Lothar of the Empty Jug

Lothar was born in the town of Restov...or at least he's pretty sure he was. In truth, he never really knew his parents. Raised by his older brother from infancy, until he disappeared when Lothar was somewhere around 8 years old, his only family has been the street rats and orphans common in nearly every dark corner of every town and city.

Lothar learned early on that running away was much more prudent than getting into a fight (Reactionary trait)...besides he was never any good at fighting with weapons. He only had them taken away and used against him. So it was best to just high-tail it. His size, being on the rather small end of things, was a detriment when it came to going toe to toe. But he found it rather handy when squeezing through a hole in his attempt to escape a group of thugs.

The streets breed quickness of hand and eye as well, which means that Lothar grew nimble from a young age. And he utilized this to his advantage in his too-oft dealings with his competitors. Resources being what they were, he often had to either beg of forage for food. For some reason, theft never suited him. He just couldn't seem to get used to the way it made him feel. His brother had no such compunctions, and this is what likely kept Lothar alive for the first 8 years of his life.

It was a fire that changed things. One early winter morning Lothar awoke to stinging smoke that swirled about the small hovel that he and his brother had built out of scavenged boxes and a castaway piece of sail cloth. It might have been the small candles that they'd been using to keep the place warm. Or maybe it was set on purpose by some of the more aggressive competitors in the area. Who knows. All Lothar can remember of that fateful morning was waking up coughing with half the place in flames. His brother was nowhere to be seen.

Weeks of futile searching led to Lothar believing that his brother must have certainly fallen to ill intent. And to this day, he still wonders what happened to him.

One evening Lothar, starving and cold, stumbled across a brown stoppered bottle in an alley behind a rather shabby bordello. He scooped it up, scrambled for a safe place in which he might investigate it w/out unwanted attention, and then unstoppered it. Inside he found a warming amber liquid. He sipped it and it made him cough, but it also made his belly warm. (Later he was to find that this was the very rare form of alcohol called Rum...which became his favored drink of choice when he could find it.)

An hour, and one empty rum bottle later and Lothar was out in the street singing. While he was most certainly drunk as a skunk, he was also much more clear headed than he ever had the right to be. And to top that off, he found that a strange energy surged through him. An energy that made him do things he never even considered.

A slip of the tongue to the wrong person and he was being chased through the streets by the town guard. Easily avoiding them he slipped to the ground, exhausted...his breath coming in ragged, cloudy huffs on the cold evening air. He closed his eyes to rest only for a second.

And opened them to find wonder of wonders. He was in a small stone room surrounded by wooden barrels. The room was kept warm by a series of small braziers spaced evenly around the perimeter and he was covered by a blanket! He sat up quickly only to be hit in the center of the forehead by a very sharp brick. 'Crack'! and down he went....Eyes spinning and stomach churning he looked around for the assailant. For he saw nothing to have caused such a nasty wound.

Reaching up he was sure his hand would be drawn back covered by blood, but no! OK, so what was the cause of this horrid feeling? Why did he feel so confoundedly bad? He groaned...and in answer he heard a shuffling from one of the dark corners of the room. "Ya got the head for the drink wee one, but ya aint yet got the stomach eh?" Said a deep voice that proceeded an enormous bear of a man.

Dressed in the brown cassock of an order of monks or holy men, he came forward slowly with a tankard in one hand and a loaf of bread in the other. "Here now. Take a sip-o-this and a wee bite of this hear heavenly loaf and I'll near guarantee that you feel much better."

Lothar trusted this man. He couldn't really say why, for he rarely trusted anyone besides himself. But there seemed to be some sort of aura about him that just radiated "rightness". So he nodded slowly and took a sip of the strange, pungent liquid and a larger bite of the bread. And sure enough, his head and stomach cleared up nearly immediately. This most certainly was magic of a most potent kind. And he was eager to see / try more of it!

This was the start of a wonderful relationship between Lothar and the monks of the House of Cayden Cailean.

