Overview
Bruin Shambrath, prince of Thesalys, was the eldest son of Gorath Shambrath, Governor of Greatspace, and heir apparent to the throne of Greatspace.
Personality
Bruin was intelligent, good-hearted, strong willed and charismatic, but he was also somewhat naive. He had always been a solitary person with a great need for personal freedom, and was known to disappear for weeks at a time in the woodlands of Thesalys on hunting trips. He was, however, incredibly loyal to Greatspace and had a tremendous love for its people, and many believed he would make an excellent ruler. His one great downfall - from his father’s point of view, at least - was his lack of military discipline that had been the hallmark of House Shambrath for centuries.
Possession
Bruin wore an enchanted suit of chain mail and carried a flame tongue broadsword which had additional enchantments against regenerating creatures (such as trolls), avians, flammable creatures, cold-using creatures (like white dragons) and especially the undead. He also possessed a ring of the comet.
Relationships
Family
Bruin was the eldest son of Gorath and Talina Shambrath, and had one sister. Bruin also had some distant relatives, including great-uncles and some cousins.
Friends
Korlin Haagin was Bruin's lieutenant and served as the first officer on the Hummingbird.
Ponn Jariss was Bruin's childhood friend and served as helmsman on the Hummingbird.
Mentor
Keriacus was an elderly sage who had been Bruin's mentor when he was a child, and with whom he had formed a close bond.
History
For many decades, the inhabitants of Greatspace had lived peaceful, ordered lives under the disciplined yet benevolent rule of House Shambrath based on the planet Thesalys. Prosperity and intellectual superiority were the hallmarks of those who willingly followed the established government; exile and shame were in store for those who did not. Poverty and despair were practically unknown among Greatspace’s inhabitants under the long rule of Gorath Shambrath, governor and absolute ruler of Greatspace.
All things come to an end, however, starting with the arrival of a mysterious half-elven bard by the name of T'Laan. He was immediately popular with the court of Shambrath, and soon became more than a mere entertainer - he was appointed to the post of chief advisor to Gorath Shambrath himself. Slowly but steadily, T’laan’s influence became greater and greater, until Gorath was little more than a figurehead. Unfortunately, due to the very rigid nature of House Shambrath’s rule, none of Gorath’s subordinates dared challenge his orders.
Noticing the changes in his father and harboring a natural distrust of T’Laan, Bruin began his own investigations into T'Laan's activities. Unfortunately, when Bruin attempted to recruit agents to work for him, he came to the attention of the palace guard and was promptly arrested. By order of T’Laan (who had become de facto commander of Thesalys's military) Bruin was imprisoned in the palace pending his trial for high treason. Aided by those loyal to him, Bruin managed to escape from the palace and left Thesalys onboard the Hummingbird, a court ship capable of space travel.
Bruin had hoped to find aid elsewhere in the system, but T’Laan’s influence extended too far, literally encompassing the entire sphere. To make matters worse, Bruin discovered a secret plot devised by T’Laan, where he had enlisted the aid of three priests of Bane who had been promised great power in T’Laan’s new empire if they helped him create a powerful artifact that would generate an enormous and powerful field of continual darkness. Fearing for the future of his homeworld, Bruin decided to leave Greatspace in search of help, for there was nowhere in the system that was safe from T’Laan’s influence.
When T’Laan discovered that Bruin had escaped, he declared the prince an enemy of the state and hired mercenaries to capture him. Barely avoiding the many bounty-hunters that were chasing him, Bruin traveled from system to system but found that most people were unconcerned with the plight of a sphere that was millions of miles away. Eventually, Bruin decided that his best course of action was track down his old mentor and ask for his aid.