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Tacito

 

About 31 years ago, the wizard alchemist Durante Ambrogio crafted and bound a nameless warforged to a wealthy noble by the name of Basilio Di Benedetto, marking the twelfth construct he had collected for his household guard.  Durante had promised that the Geas that had been applied to this warforged would be inherited to whoever in his family ruled the house, ensuring that no living body guards would ever need to be hired and maintained for the foreseeable future of his house.  

 

The soul-bound construct's tasks were as simple as they were tedious - guard the estate from intrusion, perform physical labor, and, when called for, act as personal guard to members of the Benedetto dynasty.  In the fifth year of the warforged's service to the Benedetto dynasty, a conspiracy between three other noble houses in the free city of Salare came to fruition to remove the powerful Benedetto house from it's influential position in the city.  While the various claims of heresy and treason were attempts to justify their actions to the Holy Empire afterward, the politics and legalities of the matter were lost upon the rank and file within the Benedetto estate.  

 

Basilio along with his wife and sister were beset upon the road en route to a diplomatic function, and slaughtered by House Enrico's mercenaries.  The rest of the dynasty came under siege on the Benedetto estate itself, by mercenaries and knights of Houses Dorathea and Grazia.  Little of the Benedetto forces were left after the siege, and what few forces were left fled, as the Geas broke when a mercenary's sword pierced the heart of the final Benedetto in the estate, Basilio's 2 year old son and six month old daughter.

 

The warforged took to the road, with no desire to be hunted and torn apart by the conflict-starved personal forces of the feuding nobles.  It's first stop took it to a local blacksmith to have fixed the damage it had received during the siege.  While it had no money to pay for repairs, the blacksmith took it as an apprentice while it worked off it's debt.  The blacksmith known only to the warforged as Pius often playfully called him Tacito, as it rarely ever spoke, nor even sought interaction besides requesting it's next assignment.  Three years later, Pius succumbed to black death, leaving the shop to Tacito.  The shop was lost to debtors within the month, however, as customers were wary to hire a construct, and also because of the warforged's poor salesmanship and undeveloped business sense.  It took to the road soon after, taking with it only it's name.  

 

Tacito's journey took it north of The Strip into the mainland of the Holy Kingdom, although it did not stay long - it was barely thirty years since the first schism war, and with the church's reversed position on the constructs, the warforged found it difficult to find work.  Mercenary contracts were virtually impossible to attain, limiting it to menial jobs and physical labour.  What work it could find was often hazardous, and it's peers suspicious, uneasy, or openly hostile.  

 

After months of northward travel, mostly by foot, Tacito arrived in Aesteria's capital city.  Mercenary work was much easier to find in the northern kingdom, particularly with the comparatively low wages that the warforged charged compared to it's human counterparts, and the relatively tame distrust present so far from the church headquarters.  Tacito was familiar only with a pike from it's days as a bodyguard, and so it was relegated to the lowest ranks of mercenaries.  For some months, Tacito worked as a pikeman by day and an apprentice blacksmith by night.  

 

Tacito caught the attention of a minor noble named Emmaline Hughes during this period.  Emmaline dabbled in alchemy, and was enthusiastically interested in the warforged, often visiting the construct while he smithed at a local shop for the sole purpose of conversation - never discouraged by an almost complete lack of reciprocation.  Despite any outward show of affections, Tacito eventually developed some attachment to her.  Over the course of a few months, the two developed a mutual friendship, and Emmaline on several occasions suggested that Tacito take up swordsmanship, the surest method to move up the mercenary ranks.  When the warforged finally acquiesced, Emmaline called in a favor from one of the Knights of her house to instruct Tacito in the use of the Longsword.  The construct learned no faster than any other human, but it's strength made it a very powerful and efficient swordsman, and six months later, Tacito was enrolled as a Man-at-Arms in a Free Company of mercenaries.

 

Tacito quickly earned a reputation in its new station, and with its enhanced status and income it started apprenticing in multiple fighting styles and weaponry, including swashbuckling, dueling and archery.  Practicing with no reprieve, and no need of rest or food, Tacito quickly mastered every weapon and style he sought after, catching the eye of his mercenary leader, who promoted him to a high position within the company, past many of the senior men-at-arms, and earning not a small amount of ire.  Tension between the warforged and several members of the company mounted as time passed, culminating when the Knight who lead the company retired back to his sponsoring house, and the new leader appointing Tacito as his second.  

 

Emmaline had retained her friendship with the warforged during its mobility through the ranks of society, and occasionally kept the construct company during its late-night practice sessions.  She was present when Tacito's small training yard was surrounded and besieged by many of the more hostile members of his own mercenary company.  Tacito was more than a match for any one of the mercenaries, but their numbers overwhelmed the warforged, and in the brief conflict Emmaline was struck down.  Tacito was forced to flee the small parcel of land he had earned, and later learned that the mercenary band had blamed the warforged for the death of Emmaline Hughes.  Hughe's family had many ties to powerful nobles throughout Aesteria, and Tacito saw little choice but to abandon his home of fifteen years.  

 

He snuck back to his land late at night, taking his weapons, and what few private possessions he had that he could carry, and then took a job as a mercenary escort for a caravan headed to Carnellia.