ARTEAUX SERENIOUS
Royal Bodyguard
Elellialbre
Destruction: 123
Restoration: 104
Conjuration: 54
Divination: 63
Alteration: 100
Arteaux. That’s his name. If he ever had a different one, he doesn’t know. He’s nothing. No one. Not really. He’s a royal bodyguard but that is all. Nothing more. Never anything more. He can’t become anyone or anything else as he isn’t allowed to. Suppressed and trained only for one specific purpose, he has no free will anymore. He was found, sick and dying outside their walls. When he was cured and awoke, he had absolutely no memory. He couldn’t even talk or move at first either. Those things came back to him over time, but nothing else. The military decided to use this to their advantage. They gave him a name and taught him all there was to be taught of the royal family and what it meant to be a royal bodyguard. They shaped and molded his mind to their ways. They taught him how to protect the monarchy. They taught him to serve and defend. He became a subservient creature pandering to the family's every whim and order. And he does it willingly. He knows nothing else but the simple order to obey. He came to them with no inhibitions, no memories, no ties to anyone or anything. Now he is tied and bound to the castle and its members. He is inferior in their eyes but loves it. He loves it for it is all he knows. Arteaux is often drawn to matters of simple logic. It might be a mere childish trait, his revulsion for complication and an affinity for black and white. But it’s simply the way he is. He seeks understanding, a limited amount of understanding to be sure. He wants to know things, but seems to hate the answers. He wants to know about himself, but is reluctant to make any discoveries. He doesn’t know what he will find if he tries to learn about himself, and he fears for the result. So he learns of other things instead. Anything, everything, something: so long as it isn’t about himself. He would rather stay the subservient creature, the nobody, the nothing, the bodyguard, than discover what he might have been. If Arteaux was an animal, he would undeniably be a cat. Ask anyone and they would readily agree. Every movement of his is feline. Every step, every turn, every move is made with unmatched grace. His mind and body are in perfect synch, his reflexes at an incredible, heightened peak. His reaction time is instantaneous. He can turn from sleepy and docile to alert and fierce within a matter of milliseconds. He can catch and throw back arrows. Once, a bullet even. He seems to be naught but a haunting, flitting shadow that glides over the ground and flickers against the walls. One minute there, one minute not. So quiet, his tread lighter than feathers. He can creep up on anyone, anything. Only certain Hunters are ever able to hear his approach. He is so still and silent, one can enter, move about, and leave a room that he occupies without ever knowing he was there. It gives him an almost ethereal quality, seeming to appear and disappear in the blink of an eye, always being where one least expects him and always vanishing when one looks his way. He’s flighty, feisty, and very independent. Yes, he lives and breathes every word that commands him, but on his own, he is extremely introverted and despairingly antisocial. He sticks to the shadows and the corners, only coming out when summoned. He does his work, serves his purpose, then disappears. Like a cat. The cat will come out to hunt the mice, eat its meal, and offer a moment of company with its owner before it runs off to new places. Arteaux might run off, but he’s always within the castle. He never goes outside unless accompanying the King or one of the royal family. Such are the rules. He has explored nearly every nook and cranny of the church, and he keeps exploring. There’s always something new to find in a building such as the nunnery palace. He also has this look about him. In his wide eyes and his usually expressionless gaze. This look that he knows something, that he’s far wiser and above everyone else than he appears to be. It’s a look that demands everyone bow down before him instead of the other way around that it truly is. It is unsettling, the way he seems to command everything with a glance. How his knowing, fathomless eyes pierce right through the soul and extract the essence of it. He is grace and lithe and liquid silver, a pirouetting ghost that haunts, a cat that creeps and crouches, waiting to pounce. There is that as well. He has all this potential, all these forgotten memories, but the feelings are still there. Sometimes he feels things and doesn’t know why. Sometimes he is angry and murderous, but he doesn’t understand. This is why some fear him, why some are loathe to keep him here, and why many are so keen to control him. He is a crouched cat. Every little emotion, every feeling, bottled up, suppressed, coiled about like a coiled spring. Coiled, crouched, waiting to strike. Claws slowly sliding out from velvety paws, serpentine oculars closed to slashed lines of silvery-gray, fangs bared, hackles raised, tail lashing, ears flattened against the skull. He is dangerous, unpredictable. A crouched cat, a ticking bomb, a sleeping dragon: just waiting, watching, for the moment when he will attack. It’s hard to think of him this way. He’s such a gentle, docile creature, but appearances can be deceiving. Arteaux is always thought of gentle. Gentle, meek, quiet, compassionate. He can be a little rough around the edges. He’s very hard to commune with as he’s a very closed, withdrawn person. Despite it, he is very pleasant and a bit more optimistic than many would expect. He