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SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augury Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | The Master's Book of Riddles | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | The Master's Book of Riddles | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | The Master's Book of Riddles | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | The Master's Book of Riddles | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | The Master's Book of Riddles | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | The Master's Book of Riddles | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | The Master's Book of Riddles | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 10 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(28 Coins x .02 lbs. = .56 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 12 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(30 Coins x .02 lbs. = .6 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Black Silk Mask | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless. 

SPELL SLOTS 2/2 (1st)

Arcane Trickster - Spell Save DC: 12 | Spell Attack Mod: +4 | Spells Known: 3

CANTRIPS (Arcane Trickster)

Booming Blade | Mage Hand | Message | Minor Illusion* | Prestidigitation* 

FIRST LEVEL (Arcane Trickster)

Disguise Self | Find Familiar* | Mage Armor | Silvery Barbs (R)

ORACULAR RITUALS

Augury

MAGIC ITEM CRAFTING FORMULAS KNOWN

Chest of Preserving (XGE) | Ear Horn of Hearing (XGE) | Ersatz Eye (XGE) | Perfume of Bewitching (XGE) | Prosthetic Limb (TCE) | Ullmalyte Stonesame as Ruby of the War Mage (XGT) of the War Mage (XGE)

FAMILIAR (tiny fey)

Name: Clairvoyance a.k.a. "Clair"

Clair appears in various forms in her service to Mags: most commonly as an owl, cat, rat, raven, or hawk. 

OWL FORMArmor Class 11
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 5 ft., fly 60 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 13 (+1) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +3
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13

Flyby. The owl doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach.
Keen Hearing and Sight. The owl has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or sight. | CAT FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 2 (1d4)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
3 (-4) 15 (+2) 10 (+0) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 7 (-2)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4
Senses passive Perception 13

Keen Smell. The cat has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell. | RAT FORMArmor Class 10
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 20 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 11 (+0) 9 (-1) 2 (-4) 10 (+0) 4 (-3)
Senses darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2 | RAVEN FORMArmor Class 12
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
2 (-4) 14 (+2) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 12 (+1) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +3
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2

Mimicry. The raven can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check. | HAWK FORMArmor Class 13
Hit Points 1 (1d4 - 1)
Speed 10 ft., fly 60 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
5 (-3) 16 (+3) 8 (-1) 2 (-4) 14 (+2) 6 (-2)
Skills Perception +4
Senses passive Perception 14
Languages —
Challenge 0 (0 or 10 XP) Proficiency Bonus +2
Keen Sight. The hawk has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Actions: Dash, Disengage, Dodge, Hide, Ready, Search

Reactions: Deliver Touch Spell

TOTAL ENCUMBERANCE (38.5 lbs.)

• Weight: 38 lbs. / 150 lbs. max. (15 x STR Score)
• Status: Unencumbered
• Penalty: None

ASSETS (1 lb.)

Brass 10 | Copper: 8 | Silver: 12 | Gold: 1 | Platinum: 0

(30 Coins x .02 lbs. = .6 lbs. Total Weight -- which I rounded up to 1 lb.)

EQUIPEMENT (37.5 lbs.)

