Gunfred Altzmiz is one of the longest-running survivors of Blood Tides. He begins his story believing himself to be Gunfred of Averland, a wandering fiddler, skilled rapier fighter, occasional spy, and adventurer who survives as much through charm and intelligence as through violence.
Gunfred is rarely the strongest person in the room. His strength is understanding people. He can joke with soldiers, negotiate with criminals, speak comfortably with sailors, and recognize when pride is about to turn an argument into bloodshed. Over time, those qualities transform him from a wandering rogue into someone capable of holding very different groups together.
Gunfred’s early travels eventually bring him into the company of Bloody Mary Woodson and the adventurers surrounding her. He fights Beastmen, survives dangerous wilderness, and encounters evidence that Chaos is spreading far beyond isolated cults and northern raiders.
During the troubles surrounding Rutten, Gunfred and his companions become entangled with Beastmen and the growing threat of the Shadowgave Warherd. These experiences introduce him to a world where monsters, magic, corruption, and entire armies can emerge almost without warning.
Many of the people who begin those adventures do not survive them.
Gunfred does.
That becomes one of the recurring themes of his life.
Gunfred and Mary eventually reach Marienburg, where they encounter a wealthy expedition preparing to reclaim Tylos from the Skaven.
The expedition promises glory, wealth, and the restoration of Imperial territory.
Gunfred is skeptical.
He has already learned that powerful men often use grand causes to convince other people to do the dying.
Nevertheless, he joins.
It is during this period that Gunfred becomes closely associated with Selindra Moonsway, an Elf from the Tower of Hoeth who believes something unnatural is happening around Tylos.
Together, Gunfred, Mary, and Selindra become part of the expedition.
At first, the campaign appears successful.
Then the Skaven tunnels open.
Tylos becomes a slaughterhouse.
Warpfire burns through streets. Skaven swarm defensive positions. Command collapses. Friends disappear or die. Gunfred fights from the ramparts using bow and rapier while Selindra battles beside him.
Eventually the survivors are forced to retreat.
Gunfred covers the withdrawal while Mary leads what remains of the company toward the shore.
The docks burn behind them.
Another supposedly glorious campaign ends in catastrophe.
After Tylos, Gunfred, Mary, and Selindra become known as the Ashen Three.
Gunfred helps give them the name.
The three have survived when most of those around them have not.
Gunfred considers writing songs about those who died. That becomes important to his character. He jokes constantly, but he remembers people. He understands that if survivors do not tell the stories of the dead, the powerful will eventually rewrite what happened.
The failure at Tylos also deepens his distrust of governments, crusades, noble causes, and powerful patrons.
He begins asking the question that follows him through much of Blood Tides:
Who actually profits when everyone else is told to fight?
The Ashen Three eventually become involved in the chaos surrounding Magritta.
Gunfred fights beside Mary against hired killers and becomes increasingly aware that Mary has accumulated powerful enemies.
Then Magritta itself begins collapsing.
Skaven violence, political instability, cult activity, refugees, mercenaries, and panic overwhelm the city.
Once again Gunfred watches a place that seemed permanent fall apart around him.
Rutten.
Tylos.
Magritta.
Each disaster teaches him the same lesson.
Kingdoms, cities, armies, and governments can disappear much faster than anyone expects.
People are what remain afterward.
After escaping Magritta, Gunfred becomes part of the crew surrounding the Santa Lyrica.
This is where his journey begins changing from survival into leadership.
Mary possesses the experience and authority to command the larger venture, while Joran understands the vessel and its sailors.
Rather than allowing the two roles to collide, Gunfred proposes a practical solution:
Mary commands the venture.
Joran controls the working ship.
It is typical Gunfred.
He does not solve the problem by deciding who deserves more authority.
He finds a structure under which both sides can function.
As the crew grows, Gunfred becomes increasingly important as mediator, organizer, and negotiator.
The Santa Lyrica eventually contains sailors, pirates, dockworkers, fighters, and people with very different loyalties.
Gunfred understands that forcing these groups into obedience will eventually cause mutiny.
When questions arise over the position of quartermaster, he favors an election.
He speaks to different groups separately.
He tells sailors why stability matters.
He explains accountability to the dockworkers.
He appeals to respect and reputation among the pirates.