has all the innocence of a young child, despite the amount of blood shed by his hands. Everything is new and beautiful and intriguing to him. His curiosity can sometimes make him a bit reckless or even clueless at times, but he isn’t stupid about it. He seems utterly naïve of certain things and quite unable to understand conversation or the ‘current lingo’ or ‘cultural references’. He’s more old fashioned, delving into ancient history and literature rather then looking to the modern things. He finds the past simple in its ways and understands that far more than the complicated drama and flair of the flamboyant present his is a part of. It often frustrated him, this modern world. He’s not frustrated easily and very slow to anger. Even in battle he doesn’t display much rage of any sort. A furrowing of the brow, a concentration, a seriousness of composure, but not anger. He isn’t very temperamental and can put up with nearly everyone and everything no matter how hard they may try to press his buttons and get on his bad side. He doesn’t lash out or lose control, and he would never dream of touching a girl. Never mind the chivalry of not hitting one, he wouldn’t even touch them unless it was his duty. He treats women as if they were divine goddesses, both delicate yet strong, fragile yet unbreakable. He never appears sad and has never been known to cry. He has been known to smile though. His trademark smile is small but very heartfelt, a little fragile thing that transforms his stony face entirely. Some may call it a loving smile, but it is hard to tell what he does or doesn’t love. He doesn’t seem to quite understand the concept. Because of this, there isn’t much worry that he will ever –how to put it- take the purity of any of the girls here. There was originally much discussion about whether it was wise to keep him within the building that the royal family lived and slept in, but after much proof that he simply had no idea about the ways of men and women, all their worries were laid to rest. There might still be a chance that a girl might be able to bed him, but as the majority of girls aren’t so keen, even that suspicion wasn’t given much thought. He seems numb to affection anyway. So he is allowed to live there, with and among the people he serves. It makes him more accessible. They don’t have to wait for him to arrive to get things done, as he is always there. They also have more control over him in that respect. Arteaux is rather harsh looking, a counter to his sweet disposition and downtrodden inferiority. He has pale skin, as though he didn’t spend much time outdoors. A little frosty of pallor, but not pale enough to be sickly or offsetting. He has a healthy enough glow to his color. His hair is pure white, the color of untainted, freshly fallen snow. It is soft to the touch, smooth and rather downy. It was once a honey brown, but turned white after he was poisoned. He has pointed ears, a common attribute of the elvish people. His eyebrows are slanted, giving him a fierce, angry look that offsets his wide, wondering eyes. The eyes themselves are a bright, silvery gray. And rather than black pupils, he doesn’t seem to have any really. They are more of a dull gray than black, occasionally blending in with the color of his irises. His nose is aquiline; sloping gently and a little sharp. He has rather sharp facial features all around. His slightly raised cheekbones and the line of his jaw give him a bit of a feline appearance. Sharp enough to be fierce but not pointed enough to look thin. More slender. Arteaux has his fair share of scars, but the most eye catching are the ones on his neck and chin. They are maddeningly unnatural, a specific design purposely placed there. Starting at the lower lip, the scar becomes two lines that meet at the base of the chin, extending further down, slightly widening, disappearing under the collar of his shirt or whatever he is wearing. It extends all the way down his chest and stomach, following the indented curvature of his muscles till it ends at his bellybutton. Three scar lines, shortening in length as they descend, cut in measured succession across his neck, in such a way that an exact half of each is on either side of the center line. Paler scars come down from the back of his neck and the start of his jaw to run down alongside the center line. These unnatural scars have raised some questions as is conceivable, but Arteaux cannot answer them, nor would he really care to if he even knew. Their origin is unknown, the meaning of them even further indiscernible. Arteaux is quite intelligent, consuming vast amounts of knowledge from reading. He likes to read. He also likes to fight, though he prefers mortal, human opponents to things like unicorns. At least with humans he has a chance of winning. Arteaux isn’t one for art or music, anything that is remotely involved with self-expression as he has next to none. He’s logical, precise, and simplistic. Things like emotion, things gained over years and years of development and self exploration have been utterly lost to him. He might be relearning, but he is still stuck in a single mindset. It is this mindset that truly holds him back from being whatever man he could possibly be. He doesn’t want to change it. He doesn’t want to find it. He doesn’t know what he will find when he does. Then he might not be Arteaux anymore. Then he might be someone else entirely with memories and feelings and goals and things. He doesn’t want that. Just thinking about it is too much to handle for his simple, steadfast mind. He’s happy being Arteaux. And it seems that’s who he will remain forever.