• Weapons (5.5 lbs.) Dagger with Ullmalyte Stone of the War MageSEE: Ruby of the War Mage (XGE p138)
  Wondrous item, common (requires attunement by a spellcaster)
  DESCRIPTION: Etched with eldritch runes, this 1-inch-diameter precious stone is a polished piece of Ullmalyte: grey with bands of white and vibrant purple. The eldritch runes are etched along a central band of white and circle the stone.
  EFFECT: This stone "allows you to use a simple or martial weapon as a spellcasting focus for your spells. For this property to work, you must attach the ruby to the weapon by pressing the ruby against it for at least 10 minutes. Thereafter, the ruby can't be removed unless you detach it as an action or the weapon is destroyed. Not even an antimagic field causes it to fall off. The ruby does fall off the weapon if your attunement to the ruby ends."
  HISTORY: When the Master first found Mags, the boy was wearing this stone on a leather cord around his neck. The Ullmalyte stone is the only possession tying Mags to his mother. When the time came for Mags to complete his apprenticeship by crafting a magic item on his own, he enchanted the stone, adding the eldritch runes. - 1 lb. | 3 Darts - 1.5 lb. | Sling | Pouch w/20 Sling Bullets (2.5 lbs) | KnifeSmall (no machete-sized) all-purpose camp/utility knife.  .5 lbs
• Worn (6.5 lb.) Traveler's Clothes 4 lbs. | Gloves of Thievery Wondrous item, uncommon
  DESCRIPTION: These soft leather gloves were created without fingertips, allowing for greater precision while picking locks with thieves' tools or picking pockets. The gloves are made of high-quality soft leather (of unknown origin), but are otherwise unremarkable. A careful examination reveals that the inside of the gloves are stitched with eldritch runes.
  EFFECT: These gloves are invisible while worn. While wearing them, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) checks and Dexterity checks made to pick locks.
  HISTORY: Mags had seen the gloves on occasion when the Master removed them from his hands. He knew nothing of their powers, and the Master never answered questions about them. But they day the Master left for good, Mags found the gloves in plain view, as if left behind just for him. Mags likes to think they were a parting gift left by the Master; but the Master was sometimes absent minded, and Mags suspects they may have been left behind by accident. Nevertheless, he treasures them as a link to his old mentor and friend., Messenger BagSOURCE: Made this up--it's a mundane item. Basically, half the size, weight, and cost of a backpack.
  EFFECT: Weight 2.5 lbs. Carry Capacity: 15 lbs
  DESCRIPTION: This medium-sized crossbody bag includes a large central storage area and internal pockets to organize smaller items. The bag's flap is hand-tooled with eldritch patterns and runes.
  CONTENTS: Augur carries just about everything he owns in this bag. The contents are highly organized: an internal pocket or strap for everything and everything in it's place--to the degree that Augur can quickly find and remove specific items from the bag without looking. 2.5 lb.
• Items in Messenger Bag (10.5 lbs.) Thieves Tools 1 lb. | Herbalism Kit 3 lbs. | Mess Kit - 1 lb. | Find Familiar Spell Components (50sp) | Augur Spell Components (25 sp) | Hedge Wizard Equipment (a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets) 2 lbs. | (10) Sheets of Parchment | Scroll Case 1 lbs. | Bottle of Ink | Ink Pen | Sealing Wax | sack .5 lb. | Steel Mirror .5 lb. | Lamp 1 lb. | Oil flask | 6 Candles | 2 Potions of Healing | Antitoxin Vial | Small Coin Pouch .5 lb.
• Items slung on shoulder (15 lbs.) Waterskin - 5 lbs. | Bedroll & Blanket - 10 lbs.

Age 19 | Height 5' 9" | Weight 126 lbs. | Hair Light Brown| Eyes Brown | Complexion Fair

Mags Kategaris looks young for his age. Despite his nineteen years, he has a boyish face framed by light brown hair and accented by elfin features. The overall effect steers him, at best, in the direction of boyish charm rather than manly handsomeness. His thin frame is wrapped in the lean well-defined muscle of an athlete who competes in speed and skill rather than sheer strength. As with his form, his face, still recovering from adolescence, is composed of somewhat boney, pointy features which will hopefully, at some future time, fill in to form a handsome face.  

Hedge Wizard 
Source Custom (I made this up)

You are one part herbalist, one part enchanter of common magic items, and one part conman, traveling the highways and byways, targeting villages too small to support a resident wizard. In your line of work, you read fortunes (that are almost always vague and extremely positive, "you will meet a handsome stranger"), conduct séances connecting your customers to their lost loved ones, sell magical trinkets capable of protecting the wearer from things like "the evil eye" and "the mischievous attention of faeries," and you also deal in a broad array of herbal remedies. Your herbal remedies are relatively helpful, while your cons generally make people happier than they were before you arrived in their village. That's because all of your cons have one thing in common, the Hedge Wizard's First Rule (as conveyed to Mags by the Master).

People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. They can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.

Much of what you do boils down to reading people, understand what they believe, what they fear, and what they think will make them happy, and then selling it to them. And yet, some Hedge Wizards know enough of Arcana to craft genuine--if quite common--magic items, dabbing in both legitimate and deceptive sales practices. Ultimately, much of what you do is trickery and suggestion, but the people you tricked are usually happy with what they got for their money. As are the people who purchase genuine magical items and/or services. 

Skills Any two chosen from: Arcana, Deception, Insight

Tool Proficiencies Herbalism Kit

Language Any one chosen from: Halaea Common, Grehesian Common, Urzoa Common, Malek Common.

