Penphel

Penphel is a sorcerer who lives in the city-state of Tuluk. He was the son of a farmer in the area of Gol Krathu when Muk Utep's army swept through the area gathering slaves. Luckier than most he was made the student of a scribe and sent back to the city where construction was already under way on Muk Utep's pyramid.

Once in the city the life of Penphel was rather easy compared to what he had known on his father's farm. He was given clean clothes, regular meals, and a dry mat to sleep on. What's more, there was almost no physical labor involved in his teachings.

In good time Penphel grew to manhood and took a place in Muk Utep's war machine as a scribe. There he was able to travel over much of the Known World as he recorded the movements of the army. It was on one of these journeys that he first encountered sorcery.

As the scribe of a general it was part of Penphel's job to decipher any writings recovered after a battle. One set of writings brought to him were in tatlum, a language which at the time was being taught to scribes. The writings detailed the casting of a basic sorcery spell and the concepts of gathering from both self and the land.

This papers Penphel kept to himself and studied often when he could get away with it. Eventually he was able to master the spell and snuck away from the camp to cast it in the dark of night to try it. Fearing that gathering the energy from himself would leave him too weakend to return, he instead gathered from the land for the spell.

The casting was a success, making Penphel invisible. The gather was also a success, and alerted the templars within the army to the precense of sorcery in the area. The spell wore off quickly and penphel ran back to the encampment, fabricating a story about having seen a group of elves, a common event in those days. Guards were set and the event was fast forgotten.

Penphel did not practice sorcerery again for a handful of years after this incident, fearing how easily the templars had detected his precense. He never forgot, however, the feeling of gathering or the sense of power he felt being able to become invisible.

The apparent secret to Penphel's power is that he's a coward. He will under no circumstances use magick nor indicate that he has magickal knowledge within the city. His ability to mask his mind and play stupid are superlative and have fooled generations of templars.

One a year Penphel makes a trip outside of the city and stays in a secluded hut for two weeks practicing his spells. Due to the limited amount of time he has to do this he defiles the land to insure that he always has enough mana to cast. In the rare event that he is discovered he immediately becomes ethereal and returns to the city.

Penphel's greatest powers are those of immortality and concealment. It is his belief that if he can outlive the sorcerer kings and the dragon he will somday be a power in the world. His cowardly nature, however, makes this very unlikely.

When roleplaying Penphel always keep in mind that he is afraid of being discovered for what he really is. He will in no event engage in illegal activity which would draw the attention of the templarate down upon him either. Nor will he move against the powers of the world, such as the Dragon or the Sorcerer Kings.

This is not to say that he will have nothing to do with players. Penphel is terribly curious about what is happening in the world, as well as increasing his own knowledge. If a player has a piece of information that he desires, he will point them in the right direction.

Examples:

The gypsies once came to Penphel with a document concerning the binding of Luir in the obsidian mines. The parchment was burned and torn, but it spoke of Whyshirrim to a great extent and Penphel dearly wanted to copy it down. In exchange, he told them about the Tree of Life at Luir's well, and how to get to it. This was information that cost him nothing to give.

Most recently Marit came to Penphel and offered to tell him about herself as well as show him some documents about assasinations for Salarr in the past. In exchange he has been teaching her how to read/write in Sirihish. Normally he would not do this, since it is illegal. In the case of Marit, however, he realizes little harm would come his way if the Templarate could catch a sub-elemental.