player.
NAME/HANDLE: Miriya
PERSONAL JOURNAL:![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
arclights
ARE YOU 16 OR OVER?: yerp
CONTACT: (shiiku (at) gmail, miriya @ plurk, arclights @ msn)
OTHER CHARACTERS: Itachi Uchihavindication
character.
CHARACTER NAME: Fiddler, goes by Strings as well.
SERIES: (wiki link here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malazan_Book_of_the_Fallen), basic character info (http://malazan.wikia.com/wiki/Fiddler) here.
CANON POINT: Dust of Dreams, shortly following his last Deck of Dragons reading.
AGE: mid-thirties, looks older
APPEARANCE: Fid's a short, wiry thing with strong arms and thick wrists, every inch a true sapper. His eyes are pale blue, and his hair and beard were once red, greying a bit before he's caught in a protective penumbra of high magic during a fairly recent battle, which turned his hair snow-white, and removed all scars from his body. Months later, the white is being replaced with a sort of salt-and-cinnamon look. (Without any official art to go with, I'll be using John Hawke as a pb, from the movie Winter's Bone.)
PREVIOUS GAME HISTORY: n o p e
PERSONALITY:
"We are all lone souls. It pays to know humility, lest the delusion of control, of mastery, overwhelms. And, indeed, we seem a species prone to that delusion, again and ever again."
A moment, then all three men were staring across at him.
‘I know,’ Fiddler said. ‘Braven Tooth, you remember the last time I played—’
‘That was the last time?’
‘It was, and there’s been a lot who’ve fallen since then. Friends. People we grew to love, and now miss, like holes in the heart.’ He drew a deep breath, then continued, ‘It’s been waiting, inside, for a long time. So, my old, old friends, let’s hear some names.’
Braven Tooth sat down on the cot, scratching at his beard. ‘Got a new one for you. A soldier I sent off this very night who got himself killed. Name of Gentur. His friend Mudslinger nearly died himself but it looks like the Lady pulled. And we found him in time to help things along.’
Fiddler nodded. ‘Gentur. All right. Gesler?’
‘Kulp. Baudin. And, I think, Felisin Paran – she had no luck at all, and when good things showed up, rare as that was, well, she didn’t know what to do or say.’ He shrugged. ‘A person hurts enough inside, all they can do is hurt back. So, her as well.’ He paused, then added, ‘Pella, Truth.’
‘And Coltaine,’ Stormy said. ‘And Duiker, and the Seventh.’
Fiddler began tuning the instrument. ‘Good names, one and all. I’ll add a few more. Whiskeyjack. Hedge. Trotts. And one more – no name yet, and it’s not so bad as that. One more ...’ He grimaced. ‘Could sound a little rough, no matter how much rosin I use. No matter. Got a sad dirge in my head that needs to come out—’
‘All sad, Fid?’
‘No, not all. I leave the good memories to you – but I’ll give you a whisper every now and then, to tell you I know what you’re feeling. Now, settle down – pour them cups full, Gesler – this’ll take a while, I expect.’
And he began to play.
For all the mystery and legend surrounding him, Fiddler is very much a normal soldier, no more and no less than the thousands of others who fight at his side. A boy born in Malaz City, he joined the Malazan army at an early age, after a stint as a stonemason's apprentice,working (and most often cracking open) many of the island's barrows. He's not a particularly soldier-like soldier; he forgets his sword exists more often than not -- but that's fine, because his true ability lays in his quick mind and skills as a sapper, the latter of which has made him a legend among the military.
His entire story is one of being in the right place at the right time -- or, if one is looking for a quiet, comfortable life -- the wrong place at the wrong time. He was good friends with Whiskeyjack -- good enough to help the man steal back his infant sister, sworn to the god of death Hood), once one of the highest commanders in the Malazan army under Emperor Kellanved's reign, busted down to a squad sergeant under Empress Laseen.
