Radiant zeke

You want to know about the planetouched what's always hovering around Lady Whitegrove? Well it's
not hardly a secret, though not many speak of it. There's a lot of resentment towards that creepy bastard
but theres a lot of sympathy too I imagine. Blessed by the gods for his connections that lad is... Fine. I'll
begin then.
The story of Weeper begins in as these tales often do in an unassuming place and with events beyond
his control. His story begins with a man who would come to be known as Radiant Zhakial. Yeah. Thats
right. The great hero has a part in this. In an unassuming and sleepy little hamlet far from the centers of
power of the world Zhak was born to a simple family and a simple life. Loved and well raised Zhak
could never understand how the hearts of men could be as wicked and cruel as they often were. This
lack of understanding however did not imply blindness to faults of character or naivety to human nature
and in fact inspired him even as a boy. Zhak simply put would to what he could to not allow suffering
to happen to anyone if there was a way he could prevent it. No matter the persons creed or origin,
Stories say he only ever killed twice and both times not only tearfully presided over the mens funerals
telling of all good they had done no matter how small, asking their misdeeds be forgiven and because
he had robbed them of the ability to make amends for them sought to do so himself. His simple goal to
prevent unwarrented pain was what drove him, and what singled him out in the eyes of the gods of
light. The young boy who stood up to every bully grew into a man who stood up to every tyrant. Loved
by the gods and charmed with their blessing he grew into a peerless holy warrior. Radiant Zhakial
became a paladin so named for his bright smile and boundless optimism though he prefered as always
simpley to be called Zhak.. Unlike many who strive and struggle with the mantle of holy warrior love,
kindness, and joy it fell easily about his shoulders and his simple caring nature and unending hope
spared him many pit falls. Zhak was no grand crusader, no vengance against evil stirred in his breast.
Because removing the stain completely from the heart was not only impossible but would rob the living
of their right to a self. Virtue means nothing when it is forced upon us was an often used refrain of his.
It was enough for him to save who he could when he could from the sting of cruelty. This is not a tale
of a fallen idealist, at least not in the way they often are.

Zhak's last great stand against evil was against one of the foulest creatures the world had ever known,
an undead being fueled by rage and vengence against the living. The greatest story of Zhak's heroism
was noy a battle. It was not through a show of arms or divine power. His friends and companions fallen
and near death around him Zhak stood between the fallen and the rage bloated corpse. With his famed
smile he stepped into the seething corona of profane power surrounding the undead horror and simply
said “Slake your need to hurt upon me. I do not hate you for it neighbor and I never will.” Everything
dark and black in the dead sorcerer seethed into the man and while Zhak's empathetic smile never
faltered over a thousened years of venomous torment and decayed resentment did. With the darkness
that drove it burnt out the Lich crumbled. Thier soul moving on to whatever awaited it in the worlds
beyond. And Zhak toppled over, withered, weakened and battered, but just because a thing is damaged
it is not always broken. Through the blessings and love of the gods Zhak lived and though he was
lessened, much of what divinity once made him capable of heroic tasks now simply helped to keep him
alive. And this still was enough for Zhak

