[Anguirel]

PLACED ON DISCUSSION THREAD ~*~ PIO

Character Description Form:

1.) Have you ever played in an RPG at the Barrow Downs? – YES – Island of Sorrow

2.) How many RPG’s on the Barrow Downs are you currently involved in? 1

List them, please: Island of Sorrow

3.) Have you posted in The Green Dragon Inn – YES
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NAME: Sangalazin

AGE: 64

RACE: Black Numenorean

GENDER: Effeminate male

WEAPONS (No magical, super-hero, mithril weapons. Just good solid Middle-earth weapons and armour only that is appropriate to the race of the character and the time period.): Sangalazin wears a ceremonial longsword of great intricacy and consciously Gondorian design; an assertion of his rights over Elendil’s Kingdom, as an heir of the great Castamir. Its scabbard is elaborately crafted, with a sequence of scenes in gold filigree telling the Black Numenorean love story of Lenezor and Shirethel. Apart from this sword, which is far too beautiful to be wielded, he carries a curved silver-edged dagger and a fine silken garrotte.

APPEARANCE: Sangalazin is of a physical type viewed with contempt in Gondor, but in Umbar admired by males and females alike. He is slender, with tapering wrists and graceful legs; his mouth is large, crimson and prominent; his large eyes a soft brown, his complexion golden, though powdered fairer, and his hair dark chestnut brown. He wears a dark blue robe of silk. His only Numenorean characteristic is his great height.

PERSONALITY/STRENGTHS/WEAKNESSES: (No half-Elven characters. No mixed-type characters. No super-heroes. No assassins. No one all powerful, martial arts proficient, or having any magical traits. Just regular characters with normal abilities for their races only): Sangalazin’s charm, or one might more accurately say charms, is not in doubt; nor is his keen intelligence, when he deigns to employ it. For all this, though, he is feckless and pleasure-loving, easily distracted, temperamental and cruel. His physical weakness (brought about, it is rumoured, by inbreeding in the house of Castamir) also makes him despised by the martial Corsairs of Umbar who serve him out of necessity; only the continual presence of his mighty bodyguards, Gondorians stolen as babies and brought up at his court, garbed in pitch-black plate armour, their loyalty ensured by luxury, stops him from being lynched in the streets.

HISTORY: Sangalazin is the great-great-great-grandson of Castamir twice over, for his parents, Sangahyando and Mehratu, are brother and sister; a marriage brought about to ensure purity of descent and to prevent division of wealth, as well as because of genuine love; such affairs are not considered accursed among the aristocracy of Umbar. Sangalazin was cherished and adored as a child because of his beauty, and could have anything he chose; he made sure of this, testing it by asking his father to execute a playmate who had blackened his eye. He watched the subsequent hanging with a good deal of interest.

From such an upbringing sprang Sangalazin’s main enthusiasms; first, the intense pleasure and reassuring oblivion brought by debauchery; second, the self-fulfilment brought by art; third, the sheer amusement of strangulation. He loves the curious gurglings produced by its victims, the goggling of their eyes...

To all these politics comes a poor fourth. Indeed, as the endlessly intriguing Lords of Umbar go, Sangalazin is relatively ineffectual and harmless due to his fickle pursuits of pleasure; but his high blood will ensure he is ensnared in its dark legacy.

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Anguirel's post


“And now, my dears...play, play.”

Sangalazin, illustrious descendant of the King of Gondor known uncompromisingly in Umbar as Castamir the Great, was stretched out on a silken couch in his black ship’s cabin, his considerable full length languidly extended. A small table stood nearby; on it was positioned a silver instrument, from which a pipe crawled, coming to rest in Sangalazin’s long golden hand. He placed it into his mouth and took another gulp at the hookah, exulting at the relief at the fumes quenching the thirst of his lungs. Truly, the hookah was a potent sign that if one rejected the ways of the East and South, one would never find civilisation.

The supine Lord was attended by twelve men. Nine were monumentally tall-like Sangalazin himself-but, and here they differed from their master, also well-muscled and armoured all about in black iron. Those who were bare-headed displayed cold, impassive stares from grey Northern eyes. Their hair was dark, but bleached yellow, in contrast to their arms. Their weapons were all forged in the Gondorian fashion; straight longswords, triangular shields, visored helms. This, then, was the feared bodyguard of Sangalazin, which he had formed when still a child; its soldiers cradle Gondorians, but in their hearts fanatical servants of the Castamirioni, and Sangalazin in particular, who knew he owed his survival to them.

The other three men in the richly furnished cabin, below the forecastle, were of quite a different sort. It was these Sangalazin had addressed. One was of the Haradrim, and beat upon a set of small drums. Another was an Easterling, and toyed with a delicate stringed instrument, which he called a sitar. The third was a youth from the North, one of the shadow dwellers, a blonde boy with a flute. Sangalazin smiled at him.

“I find your strains particularly moving, child. You touch me. To think that one such as you replaced our line upon the throne of Meneldil...but I bear no grudge. Indeed, as long as you and your people confine yourself to our music-rooms and our pleasure-chambers, and don’t mess with power, the reserve of true men...why, then, you are quite endearing.”

The Lord of Half of Umbar leant up from his position and felt the youth’s cheek. The beard would not come for some time. A pretty specimen, indeed. And how strange and yet lovely the three combined tunes had sounded, to his own composition, intermingled. That was the way of culture, of beauty, of perfection. When he sat upon the Throne at Minas Anor-for he took little account of his cousin and rival, Azaryan-his court would be ordered thus. Tedious warring would cease, benevolent peace would embrace all the lesser nations, to be guided under his command. And civilisation would prevail.

His harmonious thoughts were interrupted by the Southron striking a false note. Sangalazin raised an eyebrow, and whispered something to a guard. Two of them led the musician out. He would not be killed; not yet, for the guards would wait for him to be strangled later at their master’s whim.

It was then that a black-robed, well-spoken lordling of Azaryan’s train arrived in the cabin. Sangalazin was called to his cousin's side. He took a last, regretful drag on the hookah, tousled the blonde boy’s hair, and followed the messenger. His cousin was powerful and proud-spirited, and it would do no good to anger him now...