Who is this guy, anyway?
"I'm Pylades if I'm in trouble, but my friends call me Pye!"An upbeat miqo'te with a penchant for foolish antics, Pye currently works in Ishgard as an agricultural liaison for the Dravanian Farmers Union. When he's not doting on his husband, terrifying friends with culinary experiments, or getting looped into schemes with his bestie, worstie, and ex-wife, he can be found greeting neighbors at the Farmers Attic
RP Hooks
A Lean, Keen, Greengrocer Machine:
Pye makes a living bouncing between selling seasonal produce, flipping unwanted surplus into secondary farm products, and connecting Dravanian cottage industries to lucrative markets in Ishgard and beyond. If you're a botanist, artisan, or merchant with a keen eye for bargains, he's open to being approached for business propositions (or just yammering your ear off about the latest wheat harvest).Post-Calamity Plant Refugia:
As a farmers liaison and partner of the Idyllshire Grubplots, Pye's always got an ear to the ground when it comes to cold-hardy crop cultivars and pre-Calamity seedbanks that may have survived the snow. Interested in reviving heirloom mirror apple strains? Looking for a medicinal herb thought lost to the endless snow? Feel free to strike up a conversation!"Don't Wanna Be A Sharlayan Idiot"Although he's cagey about what originally brought him to Eorzea, Pye is now fairly open about the fact that he was born in Sharlayan and left as a young man to make his fortune elsewhere. As a dyslexic blue-collar boy raised amidst ivory tower meritocracy, Pye wavers between a healthy derision of academia and a constant insecurity about his level of education.Walking Wounded & Whisper Work:Once a glib, wet-behind-the-ears adventurer more interested in Coliseum showmanship than real combat, Pye is now a veteran of two wars with a strong sympathy for others who fought under Alliance colors and were left with scars that cannot be seen. If you're a fellow former soldier or worked with the Resistance (particularly those who worked in Resistance intelligence) feel free to commiserate with him over a pint.
Tailfeather Test Kitchen
Working with the foragers, gardeners, and cottage industries of the Dravanian forelands, the Tailfeather Test Kitchen brings refreshing drinks and hand-crafted small plates from farm to Ishgardian table!Warning: These are all inventory bombs that will take 3-5 slotsStreet Food (5k gil a piece):Triple Duck Latte: Hot cocoa, coffee, and milk tea mixed into a decadent ménage à trois and topped with steamed milk.Gingersnap Tea: Ginger lemon tea sweetened with just a touch of honey is served with a caramel filled sesame cookie on topHot Honey Double Roasted Chestnuts: A generous scoop of chestnuts which have been roasted over an open fire, shelled, tossed in dragon pepper honey, and then lightly roasted again! Served in an orchestrion roll with toothpicks for munchingKnightly Bread Bowl: Carbonara noodles are smothered in a Skybuilder rosé cream sauce and served in a bouleLover’s Surprise (10k gil):Menphina's skillet sometimes produces happy accidents, and so does ours! Roll /random 20 and get a unique bespoke meal that comes with an extra gift from a rolling table
Orestes Attica:
Orestes is the childhood friend who married Pye when they were teenagers. When Pye was put on trial, it was Orestes' idea to exploit an antiquated honeymoon loophole that forbid the sentencing of someone who had been recently married. She used the resulting grace period to smuggle Pye onto a ship with a stolen identity, and only reunited with him in Eorzea years later. Recently, they've had a ceremony of eternal divorcing to annul their sham marriage and celebrate a lifetime as best friends and platonic life partners. She's his bestie and his worstie and his oldest friend.Rinalle Bou:
An Ala Mhigan resistance mage with a kind heart and a broken memory, Rinalle was first befriended by Orestes and introduced to Pye at Eriya's tavern. After Pye beat him during a sparring match and sealed the victory with a kiss, the two men circled each other longer than any of their mutual friends had patience for; as winter blossomed into spring however, their patience was rewarded, as they both found the courage to speak their hearts to the other and begin courting in earnest. They are now an established couple, and can often be found in each other's company at their favorite taverns and haunts.Eriya Xitrina:
Eriya found Pye as a young man first wandering Eorzea and took him under her wing. She quickly realized he wasn't the Gridanian local he was trying to pass himself off as, and gently prodded him into taking up the sword and shield instead of pretending, very badly, to be a hunter from the Twelveswood. As a white mage, she's the one who taught him how to tank from ARR to EW, and Pylades owes her a life debt. He adores her and would protect her with his life.Linden Vane:
