Oswin, Scout of the Rohirrim

Character Name: Oswin

Name Meaning: God-Friend

Age: 29

Date of Birth: April 27 2980 T.A.

Race: Man

Residence: Edoras

Profession: Rider of the Mark, Calvary Scout

Appearance: Standing at 6'3”, lean and muscular, and light on his feet. Similar in looks to his twin brother, though his straight hair and beard is ruddy blond.

Personality: Oswin lives live upon the edge. He has never tossed himself to a place where he cannot recover; though it is only for his devotion to his brother, his family, and his Captain. He will take what risk is needed to protect others, especially his brother, and he will not tolerate cruelty for those he cares for, nor the innocent.

He is loquacious, and raucous with or without drink, but becomes even moreso when he has tipped back a few mugs of mead, a drink his father has forbidden from the home, so he takes it up elsewhere with his friends or at the taverns. Impulsive and competitive as they come, and a seeker of excitement and thrills, and women, pursuing each moment as if it were his last, often laughing and joking louder than the rest.

Oswin could be found as meddlesome and interfering by some, particularly Swithin, though he only wishes for his brother to live and enjoy the present moment much as he does himself, and to keep him from things that might bring him harm or heartache. He hides the seriousness of his interfering actions behind jests and games and laughter.

It is only the very few who know that Oswin is at all a very fearful and anxious man. He hides such things behind his over the top personality when in and out of the home. His Father, Mother, and Brother are the ones present when he wakes with shouts and sweats at night in his bed, from dreams and terrors of the battlefield while he is off duty from his scouting and warfare. His impulsive nature is driven by his fear.




Parents: Heruthain .55. and Katla .51.

Brothers:

Swithin .29. Twin Brother
Gram .14. Adoptive Brother

Spouse: None

Children: None

History:

Though their family deals in warfare, Swithin and Oswin have lived lives of relative peace and harmony. Their family bonds are strong, and they've had a best friend since the first minutes of their lives. The twin infants set in their mother's lap grasped and clutched at each other, stilling loud cries the moment they were placed together.

The boys grew together, inseparable, well loved by both their parents, never lacking for a safe and comfortable home. Their cousins, though much older, were in and out. Their small home like a bunkhouse for those in need, the boys had stacked beds like a military barracks lining the walls, and extra cots folded and slid beneath, ready to house any number of relatives, and any number of farm boys who walked to the city during the week for training. Oswin and Swithin enjoyed their cramped space, and abundance of companions to keep them happy and busy. Every boy who came to stay with them was treated as a brother, and their elder cousin who lived with them was like a big sister.

Mother had insisted on choosing their given names, for she knew that father, or Pop, as he came to be known, would simply make a nickname for them and call them by it all their days. For his own boys it took a bit of time, and new names wound in and out through their infant years, but at the age of two the life names Pop gave them seemed to stick. One toddler sitting at the table, stuffing spoonful after spoonful into mouth, crying for more “Tates! Tates!”. A growing boy! His love of the mashed potato earned Oswin the nickname “Tate”. The brother sitting beside him, the silly goose, was putting as many mashed potatoes upon his head as in his mouth. “Wike Os,” he declared, his now golden potato crown covering his copper hair, matching his brother now in all ways, at least in his own small mind. “You Goose!” Pop had called him, and the name settled upon Swithin since.

Shadowing their father through the city; a gruff man to outsiders, but doting love and affection on those who knew them; their favorite times were the days he would return home from his stints on the plain as a Captain of the Eored. The boys knew very well that the first night home it was early to bed for them, because that time was for Mam and Pop. The next day was completely theirs. Pop's favorite breakfast, followed up with whatever adventure he would take them on. Even his errands were adventures when they got to leave Mam's side and trail after their favorite person.

It was a day in early winter once, when they were nearly five years old, that Pop took them out on the horse for an explore along Snowbourne. Not far from home, but further than he had taken them before. It was merely a day to walk about and explore, and Pop had his bow, intending to bring home a rabbit or a pheasant for supper that night. The boys were sitting and bounding along the edge of the Snowbourne, a place where the water was pooling and calm, floating dead leaves and grasses to their hearts content while Pop stood off some paces up on the bank; half watching them and half waiting for whatever animal might present itself for supper. A rabbit bounded through the grasses, and Pop, intent on tracking it moved off further, while the little boys played as frogs in the mud. Smearing it upon their faces and clothing and hopping along on all fours. Bounding past the line Pop had drawn in the mud for them, to the big rocks, and seeing how far they could leap.

The boys matched each other for strength and leap, taking longer and longer bounds, and challenging each other further. Swithin jumped ahead, making precarious landing on a rock with water moving swiftly past; bracing himself so he would not fall for Oswin's jump. Oswin leapt, bounding rock to rock, and on the final leap, slipped, falling into water. Swithin reached for him, but in his reach tumbled along behind, both boys screaming as the river pulled them clutching each other. One was under, and then the other, choking on water, fingers gripping slippery, cold rock, until after what had seemed as ages to Oswin, Pop was there dragging them onto the bank. Oswin crawled and coughed, and at first did not realize that his brother was not moving beside him. It was only Pop's yelling and crying that drew his attention; flipping his small son to tilt his head and breathe into his mouth.

Oswin for some short moments which felt like ages saw the limp form of his brother upon the dead grass and cried as his Pop tried to draw life back into the boy. He had seen the dead rabbits that Pop brought home, the dead fish he would spear from the Snowbourne, and his brother was limp as any of them. Even when life was drawn back into his brother, Oswin worried for he seemed not the same, and illness took hold; an illness which lasted a long while.

