This subsection of the Heralds of Valdemar Character Sheet lists characters from the Mage Wars trilogy.
Urtho
- Absentminded Professor: In the Storms books, readers get another glimpse into his Tower. He appears to have been interested in everything, but this also meant he could and would jump between projects on a whim, and in at least one case, forgot he had an entirely new breed of gryphons to watch over. In his defense, there was a war on.
- The Archmage: Can make permanent Gates, made the gryphons from scratch, helped with some of the various Uplifted Animal projects, and assisted to some degree with Tayledras bondbirds and Shin'a'in horses.
- Big Good: Leader of the forces against Ma'ar, and widely beloved by them. Also so good that he says he would help even Ma'ar himself if he could.
- The Chains of Commanding: He softly gave his reason for opposing Ma'ar in one single sentence: "if not me, then who?"
- Creating Life Is Awesome: Made the gryphons, who universally love him. He thinks of them as his children, and even the few sketchy things - like controlling their fertility and keeping Kechara in private - are Easily Forgiven. Later characters credit the kyree and hertasi to him too, but those were the creations of older mages.
- The "Under the Vale" chapter in one of the anthologies says the hertasi were someone else's project to start, and he revised them to be more intelligent and maintained the other mage's inclination to make them grateful; that's why they so happily serve people, even many centuries after his death.
- Emperor Scientist: Capable of incredible feats of science and magic, and ruler of a large, disparate group of people... but only because they asked him to because of the war. Otherwise he'd be "ruling" over nothing more than his tower and its experiments.
- Easily Forgiven: There are sketchy aspects to him which Skandranon realizes, like his insistence on controlling the reproduction of the gryphons and keeping Kechara in seclusion, but as soon as Skan hears the slightest justification he forgives his creator completely, as do all the other gryphons.
- Fatal Flaw: Wide-Eyed Idealism. He's overly trusting that the people under his command have no ulterior motives, or are as skilled as they claim to be. This bites him repeatedly: firstly, one of his generals has his position because his father was exceptionally skilled in war and Urtho (erroneously) believes that must have been passed on to his son (and said son later turns traitor or could have been one all along), and the guards on his Tower wave through anyone they know, which leads to Urtho's assassination by a mage who turned traitor as well.
- Foil: To Ma'ar. Both are Person of Mass Destruction and leaders of their respective armies and are scientists (Urtho made gryphons, Ma'ar created makaar) and powerful mages. However, Ma'ar seeks power and control while Urtho wants peace and is a Reluctant Ruler. Urtho shelters the very people Ma'ar is trying to eradicate.
- Good Cannot Comprehend Evil: Averted; Urtho knows what makes Ma'ar tick, and can even think like him to help figure out his overall plans, but he hates doing so thanks to how counter to his own personality it is. That said he's inclined to be too trusting, see his Fatal Flaw above.
- Hair-Trigger Temper: He gets some POV late in The Black Gryphon. Skan confesses to stealing and distributing the secret of gryphon reproduction, and for all that they have great mutual affection, Urtho is briefly furious that one of his creations went against him, before he calms himself down.
- Hero of Another Story: Certainly he's prominent in The Black Gryphon, but that book also has a lot of allusions to Urtho's pre-war life, how he became involved in the conflict, and even how the first few years of the war went.
- Mystical White Hair: As is overwhelmingly common among Adepts, use of magic has bleached his hair, which he wears long.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: He made the weapon that caused the Cataclysm, which rendered much of the continent all but uninhabitable and destroyed a great deal of civilization. His kinsfolk the Kaled'a'in had to split into the Tayledras and the Shin'a'in to start cleaning up the magical fallout and preventing people from making it worse, respectively.
- Person of Mass Destruction: A combination of a one of his Mage weapons and his own Tower blowing up caused a World-Wrecking Wave. If you thought Vanyel was strong... well, the result reshaped a not-inconsiderable portion of the world physically, and disrupted the entire planet for at least ten years magically.
- Red Baron: The "Mage of Silence", so called because uniquely, no spell that he casts has any form of identifying "personal flair". On the other hand, this means that since his magic is so incredibly "generic", it's a dead giveaway that Urtho was behind it.
