Ronon Darkholme

Name: Ronon Darkholme
Class: Shadowbane Stalker
Birthplace: Baldur's Gate (but came to Sundren from Anaurch)
Age: 27
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Deity: Kelemvor
Alignment: LG

Ronon Darkholme was brought into this world at the temple of Kelemvor located in Baldur’s Gate. His father was a captain in the Knights of The Eternal Order who had proven to be a great leader and his mother was one of Kelemvor’s Favored Souls. His birth was eagerly awaited by all at the temple as he was expected to join his father in the fight against all who dishonor the dead.

Fate, it seems, had other plans for Ronon and his family.

One dark winter night, while Ronon’s father was on patrol outside the gates, his mother was walking home from her duties at the temple. At her advanced state of pregnancy, one of the younger Knights escorted her home, as was typical. They spoke quietly of the coming birth and the joy it would bring. Everything was exactly as it had been for the last few months.

Until a blood-curdling scream tore through the still night air.

The young paladin drew his sword, told his charge to stay where she was, and rushed down the alley towards the scream. Ronon’s mother knew that if someone was hurt, she could help with the blessings Kelemvor granted her, so she ignored the order and followed a few steps behind.

As they rounded the corner, the pair came to an abrupt halt at the sight before them. A beautiful woman crouched over another woman who was on the ground. She held her torso up by the shoulders with her face pressed against the neck and rocking slightly as if weeping. As the paladin approached, the woman lifted her gaze to meet his. The beautiful, pale skin was only marred by the smear of crimson blood covering the lower part of her face. When she snarled at the stunned knight, moonlight glistened off her elongated canine teeth. They had interrupted a vampire while it was feeding.

The young knight immediately charged the creature, slashing with his enchanted bastard sword. He fought with all the passion and fury one would expect from a Knight of The Eternal Order facing an undead abomination. Alas, the newly knighted lad was far outmatched by the vile creature. The beautifully deadly vampire easily ripped him to shreds. She then turned her attention to Ronon’s mother.

The pregnant lady tried to run for safety, but her condition, coupled with the shock of what she had just witnessed, slowed her retreat. To complicate matters, the stress and horror of the situation sent the expectant mother into labor. To her credit, she managed to make it out of the alley and into the street before the vampire caught her from behind.

The vampire, intoxicated on the blood of her first victim, began clawing and tearing at the Kelemvorite. The more she screamed, the more the beast got caught up in the torture. Finally, the beast had had enough “playing”, grabbed the woman, and sunk her fangs into her neck to gorge herself once more. That was when the other knights and clerics from the temple reached the scene.

The more experienced knights attacked the beast while the clerics rushed the woman to the safety of the temple. The vampire, who had seemed so powerful before, was easily defeated by the veteran paladins. After dispatching the vile beast, they returned to the temple and sent a runner to find her husband.

Ronon’s mother held onto life, slipping in and out of consciousness, until her husband arrived. He held her in a gentle embrace that belied his massive frame. He tried to comfort her, but the pain of her wounds and the growing pains of labor were far too much for the dieing woman. With her last breath, she drew her husband close and made him vow on his honor to save their child. The moment he agreed, she smiled softly, and then died in his arms.

The noble knight let out an anguished scream. His fellow knights drew close and tried to make him release his dead wife so that the clerics could perform rites on her. The huge man, tears streaming down his face and across his bloodied plate armor, refused and angrily pushed their hands away. He knew he had just taken the first oath of honor that he would be forced to break. And it had been to the woman he loved most in this world. He again held her lifeless body tight.

As he held her to his chest, his eyes grew wide. He had felt a movement. Could she be becoming one of the undead? Not so soon and not from the wounds she had received. He looked at her in shocked silence. That is when he noticed the source of the movement. It was coming not from her, but from the child inside.

In a flash of what some would call madness and others would call divine intervention, he knew what must be done. The noble and courageous knight drew his dagger and quickly cut into the belly of his dead wife. The others, frozen in shock at the sight of their brother in arms desecrating his wife’s body, could only stand and bear witness to the unspeakable act unfolding before them. Before the first made a move towards him, the knight turned to them slowly. In his arms was a baby boy, still covered in the blood of his mother. The child wiggled and made some noises, but did not cry. The knightly father looked up at the symbol of his lord Kelemvor then back to the baby in his arms.

“From death, comes life,” he said softly to no one in particular.

