Taryn is an exotic conflicted character that you will meet in book three of the Tales of Eldelórne trilogy. He is taller than average and very lean and spidery in form which only added to his feelings of social awkwardness. Taryn mistakes his brother’s narcissistic obsession of his body with love and becomes the willing victim of his twin’s mildly sadistic abuse. They carved mirrored tattoos that cover half of each of their bodies.The brothers liked their needle craft. As they grew older Taryn found himself being dominated and was helpless to stop Jayce’s sometimes brutal behaviors. Taryn would eventually become a strong elemental magic user whereas Jayce turns to blade weapon arts.
When we first meet Taryn he seems relaxed enough but prone to nervousness. He is sent off on a mission to Eldelórne by King Ellinduil. Taryn is autonomously alone for the first time in his existence. He is in charge of a small group of guards sent over to Eldelórne to help Naalin with the reborn elves. Barely having a grip on his own mind from his own rebirth, he proceeds to annoy the skeptical pragmatic Naalin. Finding herself in a tough situation, she makes the best of it and decides that having Taryn around is harmless enough and somewhat helpful regardless of his fuzzy-minded condition. At that time, neither one of them recognize each other from their past.
Taryn spent the saddest time of his youth in their hometown of Vehlevar creeping on Naalin as a diversion from his inner conflicts concerning his brother. He found Naalin’s happy family life to be fascinating and truly wanted to be friends. What little contact she had with him, she only knew him as shy and kind. Taryn brought her a bouquet of purple flowers as a gesture of condolences when her father was murdered by humans. He was devastated to find Naalin’s mother changed after her father’s death and started hitting her. Naalin would occasionally find a purple flower on her windowsill in the morning. This made her smile knowing Taryn had been there. She did not know he was watching her from afar. Many a time Taryn cried silent tears with her, leaning against the wall outside her room. Dropping his guard in these small moments of compassion, Jayce would find him and angrily drag him home.
Jayce was unreasonably jealous making Naalin the unwitting part of a love triangle. SPOILER: Which btw, she has no memory of until they really get to know each other in book 3. When you follow Naalin’s storyline you realize there is some serious damage going on there. No wonder she blocked out some of her past.
Taryn found himself becoming more and more defensive against his brother to protect Naalin from Jayce’s unwarranted imaginings. To control Taryn, Jayce began dabbling in herbal mixtures that would make Taryn compliant and allow him to force his will upon him. For a long time Taryn thought he was losing his mind. Long days of lost memory, cuts and bruises on his body, all these signs brought on even more self loathing. Jayce convinced Taryn he was afflicted with the same sickness their own father had. A disease that took over his mind and made him go mad and kill himself and their mother. It wasn’t until his sister, Liveen showed him Jayce’s alchemical stash that Taryn found out he was actually being manipulated.
On that day, in a righteous fury, Taryn meant to confront Jayce, but their village was suddenly overrun by a hoard of attacking goblins. Taryn sent his sister to run into the forest for safety while he went to warn Naalin. As Taryn made his way across the village his brother caught up with him and was clinging and bickering, unsuccessfully trying to convince Taryn of his innocence. Taryn coldly shoved him backward and Jayce tripped and fell into the reach of a goblin invader. In shock, Taryn watched him die. Not immune from the pain of remorse, Taryn redeemed himself by sacrificing himself to save Naalin in her escape from their burning village.
And so, the circle goes round again. By the hand of Ilmatar, Taryn is woke from eternal slumber of the true death and brought to the Autumwood kingdom. He is given the opportunity for a shiny new start in Eldelórne. Little did he know, festering in their temporary loss of memory, his brother would follow him and his sister back into the mortal realm with some sense of unfinished business…
Do you like Taryn? Let me know.
~K
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