RiderName: Ilharen
Age: 24 (11.11.156)
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: Bi
Origin: Monaco Bay & the south
Rank: Wingrider
Appearance: 5'9", very dark brown almond-shaped eyes eyes, long straight black hair, light beige skin, lithe build, feline clawmarks down his outer thighs, and a scar from an arrow above his left collarbone.
Personality:
►Essentially gentle. He dislikes causing pain of any kind to other living things. He very seldom has an unfairly cruel word for anyone and when he does slip up - as he sees it - he will suck it up and apologise nine times out of ten. He will also avoid physical and verbal fights if he possibly can, he sees no point in fighting over petty things like egos or spilled drinks. The practicalities of his life have kept him from pacifism or vegetarianism however; he’s killed a lot of animals for food or fur, even a couple of humans because it was them or him or his kin, but he has always striven to make the job as clean as possible.
► Hard working. There was no room for slackers on the road, if everyone didn’t pull their weight to the best of their ability they wouldn’t survive.
► Practical. He takes a fairly direct approach to problems and has little time for blue sky thinking on real world issues. He also doesn’t have much truck with wringing of hands or despair over a hard situation; panicking, complaining, lashing out, none of that is going to help, what you need to do is focus on trying to survive. He will do his best to calm anyone having a hard time but not at the expense of doing what needs to be done to not die.
► Imaginative. On the other hand he has a vivid imagination and loves stories, especially stories of far off places and strange and wondrous things. He loves to tell stories too and happily weave one for any attentive audience.
► Paternal. Ilharen is very fond of and generally good with children, he enjoys delighting them with stories and is quite happy to be pulled into whatever game they might want to play.
► Protective. If there is one thing that really terrifies Ilharen it is seeing people he cares about hurt, even fairly minor injury can inspire legitimate panic. On the plus side this does leave him perpetually prepared for an actual emergency but in the meantime it can cause him a great deal of stress and angst.
► Active. He’s used to being moving and doing and is happiest with his hands or his muscles usefully occupied, if he can be chatting with a friend at the same time so much the better.
► Conflict averse. Ilharen doesn't care what people he doesn't know think of him but he seriously struggles to disagree with people he is close to and gets panicky at the thought of conflict with them.
► Diplomatic. While arguments between people he's not close to don't freak him out he still doesn't like them, he seeks to foster understanding where he can and would always prefer a peaceful cooperative solution to a problem where possible.
► Generous. He loves to give gifts, usually simple and often little carved trinkets or food related - he's a good cook - but whenever Harmony clutches he gives away her eggs freely rather than trying to sell them or trade for favours.
History:
156 - Born to a family of feline hunters and pelt traders, a dangerous but lucrative occupation. The family also traded in other goods along the way, largely carved wooden things from the rare woods of southern jungle and dried spices and fruits from the same. Ilharen started shooting a toy bow at more or less the same time he started walking, and throughout his youth he became an extremely adept archer and not bad with a spear either. Growing up he was always closest with his nephew Ilintor, the eldest child of his eldest sister (20 turns his senior), who was only a couple of months younger than he.
172 - Acquired a very large firelizard egg from a family member, which hatched into gold Harmony.
173 - He and Ilintor began to join in properly with hunts. In this turn he had his first brush with death, picking up the scars on his thighs when he was pounced - his mother promptly killed the beast but he spent some time recovering. He's now very fond of the pretty marks.
175 - Ilintor was killed by a feline, and Ilharen withdrew into himself. He still did his bit for the family, of course, but he stopped socialising beyond the obligatory and no longer sought out fun and new friends when they visited Holds. Late in the turn the caravan was attacked by Holdless bandits, an attack they repelled but not before several of them had been injured including Ilharen - the arrow wound to his shoulder fortunately healed well and the incident seemed to go some way to bringing him back to life.
176 - The caravan was visiting Monaco bay Weyr for a Hatching to catch all of the visitors who might wish to buy trinkets, and the guests of honour who might be interested in something rather more costly. The clutching gold sough assistance with one of three unhatched eggs within her clutch, she felt a life in there and refused to give up on it. With her rider's intervention - Weyman L'vin - White Cimarath was hatched, and he chose Ilharen out of the stands as his rider. This was hardly what Ilharen had planned for life but how could he be anything other than delighted? As he entered weyrlinghood the change in scene seemed to do him good as well - he still grieved for his all-but-twin but with a dragon in his heart and few reminders of him life got a lot easier. Although he considered it for a while Ilharen chose not to elide his name, Cimarath had added to him not taken away and so why should he lose letters? Logical, no?
178 - After graduation the pair spent a lot of time mapping and surveying the wilder parts of the south, getting into narrow gulleys that larger dragons couldn't access. Thanks to his background as a trader Ilharen was a confident explorer with a hunger for the horizon, and he fell in love with a classmate who loved much the same things. The two pairs might have gone on happily like that if not for the plague. Yes, the plague. When the illness began Ilharen was visiting Ista along with his wing to train in its famous stormy season and exchange best practice, and there they were trapped whilst Ilharen's family and lover remained in the south. Ilha and Cimarath watched some of their friends desperately try to return home but weren't willing to take the risk of transmitting the illness themselves, and so they remained and were absorbed into the diminishing Weyr. Cimarath was unscathed by the plague, naturally immune like many surviving dragons were.
181 - Led by Weyrleader D'lana the pair made for Fort, where the surviving dragons of the north were congregating as their leaders hatched a desperate plan.
Other: Image, David Chiang
Dragon
Name: Cimarath
Age: 6 (176)
Colour: White
Size: 16.5ft
Appearance: His right foreleg is underdeveloped, although a normal length it is very weak. This doesn't cause him too much trouble, but it does mean he has to take great care with his landings and hobbles when he's on the ground.
Personality: A bold, friendly, sociable dragon who loves to travel to new places and experience new things. He's something of an ambassador, good at bringing people together.
Other:
Firelizards
Harmony
Gold firelizard
10 turns old (172)
29.75 inches
A helpful, friendly, intelligent firelizard with a keen focus - she was used both to watch for danger in the jungle and for light-fingered people around the family's trade stalls. Harmony is seldom far from her human's side unless she's carrying a message or package for him.
