[Verified by Banshee] Jess'e

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Jess'e

Postby Jess'e on May 28th, 2013, 3:02 am


JESS'E

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Name: Jess’e
Age: 20
DOB: Spring 17, 493 AV
Place of birth: Ahnatep
Gender: male
Race: mixed (Eypharian/Benshira)


Physical Appearance:

height: 5'10"
build: slender
hair: dark brown
eyes: green-gold
complexion: darkly tanned

Character Concept:

Jess’e has been a slave since birth, and is very accepting of his lot in life. He has never aspired to freedom. It’s not a concept he would readily embrace, for himself. In fact, given his history, he’d probably be quite hard put to earn a living as a freeman. He tends to be passive, and rolls with the punches life can throw, and he’d have a hard time directing himself, if he had no master or mistress doing that for him. For a slave, his life hasn’t been so very bad – he hasn’t been brutalized or starved or horribly maltreated. Still, life at the wrong end of the chain isn’t all peaches and cream. He’s learned to be adaptable, and non-confrontational, and maybe a bit manipulative, when he has the need and the opportunity. Gererally, he is placid and content, if not actually happy. For most of his life, his role has been that of companion, so like a pet, he has a knack for making others happy and has a soothing effect. A people pleaser, for sure, he looks for another’s smile long before he’d even consider what might make him smile.

Character History:

Jess’e was born into slavery and has never known any other life. His mother was a slave, owned by the House of the North Wind. She was basically a domestic, who was comely enough to attract the attention of one of the lesser males of that august House. Jess’e was the product of that short lived union, and was born in the slave quarters of the vast enclave. By that time, his young mother had already lost the favor of his father, the noble having already moved on to another, less pregnant, girl. His mother was once again relegated to domestic servitude, working in the kitchens for the most part. At least fate allowed Jess’e to be blessed with her milk, her love and her company as he grew from infancy, for it was not unknown for a noble to have his bed slaves’ progeny dispatched in order for her to be able to more fully concentrate on what her real purpose was in life. But this time, fortuna smiled, a little, and mother and son were very close. Jess’e grew hanging on to her skirts and then playing in the kitchen courtyard with other children like himself. By the time he was four or so, his mother was teaching him small tasks that he could help with – scrubbing pots and pans and sweeping the floor, turning the handle of the grain mill, shooing the flies off of dishes waiting to go into the dining room. It was on one such occasion, when he was about seven, that he unexpectedly had to actually carry a dish into the dining room of the noble family. The servant whose task it would have been tripped and turned an ankle at literally the moment before he picked up the tureen. As Jess’e had been holding it, patiently waiting for the man to take it from him, the head servant of the kitchen gestured to him imperiously and said only, “Go, you have cleaned in there often enough. Set it down on the table and come right back. That’s all you need do.”

Of course, life is never quite so simple. Jess’e was a cute little fellow, and when he entered the grand dining area, and went right to the correct table meaning to do exactly as he was told, he caught the eye of one of the matriarchs of the family. She beckoned him over and what could he do, but obey the summons? Taking his chin between her bony fingers, she looked deep into his eyes and then nodded, apparently satisfied by whatever she had seen there. She smiled and asked him his name, which of course he gave, trying hard to stand up straight and not stammer, though his eyes were now downcast as they should be. The noblewoman nodded again and said to her own personal attendant slave, who stood behind her, that Jess’e should be brought to her on the morrow. With a warm smile in dismissal, the boy was sent back to the kitchens, the head slave there very upset at his delay. But upon explaining breathlessly what had transpired, Jess’e saw the aggravation in the man’s face turn to wonder, and his own mother’s eyes grow wide with concern, tinged with hope. The matron had smiled, she asked, over and over. You did not trip? You did not spill? No-one hit you? She seemed pleased with you? Over and over and over, his mother peppered him with questions, trying to reassure herself that her little son was not in trouble. Jess’e himself was on pins and needles, unable to sleep all night, wondering what would happen the next day.

Shortly after the nobles had broken their fast – long after the slaves had risen at the crack of dawn to prepare that meal – the head slave summoned him and he was passed over to the slave he’d seen the night before, the one the old woman had given her instructions to. That slave did not smile, but neither did he frown, or cuff the boy. He merely lead him through the long corridors, walking endlessly it seemed, finally coming to a part of the house that Jess’e had never seen. Here were the quarters of the matriarch – spacious and luxuriously appointed. He was told to wait, and instructed to sit, on the floor. After what seemed a very long while, he was told to come, and he was ushered into the presence of what, it turned out, was his new mistress.

