Sejan Chanir II

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Sejan Chanir II
Say-hahn shah-near
Created by Sejan Chanir (player)
Information
Gender Male
Occupation Soldier
Affiliation The Grey Tower
Nationality Altaran

Sejan Chanir II is an Altaran Soldier of the Grey Tower.

Description

Sejan is average height and lean. His father is Domani and his mother Andoran, and his coloring is not quite the coppery tone of most full-blooded Domani. He wears his black hair cropped short, has green eyes, and wears a piece red glass set in silver in his left ear, which he is known to fiddle with when deep in thought. He loves music, swordplay, and stories of grand adventures. His attitude is optimistic and easygoing, but he is also impulsive, often acting without thinking. While he reads and enjoys it on occasion, deep philosophy and history are of little concern to him at this point in time. He is well known for wearing a small smile when just walking along and thinking, a habit that got him into more than one duel in Ebou Dar when a passerby thought Sejan was directing the grin at them. In a team or social circle, he is one of the more outspoken participants, never wanting to sit in the shadows and follow orders.

Biography

Twilight shadows grew thick, shrouding the quickly emptying streets of Ebou Dar as young and old filtered into their homes or the city's preponderance of inns to dine or enjoy the companionship of family and friends. Sejan and his friends, too, headed for the shelter of their homes, the melancholy silence between them reflecting the growing quiet of the streets around them. Daglan jarred Sejan in the ribs with a sharp elbow.

"Best lose the grimace before your mother wonders what has made her pretty little son look so grim, Sej." Sejan caught a glimpse of white teeth flashing a smile from a dark, chubby face.

"Yeah, but if I were you, Dag, I'd worry more about how your mother is going to react when she sees another cut across your cheek." Sejan smiled darkly, "She will likely not settle this time for believing you fell on your face. Maybe if you tell her you pulled your knife on a man to impress Renys and cut yourself in the doing, though…" he trailed off as Darris and Kennit snickered on his other side. Daglan cursed and said something rather unflattering about Sejan's sense of humor. "Be easy, friend. I would hate to gut you just up the street from your mother's house! She would either send your troop of brothers after me or marry me off to your sister." Sejan shuddered in mock horror. "Truth, I think I might run faster from the latter."

Accustomed to years of bantering, Daglan reached under his cloak and produced his knife with a fairly impressive twirl. "The only reason you call my sister ugly is because she continues to refuse to be your pretty and you know it!" Sejan shrugged and smiled helplessly. He was beginning to think his enthusiasm for chasing after Tammara was waning, but she was beautiful and charming. She was also proving to be one of those girls who liked to smile and flirt innocently, but never settled down enough to stay with any one for very long.

"You may have the right of it," was all he said. "Anyhow, I'll see you all at the docks tomorrow," he called with feigned cheerfulness as he turned down his own street. They walked on and Sejan strolled past houses where laughter and jeering spilled out onto the street from open doors and windows. Summer's heat had cooled and autumn winds made it mild enough to wear a light cloak at this hour. Sejan pulled his cloak closer, holding it closed as he bounded up the few stairs that led into his house.

The house was smaller than the rest surrounding it, but always pleasantly cool. Though generally quiet in nature, he and his parents found comfort in their surroundings. In the entryway, he removed his soiled boots and his ears perked up as he caught voices coming from his father's study. Guests were not uncommon in their house, but Sejan had not heard that his parents were expecting anyone tonight.

Sejan's mother, Myrenne, greeted him on his way to the stairs next to the kitchen. Plumply pretty, her long dark hair showing traces of white, she looked at him suspiciously. "And what have you been up to tonight?" Her green eyes, identical to his own, flicked downward to look at the knife at his belt. Sejan sighed. No, he was not going to avoid her notice tonight, after all.

"Take off that cloak, Sejan," she said, and he winced because her normally mild voice carried more than a hint of maternal authority. Slowly, he strode into the kitchen while removing his plain blue cloak. His plain leather workman's vest was scratched and worn, but the sleeves of his undershirt were dirty and bloodstained. The blood was not his, but he had let Kynan's knife rip one sleeve when he had barely twisted away in time to avoid a slice to his left bicep. Myrenne's eyes tightened and her hands went to her hips. It was a gesture that all women seemed to know, and worse, they knew that it made grown men feel as small as little boys whenever they employed it!

Myrenne shook her head in exasperation, and incongruously, Sejan caught the scent of his favorite fish stew and fresh bread baking over the hearth. "I don't know what to do with you, youngling." His mother's voice never rose in anger. His parents were much alike in that respect - neither believed giving over to anger solved a problem. But their quiet displeasure always infuriated their quite passionate child. "Let me guess," Myrenne began succinctly, "Daglan or one of your other hotheaded young friends let his mouth run, and being the ever loyal friend, you could not stand aside during the fight." His mother's eyes didn't so much as blink, but she stared straight into her son's identical eyes, hers shining like green augers and his own widened in helplessness. "You are twenty years old, Sejan. Too old for this foolishness." She turned around, wiping her hands on her apron. Picking up her knife, Myrenne chopped up vegetables for the stew, her words emphasized each time the knife cut through and thunked solidly against the cutting board.

"Two months ago you came home bleeding enough to scare even your father," THUNK! "A few weeks later, it's a black eye and a sprained ankle," THUNK! "Last week you say you will be home to help your father fix the roof," THUNK!, "and you stay out late doing the Light only knows what," THUNK! "And now you come home with bloody, torn clothes," THUNK! The words were only harsher for being spoken lightly, though he suspected his mother knew quite well the effect the knife was having on him.