From the time Ronon entered this world, he was trained by the clerics and paladins in the service of Kelemvor. While he did well in the martial training, he excelled in his studies with the clergy of the Lord of The Dead. Some say this is due to a metaphysical connection he has with Kelemvor due to the odd events of his “birth.” In truth, he simply feels more comfortable with the slightly less rigid life style of the clergy than the strict, military regiment of Kelemvor’s paladins. His less than great strength and barely average constitution also gave the more combat oriented members of the Order pause in believing the prophesies of some great calling for the “one born of death.” When the Knight’s attitudes would get too much for the young Kelemvorite, he would sneak away into the dark corners of the city. From there, he watched and listened to all around him. He eventually became quite good at remaining unseen and unheard as he watched. His rapid progress with the clergy was enough to make his father proud.

One night, Ronon was watching a group he believed to be suspicious. He was hiding in the shadows and remaining as quiet as death itself. As he watched, a hand clamped down across his mouth and pulled him deeper into the shadows. The grip was strong, yet did not do him any harm. Ronon stopped struggling and a voice whispered in his ear.

“Silence, young watcher…the evil before you is more than you are prepared to handle at this time.”

With that, the black-gloved hand released its grip slowly. To his credit, Ronon made no sound as he slowly turned his head to view his captor. His eyes met those of the dark-clad man. The eyes he looked into were dark…almost shadowed…with soft points of light within. The man pointed to the ones Ronon had been watching. Ronon followed his gesture a moment then turned back to find the man gone. Unsure of what to do, he turned his attention back to the small group meeting in the dead of night.

One of the men reached down to a large bag near the edge of the street. When he opened it, the half-rotted face of a corpse could be seen in the dim star light. Ronon resisted the urge to run and kept watching. One of the others…one that carried himself much more confidently than the others…knelt beside the bag and began chanting. Dark energies flowed from his fingertips and his mouth and began swirling around the corpse. In a few seconds, the rotting husk began to slowly twitch and move.

“Necromancers,” Ronon whispered…a bit louder than he had planned.

The apparent leader whirled and called his companions to grab the boy. They had barely moved when a hail of arrows turned the closest into a pin-cushion. A split second later, a pair of knights wearing the colors of the Eternal Order charged from the surrounding alleys and attacked the defilers with holy abandon. The battle lasted mere seconds and saw all the necromancers dead. The dark garbed man that had grabbed him earlier emerged from the shadows and mumbled a few words over the writhing undead thing they had raised. At the end of his prayer, the noble dead fell silent once more. He then turned his gaze, now with eyes of crystal blue, back to Ronon.

Ronon was taken back to the temple and his father was called for. When his father arrived, he seemed quite displeased with his son for being out this late at night. That was, until the dark-garbed man held up his hand, silently stopping the tongue lashing before it began. Ronon’s father went slightly pale in this man’s presence. Something Ronon had never seen his father do in the presence of anyone or anything before. Then the living shadow spoke.

“The boy has the sight. He does not yet know it, nor how to call upon it, but the gift is there. He is destined to become one of us…one of the Night Watch. Do you give permission for your son to take up this honor, Lord Darkholme?”

Ronon’s father was beside himself with pride. His son…the one born of death…the weakling the other knights made fun of behind his back…would be of the Night Watch. The smallest and most dreaded faction in the Eternal Order. Scouts… investigators… watchers in the dark. All are gifted with the ability to see the evil that lurks within the souls of men. All tasked with watching for weaknesses and alerting the Order when to strike to better ensure victory over those who would defile the noble dead.

As Ronon’s training was at its end, he was assigned as the Night Watch under his father’s command. After a few small skirmishes and assignments, Ronon proved his skills and cunning to all in the company. In the winter of his 21st “birthday,” the company was sent after a large group of Banites operating near Anauroch. They were gathering followers and amassing a large army of undead which they intended to march westward, conquering any in their path. When they met the Eternal Order company, backed up by warriors from the Flaming Fists of Baldur’s Gate, their progress stalled. They lost dozens of followers and hundreds of undead to the Kelemvorite warriors.

Having had enough of their losses, the Banite’s leaders sent wave after wave of undead at this most fearsome unit. This onslaught was meant to wipe out the main obstacle thwarting the advancement of the undead armies once and for all. The vile necromancers even raised the fallen knights and their squires to use against their former brothers. This campaign went on for days, slowly whittling down the number of knights. Even with additional forces from the Flaming Fists, the knights were hard-pressed to hold ground. While the number of undead destroyed outnumbered the fallen knights nearly twenty-to-one, the losses were harder to replace for the living than the dead.

