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y-rhywbeth2 · 4 months ago

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Elven subraces

Link: Disclaimer regarding D&D "canon" & Index [tldr: D&D lore is a giant conflicting mess. Larian's lore is also a conflicting mess. There's a lot of lore; I don't know everything. You learn to take what you want and leave the rest. etc]

(Tel'Quessir only, we're not going into the non-Torillian stuff like snow elves or astral elves)

How many of these bastards could you possibly need, you ask? Well according to the writers there are never enough:

So lore dumps on Moon elves, Sun elves, Star elves, Wood elves, Green elves, Aquatic elves, Winged elves, Dark elves (and their infinite permutations), Lythari, Fey'ri, and Celadrin. And we're not going into the other tiny little pockets of culture like the Llewyrr or the Poscadari.

A brief talk about the mixing of subraces, and then starting the lore dumps off with the moon elves.

(Well, the first half of the moon elves, because I forgot some things after moving onto the star and sun elves and had to add it later)

A note before going into it is that, obviously, elves can be descended from multiple subraces. Mechanically they will take after one parent, usually a mother. In appearance they usually favour one parent over the other, but they may have any mix of traits from their parents.

So a green elf (wood) and a moon elf (high) may produce a child whose 5e character sheet says either wood elf or high elf, with the appropriate stat bonus (3.5e would put them down as green or moon). It takes generations of mixing to produce a distinct subrace as the moon elves and wood elves have.

Canonically:

Shemmithil Maraphiir - better known as Ashemmi - is the daughter of a sun elven mother and a moon elven father. Mechanically she was a moon elf (and identified as one), and she had blonde hair and golden eyes from her mother.

Halanaestra, a tavern-master (barkeeper/pub landlord) on Evermeet is of mixed silver, green and sea elven heritage.

There's also an elven noble house (House Le'Quella) of mixed moon and green heritage.

As the offspring of an elf and a half-elf is mechanically classified as an elf in the Realms it's also possible for an elf to display human genes from a grandparent or more distant ancestor. (Or even a non-human non-elven ancestor).

Elven aging, in DnD baseline canon, features a lifespan of aprox. 750 years. That said, sources have varied and different elven subraces have different average lifespans so I'll mention them. It's also worth noting that these are average lifespans, and even the shortest-lived elven subrace (drow) are known to live into four digit numbers.

Obviously the lore presented is cultural norms and stereotypes, and individual elves may not fit the mould perfectly.

High Elves are sometimes referred to as Eladrin, which also happens to be the name for the closely related celestials/fey who dwell in the Feywild and Arvandor. Generally people just call them elves.

Calling a moon or star elf a high elf may cause confusion, as while there are three subraces that fall into the category it's also one of the terms used to refer to sun elves.

All high elven subraces share the same average heights and weights, standing on average about the same heights as humans (in contrast to elves of other worlds, who tend to be shorter)

Height Range: 4'5" - 6'6", averaging the same heights as humans.

Weight Range: 70 lbs - 250 lbs, lighter than a human of the same height and build - likely due to the comparatively physical fragility and 'delicateness' high elves are known for.

The People of the Moon - Teu'Tel'Quessir

Moon elves, Silver elves, Grey elves*

*A slur used by gold elves who consider them inferiors (and what an elf should not be).

By far the most likely to show ancestry from outside the moon elf gene pool. For example; while moon elven hair skews towards silver-white, they can be seen with hair of any colour.

Hair: silver, white, silver-white, white-blue, white-green, blue, midnight blue, black. Very, very early generations of moon elves had bright red hair, but that gene seems to have died out.

Eyes: Green, blue, grey, silver. A distinct trait of moon elves is that their eyes are always flecked with gold (which catches the light, giving the impression of literal gold or even stars).

Skintone: 'Bleached white' - also likened to ivory, alabaster and snow - with blue undertones, and an affect that's described as being like 'white marble' (which I assume is the blue pattern formed by veins under the skin where it's thin, but that's just my assumption.)

Average Lifespan: 500-900 years. Second longest lived of the elven subraces.

Patron deity: Sehanine Moonbow, deity of death, journeys, transcendence, dreams, mysticism, the night sky with the stars and moon. Moon elven religion is also the only one to officially include Angharradh in the pantheon.

Wandering party elves who may have to show up to work hungover. Individualistic, impulsive, flighty, fun-loving, hedonistic little bastards who tend to take risks and have a horrible ability to judge said risks: Do first, think later. Being alive is a delight, and the purpose of life is to enjoy it to the fullest (and to have the freedom to do so). If you visit Evermeet some of them will board your ship without warning on the way in and drink all your booze while singing bawdy songs. They tend to embrace change, delight in gambling, and see life as something to be enjoyed - other elves simply need to pull their heads out of their asses.

'Life is for the living and is best spent among the lively. Revel in variety and laughter, for all living things can learn and laugh with each other.'

Origin:

Moon elves are descended from the children of Sharlario Moonflower, an adventuring merchant from the Feywild (although his rival personally believed the man to be a pirate). He was staying in the city of Tintageer when it was destroyed by disaster and fled with the survivors to Toril. Said survivors became the gold elves, while he married a green elven priestess of Sehanine Moonbow. Their children inherited his white-blue skin and their mother's devout reverence for the Daughter of the Night Skies and were nicknamed moon elves as a result, they took to wandering as he did and served well as diplomats between the various elven people who had made their home on Toril.

(The Moonflower clan also went on to be the royal family as history progressed, and some sun elven reactionaries have never really forgiven the moon elves for that since that's their place.)

The Road of Life: 'The silver elves strongly believe than an individual must choose his or her path through life.' In the moon elven take on the core elven philosophy there is no one correct way to live life, and every individual must be free to find their own way and chose the path for themselves. It's not the destination that matters, but the journey.

Moon elves have a drive to seek excitement and new experiences; to see and do as much as they can within their lifespan, trying out new things and dropping them for the next as they go. They often spend the longest time in the first stage of the road, characterised by chasing impulse and entertainment, travelling and adventuring, focusing on themselves and their own interests rather than the community - and sometimes lapsing from the second stage (the mature stage where they focus on their society and their place in it) back to the first wanderlust stage in later life. There is no stigma against this however; it's their road to walk and they must walk it as they see fit.

