Rumaylah, the Weaver (Dol Amroth)

Character Name: Rumaylah

Name Meaning: Caring

Age: 43

Date of Birth: 2967 of Third Age

Race: Woman born of Near Harad by blood. Allegiance to Gondor by choice.

Residence: Dol Amroth, Gondor

Profession: Weaver

Appearance: Olive skinned and dark of eye and hair, Rumaylah looks an average woman of Haradwaith. She garbs herself in the style of the women of Harad, always a silk about her. She is 5'6”, not as tall as the women of the Belfalathrim she lives amidst, though not shrinking before them, she carries herself tall and does not shirk for her dark skin as she did when she was young and new in Dol Amroth. She has a perfect, white toothed smile, which she attributes to her daily regime of turmeric and milk.

Personality: Rumaylah is inquisitive and restless. These two traits have gotten her exactly where she is in life; without either of them she would have been contentedly settled in Umbar and caring for her parents in their old age.

She has a friendly, approachable demeanor, and though she lives now in the northlands, she is as warm as the desert sun of her youth. She cares much for the well-being being of others, be it individually, as well as the nation of Gondor as a whole. She also cares deeply for her family. There is one only, her quiet, reserved husband, who has never questioned her devotion to him nor Gondor, and for that she raises him on the highest pedestal of humans, beholden to him in gratitude for the chance she was given with him to live and raise her children among the people of Gondor.



Parents:

Naquibullah (70) – Father, Former Silk Merchant, resides ashore in Umbar in his old age.

Madiha (69) – Mother, resides with her husband in Umbar.


Sibling(s):

Tahsin (51) – Brother, Haradric Warrior

Yadollah (48) – Brother, Haradric Warrior

Nehal (47) – Sister, Consort to a Haradric Chieftan

Raed (45) – Brother, Silk Merchant



Spouse: Orelion of Dol Amroth (43) - Orelion takes his family life and his work seriously. He has a kind and quiet demeanour and goes out of his way to serve the citizens of Dol Amroth as a doctor, just as his Father always has. He takes great care with his patients, and will work and run about on house calls all hours of the night for them, much to his wife's chagrin on occasion. Beyond his work, he is devoted to his family, and tries to style his children's family life similar to what had been his as a youth. He sees that they are tutored in all manner of histories and arts, and takes great joy when he has the occasion to take them upon the sea, for he loves the water. Orelion has a great bitterness in his heart over the deaths of his mother and his sister, and on occasion this boils over into into weeks of sadness, though he does his best not to let on to others about it, and he never speaks of these family members to others.

Children: Idril (25) - Idril takes after her father in voice and appearance. She is quiet, thoughtful, and well read, delighting in books, and spending many hours in the archives learning as much as she can on all the histories of Arda. She is somewhat of a perfectionist and makes herself to excel in the arts. Music and song are a passion of hers, as well as painting, embroidery, and Haradric silk weaving; a trade passed down from her mother. Though she looks a Belfalathrim, she speaks fluently both the common Westron and Haradric, as well as Sindarin and Quenya, and has no trouble switching between the languages which finds her handy when the occasion arises that they take one of the men of the Haradwaith into the Houses. She can often be found sitting with her father's patients reading to them to pass the time through their pain.

Celairdir (16) - Celairdir takes after his mother in appearance and looks a young man of the Haradwaith, though there is much noble blood in him, which gives him some difficulties upon the city streets of Dol Amroth and makes him unsure of his place. He bears himself well though, and is training in the footsteps of his father, grandfather, and great grandfather in the ways of healing. His days now are spent as an apprentice beneath his father and grandfather, though they give him time to enjoy the pleasures of youth, and he can often be found with his close friends manning sailing skiffs on the ocean waves or diving off the cliffs for sport.

Chief Asad (26) – Asad is not human, but monkey, and has been with Rumaylah since her youth, on her last trip to Umbar with her parents. He was taken upon their ship as a newborn ape, plucked from the breast of the mother ape which had come from the far southern reaches of Haradwaith, and sold for amusements by what merchants were upon the docks. Rumaylah could not resist the pitiful looking baby, and bought at the same time a milk goat to feed him; though the goat did not enjoy their passage upon the ships. She named him herself, for news had traveled through land and sea that the great Chieftan Maalik Asad had come to power after his father, and sired his first son and heir. Rumaylah joked that the ape himself may have been switched at birth with the son, ugly as he was. Asad has been her friendly, though messy, companion ever since.



History:

Rumaylah was born in motion, the waves rocking both her mother and herself to sleep on her first night under the stars. She was born to no land; only the sea, off the coasts of Harondor which is the disputed territory of South Gondor; lands claimed by both the great Chieftains of the Haradwaith, and the Stewards of Gondor; yet settled by neither.

