Beowulf

### Reign

High King of the Bryndans (77 - 61 BE, 16 years)Jarl of Fenrir (77 - 61 BE, 16 years)

### Successor

Jalmari the Unrecognized (High King of the Bryndans & Jarl of Fenrir)

### Mother

Freya Mayflora

Beowulf was High King of the Bryndans and Jarl of Fenrir from 77 BE until his death in 61 BE. He was the only son of King Farkas and Queen Freya.

Records of him were mostly written by his grandson Hol the Unready, who wrote all his achievements down by listening to living relatives who knew Beowulf personally. While some of his detailed accounts may have been possible, it is equally as possible that some accounts may have been exaggerated, biased, or even false.

## Early life

Beowulf was born at around 94 BE in the settlement of Fenrir in the Kingdom of Bryndol to his father King Farkas and Queen Freya. Other than this, much of Beowulf's past before becoming High King and Jarl is unknown.

## Reign

### **Accession**

Following the assassination of his parents at the hands of two Epsilonian assassins, King Farkas and Queen Freya, Beowulf took the role as High King of the Bryndans and Jarl of Fenrir at the age of 17. His first order as High King was to declare war on the Epsilonian to seek revenge.

### **War for Vengeance**

Immediately after ascending to the throne, Beowulf sets up a party to attack Tixal city, the capital of the Epsilon Empire. This attack would severely weaken Epsilon and would end up crippling the empire from this point on. Hol the Unready made no mention in *The Book of Ulvgar and All of the Wolves of Fenrir* whether the Bryndans killed the King of Epsilon but have mentioned that the raid brought back 14 ships worth of gold and other valuable.

### **Qarth Kingdom raid**

In 74 BE, Beowulf organized a raid towards for a long rumored kingdom across the Byr Sea that took a three weeks voyage. Beowulf and his men set up camp on the coast of Qarth and pillaged a nearby village before marching towards the Harpi Palace. At the time during the raid, the Bryndans found that the capital of Qarth were celebrating King Jalmari's royal wedding with his fiance Olavi.

After pillaging and looting some of their possessions and relics, the party return back to Fenrir along with the king, his fiance, and several other Qarthi prisoners. Jalmari and the Spears of Harpi, an elite group of spearmaidens, were imprisoned in Fenrir's dungeon while Beowulf took Olavi as his own bride.

### **Marriage to Olavi Seppala**

With the Qarth king's imprisonment, Beowulf took Olavi as his bride. The two had only one son together named Nidhoggr (born in 66 BE). From what little of their married life together had been recorded, stories of Beowulf showed that he seemed to have had little interest to no interest in Olavi's company and was rumored that he would rather have spent more time with his ergi.

## Affair with Helga of Treyga

While Helga was married to Vargus Hornbeast, Beowulf's Thegn, she had an affair with Beowulf at one point and gave birth to Ignard the Toothy who was born in 73 BE. Helga told Vargus that the child was actually his and throughout his whole life believed that Ignard was indeed his son. Beowulf also had no knowledge of Ignard being his true son and too lived his whole life believing that the child belonged to his Thegn. It wasn't until later after Beowulf's and Vargus's death that Helga confessed the truth to Ignard in a letter she sent in secrecy to the Jarls during the First Jarl Summit in 60 BE.

## Conspiracy against Beowulf

While Beowulf and some of his men went out on a hunt, Queen Olavi snuck into the dungeon where her former fiance and the spearmaidens were and freed them. Together, they conspired against King Beowulf and armed themselves, killing most of the inhabitants in Fenrir including Vargus Hornbeast the thegn, Noel Redbeard the huskarl, and the huskarl's wife, Gerda Wheatcrown. When Beowulf returned, he and his men were immediately overpowered by the usurpers and brought to the Jarl's Halls where he found Jalmari sitting on his throne before being stabbed multiple times in front of a cheering crowd of former prisoners until he finally collapsed and died in 61 BE.

## Beowulf's ergi and his sexuality

Before becoming High King and Jarl, his father, Farkas, had a slave boy assigned to him as Beowulf's personal ergi to whom he would have sexual intercourse with as a show of his dominance and manliness.

While it was normal for young men to have ergis assigned to them, Beowulf's relationship to his was out of the ordinary. Particularly, because, when a man marries a wife and have children, the ergi will either be given to another young man, set free, or killed. In Beowulf's case, it was said that he would snub his wife, Olavi, and would rather spend more time with the ergi that he still kept.

According to Jalmari, that same ergi claimed to have exposed some of Beowulf's secret kinks such as taking the role of a submissive partner, which was considered a taboo for men to take this role. The ergi also gossiped that Beowulf would often fantasize being dominated by a group of older men in an orgy. These stories, however, were most likely spread by Jalmari in order to ruin Beowulf's reputation among the rest of the Jarls.

With these supposed allegations, this put Beowulf's entire sexuality into question by many historians, believing that he may have really been homosexual and his marriage to Olavi was just out of obligation to produce an heir. Some added to the theory by claiming that Beowulf may actually have had a romantic relationship with his ergi. However, others argued that Beowulf likely had no romantic feelings for his ergi as he would, more likely, have treated him as an object. They also added that if Beowulf was in fact homosexual and favored men then he wouldn't have had a child with Helga of Treyga, his Thegn's wife, and would likely have been sexually involved with Jalmari while he was in the dungeons or at the very least rape him as a show of dominance.

With all these scenarios taken to account, many settled with believing that Beowulf was likely bisexual.