Society:

Moon elves found outside of elven lands are transients, usually travelling in extended family groups. Of course, being elves, their idea of a brief stay has them hanging around in one settlement for years, sometimes several decades. They're likely to own houses and have jobs and long-term friendships before they decide to wander off again.

Their nomadic lifestyle often leads moon elves to pick up multiple languages over the course of their lives.

Due to their history of wandering and mixing with the people they encounter, their culture encouraging a love of fun and new experiences, and the presence of Angharradh in their religious beliefs encouraging strength in diversity, moon elves are the most outgoing and amongst the most open-minded and friendly elves (the others are the copper elves, who share their open-minded outlook but are more settled and reclusive). They do have conflicts - some moon elves are embittered by historical losses at the hands of humans; Evereska has historically been barred to any non-elves save Harpers and elf friends. And sometimes the friction between the clashing ideals of moon and sun elves, as well as their bad history, turns to real enmity rather than their usual 'disapproving family members' treatment. But the philosophical outlook moon elves have drilled into their head from birth, favouring individuality, generally leads them to be willing to treat people as individuals rather than members of their group.

Moon elven houses are the most likely to adopt non-elves into house membership, and often frown upon refusing to legitimise mixed children born to their house.

They usually happily integrate with their neighbours in whatever society they're staying in, though if they feel persecuted or othered they're known to respond by becoming the most obnoxious elven stereotype in order to annoy said neighbours. An elven household in a human city isn't going to have a bedroom and is liable to be covered in plants like some kind of greenhouse (these plants are actually edible - to the elven digestive system, at least), but assuming they like their guest they'll put the plants away and prepare a guest room while hosting. Sometimes the plants are enchanted to levitate to the rafters on command.

Fighters aren't uncommon, but moon elves prefer to approach conflict with a stealth-first mentality; moon elven stories favour heroes who outwit and humiliate their opponents with quick thinking and cunning.

Literature, song and poetry favours light-hearted with a focus on humour - especially dirty humour. They have their share of more solemn and tragic historical tales, but these things have their time and place and don't get the focus.

They like to party and all night revels are a common thing. Gambling games are also a staple of moon elven social life and getting dragged into games of kholiast (a very complicated card game involving dice and a deck of 1000 cars) is to be expected.

Pets are common, especially hunting dogs and birds of prey. They don't seem to care for horses though, preferring their own two feet. On the less common selection are blink dogs, pegasi, unicorns and dragonnes (cat-dragon things).

Moon elven culture doesn't encourage hiding or repressing emotion and many wear their hearts on their sleeves. They have a reputation for mood swinging, going from exuberant joy and merriment to 'the pits of despair and melancholy' and back again at speeds that non-moon elves struggle to cope with. Hiding or repressing your emotions is frowned on, and the stoicism practiced by gold elves is derided as a 'colourless' existence.

Customisation and self-expression in fashion is big. Makeup, especially eyeliner and eyeshadow is well loved. Piercings made of metal are less common, and bone - especially from a deceased loved one or revered ancestor - is favoured. If they use metal it's likely to be silver. Most moon elves having such pale hair means that temporary dyes see a lot of use, and they like painting their nails.

They also enjoy fussing over their hairstyles, and braids, ponytails and hair decorations like beads and wrapped wire are popular.

Some - though not all - moon elves have a tradition of body paint and tattooing in 'mystic patterns,' some of which were appropriated from green elven culture while others were maintained from their mutual ancestors. Body paint and temporary tattoos are far more common as their impermanence makes them more appealing: what if you change your mind about the design later, after all? You can change temporary designs as much as you like when you get a new idea and then put the old one on again later.

Almost as if they're making up for their flighty hedonistic ways, moon elves do take their oaths and responsibilities very seriously: an oath from a moon elf should be a binding contract, and oathbreakers are reviled as the worst sorts.

Adopting the local N'Quess fashions aside, traditional moon elven clothing is relatively simple but favours the highest quality material and construction possible. They enjoy embroidery and customising their own clothes, featuring patterns and beadwork and intricately carved stones. Some even add feathers. Where moon elves feel safe they favour bolder colours - cultural wisdom says 'brighter is better' and your peers respect you more the more ostentatious you go - but in places where they feel threatened they dress conservatively and tone it down to more earthen colours to blend in and avoid notice.

While they have the usual elven love of magic, and delight in experimentation and pushing the boundaries of the Art, moon elves despise black necromancy and its creations - likely a combination of their reverence for Sehanine to whose doctrine undeath is an abomination, and their love of life and freedom (to which undeath, a form of slavery and mock existence, is also an abomination). It is not taught or studied in Evereska, which may actually put them at a disadvantage when faced with hostile necromantic spells. Want to be an elven necromancer? Be ready to live alone.

They don't tend to make very good enchanters though, as few have the patience to sit around for ages doing all the long repetitive work that goes into making and enchanting a powerful item ('Sun elves in particular find this trait somewhat embarrassing' and moon elves respond by saying that think the sun elves' taking decades to make a single object is 'obsessive'). They usually make a bunch simple, weaker enchantments to-go.

Evereska, 'the Fortress Home,' and last major elven civilisation on Faerûn, located in the far North-East of the Western Hinterlands is a moon elven state. It does host sun and wood elven residents, but the city is still founded by and mostly populated by the Teu'Tel'Quessir.

The moon elven reputation for open-mindedness may find itself faltering there thanks to an extremely xenophobic noble population; half-elves are barred from certain privileges, such as membership at the Academy, without the backing of a high ranking elven parent and during the spellplage a rise in xenophobia saw many Evereskan half-elves leave the city. They prefer never to let dwarves of half-orcs in under any circumstances whatsoever. Said noble houses are ancient lineages and think moon elves not part of these esteemed houses are second-class citizens. Non-moon elves and non-elves can get fucked. As ever, Toril's nobility are a deranged world unto themselves and you can't really judge what to expect of a people by their rulers, nor what to expect of the nobility by looking at the average citizen.

(The moon elven noble houses of Evermeet tend to be friendlier.)

Religion:

Silver elves are pious as a people, and their idea of worship is (can you guess?) partying. You start a ceremony with a few moments of solemn prayer, the elven equivalent of an 'amen,' and then immediately start the revel. Festivals end when the last elf collapses from exhaustion sometime in the early morning after.

Sehanine Moonbow features prominently in their worship, and moon elves account for 54% of the membership of her church.

