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 Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2017 12:35 pm
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Name: Kedean Aku’a
Stage: Stage Two (Guard > Berserker [Gauntlets]) || Connection: Finnufarinel
Race: Fire/Oban (Pure)
Gender: Male
3 Base Traits: patient, private, principled
Personality: Kedean rushes nothing. Life comes quickly, but in the end each of us is only given one, and Kedean believes wholeheartedly (and practices what he preaches) that the best way to take it is as it comes, appreciating and making the most of each minute. So far as he can tell, the people most focussed on getting things done quickly miss out on appreciating the process—and the process is everything. Life is the process. But that isn’t to say that he does not work hard or is not often busy. Quite the opposite, Kedean cannot afford to waste a minute and doesn’t, he is simply methodical and ever-careful as he goes.
In line with this, Kedean is incredibly disciplined. Because he cannot afford to waste anything, every decision is conscious and every moment is used: he wakes in the dark, cleans, cooks, exercises as the sun rises, washes, eats with whomever he is sharing space, and then begins his ‘real’ work for the day by the time the sun is half its height up from the horizon. He keeps most personal matters to himself, and though he is friendly, few of his friends can say they know much about him other than his cordiality and status as a ‘good listener.’
Though few know it, Kedean is also a man of deep faith—if not in quite the traditional sense. He believes, loosely, in all of the Oban gods and while in Oba may refer to them by name, but only if in conversation for the purpose of communication with whomever he was speaking to. On a personal level, he gives the gods no names and instead believes in more of a collective spirit of forces beyond the purview of the mortal world. Be they many or a single entity, he doesn’t much know or care, but that some energy connects all things living and past seems a given to him. In keeping with his faith — that all things are connected and that his purpose in life is to play a role in that balance for whatever ends he sees fit — he holds himself to a form of unofficial moral code which he hopes will make his impact on the world, however great or small, a positive one closer to bringing order and stability in a place so naturally chaotic.
Kedean is also stubborn, reserved, and self-assured. His rigid habits sometimes make it difficult for him to see alternate paths for himself and reluctant to stray from what works. His formality and private nature keep him from putting too much of himself on display, and yet, success in the paths he has chosen have given him confidence and great assurance that if nothing else, he can always rely on himself. Though he may fail his mother, father, brother — everyone he cares most deeply about and more — and though all he wants is the strength to take care of them, the only person he has flawlessly managed to take care of so far is himself. He hopes to improve on his track record with regard to others.
Description: Kedean is a massive man. Big as a child, he only grew larger with age, always being mistaken for older than he is, and at his full height he reaches the upper cusp of earthling height expectations, such that it is sometimes joked he might have alkidike blood (he does not have a drop and is within earthling range of height, but as tall as they come). Beyond this he is not only broad shouldered, but broad bodied, thick with muscle and built like a brick. His skin and hair are dark brown (hair slightly darker than skin), and he keeps his hair in long, thick dreads, usually tied back with a simple leather strap to keep it out of his way. Against the rest of his features, his eyes stand out as strikingly pale by comparison (reddish pink, light end of the spectrum). His crystals are on his back and mid-light orange.
Clothing: Simple, practical, brown/tan/black/red.
Accessories: n/a
History: Kedean never knew his birth mother, but this was never a large issue in his life. In his earliest years, he was raised alone by his father, Sabar Aku’a, too young still for memories of his own. By the time he was of an age to actually remember, his father had been taken with a young Sautian woman, Elissana, far from home. Beautiful, adventurous, and ‘exotic’ for the Oban scene, Sabar was smitten, and though there were surely outside tensions present at the time, Kedean’s memory of that early relationship is rose-colored and pristine. His father married the woman who had become his mother-figure by then, and when Kedean was seven years old, she gave birth to his little brother and only sibling, Zyric.
