The list of characters from Saint of Steel books. All spoilers are untagged.
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Paladins of the Saint of Steel
In General
The last surviving paladins of the Saint of Steel after the god's death. Since the Saint's death, they have lived with the Temple of the White Rat in Archon's Glory.
- The Berserker: Their blessing, which they retain after the god's death. Before the death of the Saint, they were guided by him to harm only the enemy and spare all innocents; afterwards, they're more traditional berserkers who will go after anything in their way.
- Dark and Troubled Past: The death of the Saint and what they did in response.
- Heroic Self-Deprecation: Many outsiders like to joke that being a paladin automatically comes with a perpetual sense of guilt, and none of those folks go against that stereotype.
- The Paladin: It's in the name. Even after the death of their god, all of them are still devoted to serving the cause of good.
- Psychic Link: If a few paladins of the Saint of Steel start going into the battle tide together, they become synchronized with each other, moving together and acting as one.
- Two Girls to a Team: Of the seven paladins, two are women.
Stephen
The male protagonist of Paladin's Grace and the unofficial leader of the seven remaining paladins. Now serving the Temple of the White Rat, he lives mainly out of duty to the debt he owes them and to look out for his fellow paladins — until he unexpectedly rescues a perfumer from the Hanged Motherhood.
- Beware the Nice Ones: He's probably the kindest, nicest, friendliest of the paladins... and perfectly capable of tearing a man's head right off his shoulders.
- Bodyguard Crush: He positions himself as a bodyguard for Grace to accompany her into dangerous circumstances, though part of his arc is him learning to let her protect herself.
- Deadpan Snarker: Nicer than the usual example of the trope, but his humour does tend towards the dry.
- Green-Eyed Monster: He's disturbed to discover that he reacts to anyone else trying to get with Grace with anger and hostility. Admittedly, both of the other men turn out to be out to exploit her, but it still gets Stephen in trouble and he eventually learns to let her deal with them.
- Heroic Self-Deprecation: In spades. Half the problems in the relationship between him and Grace are caused by him thinking he'd hurt her if given the chance, despite all evidence to the contrary, and he beats himself up over every mistake he makes.
- Not a Morning Person: Aside from having trouble even getting out of bed in the morning, he's not really capable of coherent speech until his first cup of tea.
- Passion Is Evil: He holds that view, when applied to himself; he thinks any stronger emotion he feels is a sign that he's about to go into berserker rage, and thus tries to keep it under wraps. It takes both Istvhan and Beartongue giving him a What the Hell, Hero? talk to get him to reconsider.
- Real Men Wear Pink: Stephen knits socks. He doesn't understand why people find this amusing, because knitting socks requires multiple sharp needles he could easily weaponise — except he never would, because that would require getting the needle back in place afterwards. Also, blood is hard to wash out of wool.
- The Reliable One: He has the reputation of the most reliable among the paladins, and with a good reason. He is well aware of it and tries to keep it up, which is why he anguishes so much whenever he loses his temper.
- Self-Restraint: When he's arrested for contempt of court, he freely lets the bailiffs take him to prison, even though he could easily wipe the floor with everyone in the room. Unfortunately for everyone else, he's put in the same cell as one of the Smooth Men, and when he realizes it, the battle tide comes.
- Tranquil Fury: How his battle tide manifests before it's fully unleashed; he just stands in silence with absolute murder in his eyes.
Istvhan
The largest and friendliest of the paladins, Istvhan is the male protagonist of Paladin's Strength. He spends a fair amount of time gently telling his fellow paladins to pull their heads out of their arses.
- Amazon Chaser: Part of his attraction to Clara comes from the fact that she is almost as bulky and strong as he is.
- Bandit Clan: His family seems to have been one:Stephen: Istvhan here looks less like an honour guard than a bandit, and–Istvhan: I’ll have you know that some of my favorite aunts were bandits!Stephen: Were?Istvhan: Well, they're mostly dead. Now my favourite cousins are bandits.
- Boisterous Bruiser: Extremely large, always happy to spar, and loving to crack jokes with his fellow paladins, sometimes at their expense.
