Characters that deserve cards #5 – Weekend Lore Ramblings

Aand… we're back with another week, can't believe it has been going on for an entire month now. Anyway, today I'm gonna talk about more characters that deserve to have their cards in Gwent and still don't have them. Today's post will cover some characters for the bandit archetype, more specifically the Rats gang (Szczury), which Ciri joined after getting out of the Korath desert, where she was brought after going through Tor Lara's distorted portal on the Thanedd Island escaping Vilgefortz (I've mentioned it here). They were a bunch of young people hurt by war that formed a gang in a village in Geso during the celebration of Lammas. Because how the world treated them, they had only hatred and contempt towards it. They murdered people for fun, giving away stolen goods to the villagers, they only kept the finest horses and money, which they spent on fancy clothes and jewlery. They didn't stray from fisstech either. The gang operated on the north end of the Empire, close to the border with Cintra. Ciri, despite becoming friends with them, didn't gave her real name, she took the name Falka (Gvalch'ca in elder speech), after the Redanian princess that conducted a bloody rebellion couple of hundreds years before, instead. She was at first reluctant to kill anyone, but the rest of the gang encouraged her to become as cruel as them. The rest of the gang members were:

Kayleigh – a skinny, green-eyed young male with long, blonde hair, he was the first member of the gang Ciri meets. Their first meeting happened when 'the Catchers" (Łapacze), the slave hunters who captured Ciri after she exited Korath, brought her to the tavern in Glyswen in Geso, where another group, the Nissirs held Kayleigh imprisoned. When Ciri asked for food, he asked her to free him, the innkeeper gave Ciri a knife, which she used to cut Kayleigh's ropes, then suddenly the rest of the gang came to the rescue, butchering the Nissirs and the Catchers, they all escaped the village. During Ciri's first night with the Rats, he tried to take advantage of her (which he called "returning the favour for saving his life"), but was scared off by Mistle, who then did the same. He was an adopted son of the castellan of Ebbing. After the Emperor sent an expedition to supress the rebellion in Ebbing, he met one of the Nilfgaardian soldiers, Reef, wounded. He wanted to kill him at first, but decided not to, instead making him his companion. They later joined the Rats together.

Giselher – the oldest member and the ringleader of the gang. He was a soldier in an army of one of the lords in Geso, from which he deserted after the first time his commander harassed him. he then joined the gang of other deserters, but they were attacked by an elven commando, most of them were slaughter and Giselher was injured. Another elf, Spark, healed him and became his lover. Later they both joined the Rats. He was tall, slim, had black hair and a stubble an he wore a red bandana. He was pretty grim and devoid of humor.

Spark (Iskra), real name Aenyeweddien – a free elf, banished by her kind. She found injured Giselher, healed him and became his girlfriend, then joined the Rats with him. Giselher couldn't pronnounce her name, so he started calling her Spark (because her real name meant "a child of the fire" in elder speech). She had long, dark hair and big, dark eyes shaped like almonds. She wore colorful clothes, lots of jewlery and she had piercings in the ears and the nose, she was an exceptional dancer and fighter. She was the one that criticised Ciri for her reluctance to kill at the beginning.

Reef – a former Nilfgaardian soldier, one of those sent by Emhyr to supress the rebellion in Ebbing. He was injured and abandoned by his comrades when Kayleigh found him. They were both 16 at the time, so they stick together, they robbed and killed a tax collector and later, they both joined the Rats. He was fair-haired and wore black studded leather decorated with things like chains, etc.

Asse – a broad shouldered guy with deep voice, a son of a village blacksmmith. His family was slaughtered by the Nilfgaardian marauders. He wanted revenge so he started going after them. While doing so, he found Mistle, abandoned by slave hunters. He rescued her and they started roaming together, then they both joined the newly created Rats gang.

Mistle – a tall girl with short, blonde hair, she was an aristocrat from Thurn in Maecht. Her father joined the insurgent army and disappeared. When the people of Thurn were running away from the Gemmerian Pacifiers (the same group that some members of the Skellen's crew belonged to), she, as a delicate, aristocrat daughter couldn't keep up with the marching refugees and got lost in the crowd. She was then captured by the slave hunters (that presumably raped her, causingh her to cry all night). Her capturers were slaughtered along with their male prisoners by Nilfgaardian marauders, who then abandoned the female prisoners, including her. At that moment, Asse, who was following their trail driven by the lust for revenge, found and rescued her. They were roaming together and later they joined the Rats. During Ciri's first night with the rats, she scared off Kayleigh, who was trying to bang Ciri, then proceeded to do the same. At first Ciri felt fear and disgust which turned into pleasure., Mistle became Ciri's girlfriend, they later got matching tatoos (a red rose in the groin). She is the only person that Ciri has a sexual relationship with (Ciri almost had sex with Hotsporn, but he died before they did it, presumably she had an affair with Galahad after coming to our world, but it wasn't confirmed or described in the books). Mistle wore red doublet with white lace blouse underneath it and lots of jewlery.

The whole gang (except Ciri, who wasn't there, coming too late to rescue them) was slaughtered in the village of Zazdrość (Jealousy) by Leo Bonhart.