Efrayne

Efrayne is a phrinu spectropath from Laeland and a member of the Death's Head Kin devotion, as well as Dominic's Company. He killed himself after the disappearance of his novice Dominic, trying to become a Haunt with the goal of punishing himself for his mistreatment of Dominic in his youth. To his misfortune, however, he failed to go clear and has remained sane.

Backstory
He was born in southern Laeland, where he suffered extreme physical abuse and neglect from his parents and then oldest brother when the former died. His brother left him to the Death's Head Kin devotion in the capital city, Wolfguard, where he was found worthy and inducted into the Spectres. His sacrifice was his prodigious talent for music. There he was placed under the supervision of a female phrinu mentor named Odette.

Odette and her drake husband Kaliel became very fond of Efrayne, and he in turn loved them for their friendliness and compassion. They had a son a short time into their acquaintance with Efrayne, naming the boy Dominic. Efrayne adored the child and would often keep him company when his parents were out hunting. They later invited him to come with them when they moved out of Laeland and into Oruva, and he did.

When Odette and Kaliel went clear on a kingdom-wide search for a Fae-Wyrm pack, Efrayne became Dominic's mentor at the age of 17. Efrayne himself wasn't a full-fledged spectropath yet, but the Death's Head Kin were greatly reduced because of recent Fair Folk attacks, and his skill was advanced enough that he was allowed to take Dominic under his wing. The trauma of his adopted family being torn apart, plus the stress of completing his training, being responsible for an orphan, and trying to survive in a foreign land on his own caused Efrayne to withdraw emotionally from Dominic. He would often leave Dominic alone at their home to keep him safe, and refused to talk to him about difficult subjects to protect him from the harsh outside world. As Dominic entered his late teens and became an adult, he found himself falling in love with him, and withdrew further for propriety's sake.

After a terrible argument between the pair one day, Dominic decided to leave Oruva and strike out on his own, heading east. At some point he severed his teaching bond with Efrayne without meaning to, causing both of them great psychic harm and leaving Efrayne with lasting trauma. Efrayne, unable to locate him and convinced that he had been Transfused by one of the many Willow Men in the area he was last seen in, despaired and killed himself several times in order to go clear, without success. Then he attempted to speed up the process by walking into Fair territory. After a couple failed attempts to goad a Fair One into Transfusing him, he was rescued by some locals who persuaded him to continue his search for Dominic.

Eventually he met Dominic in Nedevara after following many dead-end leads. With Dominic's agreement, he joined his mercenary company.

Personality
Efrayne has a deeply unhappy, reclusive personality magnified by PTSD from the broken teaching bond, which, psychically speaking, is an open amputation wound on his soul. Among other psychological symptoms, it makes him incapable of feeling happy for significant periods of time. He shies away from crowds, keeps to himself, and when more lucid, spends his free time either studying spectropath history, following the careers of his favorite musicians, or more commonly, nothing.

As a child and young adult, he was mistreated repeatedly by the world around him, suffering emotional, physical, and sexual abuse, and this led to his emotional stuntedness, crippling self-esteem, and poor coping tactics as an adult. With the dissolution of the teaching bond with Dominic in recent years, he has become little more than a barely functional shell of a person. His thoughts spiral rapidly when left to his own devices and he has an unhealthy obsession with punishing himself for past and present sins, which usually manifests as unreasonable self-sacrificing acts, starving himself, and constantly denying himself social interaction, which he craves as a desperately lonely individual. Efrayne has an irrational fear of experiencing pleasant things, as he thinks he doesn't deserve them and that he will lose anything good in his life before long. He has frequent dissociation episodes, appearing to have 'paused' in the middle of conversation or otherwise, when his tortured thoughts and outside events convene to cause him to panic and withdraw into himself, temporarily heedless of the outside world.

A more conservative spectropath set in the ways of his lineage, Efrayne has spent most of his life dedicating himself to his career to the detriment of everything else, in order to better protect his novice. He takes immense professional pride in his path and devotion, being incredibly faithful to the Fettered One. One of the few things that can elicit major emotion in him, besides Dominic, is disrespect or general offense against the Spectres, and other spectropaths behaving irresponsibly in their duties. Still, he sees himself as far inferior to "proper" spectropaths thanks to his uneven education, and will bow to their judgment more often than not.

Skills/Abilities
Efrayne's skill as a spectropath are unorthodox and partly self-taught, but dangerously effective. Like his mentors, he focuses heavily on constant offense and keeping the enemy in close quarters, the better to hit harder and more accurately. He uses a modified scythe blade, more or less wielding it like a scimitar rather than a polearm. His fighting style utilizes calculated dance-like footwork and centrifugal force to provide more power to his blows.

He is also a skilled gray spirit mage, with a specialty in summoning Socii. In battle, his relentless attacks backed up with ranged fire from his Socii to keep his enemies in check are a potent combination.

Relationships
Efrayne had an extremely close relationship to his mentor Odette and her husband Kaliel, almost like that of foster parents and child. He was devastated when they died.

Efrayne loves Dominic and has been intensely fond of him since their childhoods, but is unsure about how to express his affection and holds him at arm's length and then some. This has damaged their formerly close friendship beyond repair.

Among the Company, he generally doesn't socialize with them and none of them knows him very well. He is, however, mildly friendly acquaintances with Judith, Selhial, and Caradoc. He has a relationship of mutual dislike with Radimir and Ragnalla.

Appearance
Efrayne is tall for a phrinu, standing at the height of some drakes. He is white with handsome but weary features. He has messy light brown hair that is going prematurely gray with stress, and wears a headband that straps over his forehead and covers his left eye. He wears traditional Laelish-influenced spectropath armor with Oruvan touches here and there.