Aurora Varan - Monitor Lizard

[suicune]

Name: Aurora Varan
Age: 24
Birthplace: Mossflower Woodlands
Gender: Female
Species: Kalabeck's Monitor/Blue-tailed Monitor (monitor lizard)
Job/Position: Strategist and Mercenary
Physical Description:

In general, Aurora isn’t insanely obsessed with looks. This is partially due to the fact that she’s a monitor lizard (they aren’t exactly known for beauty) and partially because she looks sort of beat up – missing one eye and one hand, the only respectable aspect about her is the infrequent streaks and spots of almost unnatural blue decorating her scales. The rest of her body is a dull and somewhat boring blue-gray. Her missing eye, now an empty socket, is covered by a black eyepatch, creating a pirate or corsair-like appearance, and the remaining eye is a rather odd crimson which is actually quite typical for members of her species. There is always a rather amused look hovering on her face, the permanent smirk exposing rows of ivory teeth that serve to make her appearance more threatening. The long black claws on her right hand are covered by a steel glove encasing wrist and fingers, reinforcing the claws and turning them silver, and her other arm possesses no hand – it’s only a ragged stump sheathed in a thick layer of drab scales, mainly useless hanging by her side. Usually, a thin metal coat covers the stump so it can be used as a sort of shield against swords when necessary. The rest of her body is slightly scarred but mostly unremarkable. Besides the steel glove and eyepatch, Aurora is often seen wearing various weapons, scavenged from fallen friends and enemies alike. Three of these are worn around her waist - a kilij, falchion, and gladius. None of these are poisoned - she doesn't believe in using poisons to kill opponents. Their blades are simple metal, with none of the bright colors most warlords use to advertise their armies. Strapped to her back is a two-handed blade somewhat like a claymore, with a blade serrated to look like the waves of the sea, although this isn't symbolic of anything.

Belongings:

Kilij, falchion, gladius, and zweihander. See bottom of page for information. +Steel glove on her single remaining hand, as well as a belt for her three weapons and strips of leather to hold the zweihander's sheath on her back.

Personality:

Aurora used to be a lot more confident when she had both hands. Unfortunately, with the loss of the left hand and, by consequence, her skills with the bow, she tends to stay out of pointless fights now. Aurora can be sarcastic if pushed to it, usually reserving any of this attitude for something that annoys her. She's usually calm, despite what her permanent smirk might suggest, and is much more level-headed then she was when Eyrie recruited her. This is why she's best at strategy; without any of the 'rush-blindly-into-battle' most warriors have, she can think of a plan and work on its flaws and strengths. This is why she's so valuable to anyone who values intelligence over blind strength. She doesn't really think of herself as evil or good; she has a distaste for vermin, but also one for woodlanders - in her experience, they're usually more gullible then your average rat or fox, albeit more intelligent. Even with this distaste, however, she's willing to work with either woodlanders or warlords, if they're willing to listen to her. The reason for her distaste for vermin stems from the gang she was forced to be a part of; she's not a fan of woodlanders since they are always unfailingly hostile to her (she knows it's because she's a monitor lizard, and if she was a mouse, she'd probably freak out at the sight of a giant lizard) but still. Since the loss of her hand, she hasn't really had any identifiable goal - most jobs and occupations require two hands.

History:

Neph and Gaia Varan, Aurora's great-grandparents, came from Sampetra. Ublaz Mad-Eyes had commanded them and a crew of other assorted vermin to sail to Green Isle, but when they became lost due to a hopeless steersbeast, they wound up on the shores of Mossflower. Unfortunately, as they did so, their boat Nightsail was destroyed on an outcrop of rocks, leaving them to fend for themselves in the woodlands. Since there were no ship builders among the crew, and neither Neph nor Gaia knew the slightest thing about repairing boats, they decided to send out a small party of vermin in an attempt to find someone who would help them rebuild. When none of them returned, the remaining creatures and the two monitors were forced to leave the wrecked ship behind and find a way to survive in this 'new' land.

All of the crew were gone within a couple of days, presumably having joined different vermin bands around Mossflower. Luckily for the two monitors, it was the middle of summer where their ship had crashed so they wouldn't freeze to death. A line of monitors descended from their line ending with Nurad Varan, Aurora's father. Nocturn came from an island near Sampetra, and a while after they met, Aurora was born.

As a daughter of two monitor lizards trained in the art of fighting, she was taught from a young age how to battle. When Nurad realized she was much better with the bow then the sword, he switched from training her how to use swords to training her to use ranged weapons such as the bow and throwing knives. This turned out to be a rather stupid decision in the long run, as she would end up losing a hand when she was older, and while she wasn't a novice with the sword, she wasn't amazing with it. When she got older (around ten), it was revealed that the old crew members had actually banded together as the group of twoscore crew vermin attacked their home. Since there were only two monitors against forty enemies, they were ultimately slain after they had disposed of about ten of the vermin. In an attempt to defend her home, Aurora used her bow and arrows to shoot three of them before she was captured.

The vermin gang's leader, a weasel who introduced himself as Eyrie, gave Aurora an ultimatum - join his group or be killed. Since she still wanted revenge on the group, she joined, taking the swords from her dead parents before she left and gaining a kilij and falchion in addition to her bow.

She spent a lot of time with the group and killed a bunch of innocent woodlanders before she finally grew to be eighteen and challenged Eyrie for leadership of the gang. A long fight ensued, with Aurora alternately using the falchion, kilij, and bow to attack the weasel, before she finally trapped her foe in a corner. Unfortunately, instead of a possible easy kill, the weasel was also prepared to strike, and when she plunged her father's falchion into Eyrie's heart, he stabbed her left eye with the dagger he had been carrying in his belt and destroyed the eye, leaving her partially blinded. However, he was dead, and after her eye had healed sufficently and she'd taken the gladius from her fallen foe, she made a black eyepatch for herself out of batskin leather, keeping the socket from being seen - an enemy wouldn't take it as a sign of weakness, assuming she was a pirate or corsair.

She'd now inherited an entire vermin gang, but she didn't have any quarrel with them and simply left, allowing them to fight for the honor of being leader. Without any idea of where she was going to go, only knowing she didn't want any association with vermin like that ever again, she began roaming Mossflower. Still skilled in the bow and arrow, she made herself a name as a traveling mercenary with astounding accuracy for her single eye. Unfortunately, when one target was more then she bargained for, she got in a sword-to-sword fight again, this time ending in the death of her foe, the loss of her hand, and the gain of a two-handed sword. After this unfortunate occurance, she mostly gave up on mercenary work and turned her skill with the bow to skill with strategy.

After a few jobs, mostly involving vermin tribes at war with each other and wanting a way to get the other out of the way easily, Aurora became a wanderer once more, doing the odd job for anyone who asked and ultimately becoming a name that only a select few warlords and woodlanders knew of.

Code Words: [[correct]]

[Tirael]

Well, technically monitor lizards aren't on our species list, but hey, they're canon and we've never had one. Plus, your bio seems pretty good, so I'm gonna go with this.

Accepted.