Iakob Steele's page

A human male standing at 5'10'' and weighing a lean 170lbs with short cropped blond hair and a trimmed goatee on his chin. His skin is drawn and creased from exposure to salt and sun and his expression seems to be permanently drawn into a scowl from squinting into the sun. A sharp, hooked nose perches between heavy eyebrows and a mouth that seems to be missing it’s upper lip. Dressed in soft linens, a white shirt and black pants, under a suit of washed-black leather armor a cutlass and a dagger swing at his hip and a pistol rests at the small of his back. Many small scars line and pocket his face and hands and a Chelish prison tattoo crawls up to his neck from his left shoulder and four red dots, about half an inch in width, are tattooed over his left eyebrow, the right-most two have a black line tattooed through them while the left-most are clear.

Born and bred in Souston, Andoran, Iakob has had the taste of salt in his mouth since the days of his first memories, running along the stony beach either alone or with other children, chasing gulls and digging up starfish, hanging around the dock watching men and women ferry todays’ catch ashore, sitting on boxes and mending nets or oars, playing skip or catch on the town square with the towns church looming over them, lying in bed with the window open on a hot summers night and the cool breeze blowing in and eventually going to sea as a young man on a fishing boat. Always the sound of waves and smell of the sea was present, they were as much a part of life as the cycle of seasons and rising with the morning sun, Iakob didn’t realize how much it was a part of him until it was taken away from him.

Iakob is descendant from a long line of seamen; the Steele’s have served as naval officers back to the time of his great-great-grandfather, Martrim Steele, a history following the expansion of Taldor to the rise of Cheliax and eventually Andoran. His father, Iohan Steele, served as second officer in the Andoran navy till the time of his death 14 years ago at the hands of pirates and he instilled in his boy a deep sense of nationality and pride in the families’ service before his passing. Though Iakob was crushed at the news of his fathers’ demise he nevertheless went against his mothers wishes and joined the navy when he came of age, enrolling into the Almas Naval Academe on the strength of his family name alone, knowing that he would be doing his father proud he was determined to serve his nations ideals of freedom, individual rights and democracy.

Taking to the sea like fish to water Iakob took to his rising command status seriously and serving with honors on the Righteous Eagle under Captain Cornelius Havershaw and first mate Stevan Perth he rose to the rank of first lieutenant before being captured, along with his entire boarding party, by the Katapeshi pirate ship the Carrion’s Maw and sold to a Chelaxian noble house into slavery and put to forced labor after the failed boarding action.

It was the spring of 4712, the Righteous Eagle was on patrol in the international waters of the Inner Sea, just north of the mouth of the Uta River that separates Thuvia and Rahadoum. They had been chasing the slave galley, the Carrion’s Maw, from Katapesh, having started along the coast of Osirion but now slowly gaining on it. Finally catching the ship, Iakob led the boarding party along with John Rawkins, an enlisted fellow Andoran from Souston, a man that had proven himself reliable time and again in such actions. Once on boars, they discovered that the ship was a trap. Instead of slaves longing for freedom, they found and entire company mercenaries with hidden cannons. As the cannons blasted away at point blank range, the Righteous Eagle found itself outmatched and in extreme risk of sinking. They gave the order to retreat, but the boarding party was too far on the slavers’ ship to get back in time. If the Andoran ship were to wait any longer, it would be ripped to shreds. With a heavy heart, Captain Havershaw ordered that the ships break away.

The fighting was furious and the boarding party fought hard, but eventually Iakob saw the futility of the fight, with just over half a dozen remaining of the boarding party. John Rawkins has been pushed over the sides with a spear through him, though not before he sliced of the captains ear, and the rest lay dead or dying. Seeing as they were cornered and hopelessly outnumbered, and the Righteous Eagle was retreating, Iakob ordered the surrender.

