Template:Character Dack Fayden is the planeswalker protagonist of the Magic: the Gathering comics released by IDW Publishing. Dack hails from Drakeston on Fiora. In search of greater magical knowledge and on the hunt for the people who destroyed his town, Dack Fayden is the greatest thief in the Multiverse.
History
In his adolescence, Dack showed great promise in the magical arts, thanks in no small part to his innate ability of psychometry, the capability to absorb knowledge from objects by touch. This gave him an enormous advantage when he joined the magical academy where he spent his youth. He rose to the top of his class, and befriended his biggest rival, a boy by the name of Marsh. They were inseparable and were possibly the best mages at the academy, but while they had talent, they were sorely lacking in wisdom. The longer they were members of the academy, the cockier they became, and their hubris would ultimately prove their undoing.
After their exams one year, the pair went out to celebrate, taking it as an excuse to cause trouble. Unfortunately, they picked a fight with a band of ruffians, not expecting them to be adept at magic as well. The pair seemed to have the fight in hand, but they were so used to fighting with spells that Marsh never expected the sword that would kill him. Stunned at the loss of his friend, Dack left himself open and the group hit him with the strongest spell in their repertoire. Lying smoldering next to the body of his friend, Dack’s spark flared and he ascended.
Dack found his way back to Drakeston after the tragedy. With his future cut short, Dack took to stealing to make his living. After his return, he rediscovered his childhood friend Mariel, and as they grew close once again, he was smitten. He told her everything that had happened, including his trips to other worlds. He started to teach her how to be a thief, a dangerous and thrilling life, but it caused too much stress between the two and it eventually became too much for Mariel. Dack’s recklessness was more than she could bear and she left to go back to Drakeston. Dack went with her, but there wasn’t enough there for him to make his living, and so he turned to his poorly understood gift. He started to search the worlds for items he could steal and that quest took him to the world of Alkabah. He quickly found an artifact of great power that he decided to… liberate, but things went poorly when he discovered the artifact was not unguarded. The guardian Djinn beat him horribly and left him for the city guards. He was taken to prison to serve out his sentence, and part of that punishment was the torturous treatment that permanently stained his hand red, forever proclaiming him a thief. It took days, possibly weeks for Dack to finally tap into his ability and planeswalk back to Drakeston.
But he arrived to a massacre.
The corpses of his friends and neighbors were strewn about, the entire town having been murdered while he was away. Nothing hurt him more than seeing Mariel’s body though. He fled, unable to bear the pain and wondering if he had been there, could he have saved anyone? He nursed his pain and swore that he would destroy whoever had done this to him.
He wandered, both Fiora and the greater worlds beyond it, all the while honing his skills as a thief and making quite the living trading items from one world to another. His own magical abilities grew with each theft, because he stole not only the items themselves, but also the magics they contained. He eventually settled in Ravnica, a home as convenient as any he could ask for. He worked his way into the vast network of spies and thieves, earning a reputation and friends amongst Ravnica’s seedy underbelly. Everything changed when he stole a dagger from the Cult of Rakdos.
The dagger held memories from everyone that had used it, and to his shock… it had once been held by the planeswalker who had murdered the people of Drakeston. From the blade, after years of searching, he learned who was responsible for the death of everyone he had known. Her name was Sifa Grent. Sifa had given the dagger to the Cult of Rakdos for several reasons, chiefly to secure their loyalty, but more to keep it away from those who might want it on the plane from which it had originated, a world known as Innistrad.
Innistrad
Dack immediately dropped everything he was doing and ventured to the unknown world. He wasted no time in blundering directly into the vampires of the world, gaining the enmity of the Falkenrath in the process. However, what he could not know was that Sifa was far closer than he expected, and his actions had tipped her to his presence on the plane.
Everything was not lost though, for in his opposition of the Falkenraths, he had gained the attention of allies, a cathar named Ingrid and her father Hermann. Ingrid and Dack rode out to confront Sifa in the Falkenrath castle, but when they arrived, they found only a skeleton guard. They dispatched them easily, but to their horror learned that Sifa had taken the majority of them to search for Dack and destroy the town if necessary. Dack managed to intervene right as Sifa managed to gather the entire town… a tactic exactly like the one she used in Drakeston. Dack managed to drive Sifa and her minions away, but he lost her before he could exact his revenge.
Hermann and Ingrid led the efforts to plunder Sifa’s castle and uncovered inconceivable notes in languages they did not understand. Dack began to tell them of planeswalkers and other worlds, but he realized quickly that they weren’t listening. Indeed, they weren’t moving at all. Someone had cast a stasis spell on them while he hadn’t been paying attention. The spell’s owner made his presence known soon enough. Sorin Markov had come for the Ancient Fang, the dagger Sifa had used and the one Dack had used to track her down. He traded knowledge of Sifa for the dagger and the lives of the cathars.