It was for this cause that her parents claimed she came by her disloyalty for her own people. To be born in neitherland.

Rumaylah grew up on her parent's merchantship, trading silk up and down the coastlines of the Great Sea, from the Far Harad, north to the shores of Lindon. She met and saw people of all walks of life, from the fair elves in the northern harbors, to the dark jungle men of the southern forests. She met lords, ladies, slavers and freemen, and saw the differences between the cultures of men. Though Rumaylah spoke fluently both Haradric and Westron, she began to teach herself Sindarin and the written script of Tengwar at an early age. She could not resist the fluidity of the language; the way it was spoken, though most of all she delighted in understanding that which the light eyed men and women would speak of in her presence. At first, this brought disdain to her Father, but he soon found that his young daughter knowing the language of the north men assisted in trade, and she often came with him in the ports which allowed her see even more of the people she always had admired from afar.

Had she known no different; the city of Umbar, her parents home port, would not have seemed so terrible. They were wealthy, brought on by the generations of trade they had. Her father, Naquibullah, had lived on the seas his entire life, and so had his father, and his father before him. Though they owned an elegant home in Umbar, it was rarely in use for more than a few weeks at at time, for all time upon the shore save for forming trade connections was wealth lost.

Naquibullah and his wife bore five children; all five raised upon the decks of their trade ship.

When asked, Rumaylah's parents were loyal to Haradwaith when they were within Hardwaith, and loyal to Gondor when they were within Gondor. When asked upon the sea they were loyal to the silk trade. Rumaylah knew the time would come when they would finish their days of trading and live in comfort against the sea air, and when they chose again where to stay, it would be Umbar, and their days would end in loyalty to the Haradwaith.

Two of her eldest brothers had known their fate for many years, had already left their ship to join in service to the cause of glory. Naquibullah had sent his greatest sons as a tokens of his loyalty to the land of his blood, to be as soldiers to the Chieftan, and his elder daughter had been given to a Warlord, the Chief Husam Asad as a prize, one of the youngest taken into his consort while he was still in command.

It would be his third son, Raed who would take up his Father's business and continue the merchant trade in his line, and it would be his youngest child, Rumaylah, who would care for her parents in their old age, when their days in the shipping business were ended.

As time passed, and conflict grew greater in the borderlands between Harad and Gondor, they began to lose their stops upon the trade routes. The cities in the borderlands were in conflict, and no merchants there were still dealing in silk trade while their communities were war torn, and to the north; merchants became wary. All trades with Lindon had been cut off; and no Haradric ships sailed past the lands of Anfalas. In Gondor, it was first Pelargir that cut their trade; though they were the closest port city to Minas Tirith. A year later, they no longer had a trade in Linhir. Still for several years the trade in Dol Amroth was thriving; particularly to the business of one family, and at last, to only that family.

Rumaylah, however, had begin to depart from her parents ways. She heard no news of her siblings who had departed, and her Father was not worried for it; for those siblings had been raised and given almost as a sacrifice. It was only Raed who Naquibullah tutored and spent his time with; being sure that even though the work in lands to the north was waning, he would still have all the skill needed to trade in the southlands. The began to take aboard things other than silk; spices, trinkets, rougher cloths, so that in every port they were of use to the residents and people, and the wealth continued to flow.

The people they met and spoke with in the ports had become rougher and rougher; and Rumaylah met the slaves who would come to do their master's trade and bidding, wearing chains around their necks, and tattooed to show to whom they belonged. Rumaylah found it disturbing that men and women could be chained and kept as if they were animals. She found it disturbing that her brothers had been sent as a gift, for sacrifice in war. And she found it disturbing that her sister was given, not as a wife, but as a concubine to someone who would care for naught but her body when he saw fit.

Though her own position in life was an honorable one, to care for her parents when they aged, Rumaylah found that her Father's opinions were no better. When she questioned him for sending her siblings away, he spoke of it as an honor. When she questioned him for consorting with the slavers, he spoke of it as no injustice. Rumaylah did not wish to be part of this. She longed for the north lands, where there were no slave docks, and men took for themselves one wife alone. Where the leaders of the people had honor. Rumaylah wished for Gondor. If she could wash away the olive color of her skin in the salt sea, she would have done so, for she did not wish to be of a race who had the ideals of her own kin.

At last she saw her chances ending, for on their final voyage to Dol Amroth, they found the tradeswoman that they sold their textiles to was deceased, and nobody else was in want of their wares; those merchants left were willing to pay the higher prices to the Gondorian sailors who risked the voyage south to suppliers themselves.