Despite the internal happiness of the small family, however, they were not immune to outside circumstance, and though they had enough to get by, it was never more than that. Thus, when Elissana took ill — whether due to the reluctance of Oban healers to treat an unwelcome foreigner, the inability of their family to gather together the coin to persuade them to do so, or simply her body’s ill-preparedness to fight off strange desert diseases — her condition did not improve, but in a painfully steady progression, worsened to critical condition. When Zyric was six and Kedean thirteen, she died.
Their father never fully recovered, and in its own way her death left ripples that still have not healed over. After the loss of his wife, Sabar regressed into a withdrawn, sullen drunk. He never became physically or emotionally abusive with his sons, but despite his love for them could not seem to pull past the depths of his own depression. He continued to work—or try—but by crippling himself and his functionality through alcoholism it became more difficult for him to hold onto anything for long. The task of caring for his brother and his father was settled on Kedean’s shoulders—and he was not prepared.
Still, he tried. He matured quickly by force of necessity, but never quickly ‘enough.’ It seemed for that first flurry of years following his mother’s death that the moment he worked his way through one catastrophe or dilemma, another three took its place. To add to the matter, losing Elissana meant losing the last bastion of whatever ‘validity’ his little brother had to begin with. Though race tensions had been there prior, her presence at least had seemed to act as a refuge and a deterrent simultaneously—her arms a place Zyric could run and see his blonde hair and his sea blue eyes and understand he was not alone or as alien here as it sometimes felt. Without her, he was a strange, strange boy with foreigner’s traits who would never fully be welcome despite sharing his father’s dark skin and crystals. And no one let him forget it.
Kedean had been — and remained, to whatever extent he could — a pacifist, never out looking for a fight, but as it happened he never needed to. They came to him, and he lost track of how often it amounted to that. Literal physical scuffles over his brother’s differences, and he could only consider himself fortunate that his body seemed intent on building itself for that task whether he asked for it or not.
Zyric became his foil: loud and brash where Kedean was quiet, rebellious and antagonistic where Kedean attempted to keep the peace, and carefree, spirited, and fun-loving where Kedean always felt the looming, ever-present weight of self-imposed responsibility and the burden of guilt that came with being convinced if their father died due to his addiction, if Zyric were lost or fell astray down some dangerous path, or if what remained of their family fell apart for whatever reason—that was his fault to bear.
But in the meantime, there was work to be done. Being located on Oba’s coast with his family all his life, Kedean did primarily dock work, and was well suited for it. Fishers and traders were always especially eager to have extra quick sets of strong bodies to manage the near endless stream of loadings and unloadings needed—and later, as a wall of protection for themselves, at least in the case of traders. Though reluctant at first to involve himself in anything that would lead to violence, it was difficult—and then impossible—to avoid the inevitability in a poor desert district wherein most everyone had little to nothing—but trade and travel meant coin was changing hands and sometimes, extravagant amounts of wealth were on display in fleeting glints as merchants passed through. It was a recipe for conflict on any number of fronts, and as it became the case with regards to his brother and the fights involved in defending him, so too did it become impossible not to take a side in the stakes.
Kedean sided with order—and coin. For any lawful — or ‘semi-lawful’ if he’s pinched for money — merchant trading company, city guard corps, or sea captain in need of anything from heavy-lifting to protective enforcement, Kedean became a man for hire. His earliest jobs were, of course, whatever he could get as an untrained young man desperate for employment, but those trained him quickly in the truest and quickest form: by demanding performance. Learning by doing. Fortunately, Kedean was a quick study. His body took to fighting for masters — for, though they never for him took such an official form as the masters which owned matori slaves, that was still what they were to him: owners of his time and body because he needed their coin for his livelihood and they knew it as well as him — it took to it like it had been designed for this. As though the gods had shaped him and his life to be the answer to other men’s problems, for the right price.
He was not sure how he felt about that, but since he had little choice in the matter if he intended to support those he did care about, he let the issue rest in his mind, never explored with too critical an eye. He couldn’t afford otherwise.
