app for tu shanshu
Mar. 8th, 2013 09:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
singedPlayer Information:
Name: Hannah
Age: 20
Contact: aim @ xfeilynx, plurk @ hannahcake
Game Cast: Percy Jackson, Katniss Everdeen
AC Thread: here!
Character Information:
Name: Garrett Taliesin
Canon:pretentious land Original
Canon Point: After he’s been stuck in a cave for a month with a dragon.
Age: 22
Reference:
Garrett Taliesin was born in Dillinger, capital city of the land of Risdall, second child to Queen Gayla and King Nolan. In a land where the eldest child inherits, his sister Natalia (older by five years) was considered the heir to the throne, with Garrett being a handy back up. Natalia was responsible and level headed and looked like she would do a good job and so while their parents impressed a need to be a responsible and fair leader on her, Garrett was doted on and pretty much spoiled rotten. The attention and love he received growing up imbued him with a sense of invincibility that made him into kind of an asshole, as described above. He was a very sociable kid, although he never really figured out who was actually his friend and who was his friend because he was a prince (it was most of them :’|), or even that there was a difference.
He was seven years old when his future marriage was arranged to the newborn Princess Althea of the nearby Abere Islands, but that never really bothered him. It was an aspect of being a prince he’d been brought up with, and the Abere Islands were a patriarchal society anyway, seemed like a sweet deal to his seven year old self. He attended his lessons, but only really paid attention when there was something that really engaged him – and when he was engaged he was a quick learner. He was more interested in hunting and riding, though, a passion that stayed with him into adulthood. He gave sex a shot when he was fifteen in a brothel on a dare, and that was that. The next seven or so years were spent with other young nobles, carousing through the country, hunting, drinking, riding, banging and generally just having the time of their lives. Garrett was always the life of any party, a mix of his bright and friendly personality, and the fact that he tended to throw money around like nobody’s business.
It was Natalia who quietly talked their parents into realising Garrett was out of control. Married and with a young son, his sister pointed out that even if he wasn’t going to rule, his future bride was about to come of age and that he was in no way prepared for the political realities of that marriage. So it ended up that Garrett, having been told there was a ‘surprise’ party for him, ended up in a tower far, far away from Dillinger. His parents communicated via magic that he was there to learn some humility, his sister told him he’d brought it on himself, and Garrett raged and pouted and made a fuss until the dragon set down outside his tower.
He thought it was a joke at first, but then his bed was set on fire through the window and he realised that this was nothing he found particularly funny. The tower had been taken over by FRANCIS VON MAGICA, and after his parents couldn’t make contact, they realised they needed some outside help. A vast array of young knights arrived at the tower, only to perish horrible both at the hands of FRANCIS VON MAGICA and the dragon flame. Things were looking grim for our unheroic prince when a slip of a woman managed to stab the dragon in the mouth and sneak into the tower when FRANCIS VON MAGICA was out getting dinner or something. Given a choice between being used in the wizard’s no doubt nefarious plans, or freedom with a pretty girl, he chooses to overlook the fact that the pretty girl has a knife and make a run for it.
Only it turns out the pretty girl is an assassin hired to rescue him because some guy in Kinniburgh wants to marry him because his parents told everyone he was a princess because who wants to rescue a prince?
This is where Garrett’s life really starts to suck.
Embarrassingly enough, the dragon wasn’t a real dragon, but a pygmy dragon. So like, the size of a small horse. And for some reason, despite having been stabbed in the mouth, it had taken a liking to the pretty girl (whose name was Shelby, apparently). Under threat of being either stabbed or set on fire, Garrett agreed to be handed over to Lord Tycho in the hopes he could explain the situation.
Being pretty good at schmoozing, he actually didn’t do too badly at this. Unfortunately for him, just as he was about to reach an agreement with Tycho, FRANCIS VON MAGICA’S men caught up with them. In a rare moment of brilliance, Garrett pre-paid Shelby with a fancy ring and promised more gold at the other end if she’d agree to be hired by him and save his royal ass. Cue some badass murder from Shelby and some vomiting from Garrett as he got to see his first dead body up close and personally.
So began the Adventures of Garrett and Shelby, in which Garrett starts off totally useless. After complaining about sleeping in the cold, Shelby somehow finds the money to put them up in an inn as the travel back to the Capitol. At first Garrett is too self-absorbed to realise how she’s paying for it. As they travel, though, he starts to get a real understanding of how the people in his land actually live, about the hardships of the common people. While still helplessly naïve about Real Life, he starts to shed some of that selfishness. When Shelby lets it slip that she’s been prostituting herself for his warm inns and meals, he’s absolutely horrified.
While he would have been horrified before, he also probably would have let her keep doing it once his moral outrage had passed. Now, though, Garrett has started to grow up a little more. He insists that it’s not necessary, and, moreover, starts thinking of ways he can help. His magic might not be impressive, but it is fun; he makes use of it to put on shows to entertain villagers, and heal a few minor wounds where he can for coin. He also realises that he can heat the tent if they camp, making things more comfortable. He puts his hunting talents to good use. Beyond this, he starts to ask Shelby about her life. As they continue travelling, they get closer.
Unfortunately, Garrett’s use of magic make him easier to find. They stop off at another village a month or so into their trip (which is taking so long due to their caution), and leave at mid morning. By lunch time, the village has been totally destroyed, a burned scar left on the landscape. FRANCIS VON MAGICA is catching up.
They aren’t caught yet, but the event does necessitate doubling back and even more stealthy behaviour. They stop going into villages unless it’s desperate, and then only one at a time. Garrett takes on a mantle of guilt over the people killed that he doesn’t really know how to handle, but it’s something else that brings him closer to Shelby. As Garrett realises that she is quite possibly the only person aside from his sister whose ever treated him like a real person, he also starts to realise that he’s falling in love with her.