What can one say about life? Jess’e was plucked from the drab and hard life of a kitchen drudge – or perhaps, worse, he might have ended up as a field hand – and set down in the midst of affluence and – honestly – laziness. It was through no fault or merit of his own making. He caught an old lady’s fancy and she chose to bestow her grace upon him in the form of a cushy position, simply because she found him pleasing to the eye. His duties consisted of waiting upon her, and running her errands, both within the household and out and about the city. Of course, she had others who attended her as well. Women who helped her bathe and dress and did her hair and makeup. Her head attendant who ran her small part of the large household, ordering her meals and her day, her guards and all the other slaves who served her. She had a secretary, several musicians, a masseuse, and her own personal guardsmen – all slaves. So, in actuality, there was no need to have the young boy around. He was merely decorative – an ornament – that she kept close and doted upon, in a way.

At first, Jess’e couldn’t quite understand, nor believe, this stroke of great good luck. He was still a child. But in the slave quarters, he had seen a lot of life already. Illness and death, sex and birth, the hard hand of those in charge and the gentle caress of his mother – so he had a good idea that he had been literally rescued by a stroke of fate, to be lifted above what his life could easily have been. The one great sadness he felt with his new position was the loss of his mother. Now he slept alone at night, and whatever small problems he had or difficulties he encountered, he had no-one to turn to, to talk to, to hold him. It was a slightly lonely existence, for the other slaves that served the old woman became somewhat envious of the boy who was so obviously her little pet, and they often teased him or mocked him or taunted him when she was not able to know what they were up to. Jess’e was not the kind of kid that would go rat out the others, to go crying to his patroness – and besides, it would not have entered his head (then) that she might care or choose to do anything about this situation. However, the almost direct result of being shunned by his ‘peers’ was that he sought refuge with the only person who seemed to want him around. Day by day, season by season, his bond with the old one grew stronger and stronger. She fawned on him – she an old widow with grown children whom she felt neglected her horribly. She basked in the boy’s affection and attention, and repaid him with further elevating him to the point where his lifestyle was really hardly different from that of the noblemen’s children themselves.

It was a vicious cycle though. The more favors given him by the matron, the more and more envious the other slaves grew. Jess’e was stupid, in a way. His naturally amiable and sweet disposition made him shrink from any form of retaliation. And in many ways, he just simply didn’t understand the depth of the resentment the other felt towards him. He was happy enough, though still lonely in some ways, and it was this loneliness, and fate, that led him down a path that would see him brought as low as the height he had once achieved. Again, it was really no act or dereliction on his part that set the wheels of fortune in motion. One of the old lady’s great nephews had come to see her, and had lain eyes upon Jess’e, and well, that was that. Jess’e was somewhere between his fifteenth and sixteenth birthday, and a very comely lad he was, favoring his mother’s delicate Benshira heritage. The young nobleman, Ba’Rat by name, who was only two or three years Jess’e’s senior, was quite taken by those innocently alluring good looks. Jess’e was a slave, true – but he was the old matron’s slave. So it wasn’t as easy a matter for the young man to simply order Jess’e into his bed - though he easily seduced the lonely boy into it. Subtly, he sounded his great-aunt out on the subject of whether she’d likely give up or sell her little pet. Of course, the answer to that was a resounding no. Undeterred, Ba’rat put out feelers to the others that surrounded the old woman day in and day out. He easily discovered the deep animosity those others felt towards the unsuspecting teen, and he put that to good use. It took nothing more than a simple bribe to set Jess’e up, planting rumors here and there, biding his time until his aunt might have forgotten his interest in her favorite. Within a season, all was in place, and when the old woman was taken to bed with a severe case of gastirits, which the physicians opined looked suspiciously like poisoning, the fingers were all ready to be pointed…at Jess’e.

The matron was incredulous – the slave was dumbfounded. There were inquiries and protests and pleading and tears and accusations. Stolen bits of cheap jewelry – a document that vaguely made it seem that Jess’e would be gifted his freedom once the woman expired – clandestine love affairs that were purported to have taken place in her bed – her own bed! She was astonished and hurt to the core, betrayed and beyond solace. Jess’e was almost beside himself, knowing what she now believed him to be. But no words of that unskilled, naïve tongue could convince her that what appeared to be reality was completely skewed. Too late he saw the profound nature of jealousy, and how it was willing to stop at nothing to bring a favored man to his knees. A few days of fury and the tempest had calmed, and Jess’e had been put out of the woman’s little household. By rights, he should have been dead – executed for the attempted murder of his patroness. But of course, Ba’rat, always lurking in the background, had seen to that too. Why not, he whispered, send the monster to the rock quarries? Let him spend the next few years of his miserable existence – which would in all probability be his last – doing back breaking labor and starving to death under the lash? Let him recall all he had thrown away, and despair. Let him rot a slow death, instead of the mercy of a quick blade, or noose? Why not?

