Post by Lesa on Feb 28, 2011 3:53:09 GMT -5
C'fael
Name: C'fael (was Cadfael)
Age: 26
Gender: Male
Prisoner: No
Crime: Has he ever been caught? No. So, no.
Craft/Rank: Brownrider, Journeyman Healer (Human and Dragon)
Appearance: The eyes have it. They are what draw one into C'fael’s presence, more than his engaging lips, his interesting pace or the firm line of his stubbled jaw. His eyes are a beguiling gray, an open, light color, the gray before snowfall, a pretty event with potential for death, but still better than Threadfall. C'fael’s eyes show his calmness, his slow-to-anger persona. They say 'trust me', a good trait for a Healer, for without this seemingly open gaze, even with his 'soft' features, the ability C'fael has for mischief and mayhem still can be seen, if one knows how to look. Even after everything, it is still there. Harder to see, as his gaze is weary, but there.
Cheekbones are high, not prominent, but not hidden behind an 'apple' of flesh as some are - the straight lines of them draw attention up to his eyes, as does the line of his surprisingly straight nose, (for all his fighting, he has learned how to duck or block most strikes to the face, a good thing considering R'sey's old proclivity for swinging in that direction). Lashes are black, like his mother's, and full, almost womanly, or at least of the like that women 'would die for' as the phrase goes. Being male, C'fael doesn't notice, or particularly care. So what? They're just another part of his face.
Even after all he has seen, C'fael refuses to be cowed. He doesn't carry himself as a battle-weary veteran. Instead, his walk is a mix of the crisp attentive march of a Guard, a Healer's constant rushing from one crisis to the next and a dragonrider's languid gambol - it has made his pace almost feline, languid yet attentive, and with the ability to rush off at the slightest provocation.
Much like a feline, C'fael finds it hard to stand with a perfectly straight head - it gave him no end of grief while training with his father and later his wingleaders (though they cared about it less) as he could never come fully to attention. He finds it easier to catch unexpected sounds with this slight headtilt, even if it is just a bare degree or two to the right or left. This headtilt had him labeled 'cute' by many of the women or ladies around him; when younger made it easier for them to trust him.
Sun gold and sun gilded, his hair always hints at a potentially darker color, the klah-brown of his mother, but his father’s pale hair dwarfs the darkness - the majority of his hair ranges from Rukbat-gold to dirt brown, including his eyebrows. His ears are of a middling size, close to the side of his head, neat and adding to the evenness of his features. Worry lines cross his forehead, engraved in to the point someone could attempt to write on the lines there - but he is used to them, as he is used to the laugh and frown lines around his eyes and lips. He wears a slight stubble-scraggly beard on his face, mostly to make him look his proper age, as many seem to think he is younger,
Hands are kept clean, as befitting a Healer, nails short on the long-fingered, large appendages. Even after all these Turns, C'fael retains slight calluses from sword training - in part from teaching the use of a sword to weyrbrats, in part because many of the sword-callus places are also where Healing instruments are held. He is well muscled, through lifting patients for Healing and his swordplay, though still fairly thin for all the muscle. Even full grown, he is nowhere near the bulk or wide shoulders of his father, instead a lither figure, nimble on his feet, despite their large size, and his height, a square 6 feet. He wears whatever is available to him that isn't dirty or bloody; preferring dark clothing that fits slightly loose, to allow the best range of movement - a remnant of his childhood Guard duties, and that as a Healer, dark clothing that he can move in helps hide blood and allows him to do his job.
PB: Jeremy Sumpter
Personality: C'fael is first and foremost a gentleman. Not the ‘gentleman’s gentleman’ in the way of being a valet, but a true gentleman in the old, old tradition of a gentleman. Holding doors, being respectful to all women, protecting the weak (and those he considers his friends), being witty in speech, deeply loyal to those who he feels deserve his loyalty, not boasting over his activities, keeping himself humble, but not meek, not holding his power high over those he might be able to, forgiving and forgetting wrong done against him - most of the time. He will not push others into things they don’t want to do, unless such a thing is for their better good (visiting the Infirmary, for example).
C'fael is not an obvious leader, though he is a leader - he just leads by the maxim of "lead as you would wish to be followed", so many would not notice him having them do things - he isn't the type for stirring speeches or scare tactics. Rather, he does the 'right things' and expects everyone else to do the right things. This non-obvious leading doesn't extend to his Healer duties. With those, there is one rule and one rule only: You will do it, and you will like it.
In other words, I'm the Healer, and there's a reason for everything I tell you. If you want to live, listen. If you don't mind dying, ignore what I say. It's that simple.
