Gristla

"Don't judge anyone, or anything, on sight alone. Very little is as it seems. With the right information, even destiny can be reworked if you try hard enough."

Magic Items of Note

Description

At 5'6" tall, 170 lbs., with mousy brown hair, Gristla's appearance is rather unremarkable. The only things that set her apart from the masses are the six fingers on her left hand, and a facial tic that makes her look like she's winking at people.

Background

Gristla grew up on the fringes of society; her family members were outcasts and traveled almost constantly. She was trained in combat both for protection and as a way to make money. Her father would arrange fighting contests and take wagers on the outcome. When she won, the family had money and food. When she lost, she was shamed for it until she won again.

Whenever she got a chance, she would visit churches and bazaars as a diversion from her wretched life. Often, if her family stayed in one place long enough, a kindly cleric would help her learn to read, or a merchant would relate stories to her. She became good at picking up important details from conversations without being noticed. It seemed as soon as she grew comfortable in a place, her family would be run off for one reason or another.

She loathed her lifestyle and longed to escape, but this was not easily accomplished since she was the source of the family's primary income. However, one day the family traveled past an enormous keep embedded in a mountain range. There was talk of going into the kingdom but her father insisted that going into Celonia would only bring trouble. Figuring that the family would be unlikely to follow her there, Gristla made her escape and fled into Celonia.

She wandered the countryside, picking up as much knowledge as she could on how to better herself. She scavenged corpses for money or items, begged on the streets, hired herself out to guard caravans, and lived in sewers. Anything was better to her than the dishonest and brutal lifestyle from which she had escaped. Sometimes she would study at a church for months, but her nomadic roots always got the best of her.

While in Corothane, she heard rumors of a living saint and thought he might be the salvation she had searched for all her life. She gathered as much information as she could and finally tracked him down, but she couldn't find the courage to show herself to him. Dejected, she returned to the sewers. There had been an unusual amount of corpses there and she thought she might be able to get some traveling money. She found a really nice Greataxe that she decided to take instead of her own. Then, she looked up into the ghastly face of an ogre! Knowing she was outmatched, she ran. In her haste, she ran smack into someone. It was her saint! She was sure this was fate, and that she is on the right track to her salvation