Dúnhere the Black
Mar 5, 2019 14:27:12 GMT -5
Post by Dúnhere the Black on Mar 5, 2019 14:27:12 GMT -5
The Facade
━━ ❂ B A S I C S • • ━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━ ━ ━
Character Name: Dúnhere
Name Meaning: Hill warrior
Nickname or Alias: The Black Captain
Race: Man (half-rohirrin, half-dunlending)
Age: 30 years old
Date of Birth: Winter of 2979 T.A.
Place of Birth: Helm’s Deep, Rohan
Current Residence: Helm’s Deep, Rohan
Occupation: Captain of Helm’s Deep
━━ ❂ A P P E A R A N C E • • ━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━ ━ ━
Dúnhere’s life as a warrior began on his early teenage years and this life molded his body. His body is covered by mostly small scars, but a couple scars are more noticeable: the first one is a scar on the right side of his forehead coming from a little above the hairline, all the way down to an inch above his right eyebrow; the second one is a deep, diamond-shaped scar on his stomach, from a spear that nearly claimed his life. This intense life allowed him to develop a muscular body, which, together with his 6 feet high makes him a rather intimidating figure.
Another quite distinguish feature among his people is his dark hair and eyes. His hair is straight and thick, like the fur of a wild horse, black as the night. The man keeps it usually really short, almost the same size of his thick beard. The beard, however, has a slightly lighter tone, tracing back to his rohirrim ancestry. He is rarely ever seen without his beard. His dark eyes seem to be always alert, and that’s not far from true.
He will more often be found wearing his armour, which is composed of a chain-mail shirt covered by thick padded leather. He is not fond of metal armour other than the mail as he favours a fighting style that focuses on agility, one of his main traits.
━━ ❂ P E R S O N A L I T Y • • ━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━ ━ ━
At first, Dúnhere may look like a stern and harsh individual, grumpy even, as he takes his work pretty serious and expects nothing less than the best from those working under him. He is quite wary of strangers and seems to be in a constant state of alertness. He abhors the notion of defeat and the possibility of it is enough to make him go the extra mile and aim to reach beyond his own limits, as well as push those around him to the same path of effort. Hard worker is a defining trait in his character; he believes nothing that comes easy is worthy or true and instead feels anything that holds any value in life needs to be conquered by blood, sweat and tears. Those traits can lead him to be abrasive at times, which ends up irritating a lot of people, who then decide not to deepen the relationship, and thus only get to know the surface of the man.
Deep beneath his tough skin, however, lies a kind and considerate man. One who would take the food out of his table to give to those in need, one who would not falter before adversity and who would face dangers if for the greater good of the people of his kingdom. He was born from nothing and climbed his way up through plenty of prejudice and obstacles, and he firmly believed everyone who has the drive is capable of accomplishing the same goals. And he is always willing to help this kind of people. He also firmly believed the strong have the duty to protect the weak; this is the only way they can repay the gift of strength. But unlike many who expects gratitude and servitude in return, the only thing he expects is that people will return the kindness to others.
Loyal to the bone, once you gain his trust, he will be there for you, come hell or high-water, as those bonds are sacred and not easily broken in his heart. To those who earn a spot in his hardened, yet tender heart, they are allowed to see a much softer side of him. They can see a Dúnhere who laughs and enjoy sitting by the fire with a generous horn of ale on his hand, who likes to sing and tell jokes and has the largest of the smiles. He has a soft spot for children, especially those who lack a fatherly figure and for single mothers – he can relate to them on a personal level.
Although he is loyal and proud of his country, he has some deep buried ill feelings towards the prejudice he suffered for looking more like a dunlending. It took long for people to trust him with position and responsibility, despite the fact he was an incredible warrior and a good leader whenever he had the chance. Even to this day, he is seen with mistrust by some fellow soldiers and, although he tries not to show, this deeply bothers him, as he wants nothing more than to feel like he truly belongs.
━━ ❂ F A M I L Y • • ━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━ ━ ━
Parents:
Talfryn, father. 61 years old. Witch Doctor.
Mildrith, mother. 45 years old. Potter.
Hallaf, stepfather. 57 years old. Blacksmith.
Siblings:
Háma, half-brother. 17 years old. Blacksmith.
Léod, half-brother. 15 years old. Blacksmith apprentice.
Skadi, half-sister. 10 years old.
Spouse: Unmarried
Children: None
━━ ❂ H I S T O R Y • • ━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━ ━ ━
Life in the Gap of Rohan was never an easy life.
The conflict between the people of Rohan and Dunland goes way back in history, so much it is hard for most people to even know when it all started. The only thing that the common folk know is that its everlasting, and that they will have to make through with it, as conflict claims victims from both sides constantly.
And this time, the victim was a young girl named Mildrith, who came from a humble family of potters from a village dangerously close to the Gap. The village wasn’t very important, it didn’t even have a name. But it had fertile land, food and leather, and little to no able man to protect it. A certain day, when Mildrith was but 15 springs old, the village was raided and burned down to ashes. Most people died, some were taken for whatever perversities they had in mind for the rohirrim.