Which is terrible, obviously. Because he also realises that her friendship is far too important to him to screw up by trying to romance her now. So he suffers in silence, until one day he wakes up, and she’s gone.
They’d been camping in a cave. When he tries to leave the cave, the dragon (now named Bubbles) blocks the way and tries to eat his shoes. He stays in that cave for a month, during which time he frets over Shelby and teaches himself to cook, because half-charred cow meat provided by a pygmy dragon is terrible. Before Shelby returns, he gets dragged off to Tu Shanshu.
Setting:
The actual world that Garrett comes from is nameless, so if it needs to be referred to in the setting, it’ll be called Pretentious Land, or PL, because Ashe and I are the best at naming things.
Pretentious Land is a magical fantasy land that, if it bears any similarities to our earth, would be closer to medieval times than anything in modern day. Instead of being a force on its own, or something that comes from people, the magic of PL is tied inextricably to the lives of dragons. Being direct descendents of the mother dragon goddess White Fang and the god of magic, Emrys, magic came to the land with their birth, and began to wane with their seeming extinction about two hundred years. The only reason there is still magic around in Garrett’s time is because the dragons weren’t wiped out, as is widely believed, but instead put into magical hibernation to protect them by a group of adventurers, one of whom was the last heir to the throne of Kinniburgh (that didn’t work out so well for Kinniburgh).
Instead of true dragons, we now have the existence of pygmy dragons that also spread magic throughout the lands. While highly intelligent in comparison to most other animals, unlike their true counterparts they cannot communicate with humans on the same level, and are probably more like smart dolphins than actual people. Other magical animals were also affected by the dragon-sleep, with griffins turning into very angry catbirds and unicorns being more like Shetland ponies than anything else. These days, a call of ‘kraken’ on a ship no longer means ‘all hands on deck’, but rather ‘someone get the poking stick and detached the squidthing from the hull’.
Because of the fall of the dragons, magic is a rare thing in PL today. While some people do possess the ability to use it (mages), it’s only a couple of time in a century that a truly great wizard comes along, with earth shaking abilities. The last one is a fellow called FRANCES VON MAGICA, and his daughter Francesca. The latest one, it is becoming apparent, is Garrett’s young nephew Gavin. BUT MORE ON THIS LATER. In order for this to make sense, you need to know about the countries. While there’s more to PL than just the countries depicted here, I’m just going to give an overview of the ones that are relevant to Garrett’s story in particular.
Risdall
Risdall is Garrett’s home, and the setting for the shenanigans in his lift post getting towered. It is also the birthplace of FRANCES VON MAGICA. Out of all the countries in PL, it’s probably one of the more stable ones. This is attributed in some part to the presence of magic; as home to a comparatively large number of pygmy dragons, it has a correspondingly higher number of mages, and produces more wizards than any other nation. Its ruling family is benevolent and looks after its people, despite the somewhat bloody history of the Taliesins – they actually stole the throne from the rightful rulers, the von Magicas, about a hundred years ago. The von Magicas were doing a pretty shitty job anyway, so it’s generally agree by most people that they did the right thing. Risdall is also home to the world’s only remaining magical university, where Garrett attended for maybe a semester before getting bored and leaving.
With the aid of magic, the land is both beautiful and bountiful. The current rulers are King Nolan and Queen Gayle, Garrett’s parents, with the heir to the throne being Princess Natalia, who is married to General Jonathon, the leader of Risdall’s armies. Garrett is third in line to the throne after their son, Gavin, who has been declared a wizard by the university of magic in the capitol.
When it comes to religion, two gods reign supreme in Risdall. One is the god of magic, Emrys, who often appears as either a stag or an old man. The other is Enu, the patron goddess of Risdall. Mostly recognised as a goddess of war, she is also associated with order, government, and higher learning. She was once considered a twin goddess, but her male counterpart was highly worshipped by the previous royal family; the legend goes that when they were overthrown, so too was he toppled due to his tyrannical nature. The university also doubles as a temple to both Emrys and Enu (and their names are often taken in vain).
Kinniburgh
Kinniburgh sucks. It might be the only democracy in PL, but it’s corrupt as fuck, the results of a revolution gone bad centuries before. Fifty or so years before the disappearance of the dragons, the royal family was overthrown in a bloody coup that ended up with most of them dead. But the people who took over were just as power hungry, and that bad beginning has only consolidated the corrupt nature of the government in the centuries since. Unlike Risdall, where people generally pay more attention to magic than the gods, Kinniburgh is a heavily religious country, although the nature of the gods there can be somewhat unsavoury – it is the home to most of the world’s assassin guilds, who double as priests of the death god.
Garrett knows a lot about Kinniburgh in theory, but he never really understands the reality of what it would be like to grow up in such a place until he meets Shelby, a citizen. Who is seriously messed up.
Abere Islands
The Abere Islands are an ancient place, a tropical paradise that is probably the only land left in PL with more magic than Risdall. Nobody actually knows why this is, at least not on the mainland, but rumours and legends fly like nobody’s business about old gods and dragons that are still awake. It’s an extremely patriarchal society where women are seen as little more than objects, and the current king just so happens to only have daughters. Four of them. Garrett is engaged to the eldest as a part of a peace and trade treaty between his land and the Isles, and it hasn’t quite clicked for him that this means he’s going to be ruling it one day. While Risdall doesn’t have much to trade that the Abere Isles need, it does have a strong military arm. Any union between their nations involves trade benefits for Risdall, and protection for the Isles to compensate for their weak military.
