So yeah, kind of like Vulcans are into five-letter names that go “S???k” or at least “????k,” the “B*y*n” construction really seems to get buy-in from Battleshireans, and that’s by design. They won’t be able to defend Byron from his current bogeyman, but Bayen and Brayen can at least be delayin’, or belayin’, his braykdown. Okay, that’s enough, this is getting belaybored… on.

Everyone figured out that these two brothers were who Byron named his axes after so he could pretend they’re still with him: some figured out that Bayen and Brayen met a violent end in the way most guaranteed to traumatize Byron. No one, however, mentioned that Bayen’s tendency to give lessons at every opportunity translated directly into Byron’s “advice for the adventuring life” style of narration.

For whatever reason, Byron thinks of these two sort-of adoptive brothers rather than his own parents whenever he needs to remember nurturing figures in his life. I don’t think we nailed it down, but my thought was that his mom and dad had died in some other conflict. Byron remembers pre-berserk Battleshire as a fairly peaceful place, but it had to face some fighting now and then or it wouldn’t have been called “Battleshire.”