Bertok Garn

Master of Necromancy at the Great School of Magic

Member of the Scholars' Fraternity

AC 1014

"Necromancy in itself is not evil. It is a powerful, effective, practical magic, all too often maligned and feared. A fireball or a simple charm could be just as evil if used malevolently."

Appearance

Bertok Garn is a middle-aged Boldavian man of average height but rather stocky build. He has no signs of debility or disease (as most necromancers are believed to have), save perhaps a bit of balding at the top of his head of gray-black hair. His face is not particularly handsome, but it is not at all repulsive or terrifying. If anything, Bertok Garn's features are quite plain, non-threatening, and even forgettable.

At the Great School of Magic, Bertok wears formal wizard robes as befits his position of the Master of Necromancy, often in blacks, dark browns and reds. Otherwise, Bertok is a hapless slave of fashion, appearing in the trendiest (though not always apropos) of Glantrian fads!

Only when Bertok teaches his students or discusses necromantic theory does he become fully animated and even charismatic.

Personality & Quirks

The Master of Necromancy at the Great School of Magic is a serious scholar and a generous teacher, although he has been sometimes accused of being bookish and uninspired. As a person, Bertok is pleasant, congenial, and totally without ambition, malice, and imagination—making him a perfect pawn in the most clandestine of Glantrian conspiracies.

Indeed, Bertok innocent lives his every day, fully believing that there is nothing sinister about Glantrian necromancy and that the enlightened and cosmopolitan Glantrian wizards have totally mastered death magic, which many unsophisticated peoples shun out of ignorance and superstition.

Of course, Bertok is fatally wrong about this, and he does not have a clue...

Background

The story of Bertok Garn sounds quite trite and banal, because it is.

Bertok Garn traces his ancestry back to Kutchevski in Boldavia, but his family has lived in Glantri City for the last four generations, and considers himself more Glantrian than Boldavian altogether.

Bertok was born in AC 974, the fourth child of a modestly wealthy merchant family in Glantri City. His father, Ivor Garn, ran the family business of selling Boldavian goods, together with his wife, Gisela. Ivor and Gisela had always dreamed of being able to send their children to the Great School of Magic, and although they could well afford to financially, none of Bertok's older siblings seemed to have any magical talent. So it was a great joy to the couple, when Bertok first demonstrated an aptitude for magic.

Bertok was enrolled at the Great School and was one of the better students of his time. His keen understanding of the mystic energies of life and death opened a path to the school of necromancy, where he became a specialist, then an instructor, and then the Master of Necromancy in AC 1004.

Admirably, Bertok was able to balance his growing career with his personal life. He married his true love, Angelique d'Améry (B4, NG), an up and coming stage actress from Nouvelle Averoigne, and has two young brilliant sons, Étienne (0-level, CN) and Morphail (M1, CG).

Web of Intrigue

Master Bertok is a well-liked and much respected teacher in the Great School of Magic. He owes his prestigious position to the past Grandmaster, Prince Étienne d'Ambreville, and is forever grateful to him. The new Grandmaster, Prince Harald Haaskinz, also has much admiration for Bertok's generous attitude and effective teaching style, and trusts him completely. Like most masters of the Great School, Bertok is a member of the Scholars' Fraternity. Through the occasional official visits of the Council of Princes to the Great School, Master Bertok has been briefly introduced to all the Princes of Glantri, though none of them particularly remember him. Beyond the Great School of Magic, Bertok Garn is just an ordinary upstanding gentry of the Principalities of Glantri.

Unknown to even Bertok himself, there are dark and secret forces at work surrounding the benevolent Master of Necromancy. Prince Morphail Gorevitch-Woszlany, High Master of the Secret Craft of Necromancy, keeps a vigilant eye on Bertok Garn, making sure his non-threatening brand of Nécromance Appliqué (Practical Necromancy) keeps the casual wizards and scholars distracted and away from the true dark and deadly secrets of death magic which Prince Morphail and his Death Masters hold. Prince Morphail does this indirectly, through one of his vampire pawns, Baron Piotr-Grygory Timenko of Kutchevski, who has spent several lifetimes as a student at the Great School. Lord Piotr-Grygory maintains a personal friendship with Bertok Garn and has already introduced the Master to his "son" and "heir," Arminius (Piotr-Grygory's next persona). Prince Morphail has instructed Piotr-Grygory use all means to keep Bertok Garn in his place, but so far has had no need to do so—save for an occasional vampire charm to an overly curious apprentice necromancer or two.

Style of Magic & Combat

Statistics:11th-level human necromancer; Str 10, Dex 9, Con 14, Wis 18, Int 17, Cha 13; AL LG.

Languages: Thyatian (Glantrian dialect), Traladaran (Boldavian dialect), Sylaire.

Weapon Proficiencies: staff, dagger.

Skills: alchemy, etiquette, meditation, reading/writing, spellcraft, spellflash, teaching, undead lore.

Bertok Garn is presently the leading proponent of Nécromance Appliqué. He is living proof that necromancy is not necessarily an evil nor chaotic magic. Like all magic, necromancy can be used in daily life to do wondrous things that would otherwise be incapable with just mundane means.

In fact, Bertok employs practical necromancy extensively. He uses necromantic spells for beneficial ends, construction, protection, and even minor healing (sorely needed in Glantri!). He uses undead slaves to gather poisonous magical ingredients, to clear out the dangerous underground halls and dungeons beneath the Great School, or to work continuously and endlessly exposed to all elements—basically, to perform tasks that would otherwise be cruel and deadly for living servants to do. Bertok has even created minor undead as toys for his children (mostly skeletons of little creatures), which though easily breakable are easily repairable and replaceable. In all this, Bertok takes care to safeguard his necromancy from the taint of Entropy, which all so often necromancers succumb to.

Bertok has a wide range of necromancy spells at his disposal, but none of the truly horrible ones of the Secret Craft of Necromancy. (It is Lord Piotr-Grygory's task to keep these away from him.)

"The High Master of Necromancy? Surely, you refer to Bertok Garn? There is nothing dark nor sinister about Master Garn nor his magic!"

(Arminius Timenko, to an all too inquisitive dabbler in necromancy—who later disappeared when his curiosity could not be satisfied)

References: History of the Secret Craft of Necromancy