While the squad's healer, Mallet, was best known for picking up strays, Fiddler's compassion is obvious, and leads to some pretty earth-shaking consequences. The most important of these is a simple rescue: during the Seven Cities' Rebellion, Fiddler, disguised as a Gral Warrior, sees a pimp take off with two young girls in the wake of a street massacre. He uses his skills of improvisation to convince the pimp that it's in his best interest to sell the girls to him (at a respectably discounted rate) -- then takes the girls to their home. Their grandfather is Kimloc, a Tanno Spiritwalker, who sees through his disguise immediately but offers his own brand of thanks -- though Fiddler turns him down, a simple touch shares with Kimloc all the memories of Fiddler's life, and the Spiritwalker creates a song that serves as a catalyst for the ascension of the entire company of Bridgeburners, set off later when Captain Paran, now Master of the Deck of Dragons, blesses the company. (Ascendancy is a particularly interesting factor of the magic of the Malazan world; essentially, ascendants are potential gods, without worshippers. While Fiddler is technically an ascendant already, that power will not manifest until his own death, given the role of the Bridgeburners as Guardians of the Dead.)
He's generally a quiet man, but not stoic by any means -- given the closeness of the remaining squads of the Bridgeburners, their banter was easy and their friendship absolute; furthermore, the almost complete annihilation of the Bridgeburners in Coral (while Fiddler is still in the Seven Cities) is an obvious, painful wound.
Despite the fact that the precious few remaining Bridgeburners are decommissioned and told to go retire somewhere nice, Fiddler re-enlists with the Malazan army, taking on the (rather unimaginative) name Strings. He heads out on a new campaign, this time surrounded by strangers, led by the Adjunct Tavore, sister of former Bridgeburner Captain Ganoes Paran, now Master of the Deck. This army, known as the Bonehunters, return to the Raraku Desert -- the birthplace of the Bridgeburners, and Fiddler shows his first real moments of weakness; for a little while he considers deserting, lonely as he is for the company of the survivors, feeling more exhausted than he ever has before, while the Spiritwalker's cyclical song haunts him without pause. For as strong as he is -- as strong as the legends speak of -- he's very much an ordinary man who keeps finding himself in extraordinary situations, cut adrift and wondering sometimes if he wasn't entirely crazy.
‘Open your eyes, friend.’
But he didn’t want to. Everybody demanded decisions.
From him, all the time, and he didn’t want to make any more. Never again. The way it was now was perfect. This slow sinking away, the whisperings that meant nothing, that weren’t even words. He desired nothing more, nothing else.
‘Wake up, Fiddler. One last time, so we can talk. We need to talk, friend.’
All right. He opened his eyes, blinked to clear the mists – but they didn’t clear – in fact, the face looking down at him seemed to be made of those mists. ‘Hedge. What do you want?’
The sapper grinned. ‘I bet you think you’re dead, don’t you? That you’re back with all your old buddies. A Bridgeburner, where the Bridgeburners never die. The deathless army – oh, we cheated Hood, didn’t we just. Hah! That’s what you’re thinking, yeah? Okay, then, so where’s Trotts? Where are all the others?’
‘You tell me.’
‘I will. You ain’t dead. Not yet, maybe not for a while either. And that’s my point. That’s why I’m here. You need a kicking awake, Fid, else Hood’ll find you and you won’t see none of us ever again. The world’s been burned through, where you are right now. Burned through, realm after realm, warren after warren. It ain’t a place anybody can claim. Not for a long time. Dead, burned down straight to the Abyss.’
‘You’re a ghost, Hedge. What do you want with me? From me?’
‘You got to keep going, Fid. You got to take us with you, right to the end—’
‘What end?’
‘The end and that’s all I can say—’
‘Why?’
“Cause it ain’t happened yet, you idiot! How am I supposed to know? It’s the future and I can’t see no future. Gods, you’re so thick, Fid. You always were.’
‘Me? I didn’t blow myself up, Hedge.’
Fiddler and Hedge had been as close as brothers. When together, they had been mayhem. A conjoined mindset more dangerous than amusing most of the time. As legendary as the Bridgeburners themselves.
It's not easy having dead friends who won't stop haunting you, either -- even if it's to save your life. Maybe especially so. Hedge, Fiddler's best friend (and a victim of the battle of Coral) saves his life more than once, finally going as far as to come back in the flesh, after the dead Bridgeburner encounters an anomalous warren. But there's no smiles or happy tears or back-slaps in this reunion; Fiddler, not understanding what had happened to his old squad, had already mourned, and then said his goodbyes. Their subsequent reunion was too painful to bear, and Fiddler turned his back on Hedge, leaving him to drift like a … well, like a ghost. Hedge's stubbornness, wanting to continue on in Bridgeburner tradition as he always had, was just a twist of the knife.
