LORD LEORIC CADE
Age: 44
Station: Nobility, the head of House Cade. Lord of Castle Tarrow.
Family: Though the only member of House Cade proper, Lord Leoric has several relatives. He has a bastard younger brother, Ser Raymun. Their relationship is not particularily warm: Raymun reminds Leoric too much of their father, and he considers the bastard to be ungovernable. The two do not often meet, as Raymun spent many years serving Lord Frey as a household knight. Despite his personal dislike for the man, however, Leoric respects and trusts his brother, enough to name him Castellan in his absence.
He is betrothed to Lady Sarisa Swann, the daughter of an important stormlord, a last attempt to produce an heir on his part. He befriended her father during Robert's Rebellion and the subsequent war against the iron islands, in spite of the geographic divide, but he has never met Sarisa herself. Finally, there is Adelinde, the daughter of his dead uncle Alder. Her identity has not been verified, and all he knows of her is that she appeared at Castle Tarrow suddenly, claiming to be someone nobody knew existed.
Description: Lord Cade is a visibly aging man, long past his prime. Never a big man, being rather short and slender, he is hardly an intimidating figure. Once upon a time, he would distinguish himself in the lists, and with a blade in hand, but his strength is not what it was, and he relies mostly on experience during the skirmishes of the War of Five Kings. He is very dour; his face is made for frowns and scowls, and he is pessimistic to a fault. He has dark brown hair and a small beard, both cut short.
He tends to expect the worse of any given situation, and plans accordingly. That is not to say that he is miserable, or that he judges others for being happier than himself. Though he is not often openly merry, he relaxes his guard around those he knows and trusts, being cold to strangers and warm to friends, though his friends are few and far between. He is merely worn down by four decades of Westerosi politics, desiring no more than to return to Castle Tarrow in peace.
Biography: Born in the fall of the year 255, Leoric Cade, son of Lord Edwyle Cade and Lady Merall Boor, Leoric did not have a particularily happy childhood. Few children lived in Castle Tarrow at that time, and none were of equal rank to himself; he was friendless and isolated. Nor did he have his parents to turn to. Lady Merall had no love for him, and used him as a weapon with which to spite his father. Lord Edwyle, meanwhile, had no love for anybody at all, least of all his son. The elder Lord Cade was a cruel man of sinister repute, whose dark moods were feared throughout the region.
Leoric found himself to be happiest when left alone, exploring the tunnels below Castle Tarrow, the relics of a dozen older fortresses. He was of a bookish demeanor, and took to the lessons of his maester eagerly. Never robust, he was quite sickly in his youth, much to his father's disgust. At the age of ten, his uncle Alder Cade, barely a man himself, eloped to marry a daughter of petty nobility, despite Edwyle expressiley forbidding it. His father's rage was savage, and it was understood that there would be no more mention of the errant uncle in the castle.
He learned the use of the sword, of course, and he did not disgrace the family name on the lists or, during the War of Ninepenny Kings, on the battlefield. He was knighted during that conflict, among many other nobles. He even made a name for himself in tourneys as he grew more boisterous with manhood and knighthood. His life thereafter was much the same as any other Westerosi nobleman, a series of tourneys and feasts interrupted only by his marriage to his first wife, forced upon him by his father.
Things changed when he was 30, when the John Arryn raised his banner in defiance of the king, and the realm exploded into war. He and his father led the Cade forces to the Twins, intent on marching in support of Riverrun, but were held back by Walder Frey. By the time they arrived at the Trident, the war was already all but won. Lord Edwyle was furious, slipping first into a rage, and then when that subsided into a melancholy. He grew more and more detached with their march south as the days went on. Only when he could not be roused from his sleep did his retainers suspect something was amiss. A maester deduced that the lord had contracted an illness during the march. The sickness burned through him quickly. His corpse was sent back to Castle Tarrow within the fortnight. It was whispered that the Lord had died too quickly, and that he had been poisoned by one of his many enemies. He had certainly not had lack for those in his wicked life.
Leoric, now Lord Cade, spent the rest of the war marching from one place to another, from King's Landing to Storm's End. He returned to Castle Tarrow a different man, more restrained by the responsibilities now on his shoulders. He abandoned the lists, and began to spend more and more time locked away in his study, ruling as best as he could.
When word came south that the Lannisters were burning the Riverlands, Lord Frey called his banners, and Leoric marched once more, leading his men to the Twins. There they waited once more at Lord Walder's pleasure, receiving the shocking news of the horrific defeat at the Golden Tooth. He only marched south when Robb Stark arrived from the North, leaving under the command of Stevron Frey, his overlord having thrown his lot with the wolf. At the Whispering Woods and Oxcross he fought under the wolf's banner, and he was among those who scaled the walls of the Crag.
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