- Ethical Slut: He's the one most vocal about sex and suggesting that his friends finally get it on with either their love interests or someone, anyone else - and he follows his own advice, as he's sleeping regularly with Beartongue, making him the only paladin to have a somewhat stable relationship before the story starts. He's also extremely courteous with Clara and lets her take the lead to make sure he's not imposing on her.
- Fish out of Water: The book opens with him having to navigate his way through the lands of the horse lords, and nearly starting a blood feud when one of the lords thanks him for his services by offering him a woman. It gets so bad, the woman in question has to guide him through the process so he doesn't offend everyone.
- Put on a Bus: He spends most of Hope up north helping the Sisters of Saint Ursa rebuild their convent, which keeps him out of the action until the epilogue.
- The Smart One: Of all the paladins shown so far, he seems to be the most in control of the battle tide, and the most mentally coherent when it's on him, though he too runs the risk of succumbing to it fully.
- Super Drowning Skills: He can't swim, and is in fact terrified of drowning; at the end of Strength, Clara has to drag him through the water on her back and he still nearly dies.
- Sickeningly Sweethearts: With Clara, apparently; Galen jokes that he came back from Saint Ursa convent because he just couldn't stand the two of them anymore.
- What the Hell, Hero?: When Stephen confesses to him about his feelings for Grace, Istvhan chews him out on his actions and basically tells him to own up to his mistakes and apologize to her.
- Would Hit a Girl: Mentioned when he feels guilty for accidentally stabbing Clara (It Makes Sense in Context) and she says he wouldn't worry if she were Galen or Stephen:Istvhan: "It's different."Clara: "Because you're men?"Istvhan: "No, of course not. I'd choke Wren or Judith, too."
Galen
A red-headed man with a temper, and one of the protagonists of Paladin's Hope. He's among the hardest-hit of the paladins, as ever since the Saint's death, he's suffered night terrors that can switch into berserker rages when he wakes up in the middle of them.
- Break His Heart to Save Him: Galen breaks up with Piper not because he's uninterested, but because he believes that he's fundamentally dangerous to other people. Pretty much everyone tells him it's idiotic, and the two end up getting together after all.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Moreso than most other paladins; while Stephen, Shane and Istvhan had been travelling with paladins of the Dreaming God when the Saint died - and thus could be subdued - Galen was part of a group meeting with civillians in a fairly populated town. After the madness passed, all that remained of the locals were two left hands, and the only paladins to both survive the slaughter and wake up from their coma afterwards were Galen and Marcus. It's the source of Galen's nightmares.
- Fiery Red Head: The most short-tempered and energetic of the paladins, with a head full of red hair.
- Happily Married: Ends up married to Piper by the end of Hope.
- Heroic Self-Deprecation: Probably the worst case so far, as between his temper and his night terrors, he's convinced he's not just unpleaseant, but an actively dangerous person to be around. In fact, his low sense of self-worth causes him to sabotage his relationship with Piper, and when he proposes later, he admits that he's doing it in part because he doesn't trust himself not to screw up again.
- Ladykiller in Love: Or rather, since he is gay, Mankiller. It is heavily implied that he has had a lot of one-night stands in his time, but he falls deeply in love with Piper and they are the first couple in the series to end up married.
- Plagued by Nightmares: Galen suffers from night terrors; often he'll be squirming and screaming in his dreams, mostly remembering the slaughter at Hallowbind.
- Wake Up Fighting: Galen's fellow paladins know not to wake him up when he's having nightmares, as he will launch directly into the battle tide, in which he won't recognize even his allies. Played for Drama, as unlike Stephen and Istvhan, Galen seems incapable of differentiating between his enemies and his love interest.
Shane
The most composed of the Paladins, often called on to assist or simply look menacing in a corner.
- Big Damn Heroes: Part of The Cavalry that arrives to rescue Galen, Piper and Earstripe.
- Broken Ace: Galen considers him the best fighter among them, and the most handsome, but hopeless in other matters.
Galen: Shane could go toe-to-toe with a god, if he could get his head out of his ass first.
- Facial Scruff: The only thing marring his handsomness is his beard, which Galen calls "regrettable".
- Not So Stoic: Despite his reputation for stoicism, when escorting Grace home after a bad incident between her and Stephen, he's baffled and shocked when she starts venting at him.
