Belham Ethuldir

Belham Ethuldir, priest of the Sun-Son,.

He was born in a street in Dol Murakh, and everything pointed to him ending up a good-for-nothing. He preferred to invent something else, a high name, a family, a flamboyant part he has been playing ever since. The Sun-Son answered him all the same, which no one has managed to explain. He never says which street. And he shuffles his birth at every table like a deck of cards, so he never has to tell the real one.

Describe him

Great bearing, a white beard, a presence that lowers the voices around the table. People listen before he has even spoken. Then he speaks, and the dates do not add up, and the house he descends from changes its name between the meat and the wine. He is a very poor liar, which makes him far more endearing than he would like. The doubt will stay with you a long while: an impostor, or a wise man who finds it useful that people wonder.

Play him

Introduce him differently every time. King's son. High priest. Younger child of a house too rich to name. He has an anecdote for everything, they do not agree with one another, and that does not slow him down for a moment. Underneath he is good, only he will never be good plainly: he will pick up the fallen companion while mocking him the whole way up, and dress the act as scorn, as pity, as calculation, as anything at all rather than kindness. And hold, underneath, that he has never let anyone check whether he was capable of it.

What he says (rarely)

"My family owned three valleys. Four. Three, I am simplifying."
"I am not helping you, I am healing you. You make far too much noise dying."
"(when helped up) Thank yourself. You have just put me back at your right hand."