| Character Details |
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| James McAvoy as Samael Hightower |
| Name: | Samael Hightower |
| Aliases: | none |
| Faction: | The Reach |
| Organization: | House Hightower |
| Occupation: | Nobleman |
| Rank: | Noble Lord |
| Age: | Sep 17 88 (32) |
Lord Samael died of the Black Sickness.
Description
Samael's pale, oval face is framed by wavy brown hair that has grown a little overlong and could use the attention of a pair of sharp scissors. Vividly blue eyes are fringed in dark lashes rather thick and full for a man, and set beneath thick, arched brows. His nose is prominent, though not excessively so, and comes to a rounded point. Beneath, lips are pink and full, and his jaw is usually covered in a faint scruff of stubble that's not quite developed enough to be called a proper beard. The overall effect seems to be one of a slightly bewildered innocence.
Hardly a tall man, at seven inches over five feet, even some women may outstrip his height. His slender frame is most often garbed in simple but well-made clothes. Unless decorum calls for something more formal, he's usually found in brown breeches, a white shirt and a black jerkin with numerous pockets. His feet are typically shod in leather boots, well worn and mud-spattered. It is not uncommon for his fingers or the cuffs of his shirt sleeves to be smudged with ink, charcoal or grass stains.
Background
Samael was born to Lord Osgar Hightower, his son by a second and unexpected wife. Myra Rowan was a young and lovely creature, and she delivered a son to Osgar seven months after the quiet and simple wedding. Some said the babe simply came early and the wedding was small because Osgar was an older man with little interest in frivolous fanfare. With one wife dead and buried and his children grown or all but, what desire would he have for some grand feast? More scandalous gossips suggested the wedding was rushed because Myra was already with child before the bans were posted. After all, Lord Osgar had never shown interest in remarrying before the rather sudden decision to wed Myra. When, a couple weeks after Samael's birth, Myra sickened and died, further rumors circulated about the suspiciousness of it all. But, there was no apparent sign of any foul play, and women did die after a new babe's arrival, sometimes. Lord Osgar shed no tears for the loss of his second wife, but he was a man who was generally regarded as cold. A fair lord, and righteous, no doubt, but a man lacking in warmth and empathy.
Samael grew up in a home lacking other siblings. Indeed, he was only a few years older than his nephews born to his brother Lord Otto. Samael saw little of his father and was raised primarily by nannies and the maester of Battle Island. He was a quiet boy who took an interest in nature and in books, and the word most commonly on his lips was why? A bright child and an avid learner, he could chew through dry treatises with the singleminded focus of someone many years his senior, and if he did not always understand the whole of what he read, he would regularly hound after the maester's heels until all queries and confusions were made clear to him. He adored puzzles and riddles and would commit hours, days or even weeks to solving one.
The maester of the Hightowers was aware that young Samael was bright, but as the boy was inclined to move from one focus to another, and as his father and oldest brother intended to utilize him for a politically advantageous marriage when he was old enough, taking up the collar of a maester was not an option. However, Osgar did not care if Samael visited the Citadel to take lessons there. In truth, Osgar did not care about what Samael did, one way or the other, so long as it brought no shame to House Hightower.
By the time Samael was in his late teens, he knew many of the maesters in the Citadel by name, and he had traveled to various other houses of the Reach and the Riverlands to study under experts in various fields who served the families of Westeros. He never squired or pursued knighthood, but he did devote a significant measure of his time to the art of battle, if only to better understand it, and so learned to be a competent fighter, if not an exceptional one. He also studied independently, collecting observations on the natural world and conducting small studies and experiments as interest grabbed him. But, most cherished of all, were the opportunities to apply those studies in ways necessary and sometimes unexpected. His knowledge of both plants and soil helped him to determine why several farmsteads belonging to Hightower tenant farmers were yielding poor crops for two seasons running. His keen eye for detail and familiarity with equine anatomy let him deduce why one of a visiting lord's favored horses had gone lame and who was to blame for it. He acquired a reputation for being able to pick apart puzzles and discover causes and solutions to problems that seemed, at first, to possess neither.
Osgar ruled long and well, but when Samael was nearing twenty, a sickness struck the head of house and, a few months later, it was Otto who was Lord Hightower. Much like his father, Otto was a strict and exacting man with little time for compassion and little patience for mistakes. Samael was a peculiarity, and an occasionally useful one, so much like Osgar, Otto more or less ignored his youngest brother and left him to his own devices. At least until Samael was twenty-five, more than old enough to settle down and take a wife. The Lady Malena Lannister was also looking to marry (or, at any rate, her parents wished her to be wed), and the two wealthy houses found the match a pleasing one on both sides. As neither Samael nor Malena knew much of the other, besides a few brief letters, before the wedding, one could hardly call it a love match, but in their seven years of marriage, both have treated the other with courtesy and respect. The union has produced two children: a son, Leoline, currently six and a daughter, Aona, now age two.
Samael's continued interest in observation and exploration regularly called him away from Oldtown for weeks or months at a time, and they were travels in which his family sometimes accompanied him and sometimes did not. His most recent voyage has taken himself, Malena and the children to the East for over six months to study various means of textile production and plant cultivation in a number of the free cities. However, when word of his nephew Ormund's prolonged illness finally reached Samael, this in conjunction with the growing homesickness his family was beginning to feel for the lands of the Reach, made him realize it was time to return home. And so Samael, Malena and the children have once again returned to Oldtown.
RP Hooks
Studied in the Citadel - Samael never worked towards a measter's chain, but he did spend much of his youth and occasional spats of time during his adulthood, studying under some of the maesters of the Citadel. If you're a member of the Citadel, or studied there within the last 20 years, you may know him.
Proto-Scientist - There's no established 'scientific method' in Westeros, and Alchemy is as close as folks get to Chemistry, but Samael has a scientific mind and deals with problems with the general approach of: observe, question, hypothesis, experiment, conclusion. He also greatly enjoys academic discourses and studying the natural world.
Gentleman Detective - Samael is know for his skills at solving problems and little mysteries. If you have one, he may be the person to see.
Well Traveled - Samael's academic pursuits have taken him across much of Westeros as well as to the East. If you'd like to have a connection with him, it's possible he could have met most anyone in his travels.
Quirks
- Wealth: Opulent
- Proto-Scientist
- Keen Intellect
- Slightly Socially Awkward
- Eidetic Memory
- Gentleman Detective
IC Events
| Samael Logs |
Related Logs |
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Logs featuring Samael. |
Logs that refer to Samael. |
Relationships
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Malena |
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<Any name here> |
Gallery
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