Name: Kamiel Al’Tarrant
Age: 24
Nationality: Andor
Height: 5’10
Weight: 170 lbs
Hair colour/length: Dirty blond, shoulder length Eye colour: Pale Blue
Path: Red Shen
Channelling Ability (for his level)
Fire: Far above average
Spirit: Far above average
Earth: Average
Air: Just below average
Water: Far below average
Talents:
Stretching shields
Fire Elementalism
Illusion
Strengths:
- Ambitious
- Very focused and attentive
- Compassionate
- Trained acrobat
Weak points:
- Leaps before he looks
- Always wants an explanation
History:
Kamiel had never known a sedentary life; his family had constantly been on the move. When his father had been young, the Black Tower had wrenched him away from his parents, the girl he loved and the life he’d known. When he’d nearly completed his training as dedicated, he ran away from the tower. Foreseeing the strings that the Towers had already around him and the other strings that would follow after his raising, he left so that he could have his future since he’d already lost the past that he loved. He wandered from town to town; a vagabond, unable to stay in one place to long, avoiding the towers eyes. He met Kamiel’s mother only months after leaving the tower, and Kamiel was born the following year.
As Kamiel grew, his parents realised that they couldn’t keep up with the life style that they’d come to accept. They had to find some way to support themselves and their growing son in an adequate fashion. With the minimal funds they had, they bought some books for the young Kamiel to occupy himself with while they slowly mastered the art of being acrobats. When Kamiel was ten, his parents were finally able to support themselves and their son in an acceptable manner, no longer begging for scraps and money. They continued to travel from town to town performing in taverns and at the occasional manor house. Kamiel continued to occupy his time reading and learning the trade of an acrobat. Since he was always travelling and studying, Kamiel never really had any friends in his childhood and early adolescence. His parents and his books where all the company he needed. When Kamiel was twelve, his father began instructing him in combat. Kamiel showed great aptitude with martial arts since he was able to incorporate his skills as an acrobat and also sparred with his father with short swords.
As their wealth and abilities continued, more and more people affiliated with the Towers seemed to appear near them, following them from town to town. It was then that Kamiel’s father decided that they where no longer safe and channelled, something he’d only done in secrecy in the past few years. He opened a gateway to a small house that he’d found on the edge of the blight. He’d stayed their for a few weeks after he’d ran away from the Tower and had always kept that house in mind as a final refuge.
It was then that Kamiel finally managed to have a normal life, hanging out with other boys his age from nearby remote villages. All was going well for him until one day; a marauding band of Trollocs attacked the village where he’d been playing. The village folk where all slaughtered by the raiding party and Kamiel only managed to stay alive by hiding in the stable of an inn; barely managing to kill the Trolloc that wandered in. As the Trollocs returned to the blight, it finally hit Kamiel like a hammer that his house was on the path that the Trollocs where taking back to the blight. Fire and smoke suddenly rose in the distance and Kamiel ran faster, not caring that his own life may be in jeopardy. When he finally reached his burning house, there was not a single Trolloc alive. His father knelt in the midst of their dead bodies, cradling the body of Kamiel’s mother, tears gently falling down his face.
N After they had burned to bodies of the Trollocs and buried the woman whom they had known as wife and mother, Kamiel’s father insisted that they move; he claimed that there where to many memories where they used to live. Kamiel didn’t want to hurt his father, so naturally he came along without argument. He wasn’t in the mood to argue anyways, his mother was dear to him and while Kamiel wouldn’t voice his grief, it remained in his heart, festering there. The only feeling remaining other than grief was a deep hate for all shadowspawn and dark friends.
N His father moved them to the village of Qirat in Seanchan. It was a smaller town, but it was still a place that Kamiel was able to call home. His father took up the trade of a blacksmith, working late in the night, secretly weaving saidin into the metals he turned out. Kamiel helped out during the day, alternating with another apprentice heating the bellows and pounding metals into various shapes, from farm utensils to knives. When Kamiel was sixteen, a young girl of fourteen, named Tanya, moved into the town with her parents. She refused to tell him anything about her past, although she spent long hours watching him work in the smithy and he spent more hours with her afterwards. When eighteen, he and Tanya took it for a given that they’d be married one day and laughed about the future, about how they, two foreigners, would become Seanchan noblemen.
N In Seanchan, since the cleansing of Saidin, there have been an increasing number of male damane, male A’dam sprouting up all around. Every three years male Sul’dam would come to the town, searching for men who can channel, young or old, it made no difference. Kamiel and his father barely learned about their arrival an hour in advance. Kamiel urged his father to leave, knowing that he wouldn’t see him again if he were collared. His father hurried to a back room in the smithy, there weaving an inverted gateway for his escape. Kamiel himself was tested but the Suldam assured him he had to spark what so ever. Kamiel was relieved that he wouldn’t be collared, but also somewhat disappointed, considering that he would never be able to channel like his father.
One day, few months fast Kamiel’s eighteenth name day, two female Der’Suldam came to the town. All the girls in the town lined up before them, the Suldam snapping a collar around each of their necks and then either taking it off and sending them away or taking it off and herding them to their wagon. Kamiel watched as the Suldam placed a silver collar around Tanya’s neck and his eyes widened in horror as the Suldam gestured for her to go to the wagon. Tanya moved slowly, tears filling her eyes. Kamiel ran up to her and asked in confusion “What’s happened?” Tanya slowly turned to face him, her eyes brimming, “I am damane now”. Realisation slowly dawned upon Kamiel as he noticed the implications of that. “Run away Tanya!” he cried. “I’ll create a distraction and we’ll leave this place forever.” Tanya slapped him. Hard. “You fool!” she whispered, her voice dangerous. “The pattern has a place for everyone and my place is readily apparent. I must accept my fate.” As Kamiel turned, tears filling his own eyes, Tanya grabbed him by the hair. “Kamiel, they’ve already taken my name. I am now the damane Anna. Remember me Kamiel. Remember me for who I was, not the outcast that I am now. Remember Tanya.” With that she kissed him full on the lips. Two guards came and held onto Kamiel as Tanya was pulled away and thrown in the cart. As the cart drove away creaking into the distance with Tanya and the Der’Suldam, a rain a started to fall, the sky seeming to cry along with Kamiel as his love was torn from him. As he knelt there in the soft grass, an inhuman scream escaped his lips; “Noooooooooooooooooo!”