When Myrenne turned around, her face was composed, the only wrinkles creasing her brow were the thin ones that were there whether she was smiling or frowning. But her right hand, he noticed, gripped the kitchen knife as if she intended to use it. While Myrenne was Andoran, not Altaran, she had no trouble embracing some of the customs of the land and city in which she had been living for the past twenty-two years. So Sejan eyed his mother and the knife warily. He'd only rarely seen her in a temper, and grimly he recalled that all three times had been on the occasion that he had been seriously threatened or injured. "What do you say for yourself?"

Sejan swallowed audibly, searching for some excuse, but he knew he was groping for something that he would never find. He stood looking at his hands, which he held clasped together before him by sheer force of will. I will tell Daglan and the others that from now on we will have to make company in safer places." Light, if only that satisfied her.

His mother held his gaze for a second and then turned again to collect her vegetables and added them to the pot hanging over the fire. Sejan was glad to see she had lain down her knife. Wonder of wonders was the snort she let out when she was done. "And have your friends name you a spineless sheep to do what your old mother tells you to do?" Her lips twitched in amusement. "I know how young men think, son. You are no coward. Hasty and foolish at times, but no coward." And where this was leading, he had not a clue!

"No," she continued, "you have caused me a few of my gray hairs, but in truth you are no more trying than any other son." Her smile vanished, though, and was replaced with a very considering look. Myrenne let out the faintest sigh. "I fear it is time to talk to your father. Wash up and then supper will be ready."

When Sejan came down the steps, his father's guest was gone and his parents were both seated at the round oak table where they had always taken their suppers. His father sat quietly, absorbed in thought as his mother efficiently filled their bowls with her stew. The elder Sejan looked much like his son, and people always knew upon seeing the two together that they were closely related. In fact, people as often as not thought they were brothers, for long years of working with the One Power had gifted his father with youthful features that did not match his years. By all appearances, his father looked somewhere between thirty and forty at one glance, as young as his mid-twenties if you looked again so that you could never say exactly how old he was. But you would never guess the man could claim 65 years easily.

Their physical differences were few. His father wore his black hair long, nearly touching his slender shoulders, and his lean frame was elegant, not reflecting the wiry muscle beneath the clothing. Sejan had the same build, but wore his hair cropped short, and his skin was lighter than the copper Domani tone of his father. While his father did not bother with current fashions, his son had always latched onto them with a quickness to match his enthusiasm for all things new and entertaining. Colored red glass set in silver shone from Sejan's left ear. He had asked for a ruby, knowing his parents could easily afford it, but his father had told him he thought the style ridiculous and Sejan had purchased what he could afford on his wages from the docks. Here and now, the elder Sejan's eyes were blue, and they met his son's gaze calmly.

"Sit, son," his father said in his always-quiet voice. He looked troubled as he continued, "Your mother tells me you were in another fight." Sejan steepled his hands in front of him, a tactic his son had seen him use many times when he was choosing his words carefully or displaying a level of emotion uncommon for the man who had pursued logic and philosophy for the better part of his life. "I have begun to think that perhaps we should have raised you in Far Madding rather than in Ebou Dar," a slight smile gave his father a handsomeness that was not generally apparent, and Sejan was surprised by the small joke enough that he chuckled appreciatively. "Do you remember a day long ago, Sejan, when you asked me if you could channel?" his father asked out of the blue.

"Yes, father," Sejan replied cautiously. "You told me that you did not know, but that if I did, the ability would come to me when I was older." He had considered that entire summer that he could possibly channel and his father merely didn't want to tell him, but the memory had lost its urgency over time after his father had not mentioned it again. Until now. The desire to channel had been a great one since he was a boy, listening to the rare stories his father told him about the founding of the Grey Tower, about the trips to strange places Sejan Asha'man had taken with his Aes Sedai, Karyna Danmarian. He knew all about the seven ajahs and how his father had been of the White Ajah, dedicated to answering questions of logic and philosophy. He himself would not choose such a life, but it seemed to fit his father quite well. He had also asked why his father had chosen a quiet life in Ebou Dar, but his mother had once told him that he should not ask that question because the answer was better left alone.

"I had thought to see if you would be happier in your life here, son, but all I see for you in this life is an early death at the end of a sword." Sejan blinked in surprise. Did his parents think he was that foolish? He was very good at defending himself! But his father continued, and Sejan found himself thinking that this was proving to be one of the oddest days of his life. "The ability to channel would not manifest in you by itself, but you can learn. At first, I thought perhaps you were too headstrong to go to the Tower, but now I wonder if perhaps the training would not cool your heels. It is your choice to go, and your mother agrees." It was more than Sejan had dared to hope for. His father's tales always carried an element of wonder about them. He also knew that the training would be hard, perhaps harder than anything he had ever done.

"I will think on it, father."


Sejan reigned his horse in as he approached his destination. A thriving compound, almost appearing as a city teaming with activity here in the Mountains of Mist, lay before him. The Grey Tower and its grounds were more splendid than his father had described, or perhaps his father's memories were simply not accurate after years of being absent. He heeled Charcoal forward, and Sejan approached his future with determination and more than a little trepidation and awe. Idly, as Charcoal's sure-footed steps carried him closer to the Tower, he wondered if he would meet some of the fabled men and women he knew only in story.

Career History

  • Soldier