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A forest of briars sprang up around the castle, shielding it from the outside world: no one could try penetrate it without facing certain death in the thorns.~ The Tale of Sleeping Beauty~~'~,~@
Name Thurisaz the reconstructed Proto-Germanic name of the runic letter, Thorn.
Y'know, a pun on his existence ^^
As far as meaningless names go, I like
Raikov, but the
Random Name Generator is your friend :3
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History Thurisaz started off as any other young man might, living out his childhood and adolescent years in the shade of a large and wild forest in a humble cottage with his *family. Eking out an existence as they did in that untamed land was difficult, but not impossible, and came as something of a natural propensity for Thurisaz. He was a born tracker and hunter who only improved as he grew, progressing rapidly from the small game traps he experimented with as a child to hunting large boar and hinds with an expert eye and a strong longbow. In the summers, he kept his family well fed but the long, frigid winters were hard even for him, and he would have to range further and further into the black forest, foraging for any prize to bring home. Game was scarce and wary during such times, and it was in the middle of one of these harsh winters that Thurisaz inadvertently met his first God.
After the third thankless night spent out in the seemingly endless, ragged fringes of the forest, he came the fourth night upon a stag in the prime of its life and healthy-seeming as you please. At that moment he felt he had never seen a more beautiful sight, and with a grateful eye, sighted it and let his arrow fly. It struck true and the stag belled out once in pain before it lay still in the snow. No sooner had Thurisaz knelt next to his prize than he was assailed with the sound of baying hounds and thunderous hooves and with terror, he realized he had killed the quarry of the Wild Hunt.
Cernunnos, the leader of the hunt, was severely angered and changed Thurisaz into a wolf to suit his thieving nature and gave him the horns of the stag he had killed as penitence and a constant reminder of his folly. The god then declared that Thurisaz would be the new game of the Hunt. Thus the chase was on. Thurisaz eluded capture as best he could, but where he lasted the night, he only had a day's paltry reprieve before the Hunt set upon him afresh come moonrise. One such night, as he was crawling through the thick brambles of the forest in a desperate attempt to find cover, he came upon a **woman. Exhausted, sorely pricked by thorns and wild-eyed with fear, Thurisaz begged her to help him, but she refused to lift a finger to save him. He pleaded with her, saying he would do anything if only she would hide him, and she relented on the condition Thurisaz became hers to own until she felt his debts to her had been paid. Frantic, he agreed and the woman, who was a witch, changed him into a briar bush using the long, black thorns entangled his fur.
When the Hunt arrived soon after, they found their quarry had vanished into the thicket of brambles, never guessing that he had become a thorn bush himself, and after some searching they gave up the chase and moved on off into the sky. Thurisaz changed back and thereafter was bound by heavy price into the service of the witch who had helped him escape the God's Hunt.
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Possible Future/Additional Past/Plot Connection - thing After a hundred years had passed, a prince who had heard the story of the enchantment braved the wood, which parted at his approach, and entered the castle. He trembled upon seeing the princess' beauty and fell on his knees before her... ~ The Tale of Sleeping BeautyAs the witch grows older (see footnote **) she becomes less kindly and more wicked. Eventually, she becomes the witch described in the story of Briar Rose (also known as Sleeping Beauty). She curses the girl and the castle with her and places Thurisaz as the gate's guardian. Thurisaz falls in love with the girl but is in a quandary because he is bound by his promise to the witch and cannot go against her, yet he wants nothing more than to save the hapless girl. He entertains the possibility of being both the princess's jailer and her savior, and after a hundred years (the allotted time given by the witch) is able to enter the castle in his human form, commanding his own thorns to step aside for him.
What happens between him and the princess, what he will ultimately do, and whether the witch will ever release him from his bondage is up to you. This could all be his past, and you could officially 'start' playing him after he has been newly freed, or you could play all of this as a plot. *shrugs*
Essentially, a retelling of the Briar Rose story from the point of view of the briars :3
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Side Notes Thurisaz has three forms: he can inhabit the shape of a wolf with antlers on his brow and thorns woven into his pelt; the shape of the man he used to be; and the shape of a briar thicket. When in the latter shape, his thickets never flower, which is one way to tell which bushes are just bushes, and which bushes are Thurisaz in disguise. Whether you want him to be in free command of these alterations himself, or whether you want them to be something he needs to ask the witch permission for is your decision.
Touched by a God's magic coupled with continuous contact with the witch's magic on a daily basis, I imagine him to have a greatly extended life span, but that's totally your call.
He has command over thorny plants, and can grow them impossibly thick and tall in accordance with the briar magic the witch imbued him with. Other than that he is not particularly gifted, although he is still an excellent hunter, made all the more keen by having once been prey himself.
POSSIBLE song association here. I can't decide if the lyrics fit or not, yet.
Blitzen Trapper - Furr ::::
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Personality Although I told the story somewhat soberly, it doesn't have to be. The way it's played out could be though a series of comical-seeming events, or ludicrous situations. I'm particularly thinking of books like the
Enchanted Forest Chronicles (check out the plot summaries...the books are quite cute), which regularly pokes lighthearted fun at the oddities and ridiculous situations fairy tales often have in them.
Then again, you could make it dark, humorless and tormented, as the Grimms fairy tales were originally meant to be told. It'd be easy to do either, and depending on what kind of tone you're looking for, you'll shape the character of Thurisaz differently.
How closely you want to follow the background story I offered is up to you. If you want to use the whole thing verbatim, that's just as fine with me as if you only wanted to use some key points.
FOOTNOTES
* Family - Subject to your whims, and easily changeable depending on whether you have any canidates for him, or will eventually. He could be one of many children, or be a single child in charge of caring for his aging mother, or anywhere in between.
**Woman - I based her off of the German goddess
Perchta who is a "guardian of the beasts." She appears dually as an old hag and a beautiful woman and Perchta was at first a benevolent spirit. In Germanic paganism, Perchta had the rank of a minor deity. That changed to an enchanted creature (spirit or elf) in Old High German - such as Grimm describes - but she was given a more malevolent character (sorceress or witch) in later ages . You can, of course, change this to suit whatever character you decide might take the role of the 'woman.' I use her to suit my version of the story, in lieu of knowing which characters you have/will have.
Prizes: Lucain Self Breed because I have no Lucain, or else the Nagi, please.
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