Background

Tybalt Terrowyn Halfshadow's first memories are of pain. As a child, he was forced to undergo training in horrendous circumstances. Digging holes for days, holding intricate poses for hours, held beneath the water for minutes at a time. Any failure, any deviation from perfection, warranted a beating. Indeed, perfection itself often warranted a beating. And sometimes, the beating itself was the lesson.

Tybalt had no family of which was aware. His handlers, those unpleasant and cruel men that raised him, would entertain no questions about his parentage or birth. At a young age, Tybalt learned that this was a topic best left unmentioned. Nonetheless, he knew that was something notable about him. Something that made these men both hate him and yet be utterly devoted to filling every moment of his young life with harsh lessons. Something in his blood, his very being, that was the sole gift given to him by the circumstances of his birth.

He was raised in an austere monastery made of rough stone that had been weathered over the centuries by howling winds sweeping across the surrounding mountain peaks. The monastery was filled with a few dozen hard-eyed men and women, dressed in frayed robes, faces in hard expressions, and mostly silent. There were at least two other children of similar age at the monastery, but Tybalt never met them. Occasionally he would see them out of the corner of his eye or hear their cries above the gusting winds. He ignored them though. To acknowledge them was to invite a beating of his own. His only contact with the outside world was a handful of letters that he was told were from his mother, a woman that never identified herself, but professed love and made references to a powerful father. In his early years, it was these few words that he clung to that sustained him amongst all the agony and isolation.

The monastery itself was not particularly notable. Aged, stone walls surrounded a compound of squat buildings built to withstand the raging winds. The only building built to defy the elements was a four story, square tower that was rarely entered. The Old Man, spoken about only in whispered terms amongst Tybalt's handlers, and never to Tybalt himself, lived within. The Old Man spent his days in prayer and meditation within the tower and his nights on the roof, staring at the stars.

Tybalt guessed that he was six, or eight, or maybe ten years of age when he began his weapons training. Knives, daggers, rapiers. Tybalt was roughly treated by his handlers. One particular trainer named Gorneval - a man that delighted in being crueler than the others - was assigned to his lessons most often. A day might begin with a few moments of training, instruction in a different grip or a combination of thrusts.  Then, handed a weapon, he would be set against Gorneval or one of the others. It was years before Tybalt was able to score a blow. The first few years he was simply beaten until he submitted. If he fared well then he would be beaten less. If he fared poorly then he would be beaten more. If it were Gorneval in charge then he would likely be beaten to within an inch of his life. This process was repeated morning and afternoon for years.

Finally, one day Tybalt drew blood from a trainer - not Gorneval (how he wished!) - and his training changed forever. The next morning he was taken into the square tower and forced to kneel at an alter covered with brass vessels and ceramic jars. A long ceremony ensued and Tybalt was forced to breathe deeply of fumes from different braziers. His head spun and he had to be held up to avoid collapsing. At one point he thought he saw his first glimpse of the Old Man, staring at him, seemingly proud. But not proud in the way Tybalt might have hoped. Instead, the look of pride was remote, such as one a huntsman might bestow on a prized hound that had dragged down an elk.

Later that evening, Gorneval kicked him awake as he lay sprawled on the bare floor of his spare quarters. Forced to dressed quickly in a nondescript, hooded robe, Gorneval took Tybalt on his first trip out of the compound. He was led a dozen miles away, beaten, and left on a featureless, barren plateau amidst a raging storm with instructions to find his way home. Bruised and bleeding, soaked and starving, Tybalt stumbled into the compound and collapsed thirty hours later.

There was no reward for returning. No praise, not even acknowledgment. Gorneval proceeded to devise a series of missions, each seemingly intended to break or kill him. Drugged, beaten and left in a small village of goatherds twelve leagues away, he stole for the first time, pilfering food from an old lady. He was ashamed, but left no other choice. It was that or starve. Another time, stripped and chained, he awoke in a small jail and was forced to break out and escape. This time, he bashed a stable boy in the head with a small rock and then rode off a stolen horse. He was not proud and thought fleetingly of the punishment that the boy might receive. It was not fair, but he had no choice. Each mission was more difficult than the next, each required him to make hard choices, and hard choices were required to save himself. 

As his successes continued, Tybalt found himself required to participate in more rituals. Often he was forced to inhale strange clouds of smoke while chanting poetry in a language his did not know, merely mimicking the sounds. He imbibed dozens of potions, sweet, sour, and bitter. Some caused him to hallucinate, others caused him to vomit. Often, when weak from the effects, he would be strapped to a table and sliced with knives in strange rituals. Gorneval even took to slowly carving away the flesh of the little toe on each foot. Sometimes Tybalt would be too drugged to be aware of the pain and would just stare vacantly into space. Other moments were excruciating torture and he fantasized of killing Gorneval.