The story so far
FRANCES VON MAGICA might have been content to live out the remainder of his life being honoured as the pre-eminent wizard of the world, if it hadn’t been for the birth of Natalia’s son. Gavin being declared a wizard was the final injustice against a man whole believed the Taliesins had stolen everything from him. He began to plot against them. A coup wouldn’t do – the current ruling family was too beloved by the people for him to ever be able to rule with any kind of stability, even if he could pull it off. And while he could have arranged for the murder of Natalia’s husband and her son and married the woman himself, the chances of him being able to break a woman like that – even with magic – were slim.
Garrett, on the other hand, was another story. Considering that the young man was an idiot (to the wizard’s mind), it would be much simpler to break him into being a proper puppet. Taking over Garrett’s tower was the first part in his scheme to get the prince married to his daughter, Francesca. After a terrible ‘accident’ happened to befall the rest of the royal family (before Gavin could grow into his powers, of course), Garrett and Francesca would rule, with FRANCES VON MAGICA calling the shots. Any offspring would be of the von Magica line, and his family would be avenged.
So it’s kind of not surprising he’s pissed off at Garrett for ruining that.
Personality:
Garrett is sort of a reformed asshole, you could say. He wasn’t a dick in the sense that he likes to drown children and strangle puppies, but he was the second born child of a royal family who ruled over a relatively peaceful land – getting all of the perks of this and none of the responsibilities helped to form his personality. While he preferred to think of himself as generous – he shared his time, his body, his bottomless wallet, after all! – he was pretty much a selfish brat. It wasn’t that he didn’t think of people outside of himself – he loves his family, especially his sister (no matter how much she enjoys trolling his life) and had no shame about displaying his love for them – but more that, for the majority of his life, he couldn’t see outside his own immediate circle and surroundings. He was very much focussed on his own pleasure, perfectly amiable while he was getting what he wanted, but turning into a pouty, argumentative brat if it was taken away from him without a good reason. And, quite obviously, because he wanted it? No reason was good enough. Basically, he was only really interested into things that could benefit him, something that led to him being a proficient enough swordsman, but nowhere near a master (too much effort), and passing skilled at magic, but only things that he was interested in learning (like certain electricity tricks).
Getting locked in a tower brought out the uglier side of Garrett’s personality. While a good person at heart, he didn’t exactly acquit himself like one. He was offended, angry, arrogant and rude, haughty and demanding, and once the tower was taken over by an evil wizard, incapable of understanding the seriousness of his situation. He was a prince, didn’t that make him untouchable? He was easily frightened by things beyond his understanding, and as such, stuck his head in the sand rather than do anything else like finding out what his kidnapper wanted.
A combination of Shelby and the situation in general has worked a marked change on Garrett in the past few months, however. A mixture of trauma and careful friendship have worked wonders that parental discipline and towers couldn’t. Garrett’s travels and hardships have forced him to realise that a world exists that doesn’t involve him – that, even though he’s on the run for his life, doesn’t really care about him. A prince can starve as easily as a pauper if no one knows he’s a prince. In order to survive, Garrett was forcibly stripped of his identity as ‘prince’ and had to scrounge around to figure out who he was without that.
As it turns out, not a bad guy. He understands now that actions have consequences which can mean life or death for any number of people – his actions included. He’s willing to think more about the long term, and to put effort into things that don’t have an immediate benefit, or any benefit for him at all. He can look at a situation now and understand why he should care about it, even if it doesn’t affect him and would endanger him to help. The generosity of feeling that he always showed around his family has tempered into a genuine desire to help the people of his country (having seen how they live), and he’s gained a greater understanding of the difficulties involved in running a country, and the responsibilities. Where once he might have been jealous of his sister for being the future queen, he now feels that you couldn’t pay him to do the job she’s been preparing for all her life. He understands that he himself would be woefully unprepared to manage the kingdom. No longer thinking that he would be THE BEST KING EVER, he acknowledges that he probably doesn’t have the temperament or the skill to be in charge of Risdall.
His experiences have changed what was a pretty self-involved, almost goofy sense of humour into something a little more wry and self-deprecating. Having acknowledged he was a bit of a twat, he doesn’t have any problem with poking fun at himself now (alongside other people, admittedly). In particular, he likes trying to make Shelby smile, and will consider having opened his mouth a success if he can get her to do it.
Garrett hasn’t automatically become Mr Uber Maturity, though. He’s a better person now, less selfish and annoying, but he still has this tendency to…flail. His personality is still a loud one, even if it’s less obnoxious – he likes to flirt with pretty ladies and pretty men, although he’s more honest about his compliments now. If something doesn’t make sense or is unfair, he has no problem getting into an argument about it – he just has a tendency to dive in and do this on other people’s behalf now. He only gets really, seriously angry on the behalf of other people, and even that’s rare, and usually because of Shelby. He’s essentially a good natured person, veering into a little ridiculous at times. Sometimes he’ll play that aspect of his personality up for laughs, but other times he’s kind of unaware that he’s being a dumbass. In general, he likes entertaining people, and being thought of as entertaining company.
Garrett is smart, but by no means a genius, and his lack of attention span in the past has mean that his knowledge has a lot of holes in it. He has picked up an urge to learn more about things that have never even occurred to him before – farming details, how to run an inn, how to cook – and if given the time, he’s actually willing to put in the effort now to learn a new skill.
It’s come up a few times in passing, but the truth of the matter is that, while a lot of this growth in Garrett has come about as a result of his recent experiences, Shelby Rook is the driving force behind them. Over the course of the past few months, the assassin has somehow become his first true friend. While he’s lost the title of prince to the strangers he meets, Shelby knows he’s a prince, and doesn’t really care. It’s a novel experience for Garret and, he discovers a freeing one. He doesn’t have to second guess what she wants from him, because she’s almost always up front about it. As he started to learn to appreciate her more, he was concerned that she was only around for the money, but they’ve had too many close calls from FRANCES VON MAGICA now for him to really believe that. His life has reached a point where staying with him wouldn’t be worth any amount of money, because chances of survival are so slim. Because of this, he’s convinced that Shelby really does like, him, at least as a friend, although he does have his moments of paranoia.
