Nathaniel Hawkshaw is a hulking young Molthuni man who dresses in plan browns and tans or whatever best allows him to blend into his environment. His family has a long and distinguished history of service on one of the great aristocratic estates in the Sweet Orchard section of Canorate. Their devotion to their masters has elevated the family to a status above that of common servants. In fact, they are treated nearly as a junior branch of the Teldas.
As a youngster, Nathaniel spent his formative years as the aide-de-camp, sparing partner, companion and guard for several of the younger children on the Teldas's estate. Since he spent so much time in their company, the Teldas family thought it proper that he should receive an education almost equal to that of their children. In this way, he learned to hunt, trap, read, speak foreign tongues and skill at arms. The ultimate aim of his education was that he become a loyal bodyguard to one of the lesser heirs of the family.
Nathaniel was an unofficial part of a Molthuni diplomatic mission to Korvosa. The purpose of the journey was to establish personal relations with family business contacts in the city while also increasing the reputation of the minister in Molthune's aristocratic circles. While assisting the minister's bodyguards, Nathaniel noted a small child pick the minister's pocket and the young magus quickly apprehended the thief. This seemed to be a feather in Nathaniel's cap, but it placed a black mark in Gaedran Lamm's book.
Lamm had his revenge days later by drugging Nathaniel's morning tea with shiver. As a result, Nathaniel slept away the early hours and failed report at the minister's side when he made his way inside the castle. As fate would have it, two would-be kidnappers made an attempt on the minister that morning and nearly succeeded in capturing him.
In the aftermath of the scandal, Nathaniel was dismissed in a humiliating scene and only his family name prevented him from being brought back to Taldor in irons. As it was, he was left in Korvosa to make his own way home. Word of his dishonor quickly spread throughout his erstwhile friends and associates in the city. None would give credence to his protests of having been drugged by an unseen enemy.
Nathaniel would have been left to wonder about the nature of the treachery against him if not for a personal message from Lamm. The old villain sent one of his "Little Lamms" to sing a rhyme outside Nathaniel's window, celebrating the plot against Nathaniel. By the time Nathaniel made it out into the street, the urchin was gone.