Soon after, Tybalt's training changed. Gorneval would bring him to a city and assign him missions with incongruous objectives. At first he might be required to pick the pocket of a poor man selling his wares at the gate leading into town or a fisherman dragging their day's catch to shore. Tybalt took no joy in these tasks. Other times he would be instructed to assault specific targets and then lead them on harried pursuits through the city. He cried the time he was forced to kill a seamstress's cat and then scream abuse at her, provoking her to chase him through a crowded market.

As Tybalt grew, his missions became more dangerous. One morning he snuck into the quarters of a pit fighter that was hungover from celebrating a tournament victory and sliced his Achilles tendon. That man had taken money and failed to throw a fight. Another time a scared man that refused to repay a debt he owed had hidden himself in a closet in the basement of a small warehouse and barred the door. Tybalt climbed in through a small exhaust pipe and stabbed him in the back. Occasionally, Tybalt took some delight in his missions and used his cleverness to devastating effect. He was assigned to kill a cruel man that had habitually abused women. Tybalt led the abuser on a path he had set up, through a series of small holes with jagged edges in ruined fences, Filthy, exposed nails tore at the larger man. As his pursuer struggled to follow, he was forced to stomp through a middens for which Tybalt knew how to easily leap from spot to spot. Weeks later, Tybalt heard that the man had died horribly from multiple infections.

His missions became more elaborate. He would spy on the clandestine meetings of others in small rooms at the top of tall towers, hanging perilously from small window sills. Information that might harm powerful and heartless men was released to their detriment. The stronger that Tybalt became, the more likely it seemed that his assigned targets deserved the punishment that he meted out. Sometimes, Gorneval would tell Tybalt why these men deserved their punishments. So, while there was occasionally a faint whiff of regret, in most cases Tybalt felt that he served as the unseen hand of justice, collecting payment due from those who owed it. After a time, Tybalt had no compunctions about deciding the amount of retribution that would be meted out and the form that it would take. 

Gorneval took sadistic glee in making some of his missions unnecessarily difficult. Tybalt would be forced to wear a bell around his neck while spying or would be armed with only a stick while confronting angry guardsmen in seedy bars. There were many occasions where this led to failure. And a failed mission, or sometimes a successful one, would result in Gorneval adding a beating of his own.  

The strangest missions were ones in which Tybalt was required to kidnap someone. The target was typically an adult, often one that was resolute and had a strong purpose. Gorneval preferred that he ensnare caravan guards that were to trained to spend long hours staring out into the night or innkeeps and barmaids used to paying close attention to clientele. Tybalt would be forced to stare into their eyes and try to make them do things, as if the power of his mind was sufficient to make a man confess his deepest fears or a women tell him her most shameful secrets. When he failed, as he always did, he would be beaten for a few minutes, instructed to try harder, and then set at his task again. These nights were the worst for Tybalt as the sessions would continue for hours. Over and over, each round destined to end in failure and pain as Tybalt was forced again to try to do something that he knew to be impossible.

Finally, one late night at the end of a particularly difficult mission, Tybalt was drugged and tied to a small cot in a safe house located in a storm sewer beneath a crowded city. Gorneval was beating him with a chain and Tybalt's cries echoed throughout the underground warren of tunnels. At this point, an inkling of Tybalt's consciousness, curiously disconnected from the body being beaten as it lay in a drugged haze, realized the futility of his circumstances. Missions, beatings, and silence from a man that bore him nothing but ill will. What kind of man would resign himself to this fate? Tybalt could feel the friction between the two beings that he was: a dark angel of justice capable of the most dreadful actions and a boy forced to suffer in a fashion that no one should be expected to endure. And it would be endured no more.

That tiny inkling of thought - sparkling and incandescent - descended into Tybalt and blasted into life. His eyes flashed open, swirling with a sinister gray where they had previously been glazed over. Those eyes stared directly at Gorenval and the clouds within them churned and grew, the savageness of the storm within growing by the moment, the irises themselves straining with violence and death. The sheer force of will, the clarity of thought instilled by that tiny inkling, was too much for either Tybalt or his tormentor to endure. Tybalt, restrained by ropes holding him to his cot, arched his back and strained mightily against his bonds as the horrible energy coursed through this body. Mesmerized, his face blanched and stricken, Gorneval drew a knife from his boot and stabbed himself in the chest. Three times. All to avoid that horrible gaze.

As the storm in his eyes subsided, the rage within spent, he freed himself from his bonds and stood. Tall, hair of raven black, and eyes of sinister grey. He felt stronger, he had purpose. A burning patch at the base of his neck subsided, the tattoo of an evil eye now imprinted on his skin. He flexed his arms and fingers and drew himself up to his full height. He would not return to the monastery. He would chart his own course now. He was not who he used to be. He was something more. He was Ser Shadow.