And Fiddler never asked for any of this. While he doesn't often get to the point of feeling sorry for himself, he's aware of the power involved in all their actions, and hungry to keep from making things worse. When Tavore requests that Fiddler offer a reading with the Deck of Dragons, he warns her that it's a huge mistake, given the elder powers in their current location, as well as what such divinations can bring down on them. Tavore insists, and Fiddler sequesters himself in a tavern, stubborn enough that it takes multiple squads to catch him and drag him to the appointed meeting.
He faced her, blinked. ‘Death but passed through. Even the Errant was... dismissed.’ He snorted. ‘Yes. Dismissed. There is so much power in this Deck of Dragons. In the right hands, it could drain us all dry. Every god, new and elder. Every ascendant cast into a role. Every mortal doomed to become a face on a card.’ He resumed his gaze out the window. ‘He dropped one on to the table. Your son’s. The table would hold it, he said. Thus, he made no effort to claim your son. He let it be. He let him be.’ And then he shivered. ‘Pinosel and Ursto—they just sat too close to the fire.’
‘They... what?’
‘The caster held back, Acquitor. No one attacked Ursto and Pinosel. Even your unborn son’s card did not try for him. The caster locked it down. As would a carpenter driving a nail through a plank of wood. Abyss take me, the sheer brazen power to do that leaves me breathless. Acquitor, Ursto and Pinosel were here to defend you from the Errant. And yes, we felt him. We felt his murderous desire. But then he was thrown back, his power scattered.
...
‘Speak with this caster,’ she said. ‘And... ask him... to refrain. Never again in this city. Please.’
‘He was unwilling, Acquitor. He did what he could. To protect... everyone.’ Except, I think, himself. ‘I do not think there will be another reading.’
What Fiddler learned from his reading that night was one more thing to stoke both his compassion and his grief; he gained precious insight on the Adjunct Tavore and what she intended on doing with her army, enough to break his heart anew. And he decided to stand with her, even if the no one else would -- much less could -- understand.
Because that's what Fiddler does. Whatever needs doing: building walls or blowing them up; throwing his mortal weight against the might of power-hungry elder gods, or standing as the last pitiful line of defense for an alien, misunderstood power; carrying the ghosts of a dead company across the breadth of the world -- he'll make it happen with a soldier's grace and wisdom, and with a heart battered but never hardened by the violence and horror of the only life he knows.
ABILITIES: Fiddler is a pretty normal fellow -- a crack shot with a crossbow, but little out of the ordinary, save for the potential of a lengthened lifespan. However, there are moments -- often shrouded in wonder and mystery -- where he displays something entirely else. This manifests in Fiddler's occasional Deck of Dragons "games" (reluctant as he is to engage in them), a sort of prophecy that manages to be both weirdly roundabout and incredibly blunt (and occasionally violent). As a person on the verge of ascendancy (and arguably, godhood), he's still very much mortal, but is rather more durable than your average joe. He is also, inarguably, the best sapper in the Malazan Empire: he and his partner, Hedge, perfected the art of using Moranth munitions, both as weapons in battle and in demolitions. His last … ability, of sorts, is demonstrated twice in the series, but never particularly explained: his fiddle-playing is a blessing for the dead, but has also been used to summon ghosts, quite literally.
POSSESSIONS:
Standard Malazan soldier's outfit and gear: helm, uniform, sandals, rain cape.
Bed roll, pig-sticker, plate, three daggers, whetstone, waterskin, small lump of wax. Stale biscuits and a few strips of dried meat. Small flask of Falari rum.
Broken fiddle
Lobber (heavy crossbow specifically designed for throwing Moranth munitions) and components
Sword (in a cracked wooden scabbard)
Small woolen blanket
Deck of Dragons (consider it a sort of wooden tarot deck)
Satchel of Moranth munitions (three cussers, eight sharpers, nine flamers, six crackers, four smokers), small vial of acid (for dissolving clay munition shells)
samples.