Years of living amongst the monks, learning their ways and growing from the scrawny child to a stout (yet still short) individual able to pick up and haul full half barrels of ale in his arms, Lothar naturally fell in with what he considered his "family" at House Cayden Cailean. Which in truth was a brew pub of the highest quality.

There was only one problem, for some reason, the "magic" just never came. He was tutored and lectured day and night. But to no avail. He just didn't have the natural predilection for spells. It just wasn't in his blood. So he labored as a brewer and helper in the House for years, never believing that he was meant for more than that simple life. Drinking and brewing were his life. (Fortified Drinker trait)

This time though it wasn't a disaster that changed his life but rather the arrival of a strange individual. One evening a traveling monk came to stay with the brothers. A follower of Cayden Cailean, this brother was not a brewer, which was rather strange. But he could most certainly drink with the best of them...And when he did, strange things happened. He was somehow empowered with a strange energy and could do the most amazing things.

Lothar recognized the "energy" immediately, for he felt a small part of that every time that he drank as well. But he assumed that it was something that all brothers experienced. He was soon to learn though that this was not true at all. What happened to him was rare in the extreme amongst his brethren. In turn, the visiting monk recognized a brother in Lothar and took him under his wing, making Restov his new home.

A few years pass while Lothar was being trained by the traveler in the martial arts. A type of art / combat that was blessed by the god Cayden Caileen: The art of the Drunken Master. This is when he finally earned his honorific of "Brother Lothar of the empty jug". And this is also when his master said goodbye. It was time for him to continue his journey, but he told Brother Lothar that there were more of his kind out there. And most nearly all of them were searching for a school where they could learn the arts he'd been teaching for years.

So the master left Brother Lothar with only one directive. Find a place to open a school for their art. Dedicated to Cayden Cailean but that also teaches the rare form of martial arts known also as 'Drunken Boxing'.

Today, after a full year of trying, and failing to open a school here in Restov, Brother Lothar is now certain that his destiny demands that he head south, to carve a school out of the chaos of the wild. And lo an behold, an opportunity has arisen. As if foreordained by Cayden Caileen himself!

Elsbeth

Elsbeth was born in the River Kingdoms, the product of a Pirate Queen human mother and Mercenary elven father. Upon her mother’s death, Elsbeth
decided to seek out her father far to the north. She headed to Winterbreak, but found that her meager skills were insufficient to live on, and she
soon ran out of money. Destitute, she petitioned to the local church of Calistria to provide for her and soon found herself a Sacred Prostitute of
Calistria. After a few years she met a young inquisitor named William. He was quite taken with young Elsbeth, both by her charms and the divine power
he sensed within her. He decided he would have her join him on his missions as his apprentice, and soon Elsbeth found herself traveling throughout
Brevoy at William’s side. Time passed, and somewhere between exposing traitors and destroying enemies of the faith, she and William became lovers and
finally married (This joyous event took place three months ago).

Two months ago they entered Restov, chasing after a small group of cultists worshipping Asmodeus; the cultists had been desecrating shrines and
temples of various deities in the region, and their trail led to Restov. The couple was accompanied by Atif, a priest of Erastil, who joined them
after his shrine had been attacked and burned to the ground. William was uneasy, something about Atif seemed out of place, but the priest seemed
genuine enough in his desire to see the cultists punished, so William let it go for the time being. After a few hours seeking information within the
city, William was able to track the cultists to a small farm just outside of town.

As the small group headed into the cellar, they could hear the sounds of chanting coming from below. Suddenly Atif proved Williams’ suspicions true,
as he stabbed William in the back with a poisoned blade. The cultists had prepared an ambush, and now poured forth to attack. Elsbeth was cut off
from William in the battle, and as she tried to reach his side, was stabbed multiple times. Elsbeth realized that she would not reach him in time,
and she could not defeat these cultists alone. So she did the only thing possible: she ran. As she took one last look back, she saw through her tears
as Williams’ head was cleaved from his body by Atif.

