Hathus

*"Aryonia's call may echo with power, but I am the keeper of the justice it seeks to uphold. I shall not be a blind instrument; I shall be the voice that questions and the hand that mends." - Hathus on Aryonia's shift toward authoritarianism as the God of Order*

## Physical description

### Biography

Hathus is the High Lord of Quipmore and Hand of Aryonia under Emperor Aryonia beginning in 4116 PCE. A talented magic user and cunning military strategist, Hathus is one of Aryonia's most trusted advisors and commanders.

### History

Hathus was born to two half-elves in the north of Quipmore in 4089 (PCE). When he was born there was some call to have him blinded or left in the Twisted Forest due to his glowing red eyes. Many in his small mountain village believed his eyes were the sign of a ill omen, and forced him and his family to flee, when Hathus was barely 3, after a plot to murder them all was discovered by a family friend. His family fled to the Sea of Grass, hoping to find safety with a group of nomadic elves.

While in the Sea of Grass, Hathus' family was rejected from multiple nomadic elf groups, all alarmed by his glowing eyes. On the brink of starving, a mysterious elf found Hathus and his family. The elf was walking past the family, ignoring their pleas and cries for help until he noticed Hathus' glowing red eyes. Intrigued by Hathus, the elf dropped an illusion and revealed that he too had glowing eyes, but his being gold. The elf would conjure an extradimensional manor, allowing the struggling family a place to rest and feed themselves. While under the care of the mysterious elf, Hathus' parents became concerned, seeing their sudden benefactor take such a high interest in their young child. They ultimately decided to leave the manor and return to Quipmore. Despite the protests of the elf, Hathus and his family left the manor.

With Hathus' eyes being a hazard for the family as they traveled, Hathus' mother applied bandages over his eyes to protect Hathus as they traveled. After months of traveling, and rarely being allowed to have his eyes uncovered, Hathus arrived in the Quimorian capital with his family. His parents would take up many jobs in the capital, moving neighborhoods and changing jobs when followers of a new extremist religious sect chased them out.

Around 4095, when Hatus was 6, it was discovered that Hathus had magical abilities. While keeping his eyes covered, Hathus was pushed down a flight of stairs in the streets of Quipmore's capital. Just before Hathus his the final step, he held out his hands and pushed through the street floor and into the city's sewer, with all remaining on the surface being his eye coverings and clothes. While in the sewer Hathus wandered aimlessly. But during his wanderings, Hathus experimented with his newly discovered magical reserves. With little effort, Hathus was able to cast a simple light spell and illusion spell to travel through the dirty sewers and cover himself. Hathus would wander the sewers for 3 days before finding a way to the surface and return to his family.

When Hathus was discovered without his eye bandages, he was chased and attacked by children, then more extremist Quipmorian adults. Not knowing how to defend himself, Hathus would lose part of the tip of his right ear. When finally reunited with his parents, Hathus' family forbid him from using magic and made him once again cover his glowing eyes with bandages. This did not stop Hathus from practicing with his magic when his parents needed to work or were sleeping at night. Secretly, Hathus would master several spells by the time he was 8. An unexpected consequence of his magical advancement was Hathus' eyes became brighter as his abilities grew stronger. His eyes became so bright that bandaging them no longer was a sure way to hide them, as his eyes would still glow through when they were open.

In 4098 PCE the extremists of the Echoweave faith briefly took power in the Quipmorian capital. With this came many restrictions for non-human magic casters, eventually resulting in the execution of many non-human magic casters accused of practicing "unnatural perversions" of magic craft. When the executions began, with no end in sight, and Arkonian influences flooding the city, Hathus and his family joined a mass exodus of non-humans from the capital.

During the exodus from the capital, with pressure from the city counsel, the King of Quipmore declared a state of emergency in the city, handing over authority to the extremist Echoweave leaders to oversee the exodus. Having been given unprecedented authority, the leaders of the Echoweave extremist factions declared a purge of non-human casters in the city. Although new of the declaration was originally kept secret from the non-humans of the capital, news of the purge broke out and the exodus of non-humans grew into a massive panic. What originally started as systematic checks and tests for non-human magic users, quickly devolved into a slaughter, with Echoweave inquisitors not willing to leave any chance of non-human magic users remaining in the city.

During the panic, Hathus and his family were just barely pushed out of the city before the gates closed behind them. Not able to escape the panicked mod, Hathus's family was swept into the surrounding countryside, eager to escape the new government's purge, only to hear Quipmorian inquisitors were searching the area to silence any word of the capital's purge of non-human magic casters. Docks were quickly put under heavy security to prevent any non-human with news of the purge leaving the country before the Quipmorian capital counsel could spread their official narrative. Having been trapped south, with no ships and the Twisted Forest to the east, Hathus's family attempted to travel to the fallen kingdom of Poros to escape the inquisitors.

