Mooncharmer

"Everyone has a song that touches them straight to their soul; for some, it has already been written, they just have to listen to all they can and meet as many dragons as possible to find it. For others, it is the simple song of a scroll rolling, or the wind blowing through the mountains, or the voice of whom they love, and peace is their reward. And for those who have done all they can but cannot find it… they have the opportunity and experience to make it." - Mooncharmer
"Heh, it took me all night to think of that. My visions say that she'll probably find that inspiring and/or funny. Hopefully." - Mooncharmer
Heya peeps! It's yet another one of Artemis the FowlWing's OCs!
This particular dragon is part of TheUnFathomable's Character/Song contest, check it out if you didn't pay attention to the highlight! Heh... an OC that loves music for a song contest...
I don't own the song, or the rights to the song, that this dragon is based off of; just making that clear, in case some weirdo copyright peep would like to say something.
Mooncharmer is a one-moon-born NightWing with a passion for music and a girl, known only as Windkeeper, he's only seen in his visions and dreams but hopes to one day meet.
He is also a fairly famous singer/musician, and travels frequently from town to town, searching for his girlfriend-who-doesn't-know-she's-his-girlfriend and playing and singing for dragons all over Pyrrhia. 
== Appearance ==
A typical NightWing, Mooncharmer has two silver horns, two ears, two yellow-orange eyes, four legs, twenty talons, two wings, a long tail, and black scales that, in reality, are more of a really, really, really dark purplish-blue color.
However, on a more personal level, Mooncharmer has a few, if subtle, differences from what might be called your "average" NightWing. For one thing, scattered across his face are silver freckles, which contrast sharply with his night-black scales and sometimes causes fandragons to crush on him. Although he pretends to be embarrassed by this, secretly he loves the attention and is sometimes shown before concerts to polish these particular scales until they shine in even the dimmest of locations.
Stranger than his freckles, however, is the apparent lack of pattern or control in his wing-stars. Although this may not seem strange to other tribes, NightWings, who are used to random silver scales and various birthmarks, take star-patterns in wings very seriously. Therefore, Mooncharmer's stars, when compared to the spiral-patterned stars of his mother, and the criss-crossed stars of his father, are an oddity. They follow no rhyme or reason; at first glance, they seem to fall into stripes, but at closer inspection there are several spiraling and jumping exceptions to this rule. Mooncharmer claims that this "pattern" is actually something that could be translated into music or words, which in turn would be a sign that would lead him to his lover. No one really believes him, and ignores him when he tries to talk about it.
== Personality ==
Before his mother's death (more about that in History), Mooncharmer was a bit of a brat. Bloodthirsty, ambitious, and annoying, he had no problem with harming others, whether intentionally or just by accident, to get what he wanted. However, when his mother died in the NightWing/RainWing war, he began to be more philosophical, peaceful, and optimistic, hoping for a better world than the one he had come into. He began to absolutely hate fighting, and tries to be a peacemaker in all situations. Although he says that he is not entirely sure himself about what brought upon this change, whether it was his mother dying, that one SkyWing, or destiny itslf, he refuses to go back to the dragon he was before, believing that the world needs a bit more hope and he should be the one to bring it to others through his music.
Although he is usually hopeful and cheerful, occasionally he has flashbacks of the NightWing/RainWing war and his mother dying and doubts and regrets about what he could have done in the past and if he’s actually doing the right thing and on the right path. He tries his hardest to shake these thoughts off, keeping his optimistic demeanor and thought process, but sometimes fails and has to rely on visions of Windkeeper to keep him going.
He is also known to be quite clingy and obsessive, constantly talking about Windkeeper and relying on his thoughts and visions of her (and also, although he mentions this less, the SkyWing and religious stuff) to keep himself from being swallowed in his darker thoughts. He changes the subject whenever someone mentions this flaw to him.
As mentioned before, Mooncharmer is also quite spiritual/religious, and sometimes talks about inanimate objects such as the moons “being alive” or “watching over all their NightWing children”. He is also a firm believer in destiny, due to his various visions and prophecies. He typically doesn’t show this side of himself to others, but it often comes out in his songs and when arguing with other NightWings.
== Abilities/Weaknesses ==
Mooncharmer's abilities are mostly just the normal NightWing abilities, such as fire, the weird bacteria-thing they sometimes do, and being able to blend into the shadows with ease. As well as these abilities, Mooncharmer, being born under one full moon, has the ability to see fairly far into the future. Although his prophecies and visions are mostly centered around a female NightWing that he's never met, he sometimes has extremely powerful visions about things happening far away. However, these visions are often too late to do any good for the ones experiencing them, except for the fact that they can get help from other dragons slightly faster than they would have in the first place.
