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About Nathaniel Whitecloak

Nathaniel Whitecloak
Swashbuckler (Flying Blade) 3
CN Humanoid (Human)

Nathaniel Whitecloak

Nathaniel grew up in a large family, the 4th of 7 children. Not old enough to gain recognition for responsibility, but not young enough to gain the affectionate attention reserved for the baby of the family, the young man frequently found himself neglected and alone. The boy quickly found friends outside of the family, however, using his boyish good looks and gift of gab to endear himself to the other children his age.

As he grew older, he found he had a natural agility that others lacked, using his acrobatic skills to amaze those around him and gain the attention he sorely craved. As his stunts grew stale, he tried increasingly daring and brazen things, basking in the notoriety it gained him until it became the norm and he had to come up with something even more reckless.

It was around this time that Nathaniel became interested in girls, in particular one girl, Mara. She was a dark-haired, long-legged dancer with a regional troupe that came through around once a month. The young man practiced juggling, first with wooden balls, then with knives, for several months, then talked to the Ringmaster to ask about joining. Seeing Nathaniel's skills and envisioning other acts for the young man, the showman accepted.

While working with the carnival, Nathaniel's easy-going nature and handsome face made him popular relatively quickly. Easily tricked but also curious, he found out from many of the acts how they performed their sleight of hand tricks, and the young man found it easier to look for such things in the future.

Nathaniel wooed Mara subtly at first, having short conversations with the woman after having spent an hour or longer primping for the brief interaction. Eventually he won her over, they first becoming lovers, then her joining his increasingly popular act. She would throw targets in the air for him to hit with a thrown dagger, toss more items into an increasingly complex juggling ring, and in general just assisted him however he needed.

Then one night, he decided to try out a new trick involving both juggling and throwing knives, the young man juggling five knives and then flinging them into a target around the young woman. The first four went fine, but an overconfident fling of the fifth landed the dagger in Mara's side. Horrified, he went to get her help, but the raucous crowd slowed him and she ended up dying a slow, horrid death from the gut wound.

Nathaniel was run out of the show, his name now anathema. He hadn't done anything legally wrong, but the other performers refused to work with him after the debacle. Listless, Nathaniel drifted for a couple of years, traveling from town to town and bed to bed, even working shipside for several months, until finally arriving in Vliasport. Hearing of the casting calls of the Sirensong Traveling Carnival, Nathaniel decided that he had run away from his past long enough and vowed to go and wow the people in charge and get back to regularly doing what he loved in front of the larger crowds that such a troupe could provide.