Heartsease Whitefoot

[nikki]

Name: Heartsease Violanus
Gender: Female
Age: 15
Species: European Rabbit
Occupation: Wanderer. Heartsease has a deep wish to join the Long Patrol, and is working her way toward this goal.

Physical Appearance:
A lithe young rabbitmaid of average height for her species, Heartsease is a lively looking creature in near-constant motion. Notably smaller than a similarly-aged haremaid, she nevertheless carries herself with confidence. Her fur is the typical gray-brown of her species, save for black tipping on her ears, white on her chest and stomach, and a white right footpaw; the claws on the white footpaw are much paler than the claws on her three gray-brown paws. Her eyes are bright brown and longlashed, and her whiskers rather delicate-looking. Normally simply clothed, she wears a short tunic dyed the pale violet of her namesake flower and belted in yellow; she carries a flask and two small supply satchels on the belt, as well as a short knife suited to wilderness craft. She rarely wears jewelry of any sort, but does often make garlands of leaves and flowers in season. Heartsease always carries a spear with a shaft as long as she is tall (including erect ears), with the metal spearhead extending a further foot beyond her eartips and flanked by two metal lugs. Expressive and confident, she is an easy book to read and a friendly, outgoing maid more or less comfortable in her own fur, with only the typical misgivings of a creature out on her own for the first time and beginning to find her role.

Possessions:
Spear: Heartsease's most prized possession is a yew-and-iron spear with a small metal spike opposite the main spearhead. Old, but well maintained.

Knife: More suited to trimming lines and cutting roots and branches than battle, though one imagines it will do in a pinch.

Flask: Normally filled with water.

Supply Satchels: One is for carrying a small stock of provisions; the other carries a map, a tinderbox, a whetstone, and any odds and ends that catch her fancy.

Personality:
Cheerful and outgoing by nature, Heartsease has all the confidence of a young beast out on her own for the first time. Though her upbringing has made her quite courteous and she is eager to please, her wish to impress the hares she admires often lends itself to a leap-before-you-look demeanor and her sense of humor has gotten her into trouble many a time (usually with the stuffy older rabbits of her home warren). This same will to impress and succeed does lead her to throw herself into tasks and exercises with zeal, and Heartsease makes an attentive student if given a patient teacher; on the other hand she has a slow-burning but very real temper, and will bridle at skepticism and may hold grudges (and can be irritated by the sometimes-dismissive attitude toward her species in general, particularly the idea that the very word 'rabbit' is an insult). Overall she is a goodnatured rabbitmaid with a willful streak and a deep need to prove herself; time will tell if this will mold into real skill.

Strengths:
Spearbeast: Though far from a master, Heartsease has become confident and competent with her weapon due to dedicated work. She has far to go, but she is no longer a novice with the spear and able to stab, slash, whack, or trip as well as parry and disarm with the lugs if she can catch her opponent unaware.

Orienteering: A skilled navigator in day or night, fair or cloudy.

Agility: Heartsease has taken the characteristic zigzagging run of rabbits a step further, working to become nimble and unpredictable in movement to counter her lack of speed and strength when compared to a hare.

Determination: If she decides to do something, she will pursue it to the bitter end - vehement and relentless in attack, and dogged in pursuit of tasks and lessons.


Weaknesses:
Short Range: Quite aside from a relative lack of reach, she is completely hopeless with any sort of ranged weapon, openly admitting that she nearly took her mentor's head off with a slingstone... while he was standing behind her... and she hadn't even realized she'd loosed the stone. Bows are out of the question.

Anti-Herbalist: The only plant she readily identifies is her own namesake - without help, she can be downright dangerous.

Stubborn: Determination is a two-edged trait, after all.

Inexperience: The curse of any youngbeast - Heartease has practice and theory, but no true-life experence to put it to use.

Physical Weakness: Though rabbits are among the fastest of beasts, Heartsease is noticeably slower than her hare peers; she is also physically weak in comparison to many other warrior beasts.

