Carter
Appearance
Standing at exactly six feet in height, Carter is a creature of lean muscle and pale flesh. Stress lines have marred the youth's brow and eyes, often leading strangers to assume that he is far older than he truly is. His hair is a salt-and-pepper blond that is kept cut relatively short, his eyes dark and blue as the ocean surrounding his hometown. He carries himself proudly, a chip clearly upon the boy's shoulder, but it is a chip that he feels he has earned. Carter exudes total control and confidence with every measured step he takes.
When consumed by the powers of his patron, he is a far different creature. His skin takes on a ghostly palor, and the blood in his veins runs black. His eyes take on the dark colors of the void, and his voice takes on an ethereal note that tends to make the usual mortal's hairs stand on the back of their neck.
Skills and Abilities
Brawler: Once, Carter was nothing more than a skilled brawler. He was a skilled combatant with a blade, and learned to fight dirty as most pirates do. These abilities grew tenfold once he made the pact with Gorranth and his patron deity.
Life Drain: Carter's magical abilities have grown unnaturally quickly, courtesy of the exchange of his soul for the powers of the void. He is a practitioner of the dark arts, and uses such powers with the skill of a practiced magician. Necromancy in its more base forms are Carter's bread and butter. He draws his vitality and strength from those he kills, forcing their life force to become his own, and using whatever excess remains to augment his physical abilities to superhuman levels.
Flames of The Patron: Carter can call upon the powers of his patron to summon flames of an ethereal quality. They come in shades of blue and white, and freeze to the point of death rather than burn: They assault the soul as much as the physical body. These flames are quite powerful, but must be called upon sparingly lest they consume the user. Better control over the flames can be maintained for a time by the sacrifice of mortal lives, the power of their life force used to augment the user's dominion over such ethereal powers.
The Void: Carter can manifest the gift of his patron in the form of pure deathly energy. This can be used to kill distant enemies, blast through walls, and other generally destructive activities. Such energy is variable given how much life-force he has absorbed along with his emotional state, and using too much will sap his own life force and lead to his death should he be reckless.
Brothers In Death: Carter can raise the corpses of the recently dead so serve his whims, so long as he has gathered enough life force from the living to do so. Currently his ability to raise the dead is limited to a small handful of standard creatures, but it is an ability he plans to grow with practice.
Hidden Nature: Carter can conceal his ties to Gorranth and the specter's patron by simply ignoring their calls to power. This hides the fact that he is lacking a soul from most of those capable of searching for such things, but one particularly skilled in such abilities would likely become aware of Carter's unholy bargain.
Embrace Gorranth: Carter allows the spirit of Gorranth to gain a level of control over his body. When united with the servant of his patron, Carter's abilities are significantly amplified, as well as his general constitution. Entering this state is extremely dangerous for Carter, as he is forced to undergo the visions of horror and torment that assault Gorranth's psyche at every waking hour. He will hallucinate being in whole other places at time, hear the vocies of the long dead, the screaming of those souls tortured within the pits for their sins, and many other hallucinations designed to drive the mortal mind toward insanity. Maintaining this bond for too long would undoubtedly lead Carter to incoherent mania, and one can only guess as to what would happen to him if he survived that stage.
Personality
Carter is a broody individual with a dark sense of humor. He does well in social settings, a skill he learned while trying to thrive within his father's pirate crew. He's keen to go his own way, not feeling any strong bonds toward anything save for himself, and will rarely throw himself in with others unless it serves to benefit his own purposes.
Despite the loss of his soul, Carter has retained the compassion his mother instilled in him. He loves life, and believes all people have the capacity to be 'good'. He rationalizes his position as a 'good' person by writing off many of his past misdeeds as the actions of a different man, one who was forced to do such things lest he or his mother be murdered.
Even still, these sins weigh heavy upon carter's soul. He is melancholic and borderline suicidal at times, though he would never take his own life, but rather seeks to throw himself into situations where he might perish protecting others. In this way, he hopes to leave a good memory, and escape from the corrupting fall he knows will come now that he lacks a soul. He wishes to prove that he is 'good' despite his past and the bargain he has made with the darker creatures of the void.
At times, the corruption of his mind is evident. Lacking a soul, Carter finds himself less driven to help others, and finds himself more inclined toward violence and apathy. He is aware of this corruption, and chooses to do 'the right thing' because he still knows what it is. In his mind, even if he feels like serving himself and at the expense of others is the right choice, he also knows that he would not have thought such things before his soul was made forfeit. With that in mind, he makes most of his decisions based on the way he composed himself before the loss of his soul, rather than after.