#everyone will need their own loretags here I think! for now using my general one

[lady-quen]

Verse: The Hound, The Haggard, and the Haunted

Posting an initial version of the lore being cooked between myself, @rostomanologist and @commanderteag ! The context will pretty much be necessary to understand most of the humor oscillating between these chucklefucks :) Chaos plant trio is a thing now.

The Dawnborn Maelmordha and Duskborn Kimarse have known one another since approximately 1320 AE as saplings, at least until Mael's Wyld Hunt and Kima's run-in with the Inquest ensured no further contact. The two wouldn't properly meet again until sometime after 1330 AE, during Commander Maelmordha's Elonian campaigns.

Owing to his death at the hands of Balthazar, Mael, now a lich, struggles with controlling his Diabolist powers, opting to utilize sealing tattoos and enchanted chains to stall the demon essence from consuming his soul. It was after the conflict with the War God that Maelmordha and Kimarse met again, the latter traveling in the area out of curiosity about the Awakened Inquest rampaging in Tyria.

The so-called Thanatologist caught onto the "deal" with the Pact Commander rather quickly and, armed with potential blackmail material, figured it most beneficial for them both to engage in a contract. An undying subject for the death scholar and possible help with his condition for the Commander, especially with Kimarse's Revenant former acquaintance in the picture - Noereen, haunted by the spectre of a legendary White Mantle well-versed in bloodstone magics. A bloodstone collar could be forged to act as a magic buffer, but a sample was required, and, well, with most equipment simply dissolving within the Commander's chest portal and the man himself being unable to perform the procedure, Kimarse thought it best to ward her left hand, plunge it in and hope for the best. She managed to pull out the demon core now replacing the Commander's heart for study, but lost the appendage to extreme frostbite. A tradeoff, just like Tyr lost his hand in the jaws of Fenrir - in order to apply Gleipnir.

Enter Maolmuire, a formidable Mesmer with an unsettling connection to the Dream and the sword Caladbolg.

Maolmuire of the Noon, awakened approximately 1330 AE, is a member of a cycle which suffered malformations following the Pale Mother's injury at the claws of the Shadow of the Dragon. Born with a warped right arm and a pair of wings, he stands out from his fellow sylvari, but what happened to his corporeal form is scarcely his only affliction. His connection to the Dream far too strong to the point of being unable to separate his own memories from those of its denizens, Maol's waking and sleeping moments alike are dominated by the three Knights of the Thorn: the Valiant Riannoc, the Marshal Trahearne, and the Commander, Maelmordha. The three personalities blend within him, and a destiny laid out by the Astral Ward itself sends him on a quest into the desert to find the Commander. With expert mesmeric magic, he is able to infiltrate even the Order of Shadows until he eventually confronts the Commander, now a different beast altogether than the pre-death image which yet remained of him inside the Dream.

In spite of being walking reminders of one another's worst traumas, Maelmordha and Maolmuire work together, with the former's condition and ever-fresh grief for the Pact Marshal making the burden of the lich-slaying Caladbolg infinitely heavy. Following the campaign against Palawa Joko, he attempts to return the sword, only to be met with rejection - for now. Indeed, it isn't long before the Mother receives a mysterious vision and nominates the Fourth Knight, who happens to be none other than Maolmuire himself.

The three keep in contact and work together in the future, out of selfless and selfish reasons alike.