It’s an almost naïve friendship between the two of them, despite the dark turn his life has taken. Shelby’s life has been so terrible that it inspires Garrett to be better, for her. He wants to prove to her that someone can treat her like a person, that she deserves good things, that she’s not just a tool. In his earnestness to prove this, he accidentally ended up falling in love with her. Everything about Shelby evokes some kind of strong emotion in Garrett – delight, protectiveness, even anger on occasion. But especially love. And he’s so terrified of losing her in some way now, that he doesn’t mention it. At all. She means so much to him that he can’t risk losing her on some ill thought out romantic escapades. When she leaves him for a whole month, he’s totally heartbroken; it’s only the presence of Bubbles that reassures him she’s coming back.
Upon finding out he’s on the turtle, in between Life & Death, Garrett will mostly be relieved. At least, once he finds out that Shelby’s there too. Without her he’ll fret about where she is and how she is and what she’s doing, but the relief of being reunited with her here where there’s no FRANCES VON MAGICA to be worried about will pretty much overwhelm any concerns about whether or not he’s alive or if he starved to death in a cave. He’ll also consider it a win because if he’s here and time is frozen, his enemy can’t continue his nefarious plans, and his family is safe. Not having to be on the run all the time is also a relief, although he’ll be a bit twitchy about things until he’s sure.
Appearance:
Garrett is pretty damn fine. Standing at around 6’1”, he’s lean, muscled and tan – the sort of guy who spends time outside and obviously keeps himself in shape. His hair is dark brown and generally kept shaved close to his head, although in recent months it has grown out to be sort of wavy and floppy. His eyes are a dark grey/blue colour with an spot of brown in the top half of the left iris. His PB is this handsome fellow.
Abilities:
Garrett has moderate talents at swordsmanship. He’s a fair archer and good on a horse because yay hunter, and has been forced to make use of those skills in recent months. He also has some minor magic skills, mostly fire and light related – creating flames, although he can’t throw a fireball to save his life, sparkles and pretty things. He also does a little bit of sex magic – that is, magic to make sex better, not magic fuelled by it – because why not? This familiarity with the body ties in to his minor healing ability – cuts and bruises and small fractures he can heal entirely, but anything big he can only really ease the pain of. He does have the capacity to learn to improve these skills, but it would be hard work.
Inventory:
- Slightly rumpled clothes
- a sword
- some coins
- a waterskin
Suite:
Wood sector, because the idea of him living in a tree is hilarious to me.
In-Character Samples:
Third Person:
It surprises Garrett to discover that, having avoided all people except Shelby since the destruction of Envine and then being stuck in a cave for a month, that being surrounded by people again is…difficult to manage.
The first thing that strikes him is blind panic, once he realises the kedan have taken him to a city. He tries to explain the dangers to them, words spilling out of a mouth unused to forming them as of late, but they don’t seem to be too concerned about the fact that this pretty city is potentially about to be razed to the ground.
Strangely enough, it’s the word ‘Emperor’ that calms him down. Risdall doesn’t have an Emperor. The only place he knows that does is Trint, and as powerful as Frances is, Garrett is mostly sure that he wouldn’t be able to get away with wiping out an entire Trintian city just to get at one neurotic prince.
So he listens to the kedan explain the console to him. Most of the ‘why’s don’t make much sense to him, but he gets the gist of it – magic mirror, he’s seen weirder things. He thinks he’ll use it later, walking out of his treehouse (and more trees? Really? Some god is laughing at him, somewhere) with the intent of exploring.
And then turning around and walking right back in. Shelby won’t be able to find him if he doesn’t stay in one place. Assuming she even wants to come back to him now that they’re apparently not in Risdall and therefore have no capitol to deliver him too. He’s also lost her dragon somehow. Which wouldn’t personally be a problem if he wasn’t half convinced that she’d rather look for it than him.
“Romance,” he announces to the magic mirror, which is off and silent for the moment, “is far more difficult than the bards make it seem.”
He can hear her voice in his mind. Actually, no he can’t, because she’s always so unexpected that he’s never entirely sure what she’ll say next. But he can see her, the deceptively fragile features of her face. She would absolutely judge him for what he’s about to do, and he has the self-awareness now to admit that it’s probably extremely stupid.
But if Frances is in this place with him, he can’t in good conscience allow people to remain unaware of that. Even if it means the old bastard will find him and haul him off.
Besides. It’ll give him something to do while he tries to remember how to deal with people in person again.
Network:
[The two conflicting impulses of ‘staying alive’ and ‘finding Shelby’ have fought themselves out in Garrett’s brain, and there is now one very attractive prince sitting on screen. If he seems distracted at moments, it’s because he’s on the lookout for potential wizards coming to kidnap him]
I have to say, this isn’t exactly how I imagined getting out of that cave. Then again, after a month or so, I was starting to wonder if I might not get out at all, so I suppose this is an improvement.
[He glances over his shoulder, before returning to the camera. He’s basically assuming this is some weird kind of magic, because what is technology. ] I’m not sure how I feel about being surrounded by trees again. It’s a hard life for a – for me. My life is difficult. Exceedingly so. [a cough] But I do believe that someone out there may be able to help me, at least with one particular issue.
[He holds up a finger, and hurries off screen. There is the unmistakeable sound of a toilet flushing, and then he’s back] What in Enu’s name was that?
[A beat] Also, there are potentially two people looking for me, here. One of them is called Frances von Magica, and I suggest you stay far, far away from him should he turn up. If you find my empty husk of a corpse lying on the streets somewhere, it was most likely him. [He pauses for a second, and some of the upbeat nature slips from his tone. He drums his fingers against the desk] The other person knows who she is.