JOURNAL ENTRY SAMPLE:[video]
[There's a faint clinking sound and a hiss; the camera pans up, around, then back down the dirt, where a worn, weathered hand is curling against the pebbled beach.] Aye, Adjunct, I told you thirteen was bad. Hood's breath-- [That voice is soft and raspy murmur -- definitely a little drunk, and maybe a little fond, irritated and sad, in equal measures. The view lifts upward once more, at that foreign scattering of stars above.]
Ah, not your realm, is it, you hoary old bastard? Not that I suppose I can even call it yours, not now.
Life's full of surprises, ain't it just?
[A snort; gallows humor, even if there's no one else around to appreciate the joke. There's a scratching sound -- this fellow, scratching his head as he looks around, and it wouldn't be surprising at all if that's the cause of this entire message in the first place. And then down, once more, the man falling silent as he shifts, the camera now framing a bundle of wrapped oil-cloth, which he opens with care, revealing the disassembled pieces of a heavy assault crossbow. A trained eye might spot a few differences: the catch, mainly, a strange sort of bowl where a bolt should lay. Those scarred and pitted hands assemble the weapon quickly and smoothly, well within a minute -- it's fairly obvious that this is a fellow who knows exactly what he's doing. The camera lurches as he stands up, shifting unsteadily as the man cocks the crossbow in a smooth motion.]
Not a warren, no -- your hold sure don't feel empty, but neither does a lot of things that are, Hedge's ugly head included. You might be old, but the Master of the Deck owes me a favor or three, Errant, and your chances are as bad as your timing.
Maybe I'll go have a look, see if I can't find a comfortable spot to watch -- from a distance, of course. He's got a bit of a temper, does the Captain.
[There's another off-screen rustle, and then his hand slides into view, setting a small clay ball into the bowl.]
If I don't find you myself. [Another snort, indelicate.] Maybe things are different in Lether -- but from where I come from, it's never smart to throw down with us mortals.
You gods, you always lose.
THIRD-PERSON SAMPLE: /skips
NAME/HANDLE: Miriya
PERSONAL JOURNAL:
arclightsARE YOU 16 OR OVER?: yerp
CONTACT: (shiiku (at) gmail, miriya @ plurk, arclights @ msn)
OTHER CHARACTERS: Itachi Uchiha
vindicationcharacter.
CHARACTER NAME: Fiddler, goes by Strings as well.
SERIES: (wiki link here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malazan_Book_of_the_Fallen), basic character info (http://malazan.wikia.com/wiki/Fiddler) here.
CANON POINT: Dust of Dreams, shortly following his last Deck of Dragons reading.
AGE: mid-thirties, looks older
APPEARANCE: Fid's a short, wiry thing with strong arms and thick wrists, every inch a true sapper. His eyes are pale blue, and his hair and beard were once red, greying a bit before he's caught in a protective penumbra of high magic during a fairly recent battle, which turned his hair snow-white, and removed all scars from his body. Months later, the white is being replaced with a sort of salt-and-cinnamon look. (Without any official art to go with, I'll be using John Hawke as a pb, from the movie Winter's Bone.)
PREVIOUS GAME HISTORY: n o p e
PERSONALITY:
"We are all lone souls. It pays to know humility, lest the delusion of control, of mastery, overwhelms. And, indeed, we seem a species prone to that delusion, again and ever again."
A moment, then all three men were staring across at him.
‘I know,’ Fiddler said. ‘Braven Tooth, you remember the last time I played—’
‘That was the last time?’
‘It was, and there’s been a lot who’ve fallen since then. Friends. People we grew to love, and now miss, like holes in the heart.’ He drew a deep breath, then continued, ‘It’s been waiting, inside, for a long time. So, my old, old friends, let’s hear some names.’
Braven Tooth sat down on the cot, scratching at his beard. ‘Got a new one for you. A soldier I sent off this very night who got himself killed. Name of Gentur. His friend Mudslinger nearly died himself but it looks like the Lady pulled. And we found him in time to help things along.’
Fiddler nodded. ‘Gentur. All right. Gesler?’