They are also the only elven subrace to remember the triune goddess Agharradh: the queen of Arvandor and a fusion of the deities Sehanine, Hanali Celanil and Aerdrie Faenya. Other subraces may find themselves called to her service but 93% of her total followers are moon elves. Sun elves are the only other elves who know who Angharradh is, and they dismiss her as moon elves misinterpreting Sehanine and consider her worship heretical (though they largely leave the moon elves be).

#Oh Xan of Evereska; you were the worst moon elf ever #Sand traded joy in for schadenfreude and scathing sarcasm #Linu... should not drink. I mean I'm sure it'd be hilarious to watch. From a distance.#Astarion's doing pretty well as an example of moon elvendom except for the vampirism. He hasn't made any oaths to break that I recall #And now bedtime #lore stuff #/astarion #long post #pointy eared stuff

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catulhu333 · 5 months ago

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Khaine and Khorne being directly stated to be the same

While this is an often discussed theory, or that the two are at least closely connected, and many hints of it in lore/fluff, there are at least two instances in canon were this was directly stated. First one is very old, from the 1988 article "Witch Elves!" in White Dwarf #108: "The Kryrnaa are an ancient order, founded during the early dark days of the building of Naggarond. They had turned from the worship of Slaanesh soon after their exile from the Elven Kingdoms, and, still drawn by the allure of Chaos, took the murderous Khaine as their new Master. For many centuries the Krynaa were a secret order, their name heard only in the whisperings of dark passages, but their numbers slowly grew. And as the Krynaa increased in strength, there came the inevitable conflict with the Dru Perim. For Khaine is that aspect of the Blood God recognised by the Druchii, and the Blood God, known to other races as Khorne, is the sworn enemy of Slaanesh."

The second time, is much newer excerpt, from 2006's Liber Chaotica:

"Of Pleasure And Rage

Behold! For I speak to you from the Shadows - the Great Darkness, that gives meaning to all Light. At the heart of this Realm, shrouded and unclear, stands the Powers of Chaos, locked in each other's embrace, hated lovers and eternal companions.

These Four are like points upon a compass - none are close and some are opposite. War and Pleasure are two such opposites, facing each other across eternity, hating and warring, two ideals seperated by an impassable gulf of Belief and Purpose. For Khorne is discipline, hardness, suffering and rage, while Slaanesh is indulgence, beauty, ecstasy and lust. Their opposition is carved upon the knucklebones of fate and conflict can be their only recourse.

Yet how mightier is Khorne than his delight-filled sibling! Oldest of gods and greatest of warriors, Khorne's armies stretch from infinity to infinity to infinity and the Pleasure God may not rival Him. But this was not always so. For in the days when the Slaanesh, Last Born and Most Beautiful, strove for existence, His power waxed stronger than all other gods, be they seperate or together, and it seemed as though His spiteful triumph would destroy the Balance in the Warp.

But as is ever the case, Khorne was there to stem the flow of Delight. He saw the growth of His youngest sibling, and hated Him even before his birth. With His mighty arms, Khorne sought to crush the life from Slaanesh before He had even left His womb, but the war god had not counted on the passion of Slaanesh's creators, and the harder He squeezed the greater the pressure became to drive His arms apart.

The war god fought on. He sought to give all mortals time to bring an end to their corrupting decadence - the decadence that fed the nascent Power that was Slaanesh. But mortals are weak as gods are not, and though some used the time bought for them by Khorne to learn from their wicked ways, many others did not and sank ever deeper into indolence and debauchery.

Slaanesh's tempermental screams and self-tormenting nightmares echoed through the Aethyr, and insanity bloomed on every world. Terrible storms raged throughout Heaven and Hell, and rains of fire lashed across Khorne's back, but His grip ever stayed firm around His embryonic sibling. Freezing winds tore at His face and floods of poison crept up His legs, yet still the War God would not let go.

Then His brother came upon the scene. Decay stood there beside War.

"Give up," sighed Father Nurgle. "Give into what must be. It is the nature of things that morals decay and cultures must rot. Mortals cannot leave their destined path."

Khorne turned away from His brother and grasped His wrists all the tighter. Then a gust of coloured light brought there to the brothers the Changer of Ways, and Tzeentch gazed upon the War God with amusement and disdain.

"End this," he hissed. "For it must come to pass. Change is the constant that cannot be changed. We Three must be Four, so the Game has demanded. Be it now, be it later, our sibling must come."

But Khorne would have none of it. He rorared His fury until the universe shook, and the foundations of All That Is, All That Was, and All That Shall Be, threatened to crumble. His brothers left Him then, one with a sigh and one with a chuckle, for both knew that the ending was close.

Upon the Mortal Plane the wars had all ceased. All morals and laws had rotted away, and the change to conceit was almost done. The Three wavered as decadence took hold, and Slaanesh expanded beyond size and beyond measure. But Khorne, unable to see defeat, hung on to His charge though his arms were bent back and His body near-crushed. Then with a scream of release that ripped through the Warp, Slaanesh threw off His eldest brother and burst into being.

Such was the Event of Slaanesh's birth, the metal body that had contained Khorne's essence since He had slain Khaelis Ra, shattered into a thousand pieces that scattered across the dimensions. But though His soul had been freed from its silver prison, Khorne had not the strength to strike a counter blow against exultant Slaanesh, and so the Pleasure God was left to reap the souls of His mortal creators and set His Throne alongside those of His brothers. So it was that the Three became Four and the Eternal Pantheon was complete.

From whenever 'then' was, until wherever 'now' is, the gods have continued their unending dance, twirling each other through the minds and souls of mortals. First one leads and then another, each keeping step in this pavane of peril, a stately measure played out to the beating of human hearts.

None of these powers can ever truly win against its brothers, for, as the Great Conspirator did say, it is the nature of things that change is the only constant - and nowhere is this more true than within the shadow place that is Chaos.

Yet still the gods dance and their bellows of delight shake the universe.

from the 'Liber Maleficarum'. Restricted distribution 2405- I.C. by order of K. M. Eisel, Witch Hunter Captain"

(written down by Dreadnautilus on reddit, as the fragment was in handwriting in Liber Chaotica).

