Maxwelinski

Dejacque Heraldry: In Ore Mingentem

Description

Maxwelinski Dejacque, a Rakash. He has a classically chiseled face, reflective sage-green eyes and a fine straight nose. His dark golden brown hair is short and perpetually disheveled, and is worn untamed. He has lightly bronzed skin and a lean, well-defined build.
He is tall for a Rakash.
He is a pack hunter.

Maxwelinski Dejacque, a Rakash. He has a compact and copiously wrinkled square face, reflective sage-green eyes and a pair of raised and rounded ears offset by a short and blunted muzzle. He has a fawn and white-chested coat with black masking, a stubby tail and a lean and well-defined build.
He is tall for a Rakash.
He is a pack hunter.

The Story

Maxwelinski Dejacque, by Finnbar

When a Rakash in his prime arrived in the province of Zoluren one day, no one noticed. It's a big province with a big city, The Crossing. If you had asked him where he came from, he might tell you he was raised by wolves. Yes, literal wolves. He insists. It isn't self-depreciating Rakash humor. That's his story.

Abandoned at the young age of 23, his cruel parents left him on a hill to die. Despite his cries - “Ma, Pa, No! I'll get a job!” - he was condemned to exposure. If not for a kindly pack of wolves, he may very well have died. For the next ten years his adopted family nourished him. He relied upon the teat of the wolf to survive. A mere babe.

He survived, but the wolves did not. It had been ten years, you know. They died of old age. Wolves don't live that long. It was 419 when he stumbled out of the forest and found himself on the Northern Trade Route.

Lacking education, skills and the ability to speak beyond rudimentary grunts he set out to make his fortune. He needed to make a living. Get that food. That wolf milk, if you will. He was hungry.

The first guild he came across was that of the Warrior Mages. There he met the big guy, Gauthus. The boss. He was about to introduce himself when Gauthus blurted something out.

“You like killin' things?!”

“W-what things?” Max was rattled.

“You know. Just anything. Killin' is fun.”

Being a Warrior Mage was not for him. Gauthus clearly had something wrong with him. Max left. And as he reflected on the multitude of Warrior Mages outside of the guild, foraging and braiding wild grasses into intricate and useful tools, he wondered how different they were from Gauthus inside. They seemed to be dedicated artisans.

He stumbled into the city of The Crossing, through it's famed Northeast Gate. It wasn't long before he was at the Paladins' Guild. There he met Verika Kennelworth, Paladin Representative. A Rakash, like himself.

“This guild is not for the weak of heart, it is not for the weakl…”

Katamba peaked over the horizon. They both fell to the ground, mid-speech, writhing. Max drooled a little. Moonskin. When he stood up, he and Verika gave each other that look. The morning look of a stranger in your bed. The look of a decision you immediately regret. Shame.

He turned and he walked right out the door, without saying another word. The Paladins weren't for him, either.

After a brief stroll up Magen Road he encountered the Empaths' Guild. He produced a delicate red bird from a small pocket. It wasn't moving. Prydaens lurked.

“Can anyone heal my bird?”

No one responded. He raised his bird high into the air for everyone to see. These Empaths didn't seem to care. He dropped the dead bird and went to leave. When he paused to look back he noticed a slim Prydaen snatch the dead bird up with a cat-like swipe, toss it into the air, and devour it in a few quick bites. All in a quick, practiced motion. Salvur Siksa pointed and laughed. This had happened before.

This Empaths weren't the guild for him, either. But they seemed less awkward than the Paladins.

Just as he stepped out the door, he saw a surprisingly short Elven girl head to the south. He moved to follow, seeing her enter the city's headquarters for the Barbarians' Guild. Then, a distraction.

“Pssssst. Wanna try a dusssk berry?”

A lizard-like creature hissed at him. It was a S'Kra Mur. The S'Kra had a black longcoat and was holding it open with one hand. Stitched into the lining were little pouches filled to the brim with assorted berries, fruits, stems, leaves, herbs and mushrooms. A few seemed to be in powdered form.

“What's a dusk berry?”

“Drop berriessss, not boltssss.”

Max shrugged. This was unintelligible. He took one anyway.

…

“Congratulations, Maxwelinski! You're ready to train for your next rank!” An old Bard was howling shrilly into his face. He winced at the sound. His head hurt. Reflexively he reached into the inner pocket of his coat, produced a small berry and popped it into his mouth.

“What rank is that?”

“Just keep playing instruments.” She frowned.

He stumbled out of the building, but immediately leaned up against the brick facade next to the door. His heart was beating fast. Panic. He rifled through his pockets. A passport to Velaka. Maxwelinski Dejacque. That sounded familiar. He relaxed. Now highly tolerant to the sedative effect of the dusk berry, he merely calmed the hell down. An Elf with the cutest freakin' nose came around the corner, walked up to him and held his hand. They stood silently, calmly. And he remembered.