The sailors were thrown in shackles and sold to a Chelaxian lord, then sent to Deepmar mine as forced labor. Iakob esaped a year later, leading a group of six men from bondage to freedom. Only Iakob and another Andoran sailor, survived the escape to get to the abolitionist underground. The pair were smuggled out of Cheliax separately by the organization.

Upon arriving back to Andoran Iakob was met with blank stares as he told of the penal colonies location and the treatment of its prisoners, mostly political in nature, disgruntled Chelaxians and Andoran soldiers mixed with commoners and rotten apples, with the jailers being the worst of the lot. Pressing his superiors for action, Iakob was denied on the grounds on Andoran not wanting to start a war with Cheliax. Given a medal Iakob was honorably discharged from the navy.

Iakob was furious to say the least, he had counted on the Andoran navy to respond, he hadn’t dared believe otherwise. The belief that they would storm the island and rescue the prisoners had carried Iakob through the emotional storm of doubt, disbelief, anger and resignation of life in prison. Finally he had told himself that they simply did not know where they were and so, on that belief, had instigated the escape, promising the ones left behind that he would return with the full strength of the Andoran Navy at his back and break them all out, meeting out justice to the ones who needed and deserved it! Now the navy had made him a liar.

Disenchanted and disgusted he left high commands compound in a fury, bearing his anger with the best grace he could. Visiting officers’ lounges and barrooms favored by sailors Iakob was met with blank stares as he told of his stay in Deepmar, asking the officers to argue his case with their superiors earned Iakob disapproving looks, and so Iakob returned home to Suston a broken man, feeling betrayed and abandoned. Learning of his mothers’ death upon arrival only served to deepen Iakobs sinking emotional state, when she had received news of her son’s capture she had assumed the worst and after eight months of grieving she had walked into the waves, letting the ocean take her body and soul to rest with her husband and only son.

Grieving for his mother and bitter at his superiors for failing to uphold what Iakob believed were the Andoran ideals he took to drinking, finding that a swig now and again helped calm his nerves, it took the edge off. On a drunken ramble through his family’s house he found his fathers’ old sea chest, his battered old pistol and cutlass, along with notes, trinkets and other memorabilia. Shifting through the dusty remains Iakob lost himself for hours in memories of his father and the talks they had, he found himself connecting to his father at a deeper level than he had before, and he knew that his father would have been proud of him. But he would not have him give up. Iakob needed to move on. Iakob found himself unable to blame High Command for not wanting to risk a war with Cheliax, they had to look at the bigger picture; How many lives would they risk with such action? They risked drawing the full wrath of Cheliax on them, the Andoran democracy was to precious to risk open war. Blatant defiance was one thing but War? No.

Sitting there reading a letter his father had written to his mother Iakob came to realize that there was another way. The Andoran navy’s hands might be bound, but a privateer? No. A privateer was free to sail as he pleased, well, mostly. A privateer flew a flag of convenience and Andor hired those it knew to look favorably on its views. Feeling himself fill up with a fervor Iakob realized that all hope was not lost; If he could manage to acquire a ship and raise a crew he could still keep his word and rescue those left behind.

It was a crazy idea but it was all Iakob had and so, gathering the sea chest up along with his meager belonging, his uniform, medals and memorabilia, he headed back to sea, taking work on a trader heading west...

Iakob is gruff to say the least; those who would say they knew him before he left the Andoran navy would say that he was an ambitious soul, a diligent soldier and a loyal friend. He enjoyed company and humor, games of all sorts and took to his work with a sense of contentment. But now he is a completely changed man. Spending long hours in silence, intent on the job at hand or staring over the railing toward the horizon, or maybe just a picture in his mind’s eye, whatever the case, he has become distant, gruff, changed.

Iakob believes strongly in the Andoran ideals of freedom, personal choice and democracy. He believes that everyone should get a fair shake and an equal chance to prove themselves and he believes strongly in that the strong should protect the weak. He has a low tolerance for slavers and pirates, thinking them men of low moral, but he's not as naive as to believe that they are all evil men without scruples. After all, his experience has shown him that there is honor among thieves.