Gubbin

The less-empowered types, the undecided, the morally shifty and most mundanes who get slapped around by greater powers go here by default.
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IamLEAM1983
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Gubbin

Post by IamLEAM1983 »

Name: Gubbin
Age: 500 years old
Gender: male
Species: Wyldfae, Malk

Strengths: initially operating as Gawain Machae's butler and general manservant, Gubbin obviously is an expert at etiquette, protocol and general manners. Supernaturally tactful, he seems unable to earn anyone's ire outside of his being asked to being purposefully unpleasant. Even if you dislike him intensely, you'll find yourself generally unable to bring yourself to do him harm in any shape or form. He simply doesn't seem to warrant that much attention.

His tact also comes with supernatural discretion. While not invisible, he seemingly has the ability to grow completely silent – to the point where even those species with the keenest sense of hearing will not detect his presence. He seems able to override the vague intuition some people occasionally can have and which tells them they're being watched. This means that he could be standing right behind you, and if he doesn't want to disturb you or simply doesn't want you to know he's there, you won't notice him.

Surprisingly, however, Gubbin is also a supernaturally efficient stalker and killer. Underneath the butler-worthy frost waits a fair bit of sociopathic petulance, as he tends to be adequately cheered up when left to either go snoop on someone or attack them outright. This seems to be a trait that's inherent to several Grimalkin bloodlines. Without MRIs showing the expected anomalous brain activity that would indicate sociopathic or psychopathic leanings, he seems racially inclined to think that hunting or killing other people is something that's fun, empowering and enjoyable.

Owing to his nature, Gubbin is largely at ease with short-range mêlée weapons, basically anything that could be considered to be an analogue to his natural claws. Short swords or bastard swords, kitchen knives, scalpels, cleavers – basically anything short that allows for several fast strikes. His natural feline-worthy inclinations would drive him to disable his victims first and to prolong their agony, but he still is rather proficient at landing merciful one-hit kills.

Thankfully, that professional ability of his and the tact he wields expertly cover his deep-seated killing urges like a leaden shield, ensuring that most of what everyone will ever see of him will be perfect social graces. Only his master knows how to spot those instances where his habitual super-polite frost becomes faked and suddenly hides the acute desire to tear some impudent fool's eyes out.

Like all felines, Gubbin also has a rather deep independent streak. While he has the same potential for affection as anyone else, he tends to be extremely self-reliant in all matters outside of his contract of the moment, or his customarily sworn posting. Something of an expert urban survivalist, even the slummiest corners of Sandhill wouldn't give him much pause.

Then, of course, the gifts associated to his being of the Grimalkin have to be considered. Excellent low-light vision and acute hearing, along with an acrobat's sense of balance and a surprising amount of stamina in relation to his appearance can all be observed. His humanoid appearance might resemble a certain classic Dickens character, complete with an elderly man's little tummy and a slightly protruding spine – but he could beat veteran human soldiers on a dead run almost right out of bed.

His final advantage is the simple element of surprise caused by fact of seeing a cravat-wearing Victorian elderly gent with pointy ears and a long nose clamber his way up drain pipes or sheer stone walls. The way he dresses and what he does for a living (at least, officially) really doesn't mesh with what he's capable of. Most of everyone, Summer Fae included, tends to assume he'll be a bit of a foppish sort who's more than a little squeamish of the slightest sight of blood.

Honestly? He really isn't.

Otherwise, being a Malk, he's able to shapeshift between his true quadrupedal and very catlike self, and his more human-like bipedal stance. One sees him exist as an inordinately big and reedy black cat with oversized and red-tipped ears, the other stance involves a medium-sized man with a thin build, pallid skin and decidedly glacial features – along with pointed and slightly reddened ears and an elongated nose. Being able to shift between both forms at will, he tends to use this during his attacks or stalking sessions. Being a cat makes traversing narrow gaps or slipping through small holes easier, while being humanoid allows for basic social stealth. Don't be surprised if the sight of a disturbingly tall, bent-over and thin alley kitty pouncing on you with his claws out turns into you being pinned to the floor by the full weight of a grown man keeping paring knives against your throat...

