Bhimar Firesong

Bhimar was five years old when his mother, Ruya, disappeared from his life suddenly. His father, Laltel, told him that Ruya was dead, that she was murdered, but that she wasn’t needed. Bhimar spent the next thirty years learning from his father sorcery, building on the foundations laid by Ruya through the knowledge and volumes of lore that she had taught to Laltel and left behind, as well as how to fight and how to survive in the desert. Before he died at his own son’s hand, Laltel instilled in Bhimar the need for two things. One was to take the Seosan throne Laltel thought was rightfully his, as he was actually the older brother of the current king, the difference being that Laltel had been born to a concubine, and the current king born to the queen. It was a desire that eventually grew, in Bhimar, to be for all the Five Kingdoms. The other was to ensure that he took a wife who would give him good, strong sons and who would stay loyal, whether out of love or out of her own lust for power.

The secret, Bhimar knew, would be to gain the Hearts of the Kingdoms, and so he set out to capture Shadow Walkers. He continued to study his father’s volumes of sorcery until he perfected a spell that would capture any Shadow Walkers that came within a certain distance of his tent. He didn’t have to wait more than a week before he captured two Shadow Walkers wearing the uniform of the royal guards of Linwood: Alastar Redleaf and Arya Summerbreeze.

Having retained his father’s network of spies, Bhimar knew that Arya had been a close friend of Princess Agrona of Linwood, but that they’d had a falling out, and that Alastar’s twin sister, Rhiannon, had married Agrona’s brother, Ithel. He bound them to keep them from escaping into the shadows using iron cuffs around their wrists. He beat and tortured them to get them to agree to steal the Hearts for him, regularly raping Arya and forcing Alastar to watch.

With word that Agrona was pregnant and having overheard Arya tell Alastar that she hoped to reconcile with her friend, Bhimar told his contact in Linwood, Alastar’s older brother Doran, to cause Agrona to have a miscarriage. Using this to show Arya and Alastar how easily he could get to those they cared about, they finally agreed.

Thinking he had won at last, Bhimar was outraged when Arya and Alastar never returned. Still, Bhimar bided his time. He left the training of his men in charge of his second-in-command and traveled to Linwood, where he met, befriended, and seduced Agrona. Finding her to have power flowing through her veins, he taught her in the arts of sorcery even as he helped her continue her destruction of every one of her sister-in-law’s pregnancies, encouraging her to insure that her brother had no heir but her, not caring that he shared her with one of the guards who had no idea that she was sleeping with Bhimar as well.

After fourteen years, Bhimar brought in his men, who murdered King Ailill and Queen Catriona. There were to have been no witnesses, but Agrona saw, and when she tried to disassociate with him, he blackmailed her, even raping her to remind her that he could get to her at any time when she became lax in what he now viewed as her duty to him.

A hundred and seventy-eight years after seeing to the deaths of Ailill and Catriona, Bhimar was in Isiltaras when he saw a dark-haired beauty named Tanith. She was dressing to go to the palace, to become a concubine for a young King Ruslar, when he kidnapped her. Back in camp, he spoke to her of love and promised her riches and power beyond her imagination, that she would someday be queen and not a mere concubine. She was resistant at first, but he wore her down, and not quite two years later she bore him twin sons, Drusus and Draco.

Deciding his wife needed a servant and that his oldest would need a worthy bride, Bhimar again went to Isiltaras. There, he kidnapped Queen Rhosyn and her two newborn children, Nisha and Rowan. He kept Rhosyn as a slave and Nisha to be a bride for Drusus. He took Rowan to Linwood and presented him as a “gift” to Agrona, who took him and told him never to contact her again. Bhimar merely laughed and returned home.

Six years later, Bhimar again led a raid into Linwood. He killed Ithel and Rhiannon, framing Agrona for it with help from Doran. He also began keeping a careful eye on Nisha, who had begun showing all of the signs of being a Shadow Walker. He let her train herself and play in the shadows, but he would not let her get far from camp, using magical wards to set limits and an iron cuff to keep her in the camp when she tried to push the limits.

Six years after his last raid into Linwood City, Bhimar arrived there again, slowly poisoning Cliona, who he knew to be the princess that had escaped Agrona’s notice when she had been lax in her duties. Not knowing Cliona had a daughter, Bhimar slipped her a potion that imitated death, and hours after she had been buried, he retrieved her, woke her with the antidote, and took her as a slave as well. Knowing that Rhosyn would recognize her, however, he gave Cliona more potions to keep her mute and change her appearance and renamed her Pari.

