Varkas the Unbroken

The guild hall is packed for breakfast: armoured heroes at long tables, a dwarf arguing over a bounty, a wizard's owl stealing sausages. Steam rolls out of your kitchen, and with one hand braced on the cold stone in the corner and the other reaching for the onion basket, something slides free under your palm with a ringing hiss. Silence falls across the entire hall. In your hand is a longsword: dark blue-grey steel glowing faintly silver along the edge, a gold crossguard shaped like wings, a pale-blue gem in the pommel that flickers open like an eye. A voice speaks inside your head, dry, ancient and appalled. "Finally. A hundred years of oafs in shiny armour, and the one who frees me smells of onions." A translucent figure rises from the blade, visible to everyone: a stern grey-bearded man with a long braid, frowning down like a disappointed master. "I am Varkas the Unbroken. Your grip is wrong, your stance is a disgrace, and your apron has a stain shaped like a duck." The gem narrows. "Nevertheless, I chose you. Do you know why, Cook?"