As seen in the fragment describes Khorne fighting and destroying K(h)aelis Ra (the Nightbringer), exactly like Khaine was described in lore from the same period (the short story, and in-universe Eldar myth "The Birth of Fear"). And being, or rather Khaine/Khorne's shell being shattered by Slaanesh.

Does it mean Khorne and Khaine are the same? Not necessarily. Even the fluff from Liber Chaotica implies they are no longer the same, being split by Slaanesh. It's also hard to tell if this fluff/lore is canon, especially seeing multiple elements from the White Dwarf #108 were directly retconned. Still, it does show there were instances were the two gods of war and blood were stated to be same.

combined artworks of Khaine by Jes Goodwin and Khorne by Ian Miller

#khaine #khorne #warhammer #warhammer 40k #warhammer fantasy #obscure #40k

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metalomagnetic · 6 months ago

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I *love* your answer on the house elf lore. I have a few related questions, if you don’t mind LOL…

How long ago was the initial enslavement/Helix Black? And did Helix’s grandson know why his house-elves were treated differently than other families, was he told? Are the Blacks told all of this, or do they just learn to treat their elves with affection because that’s what everyone around them does?

We know that the Blacks have astral magic and that helped in the war effort, but did other families have specialised magic that helped as well? I know Voldemort doesn’t know how the Gaunts were tied to snakes, but will we ever find out?

And finally - does magic feed itself? You say that the wizards of the past were way more powerful and they lost some of that with the death of the High Elves; is that because there is a balance that needs to be kept? Does the wizarding world have a certain biodiversity LOL?

Again, I love all of your lore. It’s such a treat to hear any of it. I devour it every time.

I am so happy you're enjoying the lore!

So, the second (and last) Elvish War lasted for about twenty years, and Tessuth was born during it, as was Helix's grandson, since they are the same age.

The war ended when they were twelve, and that's when Tessuth was enslaved. Helix only lived five more years after that, waiting for his grandson, Cetus, to reach adulthood before offing himself.

Since Tessuth was a child, both by human and elven standard, she grew up with Cetus. Helix was very intrigued with her magic, different than wizard kind, and with no need of a conduit like a wand to work. He (and other wizards) attempted to replicate it, learn it, but no wizard was ever capable. That's how he spent the last years of his life, mainly shut in with Tessuth and Cetus, teaching his grandson about family affairs, and keeping a close eye on Tessuth and her sister, making sure the curse was working and that the elves truly couldn't disobey.

Of course, Tessuth, being a child, latched onto Helix as a parental figure, and onto Cetus as a play-mate and sibling.

Tessuth, her sister and Cetus are all told that Tessuth's relatives were Evil, tried to destroy wizards, but wizards were 'merciful' and didn't kill Tessuth and the others, instead 'taking them into their homes'.

Poor Tessuth, due to her age and also because of the complex curse and charms bonding her into submission, truly does feel grateful for the Blacks eventually, for sparing her and her sister's lives, especially when she sees how awful some other families treat their elves.

Cetus grows, learns everything about the war and his mind develops, understanding the complexities of what transpired, but Tessuth never quite catches up, never quite grows as she should.

She's confused when what she saw as a fellow child, a play mate, becomes her new Master, grows old, has children of his own, and then dies, while she remains unchanged.

From all the Blacks, she loved Cetus the most, and it was heartbreaking for her to lose him. He is also the only one that treated her like a true family member. Initially, she and her sisters were not used for house labour, mostly because what remained of the Blacks didn't trust them yet with their food, neither did the elves knew how to cook human food. I think it took them some years to figure out what elves could do. Years of Tessuth learning to cook from human servants, for the Blacks to see that when she made a mess she could clean it *much* faster and efficiently than wizards, with just a snap of her fingers.

I think with each generation she became more and more of a servant, and not much else. Yet since she raised so many Blacks, loved them, played with them, took care of them, even when the children grew into adults, they still viewed her kindly; most Blacks were never cruel to her, her sister, or their own children, when those came. It is sort of a tradition- yes, their elves are their property, but since the elves are such a huge fixture in their lives, and they aren't taught to despise them, they aren't the type to physically abuse their elves. Of course, there are exceptions, some Blacks are crueler than others, some grow resentful in childhood because the elves 'snitch' on them to their parents and so forth, but most never truly develop the pure disdain Malfoys have for their elves, for example. I also think Tessuth and the first generation of house-elves are much stronger magically than the next generations, simply because they were born free, and they were allowed to develop naturally at least for the first years of their lives. Their own children never had that chance, so their magic never reaches that of their ancestors.

Blacks especially like Tessuth because she's their living history, she can tell them so many things she witnessed during the centuries, stories that were never written down, secrets of former masters that were never meant to be found out, but Tessuth tells new masters everything, since she physically cannot hold a secret from her master.

She is a huge reason why Blacks never change their ways, never lose their way, because she's literally there to raise them all as she raised Cetus' children, with the same values and antiquated notions. If Sirius would have paid her more attention, she could have told him of ways Blacks practice astral magic. But, of course, Sirius would never think to ask her about that, since she's basically like taking furniture to him, not much else.

Kreacher is also very old, 600 plus years in canon, I believe, but the children he raised, for example, are more 'modern', as opposed to those Tessuth cared for. At some point, one Black favoured Kreacher over Tessuth and replaced her as Head Elf, simply because it was Kreacher that raised him, and not his great aunt.

Sirius, while he hates Kreacher for shit in his childhood that was in no way Kreacher's fault, but Sirius as a young kid couldn't grasp that, he still prefers Kreacher over Tessuth, trusts him with little Orion, simply because it was Kreacher that was always there beside him, and not Tessuth. And at this point in the story, as Sirius matures and comes to realise Kreacher is blameless, he does allow himself to appreciate his old elf, while Tessuth remains to him the odd, crazy elf his great grandfather and than his grandfather had around.

Malfoys, for example, lost their first generation elf pretty early on, and because they always mistreat them, their elves die much younger that they should, so they always end up with new ones like Dobby, that don't have the wealth of information Tessuth or Kreacher have, nor the emotional attachments to Malfoys, that Black elves hold for the Blacks.

Yes, I think more families had special magic that belonged to their bloodline, like the Gaunts and the Blacks. But many families died off entirely, or lost members too early to ever discover the 'secret'. That, and, as I said, magic itself became weaker, as magical beings are being killed off, and muggles advancing so incredibly fast, taking over everything.