Name: Hannah
Age: 20
Contact: aim @ xfeilynx, plurk @ hannahcake
Game Cast: Percy Jackson, Katniss Everdeen
AC Thread: here!
Character Information:
Name: Garrett Taliesin
Canon:
Canon Point: After he’s been stuck in a cave for a month with a dragon.
Age: 22
Reference:
Garrett Taliesin was born in Dillinger, capital city of the land of Risdall, second child to Queen Gayla and King Nolan. In a land where the eldest child inherits, his sister Natalia (older by five years) was considered the heir to the throne, with Garrett being a handy back up. Natalia was responsible and level headed and looked like she would do a good job and so while their parents impressed a need to be a responsible and fair leader on her, Garrett was doted on and pretty much spoiled rotten. The attention and love he received growing up imbued him with a sense of invincibility that made him into kind of an asshole, as described above. He was a very sociable kid, although he never really figured out who was actually his friend and who was his friend because he was a prince (it was most of them :’|), or even that there was a difference.
He was seven years old when his future marriage was arranged to the newborn Princess Althea of the nearby Abere Islands, but that never really bothered him. It was an aspect of being a prince he’d been brought up with, and the Abere Islands were a patriarchal society anyway, seemed like a sweet deal to his seven year old self. He attended his lessons, but only really paid attention when there was something that really engaged him – and when he was engaged he was a quick learner. He was more interested in hunting and riding, though, a passion that stayed with him into adulthood. He gave sex a shot when he was fifteen in a brothel on a dare, and that was that. The next seven or so years were spent with other young nobles, carousing through the country, hunting, drinking, riding, banging and generally just having the time of their lives. Garrett was always the life of any party, a mix of his bright and friendly personality, and the fact that he tended to throw money around like nobody’s business.
It was Natalia who quietly talked their parents into realising Garrett was out of control. Married and with a young son, his sister pointed out that even if he wasn’t going to rule, his future bride was about to come of age and that he was in no way prepared for the political realities of that marriage. So it ended up that Garrett, having been told there was a ‘surprise’ party for him, ended up in a tower far, far away from Dillinger. His parents communicated via magic that he was there to learn some humility, his sister told him he’d brought it on himself, and Garrett raged and pouted and made a fuss until the dragon set down outside his tower.
He thought it was a joke at first, but then his bed was set on fire through the window and he realised that this was nothing he found particularly funny. The tower had been taken over by FRANCIS VON MAGICA, and after his parents couldn’t make contact, they realised they needed some outside help. A vast array of young knights arrived at the tower, only to perish horrible both at the hands of FRANCIS VON MAGICA and the dragon flame. Things were looking grim for our unheroic prince when a slip of a woman managed to stab the dragon in the mouth and sneak into the tower when FRANCIS VON MAGICA was out getting dinner or something. Given a choice between being used in the wizard’s no doubt nefarious plans, or freedom with a pretty girl, he chooses to overlook the fact that the pretty girl has a knife and make a run for it.
Only it turns out the pretty girl is an assassin hired to rescue him because some guy in Kinniburgh wants to marry him because his parents told everyone he was a princess because who wants to rescue a prince?
This is where Garrett’s life really starts to suck.
Embarrassingly enough, the dragon wasn’t a real dragon, but a pygmy dragon. So like, the size of a small horse. And for some reason, despite having been stabbed in the mouth, it had taken a liking to the pretty girl (whose name was Shelby, apparently). Under threat of being either stabbed or set on fire, Garrett agreed to be handed over to Lord Tycho in the hopes he could explain the situation.
Being pretty good at schmoozing, he actually didn’t do too badly at this. Unfortunately for him, just as he was about to reach an agreement with Tycho, FRANCIS VON MAGICA’S men caught up with them. In a rare moment of brilliance, Garrett pre-paid Shelby with a fancy ring and promised more gold at the other end if she’d agree to be hired by him and save his royal ass. Cue some badass murder from Shelby and some vomiting from Garrett as he got to see his first dead body up close and personally.
So began the Adventures of Garrett and Shelby, in which Garrett starts off totally useless. After complaining about sleeping in the cold, Shelby somehow finds the money to put them up in an inn as the travel back to the Capitol. At first Garrett is too self-absorbed to realise how she’s paying for it. As they travel, though, he starts to get a real understanding of how the people in his land actually live, about the hardships of the common people. While still helplessly naïve about Real Life, he starts to shed some of that selfishness. When Shelby lets it slip that she’s been prostituting herself for his warm inns and meals, he’s absolutely horrified.
While he would have been horrified before, he also probably would have let her keep doing it once his moral outrage had passed. Now, though, Garrett has started to grow up a little more. He insists that it’s not necessary, and, moreover, starts thinking of ways he can help. His magic might not be impressive, but it is fun; he makes use of it to put on shows to entertain villagers, and heal a few minor wounds where he can for coin. He also realises that he can heat the tent if they camp, making things more comfortable. He puts his hunting talents to good use. Beyond this, he starts to ask Shelby about her life. As they continue travelling, they get closer.
Unfortunately, Garrett’s use of magic make him easier to find. They stop off at another village a month or so into their trip (which is taking so long due to their caution), and leave at mid morning. By lunch time, the village has been totally destroyed, a burned scar left on the landscape. FRANCIS VON MAGICA is catching up.
They aren’t caught yet, but the event does necessitate doubling back and even more stealthy behaviour. They stop going into villages unless it’s desperate, and then only one at a time. Garrett takes on a mantle of guilt over the people killed that he doesn’t really know how to handle, but it’s something else that brings him closer to Shelby. As Garrett realises that she is quite possibly the only person aside from his sister whose ever treated him like a real person, he also starts to realise that he’s falling in love with her.
