Anto Singh Feagh

Anto Singh Feagh, known by his given name Anto or his nom de guerre "Whip" (so-called for his stature and not, say, a tool preference), is a late-20's man originally from a mining town in Celestia. He currently lives in Wydmoor, trading as a bondsman and bounty hunter who specializes in tracking down arcane magic users. Rare as those may be, his work tends to come in semi-lucrative spurts punctuating long lulls spent studying the arcane, performing odd jobs, and drinking. He's still very close with his family, who have since migrated to one of the farming hamlets that supply Wydmoor, although his work sees him away from them for extended periods at a time.

Childhood

Garen and Tilde both worked the Odessan red iron mines. They liked to say that they met when they both reached for the same pickaxe, which might even be true. Whatever the circumstances, Tilde was pregnant and married shortly after, in that order. Their first was Illed, and Anto the second, and he came with a complication that left the family with no more offspring. Luckily, both children grew up healthy and free of calamity, and while they might have been a bit more short-handed around the house than they'd like, they were all the closer for it.

The levies came when Anto was eleven, just old enough to start an apprenticeship with a blacksmith. Tilde and Illed were both called up, leaving Garen to manage the homestead. Anto was more than a little bit jealous of his big sister, and she promised she'd come back with hard-won trophies and outrageous stories enough to satisfy him for years. Garen and Tilde kept a much more serious demeanor, but then, they were both old enough to have known war.

A few years passed, Anto working through his apprenticeship in the home of the master craftsman, Garen working the mines, and news from the front. Letters were regular at first, all in Illed's hand (Garen had taught the whole family to write, having learned on his own ages ago), filled with details about their adventures. Steadily, though, they became terser, and less frequent. Eventually, they stopped coming at all, though father and son never passed a day without asking for them.

Around this time, Garen suffered an accident in the mines, losing a hand and an eye. Though he eventually recovered, he would never work in the mines again, and Anto found himself struggling to make ends meet. He finished his apprenticeship, moved back into the family home, and continued working for the same master as a journeyman. After his day's work was done, he'd rush home to finish what duties he had there, and then to the center of town to pick up whatever extra work he could. He spent a lot of time with tradespeople, craftsmen, and travelers of all sorts, and found himself fascinated especially by the adventurers who would come through.

Just as Anto turned fourteen, Tilde and Illed came home. They were both alive, and Anto and Galen were overjoyed to have them back. War had changed them, though, physically, and otherwise--Tilde wore an eyepatch opposite her spouse, and Illed had a scar through both cheeks that she never spoke of. Both were harder, less prone to laughter, less likely to smile. Still, though life never was the way it was before the levy, they managed to settle into a routine. The tension was uncomfortable for Anto, and a year later, he saw an opening to pursue his own adventures.

By now seventeen, he had noticed a particular adventurer who always seemed to have spare coin. They kept to themselves, and never stayed too long, but always drank and ate the best the town had to offer, with well-maintained gear of good quality. Anto watched this person's habits and, one night while they were in town, invited himself to their table. He asked to join them, and got silence in response. Unwilling to be deterred, he launched into his life story, describing everything. He spent hours at the adventurer's table, giving them all the details he could think of, anything he could say just to fill the quiet. The adventurer gave no response, just continued drinking. Finally, at the end of the night, the adventurer got up to leave. Anto hurriedly stood up to give one last plea, but an outstretched hand silenced him. In it was a note, in exquisite penmanship in Celestian, which Anto did not see the adventurer write. It said, "Here, at dawn." And that was how Anto started his second apprenticeship.

Anto left a note for his family, leaving before any of them had risen.

The Bounty Hunter's Squire

The adventurer never said their name, or indeed, anything at all, but Anto would eventually find that other people referred to them as Whispers. The adventurer communicated entirely through notes and gestures, the former always produced without any evidence of writing, and always in tasteful, delicate calligraphy. They would always hide their features beneath a cloak, even in heat, and while Anto starved for any personal detail from them, they always left him wanting.