N It took Kamiel ages to recover, but with the help of his father he managed to make it through the tough time. Furthermore, late at night, Kamiel’s father would attempt to teach him the art of reaching Saidin. After months of trying, Kamiel experienced the icy flood of Saidin enter his body, frozen yet burning at the same time, like a mountain falling on him. His father continued to train him in secret late at night, careful to subdue their activities when any questionable character came to the town. Eventually, over the years, Kamiel became adept at creating shields, able to shield his father and hold him tight even while he embraced saidin. He also showed great aptitude for fire manipulating it with ease, with barely any guidance from his father. Kamiel and his father often made long journeys in the wilderness of Seanchan to duel. Not only with short swords, but with saidin as well. It was almost a dance as they fought across plains, silhouettes against the setting sun. Attacking with swords here, weaves of saidin there, defending and cutting weaves all interchangeably. Kamiel was often able to win these over time since he was more aggressive with the one power, while his fathers’ talents lay in travelling, aligning the matrix and fire Elementalism. Kamiel and his father had in truth abandoned their smithy in Qirat, staying now in the wilderness, fleeing from any sign of patrols or damane and living off the land. During a time when Kamiel, who was twenty-four, and his father travelled closer the Seanchan blight than usual and where attacked by shadowspawn. Kamiel and his father barely managed to kill them all, since their shapes where elusive in the moonlight. Kamiel’s father took a stray arrow in his heart and died instantly leaving Kamiel alone in the world.
N Kamiel gave his father a proper funeral headed south, to find a ship to the mainland. His fathers’ death gnawed at him even more than his mothers. His father had been a close companion with him throughout his life, all ways there for him. The memories of his father and Tanya where too strong in Seanchan and Kamiel didn’t think he could continue to dodge the patrols. With what money he had left, Kamiel got a small room on ship headed for the mainland. His destination was the Black Tower, even though he knew his father would have disapproved. His father always claimed that he could have a better life without the towers and had maintained his philosophy until he died. Kamiel, however, had no one to turn to and knew that either the Black Tower or the Male Sul’dam would find him someday.
It was on that fateful voyage, that Kamiel realised that there was two Suldam and a damane on the boat as well. His hopes soared and finally skyrocketed when he saw a glimpse of the damane’s face. It was Tanya! As Kamiel lay in his chamber that night, wondering how he could retrieve her, a sudden storm hit the boat, destroying it. Scrambled to try and find Tanya’s room, but a falling beam hit his head. “Tanya” he moaned softly and then his world went black.
Kamiel awoke along a beach to the sound of screaming. Sitting up, he noticed three female figures just slightly further down the beach. As he approached, he noticed that it was Tanya and the two other Suldam. One of the Suldam was huddled against a tree, hugging her knees close to her chest, moaning softly to herself. The other Suldam, the one holding Tanya’s bracelet had a narrow piece of wood through her stomach. She was retching blood violently all over the sand while Tanya screamed, clutching at her chest. “Take it off her!” Kamiel yelled at the Suldam against the tree, gesturing at the a’dam. Her face took on a dangerous tone and said, “She is damane”. Kamiel was not in a mood to be argued with. Embracing saidin, he carefully channelled fire into her blood, slowly heating it. Screaming in agony, the Suldam jumped up. Kamiel released the flows as the Suldam took the necklace off the now unconscious Tanya, just as the other Suldam collapsed; dead. Staring in horror at the uncollared damane and the dead Suldam, the second Suldam ran off in the night.
Tying a shield around Tanya, just to be careful, Kamiel lit a small a fell asleep, exhausted. When he awoke and stood up, Tanya leapt on him, tears of joy in her eyes. “Kamiel”, she said, “it really is you” She was sobbing “Brina’s dead Kamiel! She was so kind to me”, Tanya said gesturing to the dead Suldam. She went on incoherently, mumbling to herself, crying and laughing, until Kamiel kissed. “Gods how I missed you” he said to her, his heart pounding furiously against his chest. Tanya looked in his eyes and asked “what do we do know with our lives? Where are we? The blood and the seekers will surely have us killed after what’s happened!”
Kamiel answered, “We are far from the Seanchan. We should go to Tar Valon, it is a place where we can be safe from the world.” Noting the confused look in her eyes he added, “it is a place for channelers.” Nodding, Tanya acquiesced, understanding the vast journey that they had before them. Together they made there way along the shore until they reached a vast city. From there, the pair of channelers made their way to Tar Valon, in hopes of a new and better future.
I have just a few problems with this:
My main thing is, how did Kamiel and his father manage not to be taken as male damane? We know from the books that you can, in fact, chain a man, and since the taint is long cleansed, the Seanchan would also be on the lookout for male channelers to take. If Kamiel and his father lived openly in a village, they would have been tested.
Also, how could Kamiel deal with the death of his father and mother so well, but couldn't get over Tanya? True, the death of parents and having your love stolen away are two different things, but it still seems inconsistent to me.
Thank you for the feedback mother!
I've made some changes and have marked the altered paragraphs with a bold "N". (I'm not sure why I used an N :rolleyes: )
Much better, thanks! Approved. :)