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Name: Michael Swan
Age: 34
Gender: Male

Magic: Fire
Hound: Kaendrel

Physical Description: Michael, Mike to his friends, is on the tall side and slender, but wiry, with black hair and haunted blue eyes. His hands are scarred with burns and cuts from his metalworking.

He works most days, so he's usually in jeans and a long-sleeved work shirt (which is usually singed despite his diligent efforts to maintain it), but he'd probably look quite sharp if he ever cleaned up and went out.

Personality: A dour, softspoken man, Michael seldom smiles and never laughs. It seems as though something long ago stole his joy. He is, however, intelligent, honest, hardworking, and more than willing to help those in need. And he hates, hates a bully.

Biography:

Michael arrived in Somera a few years ago. Those few who know him from those days remember a gaunt man in ragged clothes with a haggard face. He spoke little and jumped at shadows, and was in the company of a small, white and gray hellhound pup. Now he has somewhat recovered himself, though he still doesn't much care for dark, close spaces. He never speaks of what came before, gracefully deflecting and changing the subject whenever anyone asks. If pressed, he simply explains that his past was painful and that he prefers not to speak of it.

The part he's not telling is that he grew up an orphan in Arkenvale under a different name, one he tries to forget. He fell in love with a beautiful young woman who returned his affections and they were set to be wed, but an aging nobleman with very dark tastes had other designs.

Michael did his best to protect the woman he loved, but to no avail. One night, when he was supposed to meet his beloved, she did not arrive. Upon arriving at her house to see what was the matter, Michael found the nobleman standing over her in a pool of blood. He slew the nobleman just as the police were summoned.

Michael was tried and found guilty of the murder of the nobleman, and was set to be hanged. While in jail, gloating relatives of the slain nobleman came to torment him, telling him of his love's lingering death from her wounds and jeering at him for being unable to attend her funeral.

Due to a lucky paperwork error (though he didn't consider it terribly lucky at the time), Michael was instead thrown in a remote jail reserved for political and otherwise embarrassing prisoners and was subjected to the awful conditions there for many years. Eventually, he managed to kill the cruel jailor and, for lack of a better plan, escaped to the south.

As he wandered the roads, sick and starving and lacking a true reason to proceed, he found Kaendrel. Despite the trauma of their introduction (Michael is not overfond of dark, closed places, and was even less so back then) the Hound was a much-needed balm to his wounded soul. With her welfare as his new guiding light, he made his way south to Somera to begin a new life.

The Summoning:

It had taken her a bit to talk the man down. The compulsion that had drawn him down here had somehow overcome a raging case of claustrophobia to do so, it seemed, because the poor fellow was damn near hysterical. She had also put together something about a storm, and the dark... maybe he'd stumbled down here by accident? Well, it didn't much matter. He wanted to leave, but the tunnels were smaller and darker than the cave that was upsetting him so. He was trapped.

Finally, she coaxed him over to huddle next to the light of the portal and spoke to him until he was calm enough to respond. All he wanted was to get out of the cave, but Kaendrel could tell he needed much more than that. His clothes were little more than rags, and he was thin, hurt, and sick. She, however, was desperate to get out of the Abyss and would take what she could get.

"Come then. Let me help you," she wheedled, keeping her voice soft and gentle. It was hardly sporting, this. Lucky for him, this broken wreck had happened upon a decent sort of Hound to summon. "If you let me join you, I will look after you. Make sure you're fed and warm and safe, and get you out of this cave. Do you accept?"

"Yes," he whispered. It was enough.