tawny brown hair - grey green eyes - full lips - light toned skin - lithe build - slightly below average height
gnosis mark of a hurricane on his back between his shoulder blades in silvers and blues
thin scar on his right arm
Keene's face is almost always in a perpetual slight frown. The frown serves as an accurate testament to the various states of mind he finds himself in: philosophical thought, concentration, and speculation. It is rare for Keene to smile, as success isn't something he was raised to be proud of, and humor was something he'd never quite got the handle of. He does not avoid socialization, but neither does he seek it out unless he requires something from someone. His voice is quiet, reserved but not without emotion. He moves as unobtrusively as possible, a passive trait instilled in him through the many years spent as his mothers assistant.
calculated - curious - reserved - aloof - stubborn - resolute - confident - terse - maverick - solemn - resourceful - selectively perceptive - skeptical - reticent - socially indifferent
Humor is lost on Keene; so too are romantic advances, subtleties, sarcasm, rhetorical questions, and suggestions. Some people see the world in black and white, but Keene sees in a single, unattributed color. There is no good or bad, merely what is and what is not. This does not mean, however, he acts without digression. Laws exist to maintain order. Order exists to maintain life. Life cannot exist without order. Alternatively, lawlessness exists to counterbalance the oppression of laws. Chaos is the natural outcome of order. Death is the inevitability of life. Keene does not exist to upset the natural balance of things, thus he obeys that which is established for no other reason than to do anything else would lead to the same end result. When spoken to, Keene uses as few words as possible to accurately convey both his thoughts and his responses. Beyond that, Keene usually does not actively seek out social interaction, but he doesn't shy away from it (however others may often wish they did not instigate a conversation with the socially inept Keene). A risk taker in his own respect, Keene is not afraid to push the limits of what he is able to do; his calculated nature, however, often weights costs and benefits of actions beforehand, making all risks (save a few made in the heat of the moment) calculated data. This doesn't mean he's never surprised. Data can be misinterpreted.
Keene was born specifically to assist his mother in her research into meteorology and the magical manipulation and control of such events. Mella was an extremely devoted woman; however, her devotions did not lie in the hands of a man. She was a mistress of magic, having devoted her life to her art the moment she was initiated into the volatile discipline of reimancy. Unfortunately for the avid mage, the University was far too restrictive to warrant an attempt at gaining enrollment (and thereby access to their facilities). Unwilling to allow her research to sit and gather dust due to a lack of the necessary assistance, she decided to create her own assistant. Strong-headed, terse, and generally harsh, Mella found her chances of procreation through the typical avenue of courtship and marriage to be far too low for what she required. Using what few feminine wiles she had, Mella successfully seduced (and reseduced) an intoxicated sailor for several nights until his departure back to Syliras - she was willing to take risks with magical experiments, but as a child was something she absolutely required, Mella wasn't nearly as keen to simply leave it to chance.
Mella continued to work and conduct research and experiments up until the day her child was born. Keene was delivered in their home as Mella could not be bothered to get herself to the University's infirmary. From the moment he drew breath, Mella viewed the child as a tool to help her achieve her goals. It was not so much she lacked compassion, but rather she figured the child was hers to do with as she pleased (as she'd gone through the trouble to create the thing in the first place - and what a process it had been). Training began the moment Keene was cleaned and wrapped in his mother's skirts while she regained her strength. Starting from the legends of magic's beginning, she began to infuse her soon to be apprentice with whatever knowledge his developing mind might retain. According to Mella, Keene's first word was "res" and his first sentence "Djas ranuit." (In truth, she simply misheard "yes" and refused to respond to requests unless he asked in Nader Canoch). Such was the foundation Keene was raised upon. Mella placed emphasis on persistence, innovation, intelligence, and learning. Failures were opportunities, success merely a false trail to lead towards complacency. Creativity in problem solving far out-valued obedience and adherence to rules and regulations. Caution, of course, was suggested, though Mella did not stress the dangers of overgiving, preferring to emphasize secrecy.
