Brayan Marston

Brayan Marston was an infamous robber known for several large heists and, more so, his seemingly miraculous escape from the "inescapable" Rosewick Prison in AV 1492.

Childhood

Born to a family of poor peat farmers on the Balihr Heath, Brayan Marston had seven other siblings. His parents often struggled to provide enough food for their children to live on, and Marston and his siblings often went to bed hungry. At the age of 8, Marston, accompanying his parents into the city to sell peat moss on market days, began to practice pickpocketing from passerby to earn a little extra money. Over time, he perfected his technique and began to steal larger and larger amounts without being caught. He kept this upuntil he was 15, when his parents sent him away to find an apprenticeship in the city because they could no longer take care of him.

Thievery

In the city, rather than make a living in an honest way, Marston continued his string of thievery, finally working his way in with a gang that would stage robberies on coaches outside the city. Some years after joining this gang, when Marston was 21, they were caught by armed guards, but Marston managed to escape unseen from his position as lookout. He became bolder on his own, seeking out bigger and bigger targets until the newspapers caught wind of his exploits and published several articles on the Vanishing Thief, as he was known. This nickname was given thanks to his ability to seemingly vanish into the mist whenever guards accosted him.

Marston began to steal from the richest of the folk in Rosewick, targeting the most difficult and well-guarded homes as if wanting to be challenged even a bit. But even these proved to be no challenge to the master thief. Some speculate that in his several-year run stealing from the upper class of Rosewick, Marston amassed upwards of three million gold worth of coin, jewelry, and other valuables. Strangely, Marston seemed to have a penchant for stealing clocks, whose gears he would remove, leaving one at each of his crime scenes as a calling card.

Capture

In AV 1489, Marston was finally caught. The Rosewick Guard, having hired several skilled magic users from Ashann's Academy, had set up a trap for Marston in one of the few houses he had not stolen from yet - one with a large, ornate grandfather clock displayed prominently in one of its sitting rooms. Marston walked right into the trap, and was snared by several different spells at the same time, rendering him immobile. The Rosewick Guard quickly restrained him, brought him to court, and within a week Marston was convicted on many counts of grand larceny. He was sentenced to lifetime in Rosewick Prison.

Interestingly, through the whole capture and trial, Marston never once seemed to be surprised or upset. He took the whole thing seemingly in stride, smiling and joking with the guards and with the court. Even once he was imprisoned, he quickly made friends with his fellow prisoners and was friendly with the guards.

Escape

Marston was in Rosewick Prison for almost four years, until the morning of the 19th of Third Winter, AV 1492, when he seemed to vanish from the prison entirely. He left behind in his room - which had been locked - a spoon, a smattering of what appeared to be ground sulfur, and a loose brick. However, none of these items seemed to have any use whatsoever in aiding Marston's escape, especially not from the heavily guarded walls of Rosewick Prison. He had simply vanished. Although they searched the whole city and set a high bounty for information pertaining to Marston's location, the master thief was never seen again. To this day, no one knows what became of Brayan Marston. Some say he died while escaping, and others believe he returned to his stash of wealth and used it to buy his way off the continent, making a comfortable life for himself on some far-off shore.

Age

Unknown

Date of Death

Unknown