Bri'zani - Lionfolk Tracker

Born in captivity, oceans away from his homeland on Zandorion, Bri’zani was raised in bondage to a wealthy merchant and slaver. Sudd Tohst’s Lionfolk were often used in game and bloodsport by their owners, with small fortunes flowing through the blood-soaked arenas day in and day out. Bri’zani was fortunate to be spared from a place within the ring, but instead stood ringside, next to his owner, a towel at the ready and meagre training in first aid to bandage and heal any pressing wounds that might emerge in the scraps. For the Lionfolk slaves often would maim or slay any human trainers and cutmen, thus their enslaved kin would begin taking their place, though Bri’zani, like many in his position, were seen as traitors and “declawed” by their people. This insult was used derogatively among the servants to refer to any Lionfolk or Catfolk who lived in comfort and easement with their masters, usually having their own servant’s quarters in their abode with regular meals and baths. Whilst he was grateful to not share the squalid conditions lived in by the majority of his enslaved kin, their insults and belittlement often alienated him from their plight, and by adulthood any empathy he held for them had long since dissipated. Hence there was no hesitation after a group escaped from his master: Bri'zani volunteered in leading a party of headhunters in tracking them down. Their scents were familiar, strong and wretched on the savannah winds, and after a week their pace had deadened, fraught by hunger and illness. They were all recaptured thanks to Bri’zani’s innate ability to track. When they returned, five of the twenty were publicly executed by their master, a warning to any who might show signs of disloyalty in the future. Over the years, Bri’zani’s master then came to render his services to his own fellow slavers and other nobles, with the young Lionfolk earning a reputation as a master tracker in finding runaways, whatever crevice they might hide in. In his final task for his master, Bri’zani was able to locate a large contingent of runaway slaves for Sultan Hakim, many of whom were his kindred. In a public display thereafter, the Sultan had all the slaves brought to the main square of Torish Istrath, where he had one member of each slave family executed, forcing their kin to watch on in horror. In thanks to Bri’zani’s service, the Sultan declared Bri’zani a freefolk, to forge his own future for his service to the Sultanate. Uproar came from the slaves who watched, as the cast insults and curses towards him, calling him a traitor, declawed. A murderer. In the moment, Bri’zani felt nothing but further resentment towards those who spat at him and hated him, but in the months after he walked free, his conscience began to weigh heavy through reflection: the sight of his beheaded kin laying upon the sandstone floors. The weeping of their children, watching their parent’s brutal execution. Could he have done more for them? Would they even love him if he did? Were they even worth saving? His master had always treated him better than his own people, even as a child, yet a sinking feeling in his stomach began to constantly linger, gnawing at his soul. It was here that Bri’zani then decided to join the World Explorer’s & Hunter’s League, hoping that his skills as a tracker might be put to good in the world, rather than be used to enforce bondage upon those who, in another life, would have called him their brother.