Alton Orkwood

Born in 411, Alton Orkwood is the second son of Harlon Orkwood and the current Lord of Orkmont, having been so since so since the year 435 following the end of the civil war that engulfed the Iron Islands and resulted in the deaths of his father and older brother.

Appearance and Character
A little over six feet, broad shoulders, strong from years spent at sea, but tired from the same. His face bears the faintest lines of an old anger put half to rest years ago. Beneath the thin, faded mask of a decade's worth of reaver's scars, hunter's scars, there remains a lightness of youth.

Childhood
Born to Harlon Orkwood and Helya Tawney in early 411. His mother died in childbirth. How different would it have been if she'd lived? Alton's father was a fair man, and not incapable of love, but he raised Ironborn sons. Alton was taught how to fight, how to row, how to read the waves and the stars better even than he could read letters on a page.

As a young boy he would spend whole days at the shipyard, watching as longships were built from the keel up, the planks joined stern to stern, one overlapping the next, and from the second he was old enough, he worked in those shipyards himself, learning to use the tools that any Ironborn worth his salt could use.

When he wasn't learning to build ships, he was learning to sail them, and gladly took up opportunities to crew fishing vessels and the like from the time he was 13 years old.

Adolescence
In 425 AC the arrival of the Blue Winter, and the storms, forced a moderate curtailment of seafaring activity throughout the Iron Islands. The vast fishing fleets of Orkmont came home, the shipbuilding industry slowed, and Alton, who by now was eager to spend as much time at sea as possible, suddenly found himself stuck on land and often indoors.

Never any kind of scholar at much other than the nautical sciences, Alton instead honed his skill with a sword during this time, favoring the speed and ease of movement afforded by a rapier, over the more common broadsword.

This was also the time when Alton began to take a greater interest in the affairs of his House, their relation to the other noble families of the Iron Islands, and the role they played in the politics of the day. He would listen to his father and his older brother Erich talk at length about the hardships brought on the by the winters, and he took it to heart when they spoke about how the Ironborn had only ever known true prosperity when they fully embraced the Old Way.

At Sea
By the time Blue Winter had ended in 428 AC, Alton Orkwood had come of age, and like so many young men, and especially Ironborn, he wanted to see the world. So, in early 428, he took three ships from the Orkwood fleet and departed from the Iron Islands get a taste of what lay beyond this rusted little corner of the sea.

The next years saw him trace the shape of Westeros in a long crooked U, north to south to north again over on the eastern coast, and in there somewhere: the Stepstones, the Free Cities, the Shivering Sea, and though the Old Way had been gone from the Iron Islands since the days of yore, Alton and his men exported it when and where they could, laying in wait for the moments when some wealthy merchant or another would make themselves vulnerable on the water. They were sloppy about it at first, and Alton collected a few scars for himself down in the Stepstones, but what better place was there for a reaver to cut his teeth? They came out of it all the stronger, and carved their way up the Narrow Sea, learning just how narrow it truly was when they incurred the wrath of this family or that company and found themselves the subjects of one vicious pursuit after another until by 431 they'd run plumb out of sea.

At this point, Alton had lost one ship (to storms, to desertion, or to something else he'd never know) and his remaining crew were losing heart. Whenever they made money, it seemed, they either lost it fast or spent it faster, and by the time they'd made it to Lorath, they were tired, growing poorer by the day, and still remembered all too well by the enemies they'd made back in the Narrow Sea. Alton was on the verge of chancing the voyage home when one day he was shown the truth of how a fortune could be made when an Ibbenese ship hauled a Leviathan into the harbor. He watched the Ibbenese as they cut the beast's massive head wide open and harvested the thick, waxy oil from within before feasting on whale meat later that very night. When they'd sold their harvest, the crew were showered with riches. It was said that the barrels of oil that ship had come home with would keep lit all the lamps of Volantis for a fortnight.

Alton and his men considered robbing these people. A year before, they would have, but they had grown tired of fighting, racing, and running out of places to go. Instead, they waited until the captain of this ship was alone one night, then more or less kidnapped him, and demanded he show them how to hunt whales. Soon thereafter they left Lorath with their Ibbenese guide and whaled in the Shivering Sea until they were richer than they'd ever been.

After these years and miles, the Iron Islands had begun to seem like a far off dream to Alton, like he could feel his own self and history slipping through his fingers. There were some days when he could be asked where he was from and it would take him a couple moments to remember. The Black Prophet's Rebellion came and Alton was nowhere to be found. In 435 AC, when word finally reached him of the deaths of his father and brother, he decided at long last it was time to return home. He had long since exchanged his vessels for wide-hulled whaling ships and when he sailed into the icy harbor of Orkmont he looked at first like a foreigner. But he came with gold. Gold and food.

Since 435
Since his return to the Iron Islands and becoming Lord of Orkmont, Alton has seen to the rebuilding of the shipyards of Orkmont and the construction of new vessels to replace those lost in the Scouring of Orkmont near the conclusion of the war.

He has led a mostly quiet life on the island, and is inclined to leave strife and hostility in the past. He holds no grudges, but is committed to advancing the interests of his people through whatever means best suit the moment.

Family

 * Triston Orkwood (†)
 * m. Gysella Codd (†)
 * Esgred Orkwood
 * Harlon Orkwood (†)
 * m. Helya Tawney (†)
 * Erich Orkwood (†)
 * Alton Orkwood