Rowf Hallvers

Male Bahman/Haavic

19 Years of Age

5'-10" | 160lbs

Average Build

Dark Brown Hair

Tanned Skin

Orator

Senior Officer Heinrich Zweilgard had never intended to start a family. Why would he? A man in his position would only be dragged down by such a thing. Less than a minor Haavic nobleman by birth, he had worked his way up the ranks of the city guards, then an officerl, and finally a captain. He was damned near nobility as far as he was concerned. And he and everyone else knew it.

Money, fortune, prestige: all were at his beck and call. Yet why did he suddenly find himself saddled with a woman named Selia Hallvers? Sure, she was beyond beautiful, and even though she was but a lowly Bahman textile worker, he explained this away as a mistake in genealogical lines which he had submitted to fourth committee of the lower council, soon to be in session, or some other such fabrication.

How could she not be noble, the way she shined in all the finery he clothed her in? He showed off his prize at all the parties, all the galas, the theater, the eating establishments, and even the pub. And so it was that he was rather surprised when, upon returning from several months of official military business, he was introduced to his son, the bouncing Rothrick Zweilgard-Hallvers. The next three years were lived as if in a daze for Heinrich. He still went to the theater, to the galas, to the parties, but now his lovely mistress carried with her a child. Oh, what a gorgeous baby, you must be so proud, they would say. Yes, so proud, he would respond, numb. His mistress, Rothrick's mother, was all beaming smiles.

In those days, she did much of his talking. No more was she a prize. As one year became two, and two became three, she became a burden. Her and her horrid son. No, not his. He didn't want the thing. He wanted to be free. And so, one morning, he left.

Selia, of course, expected him back. It was not, after all, unusual for the man to go off on business suddenly, though he had usually told her. A month, she waited, until, with surprise, she found herself with child again. She began to dig in to savings to live, to keep up her luxurious lifestyle, and to provide the best for her children, both born and unborn. Surely her handsome Senior Officer Heinrich Zweilgard would return soon to put things in order? Yet return he did not. Still, she lived, and when the second child came, she named it Katya Hallvers, and saw to it that Rotherick and Katya had the best schooling, the best teachers, the best of everything. Rotherick showed a talent for music early on, and Katya for dance. In fact, Rotherick would often play with the dance instructors, and Katya would dance, all glowing and smiles.

Yet every week, things began disappearing from their home. A golden candelabra, a set of fine crystal glasses, a painting, and even Mother's finest dresses vanished. “Her Heirich would return”, was the litany she began to live by. And so life carried on, and each year, a little more of Selia died. She came to know that Heinrich was not coming back. And for as much as she loved her children, she had loved Heinrich more. And so, when there was little left to sell but their home, Selia, Katya, and Rotherick moved into lesser dwellings, and for a time, they were as happy as they could manage. Yet time went on, and schooling grew less and less often, and of less quality. Two years later, with Katya now 5 an Rotherick now 8, the small family moved into peasant quarters. Times grew hard. The children grew lean, and they worked hard to support their mother, who had grown thin and gaunt in her consuming grief. And so, even while existing on bread and wine, eventually there was no more money to be had, and to the beggars hovels they went. Two more years passed, and while Katya grew bitter and angry at her need to beg and Rotherick turned his intelligence and charisma into tools for surviving, Selia gave in to grief and left. It was in the Tanner's Stink they found her, laid up in a noxious den of hallucinations and foul vapors, spending the last of her coppers on a day of stupefied nothingness. And there they left her, for the time being, to try and make their way, and let their mother find what pleasure she was still able to.

Rothrick, now 11, and known as simply "Rowf," had taken to panhandling, singing the songs of his youth, creating new songs, and orating wonderful stories that he would come up with on the spot. This was usually enough for a copper or two, which he would take back to his mother.

She would hunch there, in a dirty cot, smoking a pipe with some foul substance that made her forget who and where she was, reliving those wonderful days of her all-too-short time with Heinrich. She favored a particular place, and with great regret, for he loved his mother, he made a bargain with the 'proprietor:' he would bring a regular income to him, if he would keep his mother in a good cot, and give her anything she needed. The proprietor, a hard, angry man, agreed, for it was not an unusual thing to want to remain evermore in a cloudy haze of remembered glory. And so by day, Rowf would sing, dance, and spin yarns of such marvelous adventures that it would make a listener tear up for longing to see it all, and so earn enough of a pitiance to pay for his mother's continued care. By night he sought shelter in an old, abandoned shop and warehouse in the center of The Stink. Ol' FlatJack's, it was called, for the owner, Ol' Jack, still lay crushed beneath a crate of long-rotted leathers, only his shriveled boots showing from beneath the massive box. Rowf had discovered FlatJack's, and it was there that he held 'council' with his fellow street children. Hooligans all of them, some meaning well, some with only hate in their hearts, but all welcome.

Long they would sit and trade their daily tidbits of coin, food, and sundries, the darkness lit by a pitiful spark from a lantern that surely must be older than the city itself, until the stale oil swiped long ago from some merchants cart would run dry and they knew only darkness. And sometimes, when the fancy struck him, he would go see Katya, for he knew well of what had become of her.