"There's a chaos that reigns at the heart of this beast
Yes our carnival here's a well-oiled machine"
-- Devil's Carnival
BASICS
NAME: Dunsmith
GENDER:
PRONOUNS: Primarily he/him/his, but any are fine
ORIENTATION: Not super interested in labels but tends to find masculine features most attractive
BIRTHDATE: Winter of 2721
AGE: 54 as of Winter 2775
LOCATION: Semaca Weyr
OCCUPATION: Brownhandler, trader, apprentice Harper,
WING: Weyr Guard
APPEARANCE
EYES: Light Brown
HAIR: Gray
HEIGHT AND BUILD: 6' 5", thin as a rake
PLAY-BY: Tom (Deltora Quest)
EXPY SOURCE: N/A
FULL APPEARANCE:
Dunsmith is tall and incredibly thin. He likes to dress colorfully, but practically, often in vests. His clothes often seem to hang off him in a baggy manner, but this doesn't seem to bother him. He's always fidgeting with something in his hands, usually a large glass marble. He has a long, narrow, angular face. He keeps his gray hair cut short enough to stay out of his eyes, and he occasionally slicks it back just for good measure. He has bushy eyebrows, a slightly larger nose than one might expect on a face as thin as his, and a constant - and occasionally knowing - smile. His hair has gone gray a little sooner than most people's, but it only serves to give him the appearance of being a kindly, gentle older man.
Dunsmith moves a lot faster than one might expect. He's not as strong as he was when he was younger, but he's still agile and dexterous, which has been known to startle some people, especially if he starts running unexpectedly.
PERSONALITY
PERSONALITY:
Dunsmith would definitely prefer people to think of him as an innocuous - if pleasant - old man. And for the most part, he is! He's outwardly pleasant to everyone, quite sociable, a born salesman and storyteller. He tends to try to stay neutral in conflicts, and should things devolve into violence, he'd much rather cut and run than stick around and see how things shake out.
Privately, the man is cold, calculating, and manipulative. He can be warm as a hearth to a person's face when not five minutes ago he was putting the final touches on their downfall. He's quite good at spotting people's weaknesses, and has no qualms about exploiting them. His loyalties are are only truly to his own survival and the survival of his son, and damn what anyone else thinks or feels about it, including said son. He'd throw his own wher under the bus if he thought it would keep them both safe. He'll bow to authority but balks at anyone trying to force him to their will, and will find any way to weasel out from under their control. Luckily, he is not at heart a malicious or power-hungry man, more opportunistic than anything else.
HISTORY
FAMILY:
Parents - Holders in Bitra
Ex-partner (they/them) - parent of his son
Son
SIGNIFICANT OTHER: None currently
BIRTHPLACE: Bitra
HISTORY:
Dunsmith has always had a natural gift for gab, so at eight, he was apprenticed to be a Harper. He was more interested in learning dances, though, than rhetoric, and often butted heads with his teachers, having very little interest in the "correct" way of doing things as far as the Crafthall was concerned.
At sixteen, it ultimately became clear to him that being a Harper wasn't for him, and instead he ran away and joined a passing trading caravan. For the first time, he felt at home. Salesmanship came utterly naturally to him, and coupled with the few things he did manage to retain from his lessons, he was able to put on quite the show for people. He wandered Pern with the group, and his late teens and early twenties were those of a wild young man with few responsibilities and no one to answer to. He began moonlighting for Majima's criminal network off and on when the caravan would pass back through Bitra, passing along information and helping move cargo without asking a lot of questions.
As turns passed, the caravan he was a part of traveled farther and farther, eventually joining up with another group when he was in his later twenties. Dunsmith fell in love with one of these new caravan members, and had a son. He continued to work for Majima's criminal network as it grew, though as his partner clearly didn't approve, he kept it quiet and mostly just stuck to passing information. Several years after the boy's birth, the group was attacked by bandits and several people died, mostly from injuries as the caravan Healer wasn't prepared for such wounds. Dunsmith's partner realized that life of the road wasn't for them, while Dunsmith wanted to stay on the road. They and Dunsmith discussed it, and decided that Dunsmith would keep their son and raise him. They parted amicably and kept in touch.
With the return of thread in 2755 and a son of six turns in tow, Dunsmith decided it would be safest to settle down a little while. He decided to settle in Ogren, since that was the closest Hold he was near at the time. He tried to be content being a simple Holder, running a shop and selling wares. And if he couldn't help selling information while he was at it, well that was just because people liked to talk to him! He did try to shield his son from most of his less scrupulous sales, however, as he didn't want his son to get dragged into anything too dangerous. He bought a wher egg in 2764, hoping it would help in keeping his son safe should any of Dunsmith's old associates come knocking. The...unusually colored Dunsk emerged, but everyone seemed content with the fact that he was brown, so Dunsmith didn't worry too much over it.
In 2767, Dunsmith awoke to find a letter from his then 18 turns old son, saying that he'd gone and not to come looking for him. Whether his son was possessed of the same wanderlust as is father, or simply got tired of his father's occasionally overzealous, overbearing attempts to keep the young man safe, Dunsmith would never truly know. He took Dunsk and joined up with a caravan, disregarding his son's letter and trying to find him. It's been several turns, now, though, and he hasn't had much luck. He's thinking he might settle down somewhere for a time and see if he won't have more luck calling in a few favors to see if someone else can track the wayward lad down. Semaca seemed a natural place to settle to him, with its like-minded piratical holders, as as the farthest possible point on Pern his son could run. If Dunsmith was on the Southern continent, his son could only hide from him on the Northern one, and it was much harder to remain anonymous there. He's confident that it'll only be a matter of time before his son is found.
He arrived sometime near the end of 2775, beginning of 2776. He met a lovely young person on the journey there who he's seemed to adopted, much to his own surprise, and for now, he's content to keep his head down and seem innocuous. And to pretend he's never heard of Majima and the empire he built.
UPDATES
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