Besides his powers, Mooncharmer enjoys playing instruments and can play the guitar and any percussion instrument extremely well. He also writes his own songs, but most of his more intricate and interesting songs he saves for when he will eventually meet Windkeeper.
His abilities and personal strengths, however, come with definite weaknesses; although his visions help him in many situations, he can become obsessed with looking at the Windkeeper futures and trying to find Windkeeper, often neglecting his health when another string of visions saying where she might be or how he could find her comes along. He’ll drop everything, even if something important is going on, just to find a new clue as to her whereabouts. This is the same with any SkyWing visions he recieves, although those are dealt with with a lot less... drama. Although this may not be a definite weakness, it does get him into a lot of trouble, whether with his health and strength or because he neglected something or someone that ends up putting him in danger. 
Mooncharmer also isn’t that big, or good at fighting; although he has the strength to fight, since he has to travel everywhere by wing or foot and play instruments for long periods of time, and doing so requires a certain level of strength, character, and defense skills, he frequently takes long rests in towns when he’s not obsessed with Windkeeper and avoids fighting and other, similar physical activity as much as possible.
== History ==
Before Mooncharmer hatched, the NightWings started a revolution against the RainWings. Although the NightWings had been peacefully co-existing in the Rainforest with the RainWings for millennia (the year was 6,500 AS), suddenly the queen of the NightWings (wife of the RainWing king, per tradition) killed her husband and ordered her citizens to attack. Mooncharmer's mother and father both fought in this war, which lasted for about ten years before eventually abating, neither side winning.
However, in the second year of the war, Mooncharmer's egg was laid. His parents, named Skywhisperer (father) and Pathhider (mother), were understandably upset that their dragonet was to be born into a war, but overjoyed nonetheless. When he finally hatched, they were impressed that at least one of their dragonets were to have powers, his older sister having no powers herself, and cared for him and his prophetic powers as well as they could while still fighting in the war.
Despite the fact that he was raised in a loving family as far away from the war as possible without Skywhisperer and Pathhider being traitors to their tribe (the RainWings, although unable to destroy their mostly-stone homes, had driven most of the the NightWings out of the Rainforest and into the Claws of the Clouds mountains by the fourth year), Mooncharmer grew up to be ambitious and violent. He dreamed of being an assassin or soldier, and any stories his parents would tell him of how terrible war was would only make him excited and violent. Any visions he had were mostly of him becoming Commander in the NightWing army, and any peaceful ones (including those of Windkeeper) were discarded as dreams or "weakling thoughts". Eventually his parents gave up on trying to pacify his apparent bloodlust, and instead asked a family friend, former blacksmith and now general, Stonekiller, to teach their now-three-year-old son simple battle tactics and techniques.
Mooncharmer was extremely excited to meet Stonekiller, but instead of just waiting for his parents to take him to where the NightWing General was hiding in the mountains, he decided to go off and find him himself. His sister noticed and tried to stop him, but he ignored her and flew away before his parents would come home from a day's worth of fighting.
Along the way, Mooncharmer happened to meet a battle-scarred, half-blind SkyWing living alone in the mountains. Feeling a bit lonely himself, Mooncharmer spilled his hopes and dreams to the old orange dragon, who listened carefully as she plucked a small instrument in her lap. When he finished, the SkyWing warned him against going to Stonekiller's hideout, saying that "war will only bring an unfortunate event closer" and that learning to sing and play instruments would serve him much better as a dragon. Mooncharmer scoffed at this, wondering how on the moons she would know that if she wasn't a NightWing, and refused her offers of her instrument for him to learn. She then yelled at him for being a "foolish vision-worshipper without knowledge of the future" and flew away into a cloud.
Immediately after, Mooncharmer had an intense vision of a NightWing looking like his mother with a spear in her heart and covered in blood in the Rainforest, and a small NightWing wearing a helmet (later revealed to be Windkeeper) shaking her head sadly over the corpse before running off into the greenery. Shaken, Mooncharmer waited a while for the SkyWing to reappear and explain, but when she didn't he finally gave up and decided to continue on his journey, despite his prophetic vision.
It took a while, and a lot of help from various older NightWings, but Mooncharmer eventually found his way to Stonekiller. However, when he got there, Stonekiller was sharing tales of the glories of war with a gigantic, weapon-laden NightWing. Mooncharmer listened to the tales, practically spellbound, and asked the larger NightWing question after question about the war and how he got various scars how old one had to be to go fight in the war. Although the NightWing (which turned out to be the Commander) put up with his endless questions for a while, eventually he laughed and asked Mooncharmer if he wanted to come with him to the battlefield. Mooncharmer eagerly agreed and they flew off, Stonekiller confused and bemused as to why Mooncharmer had come without his parents but pretty much disregarding it for personal reasons.