That's not to say there aren't still secrets old families hold. Black astral magic is technically a secret- there are rumours about it, but it's not a known fact anymore. And the same could be said by other families, who might be hoarding knowledge from the rest.

I do think the wizarding world has some biodiversity, and as muggles encroach more and more in their space, this diversity is dying off, little by little. Like the Elves, the centaurs I imagine are very few in numbers now, dragons that aren't allowed to roam free and multiply so muggles won't spot them, giants etc. And with every species wiped out, magic slowly dies, and will eventually give way entirely to the technological area of humanity. Of course, that will take another millennia probably, but eventually magic will die off entirely.

And, who knows, at some point, thousands of years into the future, probably humans will die off to make way for robots or god knows what else.

#my writing #it runs in the blood

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hoboblaidd · 1 month ago

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The Solas and Mythal relationship is fascinating, and I'm going to examine it from this thesis: Solas was the Left Hand of Mythal in much the same way a hardened Leliana was the Left Hand of the Divine. Bear with me on this.

Dread Wolf Solas and Leliana are incredibly similar - they both have titles that became their identity (Dread Wolf, Nightingale); they both manage a highly effective covert network of agents across the continent; they both deal in information and subterfuge; and they devotedly served a powerful religious figure. Just as Leliana had Justinia on a (arguably unearned) pedestal, Solas strangely does the same with Mythal despite how contradictory that is to his anti-slavery, anti-establishment views. Solas and Leliana are also reformers on a grand scale - she wants to change everything about the Chantry to make it more inclusive, and he wanted to free the slaves and create an egalitarian elven society.

There is a significant power imbalance between Solas and Mythal that also mirrors Leliana-Justinia. Mythal was the stabilizing power in Elvhenan and acted as a god. Justinia sought to be the stabilizer whose "divine" authority came from Andraste and the Maker. Solas was, at most, a free and devoted servant/spymaster, just like Leliana. The Solas-Mythal relationship is complicated by the fact that she was a slaver, given the vallaslin and the Sentinels' bindings. But she doesn't seem to have punished Solas for removing his vallaslin, as Cole's Trespasser line suggests. Perhaps she even respected his choice. It puts them on a slightly more equal footing (I'm not excusing her slavery, that's a separate post on her lore).

I don’t think that Solas started his rebellion because of Mythal's murder. I think he had her blessing to wreak the same subtle discord that the Nightingale did - destabilizing the other gods' holds, fomenting dissent, etc. All of which would strengthen Mythal's position. Given his comments about courtly intrigue, I think the Dread Wolf shadowed his powerful patron to events and gathered intel, just like the Nightingale. It's also reminiscent of Celene-Briala in TME to a point. I think that's how it went until Mythal died, and then it became an all out guerilla war.

Speaking of Celene-Briala, people have speculated, based on the red lyrium idol and his devotion, that Solas and Mythal may have been lovers. To me, this is the same as the dialogue we get with Leliana when asking if she and Justinia were lovers: No, Leliana says emphatically. It was both different and more than lovers. It was respect and devotion. (I wouldn't put anything past the Evanuris, including the icky power imbalance, master-servant type 'relationship' that Solas-Mythal would be, but it doesn't track for me from a narrative standpoint unless Veilguard reveals that every god was thirsty for him).

For extra Evanuris Family Drama, his closeness to Mythal as a Left Hand and confidante could further inflame the Andruil situation - not only was he close to Ghilan'nain, but he may be closer to the Mother than her own daughter.

To round this out, Solas' statues in Mythal's territory flank hers or are posted at doorways as if on guard (probably the origin of the Dalish practice of placing Fen'harel statues at the edges of their camps to ward off evil). In her death, he is an instrument of her vengeance on the Evanuris - sealing the gods away as justice on those who betrayed her. It’s reminiscent of Leliana at the start of Inquisition. She was supposed to be the protector of Justinia, she failed, and now she’s out to right that wrong to the extent she can.

#I’m still teasing this out #Veilguard will likely destroy this but this is where I’m at now #headcanons

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monstersandmaw · 1 year ago

Text

Snowfall - a polyamorous m/m/m fantasy story ft. an elf, a vampire, and a draugr/lich (sfw)

Disclaimer which I’m including in all my works after plagiarism and theft has taken place: I do not give my consent for my works to be used, copied, published, or posted anywhere. They are copyrighted and belong to me.

I had a random and vivid dream about a draugr/lich with a secret, living in an old tomb in Skyrim and meeting a twinky, kinda foul-mouthed elven adventurer and his snooty, grumpy, (not-so-)secretly adoring vampire boyfriend. This was the result.

Daethir is pronounced 'day-theer', Nyr 'Neer', and Karsi 'car-si' (with a short 'i' like 'hit').

If you’ve not played Skyrim, none of the lore is needed to enjoy this story. It’s just someone else’s sandbox I’m playing in for some handy, pre-existing lore.

Content: Brief/passing mention of enslavement and mass sacrifice, genocide of an entire species, a tiny bit of blood and threat to life, and Daethir’s inner (and outer) monologue which includes a fair few uses of the word ‘fuck’.

Wordcount: 7589

Despite what the tattered remnants of his pride were trying to tell him, Daethir was most definitely, one hundred percent lost.

He was completely fucking disorientated in this dilapidated shithole of an ancient Nord tomb. He was also incandescently furious about that fact.

His sense of direction was fucking legendary. He must have explored a hundred underground tombs and dwarven cities, sunk deep into the earth as well as forgotten places consumed by rambling forests, and never once had he got lost before. He’d even been to bloody Labyrinthian! But no. He’d taken a wrong turn somewhere maybe three or four hours back, and now he was balls deep in skeever shit and cobwebs, and couldn’t find the way out.

“Oh man, Karsi must be going berserk out there,” he muttered through clenched teeth, breath billowing in the dark, cold tunnel.

The draugrs’ strange compulsion to keep the tombs somewhat maintained for their slumbering master meant that there was nearly always light flickering in the sconces on the walls, and braziers were often found burning at the intersections of the tomb’s warren of passageways, and he found himself pathetically grateful that he wasn’t lost in the pitch black at least.

“Hold on, love,” he added as he set his jaw and tried to strain his senses for the faintest lift of a breeze in the stagnant air of the tomb. “I’m coming.”

