Marius: The Journeyman Chronicles
by Justin Jay Gray
"Marius lay on the cold cobblestone with the familiar aftertaste of vomit in his mouth. A small puddle of churned food and too much ale lay next to him. He tried to shut his eyes and ignore the pounding in his head, but it was to no avail. Instead he simply welcomed the cool drops of rain as they began to lightly fall on his face. Breathing deeply he heard the square bells ring out for the last time, and an array of cheers followed. Finally..., he thought, night. Time to go to work..." From I. Party in the House of Gandit.
A child of the plains, Marius is a member of a once proud people known as the Journeymen. Legend has it the Journeymen once travelled across the entirety of the Orphan continent, descendants of the first civilization, living in nomadic tribes. Eventually settling on the plains of Olivia, they enjoyed a peaceful existence under the rule of the Olivian monarch. Following the democratic revolution, and subsequent deposition of the royal family, the plains were primed to be mined and destroyed for valuable chard. Attempting to protect their lands, the journeymen were eventually devastated by the ensuing war, and now reside on small reservations, with barely a tenth of their population remaining. Haunted by the bloodshed, Marius has abandoned his throne as heir apparent to the Journeymen chiefdom, instead seeking fortune as a blade for hire. Traveling the Olivian countryside with little more than his custom modified Djerik, an instrument/weapon, he accepts any job, no matter how morally ambigous, so long as coin is involved.