To the north are the plains and scrublands currently being raided by the Storm Elves, and to the south are the unstable borders of the lands collectively known as The 1001 fires and the lands the Silk Elves claim as their Temples of Silk. But directly to the east are the vast expanses of the stone wastes, and beyond them are nations of gold and exotic goods, ready and hungry for trade. All it takes is someone willing to cross the Sea and then the stone wastes, and many are those willing to take the chance for gold and riches.
And that's where Skinny Ermire comes in.
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| Shamelessly stolen from a google images search for "Fantasy Dockyards" |
Skinny Ermire is an extra rotund, extra brown, middle aged halfling you can almost always find at the docks owned and controlled by the Temerkind Trading Guild. Those docks are located near the center of the docks reserved for citizen shipyards. He'll be sitting on a stack of crates, watching the dockhands load and unload cargo, offering instruction in his booming baritone if asked, and occasionally shouting warnings regarding personal safety or fragility of the cargo's contents. Skinny hasn't been a working hand on a sailing vessel for many years, but he still knows most of everything there is to know about a ship, and he still looks and talks the part. He likes to say, "waste not, want not." As a matter of perverse self indulgence he calls everyone "baby." Skinny Ermire is, ostensibly, the dock boss, and he's friendly if you have legitimate business.
Some of his dock lieutenants know that he's not just a member of the guild, but a high level leader, too. As such, he's in a position to negotiate trade taxes and tariffs with the Tower of Sarai for his fleet, and influence their decisions regarding other fleets and foreign nations. A few of his men are also aware that he's a high ranking member of the Sarai thieves' guild, with all the utility and profit that can grant. They're almost right. Skinny is the head of the Sarai thieves' guild, and by extension, the thieves' guild of all six of the free cities.
In it's position of authority regarding trade, Skinny has made a fortune off of smuggling, caravan theft, kidnapping, slaving, limited piracy, and murder. His wealth has positioned him to exercise control over the other thieves' guilds in the cities, and those who couldn't be bought were killed, or kidnapped and sold to the highest bidder. Occasionally worse.
Skinny deals with his allies in a fair, sometimes even generous manner. He happily bribes the local urchins, and brings them into the folds of the thieves' guild. He'll equally happily bribe a hardworking sailor from a rival trading company onto one his ships. He wants loyalty and knows how to get it. No fool, though, he's seen through those that try to usurp him and looking for handouts when they have something to offer instead.
Skinny Ermire's success didn't happen overnight, and it didn't happen without planning or ruthlessness. Most halflings show their age in their eleventies, and many make it to one hundred fifty. Despite his apparent middle-agedness, Skinny is actually closer to two hundred years old. Because he wants to be. Being a man who's seen firsthand proof of gods and monsters on the waters and on his travels, dying is something he wants to avoid at all costs, having led the life of black blood and bile he has.
When Skinny was only a mere hundred and twenty, his deeds weighing upon his head, and as he felt his vitality flee, he met a Yuan-ti warlock. Skinny Ermire's ship, The Regal Gorgon, had made port at an island not shown on the maps, hundreds of miles from where any land at all should be. The city's name was unpronounceable without a forked tongue, but the denizens were still willing to trade for what they had. And, oh, what they had.
Skinny met a merchant who offered him the thing he wanted more than forgiveness, more than redemption. He offered a way to avoid death, and live as dastardly as he wished, forever. He just needed to do one little thing.
And so now, twice a year, Skinny Ermire eats a living, sapient soul over the course of three days. The more of their body he can eat before they die, the more of his youth he recovers. Over the last seventy-plus years he's gotten quite good at cutting out just enough. Not too much, lest they die, and not too little, lest he could have gotten more. Though not strictly a requirement of the ritual, Skinny likes it when they're conscious. Likes it when they're forced to watch.
Skinny practices often, to make sure he's ready for when the night comes, and he's grown corpulent from it. He wants to make sure he can fit it all in his gullet when it counts. So much was wasted in the early years because he didn't have the room. So much blood was also wasted in the early years, spilled on the floors and splashing the walls, but it's part of the body and it counts, so now Skinny makes sure to collect it, and mixes it with his rum. It's become a favorite drink of his, and even when there's no eldritch benefit, he carries a bottle of his special brew, coyly sharing it with the unaware.
Skinny has developed a list of skills he'd never thought would carry him this far, but when you run the criminality of the free cities they're very handy. Grinding bones to powder, removing unnecessary organs, amputating limbs and cauterizing them, performing life saving medicine when needed, mixing cocktails of drugs that numb just the right amount of pain, cooking nearly inedible parts into palatable things, and when nearing the deadline, swallowing whole chunks of flesh, torn straight from the victim, with little time to waste. Waste not, want not.
Waste not, want not.
Waste not, want not, Babies.
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