It was the day the shady S'Kra had pulled him to the side. He had taken something. He heard music coming from a nearby building. It sounded like a bar. He sat down and ordered a drink. The barmaid lectured on and on about what he thought were Elven beers and Toggish grogs. He nodded sleepily and stared at her with a blank expression. His mind wandered to the surprisingly short Elf.

“Just sign here, here, and here if you want to JOIN.” The barmaid had a desperate, severe tone.

He signed, or rather he drew a crude X on the paper. He was taken aside to swear an oath. And then he was taught how to cast a magical spell.

In retrospect it was a lot of bureaucracy just to get a beer.

Maxwelinski, starring in MAXWELINSKI, P.I.

A light rain had just begun to patter down from above in the loose city known as the Crossing. I inhaled deeply on my stump cigar, wincing at the telltale odor of corpse. Three long years and they still haunted me. I looked up at the crude sketches on the wall. Likenesses of the missing Prydaens. All young. The trend of dressing little Prydaens as baby dolls had never fully disappeared, but this was something new.

All of a sudden I heard a knock at my faux flamewood door. The faux sungold plaque engraved “MAXWELINSKI, P.I.” tumbled to the door, faux mistglass shattering everywhere. I put down nine iron ashtrays I had been juggling, snuff my cigar into one of them and call out, “IT’S OPEN DAMNIT!”

This Cleric with an angular face walks into the room. He’s about the tallest drink of holy water I’ve ver seen this side of the Selgotha. He hangs his floating orb thing on my faux copperwood coat rack. His nose wrinkles up.

“It smells like smoke.”

I pull out a sky-blue imnera runestone and cast Zephyr. The smoke disperses.

He sits down in front of me and crosses his legs suggestively, adjusting his cassock. I can feel the blood rush to my ears, but I manage to keep a straight face. I see his anloral shrew pin. Kerenhappuch, typical.

“I have a job for you, Max,” he says. I bet you do, I think.

“And I have some information.”

This gets my attention. I can tell from his look that it’s about the missing Prydaens.

“But first,” he says curtly, “you must do something for me.” There’s the rub.

He slips a piece of parchment from his pouch and pushes it across my faux expensivewood desk. It looks like a child’s drawing of a blob man.

“Do you recognize it? This construct killed thirteen people at the Rangers’ Guild. Me, and my associates, want it. When you find it, call me.”

It looks like every single glass construct ever, but I nod assent. I look up at him, “How do I find you?”

“You’re a Rakash, aren’t you? Just howl.”

He stands up and goes for the door. He moves to jiggle the handle, turns and looks at me. We exchange glances. “You remember how to howl, don’t you?,” he asks, “You just put your lips together and go AAWWOOOO.”

Eyewitness testimony of the umbral moth invasion of Boar Clan, as told to Maxwelinski by an umbral moth

As early as I can remember, when I was but a pupa, my mother told me to watch out for the lights. No matter how pretty they look, just stay away from them. If someone offers you a light just say no. For most of my life I heeded this advice.

During the day I slept in the shade beneath large leaves or nestled in the camouflaging bark of a large dryad’s tree. At night I came out to drink the nectar of flowering plants with my freakishly long proboscis. Many times I looked up at the stars and felt a pull, an attraction. Those were lights. But they were too far away. I flirted with them, but I was safe.

During the twilight hours I awoke to find columns of people, caravans, headed toward a city. The road was lit with torches. I put this out of my mind and went about my job in the local ecosystem. As the night grew longer the light grew brighter. Light had all become concentrated in one area, visible toward the horizon. The pure dark of the night, the dark that lets you see stars unblemished, had become marred by a reddish-yellow haze.

Light pollution. That was it. It drew me to it like a reaver to samatak. Up to this point in my life I stayed out of trouble. I was a model moth. I had a beneficial symbiotic relationship with night-blooming flowers. I was the fauna, the flora was itself. I pollinated while I drank. My proboscis is also generously endowed by moth standards. You could say I was an exceptional moth.

I don’t remember the journey, only that I was in a city. Trees had been cut into logs, logs stacked to the height of at least three wingspans. All had been lit to produce massive, intoxicating, light-producing fires. Bipeds, Humans and Prydaens, their young, all gathered around.

When I flew closer to the fire, closer to the action, people began to panic. There was screaming. Swords were drawn. I felt hard metal slap against my delicate, powdery wings. I tried to extend my feelers, my furred little legs, even my proboscis. This was a sign of peace. I’d witnessed bipeds do with their own upper appendages.

The people had become hysterical. They were no longer in their right minds. Marty, the moth who lives in the closet of an abandoned farmhouse close to the tree I sleep in during the late spring, flew by just in time to see. I was trying to shake a flailing biped I had managed to secure in my six legs. I was pheromoning, “Biped, calm down! I’m not going to hurt you.” The biped was responding with loud auditory signals and chops from a hand axe.

Almost immediately the word got around to the other moths. The whole forest came to see the spectacle. And the rest is history.