Frankar
Last known location (as of DR 1730): Darakan, Khatridun, Labkhan
A dwarf from the city of Darakan, in the kingdom of Khatridun, fascinated with mechanical devices and runic magic.
Mysteriously vanished in a storm in DR 1730.
Seeker’s brother. Seeker told his story on April 16, 1748, after surviving the storms caused by Hralgar around Stormcaller Tower.
Seeker’s Story of Frankar
“I have a younger brother. Or had, I do not know for certain. Frankar was his name. We called him Frank. I was thinking of him in the storm. And all those days he spent hunting salamanders.
A wonderful prodigy, as a child wise beyond his years, memorized the architectural histories, could draw a diagram of the great keep from memory, the pride of our parents.
A talent in runic magic as well, once in a generation, fluent with the symbols, like a conductor of an orchestra but his musicians were the arches of stone.
He became obsessed with being perfect. And obsessed, as well, with a game that he had invented. A dangerous game, a kind of divination, but without the gods I think, a way or so he thought, to know what lay ahead. So he could never fail in his tasks. It was a kind of machine, made of stone wheels, and bits of crystal and gemstone, animated by magic. But an evil machine. It was like the face of a great clock. And in it he would place a tiny white salamander, a blind creature, rare and elusive, you only find them deep underground. He was always hunting them.
And the salamander would enter the clock at its center, and crawl about, sealed inside, seeking a way out. And around the face of the clock were 12 little passages. If the salamander went this one way out, it would be frozen. Another way, and it would be crushed between stones. Another way and a blade would slice it, or it would be suffocated in a jar, or shocked by lightning, and so on.
And depending on the fate of the salamander, he would know his future. If the salamander was crushed, then some crushing weight would come. If it was stabbed, perhaps a heartbreak would come, or perhaps some great insight. Who knows if it really worked.
The machine was a secret, you see. He hid it carefully from all of us. We only learned about it one morning, the morning after the night of a great raging storm. We found the machine at the top of the keep, high above the mountain, all in pieces. And by careful study and reconstruction I determined what it was, and what it had been for. Or so we think. Frankar, my beloved little brother Frank, was gone- we do not know where he went, and we have not seen him since. The only clue he left us was a tiny white salamander, burned to a crisp.”