Having spent a year fleeing the inquisitors, Hathus and his family maintained various aliases as they attempted to sneak out of Quipmore. At one point Hathus's family was only half a days' travel from Poros before being forced to turn around by a strategic march along the Poros border by Quipmorian troops. Slowly, the Quipmorian army had worked its' way through all directions of the nation, carefully snuffing out any survivors of the capital purge. Even when the Echoweave extremists lost total power in the capital, the counsel agreed to continue the hunt for survivors, seeking to protect their reputation and satiate the temporarily weakened minority of extremists.

In 4100, after over a year of hiding, Hathus and his family were forced to make another attempt out of Quipmore. With the support of sympathetic noble family, 4 days out from the border with Poros, Hathus' family was packed into a large crate with a stuffed owlbear, being carried by traders to Valrune. Tragically, the plot was discovered when a servant of the family reported the family to Quipmorian authorities. The trader caravan would eventually be apprehended, but not before Hathus and his family fled into the forest. They were being pursued by Quipmorian soldiers, never escaping sight of their torches and sounds of their dogs for long.

Hathus and his family were able to stay ahead of the Quipmorians, getting past the border, and into Poros. The Quipmorians did not end their pursuit at the border, however, and tracked the exhausted family past the border, knowing it was only a matter of time before they would catch them.

On a cold night in 4100, after 2 weeks of running and hardly any food, Hathus and his family took shelter in a cave, just south of the small village of Hushire. Unable to run any further, Hathus' family hid deep in the cave, being sure Hathus kept his eyes closed, to hide their red glow. When the sound of Quipmorian troops finally seemed distant after weeks, Hathus' father carefully went to the front of the cave. Hathus, having kept his eyes closed for days at a time, dragged forward by his mother and father, upon hearing his father's steps become heavier, and more confident opened his eyes. Seeing his father turn to smile, finally feeling safe after a year and a half of running and hiding, Hathus' mother, also thinking they were safe, stood, running toward her husband, with Hathus close by. The celebration was cut short with the revelation that Hathus' eyes cut through the dark and brought the reemergence of Quipmorian torchlight and the bark of their dogs rushing toward the cave. With no where to run, Hathus' parents took him deep into the cave, hoping to at least buy him as much time for his short life as they could. Hathus kept his eyes clenched shut in the back of the cave, not moving as he heard the yelling of soldiers growing louder.

Hathus' father fell first, weak from hunger and exhaustion, breaking his arm attempting to stop the charge of soldiers, and meeting his end to a blade at the base of Hathus' mother's feet. Hearing his mother scream in agony as she met her end beside his father, Hathus couldn't help himself and opened his eyes, seeing the Quipmorians turn their attention from his parents fresh corpses to his glowing eyes deep in the cave. With Hathus having nowhere to go, and filled with terror, his back pressed the cave wall, watching as the Quipmorian soldiers rushed at him. This is when Hathus heard a gravelly voice, call out to him, seeming to take pleasure in slowly delivering Hathus an offer to save him in exchange for his eternal servitude.

Hathus, given no other choice, accepted.

Hathus would go on to spend years as an urchin in Poros and the Sea of Grass, serving his newly acquired patron. During this time, Hathus would develop his magical skills dramatically, eventually learning how to cast an illusion to hide his glowing eyes. By the time Hathus became an adult, he had mastered many high level spells, using his patron to acquire the resources he needed to teach himself increasingly difficult spells. Once confident in his magical abilities and compelled to follow the commands of his patron, Hathus returned to Quipmore, hunting down various nobles of Quipmore, delivering justice against those that committed the capital purge that he could reach. Slowly, Hathus even became skilled with a sword as rumors of a magical spirit of vengeance took shape among the Quipmorian noble class.

At some point Hathus would travel with Bromstrop and The Tall Boys. Around this time Hathus would obtain some level of control over his patron, but has not revealed how he obtained it, or what it is that he holds over his patron.

Aryonia would eventually recruit Hathus as a Hand Of Aryonia, appointing him High Lord of Quipmore upon its' conquest.

### Notable Interactions in *Tales Of Ye Old Interest*

* Hathus lead the siege on Aerishen, using draegoths to take the city.
* Myth spied on Hathus with a scrying spell, when Hathus caught her and accused her of being a pervert. They would connect over them both having patrons.
* Hathus and Myth would message each other using their tomes, eventually regarding each other as confidants, despite Myth and her party being official enemies of the Aryonian Empire.
* Hathus signed a ceasefire against the United Arkonian Theocracy after being persuaded to by Elfi, Myth, Eldremon, and Olivandria.

### Trivia

* Hathus advises Myth to gain power over her patron.
* Hathus is trained in both wizard and warlock schools of magic. along with being capable with a sword.
* Despite learning how to hide his eyes, Hathus has not since becoming a Hand Of Aryonia.
* Due to his experience with his patron, Hathus is very reluctant to have his abilities increased by Aryonia, only agreeing to during the siege of Aerishen.
* Hathus' patron is named Nakties. Nakties is an entity of hunting and darkness and holds a domain in the shadowfell.
* Hathus once had a puppy that died when he lived in the Quipmorian capital.