- The Reliable One: The other one aside from Stephen to be considered extremely reliable.
- The Stoic: Aside from the incident with Grace, he's pretty much always calm and composed.
- Straight Man: Becomes this when in company of Stephen and Istvhan, as the two trade jokes and barbs while he suffers through them in silence.
Wren
One of the two women among the Saint's paladins, with a habit of bottling up her emotions.
- Action Girl: A berserker paladin, and no less badass than her brothers in arms.
- Emotionless Girl: She comes across as having no feelings at all, with Grace describing her expression as "curiously blank", though Stephen implies that it's less that she's emotionless and more that she refuses to express any of her emotions.
Wren, of all his brothers and sisters, was the one most determined to prove she was made of iron and stone.
- Loophole Abuse: When Bishop Beartongue forbids anyone from giving Stephen a sword to fight the Hanged Mother priests with, Wren lends him her dagger instead.
- Motor Mouth: Piper claims that Wren is usually "as chatty as her namesake", despite her general disposition.
- Pint-Sized Powerhouse: She seems to be the shortest of the paladins, barely coming up to Galen's collarbone, but she's still a paladin of the Saint of Steel, and well capable of kicking ass.
Marcus
One of the two survivors of the massacre at Hallowbind, alongside Galen. Unlike the other paladins, Marcus is a married man, but he never contacted his wife after the Saint's death, letting her think he died as well.
- Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder: He speculates that in the past three years, his wife may've married the town blacksmith. For Marcus himself, the trope is averted; he has stayed fastidiously loyal to her, even though he doesn't believe he'll ever see her again.
- Big Damn Heroes: He comes to Galen and Piper's rescue alongside Shane.
- Break Her Heart to Save Her: After Hallowbind, Marcus never contacted his wife, letting her believe he's dead for her safety.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Marcus is one of only two survivors of Hallowbind, a town where a dozen paladins were meeting with the local populace when the Saint died. In the ensuing madness, the paladins tore the town apart and then fell on each other. Worse yet, Marcus had been married beforehand, and chose to hide rather than confront his wife about the reality of his existence.
- The Eeyore: The most glum and melancholic of the group, though with a good reason.
- Faking the Dead: He let his family think he died at Hallowbind, ostensibly to keep them safe.
- Happily Married: By all accounts, he married out of love, and still cherishes his wife dearly, even if he refuses to let himself see her anymore.
- Impoverished Patrician: He was a minor noble before becoming a paladin, though all that he has left of that time are impeccable manners and horseriding skills.
Judith
The other female paladin, with next to nothing else known about her.
- Bit Character: She's mentioned extremely rarely, has only one line in a flashback, and she's not even named in her sole present-day appearance.
- Mysterious Past: Despite knowing the other paladins for nearly a decade, she has never shared anything about her origin - even her native country.
Others
Grace Angelica
A perfumer, originally from Anuket City, who runs a small but prestigious business in Archon's Glory. The female protagonist of Paladin's Grace.
- All Witches Have Cats: Invoked by the Motherhood priests; she lives with a civette cat named Tab, which they use as a "proof" that she's a witch.
- Awful Wedded Life: Phillip only married her because he believed she was a genius perfumer who could enrich his business; he also had an inflated sense of his own prowess in bed, made Grace feel like she was the one at fault for not enjoying their marriage, and started sleeping around, even bringing his lovers home while she was also in. Grace eventually ran away from him, and by the end of the story she starts the process of formally divorcing him.
- Blessed with Suck: Underplayed, but her unusually strong sense of smell occassionally leaves her overwhelmed by sensory overload.
- Cloudcuckoolander: She can spend hours talking about perfumes, even in circumstances that don't warrant it, often gets distracted by unusual smells, and thinks there's nothing wrong about going alone in city's seedier areas at night while there's a serial killer on the loose.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Grace was raised in an orphanage, then taken in by an angry, threatening teacher who later forbid her from taking any of her notes when she left his services. She was then married to an emotionally-abusive husband who quickly began cheating on her. She eventually fled Anuket City in the middle of winter with nothing but her clothes, her perfume notes, and her weasel-cat, Tab.
- Hidden Supplies: She keeps several stashes of clothes and money across the city in case she has to run away yet again.