Which is terrible, obviously. Because he also realises that her friendship is far too important to him to screw up by trying to romance her now. So he suffers in silence, until one day he wakes up, and she’s gone.
They’d been camping in a cave. When he tries to leave the cave, the dragon (now named Bubbles) blocks the way and tries to eat his shoes. He stays in that cave for a month, during which time he frets over Shelby and teaches himself to cook, because half-charred cow meat provided by a pygmy dragon is terrible. Before Shelby returns, he gets dragged off to Tu Shanshu.
Setting:
The actual world that Garrett comes from is nameless, so if it needs to be referred to in the setting, it’ll be called Pretentious Land, or PL, because Ashe and I are the best at naming things.
Pretentious Land is a magical fantasy land that, if it bears any similarities to our earth, would be closer to medieval times than anything in modern day. Instead of being a force on its own, or something that comes from people, the magic of PL is tied inextricably to the lives of dragons. Being direct descendents of the mother dragon goddess White Fang and the god of magic, Emrys, magic came to the land with their birth, and began to wane with their seeming extinction about two hundred years. The only reason there is still magic around in Garrett’s time is because the dragons weren’t wiped out, as is widely believed, but instead put into magical hibernation to protect them by a group of adventurers, one of whom was the last heir to the throne of Kinniburgh (that didn’t work out so well for Kinniburgh).
Instead of true dragons, we now have the existence of pygmy dragons that also spread magic throughout the lands. While highly intelligent in comparison to most other animals, unlike their true counterparts they cannot communicate with humans on the same level, and are probably more like smart dolphins than actual people. Other magical animals were also affected by the dragon-sleep, with griffins turning into very angry catbirds and unicorns being more like Shetland ponies than anything else. These days, a call of ‘kraken’ on a ship no longer means ‘all hands on deck’, but rather ‘someone get the poking stick and detached the squidthing from the hull’.
Because of the fall of the dragons, magic is a rare thing in PL today. While some people do possess the ability to use it (mages), it’s only a couple of time in a century that a truly great wizard comes along, with earth shaking abilities. The last one is a fellow called FRANCES VON MAGICA, and his daughter Francesca. The latest one, it is becoming apparent, is Garrett’s young nephew Gavin. BUT MORE ON THIS LATER. In order for this to make sense, you need to know about the countries. While there’s more to PL than just the countries depicted here, I’m just going to give an overview of the ones that are relevant to Garrett’s story in particular.
Risdall
Risdall is Garrett’s home, and the setting for the shenanigans in his lift post getting towered. It is also the birthplace of FRANCES VON MAGICA. Out of all the countries in PL, it’s probably one of the more stable ones. This is attributed in some part to the presence of magic; as home to a comparatively large number of pygmy dragons, it has a correspondingly higher number of mages, and produces more wizards than any other nation. Its ruling family is benevolent and looks after its people, despite the somewhat bloody history of the Taliesins – they actually stole the throne from the rightful rulers, the von Magicas, about a hundred years ago. The von Magicas were doing a pretty shitty job anyway, so it’s generally agree by most people that they did the right thing. Risdall is also home to the world’s only remaining magical university, where Garrett attended for maybe a semester before getting bored and leaving.
With the aid of magic, the land is both beautiful and bountiful. The current rulers are King Nolan and Queen Gayle, Garrett’s parents, with the heir to the throne being Princess Natalia, who is married to General Jonathon, the leader of Risdall’s armies. Garrett is third in line to the throne after their son, Gavin, who has been declared a wizard by the university of magic in the capitol.
When it comes to religion, two gods reign supreme in Risdall. One is the god of magic, Emrys, who often appears as either a stag or an old man. The other is Enu, the patron goddess of Risdall. Mostly recognised as a goddess of war, she is also associated with order, government, and higher learning. She was once considered a twin goddess, but her male counterpart was highly worshipped by the previous royal family; the legend goes that when they were overthrown, so too was he toppled due to his tyrannical nature. The university also doubles as a temple to both Emrys and Enu (and their names are often taken in vain).
Kinniburgh
Kinniburgh sucks. It might be the only democracy in PL, but it’s corrupt as fuck, the results of a revolution gone bad centuries before. Fifty or so years before the disappearance of the dragons, the royal family was overthrown in a bloody coup that ended up with most of them dead. But the people who took over were just as power hungry, and that bad beginning has only consolidated the corrupt nature of the government in the centuries since. Unlike Risdall, where people generally pay more attention to magic than the gods, Kinniburgh is a heavily religious country, although the nature of the gods there can be somewhat unsavoury – it is the home to most of the world’s assassin guilds, who double as priests of the death god.
Garrett knows a lot about Kinniburgh in theory, but he never really understands the reality of what it would be like to grow up in such a place until he meets Shelby, a citizen. Who is seriously messed up.
Abere Islands
The Abere Islands are an ancient place, a tropical paradise that is probably the only land left in PL with more magic than Risdall. Nobody actually knows why this is, at least not on the mainland, but rumours and legends fly like nobody’s business about old gods and dragons that are still awake. It’s an extremely patriarchal society where women are seen as little more than objects, and the current king just so happens to only have daughters. Four of them. Garrett is engaged to the eldest as a part of a peace and trade treaty between his land and the Isles, and it hasn’t quite clicked for him that this means he’s going to be ruling it one day. While Risdall doesn’t have much to trade that the Abere Isles need, it does have a strong military arm. Any union between their nations involves trade benefits for Risdall, and protection for the Isles to compensate for their weak military.