On a particularly hard offensive by the undead hordes, the battle was not going well for the knights. Their losses and the seemingly unending hordes of abominations were not only taking a toll on their resources, but also on morale. This was especially true of the younger knights.

As more and more knights fell to the rush of undead, it became clear they needed something to rally the morale of the men and get them to redouble their efforts to keep the hordes at bay. Ronon’s father took up Kelemvor’s standard in his shield hand and his great bastard sword in his other and charged a large group that had driven a small band of knights, along with several warriors from the Flaming Fists, to the top of a small hill. His armor splattered with undead blood and his sword shining brightly in the winter sun, he cut his way to the trapped group and planted the standard atop the hill. When the rest of the men saw this symbol, planted high for all to witness, they did indeed fight harder and with their original zeal. Ronon felt the pride well up inside him as he gained strength from his father’s actions, striking out with a fever he had never felt before. His blade and spells ripped through any who came near him.

While this act was a turning point for the battle, it was not without its price.

The standard, flying high in the cold breeze, had also grabbed the attention of the necromantic commanders. With the setting of the sun, they doubled the number of undead and sent more powerful undead against this icon of hope. This force included vampires and other powerful undead along with the normal zombies and skeletons. The warriors on the hill, weary from a day-long fight, began to fall to this new assault.

Many others, including Ronon, who was forced out of the shadows and into the battle, had been cutting a path towards the hill for some time. By the time the elite undead force reached the hill, Ronon and his group was within shouting distance of his father and the rest. Ronon watched in horror as the vampires, much like the one that had killed his mother all those years ago, swarmed the remaining defenders of the hill top and knocked the standard down. The last Ronon saw of his father was him being dragged down in a sea of undead and blood.

This assault, which was meant to break the spirits of the remaining knights and warriors, had the exact opposite effect. All the undead masters had done was make martyrs out of the hill top defenders. Now, instead of facing opponents with broken spirits and no hope, the scourge hordes faced a force of zealots with purpose and honor on their side. Shouts of “For the fallen!!” and “Honor the dead!!” could be heard rising up above the sounds of battle. Even those who had been wounded and were being removed from the field of battle rose up off their litters to rejoin the fight, their pride and honor overriding the pain of their wounds. The undead army…or any army…could not hope to win against such powerful feelings and sense of purpose. Especially when wielded by such capable warriors.

During the route of the undead, Ronon made his way to the hill where he had seen his father fall. As he reached the top, the young cleric came face-to-face with his worst nightmare. Before him stood his father. But it was his noble father no more.

As a last effort to demoralize the knights, the necromantic leaders of the army raised all who had fallen on the hill top and turned them into their servants. The only order they received was to kill the knights.

Ronon was forced to face the thing his father had become amidst the blood and gore of a days long battle. Even as a zombie, his father’s skill with a blade was much greater than his. It was all Ronon could do to keep from losing his head to the bastard sword of his father. In the end, Ronon only managed to defeat his father by calling on the power of Kelemvor and rebuking him. This stunned the thing his father had become long enough for Ronon to remove its head. The rest of the knights found him holding the remains of his father as if comforting him. Those old enough to remember saw an eerie resemblance to the scene all those years ago when a Knight of The Eternal Order held his lifeless wife at the temple. Not one word was spoken until Ronon lifted the remains and asked that his father’s sword be placed across him as he carried his father back to the temple for a proper funeral. The entire Order, from across the land, attended the funeral.

Ronon, still heartbroken at the loss of his father, fell into a melancholy. His superiors in the order became increasingly worried about his mental well being. They decided his only chance to come to terms with having to put down his own father was to leave Baldur’s Gate and find a new purpose in life.

Ronon went back to Anauroch, near the place his father had fallen. He spent his days in meditation and prayer and his nights in hunts for any remaining Banites or undead in the area. As his skills grew, the “sight” came to him. His eyes began to take on the shadowy aspect he had seen in those of the one that trained him. He no longer saw the world the same as ordinary people. He saw the evil that men held in their hearts and souls. It emanated from them like a cancerous fog surrounding them. After a couple of years roaming the wastelands, Ronon finally came to accept his fate in life. He was Night Watch. He exists only to serve the church. And he is alone.

So, Ronon gathered his belongings, including his father’s sword and the dagger that had been used to cut him from his dead mother, and made his way to a land he had heard was filled with evil. Perhaps here, he can find peace and a place to belong.