User:Lhynard/Characters/Brace

Brace Splitbark was a man who played a part in the tale known as the Legacy of the Green Regent, as told by the bard Teseryne Truesilver.

Description
Brace was a short, stocky man with tan skin, blue eyes, and long brown hair. Though he was handsome enough, he rarely was seen to smile and thus had a grim, stoic look and came across as rather standoffish. Brace was usually dressed in the clothes of a simple tradesman, with a belt full of vials and potions.

Possessions
Brace carried a pair of daggers, one of which had once belonged to his father.

Relationships
Brace was the brother of Korrlan Splitbark, an Ilmatari priest from Neverwinter. His mother had been a spellcaster of some kind.

Brace seemed to relate to Blaz Merrymar, one of the merchants in a caravan heading from Zelbross to Loudwater before Shieldmeet, since that halfling appeared to have suffered a great loss and only faked happiness for the benefit of his fellow travelers.

When Brace first saw the halfling Juniper Churlgo, he mistook her for a spectre of his young daughter, Silifrey.

History
Brace received his name when his father had told his mother to brace herself in the final moments of birth pangs before he arrived in the world. She had slapped him then for his failed attempts to comfort her, but they laughed about it afterward and named Brace the Common word instead of after his great-grandfather, the original plan. Korrlan had received that name instead.

When the Wailing Death struck the city of Neverwinter, it decimated the city and also the Ilmatari hospital there where Brace's brother Korr had worked. Brace's children and wife died in the plague, as did the head of the Ilmatari Church. The hospital even ran completely out of supplies. The two brothers were forced to leave the city as refugees, and they found themselves in a merchant caravan heading east away from the Sword Coast.

The caravan was waylaid just before twilight by a small band of goblinoids led by the goblin Skar. The caravan leader, Blaz was rendered unconscious by the bugbear Gvrag after Skar demanded a "tax" that Blaz refused to pay. One of the other travelers, an elf named Ilrien, fired an arrow, beginning a battle in which Brace and his brother found themselves involved. Inspired to courage by Korlann's divine magic, Brace took down the bugbear with a flask of alchemical sleep gas, and slew two goblins with his daggers. The battle soon ended, with Skar and one other goblin captured alive, but one goblin escaped into the woods. Several of the caravan members were injured, and Ilrien almost died. When Blaz came to, he mistook those who had fought for adventurers and implored them to rescue his sons, whom Skar had mentioned as being still alive.

The next morning, the small group of those who had helped defend the caravan&mdash;Brace and Korr with Ilrien and a halfling named Juniper and a gnome named Samophlange&mdash;set off into the wounds, hoping to track the escaped goblin. As they searched for evidence, they stumbled upon a tonandurr tree, which was the home of a grig prince, Groef Feythrin. In exchange for some songs from Ilrien and Samo, Feythrin allowed them to strip some bark from the tree, which Brace used to make some bandages for their wounds. He then told them that the goblins could be found in a large pit far to the east.