The story so far
FRANCES VON MAGICA might have been content to live out the remainder of his life being honoured as the pre-eminent wizard of the world, if it hadn’t been for the birth of Natalia’s son. Gavin being declared a wizard was the final injustice against a man whole believed the Taliesins had stolen everything from him. He began to plot against them. A coup wouldn’t do – the current ruling family was too beloved by the people for him to ever be able to rule with any kind of stability, even if he could pull it off. And while he could have arranged for the murder of Natalia’s husband and her son and married the woman himself, the chances of him being able to break a woman like that – even with magic – were slim.
Garrett, on the other hand, was another story. Considering that the young man was an idiot (to the wizard’s mind), it would be much simpler to break him into being a proper puppet. Taking over Garrett’s tower was the first part in his scheme to get the prince married to his daughter, Francesca. After a terrible ‘accident’ happened to befall the rest of the royal family (before Gavin could grow into his powers, of course), Garrett and Francesca would rule, with FRANCES VON MAGICA calling the shots. Any offspring would be of the von Magica line, and his family would be avenged.
So it’s kind of not surprising he’s pissed off at Garrett for ruining that.
Personality:
Garrett is sort of a reformed asshole, you could say. He wasn’t a dick in the sense that he likes to drown children and strangle puppies, but he was the second born child of a royal family who ruled over a relatively peaceful land – getting all of the perks of this and none of the responsibilities helped to form his personality. While he preferred to think of himself as generous – he shared his time, his body, his bottomless wallet, after all! – he was pretty much a selfish brat. It wasn’t that he didn’t think of people outside of himself – he loves his family, especially his sister (no matter how much she enjoys trolling his life) and had no shame about displaying his love for them – but more that, for the majority of his life, he couldn’t see outside his own immediate circle and surroundings. He was very much focussed on his own pleasure, perfectly amiable while he was getting what he wanted, but turning into a pouty, argumentative brat if it was taken away from him without a good reason. And, quite obviously, because he wanted it? No reason was good enough. Basically, he was only really interested into things that could benefit him, something that led to him being a proficient enough swordsman, but nowhere near a master (too much effort), and passing skilled at magic, but only things that he was interested in learning (like certain electricity tricks).
Getting locked in a tower brought out the uglier side of Garrett’s personality. While a good person at heart, he didn’t exactly acquit himself like one. He was offended, angry, arrogant and rude, haughty and demanding, and once the tower was taken over by an evil wizard, incapable of understanding the seriousness of his situation. He was a prince, didn’t that make him untouchable? He was easily frightened by things beyond his understanding, and as such, stuck his head in the sand rather than do anything else like finding out what his kidnapper wanted.
A combination of Shelby and the situation in general has worked a marked change on Garrett in the past few months, however. A mixture of trauma and careful friendship have worked wonders that parental discipline and towers couldn’t. Garrett’s travels and hardships have forced him to realise that a world exists that doesn’t involve him – that, even though he’s on the run for his life, doesn’t really care about him. A prince can starve as easily as a pauper if no one knows he’s a prince. In order to survive, Garrett was forcibly stripped of his identity as ‘prince’ and had to scrounge around to figure out who he was without that.
As it turns out, not a bad guy. He understands now that actions have consequences which can mean life or death for any number of people – his actions included. He’s willing to think more about the long term, and to put effort into things that don’t have an immediate benefit, or any benefit for him at all. He can look at a situation now and understand why he should care about it, even if it doesn’t affect him and would endanger him to help. The generosity of feeling that he always showed around his family has tempered into a genuine desire to help the people of his country (having seen how they live), and he’s gained a greater understanding of the difficulties involved in running a country, and the responsibilities. Where once he might have been jealous of his sister for being the future queen, he now feels that you couldn’t pay him to do the job she’s been preparing for all her life. He understands that he himself would be woefully unprepared to manage the kingdom. No longer thinking that he would be THE BEST KING EVER, he acknowledges that he probably doesn’t have the temperament or the skill to be in charge of Risdall.
His experiences have changed what was a pretty self-involved, almost goofy sense of humour into something a little more wry and self-deprecating. Having acknowledged he was a bit of a twat, he doesn’t have any problem with poking fun at himself now (alongside other people, admittedly). In particular, he likes trying to make Shelby smile, and will consider having opened his mouth a success if he can get her to do it.
Garrett hasn’t automatically become Mr Uber Maturity, though. He’s a better person now, less selfish and annoying, but he still has this tendency to…flail. His personality is still a loud one, even if it’s less obnoxious – he likes to flirt with pretty ladies and pretty men, although he’s more honest about his compliments now. If something doesn’t make sense or is unfair, he has no problem getting into an argument about it – he just has a tendency to dive in and do this on other people’s behalf now. He only gets really, seriously angry on the behalf of other people, and even that’s rare, and usually because of Shelby. He’s essentially a good natured person, veering into a little ridiculous at times. Sometimes he’ll play that aspect of his personality up for laughs, but other times he’s kind of unaware that he’s being a dumbass. In general, he likes entertaining people, and being thought of as entertaining company.
Garrett is smart, but by no means a genius, and his lack of attention span in the past has mean that his knowledge has a lot of holes in it. He has picked up an urge to learn more about things that have never even occurred to him before – farming details, how to run an inn, how to cook – and if given the time, he’s actually willing to put in the effort now to learn a new skill.
It’s come up a few times in passing, but the truth of the matter is that, while a lot of this growth in Garrett has come about as a result of his recent experiences, Shelby Rook is the driving force behind them. Over the course of the past few months, the assassin has somehow become his first true friend. While he’s lost the title of prince to the strangers he meets, Shelby knows he’s a prince, and doesn’t really care. It’s a novel experience for Garret and, he discovers a freeing one. He doesn’t have to second guess what she wants from him, because she’s almost always up front about it. As he started to learn to appreciate her more, he was concerned that she was only around for the money, but they’ve had too many close calls from FRANCES VON MAGICA now for him to really believe that. His life has reached a point where staying with him wouldn’t be worth any amount of money, because chances of survival are so slim. Because of this, he’s convinced that Shelby really does like, him, at least as a friend, although he does have his moments of paranoia.