- Reluctant Ruler: Ended up as the leader of an army by 1. being one of the most powerful mages alive and 2. being the only guy to take charge after everything fell apart.
- Sorcerous Overlord: A generally benevolent one.
- Universally Beloved Leader: Basically the only people who actively dislike him are bad guys. Most notably the hertasi adore him - of course, they were designed to be grateful to their creators - and most of the gryphons see him as almost a god. Skan mentions a little bit of grumbling among some gryphons about his control over them but feels intense panic and unease at the thought that he's not totally on the level, and eagerly seizes on reasons to forgive him.
Skandranon Rashkae
- Ace Custom: Until the end of The Black Gryphon, his feathers are black, and since he doesn't belong to a specific unit, he doesn't have his primaries dyed in any unit's colors. It's never stated if he's naturally mostly dark-feathered, just that he's got some kind of barring on his wing feathers and uses black dye to make his coloration uniform.
- Ace Gryphon: One of the best fliers among the gryphons. Also, one of the most insane fliers among the gryphons.
- Desk Jockey: In The White Gryphon, he's become one of the leaders of the new settlement, and he's getting fat and out-of-shape because herding cats and leading the settlement have kept him from going out and doing stuff like he used to.
- He's Back!: Signified by dyeing his feathers black when he tries to figure out who's framing Amberdrake for murder.
- Dance Battler: Yes. He studied choreography and incorporated what he learned into his flying stunts. It's what's made him so difficult to kill and unpredictable in the sky.
- Deadpan Snarker: Oh yeah. It's funniest when he's snarking at himself.
- Didn't Think This Through: Usually when coming up with Indy Ploys
- The Gadfly: He finds perhaps a bit too much enjoyment in teasing his friends and family...
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: He and Amberdrake.
- Iconic Outfit: Or the Gryphon equivalent, anyway. Unlike the various other gryphons, with their various bird of prey-inspired markings, Skandranon has purely black feathers, making him visually distinct from a distance.
- Indy Ploy: Skandranon's strategy seems to be come up with a crazy idea, improvise when everything goes to heck and hope it works out.
- Large Ham: Skandranon revels in being overdramatic and flashy.
- Locked into Strangeness: His black feathers are bleached white when he just barely makes it through a portal at the end of The Black Gryphon.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: A dying Urtho gives him a weapon to use against Ma'ar with the intent that he hold onto it and find a chance later. Skan arranges to have a Gate set up leading to Ma'ar's palace pretty much instantly. Urtho's death involved deliberately setting off a similar effect - activating both weapons almost simultaneously resulted in the Cataclysm.
- Red Baron: "The Black Gryphon," for obvious reasons.
- Snake Talk: Skan is noted as being unusually articulate for a gryphon, and normally has perfect diction, but he does slip into hissing when he's very tired or angry.
- Trrrilling Rrrs: When tired or angry.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: Despite his dramatic self confidence, the approval of his creator Urtho still means something to Skan.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: Skandranon is incredibly difficult to be around if he likes you. If he dislikes you, he's insufferable.
Amberdrake
- Dark and Troubled Past: He had a rough adolescence, leaving his family to attend a "modern" college of medicine in an unfamiliar city, with well-meaning teachers who didn't understand him and largely hostile classmates. Ma'ar's ascendance to power made things much, much worse.
- The Empath
- A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Read: Not helped by his old teachers not believing in mystical gifts.
- Florence Nightingale Effect: A rare male version. Helping Winterhart recover from her trauma brings them closer together.
- Happy-Ending Massage: A constant expectation, also sometimes how his massages actually do end.
- Healing Hands: Very good with his magic; one character is amazed he can trigger only the sensation of "cold" in a small area whereas the healers she was familiar with would trigger cold, heat, pain, and pressure in a much larger area.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: Everyone knows how much he loves Skan. He's afraid that all Skan feels for him is simple friendship, but Everyone Can See It, and Zhaneel assures him of that.