When they arrived at the battlefield, a cleared section at the base of the mountains, that day's battle was still in full force. RainWings and NightWings twisted violently in the dying sunlight, random red gashes appearing in the air as camouflaged RainWings were hit with spears and NightWings dropping where they stood as toxic darts infiltrated their defenses. Mooncharmer was ecstatic, ignoring the death and gore surrounding him as he watched NightWing heroes take down ten RainWings with one well-aimed attack. He asked the Commander if he could join, but the NightWing just laughed and said that he’d “just be squashed, like the ignorant weakling dragonet you are”. 
Mooncharmer became extremely angry at this, and started shouting at the Commander, saying things about how he would single-handedly end the war and then take over the Commander’s job. At this, the Commander became angry as well, telling him to go home and to stop messing with things he didn’t understand. Instead, Mooncharmer did exactly the opposite, and flung himself into the heat of the battle. 
Ignoring the Commander’s yells, Mooncharmer found himself being splattered by blood, with dragons roaring around him. Deafened, blinded by blood, and confused, especially since the battle wasn’t the neat, orderly, honorable fight he thought it was, Mooncharmer ducked under the large dragons, trying to get to Rainforest cover. Swerving around various angry dragons to avoid getting stepped on, he got turned around and instead started heading further into the battle. 
Soon, however, he was face-to-face with a RainWing who had finally spotted him among the carnage. Whipping out his blowgun, the RainWing prepared to tranq the tiny Mooncharmer, who decided that this would be a fine time to try out his fighting skills. Leaping at the RainWing, he attempted to claw the dragon’s eyes out. Unfortunately, his fighting skills were pretty much nonexistent, since he had never received lessons from Stonekiller, so the RainWing just batted him to the ground and pinned him down with a couple of talons. Mooncharmer tried to squirm away, but the RainWing laughed and picked up his blowgun for another try.
Mooncharmer’s mother then appeared out of nowhere, looking at Mooncharmer as though she had seen a ghost before barrelling into the RainWing, who snarled and let go of the tiny NightWing. Pathhider yelled at Mooncharmer to take cover as she raked her talons across the RainWing’s face. To her anger, he refused and instead cheered his mother on as she fought -- until he remembered the vision he had had about her. His cheers quickly turned to shouts for her to stop and fly away as he realized that his vision was about to come true. 
Pathhider turned, but only to shout at him to run. While she was distracted, the RainWing blew a dart into the location of her neck artery and camouflaged, disappearing into the battle. Eyes widening, Pathhider fell where she stood, gasping. Mooncharmer tried in vain to move her, but he was too small to drag her far. 
Suddenly, if only to make matters worse, a crazed NightWing charged towards them, thinking that the collapsed Pathhider was actually a RainWing in disguise in his battle-rage, and that the tiny NightWing was in danger. He thrust the spear towards Mooncharmer’s mother, which expertly landed directly on her heart. Pathhider sighed softly, then closed her eyes and was dead a few moments later.
Mooncharmer’s toughness and bloodthirstiness pretty much melted looking at his dead mother, as he suddenly realized the perils and horribleness of war. Questioning why he had ever had wanted to be a soldier, he flew away, sobbing. Miraculously, no one attacked him as he flew towards the mountains, missing the final part of his vision take place.
For the next three years, Mooncharmer wandered around the Claws of the Clouds mountains, eating anything he could find and wondering about destiny and if the mysterious SkyWing had been right and wishing that he hadn’t flown into the battle in the first place. He was often sad and lonely, having no one to really talk to about his thoughts and the past and how he was feeling. As he roamed, he searched for the SkyWing for answers to his questions and thoughts and perhaps some music lessons, but although he saw her once or twice he was unable to reach her or talk to her before she would fly away and disappear. His visions weren’t much help either, either being obviously too far in the future to be useful, random strings of words with flashes of Windkeeper (whom he still had no idea was important at all) or completely nonexistant.
During this time, Mooncharmer started developing a habit of talking to the moons, wondering about their connection to NightWings and NightWing powers. Although at first he avoided other dragons, trying to place any guilt he felt on them for his mother dying, after the second year he started questioning various NightWings about the origins of dragons and why NightWings gained powers under the moonlight. No one had any satisfactory answers for him, and he still couldn’t find the SkyWing, so after a while he gave up and went back to his own speculation.
Eventually Mooncharmer decided to get out of the mountains, unwilling to go back to his family and admit to what he had caused or search for the SkyWing any longer. He trekked his way to Possibility, where he spent most of his time on the streets, attempting to sing for any food or supplies dragons could give to him. He was a terrible singer at the time, and still kind of anti-social after his years in mostly solitude, and so didn’t have much luck, no matter how hard he hoped that others would help him. It didn’t help that he would attempt to break up fights between dragons no matter the situation, even when the fighting was actually just a competition or game, making him unpopular throughout the dragonet and wrestling community.