Elsbeth’s journey back to town was a hazy, pain-filled memory, but somehow she managed it and finally collapsed in front of an apothecary’s shop.
When she woke three days later, the apothecary told her that she had lost a great deal of blood and should have died, yet miraculously she survived.
But then she was told that while she survived the vicious injuries inflicted upon her, her child had not. Elsbeth was stunned at this news, since she
hadn’t even realized that she was with child. Not only had they taken her husband from her, but her unborn child as well.

Elsbeth believed that she had been blessed by Calistria to survive her injuries so that she could wreak terrible vengeance on those that had taken
everything she cared about from her. After she recovered enough from her wounds, she tracked down those cultists foolish enough to reveal themselves
to her, and killed them slowly and brutally, hoping to flush out the one true target of her hatred, Atif.

Two weeks ago she heard a rumor that a priest of Erastil matching Atif’s description had traveled to the Stolen Lands as a “missionary”. Elsbeth did
all she could to be part of the next group of explorers heading down to that area, determined that if she has to, she will explore the entire area by
herself to find Atif. And the gods help anyone that gets in her way.

Ixilplith

Ixilplith is a bastard. Born to an innkeeper’s daughter, he never knew his father. He was raised well by his mother and grandparents but, as he grew
older, whenever he asked about his father he was only met with silence. He grew up around the inn and learned how to serve and cook. He was a quiet
and polite boy who loved to spend his free time wandering the nearby woods.

As Ixilplith grew, he developed an interest in learning to read. His grandfather knew basic literacy due to his need to place and received orders for
the inn and to keep the books. Ixilplith learned fast. One day Tyrone, an older man who was a regular at the inn, offered to loan him a book. It
turned out Tyrone had a great many books and Ixilplith was always eager for the next. He spent many an hour sitting in the sun out in some glade
reading and enjoying the cool afternoon breeze.

One day Tyrone gave him a special book. It was a book containing minor cantrips of the type used by hedge mages and town healers. Ixilplith was
fascinated and spent days roaming the countryside learning to identify, name and collect many of the local herbs, plants, and other items called for
to cast these spells. This also inevitably led to many mishaps or small explosions in the inn kitchen, until Ixilplith was finally forbidden from
performing any further extracurricular activities in the kitchen and had to learn to perform his experiments over a campfire out of doors.

His family was tolerant of his odd little trials and errors, as he performed his chores and duties diligently and because he seemed to have a natural
knack for learning these things. They also occasionally came in useful. Then one day a mysterious stranger appeared in town. He came to the inn and
stayed for a week. Everyone in the town avoided man except for old man Tyrone, who met with him every night at the inn and shared private
conversation with him by the fire. At the end of this week, the man approached the family. He was a member of a guild of mages from the city of
Skywatch and he wanted to bring Ixilplith back with him to become an initiate of his guild. When the family said they could not afford such a thing,
the man assured them that it was not an issue. The family was loathe to give up Ixilplith, but knowing how great an opportunity this was they could
not say no. So it was that Ixilplith found himself packed and gone the next morning.

Ixilplith spent the next few years studying at the guild. His knowledge of serving and cooking served him well in earning his keep, though some of
the other initiates, who had obviously come from richer families, mocked him occasionally for having this knowledge. He had new forests to explore
and new plants and items to learn the names of. Ixilplith was happy and regularly wrote to his family. He found he had a particular predilection for
learning air and wind related spells and upon his graduation from initiate to guild member he was given the name Windrunner. He decided he would
become a wind elementalist mage. Soon after his graduation, he was called before the guild elders. The guild had historically had good relations with
a group of rulers known as the Sword Lords who were attempting to explore and colonize an area known as the Stolen Lands. In order to maintain good
relations with the Sword Lords they had agreed to send a young mage to be part of one of the groups tasked with this exploration. Due to Ixilpliths
love of the outdoors and air elementalist focus, they thought he was the ideal candidate to fulfill this obligation. They would expect regular
reports from him, especially noting any contact with or evidence of the Fae in the area. Ixilplith embraced this opportunity to learn, adventure, and
prove his abilities to his guild.