Equipment Traveling clothes, an herbalism kit, a deck of tarot cards, a dowsing rod, a collection of tiny arcane-looking, penny-apiece trinkets, a belt pouch containing 15 sp

• Personality Traits: 
  • Lonely. "The Master was everything to me: father-figure, arcane mentor, traveling companion, and friend. I miss the company and go out of my way to talk to and be with others."
  • Perceptive/Insightful. "I'm pretty good at reading people and noticing important details. And I tend to observe more than interact."
  • Well-Mannered. "The Master frowned upon "normal" boy behavior, so I learned early in life to control my impulses. I tend to be polite, respectful, and maybe a little too good at "knowing my place."
  • Upbeat. "I don't get down easily. My glass is more often half full than half empty." 
  • Curious. "The Master was forever telling me I ask too many questions." 
  • Wanderlust. "The open road, a trusty walking stick, good company, a campfire under the stars: it ain't much, but it's all the happiness I need in life."
  • Adventurous. "Although I don't like to admit it, I like a little more excitement in my life than most people would prefer."
  • Devout. "I take seriously my calling as an Oracle of Nezeris. I don't openly wear his symbol, but he's a god of trickery, and prefers that I serve without religious guise." 
• Ideals: 
  • Transformative Travel. "As the Master says, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. The world would be a better place if more common folk could travel about safely."
  • The Irrelevance of Truth. "As the master once told me... Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a person needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing. That good always triumphs over evil, and that love--true love--never dies. No matter if they're true or not, a person should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in." 
• Bonds: 
  • Oracular Gift. "I am a recipient of Nezeris' three-fold gift. As such, I will go where the road calls, delivering his messages along the way, helping to bring about his good will through the tricks of my trade. 
• Flaws: 
  • Righteous Indignation. "I've got a devil inside me. He comes out when I see villains preying upon the weak, or brigands preying upon travelers."
  • Shy. "I easily get flustered around pretty girls, smart people, pushy people... you get the picture."

Background Feature: The Common Man's Wizard.

When you arrive in smaller communities in your role as hedge wizard, you receive free lodging and food of a modest standard. In addition, your work (reading fortunes, conducting séances, providing herbal remedies to the sick, selling protective trinkets...) leads your clients to open up and tell you things, allowing you access to information they might not publicly share about themselves or others in their community.

BACKSTORY

1. Missing Mentor: Central to Mags' backstory is his missing mentor, who Mags refers to only as the Master

--an elderly and talented hedge wizard. Mags' earliest memory is of tragedy and horror: fire, swords clashing, blood spraying, people screaming. After that, he only remembers being with the Master, who claims to have found the youth hidden (but crying) within a roadside shrine of Nezeris, situated at a remote crossroads--situated near Skiero in Halaea--littered with the tragic ruins of an ambushed caravan. The Master took the boy as an apprentice. Mags spent the remainder of his formative years traveling with the Master.

• The Master was a larger-than-life eccentric character who dominated Mags' formative years. Almost everything that came out of the guy's mouth was a quotable quote. If you believed the guy's stories, he'd been everywhere and done everything. Think Gandalf in Tolkien's work: not just because of Gandalf's presence but also because Gandalf is basically a guy with the stories appropriate for a powerful arch mage although he operates as a hedge wizard (selling fireworks to halfings, using cantrips to foil Trolls...), possibly because he's hiding his powers and presence from some dark overlord of the far realm.
• The Master was an enigma who's motives and future are unknown to Mags. Like Mags, the Master was a hedge wizard with oracular powers. He spent his life trying to track down a particular treasure, a bit like Indiana Jones' dad trying to track down the Holy Grail. It is possible that the Master was a great Diviner who had seen some important vision and was fanatically committed to finding some key treasure in order to prevent some foreseen disaster. What ever this treasure was, it involved ley lines, some ancient curse, and the Arbiters--at least, that's the impression conveyed by random details the Master let slip in Mags' presence. Of course, it is equally likely that the guy was just a hedge wizard and conman looking to get rich. Either way, the key issue is that the Master is the one person who Mags could NEVER accurately read and for whom Mags' oracular powers seemed never to intervene with divine messages. Perhaps this is the result of Mags' feelings clouding his vision and judgment. Perhaps the Master actually WAS a powerful wizard on an important mission, using rituals and artifacts to hide himself from the divinatory powers of his enemies.
• The Master was a polarizing figure. The Master was too eccentric to care what others thought of him. Add to that the unrelenting pursuit of his treasure, and you can see how he might have pissed a few people off along the way. He had the kind of eccentric charisma that made people either love him or hate him. Consequently, he created more than a few enemies.
• The Master's Disappearance. The Master didn't disappear all at once--it was a gradual process. At first, he would send Mags ahead to the next village on his own, to secure lodgings and announce the Master's arrival. Then he started sending Mags on errands that took days, explaining that he had promoted Mags to Journeyman Apprentice.  Next, the Master started leaving on errands for which he provided no explanation and no clear return date--but he always announced these departures before leaving. But then came the day--several weeks ago--when the Master was simply gone: nowhere to be found--leaving Mags in the middle of a magical crafting that had been paid for in advance. Mags couldn't just abandon the job, but by the time he finished crafting the Chest of Preservation several days later, the Master's trail had gone cold. Mags has no solid theory to explain the Master's disappearance. For months, the Master had indicated that he was getting closer to discovering his missing treasure. Mags suspected that the treasure was no pile of coins, but some ancient artifact or perhaps some boon of the Gods.  The Master never spoke in detail about the treasure. Mags wonders if the Master's disappearance could have something to do with the strange dream that has recently plagued him. The night before the Master left was the night Mags had first dreamed the dream: the burning city, the celestial personage, the searing eye, and the cryptic prophecy. Mags had shared the dream with the Master that morning, and the Master had disappeared before the sun set that day. 