Sorin’s information pointed Dack to the world of Grixis, prior to the conflux of Alara. He was quickly captured by the demon Malfegor, who had devious plans to try to steal Dack’s spark for himself so he could finally escape the tiny world of Grixis. It was a task he had tried before, which is what led to Sifa’s ascension. Before Malfegor could attempt his plan though, Dack escaped and used his power to learn more about Sifa, including what had triggered her spark. Unfortunately, it offered little insight more into what she was up to or where she had gone. With few other options, he returned to Ravnica to find what she wanted with the Rakdos.
Return to Ravnica
Unfortunately, when he arrived, things had already been set in motion. The Rakdos were looking for him and attacking his known associates to get to him. Amidst all this, he learned that couriers were vanishing as well, and the invitations to the rejuvenation of Vitu-Ghazi were falling into the wrong hands. Using his psychometry on one of the messages, Dack figured out Sifa’s plan. She was plotting to drain the power from all of Vitu Ghazi with the same spell she had used to consume the life from Drakeston. With his motley crew of misfits and thieves, Dack rushed to the City Tree, arriving just in time to confront her and her forces. An enormous battle was waged in the boughs of the tree and Sifa had Dack on the ropes, but just like his friend Marsh, from ages ago… she forgot to protect herself from a sword. One of Dack’s colleagues managed to stab her from behind, wounding Sifa horribly at the cost of his own life. Dack loomed over Sifa as she bled, trying to suck the life from the tree to restore her own health, but Dack would not allow it and cut loose with his most powerful spell, bringing vengeance upon the death mage at last.
Now Dack’s vendetta was done, but his life was left adrift.
Theros
Following rumors that the Boros Legion had acquired a weapon that might upset the balance of peace on Ravnica, Dack broke into Sunhome to take the gem from them. Unfortunately, he could not locate it before a number of angels located him. Rather than tipping his hand, he grabbed the first thing he could and leapt out of the window, quickly losing pursuers in the crowds below.
However, the random relic he had grabbed (a magical gauntlet) proved to be far more than he could have expected. It spoke to him, tempting him with secrets that he could scarcely imagine. Using his gift, he was inundated with images and power of a vast and ancient being and a mysterious island, but despite that, he was no wiser. Only two things became apparent. The gauntlet was incomplete, and its other half lay elsewhere.
His travels took him to Theros.
On Theros, Dack found himself surrounded by thugs, which didn't heed his words of warning. After defeating them, a thankful boy took him to his father's ship, the Hadross. Fayden hired Captain Vog to take him to the island from his vision. On the island, Fayden found a cave filled with hundreds of human skeletons and petrified men. After he found a metal arm guard, which was the other part of the magical gauntlet, he was attacked by the gorgon Hythonia and by a witch but managed to escape.
Safely back on the Hadross, the crew found themselves being attacked by a kraken. Fayden slipped on the completed gauntlet, felt an ancient power within him, and defeated the sea creature.
Back in Meletis Fayden had nightmares every night. He had been studying the gauntlet, but it only showed him images he couldn't translate. He met the magic user Atha who told him that he would be affected by a Sleep Curse very soon because of his magical powers. Nobody knew that Ashiok, the Nightmare Weaver caused the Sleep Curse, and no one knew how to cure it. Her village was decimated by this curse, and now Fayden had it too. Dack decided to seek help from others on Theros, and was last seen entering a portal to Theros's Underworld. [1]
In-game references
Represented in:
Depicted in:
- Acquire (Media Insert)
- Arrest (Media Insert)
- Bred for the Hunt
- Dack's Duplicate
- Duress (Media inserts)
- Electrolyze (Media inserts)
- Feast of Blood (Media inserts)
- Faithless looting (Media inserts)
- Gaze of Granite (Media inserts)
- High Tide (Media insert)
- Standstill (Media inserts)
- Treasure Hunt (Media inserts)
- Turnabout (Media inserts)
- Wash out (Media inserts)
Quoted or referred to:
References
- ↑ Template:NewRef
Sources
- Monty Ashley (October 27, 2011). "Comic Book Previews!". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
- Matt Forbeck (2012), Magic: The Gathering, IDW Publishing
- Matt Forbeck (2012), Magic: The Gathering - The Spell Thief, IDW Publishing
- Matt Forbeck (2013), Magic: The Gathering - Path of Vengeance, IDW Publishing
- Jason Ciaramella (2014), Magic: The Gathering - Theros, IDW Publishing