Oh a whim, Rumaylah made an offer to the son of the Gondorian silk merchant, of a marriage contract. She had always been fond of both Orelion, who was of an age with her, and also Gilraen, his elder sister; who had treated her kindly from as early as she could recall dealings with them. They had known each other for years; and though their meetings were always short as their parents worked out trade matters, Rumaylah saw a light in the family. She knew they were good people.

Orelion was at the time grieving both the deaths of his mother and sister, and in many ways his father who had become distant. Though it was not a custom for a high born, well brought up Belfalathrim to wed with one of the Haradwaith, both Orelion and Rumaylah cast aside custom, and were bonded in marriage, first for necessity and companionship, though it did not take long before they grew to love one another deeply, and respect was given on both ends.

Since the day of her wedding, Rumaylah has declared herself Gondorian, to any and all who ask or accuse her of split loyalties. The only split in her loyalty is in her disregard for Gondorian fashions, preferring still the smooth flowing silk that she grew up in opposed to the stiffness of wool. Also her devotion to her alkarakum 'iustaghil, the mix of milk and turmeric, a spice common to the Southern Lands, which Rumaylah finds to be a cure all for most ailments.

After her marriage, Rumaylah has never again spoken to her family, though she knows they have been in port several times since that year. She did not try to help her husband keep his mercantile, for that had been the business of his mother and sister, and his interests were in healing like his faster. Rumaylah began to help them about the Houses of Healing in cleaning, and trying to bring comfort to the patients, and especially in bringing a contrast to the stark white walls; her silken tapestries filling each room year by year, along with her plants to purify the air, and of course, her turmeric milk and honey to settle the stomach of any patient who walked in the doors.

Still, Rumaylah knew there were greater needs for her than caring for the sick and injured patients in the Houses. First, it was a man who had come under her husband's care; a man who had been brought in chilled to near death; a festering laceration upon his side. His skin was darker yet than Rumaylah's and he spoke Haradric. What words came to her when Ladrengilon and Orelion had nursed him back to health were horrifying to Rumaylah, for it was so similar to her own story. He was a son of merchants, beaten and tossed off his own family's ship by his brothers for stating his displeasure with Haradwaith, and saying the Steward of Gondor was wiser than the Chieftans. When he was finally mended again, Rumaylah and Orelion were able to speak on his behalf to the owner of a fishing vessel, and secure the man a good job, which offered him an honest wage. Over the years, that man began to speak to others of the help he had received, and a slow trickle began to come forth to Rumaylah and her husband, for advice and assistance assimilating into the north lands. The woman came to know near all those of Haradric descent living in the city and further afield, and to learn their stories on where they had come from; and how they had chosen to leave their southern kin.

Though never written down; Rumaylah has over her years acquired a network of voices about Dol Amroth; and the voices spread to the ships on the sea, and even further to the harbors of the south. There is chance, and future, and a way out, to those who wish to escape the coming wrath, for there is no good in staying among people who hold slaves, and of pledging themselves to a dark leader in the east who only sees them as thralls. One must reject their homeland and pledge allegiance to Gondor; find an honest way to make to the White Harbor, and Rumaylah will help. She is especially keen on assisting the young families who are trying to live in peace, women fleeing with their children, and the young men who wish not to be pulled into the armies which are growing daily, and pledging service to the leader of the Black Lands to the east. There are jobs for these men who wish to be in service to the Prince; to work an honest living and care for their families in a land where slavery is not permitted. There are jobs upon the warfs, upon the fishing boats, and farming the fields, orchards, and vineyards where wages can be earned.

These voices also return along their routes with words to Rumaylah's ears of the happenings in the South Lands. If she thought her stops and visits to the various port cities in her youth were where she could gain the greatest spread of news, she was sorely mistaken, for her network now is much larger, and she has many informants who keep not only in news of her family's merchant business, but news of all the trade up and down the coats; the news of the political happenings in the coastal cities, and the news of what moves the southern Warlords have made.

To the ordinary people of Dol Amroth, Rumaylah is a weaver of only silken threads, though to the counselors of the Prince, Rumaylah is a weaver of information. Though some of the city folk may be wary and never give their trust over to someone who looks like she, Rumaylah is held in high esteem as an informant by those who will use her information to keep an idea of the enemy's plannings and doings.

Still, one of the greatest treasures that Rumaylah holds is to sit down and look upon the relief in the eyes of those refugees who have come to her seeking assistance to settle away from the South Lands, “Fa'iinah sawf yakun ealaa ma yaram.” It will be all right, she would tell them, as she settled down to give them a glass of milk and turmeric, and work the shuttle of her loom, while she taught them what they must do to leave behind Haradwaith and become a Gondorian.