Laurynn Shepherd

Player: Lurker
Race: Human
Age: 19
Class: Sacred Fist/Master of Many Styles
Deity: Ilmater
Alignment: Lawful Good
Height: 5’3”
Weight: 95
Eyes: Brown
Hair: Brown

Description: This young woman is nothing remarkable to speak of, and would certainly cause few onlookers to stop and look twice. A pale skinned, freckled face is framed by dark brown hair that tends to get in the way of large, brown eyes. Her form, while not remarkable for a woman, is fit, toned and boasts agility in every step. Her clothing is typically a simple grey sackcloth robe, with wrappings on her hands that are red, mimicking the bound hands pendant she wears around her neck.

Background

A book of no more than a simple binding of parchments with bonded covers, the writing therein is one of perfect penmanship, like that of a scribe, reflecting some years of learning, is kept tucked neatly beneath a tiny cot in the Rose Leaf Monastery.

I’ve not been one for writing down my thoughts much. I tend to just remember. My teacher always said I was a living book, that once something was written within, it was verbatim and indelible. But now I feel as if I should start chronicling what I see, and what I do, so that I may look at the pages, and focus on turning the memories inward to my growth – not just the recollection.

Besides, my own retention is worth nothing if I should pass to the House of my Father and leave the lessons contained therein to perish with me. There are those I’ve yet to meet who might benefit from my thoughts, or my lessons learned, as simple as they may be. I am a child of Ilmater – a disciple of the Broken Ones. I live, so that others may find peace from their burdens. I breathe, so that I may deliver those who are tormented from the hands of their tormentors, and I may bear suffering for them so they may find strength. My hands are my weapons; only then can one not harm or kill without impunity, for only with the bare hand can you not remove yourself from the harm you deal upon someone else.

Truly, my Father of Mercy is the only father I know. The parents of my birth, whoever they were, I’ve never met. Thus my life has always been for the Crying One. I do not mourn, or bemoan my lot in life, for I have had family in my faith. I’ve been sheltered, fed, and taught to sustain. There are so many who have so much less, and suffer so much more. I grew up overlooking the Trackless Sea on the cliffs of the Starspires. I first came to Arabel as a waypoint in my sojurn to the Monastery of the Yellow Rose, where I could see and study at the monastery where the founder of my Order became the twice-martyred. To learn how to be not only a disciple, but a teacher and healer as well. I’ve spent most of my time in the monasteries, in my studies, and tending to those who come to us in pain, or in need.

Laurynn was raised in the Cloister of St. Ramedan having been rescued by the monks as an orphan. Here she learned to be a disciple of Ilmater. She grew up learning the tenets of the faith, and how to hone her body into peak physical perfection. It was also a very sheltered life, and even amongst the other monks of the temple, she often kept to herself when not in training or study. She learned to tend to the infirm both in mind and body as a mundane healer and surgeon; it wasn’t until she left the confines of the Cloister that she learned to supplicate the powers of her god.

It was her desire to make a pilgrimage to the birthplace of her desired Order, in the Earthspur mountains of Damara, and once she came of age, she embarked upon her sojurn, on foot, from the coast of the Trackless Sea eastward. She stopped in Arabel during this journey, taking refuge in the Monastery of the Rose Leaf, which is also a shrine dedicated to St. Sollars the Twice-Martyred. Here she stayed for some time, learning the ways of a priest, as well as a monk, and she came to call it home to the point that when she did finally complete her sojurn, she soon returned to Arabel.

Personality

I’ve bound myself to purity in thought and deed for as long as I can remember, and chastity has been easy for me. I’ve never been pretty – at least not that I consider, and there are plenty of others who are prettier. I am content in this, and it has given me focus to my studies, and my discipline. I considered I might trade this vow for one of devotion, once. But I found it to be fleeting, as he found someone prettier. Perhaps it’s better, that I be wholly focused on my god, and not take the chance on heartbreak hoping for a knight to want me, when there are others who are more akin to a fairytale princess than I.

Laurynn is socially awkward to extreme; she has a hard time expressing herself to others, even as she might be ministering healing or care to the wounded. It’s only when she talks of her faith, and the church of the Crying God, that the awkwardness somehow fades and a talkative, confident person shines through. She is a bookworm, and takes to knowledge like a sponge to water, and she’s not showing off when she starts to run on about the things she knows and beleives in; she’s just that excited to know the answer. Despite her bookish, shy demeanor, she’s steadfast in her faith, and she’s a diehard protector, not a shrinking violet in the face of danger.

Relationships

Father Mallory has said I need to start getting out more. Shutting myself in has enriched my knowledge, but it has not enriched my experience, nor those who would look to me for comfort in their pains. If I’m to make a real difference for the suffering here, I have to be a Broken One. I have to take an active role to remove what causes their sufferings. Father of Mercy, grant me strength and patience needed to reach out, and be your hands — there are so many that hurt, that need to be lifted up.

Laurynn has very few, but trusted, friends among the adventurers of Arabel. She’s taken a chance — and lost — at love once, in the person of a shy paladin of Ilmater who would visit the orphanage. Theirs was a slow kindling — what seemed to be enduring — love over the course of three years, until she left to make her final pilgrimage to the Unapproachable East to visit the Monastery of the Yellow Rose. Truly, it was at that point, one of the things that was incentive to return to Arabel after her pilgrimage. Though, when she returned some moons later, she found that her paladin had betrothed himself to another.

This made her shrink away again into seclusion of the Rose Leaf. She had kept her vow to remain chaste until she might make a vow of betrothal once more, though she didn’t hope for it; in her heartbreak, she blamed herself for not being pretty enough.

Then one day a wayward — and somewhat vagabond — knight of Torm stumbled into the shrine mortally wounded, and Laurynn was in the sanctuary to give aid. She had nowhere to go, and so she offered her bed as an infirmary as she nursed the warrior woman back to health. This seemingly rough around the edges warrior was like no paladin she’d heard of, or read about — certainly never met; and the knight’s swaggering demeanor and blatant flirtations mortified the young monk. And yet, it also endeared her, that this roguish knight would somehow be interested in her, and call her an angel. Further, this knight, Vae, insisted it must be the Triad’s providence that they met, so that the knight might have a helpmate in a priestess to found a new order in the Triadic faith.

And that priestess, according to the paladin, was Laurynn.

Over the moons she sheltered the knight, and tended to the warrior woman’s healing, she grew more and more fond, until the day Vae betrothed herself to the shy, awkward monk. They stay together now, in the monastery, tending to the needy and the orphans as they plan their future, and await guidance on fulfilling Vae’s commission. Laurynn has her knight — albeit one who’s armor is a bit tarnished, but she’s intent on helping Vae become a shining sentinel of chivalry, at least, as best she can.

Goals

• Physical and Spiritual perfection are tatamount to Laurynn’s aspirations as a Broken One of Ilmater; she has to be in peak condition to stand against danger and ward against others’ suffering.
• She now shares Vae’s charge to found this Triadic order that Vae was commissioned upon by her teacher.
• She wants to be married to Vae, when they feel the time is right.

Plot Hooks

• As a Broken One, Laurynn will be a sworn foe of Loviatar and her minions. Anything with Lovite fingerprints on it that happens in Cormyr or the Dalelands is going to get Laurynn’s attention.