Then there's those few perks being a non-person by Fae law imparts on you : if Gubbin carries out specific instructions and those orders somehow land him in the slammer, Fae law would run in opposition to the mortal plane's and America's codes. If you catch Gubbin red-handed in whatever shape or form, Fae law dictates that he isn't responsible for what he does. His geas includes just about every single command you could possibly give him, so responsibility falls back onto Gawain – or whoever would be so lucky as to be his new master. He really is a clawed, walking, talking and sentient loaded gun; the wielder being his boss or bosses.
Weaknesses: as with all Fae, Gubbin is vulnerable to the Bane. He doesn't just wear white gloves in order to avoid scuffing the silverware – it's more a case of him being able to handle his sometimes improvised implements of murder outside of Evergloam without running the risk of temporarily losing control of his weapon-holding arm and hand. If that happens, the resulting paralysis reaches down into his soul, taking his already excited killing urges and driving them up the wall. Like an extraordinarily motivated big cat, he'll then jump and weave his way through whatever stands in his way, so long as his efforts end with him being able to savagely maul or cut into whoever is responsible for his injuries.

Once that's dealt with, he'll then sink into the more standard depressive cycle iron exposure tends to cause. Expect him to see him act in an unusually absent-minded or sluggish manner, shortly after these frenzies of his.

Owing to his nature, while he can force himself to avoid killing unwarranted targets and generally wait for the green light from his master, his deep-seated instincts force him to find someone to stalk or at least protectively shadow every two or three days. He seemingly can't afford to live with his guard down for prolonged periods of time, or else his temper and overall mood become generally excessively sour. Both in terms of racial heritage and general behavior, he has to find someone to stalk – either out of received orders, a need to investigate something further, or because he has been either ordered or compelled to act as some sort of unseen and unfelt bodyguard. This means that while he absolutely act socially for long months at a time, he still occasionally needs to let his inner cat do the talking.

If nothing deserves to die in the immediate vicinity, then he'll fall back on shadowing someone or something he's been made to care for. He's still best sated, however, when allowed to at least remotely injure someone or something once a month. Luckily, being a Malk, he tends to solve that problem by taking to the woods outside of Pickman's Sound and stalking a few groundhogs. It's not as thrilling as actually hunting down someone who's deserving of a complex kill, but it at least quiets the urge on a long-term basis.

Grimalkin also have a serious disadvantage when compared to their more noble cousins, the Summer-aligned Fae Hounds. Their roots being equally dispersed between Dark and Warm Winter, Gubbin's family is a bit of a temperamental crapshoot. Like moody cats who are difficult to reliably tame, his family's warranted precautionary measures from their owning clan, the Machae. As such, should anything happen to Gawain and with no other Machae residing in Hope, the mantle of Gubbin's ownership is likely to be passed on to Summer. With decency and concerns of nobility preventing any local Summer residents from choosing to own Gubbin, odds are that the butler would find himself either auctioned off, entrusted to close allies of locally prominent Fae or worse – left in an odd state of non-determination. Bound not to be able to act as a Malk for as long as he remains without a master or is not freed from his bondage, not having someone to call the shots for him would be utter torture for him on the long term.

Of course, the concept of Fae bonds running so deep and for so long reminds several mortal historians and U.S. History specialists of the decades that preceded abolitionism. In some ways, Gubbin is very much what you'd call a “White Nigger” - a glorified slave whose only advantage involves a better education and sense of breeding than most freedmen. You could also argue that for a living and breathing piece of property, he's allowed to lead a rather comfortable life. Still, it doesn't change the fact that several American and European humane rights associations look to Fae bonds and certain long-standing inter-familial Oaths with the clear intent of dismantling them – nevermind that the centuries old pseudo-slave is oftentimes fed, clothed, cared for, loved and appreciated for its contribution to its owning family. This had caused rather odd situations where people have attempted to empathize with Gubbin concerning slights and abuses that frankly, just aren't there. Even if you could argue that the Machae weren't the brightest owners ever, Gubbin was leagues and bounds away from being abused in any shape whatsoever, whilst in their care.