Without explicit direction, Anto did his best to figure out his duties. Corrections came with a light strike, or a pointing finger, but the work at first was uncomplicated, and it didn't take long for Anto to settle into a routine, making camp, preparing simple meals, and maintaining gear. The adventurer kept their own counsel, and a rigid schedule: Up at sunrise each day, exercises and ablutions (done somehow under the ever-present cloak, which perplexed Anto greatly) before breakfast, then travel. After a day's march, the evening was either for studying any of the few tomes the adventurer kept, or a notebook filled with the adventurer's writing. Anto did his best to follow along, and the adventurer would do little, except offering a correction here, or a supplementary note there. Anto found his new master's teaching style frustrating, but he persisted, and he slowly found himself having an easier time following along.

It was a few weeks of walking before the pair got to TBD, and it wasn't until then that Anto actually found out what the adventurer did for a living: Bounty hunting. They took it upon themselves to track those shifty and sometimes dangerous people that people wanted tracked. In more civilized areas, this typically meant bringing them in to some authority for justice. In some areas, this meant acting more directly. In any case, the adventurer was well-suited to the work. They showed a particular desire for tracking down rogue users of magic, and since this was work other people tended to stay away from, it usually ended up being a very lucrative path for them. Anto came to understand how the adventurer afforded their lifestyle, and how much risk this sort of life came with.

It was just as he was starting to show real promise as a protegé that things went south. The two were tracking down a particularly troublesome individual who had been bothering travelers in TBD region for several months, a warlock, bound to some malignant, otherworldly presence. This warlock made their home in a forgotten ruin deep in the forest, gathering a small group of enthralled fanatics worshipping their eldritch patron. Anto and the adventurer managed, stealthily, to confront the warlock, and the ensuing battle went well for them, until the warlock, screaming a foul curse, grabbed hold of Anto's master, both disappearing with a faint pop. It was the last Anto saw of either of them: fearing for his life, and surrounded by still-unaware fanatics, he grabbed what proof he could that the warlock was gone and fled.

Quite suddenly his own man, Anto saw no choice but to continue his profession while seeking his former master. He studies strange texts of the arcane and spends what he doesn't on his family or drink on gaining knowledge. He's gone on this way for close to a decade, slowly making contacts and building a reputation for himself as someone moderately capable. In the meantime, his parents' injuries and the imminent exhaustion of the ores in the mines have brought them to move closer to Anto's base of operations.

Present Day

Anto now does his own work in Wydmoor, under the name "Whip", using what he learned from the adventurer to earn a decent living. With support from his and Illed's earnings (the latter working as a guard), and by supplementing with the occasional odd job, they live comfortably, and the family shares a close relationship despite Anto's extended absences. His parents are still in reasonable health, but his sister has developed a cough that, recently, has begun to produce blood. Anto hopes his family can find a cure for her, before it is too late, but personally feels frustrated that his personal expertise takes him too far out of that realm to contribute directly. He also feels his abilities have plateaued, and has been constantly on the lookout for a job that might really test his mettle.

Bounty hunting is a small world, so it was inevitable that he and Joanawould bump into each other. They've competed occasionally, worked together occasionally, and generally have a warm professional relationship, although not an incredibly close one. Secretly, Anto has always been jealous of the magical talent he has never fully realized seeming to just come naturally to her. He recognizes her obvious worth when they find themselves working together, and respects her ability to hold her liquor, as well.

What free time Anto doesn't spend in the tavern or with his family, he spends at the Circus Librorum, a fixture of learning in the town. He makes his study of the arcane there, and knows his way around the stacks, but knows he can't hold a candle to its founders for generalized knowledge. He respects their attitude toward their work, although he personally finds their zeal toward the mission to be a bit much.

• Personality Trait: I relax by finding hard-to-reach places, preferably with a view.
• Personality Trait: I get very wrapped up in things when I talk about something I'm interested in.
• Ideal: Hope. Sometimes it's hard to see the seed of goodness in the future in a terrible situation, but it is always there.
• Flaw: Having romanticized conflict so much in my youth, I'm now very cynical about adventurers' exploits, and mostly am just in it for coin.
• Bond: My family keeps me grounded in reality and lets me know who I am, no matter where I end up.
• Bond: I feel my master is out there somewhere, and won't give up on them.

LES SPOILEURS Anto Singh Feagh's Character Sheet LES SPOILEURS