The Keeper
The man with a house, but no home; finding the missing, but not what's missing.
Character name: Adrien Durand.
Age: 18.
Region: Born and raised in Imisus; currently a wanderer, but with a home in Mishkan.
Appearance: Small, pale, and delicate, Adrien has never known the flush of youthful vitality, and probably never will. He's a pale flame of a person who seems to consume himself -- no matter how much he tries to exercise or how healthy he eats, he has stopped growing at 5' and can't be much more than 100 lbs.
He is very pale, with equally pale blond hair, usually kept short and combed neatly, and surprisingly sharp green eyes. When embarrassed, he tends to flush a shocking shade of red, and he sunburns badly instead of tanning. In an unfortunate twist of fate, he gets cold very easily, and so he’s almost always bundled up in a thick coat, gloves, and boots, with a long scarf wound multiple times around his neck. Despite this, his thin, bony hands are almost always cold when he removes his gloves, and he always internally groans when he has to go to Shyregoed.
Somehow, against all odds, he escaped the Plague while hardier folk around him succumbed to it.
Personality: Adrien comes off as well-bred, polite, even a little shy -- he doesn’t go out of his way to be social, but when he does speak, he tries to take care not to step on any toes or bruise any feelings. Upsetting people is more trouble than it’s worth, and if a little extra effort on his part to smooth over potential offenses can prevent loud arguments or fights, so much the better.
His Plague’s loud, unflattering observations are a source of great embarrassment for him, as he hates being the center of attention -- especially
negative attention. In fact, he dislikes commotion in general, and tends to be a bit of a wallflower, fading into a crowd or the background fairly easily. Of course, being on most people’s good side is very helpful when he has questions that need answering, or people that need finding.
His quietness isn’t for a lack of things to say, though. While his education was good, if unremarkable, he prefers to
observe. People, to him, are the most strange and curious creatures of all, and the Plague is the greatest puzzle. During the long hours he spent people-watching from his window as a child, he acquired a peculiar knowledge of people's general habits, and the possible meanings of a nervous glance or an unusual stain. He doesn't always get it right, and he usually keeps his observations to himself.
He does not like hastiness, nor does he like to be rushed; he much prefers to have the luxury of time, to be able to look, listen, and learn. The right question here and the proper observation there can give him plenty of information, though he doesn’t spread it unless asked, keeping it to formulate his own ideas. Given adequate time, he can make plans, and backup plans, and prepare -- since, to him, preparation is the most important task of all.
Unfortunately, this leads to him to be overly cautious sometimes, as he prefers to think, not act. He will hesitate to take opportunities and risks when he ought to, and he would rather retreat from a disadvantageous situation than stick it out. If he has another compelling reason to stay, such as loyalty to a person or to his ideals, that will override his caution -- but in the absence of that, retreat it is. As a result, he usually doesn't end up in situations out of his control or beyond his ability to affect.
His caution stems in part from the fact that he prefers to be prepared, but it also has roots in insecurity. He simultaneously craves affirmation and distrusts it, just as he seeks company, but is uncomfortable with others. Although he has observed others for years, he has rarely attempted to interact with them himself -- and after his mother's death, a fear of further attachment took root. She was the only person he considered himself close to, but even she could not escape the Plague.
This is probably complicated by his very strong, optimistic belief in people’s inherent goodness, which almost borders on naivete. He’s not stupid -- he knows that people will lie, cheat, steal, and murder, and that some people are simply beyond redemption or caring about it. However, rather than deny that evil exists, he chooses to believe that all people have the capability to be good, but circumstances have forced them to be otherwise, and he’s very enthusiastic about it. Morals and righteousness are the topic that rouse the strongest response from him, and he will go on at length about doing the right thing if the listener lets him. Directing him away from the subject, or telling him to shut up, might work -- but he will quietly, and stubbornly continue to believe. Whether he will always believe, though, is uncertain -- especially in a place like Panymium, where so many have been brought low by the Plague.
History: In Imisus, the household of a Scientist and his wife was busier than ever. Marie Durand was reserved, refined, intelligent, ladylike, and polite, the daughter of a soldier; Vincent Durand, on the other hand, was an eccentric Scientist, prone to long silences followed by loud and excessive rambling when struck by a particularly good idea. Though the marriage had been arranged by their parents, it was not unhappy, and Adrien was born in the middle of a bitterly cold winter. His parents both had high hopes. His father wanted him to follow in his footsteps -- and his mother hoped that he would follow her own father into the military. Ever since marrying Vincent, she had become painfully aware of the silent distrust leveled at the Scientists, especially since her own family treated her husband with suspicion and wariness. If her son was to become a soldier, he might find an easier way through life; she kept the hope that he would thereby break her family's silence locked in her chest.
As he grew, Adrien took most after his mother, who was home much more often. His father was almost always working, not returning until long after his son had fallen asleep, then rising in the early hours of the morning to go to work. When they
were in the house at the same time, Adrien was embarrassed by his father’s sudden and often incomprehensible outbursts, and withdrew from them, becoming ever quieter and more thoughtful.