C'fael is rarely now mischievous or teasing. Vocal only, rather than how he used to be, occasionally setting up pranks or traps, usually with R'sey's help - and generally not just for a laugh. There was a reason for the traps: someone stealing supplies, or thefts from a weyr, things of that nature - their traps would capture the villains, and rather than get shown as the ones who did the deed, saving Fort or the rider's belongings, or whatever it was they used the trap for, C'fael and R'sey would act as if it was all a game, right up until R'sey's death - earlier that sevenday they caught a Trader stealing fellis, but no, the trap hadn't been set for the Trader going after the fellis, of course not, it had been set by R'sey to capture C'fael! Only the Senior Weyrleader and Weyrwoman knew the truth of the matter: exactly how the pair liked it.
C'fael, like most Healers, angers slow; when he does blow up it is once, and sudden and over quickly – the strong gust of wind in a storm that knocks you down, not the lightning strike that can cause permanent and long lasting damage. Even when angry, he is not precisely one to yell - more to dryly comment on the thing that made him angry to make the person see the fallacy of their ways. It is this dry wit and deep, near biting sarcasm that served him in good stead with his lifelong friendship in R'sey.
History: From Hadsyn Hold, outside of Benden, it is a smallish minor hold, holding about ten to twenty families at one time. Cadfael’s family has been the Guards protecting the area since his great-great-grandparents moved to Hadsyn. Cadfael first met Remsey two days after he was born. To say they were immediately best friends would be… close to, but not quite true. Hard to say when Remsey‘s first action was to make Cadfael cry. But Remsey‘s action that set off Cadfael was Remsey himself crying. So perhaps they just bonded in the way of very young children.
They were seldom seen without the other as they grew – training to be Guards with Cadfael’s father, or exploring around Hadsyn, or whatever they were doing, it was always together. Cadfael’s mother was worried about it – there were plenty of boys around, why did they play only with each other? His father only thought the better of them for it – boys working that closely together could read each other’s minds before long, or close to it. Made it considerably easier not only to teach them, but to salve his conscience when even at six Turns old, they were sent out on patrols.
Light patrols only, but something had to be done to keep them busy, Cadfael couldn’t talk Remsey out of all of his wherrybrained schemes, and many of the adults were fed up with them, or just sheer too busy to punish them properly. The patrols made sure they were active, and kept them away from the cothold and the mischief they could rain on its inhabitants. These same patrols were what firmed up their friendship into a partnership – before, many, Cadfael’s parents included, had thought that the boy would only follow Remsey around like a puppy, never giving his own opinion on anything, only parroting what Remsey said on the matter. When the two came in with Cadfael haranguing Remsey on some misdeed on the trail, or how he shouldn’t have done that, that was why he hurt himself, or anything else ‘standing up’ to the other boy, did they begin to see. Remsey needed Cadfael as much as Cadfael needed Remsey. They were equals, partners.
This partnership threatened to be split up when the Harper who taught them suggested Remsey be sent to his own Hall for training – the boy was certainly sneaky enough to make a good Harper of one respect. It seemed Cadfael would be left behind, training further as a Guard and never getting to see any of the world besides his current Cothold. At least, until his mother turned to him and told him point blank that he was going to Healer Hall himself, ‘Remric told us to send you, so we will. Don’t you two get in too much trouble!’ Remsey's father, a Master Healer, had stepped in to assure the boys were not separated - Cadfael's mother hadn't wanted to fully see her son's potential, worried as she was about his closeness to Remsey.
At Healer Hall, Cadfael flourished. He was both close enough to Remsey to see him every day, and yet far enough away to be able to concentrate on his own studies. The pair had to deal with rumors and "thoughts" on their close relationship, but soundly beating their accusers took care of the problem admirably, at least according to them. They weren't hidebound, with the idea that homosexuality is odd... it just wasn't them, so they didn't feel they should have to deal with such talk. Made sense to them, if no one else.
Unfortunately, this behavior, the fighting and the mischief got them booted out of the traditional classes. Not thrown out entirely, but put under direct surveillance. To say that they did even better than they had before is the honest truth. Cadfael learned even more under the combined tutelage of Master Healer Mikael and Master Healer Nixie than he had the Turn he’d been being trained by the Teaching Healers; admittedly it was one Turn compared to several Turns, but their way of teaching seemed to work better for him, especially as he got two opinions on things and gained a “sister” while he was at it, Gwynell perfectly willing to accept him as an older brother of sorts, he and Remsey joining the family of three for meals, Gwynell also adopting Remsey as a secondary brother.
The pair of boys were Searched to Fort Weyr at nineteen Turns, a year after they turned Senior Apprentices in their respective crafts (delayed at walking the tables due to mischief and being around each other, in part because Cadfael found himself dragged along on numerous of Remsey's missions, regardless of how much he learned under Nixie and Mikael). There is still some difficulty in asserting that Cadfael was actually Searched, more he went along because he asked if he could, and it turned out the Weyr could use a young, trainable Healer, and Nixie and Mikael approved, knowing that though he could still learn more under them, it was time for him to branch out.
Cadfael Impressed from the stands, sort of. Cadfael ended up being told to go on the Sands to assist another boy who had gotten walked over by a hatchling. Said hatchling was waiting a little ways away from the boy, and even as Cadfael went to work, spoke. I am sorry, C'faelmine, that I hurt him. Brothers' was in my way until you came here, instead of making me go to you. Thank you. Now will you feed your Ansyth?