- Line-of-Sight Alias: Her surname, Angelica, is one she made up after arriving in Archon's Glory; it comes from one of the substances she uses in perfumes.
- Nervous Wreck: She spends much of her book in the state of panic and near-nervous breakdown over everything that's happening.
- The Nose Knows: Her sense of smell is so good, it almost qualifies as a superpower. She can immediately sense and dissect any smell into ingredients, recreate smells as perfumes, and even sense trace amounts of distinct scents with the precision close to a bloodhound. It's the reason she became a perfumer.
- Punny Name: While not alluded to in-universe, the title of her book is a pun on her name.
- Socially Awkward Hero: She's the most at home in her laboratory; having to interact with the high society gives her panic attacks.
- Unwanted Rescue: Grace hates being rescued, and believes she needs to stand on her own two feet, leading to some tension between her and Stephen (who, as a paladin, is of course dedicated to saving the innocent).
Clara
A nun from the Convent of Saint Ursa; the female protagonist of Paladin's Strength. Like all Saint Ursa nuns, she's capable of shapeshifting into a bear.
- Action Girl: Between being a large woman herself and the ability to transform into an even larger bear, she can easily keep up with Istvhan in a fight. Even among her convent, she's one of the best fighters.
- Animorphism: She can transform into a giant bear, both willingly and when her emotions run high.
- Bears Are Bad News: She only brings out the bear when the situation is truly dire. Occassionally, the bear makes it even worse.
- Our Werebeasts Are Different: Her transformed form is a large, albeit otherwise normal bear. It has a second "mind" attached to it, which she calls "the bear", which steers the body when she's transformed, and it has to be kept under control of the human mind ("the voice"), or else it will run off to do bear things.
- Put on a Bus: She spends most of Hope with Istvhan up north, rebulding her convent, and only returns for the epilogue.
- Shapeshifter Mode Lock: She avoids transforming too often for fear that the bear would not let her turn into a human again - something that apparently occasionally happens to the nuns.
- Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: Her clothes don't survive the bear transformations, and sometimes she doesn't have the time to take them off before she changes. Istvhan eventually starts carrying spare robes for her.
- Sole Survivor: The only nun to escape the sacking of her convent, mostly by being extremely sick and getting tossed off the wagon. The search for her sisters is what intially brings her and Istvhan together.
Doctor Piper
A coroner working for the city's constabulary, and the other protagonist of Paladin's Hope. He's a minor wonderworker, able to see the last few moments of a being's life by touching its corpse.
- Blessed with Suck: While the power to know how a person died should be extremely useful to a coroner, it's diminished by the fact that for one, Piper can't control it, and for other, wonderworkers are treated by many people in the world with distrust. And that's aside from the fact that he experiences those deaths as though they were his own.
- Conditioned to Accept Horror: Between working with corpses and having experienced dozens of other people's deaths, he doesn't really find many things disturbing.
- The Coroner: Piper is a lichdoctor, which is the equivalent of a medical examiner, and spends most of his time doing autopsies. He's a little more sensitive to other people's response to the bodies he works with than the more sardonic examples of this trope.
- Creepy Mortician: Subverted. His introduction to the story has him open the door with a creepy leather mask on his face and a bonesaw in his hand. It soon turns out that he was just caught mid-dissection, and he's a perfectly normal (if slightly desensitized) person.
- Deadpan Snarker: His default mode of humour.
- Early-Bird Cameo: He's first introduced in Paladin's Grace for one scene and an epilogue, but doesn't become a major character until the third book.
- Happily Married: He and Galen get married by the end of Hope.
- Power Incontinence: His abilities always work, meaning he can't even eat dead meat without experiencing the death of the cow or chicken it once was. It made him pretty much a vegetarian.
- Psychometry: His talent allows him to experience the moment of someone's death from their perspective by touching their corpse.
- The Smart One: He has in-depth knowledge of human anatomy and surgery, and knows the most of the main cast about the works of the ancients. He's also the one to figure out how the ancient labyrinth functions.
Bishop Beartongue
The highest-ranking priest of the White Rat in Archon's Glory. She has taken in the Saint's paladins after their god died, making her their superior officer.