Connection: Kedean has had a rough life, but he isn’t the only one. While Kedean was growing up on the desert coast of Oba, taking fights for his brother and training himself into a weapon for other’s aims, on an island just across the sea, Finnufarinel was just beginning a very different—but even more embattled path in life. At the cusp of stage two (for his stage two quest) Kedean’s younger brother, Zyric, will run away from home (or ‘disappear’), triggering Kedean’s guilt (he blames himself for Zyric running away) and a reluctance for him to go anywhere in life (while he is on the lookout for his brother, he doesn’t want to stray far from familiar paths in case Zyric comes back looking for him). This leaves him basically in a guilty rut.
Meanwhile, across the sea Finn has just been reunited with his brother after years of separation and having assumed Tacrith was dead—and he’s not impressed. He’s angry, he’s disenchanted with the world, and to top everything off, he’s a walking time bomb of magical capacity as of yet untapped, waiting to go off if the fuse is lit. And Finn’s fuse is soaked in kerosene. He has no filter, no shield, little to no concept of his own power (and certainly no sense of control), and no love for humanity. Disenchanted with the lies of the man who abused him, the untrustworthiness of society, and a brother who apparently lived a soft, cushy high life while he was being starved, Finn is about to leave Yael.
He will arrive on Oba’s shore much as he left the shore of his homeland: dangerously thin, filthy, angry, and ready to eat anything. But foreigners are not always welcome on strange soil, and dirty, dangerous poor are rarely ‘welcome’ anywhere. It doesn’t help that Finn itches for a fight like an animal for fleas, and like other things before it: fights again in this case seemed inevitable. Kedean, though, unlike many of his brethren, has a special space in his heart for those whom society sees and does not accept because they look different. Finn is perhaps one third of the size of Zyric, if that, and he is strange to Kedean’s eyes: with his matted purple hair, his eyes which at least at first emit an eerie silver glow, and the inky black of his crystals and sclera. But perhaps because he is so small, or because Kedean fancies himself a defender for those in need of one, or because his life has made him especially positioned to take the side of those society turns a wary eye on—whatever the case, Finn arrives on the docks that Kedean frequents and their needs, on enough levels, overlap so as to bring their lives together in a number of unplanned for ways.
Finnufarinel is an explosion waiting to happen in need of a pillar to anchor him. Kedean is that anchor, in need of a little shaking up. Finn will be a catalyst in Kedean’s life, forcing him to reconsider how regimented and ‘stuck’ his life has become, as well as how much he has let himself be an instrument for others as opposed to pushing more of his own life choices. |
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Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2017 8:21 am
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Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2017 8:44 am
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Posted: Thu Feb 16, 2017 1:43 pm
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Posted: Thu Feb 16, 2017 1:57 pm
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He needs to be in stage two because during his prentice stage age, he is not in the mindset (or life position) to take Finn into his life in any serious portion or be the support that will be needed. It’s critical that during his prentice stage, Kedean is mostly focussed on his own family, on his father, on his brother (on his dying mother and the immediate after affects of that). He can barely keep up with it all (and in many ways can't, but is incredibly focused on trying) at that point. It isn't until the beginning of stage two that he loses Zyric, his last real cling to normalcy there in family affairs (trying to “keep everyone together” and fulfill the caretaker role).
