Verity Parson

**Verity Parson** is one of the protagonists of *This Used to be About Dungeons*, the party bard.

## Personality

Decidedly not a morning person, rising late (4th bell at the earliest.)

Leaves her room extremely messy.

### Skills

Verity is noticably more skilled than the average small tavern bard, layering in emotional components to her performances that cheered the patrons. Her skill belies her elevation (2nd at the start of the story).

## Appearance

Tall for a woman, slightly shorter than Alfric. Long, shiny black hair. Green eyes with long lashes. Her face is slender and delicate, with high cheekbones, a narrow nose, and thin lips. She has the typical pale complexion of an Inter native.

### Equipment

Her favoured instrument is a six-stringed lute, which she sometimes carries in a case over her shoulder when not prepared to play.

In her first appearance, she wore her hair tied back and a long, conservative blue dress with the sleeves pullet back.

## History

Musically trained rained in a Dondrian conservatory and achieved some fame before running away to Pucklechurch.

She arrived in Pucklechurch 8 months before the story started.

## References

1. ↑ “Verity doesn’t like the mornings, but I’m not going to sit here all day waiting for her to get up.” [...] Verity opened her door and poked her head out. Alfric was surprised by how similar she looked to Mizuki, with her hair messy, a frown on her face, and a squint. Unlike Mizuki, she had gotten into a dress instead of a robe, one that had a pattern of white flowers on top of lavender fabric. It was slightly wrinkled.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“Just past second bell,” said Alfric.

“Oh,” she said, looking between the two of them. Her bleary eyes finally rested on Mizuki. “I don’t usually get up until at least fourth bell.” [...] “I still need to wake up, or sleep some more,” said Verity. - Chapter 2: Big City Energy
2. ↑ Alfric had only gotten a narrow glimpse into her room, but it was a complete mess, with clothes everywhere, books in haphazard piles, and remnants of old meals. It was, frankly, a frightening amount of detritus to be packed into a relatively small room. - Chapter 2: Big City Energy
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 He hadn’t come for the music either, though it was a caliber of melody that he had only heard before in Dondrian, and not the kind of thing that he would have ordinarily expected from a small town like this. No, he had come for the bard, who was hunched over a small stool, strumming her six-stringed lute with her eyes closed, her words barely audible over the sound of her instrument.

The effect of the music was subtle but complex, with more points of enhancement than were obvious at first glance. Alfric ordered the herbed chicken and garlic potatoes, with a cup of honeyed tea, and the flavors of each were heightened by the melody, the tea sweeter but not cloying, the chicken richer and more flavorful. All that was par for the course from a tavern bard, but this girl was weaving in other aspects, subtle enough that you could miss them, *emotional* components. Alfric wasn’t a naturally anxious person, but his worries had their edge taken from them, reduced down a fraction, and when he tried to focus on old sources of sadness, he found that those, too, were blunted. The inverse seemed true as well, with a few jokes overheard much funnier than they should have been, and the cozy warmth of the tavern much cosier. - Chapter 1: The Fig and Gristle
4. ↑ “Verity,” Alfric said. “She’s an extremely skilled bard, for being second elevation.” - Chapter 1: The Fig and Gristle
5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 She was tall, for a girl, but had a hunched posture when performing that made her seem smaller. Now, with the playing done, she’d straightened to her considerable height, just a touch shorter than Alfric, if that. Her clothes were conservative, a long blue dress that went down to mid-calf, and sleeves that she’d hitched up for playing but were down now, slightly wrinkled. Her hair was long and black, with a sheen to it, and it was tied back, leaving her face clearly visible. She had green eyes with long lashes and a slenderness to her features that made her look more delicate than she probably was. She had high cheekbones, a narrow nose, and thin lips, but when she smiled, as she sometimes did when she was singing, it made her face come alive. She was pale, and fit in with most of the people in the tavern in that regard, in a way that Alfric did not. - Chapter 1: The Fig and Gristle
6. ↑ She slung her lute case over her shoulder. - Chapter 1: The Fig and Gristle
7. ↑ He had heard about her back in Dondrian, where she had trained in a conservatory and achieved a considerable level of fame, and hoped that he could pluck her from this tavern. - Chapter 1: The Fig and Gristle
8. ↑ *She* wasn’t from in town either, though perhaps eight months had been long enough for her to consider herself a local. - Chapter 1: The Fig and Gristle