Gunfred does not assume everyone wants the same thing.
He understands that leadership means discovering what matters to each group and finding a system they can all tolerate.
He eventually serves as a voice and recorder during the crew’s political decisions.
Without realizing it, the wandering fiddler has begun practicing governance.
Gunfred also gradually learns the practical life of the sea.
During the pursuit of the Courage, he takes the wheel of the Santa Lyrica.
He is still inexperienced.
He makes mistakes.
At one point he overcorrects badly enough to expose the vessel to enemy fire.
But he does not abandon the wheel.
He learns.
The man from Averland who once traveled with a fiddle and rapier is becoming a sailor, officer, and trusted member of a pirate crew.
Sartosa suits Gunfred almost perfectly.
It is a city of pirates, merchants, mercenaries, criminals, sailors, spies, and competing loyalties.
Gunfred can move between these worlds naturally.
He recruits, gathers information, negotiates, and helps manage the increasingly complicated affairs surrounding the crew.
But Sartosa also becomes the location of the greatest revelation of his life.
Gunfred had always known his childhood contained unanswered questions.
The parents who raised him had spoken vaguely about his origins.
His mother once told him:
“You’re special, Gunfred. Just… born to wander.”
Gunfred never imagined how literal that might be.
Eventually he receives an ancient official document connected to Vardanos.
The record identifies him as:
Gunfred Altzmiz.
Son of Queen Alenya of the Sable Glade and Prince-Regent Tervain Altzmiz.
Prince of Vardanos.
Heir-Apparent.
The physical description matches him: fair skin, emerald eyes, and auburn hair.
For perhaps the first time, Gunfred has no joke ready.
The people who raised him were not his biological parents.
Yet they were still his parents in every way that mattered.
The discovery does not erase that life.
It simply creates another one beside it.
Gunfred suddenly has to confront the possibility that he is not merely a fiddler from Averland.
He is the missing heir to a throne.
The revelation creates Gunfred’s central conflict.
He has spent his life becoming someone without knowing what he was supposedly born to become.
He knows how to sleep beside a campfire.
He knows taverns, war, monsters, sailors, criminals, and refugees.
He knows how ordinary people talk when nobles are not listening.
He has watched governments fail.
He has watched commanders sacrifice soldiers.
He has watched cities collapse.
And now someone may eventually expect him to become a prince.
Gunfred realizes that he is somehow several people at once:
A fiddler.
A survivor.
A spy.
A sailor.
And a prince.
He hides the evidence of his birth rather than immediately declaring himself.
Before claiming anything, he needs answers.
Why was he taken from Vardanos?
Who hid him?
Did his true parents believe he was dead?
Who currently rules there?
And what would happen if the missing prince returned?
Gunfred’s growing ability to lead becomes especially clear when the crew begins acquiring serious wealth.
Treasure creates suspicion.
Men whisper about stolen shares.
Different factions watch one another.
Gunfred understands that simply telling everyone to trust their officers will not work.
His solution is transparency.
Public counting.
Multiple witnesses.
Written records.
Representatives from different groups.
Rotating guards.
Gunfred recognizes something essential:
It is not enough for leadership to be fair.
People must be able to see that it is fair.
That instinct may eventually prove more important to Vardanos than any royal bloodline.
Gunfred’s story is fundamentally about identity and earned leadership.
He begins as a man who believes he has no important bloodline.
Everything he becomes, he earns.
He survives Beastmen.
He survives Tylos.
He survives Magritta.
He helps hold together the Santa Lyrica.
He learns the sea.
He negotiates between rival factions.
He remembers the dead.
He helps create rules instead of merely surviving beneath someone else’s rules.
Only afterward does he discover that he was born to rule.
That is what makes Gunfred’s royal heritage important.
His blood may make him Prince of Vardanos.
But his journey is what might actually make him capable of becoming a good ruler.
The question ahead is not simply whether Gunfred can claim his throne.
It is whether he wants it.
And if he returns to Vardanos, its nobles may expect a polished prince raised for court.
Instead they may receive a scarred wandering fiddler who has fought monsters, watched kingdoms fail, sailed with pirates, negotiated mutinies, and learned that authority means nothing when the people beneath it no longer trust you.
Gunfred Altzmiz was born a prince.
Gunfred of Averland had to become a leader on his own.