‘Kulp. Baudin. And, I think, Felisin Paran – she had no luck at all, and when good things showed up, rare as that was, well, she didn’t know what to do or say.’ He shrugged. ‘A person hurts enough inside, all they can do is hurt back. So, her as well.’ He paused, then added, ‘Pella, Truth.’
‘And Coltaine,’ Stormy said. ‘And Duiker, and the Seventh.’
Fiddler began tuning the instrument. ‘Good names, one and all. I’ll add a few more. Whiskeyjack. Hedge. Trotts. And one more – no name yet, and it’s not so bad as that. One more ...’ He grimaced. ‘Could sound a little rough, no matter how much rosin I use. No matter. Got a sad dirge in my head that needs to come out—’
‘All sad, Fid?’
‘No, not all. I leave the good memories to you – but I’ll give you a whisper every now and then, to tell you I know what you’re feeling. Now, settle down – pour them cups full, Gesler – this’ll take a while, I expect.’
And he began to play.
For all the mystery and legend surrounding him, Fiddler is very much a normal soldier, no more and no less than the thousands of others who fight at his side. A boy born in Malaz City, he joined the Malazan army at an early age, after a stint as a stonemason's apprentice,working (and most often cracking open) many of the island's barrows. He's not a particularly soldier-like soldier; he forgets his sword exists more often than not -- but that's fine, because his true ability lays in his quick mind and skills as a sapper, the latter of which has made him a legend among the military.
His entire story is one of being in the right place at the right time -- or, if one is looking for a quiet, comfortable life -- the wrong place at the wrong time. He was good friends with Whiskeyjack -- good enough to help the man steal back his infant sister, sworn to the god of death Hood), once one of the highest commanders in the Malazan army under Emperor Kellanved's reign, busted down to a squad sergeant under Empress Laseen.
While the squad's healer, Mallet, was best known for picking up strays, Fiddler's compassion is obvious, and leads to some pretty earth-shaking consequences. The most important of these is a simple rescue: during the Seven Cities' Rebellion, Fiddler, disguised as a Gral Warrior, sees a pimp take off with two young girls in the wake of a street massacre. He uses his skills of improvisation to convince the pimp that it's in his best interest to sell the girls to him (at a respectably discounted rate) -- then takes the girls to their home. Their grandfather is Kimloc, a Tanno Spiritwalker, who sees through his disguise immediately but offers his own brand of thanks -- though Fiddler turns him down, a simple touch shares with Kimloc all the memories of Fiddler's life, and the Spiritwalker creates a song that serves as a catalyst for the ascension of the entire company of Bridgeburners, set off later when Captain Paran, now Master of the Deck of Dragons, blesses the company. (Ascendancy is a particularly interesting factor of the magic of the Malazan world; essentially, ascendants are potential gods, without worshippers. While Fiddler is technically an ascendant already, that power will not manifest until his own death, given the role of the Bridgeburners as Guardians of the Dead.)
He's generally a quiet man, but not stoic by any means -- given the closeness of the remaining squads of the Bridgeburners, their banter was easy and their friendship absolute; furthermore, the almost complete annihilation of the Bridgeburners in Coral (while Fiddler is still in the Seven Cities) is an obvious, painful wound.
Despite the fact that the precious few remaining Bridgeburners are decommissioned and told to go retire somewhere nice, Fiddler re-enlists with the Malazan army, taking on the (rather unimaginative) name Strings. He heads out on a new campaign, this time surrounded by strangers, led by the Adjunct Tavore, sister of former Bridgeburner Captain Ganoes Paran, now Master of the Deck. This army, known as the Bonehunters, return to the Raraku Desert -- the birthplace of the Bridgeburners, and Fiddler shows his first real moments of weakness; for a little while he considers deserting, lonely as he is for the company of the survivors, feeling more exhausted than he ever has before, while the Spiritwalker's cyclical song haunts him without pause. For as strong as he is -- as strong as the legends speak of -- he's very much an ordinary man who keeps finding himself in extraordinary situations, cut adrift and wondering sometimes if he wasn't entirely crazy.
‘Open your eyes, friend.’
But he didn’t want to. Everybody demanded decisions.