He was frequently ill, and never took well to running around roughhousing with other children. When they were playing tag, he was off to one side, watching beetles scurrying in the dirt, or in town, browsing a trinket shop. His one joy seemed to be examining and collecting unusual objects -- anything from teacups to butterflies to trinkets to his favorite, scarves. He would spend hours examining each new acquisition, studying them from every angle and discovering all their intricacies.
Eventually, though, his curiosity turned to people. People, who followed no pattern that he could discern, were the most intricate creatures of all. He took to sitting at the window, observing passersby as they bustled to and fro on the street, just like the insects had in the dirt -- and yet, to his frustration, he found no rules for them. He had to settle for observing facts about them and their habits and collecting the objects that they left behind, and over the years, the intricacies of social convention started to become clearer to him. But he was still aimless, goalless, unsure of what he wanted to do, and so he lingered, watching others and their lives, while he spent his own indoors.
Then, disaster: not long before his seventeenth birthday, his mother began to sicken. His father’s work was suddenly very, very personal, and it became an obsession. He was nearly impossible to approach, much less talk to, always busy or locked in his study. Adrien, dreading her inevitable end, stayed by his window seat, seeking to forget his own troubles by divining those of others.
Near the end, his father burst in through the front doors and straight to her bedside, with what he claimed had to be a cure. When he suddenly fell silent, Adrien knew it had failed -- but he had not expected how stifling the silent, empty house would become. His father stopped speaking altogether, withdrawing into his work. Unable to bear the deafening silence any more than he’d been able to bear the sight of his mother wasting away, Adrien packed up to leave.
But among his possessions was something that had not been there before: a box with a note. It was his final birthday present from his mother, a brand new magnifying glass -- but the lens was dirtied by a peculiar black swirl that could not be cleaned off. Nonetheless, he took it with him, unable to leave it behind, and he set off to travel and find his own way, somewhere far away from his silent home.
The first month was the hardest. He was very sharply introduced to a world of cuts, bruises, and cold nights, and he began taking odd jobs as he could. One of those jobs was for a watchmaker: to find the man’s sister, who had last been heard from on her way to Shyregoed to be married. Adrien discovered a surprising pleasure in this task, one that had been absent from all the errands he’d run; he was traveling, seeing more of Panymium, but he was doing so with a goal, asking questions and seeking someone in particular, in order to ease her brother’s worries. Unfortunately, it was not a happy ending, for she had died of the Plague.
Nonetheless, the experience left a lasting impression, and Adrien came to realize that many Panymese had loved ones who had been lost in uncertain circumstances. Adrien, without family ties or a fixed job to keep him in one spot, was well-suited to start looking for people exclusively -- finding runaways, lost travelers, and those who had succumbed to the Plague, and bringing word back to their friends and family. Though he has a house in Mishkan now, it’s little more than a place to store the objects he collects on his travels; he is more often off in the far-flung corners of Panymium. In finding the lost, he strives to fill the aching hole that has slowly grown in his chest for the past year.
And though it seems to him that each time he returns to his house, the dark swirl on the magnifying glass' lens seems to darken and expand, it must only be his imagination.
Quirks:-He loathes silence. It makes him deeply uncomfortable and shifty, especially if a particularly large or usually busy place is quiet. He seeks gatherings of people for this reason -- though not to socialize. The white noise of people in the background is calming to him. For the same reason, even though Lucia's prattlings are often nasty and barbed, he is grateful because at least then it's not
quiet.
-He likes to clean and organize. His living quarters are usually spotless and neatly arranged, no matter how temporary they are; his home in Mishkan is even more so.
-His collection of odd objects is quite impressive. While most of his collecting is aimless, just picking up interesting things here and there, some of it is based on a particular subject. He collects butterflies, chess pieces, and scarves in particular; a few of his favorites from the last collection usually travel with him, and he swaps scarves often.
-He keeps a notebook for each investigation, meticulously organized and filled with his cramped, nearly illegible handwriting. He keeps at least a written description of the person, a log of his travels and information gathered, and a little charcoal sketch if possible (going by a description, or any artwork the family might have of the person).
-He also keeps a journal. It's comforting for him to be able to organize events in his life like any other collection.
Development:-As yet, he has not found anyone who did not want to be found. This would probably be a source of great conflict for him -- to carry out his mission and bring back the lost person's whereabouts against their wishes, or to obey their wishes and tell the searchers that he failed? To go against someone's wishes, or to compromise his morals?
-He needs to grow a spine -- or, at least, to be less uncertain of himself and more confident.
-Friends! It would be nice if he found friends, though he's not very good at making them. Lucia's quick and clever, but she's not exactly very nice. He would probably be most at ease making friends with another Grimm/Plague, since they show immunity to the Black Plague that's claimed so many lives.
-Factions! As of right now I'm leaning towards the Scientists for him, but he would have to remain in the dark about their...less savory experiments, lest his sense of justice compel him to leave.