Try telling that to a stubborn and well-meaning Amnesty International representative who's a few forms and phone calls away from going on the war path... The fact is, the Fae and mortals have very differing concepts of freedom. One is more nuanced, layered and abstract than the other.

Appearance: if Old Man Winter's stereotyped representation and Ebenezer Scrooge shared some DNA, and if one of them had a son with a dour-faced fairy tale stepmother, the end result would probably be Gubbin.

Average in height but a bit on the reedy side, with a bent-in spine and a little tummy; he tends to give off somewhat nonagenarian vibes. His face is all in Punch Magazine caricature angles, a pointed chin paired with an elongated nose, sunken blue-grey eyes and bushy white eyebrows. With his wild crown of white hair and the way his sartorial choices are distinguished, dated and rather obviously leaning towards icy purples, lilacs and blues; there's just something in him that immediately tells you that he tends not to be a happy camper in the sense that we mortals would traditionally understand. At the same time, he imbues that bony sack of flesh and those spats and pie tails with an uncanny amount of energy – essentially a cat's languid and perfectly tuned reflexes slapped onto the human form. Like cats, he tends to have a bit of a springy, sleepy gait that can switch from careless to hyper-alert in just an instant. On top of that, he layers some sort of vaguely British kinetic crispness, generally displaying very Alfred Pennyworth-worthy tics.

To 2025's youngsters, there's little to suggest he actually is someone else's servant, unless you've watched a few Batman movies in your days or know what to look for based on a couple Victorian period pieces they might be familiar with. The ever-present distance, maybe, the fact that he seemingly lives on someone else's perception of time; the way he means more with eyebrow twitches and slight pouts than the most verbose of all orators will ever manage, how he seemingly can't stop himself from assessing someone else's sartorial choices or how he apparently can't bring himself to wear less than four layers of clothing while everyone's in Pool Party Mode...

All of that just might indicate that his job is a decidedly oldschool one, one where you get to exist as a disembodied last name and as some sort of walking and talking personal organizer for someone who's too old and too European to be considered to be part of the nouveau riche.

Carefully look past the tophat or derby's brim, though, and you'll notice elongated and nearly bloodless ears, with strangely vascularized pinna. If the political cartoonist's nose didn't clue you in already, then this, paired with some knowledge of Celtic folklore, should allow you to understand that you're dealing with a nonhuman. If that fails, the slightly feline appearance of his teeth should clue you in somewhat. Selkie fangs and Malk fangs not being exactly alike in shape, plenty of modern Dental Forensics have been able to look at roughly similar piles of bony remains and tell the human apart from the Wyldfae.

In their natural form, the Grimalkin – or Malks, for short – exist as jet-black and occasionally hairless feline creatures that may or may not have inspired the concept of the Cheshire Cat. Strangely on par with a greyhound in terms of size and general shape, these Eldritch pussycats are lean, bony, fast and big enough to knock an unsuspecting human or humanoid creature off its feet with a single and well-placed lunge. Prettiness or general appeal as housepets is definitely not part of their offered package, especially not with their too-big eyes and how unlike regular cats, they display the ability to speak even as quadrupeds. In this state, Gubbin's recognizable trademarks tend to meet up with his hairline and bushy white eyebrows – his humoid white mutton chops being reproduced on his cat's face in the form of longer localized fur that's prematurely turned white. His crown of hair isn't reproduced, however; but the slightly disorganized look it has is hinted at by the two uneven tufts of white hair growing atop his ears.

As a Malk, Gubbin carries nothing about his person except his own claws and teeth. As a human, he also doesn't tend to carry much of anything, except maybe a tray and teapot or a bag of groceries or whatever else the situation might call for. If he's out on the prowl, however, you can safely assume you'll be able to find kitchen knives or scalpels tucked away in especially stitched secret pockets and sheaths along the insides of his jacket. Underhand or overhand throws, basic lunges, calculated swipes or more ordered CQC-ish slash-retract techniques are all things he's entirely familiar with. His main advantage is that while he might look like a lifelong knife fighter, you're really just seeing Big Cat-level hunting and fighting instincts transposed to a humanoid body.