With Zyric gone, Kedean is kind of adrift and he needs to move past that hole in his life and learn to take more action. Finn kind of drops in at just the right time in that regard because it will have been some time since Zyric disappeared - enough that Kedean is still clinging to the hope that he’ll just re-appear, but also is enough in flux that this stranger ends up being someone he has the opportunity to pay more attention to and try to help, while unintentionally being affected himself. So the timing is significant and very important. :]
As for matori slavery, Kedean finds the concept personally repulsive but also ‘a fact of life.’ He could have just as easily have been born a slave, and he feels like his socio-economic status puts him on a *similar* level, though he fully recognizes that he has far more power and freedom than any real slave ever did. He respects and is curious about the Matori people generally but realizes that to most of them, he is an offense just for being the race he is and he is perfectly on terms with that. |
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Posted: Thu Feb 16, 2017 2:26 pm
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*Also if all you really want is more specifics on their plot after meeting I can give a more in-depth run down, and if you want info on how Kedean impacts *Finn* (since it goes both ways, obvs) you can quote Moose - but basically, Kedean will be newly living more or less alone only after stage two, after Zyric leaves - he will only be so significantly in his hometown after Zyric’s disappearance (so it’s part of the reason he’s even there when Finn arrives). Kedean and Finn’s connection begins tentatively - Kedean intercedes when Finn has trouble with the locals and will provide very basic help at first (try to get food in his gut), but later - probably over the course of a few weeks, after seeing him around repeatedly, more entwined (use his personal connections with the people in the area he works with to try and get Finn some work, possibly allow him to temporarily use Zyric’s room to keep him from sleeping on the street). He’ll also take note of Finn’s magic and how extensive/volatile it is, and be one of the first to try to help Finn both capitalize on and control it (Kedean knows several people who would LOVE to have a powerful mage on their side, but Kedean doesn’t necessarily trust them all with a young and impressionable street rat, so he feels/will feel like he needs to be involved in making sure Finn doesn’t get taken advantage of for his power).
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Posted: Thu Feb 16, 2017 2:26 pm
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Posted: Thu Feb 16, 2017 3:32 pm
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How do their needs overlap? Finn needs on the most basic level: food, shelter, support (or some way to support himself). He also needs, on the next tier (less immediate but more personal/character development needs) someone/something that helps him not just recognize his power (though this is a factor), but also his potential, the dangers of him not being able to control himself, and the potential benefits for him in channeling it. Kedean does not have the basic level needs (he has them all covered), but he does have the means to provide (once their relationship gets to that point though I’ll elaborate on that later) them. Kedean does, however, ‘need’: a sense of purpose/drive (previously ‘protect/care for Zyric’ was a huge drive and that’s partially gutted at least temporarily), something which challenges his semi-set ways and pushes his path outward beyond the home (this is less a ‘need’ but a point of character development that I want to accomplish through Finn driving him and testing him on that front - again, eventually).
How do their lives come together in "unplanned ways"? Initially, Kedean will meet Finn on the street and help him through some variety of street scuffle. Moose and I have not planned down the RP to a t and she can certainly weigh in here, but essentially Kedean does not take their initial meeting as any sign (then) that they’ll even ever see each other again. Finn is just a strange boy from a far off land. Since Finn remains in the area, however, and Kedean is currently stationary, they continue to encounter one another. Kedean sees certain potential in him as well as a large danger of Finn being manipulated or used if anyone with power catches on that he might be a valuable weapon, and that — combined with his general tendency to want to help, and specifically to feel like he is valid because he’s helping — causes Kedean to get more involved on a repeated basis. Kedean draws a lot of his personal purpose from his ability to protect others, and that leads him to extend his help towards Finn where he can, but in portions. So Kedean never specifically intended for them to actually remain around each other long (first he’s just interfering with one skirmish, then offering a little coin or a little food, then a place to stay ‘temporarily’, then attempting to get him work…).
Why do they stay together? Eventually, Kedean ends up getting Finn hired by a man he (Kedean) has worked for before, but on the condition that Kedean also come along to ‘babysit’ (essentially). The man is concerned that Finn is volatile and untrustworthy, potentially rob them blind, etc., and Kedean will not have wanted up to that point to take the work offered himself (it will involve actually getting on a ship and doing trade between Oba and Yael) - he doesn’t want to travel across the sea or anywhere where he thinks Zyric wouldn’t be able to track him down. By the time this happens, however, there will have been enough build-up that Kedean does concede to taking on the task and traveling with Finn and the captain. This will be a big break move for Kedean, and will also mean they’ll continue to be in close quarters as Finn develops his magic and begins building up his reputation as more than just a street rat.