History:
Heartsease Violanus is a descendant of the rabbits who fled Mossflower in the time of Lonna Bowstripe; she was born the middle child and only daughter in a family of seven kits in a warren north of Salamandastron, quite close to the mouth of River Moss. A member of a warren of rather traditional rabbits, Heartsease grew under her parents' belief that rabbits, particularly does, should be demure and mannerly beasts.

Heartease herself, however, was cut from somewhat more rambunctious cloth.

While she often put on her best manners to please her parents, Heartsease's enterprising nature and resulting explorations found her lost in the wilderness at an early age. While no harm came to her - and she never even encountered vermin - she was lost for several days until a detachment of Long Patrol hares found her and led her home. Deeply impressed by the hares' carefree, rowdy natures, deep camaraderie, and kindness and bravery, Heartsease soon began to talk of nothing but joining the Patrol as soon as she was old enough to leave home. Her parents, dismayed, said anything they could to get this idea out of her mind - rabbits are stay-at-home beasts with no business in battles or patrols, only hares were permitted to join the Long Patrol, she had no weapons or fighting ability nor anyone to teach her - but Heartsease's dream remained strong.

Luck was with Heatsease in one respect, however - an elderly squirrel friend of the Violanus family, Timothy Highleap, was amused by her determination and took her on as a pupil. At first, her lessons were limited to basic orienteering, both to reassure her parents and to see if she was a ready pupil. Once the maid showed both a will to learn and some ability in basic woodland skills (though her skill at navigation was somewhat offset by a remarkable inability to identify wild plants aside from her own namesake), Timothy taught her the basics of combat and, once she showed more than a basic understanding of the weapon, eventually traded her an old spear for some of her mother's honey-and-flaxseed cakes. With her new weapon and founding knowledge, Heartsease left home to journey to Salamandastron in hopes of seeing her dream of being a real 'perilous beast' come true.

Of course, she did leave home alone, in the dead of night. After all, her parents would never approve of a delicate doe traipsing off to a mountain fortress, and sometimes a maid simply has to take matters into her own paws.

Relationships:
Timothy Highleap: An aged squirrel, Timothy has been Heartsease's mentor since she was a kitten and was a driving force in her decision to finally leave home. [Age 65]

Brothers:
Banwurt: The eldest of her six brothers, Banwurt is a rabbit she looks up to for his medical skills and has always been close to... but not a rabbit she's overly eager to see at present. Like most of his mother's family, he has a white patch aside from the shading on his underside, in his case his left ear from root to tip. He always indulged his sister's fantasies and is now blamed for her disappearance. [Age 22]
Chicory: The second brother, he is somewhat lazy. Nominally in charge of supplies at the warren. His white patch is on his left haunch. [Age 20]
Coltsfoot: The historian brother, he knows the most of Mossflower's history; when Banwurt was sent to retrieve Heartsease, Coltsfoot was expected to accompany. He is the only child with no white patch. [Age 17]
Chervil and Campion: Twins, distinguishable only by Chervil having his white patch over his right eye and Campion having his on his left paw. Proper and dignified rabbits (as much as two bucks their age can be), they are their mother's pride and extremely spoiled and fussy. [Age 12]
Russet: The baby, he is secretly impressed with Heartsease's mission and has been caught trying to run away to follow her. Twice. His white patch is on his muzzle. [Age 8]

Parents:
Viola Violanus: The matriarch of the warren, a traditional prim doe. Deeply embarrassed by her only daughter's disappearance, she sent two of her sons to retrieve her. [Age 45]
Cress Violanus: Viola's husband, the patriarch of the warren. He was the one who selected Coltsfoot to join Banwurt, as he realized his eldest had no sense of direction and would never locate Heartsease on his own. [Age 47]

Other:
*Since leaving home, Heartsease has decided to go by 'Heartsease Whitefoot' rather than her original family name.

[Tracy]

Quick question: Where is this warren located?

Also, you might want to take your first "other" and just flesh it out into your strengths and weaknesses. Like weakness: Lack of natural strength, Strength: Good at improvising around her handicaps. Up to you, really though.

Otherwise, I think it's fine.

[nikki]

The warren is west of Mossflower, north of the mouth of River Moss - I clarified it in her history.

And done!

[Tracy]

Accepted! Have fun.