He loathes guns of all types and refuses to carry one on a regular basis, but he also isn't entirely ignorant of their operation. He might grimace at the prospect of firing one the way you'd grimace if you were asked to touch something repulsive, but it isn't out of squeamishness. He certainly can injure or kill with one – it simply feels impersonal and tasteless to him.
Behaviour: on an everyday basis, Gubbin acts and feels very much like your average idealized manservant. He's unobtrusive, quiet, observant, faithful, tolerant and consistently available, no matter the time of day. He speaks a small handful of Terran languages and has been called to at least get around in Paradise patois, he has enough ethological and cultural observations on several civilizations to maybe give a few career anthropologists a run for their money and prospectively bleed into several cultures around the world – either legal or criminal in nature. He's been given the best in education in order to be able to be the best for his master, and has studied everything from Fae intrigue to the proper setting of covers in order to be absolutely anything Gawain Machae could ever ask him to be. Walking personal organizer, living clock, breathing notebook, kindergarten educator, schoolteacher, private instructor – hitman, cleaner, spy, bodyguard or disability aide – he can be all that, and much more. Like any good butler, he also tends to express himself with a smidgen of snark and a dosed application of sarcasm; having more or less coached into being Gawain's disembodied common sense whenever it chooses to fly out the window... That means the very Winter-worthy frost he carries himself with does have a bit of actual use. That frost can occasionally mature into honest contempt – but you'd have to be pretty darn annoying, simple or generally saccharine for him to actually manage a snarl of acute and oh-so-delicate revulsion. Being a predator by birth, he has a hard time tolerating people with simple ideals or frustratingly contented outlooks on life. On the flipside, arrogant blowhards excite his deeper, darker urges.

All things considered, there's potential for him to be a really stand-up guy, a lot more than someone's Jeeves or someone else's Smithers. If you'd care to go on an emotional deep dive of his psyche as a Karthian or a skilled Mentalist, you'd see that he has every ounce of the average hopes and dreams regular people have. Where he differs from the norm is in what's underneath that basic level of humanity.

Dig a little and you'll find something inhuman, but not necessarily monstrous. You'll find a cat's basic wants and needs, and the way its instincts don't react well to being girded or shackled too tightly. Somewhere in his guts, Gubbin is very much a hunter and a killer. His family's history before their enslavement is made up of nothing but lifetimes spent leaping across Winter's tree branches and valley floors, centuries spent hunting stag and deer, stalking in tall grass in Summer territory or lying in wait while buried in Winter's eternal snow banks, only his eyes peeking from underneath them. The same way animals would find the concept of digging their claws into something that's about to become food satisfactory, there's a sudden hot joy that bursts in his chest whenever he manages to lame a target or to smell fear in the air. What starts as quiet and intense focus turns into fierce relish over time, his normally frosty features straining to contain the amount of sheer glee he eventually comes to experience.

Consequently, he has a few traits we mortals tend to associate to homicidal tendencies : he turns ornery if not allowed to hunt something over long periods of time, he tends not to go for clean kills unless his catch absolutely needs to die and, like housecats and small rodents, can sometimes play with one of his targets for several hours, chasing them around the city until the smell of their paranoia becomes so sweet it's too much for him to bear. Thankfully, part of these urges can be converted into protective streaks, with murderous glee being swapped for the sense of a job well done if he's ordered to shadow someone or keep an eye on them for their own sake. Like cats, his being owned by someone seemingly doesn't stop him from having a bit of a bossy streak around the house he lives in. Shirts have to be washed and folded his way, plates have to be arranged his way, and food, cooked his way.

On an everyday and general house-management-related basis, it's his way for nearly everything, or the highway. Unlike cats, however, he thankfully doesn't expect to be fed. He's more than prideful enough to feed himself. Just don't expect to have much of a say on the week's menu – at least not initially.

