Wulfgar

Wulfgar, son of Beornegar, was the barbarian hero of Icewind Dale, and one of the Companions of the Hall along with Drizzt Do'Urden, Cattie-brie, Regis, and Bruenor Battlehammer. He worshipped Tempus, the god of battle.

Description
Wulfgar's physical build was astounding, giving him incredible strength. He had even been known to crush a man's head with his bare hands, though it was not an easy task for him. Wulfgar was almost 7 ft (2.13 m) tall with a broad and muscular chest and weighed 350 lb (158.76 kg). He had blond hair and a neatly trimmed beard.

Possessions
Wulfgar carried Aegis-fang, a huge warhammer crafted for him by Bruenor.

Upbringing
Wulfgar was born in 1339 DR to Beornegar, a member of the Tribe of the Elk in Icewind Dale.

Wulfgar was the flag bearer for Heafstaag, King of the Tribe of the Elk, when he was just a boy. In a battle between the tribe and the Ten Towns, Bruenor Battlehammer the dwarf leader knocked out Wulfgar with a blow to the head. After the battle, when the people of Ten Towns were slitting throats of the surviving barbarians, Bruenor spared Wulfgar. Instead of death, he sentenced him to five years and a day of service to Bruenor. Wulfgar took to the forge and changed his opinion of Bruenor from slaver to father. Bruenor crafted Aegis-fang with Wulfgar in mind. When Wulfgar's sentence was almost up, Bruenor bade Drizzt Do'Urden the drow to teach Wulfgar how to fight. When Akar Kessel came to conquer the Ten Towns, Wulfgar defeated the white dragon Ingeloakastimizilian to claim leadership of the tribes, which he then turned from an alliance with Akar Kessel to an alliance with the Ten Towns.

Enslavement
Wulfgar was captured by a yochlol when he and his companions tried to save Drizzt from capture by the drow. Wulfgar caused a ceiling to cave in on himself and the yochlol in order to keep it from killing Catti-brie. However, the yochlol dragged Wulfgar with it to the Abyss and its mistress, who later gave Wulfgar to the balor Errtu, so the demon would in turn watch over the drow city of Menzoberranzan during the Time of Troubles.

When Errtu was summoned by a powerful sorcerer, he used an anti-magic gem given him by Lolth to escape and brought Wulfgar with him. Drizzt and company managed to defeat Errtu and send the demon back to the Abyss, and freed Wulfgar after six years of imprisonment.

Mental strife
During those six years as Errtu's prisoner, Wulfgar's mind had almost been broken. He later wound up attacking Cattie-brie during a hallucination, an occurrence that caused him much mental anguish. In an effort to stop the harm he was doing, Wulfgar broke away from the Companions of the Hall, as Drizzt and his companions were called, and wandered the North for a time, eventually finding himself at a Luskan tavern called the Cutlass, owned by Arumn Gardpeck.

Wulfgar eventually became the bouncer of Arumn's bar, but was descending into the world of the bottle. It was during this time that he met Delly Curtie, who would later became his wife. While working as a highwayman in Auckney, Wulfgar was accused of having raped and impregnated Lady Meralda, wife of Lord Feringal Auck. In truth, Meralda was hiding a premarital relationship she had had with Jaka Sculi, who was the true father of the child. Wulfgar, seeing the situation Meralda and the child were in, swooped in to claim "his" child and adopted her as his own, naming her Colson and raising her alongside Delly Curtie.

Arumn's cowardly friend, Josi Puddles, stole Aegis-fang when Arumn decided to fire the huge barbarian, and Wulfgar was forced to find his hammer with his thief friend, Morik the Rogue. Wulfgar eventually recovered his hammer with the help of his old friends, banished his demons without the help of alcohol, and settled down with his new wife, Delly, and their adopted daughter, Colson.

He sometimes continued to travel with the Companions of the Hall. Wulfgar was torn between a life on the road, participating in adventures with his companions, and a settled life looking after his family, but Delly maintained that he must pursue his adventuring career.

Delly's death
Delly Curtie was under considerable strain being quartered in Mithral Hall while the ongoing war against the orc king Obould Many-Arrows left her unable to walk the free air. She was left feeling isolated whilst caring for Colson. Under these circumstances, she went to visit Wulfgar when she could, but after Catti-brie's fall to the giant, with her crushed leg, Wulfgar kept close to her and unfortunately Delly, partly from jealousy and part from fear, wanted to get away from there with Wulfgar.

Wulfgar, however, was fighting beside the dwarves and Catti-brie and spent more time fighting than being with Delly. She began to feel somewhat rejected and when she went to see Catti-brie, carrying Colson beside her, she came under the influence of Catti-brie's enchanted sword Khazid'hea. In desperation, Delly left the baby Colson with a sleeping Catti-brie. With the thoughts of Khazid'hea calling to her though, too weak willed to resist, she fell under the powerful will of the sentient sword. Not being as strong-willed as either Catti-brie or Drizzt, she was overwhelmed by the sword's desire for killing, becoming an extension of the sword, as opposed to the wielder who controlled it. Colson was taken by Cottie Cooperson after Delly quite remarkably refused the will of the sword to kill her and handed the baby over to her, who quickly fled with refugees across the Surbrin to safer lands before the onset of winter, without telling Wulfgar.