He hoped the vampire didn’t hurt himself trying to break through the unique enchantment that seemed to stop the undead from passing through it. Gods, Karsi had practically been spitting venom when he’d discovered he couldn’t enter the tomb with Daethir, no matter what spells he hurled at the doorway. Daethir, as usual, had slipped gleefully through in the blink of an eye and without a backward glance.

“I didn’t even say goodbye,” he thought bitterly, and the pervasive fear of dying alone in the dark crystallised into something sharper and edged with guilt when he realised that Karsi would never know exactly how he died, and would never be able to recover his lover’s body. “Shit.”

Something moved up ahead and he froze.

Blue eyes in the dark.

Shit.

A draugr Death Lord from the size of it, and from that ugly horned helmet.

Before he could formulate any sort of plan, hands reached out from the darkness behind him.

One clasped right over his mouth to form a perfect seal against the scream that rose unbidden from the pit of his stomach, and the other wrapped around his waist, and he found himself lifted bodily off the floor and into an alcove.

Naturally, like the well-trained, level-headed, and seasoned rogue he was, Daethir thrashed in blind and abject panic, lashing out with his heels until a hoarse, scraping voice rasped in his ear, “Auri-el have mercy, stop! I’m trying to save your life!”

Deciding that his luck might have been on the cusp of changing, or that he was about to become easy prey for some maniac who apparently lived down there in the dark tunnels of an ancient Nord tomb, Daethir went limp. He was not put down.

For a long few minutes, neither of them dared move in case the slightest sound attracted the Death Lord who was patrolling the corridor up ahead. Like an extremely loyal but not terribly bright guard dog, it swung its head back and forth, growling and snarling to itself and adjusting its grip on the enormous ebony war axe in its right hand. At the way the light played along the black blade of that axe like firelight on oil, Daethir shuddered involuntarily into the grasp of his mysterious rescuer.

“Easy,” the voice breathed, right in his ear. His tapering, sensitive, elven ear.

He shuddered again and tried not to gasp for an entirely different reason this time. Funny how terror and pleasure seemed to go hand in hand for him. After all, he was dating a vampire, and the two of them frequently mixed feeding and fucking, so he was no stranger to a healthy dose of of fear lacing his pleasure. But now was absolutely, categorically not the time to start getting turned on by a strong stranger manhandling him in a dark tomb. Gross, Dae, get it together.

The hand across his mouth was warm and leathery and strong, and by the faint glimmer of torchlight from beyond their shadowed alcove, he could see the faintest flash of bone-white flesh. Strange, but not totally unusual. People were born without pigment in their skin, after all. Heck, he’d spent an entire summer with an orc carpenter who had the most beautiful red eyes and skin so pale he couldn’t go out in the sun for long without burning. Caedrak hadn’t been able to see more than a foot in front of him, but he’d made the most beautiful things with his big, sensitive hands…

Dammit, Daethir, pull yourself the fuck together.

In the distance, the Draugr Death Lord huffed in irritation, then shuffled away in the opposite direction, and the figure behind him relaxed.

“Before I let go of you, I need you to swear something,” the voice said.

It was a strange voice. Although it was as dry as the coarsest sands from Elsweyr, the consonants were crisply articulated, and it had a strange lilt to it, as though the speaker was used to the music of another language from another age. Karsi spoke a bit like that too, though nowhere near as much as this. Daethir, raised in the Ratway of Riften, spoke like a gutter-skeever with the brash accent to match.

Still with the person’s hand clamped across his mouth, he couldn't do much to respond beyond a little noncommittal shrug, and received a dry chuckle in response.

“Fine,” his saviour said with an evident smile, “When I release you, walk forward and do not look back.”

That… That was not what he’d been expecting. And the way the person spoke seemed so heartbreakingly sad that he felt his own chest constrict for a moment. He floundered a little, and, perhaps mistaking the movement for panic, his saviour set his feet back down on the ground.

Slowly, hesitantly, those spider-pale hands drew back, and of course, Daethir immediately turned around.

And screamed.

Flailing, he staggered back into the corridor that had so recently been vacated by the Death Lord, and fell hard onto his backside, sprawled on the damp ground and staring up at the emaciated corpse of another draugr.

Searing, sapphire blue eyes blazed out of a face devoid of all colour, so much so that for a heartbeat, Daethir thought he was looking at a skeleton, except this person still had flesh and muscle on their frame, even if it had all been withered away over time to white leather stretched over bone.

Pale lips pulled back off perfect teeth in a grimace, and white, barely-there eyebrows tugged into a hurt expression so profound that Daethir found himself suddenly silenced by it.

Then, because he was apparently pathologically incapable of keeping his mouth shut, he blurted, “Shit, I’m sorry, I just –”

At a croaking shout of triumph from the connecting tunnel, the pale draugr’s head twitched around and it let out a snarl of its own. “No time. Come on,” and with that, it surged forwards, grabbed Daethir by the wrist and hauled him to his feet with a strength that he would never have expected from a creature so thin.

Unlike the other draugr he’d encountered on his way down into the depths of the tomb – the ones who’d stumbled around and dragged their bare feet along like stiff, empty Dwarven automata – this one was nimble and lithe, and it wore a loose, undyed linen shift that was belted at the waist and fell halfway down its emaciated thighs. Its feet were bare though, and as it turned and yanked him down a corridor, Daethir had to duck beneath a long, white plait that swung behind it like a flailing ship’s rope in a high wind.

“Alright, I’m coming, I’m coming, ow!” he yelped, trying to keep his feet in the same frantic rhythm while also attempting to twist free of the vice-strong grip of the creature’s fingers.

“Do not fall behind,” the draugr rasped, and then let go.

“You’ll show me the way out?” he chirped hopefully, and the draugr glanced back over its shoulder.

“I’ll take you to –” its eyes went wide and for a moment, Daethir thought the creature had tripped because it turned back abruptly and shoved him hard in the chest, sending him reeling. Daethir’s shoulder struck the tunnel wall and he let out an ‘oof’ of surprise on impact, but a second later, an ebony war axe embedded itself in the damp, softly crumbling stone of a mortuary shelf.

“Holy shit,” he breathed, staring at the weapon.

“Run! This way,” the strange, pale draugr gasped, and Daethir followed blindly.

