At home with Athebryn

Athebryn Gnobwinkle is an unusual and odd person – and a perfectly normal gnome. His years growing up in Wispil (allegiance of Taldan) amongst other gnomes, meant he was exposed to the trend of Taldan opera. It was through the slow exposure of opera that Athebryn came to explore the Arts as a way of warding off the Bleaching.

Athebryn’s musical experience started with the good old “bottle whistle” – his obsession with blowing into any old hole to see if he could get a nice resonance has caused many a humorous situation, but has resulted in a him producing a unique, though odd Pan Pipe; made of bamboo, bones, and pieces of irreparable Armour, his instrument is an art piece in its own right, and produces a unique sound that fellow gnomes love.

With the success of his musical instrument and with ever busy hands Athebryn moved into a brief and successful career as a painter. His brightly coloured abstract paintings were quite the rave in Wispil; reminding the residents of the First World (not they’d ever seen it) – the method’s Athebryn used to create his paintings where often more popular than the piece itself – the most popular piece being produced by attaching paint pots to a couple of bats and releasing them. The piece ended up as white canvas with 5 spots of colour, unremarkable, but very popular due to its conception. In comparison to the canvas, the street in which he ‘performed’ this painting was awash with colour, much to the delight of the residents, many referring to the street as “Canvas Road” as a result.

Athebryn, the Young and Restless

Unable to top “Canvas Road”, Athebryn felt it was time to explore his arty talents abroad. Alas outside his little gnomish world, he found not everyone was so impressed by some bright splashes of colour, nor the unusual techniques he would use. Humans wanting realistic, dirty, and well, ‘ugly’ images, Athebryn failed to understand their tastes. Likewise the intricate and ornate work of the elves were too tiresome for the short attention span of a Gnome. Athebryn did find, however, with a good enough look at a famous painting, he could reproduce it well enough to make a sale, though not a great living.

Athebryn was amazed at the amusement many of the outside world got from his surname, “Knob” and “Twinkle”, as in ‘the latch to treasures’, Gnomified to “Gnobwinkle” (why use a silent K when you could use a G?) is a royal and luxurious name to fellow Gnomes and considered boring; but to the rest of the world, it gives them a good giggle, which is much to Aethbryn’s delight.

Ameiko, the saviour

It was when he traveled to Sandpoint that he was accused by some traveling humans of selling knock-offs. While usually Athebryn’s wondrous charm would convince them otherwise, these worldly travelers were not subject to a gnome’s charm, and things started to get heated. As the travelers started to kick up Athebryn’s little stall across from the Rusty Dragon inn, Ameiko emerged, like a poorly dressed angel, and gave the nuisance outsiders a good reason to move on.

Ameiko looked at the torn paintings left behind, and, while impressed with the copied works, realised, that their actions were not entirely unjust; the travelers had a point. Whether it was Athebryn’s golden eyes, or his unusual hat, she felt sorry for him as he was clearly struggling with life outside a gnome community.

Taking him into her bar, she explained to Athebryn, that while his paintings were very accurate, they were forgeries, which is frowned upon by humans. The conversation lasted awhile, his poor little gnomish mind was struggling to understand how providing people with an affordable version of a painting that makes people happy could possibly be considered wrong. Eventually Ameiko surcame to the odd naive charm of Athebryn and simple put it to him; “just don’t sell copies”. Having been the first Tian human to be willing to attempt to explain the ways of the humans, Athebryn accepted the advice of Ameiko; the copious amounts of grog consumed probably helped too.

Reside in Sandpoint

What is now referred to by both Ameiko and Athebryn as a very ‘hazey’ night and described by Shalelu as “the darkest night in Ameiko’s musical performances: the intoxicated ramblings and musical tidings of a Feyward and Tian is a disgrace to all bipeds”, resulted in Athebryn awaking as the new cook of the Rusty Dragon Inn.

Having been at Sandpoint for about 8 years now, he is well known with the other 13 gnomes, and quite well known as the crazy chef of Ameiko’s pub. Due to his gnomish nature, his cooking is always looking for new things, and with names like “Digits of the enemies” – no one ever knows what to expect, though that particular dish of stewed Goblin hand was a shock to most who ordered, but it certainly made for a novel night out. This gave the Inn a novel dining status, though you’d have to arrive in the afternoon to find out if Ameiko and Athebryn were serving dinner or tunes for the night.

Always on the look out for ways to fend off the bleaching and work his way into the hearts of other races’ artisans; when possible Athebryn would go as the cook on caravans with Ameiko and others, coming back with new and rare ingredients, like dragon jerky from the half-orcs and candied mushrooms from the trolls. He is still trying to get his gnomish art off the ground… just don’t wear your best clothes around him.