The Family Curse

[bickando 3967]

 

Lothar lived his short few years in fear of that curse that had taken his forefathers; in fear of backstabbing, of poisoning, of being flayed alive. He had read the stories, heard the attacks on his family. The Butcher of Brelus, they called his honored ancestor. The Headstrong, they called his ancestor that fought the Romstun hordes, and his successor they called the Meek. Indeed, that stained legacy had stained his life even as he tried to distance himself from the bandit lords of the Morsgradic Lothranians, whom had so wantonly stolen his heritage and birthrights, and had so deluded his older brother.

 

No, Lothar had not led a pleasant life. It was not to be his fate, though, to follow in the footsteps of his traitor-uncle, or his poisoned ancestor, as he was enlisted and given holy decree by High Pontiff Pontian III; it would be his most sacred duty to lead the Canonist commonfolk and lesser nobility in regaining their fear of God and in taking a place in the Third Sky. Lothar would lead the newly-created Brotherhood of Our Lady of the Tabernacle, for which he was grateful indeed to that generous High Pontiff. Perhaps, he thought, enough charity would allow him to overtake that ancient curse, make up for the massacre at Brelus.

 

But such a hex as his would not leave so easily; no, for this was a most ancient evil. Lothar had done all he could; he had planted berry bushes for the people of Helena, and took their sins upon his back in confession. He gathered wayward travelers and led them to the Imperial City, and recruited as best he could the righteous and honorable to the Church’s cause. Just as he embarked upon another act of charity, and went deep into the slums of Helena to give alms to the poor and play with the malnourished children of those dark alleys, disaster struck. Flames enveloped the region, and lit ablaze those grottos of odorous peons. Lothar thought, perhaps, that this may be the way in which his family atoned, and perhaps that by giving his life that God and the Church might remember his family as more than butchers and traitors. He gathered the children and evacuated them from that deep crevice, and then went back in to find more people to save.

 

Lothar d’Amaury de Lothiers would not be seen again, though the cape of a once-pristine habit, now charred and covered in soot, would keep a young, now homeless, child warm, and in exchange for that life another body would find itself among the ashen slums.

[argonian 14254]

A pending recruit to the Order would sigh upon hearing of his would-be Grandmaster’s death, looking over wistfully to the charred and smoky slums.