Do things change between them? When and why? Things change between them every step of the way. First they are strangers with little in common but moreso than they might think (they both understand poverty, loss, the feeling of being under the thumb of larger forces in varying degrees beyond their control obviously), but enough common ground that Kedean does extend that first hand of contact (interfering in the street skirmish) and in progressive portions after that. Once they move past strangers they are minimally involved acquaintances - Kedean has little to fear from Finn physically, but even when he first extends an offer for Finn to take temporary shelter in his home, that will feel like a risk to Kedean that he’s aware of — a risk that Finn will rob whatever little they have and flee, a risk that Finn could simply have a nightmare and burn the place down for all he knows — and he considers those both to be possible (he doesn’t completely trust Finn at that point) but unlikely enough that he’s willing to extend the courtesy and the risk for what might come as a result (peace of mind that Finn is safe, and possibly a friend/connection/more trusted ally in the future - there’s no way for him to know at that point).
Gradually this relationship continues to develop and change as they learn more about each other and build very tentative bonds of trust. When Kedean ends up on the boat with him Finn has moved up to somewhere on Kedean’s rung of people he cares about on a personal level—not family, not a lover, but someone he feels responsible for on some level and is intrigued by/has a vested interest in seeing him do well and be happy. He still at that point considers him (or will, I suspect) a loose canon and fairly unpredictable, so it still wouldn’t surprise Kedean at that point if Finn up and vanished. But he won’t.
Where their relationship goes after that point depends on how they hit it off in RP and the finer points of their interactions, but in the end, Kedean will at the very least develop a deep respect for Finn’s magic, his passion, his vivacity for life, and Kedean will hopefully give Finn some appreciation for certain amounts of order, control, and patience.
Does Zyric come back and how does/would this affect Kedean and his new "ward"? Zyric will eventually return, yes! He is not dead, he is just out having his way with the world and felt stifled where he was, didn’t want Kedean following him or stopping him (because he knew he would if he said anything beforehand), so he went off his own merry way. He will turn back up at some undefined point, but basically at around the point where Kedean and Finn’s connection is no longer iffy, once Kedean is fully entrenched in the new turns to his life, Zyric will pop back around to cause a little stir, but for the most part, that actually won’t be a huge deal (or not as much as one might think). It’s a huge deal to Kedean personally, obviously (a huge weight off his back and fear relief), but it won’t have a big impact on Kedean’s character/won’t change the path he’s taken at that point.
Zyric is for the most part a free spirit, and will be incredibly lackadaisical about the entire thing, as though he hadn’t just up and disappeared for the better part of a year or more without word. He will probably make jokes about Finn’s height, Finn’s and his brother’s comical size difference, ask invasive questions as casually as you ought to ask about the weather, and then promptly skip on to talking about his adventures before either a) joining ship or b) going off to do his own thing again, this time promising to at least keep Kedean more informed.
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Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2017 5:55 pm
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Phase One
Kedean meets Finn, defends him, first impressions. Encounters him several more times.
Witnesses the spontaneous/dangerous nature of Finn’s magic when his mood gets the better of him.
Aids him in attaining his first job on Oba and he (Kedean) speaks to some of his contacts about Finn’s case.
Eventually (with some trepidation), allows him temporary shelter in his home.
Plot Goals:
1) Setting the basic foundation of their relationship.
2) Exposing Kedean to Finn’s magic [which is uncontrollable in ways that most spellcasters do not have issues with], and in that planting the seeds of both curiosity and concern.
3) Tentative bond forming - neither of them trust each other, but by the end of this phase, the two of them should have the first threads of mutual support/benefit, with Kedean extending a hand that Finn hasn’t gotten before and providing for basic needs, and Kedean (for the first time since his brother disappearing, and in some ways for the first time ever) just beginning to become invested in the personal life and interests of someone besides family. Kedean is a decent man, but mostly he works for hire and allowing this strange foreign boy to edge into his life is a new development for him.