And so Jess’e was taken out a back entrance to the House of the Northwinds, expecting to be marched out into the land surrounding the crumbling city, and right into a slow, grueling death. Instead, he was taken down many a twisting alley and back lane, to a small, modest two story dwelling – now rented by his soon to be lover, Ba’Rat. Jess’e was speechless, and clueless. Of course, he literally threw himself at the young nobleman's knees, overwhelmed with gratitude for his intervention with his one time mistress. For he had absolutely no idea the part Ba’rat had played in his down fall. Instead, Ba’Rat wove him a tale of heroic efforts and a rescue, all due to the fact that he could not allow an innocent man to go to his death, slave or not. The natural result of this was that Jess’e instantly became Ba’Rat’s slave not only legally but with his entire heart as well. What Ba’Rat might have taken, was freely given, with nothing held back. The young nobleman promised Jess’e over and over that he was working to clear his name. Jess’e, for his part, wanted only to be able to prove to the old woman – his long time friend, patron and benefactor, that he had never, never had an impure or evil thought or wish directed at her health – that he only ever had lived to serve her. Yes, yes, Ba’rat assured him. It will happen, but it might take time. Meanwhile….

Yes, meanwhile. Meanwhile Jess’e was slowly exposed to things he had literally never even imagined. He did all that Ba’rat asked, no mater how repugnant. His lover had such odd tastes, and vicious ones too sometimes. But Jess’e never balked. He truly loved Ba’rat, and as faithfully as he had served the old woman, he served her great-nephew, though in wildly different ways. Some of what was now required of him involved being loaned out, as it were, to spy on other nobles in the city, and Ba’Rat encouraged Jess’e to hone his powers of seduction to better obfuscate the fact of what he was really after, and blind his targets with amorous thoughts whilst he ferreted out their secrets. He became quite good at these games, for he wanted to achieve his master’s immediate goals, even if he hadn’t a clue what the big picture was. Time passed, and of course, there was very little (i.e. no) headway made on straightening out the mess that had seen him lose the woman’s patronage and love. Jess’e adjusted though, to his new life. It wasn’t hard. It was just….different.

Time passed, and Jess’e fell into a circular pattern of life, doing whatever Ba’Rat asked of him. In time, it came to pass that his master was given the task of joining with a trade caravan, bound out into the sea of grass, to cross over that vast, dangerous expanse to reach the city of Syliras. There, Ba'rat was to negotiate the terms of some deal that Jess’e wasn’t privy to. Not that he’d care – he was content to simply follow orders. But unbeknownst to either of them, one of the other Houses of the half ruined city had conspired to deal a blow to this young upstart noble – who held one too many secrets in his conniving head. With sufficient bribes, they arranged for Ba’Rat to never make it to that massive, walled city of the knights. Somewhere along the way to Syliras, Ba’rat was – very unfortunately – attacked, mauled and killed by some fierce animal of the plains. Some said it was a grass bear but more likely it was a glassbeak – at least, that’s the version those in the caravan who were bribed to say would recount. The rest had been handsomely paid to just keep their mouths shut. And what about the slave that trailed behind the haughty nobleman, like a second shadow? Well…of course, he was lost to the great swaying green sea as well, or, that’s how it was supposed to go, anyway…

Languages:
Fluent: Arumenic
Basic: Common
Poor: High Arumenic

Skills:
Skill EXP Total Proficiency
Seduction 10 RB, 16 SP 26 Competent
Intelligence 20 SP 20 Novice
Massage 14 SP 14 Novice


Ledger:
Purchase Cost Total
Starting +100 GM 100 GM
Housing cash-in +500 GM 600 GM


Lores:
Lore of Ahnatep culture
Lore of Ahnatep politics

Possessions:
1 Set of Clothing
- Lightweight Linen kilts
- Lightweight Linen Undergarments
- Lightweight Linen Coat
- Simple Leather Sandals
1 Waterskin
1 Backpack which contains:
-Comb (Bone)
-Brush (Bone)
-Soap
-Razor
-Balanced Rations (1 Week’s Worth)
-1 eating knife
-Flint & Steel

600 Gold Mizas

Heirloom: dagger belonging to his master

Housing: At the time Jess'e and his master are attacked in the sea of grass, and Jess'e is left basically to die as the caravan moves off, he has no housing, per se. He will discover some money left behind (it had been hidden) in his dead master's things, and with this, once he makes it to a city, he will be able to acquire/pay for housing.

Thread List:

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One man's trash is another man's treasure Spring 85, 513 AV Ymir
A single step Summer 3, 513 AV Ymir
Lost and found Summer 3, 513 AV Ymir, Khida, Shahar, Slither


The sand is singing deathless words to me...
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Many, many thanks to the wonderfully talented Coltyn for the lovely graphics
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Jess'e
the rest is still unwritten
 
Posts: 20
Words: 35086
Joined roleplay: May 28th, 2013, 1:21 am
Location: on the edge of disaster
Race: Mixed blood
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