As per his geas, however, he'll defer to his master or masters for pretty much everything, from what they want to eat over the week to who they want assaulted, coerced, investigated or killed. That last part in particular is always lightly underlined, it being a bit of a personal point of interest and less of a household requirement. Similarly, if he's allowed to bear witness to his owner dealing with someone a bit forcefully, he might ask if he'll have the honor of “handling” that person.

In short, it might be fair to say that he fits in with practically any situation – so long as a bit of decorum is required – and that he'd have very little problems with the task of taking care of a mundane household's needs; but his one true passion remains hunting, and ideally killing targets of his own. If you were to shadow him while he's shadowing someone, you'd find that every bit of the normally frigid and even stiff displaced Englishman comes to life, an eerie lust giving impetus and graceful flow to the kind of gestures he'd normally carry out crisply – almost with a bit of unconscious frustration.

Is it any surprise, then, that he awkwardly considers acceptable banter to include recollections of past assaults, maulings or even murders – or that he can express admiration for those people the Shieldies might be paid to stop even if he himself is utterly committed to the service of one or more Shieldies to begin with? He loves the grisly business of death-dealing with every fiber of his being, and has yet to realize that with the right kind of nurturing environment, he could be made to be just as passionate about things he'll normally execute professionally, but with the enthusiasm of a brick wall.

At best, if you dig deep enough and ask the right questions, you might hear of a time when slave and master had a bit of a different relationship. The master was younger than the slave, the master's father had called for his slave to teach the boy in the ways of the world and back then, well before the outskirts of Warmest Winter would instill their two-faced cruelty into Gawain's heart, Gubbin had been able to care for the young changeling. Love him, even.

Time, age and the demands of propriety put an end to that tenderness, mistakenly convincing Gubbin of how exposing a more sensible side of oneself really didn't amount to much more than wasting time. You could assume that Gawain has hurt his manservant's pride, trust and honor quite badly, and that they all haven't been able to recover since. The more recent blow to his own honor has deepened that divide even more. It'll be a while before the Malk chooses to lower his guard around his new employers.

Goals: on some level, it might be fair to say that Gubbin is a little kill or stalk-happy. His profession and bonds' imposed subservience tend to bizarrely mesh, rather than clash, with his deep-seated desire to seek out trouble and come out on top. Being a Malk, he's also naturally inclined to want to have a few bragging rights. There's a fair bit of pride that's propping up his distant and professional affectations, but his fairly unctuous take on self-confidence is usually kept aimed straight away from his masters.

Again, like cats, he'll actively find the occasional adequate instance for a bit of self-congratulation or self-indulgence. Past that, however, and if you can get past the fact that your silent and faithful servitor has an ego, you'll find that the finer points of his geas have also turned into points of pride. Having been raised and educated as a manservant from his youth, he doesn't see his Eldritch slavery as being harmful to his sense of pride or identity. This goes so far that if made entirely masterless by an unfortunate series of events, he'll actively seek out someone else who wouldn't mind accepting his services.

Preferrably, that someone has to have a bit of an active lifestyle, to use a euphemism. He'd operate adequately in a mundane household, but would also quickly become frustrated by your average joe's lack of fevered foot chases, spilled blood or tense shadowing sessions.

History: the eternal snows of Winter don't change much, no matter if you're of Oberon's side of the banks or Mab's. For the Malks, home is Winter's forests and glens; its clearings and caverns. Fond as they are of perches and high vantage points, it's fairly common to find these feline creatures scaling the sides of impossibly tall trees, sometimes spending entire lifetimes in treetop-dwelling communities. Gubbin, however, was a child of the plains. Specifically, of those vaguely marshlike plains connecting Faerie's versions of England and Scotland. With his mother, Lavinia, being of Mab's and his father, Warwick, of Oberon's, he wasn't exactly destined to have a traditional childhood.

