Walder the Rogue

While Tim Tigeon was a happy farmer's boy, Walder's dad, the town's tanner, was a violent drunk. The miserable tanner's boy would routinely greet Tim by punching him in the face, although the future ranger never begrudged him for it, much. When Walder's father beat his mother to death when he was was not much more than a boy, he ran from the town of Maeiah, swearing never to return. He spent his young adulthood in the shadow alleys of Femin surviving as a hood, thief and sometimes killer. He petitioned to join the Mice Eyes, a particularly nasty guild and made a small chest as a cutthroat. Figuring himself badass enough to make a future fortune as an adventurer, he left the Mice Eyes by running to the woods and eventually made it to Gavin Wel.

Walder became companion with Zarconus, the knight of the Platinum Dragon, by a dark path. Having arrived in the Emerald City with a heavy satchel of gold, Walder spent a few nights hanging out at the Glowing eye, a place known for society types and high rollers. Growing impatient after having found no work, he eavesdropped on Zarconus going over maps and a plan to open the Shadow Road with a duo of adventurers, including the knight's younger brother Kaiel and a young boy, presumably rogue. While assigning all the scouting and thieving details to this one young rosy-cheeked kid, probably the son of one of the others, Zarconus does not notice Walder behind a lantern enrapt and waiting the wait of a predator. Holding until the kid made a pit stop in the privy to make his move, Walder silently dropped down on him and opened him from navel to neck with his sharp shank. When the tavern exploded in commotion and shouting twenty minutes after upon the discovery in the privy, Walder slid up next to Zarconis and whispered, "I don't mean to pry, but it seems to me as though you may be in the need of a good sneak."

(entry by Obi and Benjie Watterson)