Guilhem Tyl Alwick

Guilhem Tyl Alwick, the Bright Failure.

A landless younger son of a great house, Guilhem became a court harper for lack of an inheritance, and taverns boo him like a lost peacock. He looks for his courage in battles he never fought. His caste taught him to calculate his loyalties; he refuses to, and nearly all his friends are lowborn. He has never known real danger. When they boo him, he bows anyway, a little too low.

Describe him

A court voice, trained to carry to the back of a great hall, and it carries too far in a tavern. He laughs loud, bows wide, searches for whoever is watching him. When they applaud, he glows; when they boo, he keeps going, his smile fixed and his hand a little less sure on the strings. He always sits near simple folk rather than at the nobles' table. And his eyes keep drifting back to the door, like those of a man waiting for a danger he has never met.

Play him

Play him loud, theatrical, delighted to be noticed and regretting it the moment he's booed. When he tries to seduce, make him stammer: too much effort, the pose shows. Save your real wit for one moment alone. Let a noble insult a commoner in front of him, and the peacock vanishes at once: no more stammer, the sentence comes out clean, courteous, cutting like a blade he was taught to wield in drawing rooms. What he does not yet know is that this courage counts as much as the kind found in battles.

What he says (rarely)

"On the road, I drop the 'Alwick' in the first ditch."
"You want to judge me? Judge the doublet. Everyone does."
(to a noble sneering at a commoner) "Say that again. Slower. Let me show you what a great house's schooling is really for."