- Beleaguered Boss: Inasmuch as she appreciates having seven berserker paladins at her beck and call, their antics often leave her exasperated.
- Benevolent Boss: While she's sometimes annoyed by the paladins, she treats them as her own, and will move heaven and earth to aid them, even when they themselves don't believe they deserve it.
- Deadpan Snarker: Her go-to way of dealing with the paladins.
- Extreme Libido: Apparently, she's a very active lover. Istvhan, with whom she is having an offscreen fling with during Paladin's Grace, jokes that if she found another man, he'd be grateful and probably offer to set up a schedule for them. It's implied that part of the reason he left to chase after the Smooth Men is him trying to get a break.
- Iron Lady: A calm, intelligent, tactically savvy and shrewd politician.
- Shipper on Deck: Takes an active interest in getting Stephen and Grace together, and gives the former a What the Hell, Hero? speech to help him accept that he can date Grace and the world won't end.
- Team Mom: She houses, clothes and feeds the paladins, treating them like her own even though the White Rat does not call warriors.
Zale
A pro-bono lawyer working for the Temple of the White Rat. While they used to defend in criminal cases, these days they mostly take on property disputes. They first appeared in Swordheart, which is in the same setting.
- Omnidisciplinary Lawyer: Averted; Zale mostly deals with property law, and their efforts to defend Grace in a criminal trial mostly come down to stalling and calling out the proescution's bullshit.
- Prematurely Grey-Haired: They're described as silver-haired, but not old. It's unclear if their hair is actually grey or possibly a very pale blond.
- Put on a Bus: Though they're a notable side character in Paladin's Grace, they're absent from all of Strength and all but the epilogue of Hope.
Earstripe
An constable in one of Archon's Glory's poorer districts. Earstripe is a gnole, one of the badger-like peoples that moved into the city a few decades ago and are still distrusted by many in the constabulary, causing him much trouble at work.
- Ambiguous Gender: Gnoles use pronouns to describe their social caste, with 'he' being used for those gainfully-employed, so it's unclear what Earstripe's gender is, or if he even cares about such things.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Shows up as an unnamed gnole constable late in Paladin's Grace, but only gets a name and personality in Hope.
- Hypercompetent Sidekick: Far more competent than his superior, captain Mallory, which infuriates the other humans of the constabulary to no end.
- Intelligent Gerbil: As a gnole, he's closer to a badger, though he is as intelligent as any human.
- The Nose Knows: Like all gnoles, he has a sense of smell vastly superior to that of humans; he can smell some incredibly specific things, and some characters wonder if the gnole smell isn't at least a bit supernatural.
- Resign in Protest: Willingly resigns from the city watch when he's told to let go of the case of chopped-up bodies in the river in order to pursue the case himself.
- The Scapegoat: After he helps catch the serial killer, the constabulary tries to have him arrested for vigilantism to cover up their own incompetence. Galen, Piper and Stephen object.
- Taking the Bullet: Takes a crossbow bolt meant for Piper, saving his life and getting badly wounded, though Piper fixes him up. When Piper later anguishes about it, Earstripe points out that if Piper, the only doctor in vicinity, got shot, Earstripe couldn't save him the same way.
- That One Case: The serial killer leaving chopped-up bodies in the river quickly becomes this for him.
- Third Wheel: Becomes one to Piper and Galen's budding relationship in the labyrinth, to his great amusement.
Jorge
A paladin, albeit one serving the Dreaming God. An old friend of Stephen and the others, he never hesitates to assist the Saint's Paladins.
- Agent Peacock: He's a typical Dreaming God paladin, which is to say both extremely competent and drop-dead gorgeous.
- Demon Slaying: His primary area of expertise is exorcising demons, which mostly involves getting them out of livestock.
- Innocently Insensitive: He casually asks if Marcus is interested in Mrs Hardy before making his move, apparently unaware that Marcus is faithful to the wife he abandoned to protect her.
- In-Series Nickname: His name is actually Jorges, but everyone calls him Jorge.
- Spoiled Sweet: A rare male version; Jorge is incredibly handsome, The Ace, and serves a god who is both alive and highly popular. He also never hesitates to assist the paladins of Saint of Steel, even if it means dropping whatever he's doing and rushing off into the countryside for half a week.