From him, all the time, and he didn’t want to make any more. Never again. The way it was now was perfect. This slow sinking away, the whisperings that meant nothing, that weren’t even words. He desired nothing more, nothing else.
‘Wake up, Fiddler. One last time, so we can talk. We need to talk, friend.’
All right. He opened his eyes, blinked to clear the mists – but they didn’t clear – in fact, the face looking down at him seemed to be made of those mists. ‘Hedge. What do you want?’
The sapper grinned. ‘I bet you think you’re dead, don’t you? That you’re back with all your old buddies. A Bridgeburner, where the Bridgeburners never die. The deathless army – oh, we cheated Hood, didn’t we just. Hah! That’s what you’re thinking, yeah? Okay, then, so where’s Trotts? Where are all the others?’
‘You tell me.’
‘I will. You ain’t dead. Not yet, maybe not for a while either. And that’s my point. That’s why I’m here. You need a kicking awake, Fid, else Hood’ll find you and you won’t see none of us ever again. The world’s been burned through, where you are right now. Burned through, realm after realm, warren after warren. It ain’t a place anybody can claim. Not for a long time. Dead, burned down straight to the Abyss.’
‘You’re a ghost, Hedge. What do you want with me? From me?’
‘You got to keep going, Fid. You got to take us with you, right to the end—’
‘What end?’
‘The end and that’s all I can say—’
‘Why?’
“Cause it ain’t happened yet, you idiot! How am I supposed to know? It’s the future and I can’t see no future. Gods, you’re so thick, Fid. You always were.’
‘Me? I didn’t blow myself up, Hedge.’
Fiddler and Hedge had been as close as brothers. When together, they had been mayhem. A conjoined mindset more dangerous than amusing most of the time. As legendary as the Bridgeburners themselves.
It's not easy having dead friends who won't stop haunting you, either -- even if it's to save your life. Maybe especially so. Hedge, Fiddler's best friend (and a victim of the battle of Coral) saves his life more than once, finally going as far as to come back in the flesh, after the dead Bridgeburner encounters an anomalous warren. But there's no smiles or happy tears or back-slaps in this reunion; Fiddler, not understanding what had happened to his old squad, had already mourned, and then said his goodbyes. Their subsequent reunion was too painful to bear, and Fiddler turned his back on Hedge, leaving him to drift like a … well, like a ghost. Hedge's stubbornness, wanting to continue on in Bridgeburner tradition as he always had, was just a twist of the knife.
And Fiddler never asked for any of this. While he doesn't often get to the point of feeling sorry for himself, he's aware of the power involved in all their actions, and hungry to keep from making things worse. When Tavore requests that Fiddler offer a reading with the Deck of Dragons, he warns her that it's a huge mistake, given the elder powers in their current location, as well as what such divinations can bring down on them. Tavore insists, and Fiddler sequesters himself in a tavern, stubborn enough that it takes multiple squads to catch him and drag him to the appointed meeting.
He faced her, blinked. ‘Death but passed through. Even the Errant was... dismissed.’ He snorted. ‘Yes. Dismissed. There is so much power in this Deck of Dragons. In the right hands, it could drain us all dry. Every god, new and elder. Every ascendant cast into a role. Every mortal doomed to become a face on a card.’ He resumed his gaze out the window. ‘He dropped one on to the table. Your son’s. The table would hold it, he said. Thus, he made no effort to claim your son. He let it be. He let him be.’ And then he shivered. ‘Pinosel and Ursto—they just sat too close to the fire.’
‘They... what?’
‘The caster held back, Acquitor. No one attacked Ursto and Pinosel. Even your unborn son’s card did not try for him. The caster locked it down. As would a carpenter driving a nail through a plank of wood. Abyss take me, the sheer brazen power to do that leaves me breathless. Acquitor, Ursto and Pinosel were here to defend you from the Errant. And yes, we felt him. We felt his murderous desire. But then he was thrown back, his power scattered.
...
‘Speak with this caster,’ she said. ‘And... ask him... to refrain. Never again in this city. Please.’
‘He was unwilling, Acquitor. He did what he could. To protect... everyone.’ Except, I think, himself. ‘I do not think there will be another reading.’