No one really knows what happened to most of them, but Mildrith was taken to a small settlement known as Echad Naeglanc, near the Bonevales of Dunland. During the travel, she got sick and she almost died, but a Witch Doctor from the settlement nourished her back to health and she had nothing but gratitude towards this apparently kind man named Talfryn. He was charming on his own way, and she thought of him as handsome, in a way. She felt for him and bedded him willingly, but as quickly as she fell for him, she grew to hate him; he was married and bedded not only her, but many other young women to whom he showed some kindness.
She was enraged and filled with jealously, but there was nothing she could really do. All but a year after the child had been born, she left Dunland and went back to Rohan. Talfryn helped her find her path, out of pity, perhaps, or just because she was annoying him too much, but she was back home, a single mother with no home. Luckily, she had learned the trade of her family and as soon as she settled on this other small village, near Helm’s Deep, Mildrith managed to provide for herself and her baby.
Dúnhere was a healthy and strong child, with thick black hair which made him stood out quite a lot. People wouldn’t call him by his name, and instead would just refer to him as the “black-haired kid”, or just the “black”, and this irritated him profoundly at his younger years. His mother was good to him, but not the most affectionate, as he reminded her of Talfryn, a person she would rather forget.
When he turned five years old, his mother found a man and married him. Dúnhere had no fatherly figure and he quickly clanged to Hallaf as the person to fill this spot, but the reciprocal was not entirely true; although he didn’t mind the kid, he didn’t want to act like his father, so he would treat him with courteous negligence, which took the boy some years to notice. This emotional distance was made clear when Dúnhere was thirteen; his half-brother Háma was born, and Hallaf was all over the newborn, and kept on repeating he finally had a son.
The sudden realization hit Dúnhere hard and he realized he was never truly a son to his mother’s husband. He was no father’s son, he wasn’t even a rohirrim. He needed to find himself. Confronting his mother about who his father was, she finally told him the tale and with nothing but a short sword, supplied and an old horse, he went to Dunland to try and find the man who seeded his mother and then abandoned them. Maybe he would find home there, or maybe he would understand what he was supposed to do with his life.
Took him a year to track down the man, and during this year, he faced his first few battles against thieves who thought the teenager would be an easy pray. Unfortunately for them, he was a natural and, although Hallaf neglected him a lot, he still found the time to teach him the basic of swordplay, and although he didn’t enjoy taking lives, he enjoyed the fact that – for the first time ever – he felt like he was good at something.
Summer of his fourteenth year of age, Dúnhere found his father, and he was severely disappointed shortly thereafter. Although the first month or so he thought his father was a great, kind man, he quickly saw through his act and realized he was filth. A manipulative man who cared about nothing but himself – at least in Dúnhere’s eyes. He grew disgusted not only by the man, but he also hated the culture and behaviour of the dunlending. He realized, for the very first time, just how much of a rohirrim he actually was and regretted his decision to leave his home.
Not six months had passed when he decided to travel back to his home, to his mother and even to his stepfather.
He arrived back at his village during winter as he turned fifteen to find a bigger family than he left. His baby brother was now a toddler, and there was another baby in his mother’s arms. Mildrith embraced her eldest soon – a rare event – as he told her just how wrong he was to leave. He humbled asked Hallaf to be allowed back in the household and he accepted him. Dúnhere had a new goal in mind: he would prove to his people he was worth of being called a rohirrim and he would use his skill and strength to protect his country.
Dúnhere was big and strong enough to be able to enlist as a soldier. He left his home once again during the summer to join the army in Helm’s Deep, which was half a day on horseback from his home, close enough so he could visit it often. Joining wasn’t as easy and he was tested extensively and harshly, with people continuously teasing him for looking like a dunlending, but he knew it was to be expected and although it hurt him, he resisted. He would prove them to be wrong not by fighting them, but by forcing them to recognize his worth.
And it wasn’t easy.
Took him longer than most to be accepted as a soldier, but he finally made his breakthrough when he turned twenty years old, joining the infantry of the fortress. From then he would participate in countless battles as he was placed in a very battle-inclined group, whose goals was to enforce the order and peace around the region. He faced both man and orc in battle, and while many of his peers fell to their blades, he triumphed and survived – not unscathed. Through his collection of scars, he also collected status and respect to the point it could not be denied by the higher ups.
His skill was incredible, especially when fighting with a hand and a half sword, or with sword and axe at the same time. He was an agile and resourceful warrior with years of experience, and particularly good against orcs. He was brave and fierce, loyal to the bone to his fellow soldiers. It was impossible to deny his drive, and they came to accept the fact they needed someone like him in the ranks.
Finally, at the age of twenty-seven, he was promoted to Captain of Helm’s Deep, a position he was quite proud of. He knew very well there were many people who still disliked and distrust him, but he had managed to change the opinion of many others, who came to see him as their peer, rather than an invader from a foreign land.
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