going his own. Latro would ply his trade as a healer, rather than a poisoner, and a bard with a ghostly, beautiful voice, rather than a Forsworn warrior with a ghostly-pitched warcry. It would not be long until he was approached by the recruiters of an expedition, offering steady work to any healer looking to sign on and fill a recently vacated space on the roster and a tidy forward sum.
He signed on, the following days would surely be something of an experience. A good one, he hoped, a calm smile on Latro's face, as always.
Personality: Calm, quiet, polite, genuinely kind. Latro feels best when he can brighten someone's day with a kind word or an ear to lend, or a gift if they've known each other for long enough to know what good ones to get. Although he does these things for friends and companions, he is most often off by himself at camp, content with knowing he has company, even if he is not part of the conversation. He takes life with an ease that is such a startling difference from some of his companions, holding to a philosophy of appreciating the little things and doing well by your fellow man in hopes that it leads them to do well by theirs. He may not be the type of bard that is more comfortable in a woman's bedsheets than his own clothes or to lead a rowdy crowd in a bawdy drinking song, but he is sincere, choosing instead to stick to songs of gentle love, wistful ballads, and slow songs that bring a nostalgia for something you may never have even had.
A melancholy man, if there ever was one, and he is closest to this trait when playing for a small crowd in a calm tavern. Underneath the calm and kindness is a man very capably violent, but nowadays, that man never sees the light of day. He views his more violent tendencies with shame for the things he's done in his past, but does not make honest efforts to right them, but to forget them. Cover them over with something not unlike the winter covers over the fields and forests with thick and pure snow, making it seem as if the fields and forests were never there at all. From his upbringing in a Wayrest brothel spending his time there earning rather than spending, he views sex and sexuality with a certain disgust and fear, due to how he was exposed to it.
If you did ask him on a night where he gets particularly intoxicated, he would say that he cares not if the partner is man or woman, just that they are nothing like anyone he has ever known. He yearns for the day that he meets his equal and might finally open himself to becoming intimate like the characters in the ballads he plays. He has a particularly nasty and hypocritical disdain for drunks and only tolerates them so long as they're tossing coins his way for his music. People who spend time in brothels are immediately met with a coldness from him.
Miscellaneous: Will often prefer to be by himself, but still close to the fire, enjoying the company even if not in the conversation
His demeanor can be seen as odd or off-putting to most, but he does tend to grow on people and vice-versa as the days go by
He is indifferent to personal wealth, only playing for money because he likes playing and knows he needs to feed himself at the end of the day. He accepted the job because he thinks it'll be easy, and he doesn't necessarily mind having as many septims as he does now.
Is almost always seen spending his free-time playing his lute, but is equally well-versed in playing the flute and the mandolin, a favorite instrument in the Reach.
The thought of being casually sexual with another person is unfavorable, needing a deeper connection than most to be able to open himself up that way.
Despite his easy-going and calm demeanor, he sleeps lightly and is prone to quick hands and feral eyes if awaken by anyone but himself.
While bisexual, he has a preference for women and is nervous and a little defensive around men larger than he is due to his past as a slave-whore. The drugs are the only thing that let him drift off to sleep peacefully.
A slight fear of being lonely. Not alone, but lacking any kind of friendship or companion.
Has a special hatred for abusers of any sort.
A somewhat hypocritical dislike of those given over to drinking excessively, seeing as he has habits of his own.