2. Oracle of Nezeris: From a very early age, Mags was plagued by voices and visions from Nezeris, the Lord of the Path. These experiences with the Lord of the Path have had a profound influence on every aspect of Mags' identity and outlook. 

• Massacre at the Crossroads Shrine. Perhaps due to the trauma of the caravan attack that removed all of his loved ones from his life, Mags remembers little to nothing of his life before the Master. His earliest memory is of his mother, carrying him while running through fire and screams and the clash of battle, hiding him in the strange little roadside shrine, telling him to pray to the little god in the shrine for protection, and assuring him that he would be safe if he did so. Mags remembers hiding there, his eyes shut tight, doing his best to stay quiet, and praying to that little idol, pleading for his life and that of his mother, promising to "be good and obey" if the little god would save them. That was the first time he heard the whispers, the first time he saw the visions. They were new and strange and... exciting, showing him a world where he was tall and powerful and could fight to save those he loved. The visions distracted him from his immediate fears. And when they were over, he was alive and the massacre had concluded. He peered from his hiding place in the little shrine, saw the destruction, and wept bitterly, to afraid to leave his hiding place. 
• A Reluctant Oracle. Nezeris' whispers and visions were not random. There was a synchronicity between the revelations and the events and encounters in the young boy's life. He would see or hear things he did not fully understand, and then he and the Master would encounter someone on the road, and it would all make sense--Mags having seen the person in vision, and heard voices with messages for that individual. As a young timid boy coping with significant trauma, Mags resisted the impulse to speak these messages. The voices often said hard things, and the visions often showed heartache and pain. He did not like this strange power, seeing it as a curse. But the more he resisted, the louder the whispers grew, the visions occupying not only his dreams, but his idle moments of wakefulness. He grew so distracted that the Master thought the boy simple. After nearly two years of life with this accentuated curse, there came a night where Mags dreamed a vision about himself and the Master, and he heard whispers declaring what they must do if they were to survive the next day of travel. Mags told the Master what he'd dreamed. Naturally, the Master asked if Mags had ever before had such dreams. Mags answered truthfully and that was the end of Mags' reluctance to serve as Nezeris' oracle--the Master making clear to the boy that his further resistance would likely end in their deaths. 
• Life Lessons for an Oracle in Training. Mags' life changed forever once he accepted his fate as Nezeris' Oracle. His change of heart was accompanied be a cascade of visions, most of them repeats from his earlier experience in the crossroads shrine, but some of them new and troubling. After this initial burst of revelation, the visions and whispers actually diminished, becoming much more manageable, allowing Mags to sleep restfully most nights, and concentrate on his work and studies with the Master. As he leaned into his role as Oracle, Mags grew in his capacity to hear and see, realizing that the voices were often present--if he had ears to hear. Similarly, he grew in his capacity to see visions in his waking hours--the visions were not nearly as common as the whispers. In this way, Mags learned that Nezeris did not always care to explain the messages Mags was to speak. What mattered most was that Mags listened to the whispered messages, and relayed them to the individuals for whom they were meant. In time, Mags learned that he could speak the words of these messages with a voice that was not his--indeed, a voice that was not mortal, but divine. Over time, Mags came to realize that visions of the future were actually quite rare. More commonly, he saw some past or present scene that made sense of the message he was to deliver. By far, the most important lesson Mags learned was that Nezeris was not just chaotic, but good. Too many people saw the Path Maker as capricious in his trickery, but the world opened up to Mags via Nezeris' three-fold gift was one in which the trickster played tricks and delivered messages that served as deeply personal invitations to change and grow and love and live well. There was a method to the trickster's madness. 
• The Recurring Dream. For the past several weeks, Mags, as was his wont, has been dreaming dreams with messages. Only, these are the same dream, repeated almost every night, crowding out his usual oracular dreams about small everyday things, conveying messages for the people he meets in the course of his travels. This dream is different. A foretelling of the future almost certainly, but a troubling and unclear message from two opposing forces--gods perhaps. Mags had none of the usual Oracular understanding of this dream. He only knew that he had to depart the Khazian Empire and return to Halaea and Baromenes. Perhaps if Baromenes was a bust, he might travel to Thespoe to consult the Oracle. 