It’s an almost naïve friendship between the two of them, despite the dark turn his life has taken. Shelby’s life has been so terrible that it inspires Garrett to be better, for her. He wants to prove to her that someone can treat her like a person, that she deserves good things, that she’s not just a tool. In his earnestness to prove this, he accidentally ended up falling in love with her. Everything about Shelby evokes some kind of strong emotion in Garrett – delight, protectiveness, even anger on occasion. But especially love. And he’s so terrified of losing her in some way now, that he doesn’t mention it. At all. She means so much to him that he can’t risk losing her on some ill thought out romantic escapades. When she leaves him for a whole month, he’s totally heartbroken; it’s only the presence of Bubbles that reassures him she’s coming back.
Upon finding out he’s on the turtle, in between Life & Death, Garrett will mostly be relieved. At least, once he finds out that Shelby’s there too. Without her he’ll fret about where she is and how she is and what she’s doing, but the relief of being reunited with her here where there’s no FRANCES VON MAGICA to be worried about will pretty much overwhelm any concerns about whether or not he’s alive or if he starved to death in a cave. He’ll also consider it a win because if he’s here and time is frozen, his enemy can’t continue his nefarious plans, and his family is safe. Not having to be on the run all the time is also a relief, although he’ll be a bit twitchy about things until he’s sure.
Appearance:
Garrett is pretty damn fine. Standing at around 6’1”, he’s lean, muscled and tan – the sort of guy who spends time outside and obviously keeps himself in shape. His hair is dark brown and generally kept shaved close to his head, although in recent months it has grown out to be sort of wavy and floppy. His eyes are a dark grey/blue colour with an spot of brown in the top half of the left iris. His PB is this handsome fellow.
Abilities:
Garrett has moderate talents at swordsmanship. He’s a fair archer and good on a horse because yay hunter, and has been forced to make use of those skills in recent months. He also has some minor magic skills, mostly fire and light related – creating flames, although he can’t throw a fireball to save his life, sparkles and pretty things. He also does a little bit of sex magic – that is, magic to make sex better, not magic fuelled by it – because why not? This familiarity with the body ties in to his minor healing ability – cuts and bruises and small fractures he can heal entirely, but anything big he can only really ease the pain of. He does have the capacity to learn to improve these skills, but it would be hard work.
Inventory:
- Slightly rumpled clothes
- a sword
- some coins
- a waterskin
Suite:
Wood sector, because the idea of him living in a tree is hilarious to me.
In-Character Samples:
Third Person:
It surprises Garrett to discover that, having avoided all people except Shelby since the destruction of Envine and then being stuck in a cave for a month, that being surrounded by people again is…difficult to manage.
The first thing that strikes him is blind panic, once he realises the kedan have taken him to a city. He tries to explain the dangers to them, words spilling out of a mouth unused to forming them as of late, but they don’t seem to be too concerned about the fact that this pretty city is potentially about to be razed to the ground.
Strangely enough, it’s the word ‘Emperor’ that calms him down. Risdall doesn’t have an Emperor. The only place he knows that does is Trint, and as powerful as Frances is, Garrett is mostly sure that he wouldn’t be able to get away with wiping out an entire Trintian city just to get at one neurotic prince.
So he listens to the kedan explain the console to him. Most of the ‘why’s don’t make much sense to him, but he gets the gist of it – magic mirror, he’s seen weirder things. He thinks he’ll use it later, walking out of his treehouse (and more trees? Really? Some god is laughing at him, somewhere) with the intent of exploring.
And then turning around and walking right back in. Shelby won’t be able to find him if he doesn’t stay in one place. Assuming she even wants to come back to him now that they’re apparently not in Risdall and therefore have no capitol to deliver him too. He’s also lost her dragon somehow. Which wouldn’t personally be a problem if he wasn’t half convinced that she’d rather look for it than him.
“Romance,” he announces to the magic mirror, which is off and silent for the moment, “is far more difficult than the bards make it seem.”
He can hear her voice in his mind. Actually, no he can’t, because she’s always so unexpected that he’s never entirely sure what she’ll say next. But he can see her, the deceptively fragile features of her face. She would absolutely judge him for what he’s about to do, and he has the self-awareness now to admit that it’s probably extremely stupid.
But if Frances is in this place with him, he can’t in good conscience allow people to remain unaware of that. Even if it means the old bastard will find him and haul him off.
Besides. It’ll give him something to do while he tries to remember how to deal with people in person again.
Network:
[The two conflicting impulses of ‘staying alive’ and ‘finding Shelby’ have fought themselves out in Garrett’s brain, and there is now one very attractive prince sitting on screen. If he seems distracted at moments, it’s because he’s on the lookout for potential wizards coming to kidnap him]
I have to say, this isn’t exactly how I imagined getting out of that cave. Then again, after a month or so, I was starting to wonder if I might not get out at all, so I suppose this is an improvement.
[He glances over his shoulder, before returning to the camera. He’s basically assuming this is some weird kind of magic, because what is technology. ] I’m not sure how I feel about being surrounded by trees again. It’s a hard life for a – for me. My life is difficult. Exceedingly so. [a cough] But I do believe that someone out there may be able to help me, at least with one particular issue.
[He holds up a finger, and hurries off screen. There is the unmistakeable sound of a toilet flushing, and then he’s back] What in Enu’s name was that?
[A beat] Also, there are potentially two people looking for me, here. One of them is called Frances von Magica, and I suggest you stay far, far away from him should he turn up. If you find my empty husk of a corpse lying on the streets somewhere, it was most likely him. [He pauses for a second, and some of the upbeat nature slips from his tone. He drums his fingers against the desk] The other person knows who she is.