The Paladin returned to his sleepy village, took a wife and fell into the life of a simple village smith. He
also took the time to reconnect with his older brother.
Oh? Did I not mention the brother before? Well that is the crux of it I suppose. . Always was looked
over. In his younger brothers shadow in the eyes of family and neighbors. Lacked a strong enough faith
and conviction to go far in the curch, but since the rumors say he only joined to try to pray the gods of
light into lovimg him over his brother it isnt exactly surprising. No he stayed a small man who returned
to his small town to have little faith . Most folks don't even remember his name... Just calling him
Candle in contrast to his brother's radiance. The only things candle had in any real abundance was
greed, hate, and the ability too see and grow those traits in others. Everyone forgets it only takes one
spilled candle to turn a house into ashes. By the time his brother returned the village was a different
place. Sure the little town at the bottom of a hill still seemed as pretty as a picture but that was just
pretty flowers on a tree with a rotted heart. The series of valleys around the town was perfect for
highwaymen and slavers to accost people in places where the queens road was hard to police. Those
filth were Abbott Candles true flock. He'd turned the whole local temple and Abbey into a den of vice,
setting up forgers as scribes, flesh traders and murderers as holy men and monks. Holding purloined
youths in the wine cellars Never letting things get to big Even had black fingered poisoners posing as
healers and ran a thriving little black market from the rectory taking a piece from every dark deed in
the countryside... And he knew that if anyone could ruin it it was his brother. And so the bloated spider
sent out his cruel whispers from behind a smiling mask that his brother had lost the love of the gods...
And were it not for one simple little thing. The child.
While the blessings upon Zhak kept him alive and hale as any normal man the seething hellish energies
he had absorbed changed him a bit and on the night he and the wife thought they'd given birth the the
most angelic baby daughter the babe was born silently observing the world with hellish eyes and
burbled and cooed through a mouth of blackened razors. While the parents could overlook that
strangeness the rest of the town couldn't so over the next several years Candle eroded the good will
towards his brother. By the end of it all Zeke hung from a tree unwilling to raise a hand aginst
neighbors and kin. His wife was burned alive for witchcraft and communion with the forces of
darkness, and the child was forced to watch, much of their young spirit untethering and sinking deep to
hide from the pain.By the time the child was sold off they had little in the way of personality or will
mostly hovering like a ghost and silently watching the world unfold around them.

Weeper was sold to a criminal guild in the city who's leader was something of collector of cursed
objects and things tainted by the dark powers. He was also famous for a slew of vile appetites and a
perverse love of unethical experimentation. No one knows much about what happened to that guild.
One day they had sort of stopped operating and their biggest rivals, a group of neck cutters, back
stabbers and inheritance facilitators known as the Ashen Cloaks took their territory. Years went by and
their hold over assassination in the capitol grew thanks in no small part to their enforcer. A pale ghost
of a man wrapped in the loving embrace of smog, soot, and shadow seen Never wasted on cutting the
throats of powerful nobles or wealthy merchants... The Weeping Death was a weapon only aimed at the
sharpest blades in other guilds or those who betrayed, or stole from the Ashen Cloak. Messy public
affairs where this instrument of wrath was often seen crying fat black tears over murderers, con men,
and warren bosses alike. But the Ashen Cloaks reached to far, made to many enemies, and scared to
many of the greatest city's people in the halls of power and back alleys alike and when they came for
the Ashen Cloak the guilds greatest weapon was days out of the capitol skulking in the outskirts of a
small hamlet at the bottom of a hill planning a campaign it took over two years. to enact.

Candle it seemed was destined to hit a spot of bad luck. His men were found mutilated in the woods,
his wares never reaching his intended buyers. Thier payments never reaching his coffers. The goodly
people who remained masking his dark deeds were so disturbed by the pall over their town that to a
man they had all left to live with relatives who'd received unexpected windfalls or having been willed
lands and homes by long lost or unknown relatives leaving nothing in the town but spies, traitors,
deserters, false holy men bandits and others who had grown fat off the milk of suffering that had until
recently flown freely from Candle's Abbey of sins. Now hollowed and hungry from bad fortune they
begin to snap at one another not finding common ground until the villages final night. Fires started to
break out chasing them from hearth and home, pushing them towards the center of town where they
beheld a sight that to this day the survivors only speak of in hushed whispers when deep into their cups.
Upon the stump where the head of the vandalized and damaged statue of Radiant Zhakial once
watched over the town stood a figure of unimpressive height. Despite the smoke and flickering flames
his angelic face streaked with inky tears shone clear. In his hands he clutched a rope that looped around
the arms of the statue from the end of witch hung the almost corpse of Father Candle kicking away it's
last dregs of life. To the response to the cries of the bewildered villains seeking to avoid the flames the
figure released the rope letting the abbots mortal remains fall and raised his hand to silence them and
spoke in a voice hollowed by sorrows and rusty from disuse “I am the righteous fist of a man of the
gods. I am the devil of a mother consigned to flames that you have forgotten, and this hell that comes
with me is of your own making.
`

Sees her fathers statue and wonders what he would think

Weeper meets his Lady

Weeper finds his place