Friend

## Friend, Pirate's End

"I hunt pirates because they smell funny, probably."

*"Luck'll work 'bout eight outta ten times. A man's expected ta have some skill to fill the gap."*

### History

Born on a ship somewhere in the Sea of Ealtern, Friend probably had a more usual name at some point.  If so he discarded it in that sea as he’s gotten so accustomed to in his life.  Friend has always been more comfortable on the deck of a ship,  cities far behind him,  and attachments few and far between.

Friend is a virtuoso with a rapier,  and according to him he was just born with one and kinda got used to it.  Blending the arcane and martial arts his style is truly something to behold,  a storm of flashing steel and crackling power.  The truth of the matter is that while the rapier is a popular weapon for seafarers Friend didn’t come across his talents by mere accident.  When he was a teen he was removed from the Black Maiden,  a notorious pirate vessel,  for having a conscious.  He’d never liked the captain’s propensity for taking slaves and murdering innocents,  and as a burgeoning adult his newfound autonomy and moral agency chafed at the atrocities he watched his fellows commit.  He spoke out in the first of what would be a long career of taking swings at tyranny and authority,  and was promptly rewarded by being stranded on a small island with nothing but a blade and his pants.

Friend learned three things during his years on that island.  First was that you can make alcohol from coconuts,  second was that pants were completely useless unless you were in public (and even then there were only a little useful),  and third that some swords can talk.  He wasn’t the first person Shavath Black had stranded on this island,  and among the remains of previous victims he found his lifelong companion.  Glittering black in the skeletal grasp of a fallen sailor was a Black Blade named Fortune,  and as he grasped it it bonded to him.

He thrived there,  training with Fortune when he wasn’t hunting or building shelters,  going over arcane techniques the blade had learned from previous bonds,  and adding to his repertoire of spells.  All things considered it really wasn’t the punishment Shavath had hoped,  and Friend would live to haunt him another day.

Finally he was ‘rescued’ by a passing dragon,  and rode on its back all the way back to the city of Osirian.  The dragon was a youthful Basilo dragon that had been hunting Shavath and happened upon the wreckage of his victims,  stopping every so often to set something right.  Friend would never convince the dragon of the fruits of righteousness,  but the two became close on the notion of freedom and a person’s right to choose their fate.  Wherever Friend went Ivren would never be so far the man couldn’t ask the dragon for advice,  or trouble his old friend for companionship or heated debate.

Newly arrived in the Jewel of Kivath (and with new pants,  also a shirt) he sought to perfect his techniques amongst the swordsmen and mages of Osirian.  He’s never come to like the city or its rigid laws,  but he would swallow up their knowledge and forms for several years,  working as a member of the city guard when he wasn’t moonlighting as an adventurer.  Eventually the sea called to him again,  and he took what money he’d saved and purchased the galleon ‘Lady Luck’ and found his true calling;  Ridding the seas of the very despots and would be tyrants that began his journey so long ago.

### Ambitions

Friend’s current goals are what you’d expect of a young rapscallion in his prime.  Meet more fair maidens,  fight more evil pirates,  grow the most fantastic mustache Oustomia has ever seen,  and find some way to get the Lady Luck to fly so he can rid even the skies of tyranny and oppression.  Or rather they would be.

Four months ago Ivren called out to his youngest friend,  and Friend sailed to the island where they first met.  The dragon was mortally wounded,  hanging on by sheer force of will riddled with arrows and slices from an all too familiar axe.  Rushing to his friend’s side Friend discovered that Shavath had ambushed the dragon in a nearby inlet,  and laid him low.  Ivren’s final wish was for Friend to bear the mantle of his kin,  and to carry on his work in the name of freedom and peace.  Friend was empowered by the dragon’s last act,  but robbed of his only other friend in the world.  He hunts his former captain now,  not for the petty and forgotten slights against him long ago,  but with the vengeance of a man that’s now alone in the world.