Richard The Good

Richard De Aucourte, Was born on the 22nd of Pentember in the year 148 of the Fifth Age. He was born the son of a poor farmer in Southerlands of Camelot. During his youth he was subject to the abuse of the wicked kings that usurped Camelot's throne in those days. In his fourteenth year his family was slain and he took refuge in a nearby Saradominist monastery where his faith was solidified. Later he would leave the monastary for the life of an errant knight, until one day he came upon a tarn of clear water, where he saw the Lady of The Lake and pledged his life's service.

Youth
In his youth, young Richard understood little of the chivalric ways of his country. Though at so tender an age he exhibited all manner of knightly virtue. Richard was noble and just to all below his station and desired nothing of others that he had not himself earned through toil or hardship. Courteous was he to all women and he held his tongue before his betters out of the understanding that they knew much that he had yet to learn. As for martial glory, he wished none. Ever did he desire to settle a disagreement through fairness, calm discourse, and shrewd politics. But when the time came to fight, the boy was always found in the forefront, between his younger siblings and the belligerent.

Richard, his brothers, and his sisters were raised in the light of Saradomin, in Southern Camelot. He was the second eldest. Alongside their parents they toiled long days in the field under the blistering summer sun and endured harsh winter nights under the howling winter moon. Hard as life may have been the family was strong and did not allow pettiness and discord to govern their love for one another. But in such turbulent times, even in Camelot, discord found it's way into the lives of the ignorant. It was in the summer of his ninth year that any youthful ignorance remaining left him.

It came in the form of rough men upon unadorned horses in service to the witch-king whom usurped Camelot's throne. The first party rode up to the village of Aucourte on the day of the second harvest. These men were not knights, but low-born Free-riders and mercenaries who fought not to defend the weak or uphold the right, but for wealth, greed, power, and glory. Many of Camelot's nobility had been slain by the king in the coup d'etat in which they sided with the rightful king and many more in the wars that had followed. They demanded everything and they came as they willed for nigh on five seasons. When the soldiers came they demanded supplies for the King's campaigns against Kandarin, whom he had warred with the past two seasons. At first they demanded little though the seasons turned and each year they took more and more until the peasantry had nothing left to give. It was then that the wars had come to Aucourte, which was the scene of several skirmishes and raids by both sides in which many villagers were slain. Then came a lull in the fighting, it seemed all would return to as it was, until the riders returned, only this time they demanded men. It was during one such recruitment drive that Richards eldest brother was taken. After this, Richard's father, rather than seeing the remainder of his sons off to war, he would have his boys travel to the nearby monastery and become monks.

Life In The Monastery
The road was treacherous and they had to evade several bands of looters and road patrols whom crossed their path, but after long, they came to the monastery at Clermont. Richard said goodbye to his father and was made to take several vows to Saradomin of which he partook thankfully. He did not waste the opportunity his father gave him, but studied and learned much of the world and of himself. After a season he took to travelling with the monks to heal the wounded in the wars, often were they assailed by bandits, deserters, and soldiery. It was during these times that Richard first learned to defend himself and his brothers, with this he was selected to become a squire by an older priestly-knight whom took him in as a son. In the stead of a priest he would became a knight. Tasked with defending the roads from those who preyed upon the weak. He passed four years this way and before long he stood vigil at Clermont and took his vows as an errant knight of the church. He began to travel on his own, wandering where the world would take him.