With that, Cadfael went from Senior Apprentice Weyrhealer to Junior Weyrling, rider of Brown Ansyth, still Senior Apprentice Weyrhealer. Joy. At least it assured that he would be getting hands-on training for all sorts of maladies, rather than making numbweed - he'd be applying the poultice instead. C'fael and Ansyth and Remsey (now R'sey of Blue Desayunth) grew together again as Weyrlings, though R'sey only allowed in the Infirmary under C'fael's supervision - he knew of his friend's liking to experiment, even if it wasn't apparent to the other Healers.
Turns passed, the pair rising to full Riders without a problem, becoming a particular pair within their Wing. Time and time again Ansyth and Desayunath would set their riders down and let the pair go into a territory without identification of their being riders, ferretting out the dealers and Dusters and solving murders while only seeming to be a Healer and Harper traveling together for protection. Many were arrested shortly after the certain pair had visited, but none identified them as the two that had tipped the Guard off - it couldn't be the Duster-brother of the Healer, or the Healer stuck towing his forgetful father back home, it simply couldn't be.
Everything was going well, until C’fael’s twenty-fifth Birthingday. An earthquake struck the area R’sey and Desayunath were visiting on Search (the blue, for all his grumbling, was a decent Searchdragon), and in their attempting to clear away the rubble and find survivors, R’sey was crushed. He didn’t die instantly, instead lingering on as C’fael and Ansyth flew in to provide assistance. The bluerider died in C’fael’s arms, the blond knowing he could do nothing, R’sey was bleeding out on the inside and too many of his limbs had been pulverized. C’fael has been in a state of shock ever since, despite his visits to Hadsyn to see his and R’sey’s families. More and more of his time when not out on Guard duties involved talking with Nixie and Mikael or burying himself in his work, until upon learning of Gwynell's Impression - her Impression to a new color (and aware through C'fael of the coming pressures on their only child because of her Impression), the Healer-couple pushed at their "son" to go help his "sister" and just get to another place where he could do good. It would be a place that carried memories of R'sey subtly - many of those locked away were put there by the pair of them, but at least there would not be the spot on his ledge worn away by Desayunath's claws.
Other stuff: Is considered Gwynell's brother by her, and he considers her a sister, though they are of no relation what-so-ever.
Pets
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Ansyth
image (c) M. Sanche
image (c) M. Sanche
Name: Ansyth (An, Anie, Syth)
Color: Brown (79443B)
Age: 7
Appearance: Ansyth has been likened to a tree stump. Solid, blocky. Maybe even angular. No smooth expanse of long, lithe muscle here. No. Ansyth is a powerhouse, like those scrappy little dogs that are so stubborn that they won't give up the tunnelsnake they caught. He's like that in personality, and like that in size. Not small for a brown, however, but he is that solid pack of muscle. Not fat, just blocky and immovable. Makes it easy for helping with other dragons - he easily has the ability to help even with golds, should they need it - his wings are the only delicate thing about him, long and thin. Not gawkishly long or thin, but appropriate for his size, maybe just a tad over to add a feeling of elegance to this otherwise blocky knight in non-shining armor, their brown pennants waving briskly in the breeze.
He is as many have thought of Sir Gawain and Sir Kai of Arthur's Round Table - ruddy brown and short and blocky, but never one to be messed with. His coloring, while clearly brown, has a slightly reddish hue. If it wasn't for dragon-blood being green, it could be said that this red overtone was due to his helping so many hurt dragons. Perhaps it is, if only symbolic.
Personality: Ansyth at times seems to be the best of a brown and the worst of a bronze, personality-wise. Then again, he is a Healer's dragon, it comes with the territory - how else could one get a self-assured, cocky bronze to allow your help, unless you boss them around? Ansyth is very focused in his goals, like a bronze after a gold in flight, he will do anything he can to get to whatever the goal may be. He may not remember exactly why he wanted that goal by the time he gets it, but he will get it. He's stubborn like that. He's mentally strong; able to bear, like his rider, the hardships poured down on him with good grace and a calm spirit. Ansyth rarely gets mad. Even when he is snapped at, there has to be a reason it was done, so he can't necessarily blame whoever did it. Will he get even? Entirely yes, but only if the offense is strong enough to warrant such a thing - a rarity.
He's an old soul in a draconic body, experienced at life's ills and good things both. When things don't go the way he wants, he will get things the way he wants, by pushing with various forms of intensity for things to be done how he wants - much like C'fael does with recalcitrant patients. Even with his short memory, Ansyth enjoys thinking - thinking things through, doing all the 'what-if's' to a scenario, finding the holes in HisC'fael's logic, everything to make them better at what they do. In talks with HisC'fael, he frequently steamrolls conversations to be assured of his own way - normally for something that C'fael later admits it was better he did or did not do. Ansyth's smart like that!
