About Daren Mott“Anyone can be a lawless bandit who bullies the innocent. What takes real strength is being the hero brave enough to stop them.” Honor is strength. It is a maxim that Daren Mott has known since birth, and one whose barbs he still feels deep in his flesh. Yet Mott also knows a deeper truth: that just as a sword must bend to avoid breaking, so too must honor. And the more rigid the steel, the easier it shatters. Mott was born a retainer on the estate of Lord Daren Hitoshi, just a few days’ ride from the great city of Oda in Minkai. The son of the chief falconer and his wife, Mott quickly proved share many of the features of his sires, emulating their proud and fierce natures. It was while accompanying his father on one of Lord Daren’s hawking outings that he first came to the lord’s attention. At eight years old, Mott was assigned the honor of being the personal attendant to the lord’s son, Masao, assisting the privileged child with his falcon. All went well until the noble son, still new to the sport, mishandled his bird and nearly lost an eye for his trouble. The furious lordling prepared to kill the falcon then and there, but Mott interceded, explaining the boy’s error. Enraged even further, Masao began beating Mott, drawing the attention of the rest of the hunting party. Though Mott bowed low and accepted the savage blows of his master, he neither cried out nor begged for mercy. When Masao finally tired, Lord Daren himself addressed the bloody servant child, asking him why he had been so bold as to correct his superior. Without faltering, Mott bowed to the lord and said simply, “Because it was the truth.” From that point on, Lord Daren took the young Mott under his wing, frequently assigning him duties within the manor house, engaging him as a companion for his son, and seeing to his education in matters both martial and intellectual. In time, Mott grew to become a powerful magi, rising to the position of head samurai of the Daren holdings. When Masao died in a drunken duel at the age of twenty, thus depriving Lord Daren of an official heir, the bereaved lord began to look more and more to Mott as a son, even allowing him to take the family name. Yet Masao’s death was only the beginning of the Daren family’s misfortune. It was shortly after this episode that the Daren estate was visited by Kaneka Yoshiro, a traveling lord and government official with a position high in the Imperial Court. With considerably more prestige and official sway than Daren, Kaneka was received with full honors—yet it quickly became apparent that the guest was interested in more than just hospitality. Within a few days, Kaneka’s cunning insults, lewd advances toward Daren’s wife, and barely concealed challenges to Daren himself left Mott’s lord with no choice. Honor forbade him from allowing the slights to stand unanswered, yet challenging a governmental superior was as good as a death sentence. In the end, honor won out, just as Kaneka knew it would. Daren challenged Kaneka to a duel, and was quickly slain by the talented swordsman. In recompense for the “insult” Kaneka had suffered, the Imperial Court allotted all the Daren holdings to Kaneka. Daren’s widow, faced with the prospect of a dishonored existence among peasants, had no choice but to accept Kaneka’s proposal of marriage if she wanted to retain her position. Though the Daren samurai were bound by direct order of the court to honor their new arrangement—and plied with substantial gifts by their new master—Mott saw the theft for what it was. Several nights later, having watched Kaneka’s celebrating guards drink themselves into unconsciousness, Mott crept into his former master’s bedchamber and confronted the usurper even as he lay sleeping with his new wife. Though Kaneka screamed for his retainers, in the end it became clear that his only option was to fight. Taking up the sword that Mott tossed onto the bed, Kaneka did everything he could to kill the samurai quickly, yet Mott would not be denied his revenge. At last, bleeding from several terrible wounds, Mott succeeded in getting past the noble’s guard, ending his short-lived dominion over the Daren estate in a fine spray of blood. As Kaneka fell to the floor, pink froth spilling from his lips, Mott dropped his cudgel and knelt beside it. Knowing that to attack any lord in this manner—let alone the man the government considered his rightful master—would bring sure execution, he drew his dagger and prepared to die with his honor intact. A hand on his shoulder stayed his blade. When Mott looked up, he beheld Lady Daren—now Lady Kaneka—in her dressing gown, its yellow silk stained with the blood of her most recent husband. With tears in her eyes, she thanked Mott for avenging Lord Daren and returning the estate to her control. Yet with her next breath, she condemned him forever. Taking his hand in her own—an undreamed-of show of affection and familiarity—the noblewoman forbade Mott from taking his own life. Instead, she snuck him out of the manor and into a carriage bound for Oda, with only a string of coins, his armor, and a command to live as best he could. When the morning sun rose, it found Mott on a caravan traveling north, bound for the icy reaches of the Crown of the World and from there on to the mysterious lands of the Inner Sea. Now in his mid-thirties, Mott is a hard man who keeps to himself. Though he has long since learned to speak Taldane, he remains terse by nature, feeling that everyone in his new home speaks too much but says too little. He operates as a fearless and talented mercenary—or ronin, as he terms it—for those whose cause seem righteous, yet refuses to bow to anyone regardless of status, saying only that he has had his fill of masters. Mott is loyal to those few friends who can get past his stone-faced demeanor, yet remains secretly tortured by his conflicting senses of honor. To continue living as a masterless samurai—let alone one who has committed a great crime—is shameful, yet to deny Lady Daren’s command would be equally shameful. With no clear answer, Mott has temporarily shelved the problem. Nearly a year ago, he received word that Lady Daren had been killed, her entire estate overrun and laid to waste by an army of bandits. Seeking answers against the world’s chaos that threatened to swallow him up in despair—for he also lost his family in the attack—Mott devoted himself mastering his chosen weapon, the staff. He rises early every morning to practice combat maneuvers and constantly strives to master new techniques—particularly those known to be effective against criminals. Excellence with his weapon has become almost symbolic to him; it represents excellence of character, the mending of a broken spirit. When he has achieved perfect mastery of the rigid staff of law, he believes he will then be ready to move on from his disgrace and once again seek out the honor he once knew. Ultimately, he seeks his destiny in battle; deep in his heart, he harbors a secret hope: that perhaps one day he might raise an army of champions and lead it over the mountains, rooting out the bandit army that raised his Lady’s estate and restoring the honor of himself, his family, and the warrior’s code he feels he was born to uphold. |