After about six months of living on the streets, Mooncharmer flew back to where his family had been hiding during the war, stomach empty and rage and sorrow at his past mistakes faded significantly. His father and sister welcomed him with open arms, and accepted him even more enthusiastically when they realized that he had changed from the bloodthirsty dragonet he had been. Mooncharmer admitted that Pathhider had died because of him, but they refused to believe that it was his fault, telling him that he didn’t know and that he shouldn’t blame himself. 
On the day of his seventh hatchday, Mooncharmer, still living at home felt significantly better about himself and the past and decided to actually celebrate his hatchday instead of ignoring it like he had for the past three-ish years. He orginally planned to spend the day with his father and sister, but instead felt an urge to go to the Star Graveyard, a small bluff by the Rainforest where the many NightWings that had died in the continuing RainWing/NightWing war had been buried and were still being buried in.
Becoming excited and believing that it was destiny and the three moons calling him, Mooncharmer abandoned all his plans and instead headed towards the bluff. However, upon seeing the bluff, he was struck with memories of his mother dying in midair and had to fight desperately to keep from crashing into the ground as his limbs clenched at the flashback. 
He managed to land safely with only a sprained ankle and a few scrapes, but almost fainted as memories continued to choke him and lock him in position. Then he really did faint as a powerful vision of him meeting Windkeeper chased away his other thoughts, overwhelming him.
Mooncharmer awoke to a RainWing violently shaking him. When he sat up, it skittered away, leaving behind only a whiff of rainforest scents and medicinal plants. Looking at his twisted ankle and scratches, he found that they had all been bandaged and taken care of. Suspicious, but left without a doubt that there was some great force at work here, he ignored his wooziness and decided to find his mother's grave before figuring out what his vision was.
When he found it, he started to have a few flashbacks but started singing and talking to his dead mother to distract himself. Finishing, and finding that the guilt he had carried for so long starting to fade as he accepted Pathhider's death, he looked up to see a small guitar with a note reading "She likes music, learn to play and you'll rule the world" on the small grave marker. 
Mooncharmer picked it up... and had another vision of Windkeeper, this one with him singing and playing as she laughed. Throughly confused by the turn of events, but excited and happy, he vowed to start learning as soon as possible and find Windkeeper, wherever she was...
That day, he left his family's home and started on his journey, learning to play by himself as he yet again wandered through the mountains. When he felt that he was good enough, he played in towns and villages, until he became popular through no fault of his own. Flashbacks returned, and rival musician and gangs aliked tried to kill him or steal from him, but no matter what he kept pressing on, knowing that one day he would finally see a sign that would lead him... back to Windkeeper.
And he has continued to search.
== Quotes ==
“I’ma beat them up and tear their guts out and be so great that everyone will give me cake! RAR!” 
“Being old doesn’t mean you’re wise or that you can see the future!”
“Oh. You’re… not really that old. Um. Well. You’re still a SkyWing, so it’s not like you could see the future anyway, ya scarred moon-hater!”
“Hmm… what do you think, moon? Ask the old dragon over there, or just stay here and talk to you? Yeah, I like the second option better too.”
“I… I’m sorry, for what I did to you. I… hope that… I can someday… find my way back, to you… from down here, below the stars…”
"I WILL LOVE YOU FOREVER AND DON'T YOU EVER FORGET ABOUT ME, EVEN THOUGH WE'VE NEVER MET -- oh hey, Father, how are you today, I'm just... yelling at my visions. If it happened all the time, you wouldn't think it weird, eh?"
"I'll follow the siiiiiIIIiiiiiiignsrightback to you, back to you, back to you..." - 'Back to You', sung in Pyrrhia by Mooncharmer
== Trivia ==
* As well as being based off of the song Back to You by Twin Forks, Mooncharmer and his history was slightly influenced by certain elements of Kvothe’s backstory in The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. 
* Mooncharmer’s personality change and obsessive tendencies were probably due to PTSD, depression or another such stress- or trauma-related mental illness. Although he has learned to cope and it has definately lessed over the years, his personality change and obsessions have stayed with him.
* Mooncharmer has his ears pierced, but owns no earrings and mysteriously changes the subject every time it's brought up. It's rumored that he joined a gang at some point in his travels and doesn't want to affiliate with them anymore by not wearing more earrings, but it's more likely just doesn't want to wear earrings until he meets Windkeeper and sees the earrings he prophesied she would buy for him.
Category:NightWings
Category:Males
Category:Characters
Category:Content (Artemis the FowlWing)
Category:Occupation (Performer)
Category:Occupation (Traveler)