Kalin Stonghold, son of Gloin

Kalin Stronghold, son of Gloin, age 160

Early life ( TA 2873 )

Kalin was born while his kins were in exile in the Grey Mountains. Son of Gloin, Kalin’s life path didn’t quite follow the same as his soon to be famous younger brother. Kalin grew up as a reserved youth, meeting the minimal warrior training and spending most of his waking hours scouring the few books that the family owned. These books unfortunately had a clear bias on retelling how dwarves had been hard done by everyone. Kalin developed strong opinions and shared them with passion. For many pragmatic dwarves, Kalin was wearisome to deal with. They tended to leave him alone.

Year 2941 - Battle of the five armies - ( 92 years ago)

When Gloin left with Thorin II, he refused to take Gimli on the journey because of his young age. He also didn’t offer Kalin to come, and Kalin didn’t volunteered. At this time, Kalin was writing a book, and the endeavor was an all consuming task. Kalin wrote about the role of Aule's worship on important political decisions across the history of Durin’s folks. These research gave him a strong grasp of history, theories of diplomacy and economics. It is with great excitement that he was summoned to Erebor after the fall of Smaug, where he connected with the vastly larger corpus of literature of the lonely mountain.

Exposed to a wider range of written works, it became clear to him that the destiny of dwarves was either to wage war of craft wondrous items. Kalin took an apprenticeship in the armorsmith forges of Erebor. He soon became an expert in chain mail making: a pure dwarven art. He read extensively on the exotic and magical alloys of Khazad-dum.

Skill: writing [4], research [2],history [6], Armorer (Armor) [8]

Year 2989-2994 - Balin’s adventure in Moria - (44 years ago)

Kalin planned to join Balin’s venture as soon as the forges of Khazad-dum would get online. Unfortunatly, Balin’s bid for the ancient mountain home turned to disaster. Kalin took arm as a volonteer to link up with the retreating dwarves lead by Farin II son of Balin. During this grueling campaign, he learned the ways of the soldiers, spent way too much time under the open sky and got to experience persistent rains, mosquitoes, snakes in his tent. Kalin hated the experience, but felt good about helping the beleaguered women and children to return home after a painful 5 years journey .

Skill : soldier [2], some weapon [2], Area knowledge (Wilderland) [2]

Year 3019 - War of the Ring / Easterling siege of Erebor - ( 15 years ago)

Following the defeat of the Easterlings after the War of the Ring, Kalin became an advocate for a return to Khazad-dum. He was seconded in this lobby by Farin II. However, by FA 5, he followed Gloin and his brother Gimli to the Glittering Halls to found the Kingdom of Aglarond. There, Kalin was given oversight of establishing a library, and collect works from a variety of sources. This forced him to interact with the men of Rohan and Gondor, whom were most welcome in the new mountain home.

Kalin also learnt to make fine weapons. And as his skill grew, and the promise of a return to Khazad-dum was firming up, he became more interested in using his own creations. Afraid to be left out of the next venture, he trained in his spare time and made sure that Lord Gimli sent him when the summon finally arrived.

In the early days of FA 15, Gimli sent Kalin, his cousin Erek son of Oin, and his nephew Khazek son of Erek to Erebor for the final preparations. Kalin was accepted in the King’s retinue. History is to be written this year!

Sadly, Gloin died soon after Kalin left. However, Kalin has not heard the news yet.