With the will of the sword still driving Delly, she rushed north, bypassing the sentries who called out to her. Pikel and Ivan Bouldershoulder charged after her through the harsh weather. Later though, they came upon her slain body, apparently killed by orcs as the sword sought a better wielder day by day. The two were about to bring her body back when they caught sight of Drizzt on a flying pegasus and left the body of Delly behind.

Wulfgar, after recovering Delly's corpse and having a proper burial, and grieving over the loss, set out with Catti-brie to recover Colson. Wulfgar and Catti-brie first traveled to Silverymoon to speak with Alustriel, who directed them to the town of Nesmé, where they would likely find Cottie, and more importantly, Colson. Without resorting to bloodshed, Wulfgar and Catti-brie recovered Colson from Cottie in Nesmé.

Return to Icewind Dale
At this point, Wulfgar decided the best thing for Colson was to be returned to her birth mother, Meralda. Immediately, Wulfgar set out on the road for Auckney where he convinced Meralda and her husband to retake Colson. From there, Wulfgar traveled north to Icewind Dale, the home of his birth, to rejoin his people, the Tribe of the Elk, and find a good woman to wed. On Flamerule 1, 1372 DR, Wulfgar returned to Icewind Dale.

Four years after the Treaty of Garumn's Gorge had been signed, Bruenor charged Drizzt and Regis to visit Icewind Dale and find out how his adopted son was faring. The pair found the Elk tribe but Wulfgar wasn't with them. Berkthgar the Bold told them that Wulfgar was dead, that he had forgotten the ways of his people and had died because of it. But neither of the companions were willing to believe that their erstwhile friend had been killed. After a week of searching the Frozenfar, Drizzt and Regis discovered Wulfgar living in Biggrin's Cave. He had forced himself into a year-long exile to relearn the ways of his people and had only to survive the winter before he would rejoin the Tribe of the Elk. Although he welcomed his friends, Wulfgar wanted to complete his exile alone and, now knowing that their friend was alive and well, Drizzt and Regis left him to his fate.

Wulfgar lived to be over a hundred years old. At the time of his death, he had three surviving children of four, nine grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren. His first son and third child, Bruenorson, who Wulfgar sired when he was past the age of sixty, was almost forty years old and had been chieftain of the Tribe of the Elk for nearly a decade since the death of Kierstaad the Swift. Wulfgar's oldest daughter was married to the chief of the Tribe of the Bear, and his youngest was married to the mightiest warrior of the Tribe of the Seal. His second-oldest grandson was ready to become chief of the Tribe of the Caribou. Despite his age and illness with fever and pneumonia, Wulfgar still had great physical strength. He still had a massive chest, stood over six and a half feet tall, and killed several yetis, some with his bare hands, before succumbing to his wounds. His war-hammer Aegis-fang was promised to be given to Bruenorson.

Revival
Wulfgar shared the same afterlife as Regis and Cattie-Brie in a small pocket dimension that could be entered from a forest in Iruladoon. After dying from wounds he sustained in battle against a group of yetis, Wulfgar arrived in the pocket-dimension of Iruladoon, much to his surprise, and was greeted by Regis. He was very disturbed that he was not brought to the halls of Tempus. Upon his death in 1462 DR, Bruenor Battlehammer also joined them in the forest.

Wulfgar met with Cattie-Brie, Regis, and Bruenor in Iruladoon and was offered the chance to be reborn again to help Drizzt "in his darkest hour". He initially rejected this opportunity in favor on passing on and going to Tempus' Warrior's Rest to rejoin with his kin. In the end, however, he chose to be reborn into Toril and appear at the summit of Kelvin's Cairn with the rest of the companions to aid Drizzt in their new life.

Catti-brie
Wulfgar had fallen in love with Catti-brie in the past, but later regarded her as a close companion. At one point, the couple were engaged. He later learned that Drizzt and Catti-Brie hadn't consummated their stronger feelings for one another, which was surprising to him.

Appearances

 * Icewind Dale trilogy:
 * 1) The Crystal Shard (1988)
 * 2) Streams of Silver (1989)
 * 3) The Halfling's Gem (1990)


 * Legacy of the Drow:
 * 1. The Legacy (1992)
 * 4. Passage to Dawn (1996)


 * Paths of Darkness:
 * 1) The Silent Blade (1998)
 * 2) The Spine of the World (1999)
 * 3) Sea of Swords (2001)


 * Hunter's Blades trilogy:
 * 1) The Thousand Orcs (2002)
 * 2) The Lone Drow (2003)
 * 3) The Two Swords (2004)


 * Transitions:
 * 1) The Orc King (2007)
 * 2) The Pirate King (2008)


 * The Sundering:
 * The Companions


 * Short stories:
 * "To Legend He Goes" in The Collected Stories: The Legend Of Drizzt


 * Computer games:
 * Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn

Connections
Wulfgar