- High-Class Call Girl: He is a kestra'chern, a profession that entails being counselor, confessor, emotional support, entertainer, lover, physical therapist, and mediator, anything that can contribute to the emotional, physical, and mental well-being of others. They're rather similar to the Companions on Firefly, though less religious in nature. Amberdrake does regularly have sex with clients but insists that kestra'chern aren't primarily bedmates. Rather, his primary duties tend towards talk therapy and massage. The confusion between kestra'chern and camp prostitutes leads to several unfortunate though somewhat funny incidents.
- A young Healer makes the mistake of accosting him in a public mess hall and harming a patient by soliciting sex from him. Amberdrake cuts the Healer completely down in public, without raising his voice at all.
- A very confused, very sexually frustrated Zhaneel, overhearing a satisfied client and misled by some innocent remarks from Skandranon, straddles Amberdrake during her first appointment with him, expecting him to... service her (the appointment technically was for a grooming and primping session, after which female gryphons usually go to meet an intended partner). Given that sex with a gryphon would probably kill him, Amberdrake panics — and then has to talk fast to convince Zhaneel that the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak, so instead he'll use his other skills to bolster her self esteem.
- Medicate the Medium: When he was sent away to college in Predain to study "modern medicine", he was in a city that didn't believe in the existence of Mind Gifts, and his well-meaning teachers tried to diagnose and treat him in ways that didn't help.
- Mindlink Mates: With Winterhart
- Non-Action Guy: His entire purpose in a group is to serve as The Heart. Only at the end of The Silver Gryphon does he show any signs of weapons training, having taught himself to throw knives sometime after The White Gryphon.
- Stepford Smiler: Type A. As a Kestra'chern and Healer, he has to maintain an image of calm serenity for his patients and the army as a whole. A visibly unhappy kestra'chern has just heard something bad from a client, after all. But he's introduced having a grief-induced breakdown out of worry for Skan, and going to friends he can unburden himself to.
- Unproblematic Prostitution: While they're not primarily bedmates, sex with clients is often part of a kestra'chern's job. The client doesn't get to decide that and is refused as often as not if they come in expecting it. Amberdrake and anyone else who winds up in bed with a client seems pretty happy about it.
Zhaneel
- All of the Other Reindeer: She was bullied and laughed at for being a runt and being different.
- Death Seeker: Early in the book, she comes back from having flung herself at a larger force of makaar and killed them. This wasn't done out of reckless heroism but because she held her life cheaply, and it just so happened that she used falcon tactics they weren't prepared to counter, so she won and returned.
- Interspecies Romance: Has the wrong idea about Amberdrake's services and thinks she's going to pay him to have sex with her, and consequently takes his refusal hard. After she accepts that they're physically incompatible (he's got thin skin and is a third her size), Amberdrake finds other ways to build her confidence up, and she eventually wins a mate among the gryphons.
- Freakiness Shame: She's based on a falcon and has handlike forefeet with small claws; compared to gryphons based on hawks and eagles, she stands out and feels ashamed. Amberdrake and others convince her that she's built for speed and agility and help her construct increasingly-difficult obstacle courses where she can train — and then demonstrate — her unique skills.
- Mundane Made Awesome: Zhaneel has, essentially, short-fingered hands and is capable of greater dexterity than other gryphons - meaning that she can use tools and weapons with much greater ease.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Amberdrake notes during their very awkward first appointment that while gryphons are individuals they usually share some personality traits, most notably high self esteem - they are Urtho's most beautiful and fantastic creations, after all! Zhaneel's self-hatred is intensely out of character for the species. He helps her out of it in part by, indeed, saying that Urtho had made her and celebrated what she did, and would Urtho make such a mistake?
- Shrinking Violet: Due to being bullied as a chick.
- Snake Talk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
- Took a Level in Badass: Starts off viewed as (and viewing herself) as a "misborn" who would never amount to anything and would only be of use in the army as cannon fodder. Ends up being one of, if not the only gryphon who can keep up with Skandranon, and personally relied upon by Urtho for specific missions only she can carry out.
- Trrrilling Rrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy. Sometimes the author forgets to add these and the Snake Talk in, as when she confesses her woes to Amberdrake.