Something seemed to ripple and shimmer in the wall up ahead, and a blue light pulsed in the draugr’s hand as they charged towards the rockface. The creature seemed to be running straight at the section of wall that was warping disturbingly and Daethir’s feet slowed.

“Don’t stop! Through the doorway, quick!” the draugr barked.

“What doorway?!” he yelped, skidding to a stop a few paces behind the apparently mad draugr. “You’re nuts. This place has sent you round the bed. That’s a solid fucking wall right there, I’m not –”

“Come on!” the creature hissed in obvious frustration. It was unnervingly similar to the tone of voice Karsi took with him when he was exasperated, and Daethir was being stupid or stubborn (or both) about something.

When Daethir didn’t move, and the footsteps and continuous cursing in a language he couldn't understand drifted round the corner from the fast-approaching Death Lord, the odd, silver-haired draugr rolled its eerie, blue eyes and snatched his hand again.

With a yell of horror and surprise, Daethir was tugged forwards into the wall. He closed his eyes, expecting to be slammed into solid stonework, and was amazed when he found himself staggering right into the chest of the draugr, who nudged him to stand behind its back while it worked some kind of magic on the wall or portal.

“The fuck…?” he breathed, chest heaving.

The draugr, still holding his right hand, worked a spell with its left, and the doorway in the wall vanished and returned to looking like uninterrupted rock.

“That’s never going to fool a draugr,” Daethir said, eyeing the spot sceptically.

“Fooled you,” the creature quipped and turned to face him, releasing its hold on his hand.

Daethir opened and closed his mouth like a landed carp for a good three seconds before heat flooded his tanned face and he looked away. “So, what, we’re safe now? And what the fuck are you?”

“Direct, aren’t you?” the creature said archly, and hell, if it didn’t remind Daethir of Karsi’s dry sarcasm.

At that thought, another bolt of guilt lanced through his chest and he looked up at the draugr. It wasn’t surprising that the draugr was taller than he was – it was hard not to be taller than Daethir, provided that one was over the age of about fifteen. He tried out his best smile and hoped it stuck. “It’s one of my many charms. Please, don’t let it stop you from showing me how to get out of this charming tomb you call home.”

The draugr’s soft laugh was like a handful of dry, autumn leaves, rattling around the narrow space that surrounded the two of them. It soon died though, and he let out a long, heavy sigh.

“Oh no,” Daethir said, backing up a pace. “I don’t like the sound of that. You are going to show me the way out now, right?”

Slowly, the creature nodded. “Yes.”

“Good. Great. Let’s move the fuck along, shall we? I’ve got a vampire waiting for me outside who will probably thrall me into complete obedience for a week for disappearing and scaring him witless, and I’d rather not make it two if I can help it. Not that I mind him thralling me, quite the contrary actually, but two weeks is a long time to spend as a puppet, even if I do get the most toe-curling orgasms out of it. Fuck, I’m running my mouth. I do that when I’m nervous, and the way you’re just staring at me like I’m some kind of hitherto-unknown species of cave mushroom that’s suddenly gained sentience is unnerving. Also you never answered my question: what the fuck are you? And are we safe now?”

The draugr blinked. “Did you hit your head?”

“Beg pardon?” he asked, and reflexively brought his hand to the back of his head to search for blood or injury in his light brown hair. When he found none, it dawned on him that the question might have been rhetorical, and he pouted. “Oh, it’s funny too. Great. I found the only draugr in all of Tamriel with a sense of humour. You are a draugr, right? Because the whole ‘mummified and still walking around’ thing is usually a dead giveaway. If you’ll pardon the pun. Man, I’m doing it again, aren’t I?”

“Yes,” the draugr said. “And yes.”

“Yes what?”

“Yes, you are, and yes, I am.”

“I am what?”

“Running your mouth again, as you put it. And I am a draugr.”

“Oh. Fuck. Well, let’s crack on then, eh?” he chirped with a nervous little laugh, gesturing behind him up what appeared to be a narrow, upward-sloping tunnel. “Lead on to freedom, and all that. You can fill me in on the way.”

The creature gave a little snort of laughter and shook its head. Sections of white hair had come loose from its braid and dangled down into its glowing, blue eyes which gave it an altogether softer, dishevelled look. It cast a couple of glowing balls of light, with which Daethir was familiar from Karsi’s magic, and they floated away up the tunnel like dandelion puffs on the wind.

Following the magelights, the draugr stepped around Daethir in the narrow tunnel, and as it passed, Daethir caught the soft scents of leather and parchment and incense, and the faint crackle of ozone that hovered around Karsi too.

“You’re a mage?” he asked to break the thick silence that had flooded into the tunnel when the draugr had fallen quiet again.

“Mm.”

“And you are definitely a draugr?”

“Mn.”

“You’re… different… from the others…” he said, inviting the draugr to expand on the statement.

“Mmm.”

“You suddenly run out of words? What happened to Mr. Funny Undead from a minute ago? Wait, that was rude. I have no idea whether you’re a ‘mister’ or something else entirely. I’m sorry.”

At that, the creature gave another grinding chuckle and halted to look back at Daethir. “I am male, if that’s your question. My name is Nýráðr.”

The way his tongue trilled over the ‘r’ and ‘th’ sounds sent a thrill through Daethir’s whole body. “Neer-ath-ur,” he repeated, frowning. “That’s… It sounds elven, but… I’ve never heard it before.”

“It’s old,” he replied, and Daethir got the impression that there was some dark humour in his tone that was lost on the relatively young Bosmer. “If it’s too much of a mouthful for you, you can just call me Nyr.”

“Right. I’m Daethir.”

“You are a Wood Elf, are you not?”

“Yup, though I’m not the ‘live in the woods in my underwear and commune with squirrels’ kind of Wood Elf, so don’t go making assumptions.”

The laugh that fluttered out of Nyr was like ripping parchment, but it sounded full of unexpected delight all the same. Centuries, even millennia, as a slowly-desiccating draugr had wrought a heck of a lot of damage on the creature’s whole body by the look of it, and from the sound of things, his vocal cords hadn’t escaped unscathed either. Daethir mused that perhaps he would have had a voice as smooth and haunting as Karsi did when he had been fully alive, and something twinged in his chest at the creature’s loss.

“Well,” the draugr said, “Since we’re not making assumptions about each other, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t assume I was a mindless drone like all my fellow animated corpses down here.”

