Kjartan is a young, ruggedly handsome human man, broad through the shoulders, muscular, and naturally hairy across his arms and chest. His short brown hair is brushed into a quiff above clear green eyes and a close, full beard. He wears a sleeveless, smoke-darkened tunic that leaves his strong arms bare, with a patched leather belt and a weatherworn traveler’s cloak for cold nights. He carries a greataxe with a smooth, carefully oiled haft. Within a minute of meeting him, people notice that his tunic’s hem has been repeatedly mended with unusually neat stitches, while his voice is low and even until he is flustered, when he draws a quick breath and his words come out in a rush.

Warm, direct, and generous with practical help, Kjartan is more comfortable doing something useful than explaining how he feels. He asks curious questions without much embarrassment, especially about the lives of people who have chosen a different path from his own. He is openly homosexual and quietly hopeful that somewhere beyond his familiar roads he might find a community where his longing to belong among centaurs is met with understanding rather than laughter.

Kjartan grew up near a stretch of rough pasture and woodland where travelers sometimes passed through on their way to the open country. As a boy, he was captivated by centaurs: not only their strength and freedom of movement, but the way their communities seemed to make room for bodies and desires that polite townsfolk tried to discipline. He began copying their stories into a little stitched notebook, asking every visitor what he could about their customs, and practicing the proud, loose stride he imagined they used. He knows he is human, and that wishing cannot change his shape, but he has never quite stopped hoping that some path, magic, or transformation might bring him closer to the people he admires.