Kearney Redguard

Kearney "Red" Redguard is Branton Redguard's nephew, the son of Bran's sister Finna Redguard and her husband, Sergeant Danthirk Danson of Old Eagleholm.

Orphaned at fourteen, Red was left with nothing but his father's sword and guard armour, and a strong sense of duty. As the only surviving member of the once-great Redguard family, he became determined to win back their honour and resolved to join the guards when he was old enough - that job being a very old family tradition and the original source of their name.

Tough, unsentimental, plain-speaking and brave, Red is loyal to a fault and would never tell a lie, even if it was in his interests to do so. He can always be counted on to stand by his friends, though his obsession with his career does tend to annoy some of them from time to time.

Red lives in the Southern city of Liranwee, and would gladly defend it to the death.

Trivia

-His favourite snack is carrots, which he secretly believes helps his hair keep its colour

-"Kearney" is an Irish name meaning "a gentle warrior"

-The adult Red sports a large bushy mustache, purely because, for some reason, the name "Kearney Redguard" immediately made me think "man with a big mustache"

-One reason why I introduced Red is that I really liked the character of Branton Redguard, and regretted not having given him as much screentime as I could have. So I decided to bring in another Redguard and write about him

-Red is interesting to me because he's a complete contrast to Arenadd and even Laela. Where they are both willing to stoop to cruel tactics to win through (Arenadd especially so), Red has a moral code which he refuses to abandon no matter how dire the circumstances become. Arenadd is a villain, but Red is a hero - and a genuinely decent person in general

-Ironically, Red is the first member of the Redguard family to actually have red hair (he inherited it from his father, who was not a Redguard. The family name actually came from the red tunics the Old Eagleholm guards wore)

Quotable Quotes

"Loyalty, duty honour... that is the creed of the guard"

"Red hair's like luck - you can't take it for granted, right?"

"I don’t trust griffiners. Bunch of backstabbin’ scumbags. They don’t have honour. It’s up to us guards to be honest an’ upright."

"Us guards got a reputation for thuggery, but I never hit a kid yet and I ain't starting now"

"We’ve got a war on, an’ there’s no time for arguing about who’s the boss of who."

"I ain't no dipplowhatsit - I'm a guard"

Appears In

The Shadow's Heart

The Last Guard

The Silent Guard

The Cursed Guard