Winterhart
- Blue Blood: She was a member of a noble family before Ma'ar's invasion laid waste to the royal court. She hid her identity and changed her name in order to join Urtho's army.
- Broken Bird: As an unidentified, untrained and unshielded Empath, she was especially vulnerable to the fear spell Ma'ar unleashed on the court. Not only did it drive her (and most of the other nobility) to flee in terror, it left her with lasting emotional wounds which she only really begins to recover from once Amberdrake identifies and helps her cope with the pain she's been hiding behind her cold facade.
- Cowardly Lion: Loathes herself for being overwhelmed by the fear spell that drove her and the rest of the court to fleeing. She was not aware that this was a magical attack causing psychic wounds and thinks of herself as a coward, and she is terrified of battle. She also believed that Urtho's forces would be overrun and killed within weeks, and yet she took training and joined them, even if not as a fighter.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: All the puns intended. She's introduced as a very brusque, unsympathetic woman not well-suited to her job as a caretaker and healer to the gryphons of Urtho's army (including Zhaneel). As Amberdrake works with and gets to know her and she comes to see the gryphons as people, however, she softens quite a bit.
- The Empath: Like many healers, she has a strong Empathic Gift.
- Meaningful Rename: Chose the name "Winterhart" deliberately after traumatic events in her past. Her birth name was Reanna Laury. Lampshaded by Amberdrake when he figures it out:"I'd wondered. It wasn't because it was Kaled'a'in at all—it was because a hart is a hunted creature, and because you hoped the cold of winter would close around you and keep you from ever feeling anything again."
- Mindlink Mates: With Amberdrake.
Gesten the Hertasi
- Deadpan Snarker: Boy howdy. When Skandranon comments that he would court a makaar if it would give him a bath, Gesten who is actually supplying it bats his eyes and claims he had no idea Skan felt that way about him.
- Servile Snarker: He loves Amberdrake as though they were brothers. And like brothers, will take every opportunity to snark at him.
- Intellectual Animal: A bipedal, humanoid lizard, like all hertasi.
Kechara
- Disability Superpower: Kechara is perhaps the most powerful telepath we encounter in the Velgarth universe, but it's implied (and outright discussed in The Silver Gryphon) that her power comes at the expense of her developmental disabilites.
- Meaningful Name: Kechara means "beloved". Her name lets Skandranon know that while Urtho kept her in a tower, he still cares for her.
- Mutant: She's one of the unexpected results of the gryphon breeding program. Like Zhaneel, she has falcon features, but more sloppily applied.
- Never Grew Up: She's chronologically the same age as Skandranon, but physically and mentally stuck in a childish state.
- Snake Talk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
- Telepathy: An extremely powerful telepath. Urtho has her locked in a tower for her own safety as her powers would make her a target for Ma'ar's forces - and maybe also because if gryphons bullied Zhaneel for being different, how much worse would they treat Kechara?
- Trrrilling Rrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
Tamsin
- Healing Hands: One of Urtho's best healers.
- Mindlink Mates: With Cinnabar
Cinnabar
- Blue Blood: how she was able to recognize Winterhart
- Healing Hands: Much like Tamsin and Amberdrake; however she seems to have more outright power if perhaps a trifle less skill.
- Hero of Another Story: When Amberdrake relates a story of Ma'ar sending a dyrstaff to an enemy court, Cinnabar is very prominent in the tale, as because she was a trained Healer with shields she was unaffected and able to help figure out the situation.
- Mindlink Mates: With Tamsin
- Silk Hiding Steel: Skan suspects she could take down armies with one stern lecture, but never once does she lose her calm, dignified manner. It's part of why Skan and Amberdrake like her so much.
- Spanner in the Works: Ma'ar's conquest hit its first real stumbling block because Cinnabar's family allowed her Healing and Empathy to be properly trained, meaning she was shielded from the effects of the fear spell that ravaged the rest of the court. While the rest of the nobles were fleeing or gripped in terror, she was able to call in Urtho, who promptly took charge and rallied a defense against Ma'ar's invasion.