Keene's childhood was seeped in magic. For the first three years of his life, Mella continually attempted to teach him how to read as well as speak in both Common and Nader Canoch. Keene picked up reading faster than speaking, thus once he was four, his mother would leave him alone with a pile of entry level books and a loaf of bread while she attended her job. Due to his mother's constant involvement in her work and incessant reminders that he too should take interest in it, Keene spent little time around other children. His peers instead were the silent tomes of various collections of material knowledge, the scribbled notes of his mother, and the constant monologue that spilled from her lips (a stream of consciousness Keene was expected to absorb, understand, and recall at any given time). While a quick learner and naturally curious intellect, Kenne was not without flaw under the rigorous tutelage his mother subjected him to. Nader Canoch did not come easily to him, making any test his mother gave on the subject doubly as difficult as any other. He learned, but the knowledge he gained was not attained with ease or simplicity.
Mella had planned to initiate Keene into reimancy on his fifteenth birthday, but during a field experiment during which Keene was meant to be observing the patterns of lighting from aloft a tree, a flash of light zig-zagged from the sky and set the surrounding trees ablaze, sending Keene onto the ground and out of consciousness. Shaken by the sheer, unadulterated strength of nature and physically weakened from the fall for a time, Mella determined it was best to wait to initiate Keene into her magic art. She had invested fifteen years of her life into creating the optimal research partner, several more were trivial if it meant his survival rate would be exponentially higher. Disappointed at his own failure and his mother's choice to wait on initiation, Keene threw himself into her lessons with renewed vigor, even going as far as to formulate and test his own theories to the best of his abilities without the use of reimancy. The next year Keene was once more refused his initiation, something Mella had found to be a incredible stimulus for his work ethic. She continued to deny him reimancy until his eighteenth year after he had attempted to seduce students at the University into initiating him instead. While she applauded his innovation, it was the first time Mella ever scolded him for doing something "bad" (a concept novel -and trivial- to Keene).
Once the initiation had been completed, Keene eagerly dove into reimancy. His very first attempt resulted in a bell's worth of nosebleeding, after which Keene approached magic with a much more respectful and moderately cautious manner. His progress was steady, but it wasn't quite as prodigious as Mella had anticipated. From a young age, Mella had been tyrannical in both Keene's eating and sleeping habits. Once he was able to use reimancy, she extended her rule over how he spent his time (of which he had had a surprisingly large amount of free time in comparison). Mornings were devoted to his choice of meditation or reading (rarely, if ever, was the prior chosen). Midday was spent reading and writing Nader Canoch and more complex Common poetry and prose. Evenings were entirely devoted to incremental reimancy practice; both he and Mella decided it was best to slowly approach overgiving through tedium rather than a single complex, powerful spell. Thus control, precision, and technique found themselves in a higher regard than power when it came to res manipulation and transformation. As Mella was most interested in weather, Keene's first element was air followed eventually by water. His improvement was steady in both, neither one seemingly easier or more difficult for him to grasp.
Joining his mother in her experiments fully once he was able to manipulate his res without breaking into a sweat the moment the substance left his body, the two were able to begin testing her theoretical research. Formulas and techniques that consisted of Mella's entire life's work began to bear fruit. They were able to both produce and replicate findings, though on occasion there were times Mella pushed herself too far and experiments were put on hold until her recovery. As they progressed, Mella grew more and more obsessed, often pushing both herself and Keene past their limits to achieve progress. Everything came crashing down one night during a particularly dangerous experiment. Mella had planned to create a miniature, "contained" storm through a combination of fire, water, and air reimancy. Mella put far more power than she'd initially instructed Keene on. His mother fell to the ground vomiting blood while what should have been a small thundercloud quickly became a whirling pocket of lightning spitting devastation. As the res had been transformed, Keene had no way of containing the streaks of lighting that burst from the gaseous mass. Rushing Mella back to their home, Keene sought out a healer. By the time he returned, his mother had passed away. The University had found out about Mella's flagrant disregard for magical safety, which resulted in a generally low opinion of the Ward household.
With nothing else in the city of Zeltiva left to him but an empty house and reeling mind, Keene turned to the only thing that held any familiarity to him: books. There were, in the history books, mentions of an island dedicated to the unshackled research and investigation into the mysteries of magic. Finding little reason to stay in Zeltiva and all the reason to head to the only place he might be allowed to freely continue his reimancy training, he secured passage on a boat headed for Sahova. Leaving behind everything from his past save his mother's journal, he boarded the ship towards the only place that held any opportunity: Sahova.
The island proved a productive catharsis. Though his first few weeks upon the volcanic shores of Sahova were uncertain, Keene quickly adapted to the change of climate and culture, finding the cold, driven nature of the nuit far more suitable for magical pursuits than the glimpses he had caught back in Zeltiva. He met Risabel, an apprentice maledictor, and Boswell, a hunter for the few living residents, within the first few days, and while they were perhaps not quite "friends", the two helped to guide him through the citadel both politically and physically.
