One of the important characters in my upcoming novel Pancho’s Fall is a man by the name of Gelmiro Mendibar, from a town called Colena in the Northern kingdoms of Caelon. While Gelmiro will play a smaller role in the novel, I have chosen Gelmiro to be the first main character to be introduced in the World of El Tor, in his own story which will showcase how he came to be the surrogate father of the titular character in my novel.
With that said, some background is important. Gelmiro was born in the Fourth Age, also called the Age of Kings, on the outskirts of the town of Colena. His father, Oreco Mendibar was an excellently skilled archer who fought in the battle of Gelgadongo. From an early age, Gelmiro learned the skills necessary to be a great bowman in his own right. These skills come in handy more than a few times in his life.
At a glance
- Height: 6′ 2″
- Weight: 265lbs (Prequel) 285lbs (Pancho’s Fall)
- Hair: Dark Brown (Prequel) Grey (Pancho’s Fall)
- Eyes: Hazel
- Born: 17 Sororia, 929, Age of Kings
The time that Gelmiro was born into was a peaceful period following the end of the Northern expansion of the Warathi Empire. This led him to have a profound difference in temperament between him and his father, and the two did not often see eye to eye during Gelmiro’s formative years.
Gelmiro was an only child, with his parents having two miscarriages prior to Gelmiro’s birth. Gelmiro had a sister, born two years after him, who tragically died at just three days old.
At 6′ 2″, Gelmiro is uncharacteristically tall among his peers. With an average height of 5′ 6″ for the other Northern males in the area, Gelmiro towers above them. Reactions to Gelmiro’s height growing up ranged from other children teasing him, to later in his young age when girls started to take notice. Gelmiro’s father Oreco stands at 6′ tall, so as he comes to his full maturity, Gelmiro is even taller than his father. It was likely that Gelmiro’s father felt threatened in some way by this, and treated Gelmiro poorly the older he became.
The contentious relationship with his father led Gelmiro to eventually abandon his home at the age of fifteen, joining a band of traveling merchants as a hired hand to help ward off bandits. This would be the last time that Gelmiro would see his father alive, and the regret that came along with that realization instilled in him a desire to one day have a child of his own, one with whom he could form a better relationship.
Morally, Gelmiro strayed far from the Torian doctrine in the midst of his rebellion and womanizing ways. Although religion becomes important to him later in life, he doesn’t include religiosity highly on his list of priorities when he is younger. Yet, somewhere in his psyche, whispering and waiting lies all of the lessons that his father instilled in him.