Oswin was alone, never having been parted from his brother he trailed his Pop around the city, but his house was empty and quiet save for the laughter his Mother tried to urge from him. When Swithin was finally brought home again, his brother was once again as happy as he had once been, though his hearing was diminished, and Oswin's laughter and voice rose even louder in sound to fill his brother in on every thing that wen on inside and outside the house away from the bed.

Life returned to the home, and Oswin grew fast and able, making gains on his brother by strength and speed while he still laid abed, but the best day came when Swithin was once more allowed out to ramble and roam wit him. To follow Pop down to the training grounds when he was home from the Eored.

Taking after their father by way of swordsmanship, they began to practice early and young; always having each other to spar with. They followed Heruthain to the training grounds every chance they had, beginning true training at the age of ten. Oswin and Swithin were their Mam's helpers on their offtime, learning various handy skills to keep the home in working order while Pop was out with his Eored. Laughing and jesting and keeping the household near as loud as it was when Pop was home.

Their cousin Astrid, seventeen years their elder still lived in their home. She was a second mother to the boys, a seamstress, keeping mostly to herself and quiet compared to the rest of the household; the only to have her own room and space. She had settled down from her youthful days, though was always slightly troubled by her childhood and the loss of her father and mother when she had been young, though Heruthain's family had been as good a home as any, and better than what she was raised with. She picked up a habit when she was in her twenties that seemed to settle her soul. Just a drink before bed to to keep her company, Heruthain had banned brennevin from the household always since his brother's demise by drunkenness. He caught his niece with it out in the town more than once, though she was always a mild sort and it did not seem to affect her as much as it did some others. It was in secret that she drank much in her own room in the nights.

Finally a day came when Astrid did not wake from bed and join the family for their breakfasts. By noon, Katla thought she must have taken ill and had tried to wake her through the door to no avail. It was then that she sent her sons who were lithe and quick, wishing to be scouts for the Eored, around to the window to sneak in and check on her, and when the boys had pried open the window from the outside and made their way past the curtains, they found their cousin with her bottle of drink beside, asleep in the washtub, face under water, and stone cold since the night before.

The loss of Astrid was great to Oswin, though seeing the state of his families distress he became the encourager, pressing everyone onward to healing. Joking with his family, training with his brother, laughing and being boisterous to fill the gap of silence that would settle on his house in the evenings. Though in appearance, taking it like the rest of his family, life settled back to normal again after a time.

When they were thirteen years old, their Father came home for good, taking a transfer to become one of the Training Captains in the city. He wished to better raise his boys to be good young men, pressing them to work hard with their Captains at the training grounds, help their mother and neighbors in everything, and laugh hard with their family at home. Pop's devotion was his wife and children, and he was ever present for every help or word of advice they needed.

At the age of eighteen the boys having trained for many years were ready to take up a place in the Eored, looking forward to scouting the front lines. Swithin's hearing held him back, and for every bit of extra effort he had put in training, he could not regain that physicality to help him pass the course. Oswin became a scout; Swithin a spearman.

Oswin saw more sights; had more adventure, but told Swithin everything he had come across by firelight. The daily separation was new to them, though it only made for more stories for each brother to recount at the ends of the days, and it was not as poorly as Swithin had expected it to be, for Oswin was alone all the day, moving quiet through the landscape, while his brother trailed behind. His thoughts began to come to him. Fear of unknown, of loss, of protecting his half-deaf brother who had always been weaker than him since they were boys, of the sadness and grief that would strike his Mam if either of them should fall, and of his Pop who would take it as not having trained them well enough.

Oswin's senses became honed; he trained himself to hear longer distances while scouting, and to see further, his eyes always looking for sign of enemy. He always sought for improvement, for while he was sitting asaddle on during the day if he was not pushing himself harder, his mind would be drawing on the anxieties of what might happen if he failed.

Then they were men. Returning from their first rides, they took to the tavern in celebration. Their first mugs of mead went down sweet. Worries and fears could leave one alone on the river of mead, and one could indulge and laugh the night away, drinking on a whim, and finding pleasurable things to distract oneself with outside of sword training. His Father was none to thrilled with his drunken state, though Swithin would always wait with his brother and bring him home inebriated, allowing nothing to happen to him the same way Oswin perceived his own scouting as protecting Swithin when they were upon the field.

Never wishing to fully succumb to drink, only have things to take pleasure in, Oswin's interests in excitement were varied. He indulges when he indulges but he does not need the drink to settle himself. He could turn horses. Particularly those of the unbroken variety that presented a challenge in handling. He never minded to work long and hard on some, and on those which were not meant to be tamed, he would take to riding for sport, to see how long he could stay on their back before needing to make leap from the saddle.

Oswin could find a sweet girl here, and another there, who wanted a sort of love and comfort that he could provide with no strings attached, an evening of fun and pleasure and entertainment. If a lady ever sought further he would instinctually cut things off with her, for it would mean less heartache all around if anything should happen to him or her, and he has done that a number of times since his youth, never growing attached to girls for the sake of their individualities, but more for the warmth of a woman's arms and momentary satisfaction to be given and taken.

He could sit and joke at the taverns, taking on more than simply drinking but singing, storytelling, smoking, playing games of dice and gambling. His world is the men's world, surrounded by those Riders of the Eored who hold not to things and lives back home, but know they are given their life to service alone, and when given a break from such duties, take it in pleasure and live moment by moment, not thinking about the next departure of the Eored until they must pack their bags the night before and make sure they can rise early for the muster.

As years go on, the brothers are close, and get along well with each other, always caring for one another. Either twin would sacrifice himself for the other; the unsung agreement between them. Still, in other ways they drift. Oswin seeking further and further adventure, scouting for the Eored; yearning to explore places and seek his thrills, fighting and drawing the blood of enemies in the name of their King. Throwing aside all attachments aside his parents and his brother, as he knows he is not promised any lots in life, only promised to serve his king and country until his last breath on the battlefield.