Qabian

[Qabian]

Full Name: Qabian Amberlight (pronounce K - B - N)
Titles or Nicknames:  Magister, Keeper, Irredeemable, Q (familiar, meaning there's a high risk of pissing him off if you call him that)
Age: Late 70s (young adult)
Race: Blood Elf
Gender: Male
Hair: Copper, kept long
Eyes: Bright fel green, the left slightly brighter than the right.
Height: 6'0" (assuming average human heights)
Weight: 160 lbs (fencer's build)
Notable Physical Features: Typical sin'dorei, angled features, light scar across the bridge of his nose and down his right cheek, difference in the brightness of his eyes

Place of residence: Eversong, Sunbound Manor
Place of Birth: Silvermoon
Known Relatives:
Ashtyn Amberlight (cousin)
Marniel Amberlight (distant relative - innkeeper at Fairbreeze Village)
Qynda Amberlight (mother - murdered)
M_____ Amberlight (father – dead)
A_____ Amberlight (sister – Farstrider, missing, presumed dead)

Religion/Philosophy:
"Narcissus does not fall in love with his reflection because it is beautiful, but because it is his."   Narcissist, individualist, pragmatist, empiricist, determinist.  Doesn't believe so much in higher power and as such hates the idea of the Light as something other than a simple form of magic to be manipulated, but believes no one can really avoid their past and everyone is created by their experiences.  He uses the Grim to further his own ends, which conveniently align well enough with the Mandate itself.  Not the type of narcissist to expect others to stroke his ego, he instead expects and attempts to encourage narcissism in everyone around him.  After all, if they admit everything they do is for themselves, they're that much more likely to be stronger in their dedication to their goals, or to openly prove their need to be destroyed.  He has no respect for family or friendship and considers love, at least as it is commonly imagined to be, as a crutch that stands in the way of the true freedom of narcissism.  He refuses to see the Grim as family but instead sees them as an educational institution, students learning through experience, focused on an axiom that happens to suit each of their own individual ends and allows them to work together.

Occupation: Magister
Guild Rank: Irredeemable - Keeper
Known Associates: Nymare Sunfire (frequently seen causing destruction together to the point that finding him without her around seems to be a rarity), Malorii Airas (presumed dead), Kelven Willowwalk (ex-employee)
Known Nemesis: You.  He hates everyone, assumes the worst of everyone, and knows you're a liar, but he can work with that if you happen to suit what he needs.  A few have attempted to become more irritating to him, but ultimately they tend to fall into the crowd.  There is one, and thus far, only one exception.

Special Skills: Self-sufficiency, use of magic, gemcutting, minor fencing skills
Positive Personality Traits: Pride, narcissism, dedication, determination, observation, intensity, intellect, goal focus
Negative Personality Traits: Pride, narcissism, arrogance, cruelty, deviousness, overanalysis, insensitivity, wrath, fury, single-mindedness

History Before The Grim: 
Born to a branch of the family that had once had wealth of its own but had squandered it a few generations earlier, as soon as Qabian was old enough to walk he was sent to work for the priests of a small chapel in Silvermoon in order to get an education and reduce the financial strain on the family.  His affinity for magic was discovered there and he was sent as an apprentice to the Magisters.  His entire young life revolved around studying magic.  Although quiet and serious, he was quite social within student circles, building strong friendships and enjoying attending various entertainments, masquerades, etc.  While in terms of social status, he was generally not acknowledged by most nobility due to his parents' lack of money, he was devious enough to form connections that allowed him to attend almost anything he had an interest in.  He spent time alternately in Silvermoon and Dalaran until the destruction of the Sunwell, an event which changed him considerably in many ways, resulting in him becoming considerably less social and less tolerant of others.

As an apprentice, Qabian was amongst the group of blood elves with Kael'thas in Dalaran who were rescued by Vashj and the naga.  While he always had the stereotypical elven pretentiousness towards humans to a degree that during his youth was considered extreme, it was the events surrounding Garithos that cemented Qabian's hatred for the Alliance as a whole.  However, Qabian did not follow Kael'thas across the portal, but instead returned to the ruins of Quel'thalas to help rebuild Silvermoon.  Even then, Qabian's true loyalty was always to himself.  He earned the title of Magister some time afterward for his efforts in the rebuilding, and he considers his study of magic to be a lifelong process.

History In The Grim:
Having heard of the Grim's purpose and motivations, Qabian sought them out, eventually speaking with Lascivious and agreeing to do whatever was necessary to follow the Mandate.  Within the Grim, Qabian has worked with all styles of magic in several different fields, although his preferences remain rooted in his past, as was made clear as his history continued to interfere with his attempts to construct himself as Grim first and foremost.  A long series of machinations involving old friends, a noble house, Sunbound, a certain family known as the Dawnspires that included Grim operatives, a cursed blade, an Alliance assassin, and a miscellany of other characters left Qabian inheriting an estate in Eversong not far from the Elrendar, giving him the illusion of nobility he had never had in his early years.

Qabian's mother, already in poor health after an encounter with a certain rogue, was murdered at Winter Veil by an unknown assailant with a candy cane.  He has his suspicions about who was guilty of it, but was more concerned about improving the security of the manor than avenging someone he insists he had never cared about.  Eventually, he fired all his staff except one odd Forsaken girl and now the building itself is guarded with magic wards and physical traps.  While most of the gardens were left to grow over in the absence of a groundskeeper, sometime after Nymare took up residence, Qabian arranged a small garden of their own near the building itself.  The garden requires no maintenance as every living part of it is in fact dead and frozen, the illusion of life and movement maintained by magic.

An incident involving an Alliance witch and the tearing of his soul led him to seek help from a few fellow Grim and affected his opinions on such things as the nature of souls, and may have left him more connected with Acherontia than he finds particularly comforting.

Qabian's involvement with Nymare Sunfire is anything but simple and cannot be easily defined, especially based on their extended complex history over Qabian's years with the Grim.  However, over time he seems to have embraced the idea of a fellow narcissist who is capable of both improving and adding to his own actions, motivations, and considerations, and of maintaining a very real interest in himself and his thoughts.  To many of Qabian's absolute certainties about the people and the world around him, Nymare has become a brilliant exception, an exception that because of her lack of compliance to social expectations and her sheer exemplification of the way things should be and yet are not intrigues him endlessly.  While he is still reticent to discuss the matter openly on the basis that it is no one's business but their own, their relationship is hardly a secret.

Qabian was made a Dreadweaver for bureaucratic reasons early in his time with the Grim.  He eventually carved a niche for himself among the Grim leadership that went beyond the specific challenges of the arcane.  Though Lascivious as the Mistress had a way of keeping him in line, he found her departure incredibly disappointing in terms of his original impressions and beliefs about her as a leader, and her absence left him less inclined to submission and more likely to speak his mind and take control whenever he deemed himself capable.  Abric, it seems, recognized a certain capacity and created the new position of the Keeper which Qabian then took up.  The mage was also given the freedom to define the position as he wished.  That definition is as yet incomplete, as are his exact intentions, but his hands are now indelibly involved in many Grim matters.

"Does it make a difference what I think? I'm a jerk. The only thing that matters is what you think. Can you do the job?"

[Cessily]

When the snake called The Grim comes full circle, and The Mandate is a reality, it will bite it's own tail. And I will draw first blood. True Peace cannot be while the likes of Qabian still live. And Peace is what I ultimately serve.