Dilora Fashelle, Peddler

Dilora Fashelle
Handle: Wintermist
Name: Dilora Fashelle
Age: 28
Division: Freelander
Hails from: Baerlon
 
Height: 5" 5"
Weight: 126lbs 
Hair: Dark Brown
 
Eyes: Dark Brown
 
Primary Weapon: Bow
 
Secondary Weapon: Knife 
Personality: Dilora is a good-humoured merchant, a sweet personality that usually gets her own way by using subtle manipulation. Whenever she visits a town she seeks out the nearest inn that serves good ale and trades by attempting to out-drink her fellow traders and customers to get the best deal. She is very shrewd and quick-witted, but prefers to hide that and her strong capacity for ale behind a pair of pretty eyes. Dilora prefers to travel alone, light and fast with her small wagon-home driven by her horse, Altie, of whom she is very fond. 
History: The patchy road wound its slow and stately way across country, through trees, which had seen the better side of summer. A single horse driven wagon, painted not too dissimilar to one of the Travelling People's, made its equally slow and stately way along that road without a care in the world. Dilora was laden with costly merchandise, but she did not fear attackers as everything was concealed within the wagon bed and the walls of the structure itself. Trinkets from Tear, Cairhien and many other places she had seen during her travels across the continent lay hidden in the various nooks and crannies of her home: the base of her bed was hollow and contained trays to put the more valuable of her wares in so Dilora could protect them whilst she slept. No one had ever stopped her, nor had any brigands beset her. Cheerfully, Dilora clucked her horse's reins and looked reflectively over the countryside as the road wound towards her hometown of Baerlon. 
It had been at least two years since she had been there last - most of her family were still living within the limits of the town and she knew a warm welcome would be there when she visited later that night. Her Aunt Janni and Uncle Kerr would be pleased to see her, not to mention her parents. They would lay on a feast such as never experienced in the inns along the roads of her journeying! She licked her lips in anticipation of the roast beef and potatoes with peas and sweet carrots her mother would serve complete with home made bread and fresh butter. Dilora had a simple life growing up with her mother, father and aunt and uncle; not quite spoiled as being the only child, but enough to get used to liking having her own way. Her mother would tell stories of how she had been a restless child: dark, curly brown hair framing an angelic face with pretty brown eyes and a ready smile for anyone. Sweet-tempered and cheeky, young Dilora would smile at anyone who smiled at her as she had quickly learned that smiling worked better than shouting or demanding. Her parents had ignored her demands for attention and after a while they died down as the girl realised she got more attention by smiling at people. Jared, her father, taught Dilora her letters and realised that the girl loved books and to read whilst Emillie, her mother taught her about cooking and caring for herself. Emillie smiled in patient amusement as Dilora would set out her mother's ornaments and carved wooden trinkets on a tabletop and play "merchants". Emillie herself had been a trader before she had come across Jared's carpentry shop and fallen in love with him and given up trading to help out in the small shop with their house above it: Jared would produce carvings and furniture by request and his wife would sell it and they increased in renown becoming famed in the town. The family lived a comfortable life and young Dilora was born into it picking up her father's practicality and her mother's charm and shrewdness. Loving to laugh, she grew into a restless young woman who was always under her parents' feet. Jared, finally despairing of a sixteen year old Dilora flirting with the customers to get them to buy the items his shop was producing, spoke with Emillie about apprenticing their only daughter to a trader to learn some restraint and to see some of the world. Emillie agreed that it would be the perfect opportunity for Dilora and even though she would miss her only daughter dearly, she could indeed make more use of her if Dilora took some of their items across the continent to sell. Dilora happily agreed to take a small wagon bought for her seventeenth birthday - a rickety old cart with a hooped roof and struts large enough for her own horse, Altie, to pull it. Altie had been a present for her fifteenth birthday and Dilora loved the dun horse. Her mother and father loaded the cart up with small carvings to sell and waited for a trader to stop in Baerlon. 
Two weeks later, the regular trader Arron Penn stopped by Baerlon and made his way to the tavern close to Jared's carpentry shop. Seeing the team of horses go past the shop window, he called his daughter and his wife and went out to meet the pasty man. 
"Long time no see, Arron!" Jared exclaimed delightedly, pumping the man's hand and a wide smile appearing on his face. The trader nodded enthusiastically and took in his family waiting patiently off to one side, Dilora moving nervously as if she couldn't contain herself. "Would you take my daughter with you when you go and show her some of the world? She'll sell some items I've made - she has her own wagon and a place to sleep. What say you?" Jared waited patiently whilst the man mulled it over, seeming to take an age before he finally nodded slowly. "Aye, it would be good to have some company along. I can protect her, should she need it." 
 
"I've already trained with a bow father carved for me. Dilora piped up, her light voice girlish and eager. â€œI practice with it every day so you've no need to worry about starving." The trader laughed, his belly bouncing. "I'm sure you are. I'm just as good with this should we need it." He patted the sword at his hip as if he knew how to use it; the smile had fallen off his face. Dilora swallowed nervously, but nodded her agreement. Kissing her mother and father goodbye and promising to be back soon, she gathered her small amount of possessions and loaded her wagon ready to leave when Arron set out on the road again. 
For five years she had crossed the continents with Arron Penn, journeying through towns and cities and seeing the wondrous sites of outside Baerlon. Every day Dilora was amazed by something new, some facet of living life on the open road, which appealed to her and called to her. She traded her father's craftwork for some more little trinkets and thoroughly pleased with herself she started decorating her wagon, as she wanted it to be, making it into her home. Dilora traded with many different people, learning how to read faces and peoples posture, nuances of what they had said and how to bargain shrewdly. Most of all, she learnt that she loved taprooms and the taste of ale, making most of her dealings done in taverns and inns. Arron decided that he could no longer keep up with Dilora's activity and that he intended to return to Caemlyn to retire. "You'll do well on your own," he told her over a pot of ale in Lugard and being careful to avoid offending anyone in case of happening into a fight. "You should take up the life. Get word to your parents, of course, visit them, but I doubt you can find anywhere to call home now apart from that wagon of your'n." Dilora nodded seriously, her dark eyes mirroring her concern for the man who had been her teacher and had introduced her to the way of life she now enjoyed so much. The next morning, the two parted company with their wagons heading in different directions. 
Over the next seven years, Dilora had continued to practice the bow and got herself a small, unobtrusive knife, which she attached to her belt and practiced with. She was travelling alone now, she had better get used to defending herself. She always travelled at a steady pace, never hurrying as there was no need - traders had ways of communicating the places to avoid and she always kept herself abreast of the news at every town she stopped at. Besides, the best places to get to know what was really happening were the alehouses and taprooms of the taverns. More than one time Dilora had had to prove her skill with her belt knife as a patron got over-friendly. Oh, she never drew more than a little blood, but it warned them off. Strangely, she never got a reputation, in spite of frequenting places most ladies were warned against - Dilora got along with everyone and was jovial and friendly to patron and customer alike. Realising that she missed her family, Dilora hitched Altie into the wagon supports and climbed into the driving seat, urging the dun down the road towards home. She thought she might get distracted occasionally by the urge to trade, but her eventual destination was home, back to Baerlon. A short visit before she headed out on the road which was her life, but enough to ground her in reality for a little while and a chance to catch up and load more items to trade from her father’s shop. Her father’s shop would be closing now, Dilora realised as the sun started to set on the horizon. One step after the other, her homely wagon painted red with gold embellishments trundled across the countryside headed towards Baerlon.
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