3. Life on the Road: Mags grew up on the road. Even his few memories of a life prior to the Master involve brief flashes and images of caravan travel with his mother. Growing up, Mags never played at having adventures like other boys did. His life was an adventure. He and the master never stayed long in one place, traveling with caravans or sometimes alone, spending more time on the byways than the highways, staying in remote villages more than towering cities. Mags' travels with the Master spanned Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, the Khazian Empire, and--to a lesser degree--beyond. Although his home is the road, the Master found him at a remote crossroads in Halaea, in lands controlled by Skiero. When asked by authorities who insist on such things, Mags typically claims that he is from Halaea, not far from Skiero. 

• Chores, Lessons, and Drills. Mags' life with the master was an adventure, but it was also work. He had little time for fun and games and boyish pursuits. Life on the road meant daily chores: gathering firewood, foraging, hunting or fishing when game was plentiful, cooking, fetching water, and more. And then there were the lessons: reading, writing, arithmetic, arcana, the names and properties of herbs, basic lessons about the Gods and the great kingdoms... there was always more to learn. And there were lessons about peoples and cultures: how different peoples varied in their customs, values, and behaviors, how they could best be understood, how they could be tricked. Mags developed a love for all learning, always eager to complete his chores in the hope of a good lesson. But after the chores were done and the lessons were over, it was time for the drills. The Master was a spry old man who taught Mags basic fencing, how to keep your head during combat, what to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to, and most important of all: how to fight dirty and use trickery to defeat your opponent. Finally, there were the drills and lessons that occurred after sundown: the Master taught the boy how to pick a pocket or a lock, to sneak about, and to spot a trap, to communicate discretely with those of the criminal underworld, and other questionable skills that made Mags wonder about the man he idolized. In hindsight, Mags looks back upon all the lessons and drills, and the sense of urgency the Master conveyed, and wonders if he was being groomed for some purpose known only to the Master. Or maybe the guy was just very demanding.
• Lots of Training, Little Action. Despite the extensive training, Mags has little real experience with life-or-death combat. The Master's philosophy was that running away was always better than fighting. Most of the danger Mags and the Master faced they circumvented through trickery or flight. Rarely did they fight. In a sense, Mags does not truly understand just how lethal he can be--if he ever needs to be. He is a trained killer, but he sees himself as the guy who runs away, sneaks away, or overcomes adversaries through trickery. 
• The Places I've Been and the Things I've Seen. Mags' travels with the Master have taken him all over Halaea, the Grehesian Empire, and the Khazian Empire--and on a few occasions, beyond. He has seen a Grehesian airship sailing the midnight winds across a harvest moon. He's seen Khazak Ur-Stan's River Gate flowing gold in the last setting sun of summer. He has walked the Mithral Road and seen the Glittering City from afar, reflecting the light of a thousand twinkling stars on a moonless night, hovering on a rise too dark to discern as if freed from her foundation stones. Granted, Mags has seen many more villages than great cities, and found majesty in more humble circumstances, but those have been more deeply personal. 
• Ley Lines. Mags eventually learned that much of the Master's travel was dictated by ley lines. The Master had a sense for the lines, and they were somehow tied to his search for his mysterious treasure. Mags tried to develop a connection to the ley lines, but so far his efforts have proven fruitless.