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Background: Servant
Source: GenLegend custom (based on Astarion’s Book of Hungers)
Power can last only in a strong dynasty. Your masters held power for as long as there was a country to rule. And that power is always hungry.
You served, and listened. When your survival depends on their tastes, you listen: a difficult year. Insufficient body. Charming, but it will not keep. Something young and red, and frankly wasted on the occasion. You stood at the sideboard with the decanter and learned the entire register: what travels, what wants laying down, what improves with keeping and what merely goes on. Nobody was ever crude. Not once did anyone say a mean word to you. They discussed the guest list the way one discusses a cellar, and they were delighted, and they were generous with their compliments, and you poured.
You were just old enough. The terms were generous: a bed, a wage, and the word of a great house, which is worth more than either. They paid you to keep you. And you supplied, and filled their cups. Not cruelty. Arithmetic. Survival.
Every night you prepared a banquet for the guests. Every night you cleaned up after. But the stench and stains of iron and wine rarely vanish. You knew where the silver was hidden, and the guests left generous tips. You were not brave enough to free the world of their tyranny. But you were brave enough to say enough. You ran away. It was easy. Too easy.
You got out. But then you heard it all again, coming from inside you. “Dear, my cup is empty... and I am thirsty.”
You are out. You think so. You want to. Whether you were released, or merely reassigned, is a question you have decided not to hold up to the light. But the masters still have a hold on you. The channel did not close. The debt was never settled. And yet they allow this. A letter reached you, and with it the signet of the house, yours to use in their name: it opens doors that were never going to open, closes others for good, and teaches everyone who sees it something about you that you would rather they did not know. Instructions came with it. They said they were happy for you, happy you had found your calling. But it arrived in a tavern you had not known you would stop at, in a room with the door shut, and it was lying on top of you. The message was unwritten and yet so clear. They still own you. They will allow this, and that is not something you can get out of your head. You still receive orders. Follow the instructions, they say, and you will buy your freedom. And if you do not... well. You had better, darling.
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Ability scores | STR, CON, CHA |
| Skills | Persuasion, Stealth |
| Tool | Cook’s Utensils |
| Origin feat | Cupbearer |