Knights and squires of the roundtable, lend me your ears!
October being the month where the dead roam the world, we present you herewith an interview with a man long departed, contacting us not quite from the other side.
Once the realm’s greatest sell-sword and adventurer, he sealed his sword in a dark cave, and placed a curse upon it. He spent a century in the caves as a ghost, until someone found a way to accesses the deepest reaches of the caverns and trigger the curse.
He’s here to tell us about his adventures as a ghost, mentoring the young woman who retrieved his sword and triggered the curse.
Tell us a little about where you grew up. What was it like there?
I was born in the bustling port city of Acantha. It’s close to the Golden Peaks, south of Cathell itself. My father was a well-known merchant there and our family was quite influential across the region. I found it a stifling environment, however, with too many expectations I had no desire to meet. I made every attempt to leave as soon as I was old enough to set out on my own.
Did you have any favourite toys as a child? Any cherished memories?
No, not really any favorite toys I can recall, other than my stuffed bear Rufall. My father did not believe in a lot of play time for his children. He pushed learning on us more. I had favorite books instead. Histories of the realm and the rise of the Tae’Ahjin Empire. And my magik primers, of course.
What do you do now?
Well, as a ghost, I don’t have many worldly demands on my time anymore. However, I was once Cathell’s greatest adventurer. The bards sang of my exploits across the realm. I genuinely miss being an adventurer — the thrill of exploration and hunting out treasures that farm-hands only dream about. There are few things as exciting as that. And of course, a good clash of swords and trading spells with rival adventurers and mercenaries! I have to admit, when the chance arose for one last adventure, I jumped at it. Perhaps I should have warned Aeryn, before I gave her my sword, but sometimes the path to a good adventure requires a little subterfuge at first.
What can you tell us about your latest adventure?
Ah. You mean the business with The Harbinger. Aside from the gods themselves, only I knew of that creature’s imprisonment in the caverns. It was my sword Aric, given to me by the god Vortenthas himself, that kept The Harbinger bound. But when The Harbinger latched on to Aeryn, well, I knew The Harbinger would manipulate her into setting him free. And then it would be a race against time to stop him from bringing back the Time of Terror. The whole affair was bloody and even terrifying at times, but I would not have missed it for all the gold in a dragon’s horde.
What did you first think when the curse was triggered?
When I first became aware that Aeryn had survived my curse, which had stopped so many before her from reaching The Harbinger’s prison, I knew it was time for Aric to have a new master. I only hoped she was capable of battling The Harbinger.
To read the rest of the interview, head over to The Protagonist Speaks.
A little about The Protagonist Speaks
This site is dedicated to the characters living inside books. Each week we aim to publish an interview with a protagonist from a novel we believe you should read.
Yep, you read that right. The protagonist – or antagonist! – from the book. Not the author. Not the reviewer. The character. We aim to put the characters out in the limelight – to be heard, to be felt. As readers, they are the ones we care about the most.
We aim for most of the interviews to be done by authors for their own characters, but some interviews will fall under the category of fan-fiction. As long as it give voice to a character, we don’t mind. We’ll just make sure it’s tagged accordingly.
This is a new concept in book-blogging, one that is catching like wildfire (you should see our pipeline of character interviews!). It has been created and managed by Assaph Mehr of egretia.com.