What Fiddler learned from his reading that night was one more thing to stoke both his compassion and his grief; he gained precious insight on the Adjunct Tavore and what she intended on doing with her army, enough to break his heart anew. And he decided to stand with her, even if the no one else would -- much less could -- understand.
Because that's what Fiddler does. Whatever needs doing: building walls or blowing them up; throwing his mortal weight against the might of power-hungry elder gods, or standing as the last pitiful line of defense for an alien, misunderstood power; carrying the ghosts of a dead company across the breadth of the world -- he'll make it happen with a soldier's grace and wisdom, and with a heart battered but never hardened by the violence and horror of the only life he knows.
ABILITIES: Fiddler is a pretty normal fellow -- a crack shot with a crossbow, but little out of the ordinary, save for the potential of a lengthened lifespan. However, there are moments -- often shrouded in wonder and mystery -- where he displays something entirely else. This manifests in Fiddler's occasional Deck of Dragons "games" (reluctant as he is to engage in them), a sort of prophecy that manages to be both weirdly roundabout and incredibly blunt (and occasionally violent). As a person on the verge of ascendancy (and arguably, godhood), he's still very much mortal, but is rather more durable than your average joe. He is also, inarguably, the best sapper in the Malazan Empire: he and his partner, Hedge, perfected the art of using Moranth munitions, both as weapons in battle and in demolitions. His last … ability, of sorts, is demonstrated twice in the series, but never particularly explained: his fiddle-playing is a blessing for the dead, but has also been used to summon ghosts, quite literally.
POSSESSIONS:
Standard Malazan soldier's outfit and gear: helm, uniform, sandals, rain cape.
Bed roll, pig-sticker, plate, three daggers, whetstone, waterskin, small lump of wax. Stale biscuits and a few strips of dried meat. Small flask of Falari rum.
Broken fiddle
Lobber (heavy crossbow specifically designed for throwing Moranth munitions) and components
Sword (in a cracked wooden scabbard)
Small woolen blanket
Deck of Dragons (consider it a sort of wooden tarot deck)
Satchel of Moranth munitions (three cussers, eight sharpers, nine flamers, six crackers, four smokers), small vial of acid (for dissolving clay munition shells)
samples.
JOURNAL ENTRY SAMPLE:[video]
[There's a faint clinking sound and a hiss; the camera pans up, around, then back down the dirt, where a worn, weathered hand is curling against the pebbled beach.] Aye, Adjunct, I told you thirteen was bad. Hood's breath-- [That voice is soft and raspy murmur -- definitely a little drunk, and maybe a little fond, irritated and sad, in equal measures. The view lifts upward once more, at that foreign scattering of stars above.]
Ah, not your realm, is it, you hoary old bastard? Not that I suppose I can even call it yours, not now.
Life's full of surprises, ain't it just?
[A snort; gallows humor, even if there's no one else around to appreciate the joke. There's a scratching sound -- this fellow, scratching his head as he looks around, and it wouldn't be surprising at all if that's the cause of this entire message in the first place. And then down, once more, the man falling silent as he shifts, the camera now framing a bundle of wrapped oil-cloth, which he opens with care, revealing the disassembled pieces of a heavy assault crossbow. A trained eye might spot a few differences: the catch, mainly, a strange sort of bowl where a bolt should lay. Those scarred and pitted hands assemble the weapon quickly and smoothly, well within a minute -- it's fairly obvious that this is a fellow who knows exactly what he's doing. The camera lurches as he stands up, shifting unsteadily as the man cocks the crossbow in a smooth motion.]
Not a warren, no -- your hold sure don't feel empty, but neither does a lot of things that are, Hedge's ugly head included. You might be old, but the Master of the Deck owes me a favor or three, Errant, and your chances are as bad as your timing.
Maybe I'll go have a look, see if I can't find a comfortable spot to watch -- from a distance, of course. He's got a bit of a temper, does the Captain.
[There's another off-screen rustle, and then his hand slides into view, setting a small clay ball into the bowl.]
If I don't find you myself. [Another snort, indelicate.] Maybe things are different in Lether -- but from where I come from, it's never smart to throw down with us mortals.
You gods, you always lose.
THIRD-PERSON SAMPLE: /skips
