Hermit of Kel
"Circle of salt, stick of yew. light a candle, morning dew. The hermit is coming, What can you do? Nothing if the Hermit is after you!" Children's chant
Gutori (a.k.a. The Hermit,)
Mental characteristics
Personal history
A long time ago (2130 BF) there did exist a man named, Gutori, who lived by himself in small cabin deep in the Moors of Kel. Once, twice if dire, he would travel to one of the small communities for supplies. He didn't would show up one day walking in his long faded green hood and cloak, a large leggy black hound walking beside him. If he was getting alot he would also bring a mule. He paid in old silver coins that no one recognized but were of decent weight so no one complained. He purchased what he needed and he left that same day, dog by his side. He wasn't rude. He would answer any question posed to him but in as few words as possible and as soon as answered would continue about his business.
Rumors, the everyday entertainment for small rural communities, about him were whispered and debated over the years. And since he would only leave his cabin once or twice a year and his visits spread a half score of villages and towns it would sometimes be years between visits. Some whispered he was on the run from a foreign king. Or that he was a holy man meditating on the deeper mysteries. But he wasn't. He just prefered to be alone with his dog, Whiskers by the way, and was able to do so. The coins he paid with were from a rather decent inheritance from an unknown grandfather. His own parents had passed from the plague when he was a young man. The inheritance allowed him to live alone on a small patch of land and not be bothered.
What added to the rumors was no one was quite sure where his cabin was. It was the one thing he always was vague on. Thinking if no one knew no one could bother him. He was so knowledgable of the Moors he ws able to easily loose any tried to follow him, it happend a few times. It didn't bother him and mostly just gave him a chuckle.
Gutori made a final visit one fall. He died in his sleep in his cabin, an old man who had lived his life just the way he wanted. Whiskers, Whiskers the Third by this point, stayed with his human for a day then went and ran free on the moors, eventually joining a wolf pack but that is another story.
However.... a day after Gutori left the village of Ripple Creek, a pestilence (actually brought in by a peddler a week before) started felling villagers. Over half the village died. Those that survived blamed the strange Hermit. Word of this spread and those who delighted in spreading such tales in other communites would remind people of bad things that had happend soon after the hermit visited.
Within a few decades of these stories spreading many bad things, ill events and general malaise were atributed to the strange Hermit on the moors. Within a pair of centuries the story of the Hermit bacame something darker. There Hermit was an evil wizard who cast spells on people and communities, protected by a large black dog. Within half a millenia it was an evil spirit who haunted the moors in the guise of an old hermit. An evil spirit who could summon a pack of dark hounds to run lone travelers down if they walked the moors at night. That one persisted to this day. Anytime someone suffers a misfortune in or around the Moors of Kel, it is attributed to the Hermit. Many claim to have seen him walking the moors at night, long tattered green cloak with glowing green eyes from within the drawn hood. They say it calls out for aid and any foolish enough to approach he rips the very life from his 'saviors', leaving behind a withered husk.
And no one mentions Whiskers
Current Status
Waiting to cause misfortune
Current Location
Age
Old
Children
Pronouns
He
Sex
Male
Gender
man
Presentation
Spooky
Eyes
glowing green
Hair
Long windswept locks
Skin Tone/Pigmentation
scarred and wrinkled
Height
2 m
Weight
80 kg
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