Dragomir Ublyudok is the illegitimate son of a Rus sea king and a tavern maid. Raised within the taverns and brothels of his small town, he spent his childhood emptying chamber pots and scrubbing vomit from the floors. In his eighth summer, his father returned to their village with his army and burned it to the ground. Nearly everyone he knew was killed and himself taken as a prize to be sold into seritude. During the journey home, his father recognized himself within dragomir and instead of selling him, gifted the boy to one of his warriors.

The years leading up to manhood were brutal and cruel, but he eventually gained his freedom and earned a place within his father's retinue. But soon thereafter, his father died and dragomir was looked upon with suspicion by his father's legitimate sons who saw his ambitions as being in conflict with their own. So they stripped him of his privileges, branded him a skaggamor and banished him from his father's lands. The only thing he took with him is the childhood nickname bestowed upon him by his half-brothers; Ublyudok: the bastard.