Phase Two
Kedean, with Finn around much of the time now, begins to give first pointers/aid with helping Finn to channel/control his magic. Finn is at this stage still essentially afraid of his own power (at least when it gets the better of him); he loves it when it bends to his will, but it’s fairly terrifying when it acts without his call, and this isn’t infrequent. His magic responds to his moods, and Finn has a lot of moods. Finn has never in his life had anyone he trusted enough to ground him or guide him, and while he still does not know Kedean deeply, this door is beginning to open.
Kedean makes contact with a trader in charge of several ships which do business between Yael and Oba who often takes on mages to protect the cargo and secure trade deals, figuring that someone in more contact with Yael would be more ready to employ a native Yaelian. The trader expresses reservations for a number of reasons involving Finn’s age, background, and lack of control - Kedean may bring Finn in for a personal interview, which would cement both the fact that he is genuinely powerful but also not stable enough to be hired on alone.
Kedean trains with Finn, but perhaps more importantly at this point has been and continues to be present at times when Finn’s fear/anger/magic gets the better of him, and is proving (to Finn) that he is not about to disappear or abandon him on a whim.
Kedean’s merchant-trader contact makes him an offer: if he is willing to sign onto the same ship and take responsibility for Finn’s actions, he would hire them as a pair. The merchant thinks this is a fantastic deal, pairing off reliable physical wall/bulk defense with a magic cannon, and emphasizes to Kedean that they should try to capitalize on selling that even if not to him; they could “make a killing” if you “get that kid under control.” Kedean has reservations.
Ozzrick, having arrived in Oba some time ago and having done some shipwork to attempt to build up his abilities there, arrives in Kedean’s hometown. (Ozzrick and Kedean will have met prior to this point a number of times elsewhere in Oba, enough to form a sort of loose friendship, but he only becomes important to Kedean and Finn’s plot at this point.) He reconnects with Kedean, and informs him that he has gotten his first big break—he has his own ship!
Unfortunately, he lacks most of a crew. After much persuasion on Ozzrick’s part (of both Kedean and Finn, who Oz takes immediate interest in), Kedean eventually concedes to come onboard.
Plot Goals:
1) Flesh in the bare bones of Kedean and Finn’s connection beyond temporary support and toward the first bonds of real trust (if tentative).
2) Kedean begins in this phase to really start on his role of acting as a magical channel/grounding point for Finn. This is especially critical since it will only be built upon from here, but Finn has so far completely lacked any tether and, as stated, to some extent fears his own magic. With Kedean for the first time he begins to have the level of stability necessary to begin reigning this in.
3) Kedean confronts the prospect of leaving home/familiar spaces where his brother may not be able to as easily track him down if he returns, and initially turns it down. By the end of this phase, however, Kedean is ready to take that step.
Phase Three
Kedean and Finn set sail on Ozzrick’s ship.
Oz is a new captain, charming and adventurous—but a bit of a loose cannon himself with something of a hodge-podge crew, which leads to a number of circumstances which test all of them (storms, internal conflict among the crew, conflicts with other traders of varying levels of lawful/lawlessness on both Oba’s and Yael’s shore, etc.). Also specifically relevant to Kedean and Finn, they are now both in new territory as a pair (as opposed to Kedean being grounded in familiar territory at home and Finn being the outsider).
When it comes to physical conflict, this is the first time Kedean and Finn are tested in action together, and for the first time (and then of course at various times after) they fight side by side.
Kedean gets to see Finn’s magic in “the real world” as opposed to in practice or spontaneous outbursts, and Finn is by this point becoming much more of a force to be reckoned with not so much (though still some) in the sense of being dangerously uncontrollable, but because he has more control now and is beginning to bloom into his own magic, understand it, and channel it better.
Finn sleeps with Kedean. (Not sexually - he sleeps on top of Kedean in the same hammock on the ship.)
Plot Goals:
1) Finn and Kedean are both in new territory, as well as near-constant physical proximity and shared circumstances of danger, which re-enforces the building bond there, encouraging more close knit conversations, mutual defense of one another, and development of ever-increasing trust.