Fealty to Oberon coming with a few additional requirements, Gubbin's father couldn't just live out the life of a fairytale monster and retreat to the marshes when not beckoned. He had his ties to Warmest Winter, seeing as his job involved serving as one of several attendants and butlers to Mary Tudor. In the end, he was largely raised by his father, with his mother's stronger ties to the Queen of Cold Winds keeping her away. As you could expect, his father being encouraged to keep to a dispassionate style of upbringing instilled the same tendencies in the then-young Wyldfae. British phlegm mingled with their deep-seated hunting urges, his mother's single greatest contribution coming forth in the form of his uncharacteristic glee in the face of their night-time jaunts into the English heartland's forests.

Unfortunately for Gubbin, however, Warwick was and still is reknowned across Faerie as being one of the foremost instructors in the matters of Fae protocol and etiquette – and especially in how the occasionally difficult diplomatic relations between Summer and Winter are to be smoothed out. Before the Tudors, he'd tended to many a Viscount's desires and served as an adequate political advisor. His son understandably attracted quite a bit of attention, considering.

As per Sidhe custom, Gubbin's first outstanding geas was to his own father. From his childhood up until his first few autonomous years, he was essentially Warwick's property, his to do with as he pleased. With puberty and maturity having less to do with the passage of time for the Fae and more with fundamental and deep-seated changes in one's personality, he essentially matured into the apparently elderly gent he'd become almost immediately. Thanks to Warwick, his own son had essentially developed into a bit of an acerbic and wizened old soul – that patience and diligence manifesting as affected elderly traits. As far as supernatural manservants were concerned, this meant he'd essentially been trained into the absolute best of what a Fae dignitary could expect. A fierce competition was soon waged over his geas, as Warwick couldn't be allowed to remain the defacto owner of his son's mantle.

Scotland had its fair share of clan-related troubles while the later stages of the War of the Roses were playing out, with one outstanding Warmest Winter house – Clan Machae – landing strong bids for Gubbin's ownership. They'd eventually win out, Gubbin's geas shifting into the hands of Connor Machae, a loud and ambitious lordling who'd latched onto Oberon's britches solely out of the hopes of some strong levels of profitability. There was some of Mab's blood in the family, but the patriarch worked hard in order to convince the nobler gents from the cold parts of the Realm of Seasons that he was decidedly invested in this plane – as well as the mortal plane. To that end, he'd taken a human wife and borne his first changeling into the world.

It naturally fell to Gubbin to raise the young Gawain Machae. For years, he devoted himself as intensely as a Malk could afford, fatherly fondness breaking through the professional frost on occasion. This was another relic of the stronger passion he showed in his work than what was customary of his father, as Warwick would never have allowed himself to become attached to any of his charges. While it would never show in the eternal nonagenarian's dour features, he quickly came to love the changeling the way a father would a son. That was fairly unsurprising, seeing as Connor and Brigid barely involved himself in matters pedagogical. Gawain naturally latched onto the one person he spent the most time with. Owing to his mixed heritage, he did grow up much like mortals do, his childhood playing out naturally and desensitizing Gubbin to the needs and wants of larval man-creatures who hadn't accessed maturity as quickly as he had. Childhood turned out to be a concept he both despised and attached much importance to. It was easy for him to recognize the testing of deep-seated instincts and abilities in seemingly innocent play routines, so he made it his mission to make sure that even the boy's playtime would be enriching on some level. That, in turn, further broke through the dilligent coating of ice he kept over his heart.

By the time Gawain turned twelve, there was more affection between the two than in the son and actual father. That twelfth year also marked the need for Gawain to Choose, as he'd finally reached past human puberty. Gubbin fiercely hoped the boy would choose his human half, as he'd seen enough to know the younger Machae's potential was rooted in his humanity. What was of Faerie in him was colder, more calculating, perhaps. Ruthless, even, and maybe because of him. Gubbin secretly hoped they'd be able to keep to their dynamic of mutual enrichment, but had to bury his regrets when symbolically, Gawain reached out for the one person he hadn't planned for.