As soon as Nisha was of age, Bhimar married her to Drusus. He worried about finding a bride for his younger son, for Draco was less stable than his twin. Nineteen years after he had kidnapped Rhosyn and her children, Bhimar was shocked to learn that young Rowan had risen to marry Tesni, the daughter of Cliona and now Queen of Linwood. Sixteen years after he had killed Ithel and Rhiannon, though, Tanith presented him with a third son, though she had been certain her childbearing days were over, the birth of the twins having been thought to have rendered her sterile. Bhimar named this new son Eskander.

Two years after Eskander was born, Doran reported to Bhimar that Tesni had given birth to a girl. Five years later, Doran reported to him that Princess Nia was displaying the same signs of being a Shadow Walker that his twin sister, Rhiannon, had. Gleeful of this, Bhimar ordered Nisha to retrieve Nia, and that if she attempted to escape while unbound for this task, he would kill her mother. Nisha, cowed and obedient because of the way Drusus treated her, obeyed, bringing Nia back and beginning her training.

Bhimar was both impressed but suspicious as Nia grew. The girl spent too much time watching the men practice their archery. By the time the girl was ten, she had not only proven herself with a bow, but with a horse, as well, and it was then that Bhimar knew that this was the girl prophesized to destroy him. He responded by betrothing her to Eskander, feeling that Draco was still too unstable and would merely break her, whereas Eskander would win her loyalty for him. When his youngest was eighteen, Bhimar saw the two of them wed, only to lose Nia, his son, his horse, his wife, and Nisha and Rhosyn.

Not two months later, however, Tanith contacted Bhimar in the middle of the night. She had successfully gained the trust of all within the women’s quarters, and Bhimar utilized her as a spy, something she successfully framed their youngest son for, as Eskander had proven himself useless to them. When she was discovered and executed a few months later, Bhimar executed her father, the head of the royal guard. He also had Artunis killed by poison, and sent his top assassin, Ratan, after Tesni, who managed to survive.

With Eskander no longer under his control and Draco dead, Bhimar pressured Drusus to take a new wife. Drusus obeyed, bringing home Sigrid, an Ice Elf from Fannar who had been training as a Shield Maiden. At first, Bhimar thought that Sigrid would be obedient and loyal, that Drusus had been successful in choosing a woman like Tanith. A month and a half into the marriage, however, Bhimar realized that she was still trouble, as the other women in the camp began to rebel.

In an effort to keep the calm and return things to normal, Bhimar sent Drusus and Sigrid first to Halmar, and then to Fannar, thinking that the second trip, knowing her family was so close and yet inaccessible, would break her. When his spies told him that they did not take the route he told them to, however, Bhimar grew to realize that his final son had turned traitor under Sigrid’s influence. He did, however, manage to successfully take over Seos while they were gone, though the royal family and the women from the women’s quarters managed to escape.

Satisfied with this, at least, Bhimar decided that his newborn grandson would be his heir. With Ratan now dead, Bhimar called forth a servant and, using a magic talisman to ensure he would obey despite his loyalties to the Seosan royal family, sent him to kill Nia and kidnap her son.

Unfortunately, this, too, backfired, but by this point the Ghost Warriors had arrived from Halmar, and he was ready to strike at Linwood more directly.

When Bhimar's forces finally arrived in Linwood City, it was to find that everyone had evacuated except for Tesni's loyal chamberlain, Gwydion. Though Bhimar's first instinct was to execute the chamberlain, he quelled it long enough to realize that he would need Gwydion in order to help control the rest of the servants. Instead, he had Gwydion go to the dungeons and free Doran Redleaf, who, despite everything, remained loyal, at least until Bhimar decided to take Doran's daughter for a wife. It was at this point that Gwydion escaped with Doran's wife and daughter. Bhimar executed Doran.

During this time period, Bhimar had also captured Ratan's twin brother, Kavi, as well as Sarnai, the shifari of Isilarran. He had repeatedly forced her into his bed, and shortly after executing Doran, he learned that Sarnai carried his child. This resulted in even greater outrage when she and Kavi escaped and triggered his readiness to move further west to take Yewsel.

It was in Yewsel that, during the Battle of Hearts, Bhimar was captured and defeated. Shortly afterward, he faced a gauntlet of those he had hurt, each one landing various blows. Eventually, at the end of this line, he reached Agrona, who forcibly made him bow down before Nia sliced off his head.