A relaxed, ruggedly handsome sixteen-year-old whose long limbs and sun-browned face make him look as if he has just walked out of a field, even at a formal reception. His wheat-blond hair is clipped short and usually mussed by his hat; gold catches in it when the light hits. His skin is weather-darkened across the nose and cheeks, dry at the temples, and marked by the fine creases of someone who squints into open country. He walks with a loose, rolling stride, but becomes abruptly still when he sights a target, as if the landscape has claimed him. He holds himself without courtly polish and keeps a deliberate arm's length from strangers. The unexpected detail: he carries a small, carefully folded scrap of lace in his coat, saved from a childhood gift and handled with a tenderness at odds with his rough field gear.

Walfred is generous with people he considers his own, yet quick to dismiss strangers before they have a chance to prove themselves. He is relaxed and teasing outdoors, where he trusts his skills, but talkative and physically guarded in European company. His deep religious devotion sits beside a stubborn refusal to obey rules he considers pointless. He longs for the peace of childhood but pursues fame and competition as if still trying to prove he deserves his place.

Walfred has only one name, though Arthur sometimes calls him Alfred and, when teasing, Yank. Arthur raised him as his son, and Walfred accepts that bond as real whether or not blood explains it. There are persistent rumors that his father might instead have been one of several other placeborn men Arthur knew; Walfred dislikes the gossip less for its implications than for the way people treat his life as a wager. He grew faster than expected, outstripping a younger northern boy who had once seemed certain to remain taller. As a child, Walfred knew a quieter life of woods, trapping, and familiar company. A formative winter changed that: lost in a blizzard with an injured companion, he followed faint tracks through the trees and brought them both home. Since then he has trusted his own eye more than promises, and has turned hunting into a livelihood and marksmanship into a public reputation. Arthur later sent him across the ocean to learn proper social manners among Europeans. There he was paired with Ludwig, a German placeborn youth, whom Walfred regards with wary respect and whom he is required to keep company with. He is kind to the ordinary people he considers his own, including those whom fashionable society looks down on, but can be blunt or cruel toward outsiders. He misses the untroubled country life of his childhood and pretends not to hear anyone who brings it up.