Maelor Storm

Introduction
The bastard of Prince Daeron Targaryen and his illicit relationship with Tyana Mertyns, Maelor was raised by his father until his death in 425 AC. He is the current Knight-Captain of the Order of the Red Antler. He stands at 6’0” with a muscular build. He is known for his aloof demeanor, a byproduct of his prophetic and horrific dreams.

Appearance
Maelor’s long silver hair is generally flowing freely, when he fights he generally ties it behind him. His skin is as smooth as any other Valyrian’s would be. His eyes are a deep indigo that pull in the attention of anyone who looks at him. He wears jet black armor with the badge of his office pressed into the metal just above the left breast.

Birth
Maelor is the firstborn son of his two deceased parents Daeron Targaryen and Tyana Mertyns. His childhood was harsher than one would imagine for a child of royalty as his stain of bastardy meant he was an outcast to all those who knew his true parentage-- Queen Viseara especially. His father insisted on training Maelor himself.

Adolescence
Each morning before dawn the Lord Commander woke Maelor from the manse at which he stayed and drilled his son in combat until the sun rose in the sky. At which point he returned to the manse to spend the day with the servants his father hired for him. His mother was present often, but in some ways, Maelor felt she viewed him as a representation that his parents could never truly be together and felt disdain for him for it.

His two younger sisters were sent to Storm’s End when their mother passed. Maelor was ordered to stay behind with his father and returned to his life of solitude.

Waking Dreams
Maelor told his father one morning as he woke of a nightmare that woke him. He watched as a black dragon bigger than even Viserion, his father’s dragon, ate the sun. The sands below it formed into humanlike shapes, and the dragon unleashed the sun’s wrath below it. His dream brought him closer to the faces in the sand that had turned to a black glass.

His father told him to never speak of his dreams again.

White Fades to Black
The year 425 AC came upon them quickly, Maelor’s sixteenth nameday came and went with no fanfare from his father. He was a man grown and still, he was alone in an opulent manse paid for by his father’s own funds. Maelor wondered at that point what his life would come to. A rich bastard living his life out in the shadows of his trueborn cousins. His father’s dragon would never be his. He would never be called prince.

He woke from another dream, a white dragon sleeping in the dragonpit. Thousands of skeletal hands pulled the sleeping dragon into the ground. It thrashed. It roared. It spat silver flames as it disappeared.

His father came to him once more. For the first time, Maelor was given a weapon to raise against his father. The older man was slower than he was when he first trained his son, but he was still fast. Their duel exhausted Maelor, but it ended with the younger man’s victory. Prince Daeron Targaryen knighted his son that day. But he was never the same. Within a fortnight the Lord Commander of the Queensguard had passed quietly.

Shattered Faith
The Seven showed no mercy or compassion to Maelor in his life. He was alone with no friend and a dead father. His siblings had been raised as wards in Storm’s End, he was sure with plenty of their own friends to spend time with. He decided he would make his own way. Taking the money his father had given him for emergencies Maelor booked passage to Volantis, closer to his true home in his heart. Closer to the shattered remains of Valyria.

Upon his arrival, Maelor wandered the city looking for a place to call his own. He was enraptured by the enormity of the Temple of the Lord of Light. Triple the size of the Sept of Baelor, worshippers were always present, praising the Lord of Light. It was never dark near the temple for the night was dark, and full of terrors. Maelor paid for his stay in Volantis by working at the temple and keeping his head down. His dreams began to fade as he followed the practices of the Lord of Light. Something he was glad of, he finally could sleep without seeing terror and death. With the fading of his dreams, Maelor found an affinity for the flames that the denizens of the First Daughter worshipped and began to forget his line, forget the Targaryens, and focus upon his own life.

Firestorm
It didn’t come naturally. He had to work at it. He destroyed more sets of clothing than he cared to admit. But Maelor began to tame the flames that he was given to practice with, they were simple practices, to begin with, lighting and extinguishing candles along with catching embers as they rose through the air.