- Uptown Girl: With Tamsin. It's noted that despite being Mindlink Mates, their relationship would have never worked out if not for the fact at a war is going on.
Ma'ar
See the entry on the Mage Winds And Mage Storms page.Shalaman
- Failed a Spot Check: When he considers marrying Winterhart and she starts showing reluctance to pursuing the later stages of courtship, it takes him a while to make a link between this and the glaringly obvious fact that she has a young child fathered by Amberdrake and the child in question has come to the palace with her parents.
Silver Veil
- High-Class Call Girl: Technically a kestra'chern, a profession that entails being counselor, confessor, emotional support, entertainer, and mediator, anything that can contribute to the emotional and mental well-being of others. As part of being a provider of comfort and support, kestra'chern can provide sensual and sexual services, most being trained in massage, beauty treatments, and sexual acts. They're rather similar to the Companions on Firefly. When traveling with her household, including a disguised Amberdrake, she has to use every bit of her training to get through checkpoints when bribery or bluffing doesn't work. Slightly averted because she ends up in southern empire, where kestra'chern are revered and well-respected members of society.
- Hooker with a Heart of Gold: Her services include more than sex work, but they do include sex. When Amberdrake's former neighbors and friends turned him away a day before Ma'ar's forces arrived, Silver Veil took him in even though he was a stranger, even though protecting a Kaled'a'in was terribly dangerous, and tried to shield him from the horrors those forces wrought as they fled.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Desperately in love with her primary "client," Shalaman, though they cannot be together because of the strict social hierarchy, and very nearly has a breakdown when Shalaman proposes to Winterhart, though she doesn't hate Winterhart for attracting the attention of her beloved.
- Lady of War: Beautiful, composed, sword skills and able to lead a group of refugees through a war.
- The Mentor: To Amberdrake. She allowed him to pose as one of her apprentices while he fled with her, and this soon stopped being a pose.
- Silver Vixen: Her kestra'chern name comes from her beautiful long white hair. Silver Veil is probably about age fifty in White Gryphon and still considered quite beautiful.
Judeth
- Four-Star Badass: A respectably ranked officer in Urtho's army who keeps getting promoted higher and higher - in part from her intelligence, courage, and leadership but also in part because a horrifying war of attrition is eating away at Urtho's army despite his best efforts. By the time White Gryphon comes around, she then makes quite a respectable shift as a civilian leader too, organizing infrastructure and starting a police force.
- Hero of Another Story: Only the first book of the trilogy features the Mage Wars, and that only a late period, focusing on two noncombatants and two special forces gryphons - Judith and some others indicate something about the breadth of the war.
- Iron Lady: There is next to nothing thrown at her that can faze or slow her down.
Aubri
- Deadpan Snarker: Less so than some of the other characters on this page, but he does have his moments with Skandranon.
- Honorary Uncle: To Kechara and the twins. Kechara even calls him "Unca Aubri".
- Snake Talk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
- Snark-to-Snark Combat: When he and Skandranon are together.
- Trrrilling Rrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: He and Skandranon are constantly throwing insults at each other when they are in the same room, yet he's part of the group Skandranon considers to be friends.
Silverblade
- Action Girl: Notable in that her parents are both markedly Non-Action People.
- The Empath: She hates her Gift and the insight it gives her into people and their business. Unlike her kestra'chern father, the last thing she wants to do is get involved.
- Meaningful Rename: Her parents gave her the name "Windsong" when she was born. She chose the name "Silverblade" for herself when she reached maturity—a common practice among the Kaled'a'in—because she wanted to join the Silver Gryphons.
- "Well Done, Daughter!" Girl: A not insignificant part of the plot of The Silver Gryphon is driven by Silverblade's desire to come out of Amberdrake's shadow and prove herself in her own way rather than following in his footsteps.
Tadrith
- Red Baron: Became known as "Tadrith Wyrsabane" after the events of The Silver Gryphon, and is still remembered millennia later as more than just "one of Skandranon's children", a remarkable achievement.
- Snake Talk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
- Trrrilling Rrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
Keenath
- Snake Talk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
- Trrrilling Rrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
