[jason taylor]

Nearest Guards: Or colloquially "nearests".

These are bodyguard/servants trained to reside specifically at their employers household and form a last line of defense. They are distinct from Outer Guards who can be expected to do no more than keep unwelcome people away from entering within range of the Household which requires straightforward security skills but less tact. They act as normal nannies or pedagogues for children and valets or ladiesmaids for adults. And often as martial arts trainers to provide the employer means to be their own bodyguard or just to handle themselves in an affair of honor. As servants that is, they keep their employers privy accounts, handle luggage, give advice on social functions and so forth. They also aside from protecting from assassins keep a weather eye out for spies whether from rival houses or journalists. Not to mention approving food supplies and knowing basic first aid well enough if they are the only ones available at a critical situation. Obviously such paladins of servile virtue as the description paints do not come cheap when they come at all but reasonable approximation can be gotten for enough reward. Often the reward comes not just in money but in land, gifts or fictive kinship, things that recognize the fact that a Nearest has to be incorporated into a household's private life. One of the most important things expected is near absolute discretion. A Nearest cannot regard a householder as a proper subject for sexual approach without the Head's formal permission (which is why Nearest's from different races are often preferred; Aslan for human Nobles and vice-versa for instance assuming no known xenosexual inclination). Likewise a Nearest must be able to accompany a subject into acutely embarrassing situations (such as getting them home secretly and safely after a night of carrousing). And of course they must keep silent about the employer's private life. Conversely a Nearest who is obviously alienated enough to resign in protest reflects on the employer who it is presumed must have done something truely dreadful. Commonly there is more than one Nearest and equally they often have their own connections with each other; the stereotyped hereditary retainer does have an approximation in some circles even though the high-training needed preclude actual inherited service.

A Nearest can be made by combining a modification of the servant and bodyguard templates, plus adding Discretion (Household Life) to the CoH. Other traits can be added as desired including Quirk (stoic), Quirk: Unrequited Love, SoD (Employer), and so on. A possible model is Kevin Costner in The Bodyguard, though he should perhaps be more personable. Costner's Samurai romanticism is a great quirk for this though.

Possible adventures can go from the dramatic to the comic. Comic adventures can center around accompanying the employer on a night of vice and rescuing them from a drug-addled party before the cops arrive. More serious troubles can come when loyalties are divided; if for instance the Head wishes for information on the doings of one of his dependents.