The priest that he worked under, Methysos forced him to practice harder than even his father made him work at the blade. Maelor’s experience in dueling encouraged the priests to teach him to light the flail he had taken as his new weapon on fire. It was a ritual that he spent the better part of three years learning. He had to ensure he didn’t burn himself, that the flame would be contained to the flail’s head, that the flames would stay lit as long as he needed them to. A special oil was provided when he first began to learn how to light the flail, almost as a crutch.

Slowly he was taught how to remove the oil and use the teachings of the Lord of Light and faith in the power of the fire in his heart to light the flail. Finally during his sixth year in Volantis Maelor began to look into the flames in his spare time. When he wasn’t handling his tasks as a tenant in the temple Maelor would stare into the flames in his room. Candles, incense, fireplaces, everything that had enough of a flame. Looking for a sign from R’hllor for his loyal servant, some days Maelor thought he saw something, rushing closer. But it never clarified. It was nothing. R’hllor showed him nothing in the flames.

Withering Flames
It was hard to maintain his faith the next two years. The refusal of R’hllor to show him visions frustrated him more than words could explain. Methysos noticed the waning of his faith, causing him to work harder at what he could do successfully. Lighting his weapon for displays in front of the temple, lighting the incense for prayers inside the temple and controlling small shapes in the fire.

After an extremely late night of staring at the fires, Maelor fell asleep and for the first time since the dream of the dragon sinking into the ground, a vision appeared in his mind. A Stag standing triumphantly over the corpses of various other animals, a lightning bolt hit the ground and a large castle standing forebodingly against the sky, defying the electricity that shot from above. A white dragon beckoning Maelor, and he knew where he needed to be at that moment.

He spent the next month debating what he would do. R’hllor refused him visions yet his bloodline didn’t. The blood of Valyria had long since forsaken the heathen gods of Essos in favor of the Seven. His father knighted him a knight of the Seven. He shamed his father for every year he spent in Essos preaching for a heathen God.

Control of fire came from his bloodline, not the damned Red God. He still could control the flames, and he knew it was a gift from his father, he couldn’t ride Viserion, so he himself became a dragon and would control his own flames and burn his enemies with his rage and flail.

The Stag’s Scales
Chartering a ship back to Westeros wasn't too difficult, his looks allowed him to lie his way into appearing far more important than he really was. Storm's End looked as it did when he visited it as a young child. He wondered if his sisters still lived there, or if they had abandoned their homes as he had. His arrival was met with no fanfare as was expected. For who knew he existed?

His visions spoke true. Gwayne Baratheon stood triumphant against the Warsmiths. Hanging them for their treason against their liege lord. Maelor felt that they deserved no less. Upon introducing himself as Rhae and Gwynesse's elder brother he was allowed access to Gwayne, at which time he swore his sword to the Stormlord's service and was inducted into the Order of the Red Antler.

The Rising Storm
His rise to the position of Knight-Captain took two more years, he served with honor and dignity, but with the same lack of mercy he always had. It was during this time he met his cousin Beric Mertyns and became fast friends with him. The two of them worked extremely well with one another, Beric showed an extraordinary talent for gathering information and Maelor showed he could act upon the information gathered.

Beric discovered a group of Warsmith followers who had turned to banditry after Gwayne shattered their power base in the Stormlands. Acting as knights of the Order of the Red Antler Beric and Maelor rode to hunt the bandits down. Beric's combat skills left much to be desired, but if he got the drop on someone he would almost definitely strike them down.

Maelor, on the other hand, preferred to dive head-on into the conflict and kill all those who he encountered. When his dragon rage took over him he felt the desire to slay those around him, and so he did with his flaming flail. The two knights slaughtered the dozen bandits who claimed they still fought for a greater cause.

Maelor's actions and ferocity led to Robar Baratheon endorsing Maelor as the new Knight-Captain of the Order of the Red Antler, a position he has held since.

Recent Events
(To be filled out as events unfold)