Zale
Zale is a priest of the Temple of the White Rat, a solicitor-sacrosanct with a rank of advocate divine. Their specialty is property law, which they use to defend Halla's right to her inheritance in Swordheart, and which creates a bit of a challenge defending Grace against murder charges in Paladin's Grace.
"I will defend you," said Zale firmly. "I fear that I am not the best possible person for this, but I am the best possible person available at this time, which is much the same thing." -Paladin's Grace
In Swordheart, we learn that they worked as a clerk for five years before being called into the Rat's service. They are described as being a slender person, with a narrow face, pewter braid, brown eyes, and "excellent teeth." According to Grace, they smell like "wintergreen and ink and clean laundry."[2] They are older than Halla, who is 36 during the events of Swordheart, likely placing them in their 40s.
As a priest and representative of the White Rat, Zale holds egalitarian beliefs about the individual right to respect, independence, and fair trial, holding no prejudice against gnoles or fellow humans, and helping when they can.
They have a scientific curiosity about such wonderworker magic as that which keeps Sarkis in the sword. This is evidenced by an incident in Swordheart in which they, along with Halla, perform an experiment to see if urine vanishes as Sarkis does when the sword that binds him is sheathed. Zale is described as taking copious notes to determine the boundaries of Sarkis's confinement. They describe necromancy as "anathema in every civilized nation" and "the blackest of black arts,"[3] and are openly squeamish about murder.
Personal Life
Zale is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns. At one point, Red, a Motherhood priest, tells Zale that they "talk like a guilty man,"[4] implying that Zale may have been assigned male at birth (AMAB).
In Swordheart, Zale rebuffs Sarkis's guesses about their attraction to Halla or himself by expressing that they are too similar to get on romantically with Halla, and that Sarkis is not their preferred type of man. In Paladin's Grace, Zale says that the presiding judge Consul Gucciard is "not my type, and I am not at all his."
Appears In
Citations
- ↑ https://magpiemalarkey.tumblr.com/post/184774135694/i-was-disappointed-by-the-lack-of-swordheart
- ↑ Paladin's Grace, ch. 33
- ↑ Swordheart, ch. 29
- ↑ Swordheart, ch. 27