2) This is the phase where Kedean first begins to see Finn as something more than a child, in several senses. Before now, Kedean understood Finn had great potential, but he was tiny, angry, wounded, malnourished, and something of a feral kitten which—while it drew on Kedean’s innate desire to protect—did little in terms of earning Finn any respect on an adult level. Here, as Finn gains more control and confidence, Kedean can focus a little less on worrying about him constantly and more on seeing who he is as a person underneath all the battle scars of his youth and life-trauma.
3) Kedean and Finn become friends. (Their relationship could have been labeled a number of things prior to this point but ‘friends’ wasn’t really one of them.)
4) This is the first stage where their relationship begins to be more balanced, less ‘Kedean with all the stability and adult authority and Finn growing under that’ and more ‘two men who now have conversations and actively protect one another in battle and are generally on all around more equal footing.’
5) While it was on the rise with its foundations being laid and built on up to this point, this is where Kedean and Finn really begin to trust each other in a fuller sense, communicate on a personal level, and open up to each other gradually in ways they had not before—really with anyone. Before this point, the only people Kedean really grew personally close to were his family members. He makes acquaintance-level friends fairly easily, but rarely goes beyond that; he has had a scattering of brief flirts at romance (always initiated by the other party) which never went anywhere. By the end of this phase, he is looking at Finn differently than he does anyone else.
6) Their physical comfort with each other has changed; they are mutually allowed into each others’ private spaces (sleeping) despite the fact that they are not sexually involved at this point.
Phase Four
As Finn’s ability to control and hone his magical potential is further refined, Kedean and Finn develop into a formidable duo and balance one another out on and off the battlefield.
Whether they continue to work for/with Ozzrick or eventually take on new tasks, they will have developed a reputation for their work together and certainly have prospects, and will continue to work as a pair.
Reasonably early in their relationship, Finn will have made sexual advances on Kedean which were (repeatedly) firmly and wholly rebuffed. Kedean had zero romantic or physical interest in him when these began, and thought of him as a child, not even on the spectrum of his interest. By this point in time, however, Finn has through consistent proper nutrition filled out (if not grown much taller or bigger, just a healthy weight for his size/no longer a skeleton), had an opportunity to become slightly less of a complete mood typhoon (still a man of great energy and vivacity, but now with personal spark and happiness instead of just all chaos and trauma), and critically, is no longer dependant on Kedean (or anyone) for anything.
Finn develops through his work for Oz, the trading company (and potentially elsewhere), a name for himself in his own right and eventually something he’s always wanted (and been openly envious of in his brother when they met): respect.
This tracks with his relationship with Kedean. Kedean has by this point developed a deep personal respect of Finn, and is falling in love with the man he has become. They are not actually that far apart in age, but the nature of their circumstances always exaggerated that gap (Kedean looking and coming across older than he actually is and Finn being stunted and initially, for lack of a better word, immature due to lack of opportunity to flourish among other things).
Here, finally, those differences are less acute, allowing them to forge new ground.
Kedean and Finn sleep together.
Who knows, maybe one day they’ll settle down and do something sane with their lives. Kedean actually quite likes Yael (or will), and Finn has some contacts there (his brother and his medical center, a priest of the Sanctum who initially brought him to Tacrith after Finn had thought he’d died). Kedean also has some basic trade skill knowledge (his father was a blacksmith, reasonably good at it until his alcoholism took over, and he passed on at least some technique to Kedean, though it certainly isn’t the trade he’s used to). If ever they decide they are too old for adventure/risking their lives for mercenarial endeavors, they have options for setting themselves to something more peaceful, and likely will, one day.
Plot Goals:
1) Finn developing into a competent and powerful mage in his own right.
2) He and Kedean becoming partners in the long term in regards to their mercenary/guard work.
3) Kedean coming to respect and fall in love with what they’ve become.
4) Finn and Kedean become lovers on top of being partners, and friends, and figure they’re well-positioned to take on whatever the world has to offer.
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Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2017 5:57 pm
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Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2017 6:07 am
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