As per Fae tradition, the Choosing was done with the mortal parent standing in for that very half, and the Fae parent representing the entire set of Eldritch affectations. Gawain had been given months to prepare, but the choice he made surprised everyone. He didn't choose Connor or Brigid – but rather Gubbin; essentially short-circuiting the Choosing's process.

Gawain thought he'd please his tutor by doing so, but he instead broke through ancient Fae tradition and ignored the idea by which only blood relatives could come to have any influence in the final choice. Brigid was devastated, Connor was ridiculed in front of the attendance, and Gubbin was shamed to see the worst of his own traits surface in the youth. The glee he'd learned to keep holstered except when his hunts called for it, the predatory lust he kept chambered, the ruthlessness he'd learned to expend during his hunts and only during his hunts – all of that emerged in Gawain over the following weeks, while the elements of human nobility and decency Gawain had been able to further strengthen in his tutor seemed to wilt away in himself. To make matters worse, Gawain callously Swore Gubbin into his personal service, forcing him to carry out whatever it is he'd call for. In a few short words, the twisted youth annihilated much of Gubbin's source of pride and joy.

For hundreds of years, Gubbin lived out his life as the forced flunky of a monster he'd helped to create, unable to help himself as his Malk instincts still carried raw exhileration through him whenever he was asked to assassinate this political rival or that cock-blocking suitor. It wouldn't be too long before Gubbin's claim to fame no longer had much to do with his ties to Master Warwick, and seemed much more linked to how much blood he was known to be able to spill in short amounts of time... Every time he'd try to express shame or disgust, Gawain would simply strengthen his Bond of ownership over the Malk, until there wasn't much left of Gubbin the covertly loving and patient tutor – and until Gubbin the cold-hearted and mildly sociopathic killer held most of the headspace.

Finally, as Eirean McHale established herself in Hope as its head Summer representative, the New World began to offer new opportunities for Winter contingents who'd either seek to gain from those present opportunities – or who wouldn't mind upsetting the social order for their own gains. As powerless as ever, Gubbin was forced to voice approval he didn't truly feel when Gawain explained to him that he'd been acting as a double agent for Mab, and that he planned to bring the city's arcane defenses crashing down at the oppportune time. Mab had promised him a rather comfortable posting in the new order, and he intended to cash that check, so to speak.

It took a tremendous amount of effort for him to hijack an ordered assassination attempt and turn it into a chance to warn Holden Hall's associates of at least part of Gawain's plans – but he managed it, just barely stopping himself from plunging a knife down Aislinn McConmara's gut. He turned himself in and spent days desperately trying to officialize his defection by pushing out nuggets of truth – like what the stolen artifacts were being used for – but it was all too much for him to bear. Exhausting himself in his makeshift cell, he used his last embers of energy to desperately ask of the future Shieldies that they arrange an official arrest on Fae terms. With the Archduke and Viscount holding him, Fae law would give the Countess enough leverage to force a confession out of Machae.

That confession never came. Sensing that his plans were dashed, Gawain desperately attempted to please Mab by forcing the Tree's via conduits open and giving free range to those Winter forces waiting past the Black Ridge. The Quigley Road Massacre resulted from this – along with 2025's new influx of mages and supernaturals. The Centennial Tree had been forced awake for the first time, and evidence showed that this time, there wouldn't be an easy way out or some sort of identifiable threshold. According to some, the Tree might never slumber again.

Gawain's geas amounting to extreme coercion, all charges levied against Gubbin by mortal tribunals were dropped. With the culprit dead, all restrictions on the Fae butler's mind had been removed. Free to act as he wished and to support whom he wished, he acted the way most other Wyldfae would have, and autonomously renewed his geas to “those of Holden Hall,” referring to the recently formed Shield Group.

As superficially detached and kill-happy as he might seem, Gubbin has since made it clear that his wider bond with the whole of the group is only temporary. Considering himself fit to serve only one family at a time, he is currently lying in wait and attempting to determine who, if anyone among Shield's employees, will be worthy of the honor of having a member of the Winter Fae as a personal assistant...
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