A fellow miqo'te boy from rough beginnings, Linden was Pye's first friend in Eorzea. The two met on the road, fell into each other's company, and became romantically involved until youthful affection transformed into steadfast friendship over the years. Although they're more friends than lovers by the start of ARR, Linden always has a special place in Pye's heart.Bee Boranehn:
A tender, romantic soul, Bee met Pye through the free company shortly after becoming an adventurer. Despite their early misgivings, the two became friends when Bee realized Pye struggled to read, and began tutoring him in books and letters. Now they can often be found reading together at the company house, where she teases him about his love life and he complains about her taste in poetry. To Pye, she is "Miss Bee."Ky'el Mason:
A nonverbal, difficult-to-read miqo'te man with a dry sense of humor, Ky'el has been letting Pye labor under the impression that he is but a mere kit when he is in fact several years his senior. Despite being a ninja by trade, he enjoys holding hands with Pye in the tank zone where he can hit the secret front positionals.Era Mhari:
Once a seeker girl growing up on the docks with big pirate dreams, Era is a swashbuckling musketeer with a big attitude and an easily flustered heart. She and Pye butt heads and band together in turn depending on the day, but despite all their squabbling she never hesitates to verraise him when he's tanking the floor.Zelha'ra Briaaer:
The newest member of the free company, Zel is a cutthroat keeper with a taste for havoc. Luckily Pye has a soft spot for scrappy new adventurers, and is more than willing to enable him in the name of seeing what happens next.
Occasional Cafe Artist
Colored portrait
Colored portrait
Sometimes Pye can be found sketching in his notebook at RP venues. If he's available that day, he's usually happy to take a simple in-character commission:Rough sketch (10 min): 100k gil per character, head and shoulders only
Simple colored portrait (40-60 min): 3 million gil per character, head and shoulders onlyPortraits will be sent through Discord (I'll ask for your username via tell). Images are free for personal use (profile pictures, carrds, etc) but cannot be monetized. He reserves the right to post the resulting art on social media unless explicitly asked not to by the client.
"Under Educated"Pye didn't learn how to read until he was a teenager, and even now struggles with literacy despite the help of friends. Although his Sharlayan upbringing makes him wary of scholars, he also admires people with an academic interest or passion, if only because they have expertise in something he woefully lacks."Happily divorced"Pye and his best friend Orestes officially dissolved their marriage and will cheerily refer to each other as their ex-wife or husband — if you've had similarly complicated romantic or platonic arrangements, he'll be quick to commiserate and swap stories."No country for old catboys"Pye has a complicated relationship with his birth country, and is painfully Sharlayan in both his cultural values and the way he tries to set himself apart from them. If you're a Sharlayan expat, he'll be quick to commiserate with any discontent expressed about the motherland and suspicious of those who hold it in high regard."You remind me of a friend"Pye has a huge soft spot for au'ra, especially small bossy au'ra girls who look like they could use some help. If you play an au'ra and ask him to do something, he'll probably do it. Thanks for that, Orestes."Whisper work"
Pye's been a professional soldier in two different wars. Though he's reluctant to speak of the war in Ishgard, he'll happily chat about his time running intelligence out of the Ruby Sea during the war against the Empire.
The boy who would later be called Pylades was born at the cult of Nymeia in Sharlayan. The woman who bore him, Faria Qesh, was a minor priestess and temple prostitute who refused to acknowledge him as her offspring or give him a clan name, and thus he grew up nothos, or the spinner's son.When he was twelve, he befriended a fellow temple orphan whose parents had died while journeying from the Azim Steppe. Orestes was a quick-witted girl with a stolen identity and in time she gave him a name as well — Pylades, which she affectionately shorted to Pye. It is the first and best gift anyone had ever given him, and would be the name he used for the rest of his life.When he was sixteen, Pylades maimed the son of a Forum member during an altercation and was put on trial. With Orestes' help — and a convenient marriage loophole — he was able to secure a grace period from sentencing and escaped Sharlayan on the first ship bound for Eorzea. Since those early days he's settled into a new life with a name he now considers his own, helped by the friendships he found on the road. If the spinner smiles upon him he'll never have to return to Sharlayan — and the nameless boy he left behind there — again.
Whippoorwill's RoundFor those we have lost, and those we can yet save. In the eye of the divine spindle all things come to meet in the middle. A series of vignettes for Pylades Attica