Grim Morgensen and his horse Reaper have been battling the armies of the Red Hand of Doom for nearly a month now, and both of them are tired. In an elvish city on the edge of a swamp where the Red Hand is up to something nefarious, Grim realizes he must leave his trusted companion behind.
Despite his gruff exterior, this frightens him slightly. For a decade he has seldom been more than a few hundred feet from his horse, ever since it found him and carried him to safety after a tribe of hobgoblins had tossed Grim off a cliff and left him for dead in the wilderness. Grim's left leg is still bent from the poor healing of the injury, and he has been stuck with a limp ever since. Another reason he doesn't like to be far from his horse.
Together, out in the open and mounted on Reaper, Grim feels invincible. Reaper keeps him out of reach of enemies, while Grim strikes down his foes from a distance with a composite longbow he has carried ever since his betrayal by the hobgoblins. Grim might not be as smart as the wizards and knights he travels with, but he knows enough to prepare for anything, and so Reaper's saddle is packed with tools and implements for dozens of possible challenges. When bow and arrow fails him, Grim has tanglefoot bags, alchemist fire, lassos, nets, bolas, whips, short swords and long lances, and a case of healing potions. Thankfully for Reaper's back, Grim is a slight man.
Grim adjusts the quiver on his back, pats the dark brown horse on its neck, and says good-bye to his trusted steed and friend. He has a war to win.
Grim Morgensen is a relatively thin man, 5'7", with dark hair and eyes, and humble clothing. A leather duster covers the mithral breasplate he looted off a dead hobgoblin, and he wears a small buckler on his left arm, and a bladed gauntlet on his right, allowing him to fend off foes in melee without having to go of his bow. While mounted, his shooting style is similar to Japanese
yabusame, holding the bow over his head as he nocks the arrow, then pushing in both directions as he aims.
For a horse, Reaper is nothing spectacular, just a very lean and agile brown warhorse in studded leather barding, though the number of items stowed on the sides and back of his saddle is astounding, and yet more is magically held in an enchanted saddlebag. Neither horse nor rider is ostentatious. They are just exceedingly good at what they do, and not too shabby at everything else.