While Keene faced judgement with the intent of becoming an apprentice, a twist of fate found him following behind the footsteps of the fiery Atziri as a warden initiate. Within the first few bells of his new position, Keene was inducted into the magic of shielding, progress within only a half season, and a portent of what was to come. In the obsidian caverns of Sahova's Mt. Merlus, Keene trained himself daily, sometimes with his Warden overseer, most times without. Time was the greatest gift the island offered him. There was time to explore his new found magics and to delve deeper into those he already had a firm grasp upon. He progressed steadily, momentum building with the freedom to do so, and as the season came to a close, his strength and knowledge as a mage had been expanded upon exponentially.
With the winter season, his duties set him alongside the paths of others, some friendly, others hostile. It was a time of new experiences. He killed for the first time, defending himself against a trespassing reimancer and his morpher slave. He loved for the first time with the hot-tempered, chocolate skinned Noven. Boswell's unexpected death led to the first time he felt true hatred and regret. Even his religion was brought into question, a subject he had never thought to dwell on until the god of storms marked him as a stormwarden. Yet, as will all things that burn bright in the moment, the flames slowly settled into smoke, and as the season's end rolled over the beautiful, barren landscape of the island of the dead, Keene settled into introspection with the aid of a ghost of a child he had slain without forethought. Gods and men, love and hate, loss and discovery - it was the first time Keene found himself considering life itself as an abstract concept rather than the act of living.
Change had brought him to the island, and it was change seemed to drive him. As spring's light flashed bright across Mizahar's watchtowers, Keene's magical advancements found a purchase in glyphing and auristics, schools that only served to further his explorations into reimancy and shielding. The animator, Kamilla, found him a worthy rival, and while Keene was wholly unaware of such a relationship, she taught him the basics of animation, a world magic he had seen the result of but never the process. Knowledge continued to be offered him, and as the days passed, there came a plea from Wilhelmina, a chance for revenge.
He took the chance, but in his cold-tempered fury, he miscalculated. Losing his one chance at retribution, he found himself instead once more in judgement, only where he had been promised a position as wizard by Lector Qiao himself, the wardens arrived in force, pulling him back into their ranks. He was given the position of warden, but it was bitter-sweet. Atziri no longer trusted him nor did the child Wilhelmina, and his new domain was one of disrepair and neglect. Not one to be daunted, Keene continued as always, distanced from those he had grown to to know, to depend on to some extent. In the solitude, there was humility.
Not long after his promotion, the island was evacuated for reasons unknown. Forced to leave what had become home, Keene returned to Zeltiva. From there, he traveled to Alvadas, though only when he arrived did he understand why: to escape.
Lowered Body Temperature
Due to his extensive experimentation with Ice Reimancy and his tendency to push himself a little further than he should, Keene’s body temperature is slightly lower than the average person by just a degree or two. As a result he is more susceptible to conditions such as hypothermia, frostbite, chills, etc. but would be surprisingly comfortable in warmer conditions.
Hallucinations (25-39 Fa 514)
For two weeks hence Keene has spontaneous dream-like hallucinations. Within these dreams he is filled with the desire to fly.
Numbness
Extensive Djed usage within the period of a single day has resulted in Keene losing most sensation in his right forearm. There is no loss of mobility or usage just an ever present numbness.
Spontaneous Wounds (90 Fa - 14 Wi 514)
Splitting headaches, spontaneous wounds on his hands and arms for two weeks.
Spontaneous Wounds (40 Wi - 55 Wi 514)
The spontaneous wounds opening and closing will last for the next fifteen days.
Flashes (87 Wi - 15 Sp 515)
For the next twenty days Keene will have a slight headache. In addition, there will be occasional flashes of light that blind him, similar to lightning strikes. At all times there will be tingles like electricity is moving through his body that may cause involuntary muscle spasms.
Headache and Blurry Vision (14 Sp - 16 Sp 515)
Piercing headache for two days, random fits of blurry vision for two days.
Stony (23 Sp - 30 Sp 515)
For the next seven days, any time Keene starts relaxing for an extended period of time, he will feel a heavy lassitude steal over him and it will become increasingly harder to break out of. ![[Verified by Perplexity]](./images/checkmark.png "[Verified by Perplexity]")
