Mortal Peril/Jibril
Bio
Jibril originally hails from the Middle Lands of An-Teng, third-generation descendant of migrants from one of the coastal towns outside Chairoscuro. Like all foreigners, the Tengese barely tolerated Jibril's family, but they managed to get by living in a community with others who had left their homelands. Life was hard, but he had food in his belly most days.
Having been assimilated into Tengese culture in spite of their scorn for them, Jibril's life was planned out for him, including a marriage into another family of Southern expatriots of a similar status. His grandfather had been something of an dreamer, the one to bring his family westwards to a new beginning, and his tales fired up Jibril's imagination with longings for something more. A fierce argument with his father over his future led to him being disowned and expelled from the family home when he was fourteen.
After several hungry days of wandering, he found a merchant's guard who were passing through and persuaded the guard captain to take him on. What followed were two years of drudgery and training which often amounted to little more than physical abuse as he learned how to fight. But he stuck with it and grew strong and capable, earning his place as one of the guards. He worked the trade roads and canals for almost a decade before his path crossed with Amon Jerixs. Jerixs won his contract in a wager with his employer, transferring his service to the Scavenger Son and opening up the vistas of his life.
Over the course of four years of service, he worked his way up from common guard to one of the Shields (of whom there are four), Jerixs' personal guards who protected him and his family. But while capable, he is only Third Shield and that is unlike to change as long as Mudras, a cunning snake is Second Shield. He is biding his time before the grizzled old First Shield retires or dies, focusing all his attentions on preventing any rival from usurping the spot in the mean time. He was given personal responsibility for Jerixs' neice Yannah, a headstrong girl of thirteen who'd been foisted on Jerixs by his elder sister.
Shortly before they arrived on Prescia, Jibril came down with a nasty bout of enteric fever which laid him up for several days below deck. He still wasn't completely recovered when they landed, so Jerixs left him behind to do his business at the mansion. Thus he was unable to intervene in whatever befell Jerixs. That he was not there is a source of great shame, but right now he has Jerixs' other family members to think about. The priority is getting them safely off Prescia.
Description
Tall, broad and muscular, Jibril is what you'd expect of hired muscle. His colouring and features are those of a Southerner - nut-brown skin, black hair and eyes - and he follows those fashions as well with a shaved head and neatly-trimmed goatee (if we're casting characters, he'd be played by Morris Chestnut). He is almost always armed, often armoured and bearing the colours and heraldry of the Jerixs family.
He holds himself proudly and takes his duties seriously, and likes to think of himself as a man of honour. His life before that of his employer or dependents, that is the oath he sword on taking the Shield.