“I thought I’d already made it abundantly clear that I don’t think that,” Daethir scowled. “And you were the one who implied I had no more brains than a Death Lord…”

“You were the one who thought I was going to ram you into a wall,” Nyr countered, glancing back over his shoulder. This time, as he moved, Daethir caught sight of his pale, very tapered ear and his footsteps halted abruptly.

With his eyes wide, he stared at the elven shape of the draugr’s ear and his jaw dropped.

“What?” Nyr asked, stopping too and turning properly to face him. “What’s wrong?”

“You’re… an elf,” he blurted stupidly, and then went on in a slightly hysterical ramble. “I mean, the name should have given it away, but… holy shit, you’re an elf! I thought draugr were all human. I mean, the Nordic kings who built these tombs were… you know, humans, and they were famous for killing everything that didn’t have a perfectly rounded ear, and they had human courts and human servants and subjects, and what the fuck?” His voice ended in a little squeak as he ran out of breath.

A slow, sad smile crept onto Nyr’s sunken features, and he sighed. “I am an elf, you’re right. Are you so far removed from my time that our story has been forgotten? Did not the Atmorans start out as our friends and allies only to betray us and subjugate us instead?”

“The Night of Tears,” Daethir exhaled, reeling.

In the cold blue glow of Nyr’s magelight, the draugr’s face settled into a frown. “I… I don’t know what that is.”

“You must have died before that all went down then,” he said, trying to scrape together what he remembered of it from Karsi’s impromptu fireside history lessons. “Shit. It was a massacre. Snow Elves descended on the human city of Saarthal in the north one night. After years of uneasy peace, they slaughtered everyone and, rumour has it, took or locked away something of great power beneath the city. After that, the humans retaliated and began the systematic genocide of all the Snow Elves in Tamriel.”

The draugr swayed and staggered, catching himself with a hand on the wall before he could collapse completely, and he stared wild-eyed at him. “They’re… They’re all gone?” he hissed, his bony chest rising and falling in fast, shallow gasps. “There are no more of us?”

“Us?” he asked, and then he really saw the white hair and colourless skin, and he understood at last. “Holy shit, you’re a Snow Elf?”

Mute, he just barely managed a nod.

“Shit, I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. I should have realised and told you more gently. Karsi would have realised what you are immediately. I’m sorry,” he said, and stepped closer, closing his hand around the bare, bony forearm of the elven draugr.

“None of us…?” he asked, unable to finish the question.

“Not as far as I know,” Daethir said, much more gently this time.

He squeezed Nyr’s forearm and felt the bones shift beneath, and barely resisted the urge to jerk away in surprise. Even with his small hands, he could close his thumb and fingers around Nyr’s emaciated forearm. This close up, he could also see the way his collarbones stuck out beneath the open ‘v’ of his linen tunic’s neck, and his hollow cheeks looked all the more gaunt in the blue light that cast harsh shadows down over them. Even so, there was a cut-glass beauty to the creature with his high cheekbones and elegant jawline.

“I’m sorry, Nyr.”

The Snow Elf swallowed, blinked glassy eyes, and looked down at the point where Daethir was touching him. For a long moment, he stared, and Daethir wondered if he shouldn’t have been so forward, but the draugr gave another wheezing sigh and placed his left hand over Daethir’s and squeezed gently.

“Nothing lasts forever,” he whispered. The sound of it was like a winter wind in bare branches, and Daethir shivered. He felt like cold hands were scraping down his spine.

“What will happen to you now?” Daethir asked, still holding onto the draugr. Nyr’s body was warm – far warmer than Karsi’s undead vampire body – and his skin was supple and unbelievably soft. He’d always expected draugr to be fragile and papery, like mildewed parchment, or slimy and rotten, but Nyr was neither. He had just wasted away over time. Daethir wondered exactly how much time he’d spent alone in the dark down here, with nothing but shuffling, insentient corpses for company, and his heart went out to him. The last of his species, and confined in the tomb of his oppressors for generations while the world went on without him. “Nýráðr?”

At the sound of his full name on Daethir’s tongue, the draugr startled softly and offered him a smile that went all the way up to the corners of his kindly eyes. “If I am not caught in the next few days, the Death Lord will forget about all of this. They’re not terribly bright, after all.”

Daethir narrowed his eyes. “That means you think I’m not terribly bright, if I was as easily fooled as a fucking draugr. No offence, you know,” he added with a pointed look up and down at the draugr in front of him.

Nyr’s grip on his hand tightened for a fraction before he let go and dropped his arm, laughing quietly, that autumn rattle back in his voice. “None taken,” he said, turning to continue leading Daethir up the passage. “And in my defence, you should have been able to see through that enchantment. It really wasn’t very strong. It doesn’t have to be to keep the majority of my fellow tomb-dwellers out.”

“I’m not exactly proficient at seeing magic,” Daethir mumbled. “Can’t cast a spark myself, and scrolls are… unpredictable. Even the ones idiot Nords with no magic are supposed to be able to use,” he added morosely.

“Elves with no magic whatsoever were not common in my time, but not unheard of. I apologise. I shouldn’t have made fun of you for it.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” he huffed. “Karsi is always taking the piss out of me for it. He’s pretty adept at magic – could run rings around most of the stuffy old mages at the College of Winterhold. Even the Archmage, if you believe him. He does think quite highly of himself though, so it’s hard to tell.”

After a lilting pause in which only the sound of their soft footfalls could be heard, Nyr said, “You’re fond of this ‘Karsi’.”

“Fond? Fond doesn’t even begin to cover it. I’m besotted. Head over heels. Enraptured by. Enamoured of. Utterly fucking smitten.” He did his best to emulate, and perhaps exaggerate, Karsi’s refined, educated way of speaking while he rattled off a list of synonyms for ‘completely fucking whipped’.

Again, Nyr gave a rasping chuckle. “You don’t sound terribly thrilled about that.”

“Of course I’m ‘not terribly thrilled’ about that!” he exclaimed, gesturing up in the air with his hands. “The bloke’s a century-old vampire whose more educated than most princes, he’s elegant as fuck, can talk me into a stupor in a single sentence, and is more beautiful than all the Divines.”

“How is any of that a bad thing?” Nyr asked, still sounding amused by Daethir’s petulance over the matter.

“Well, you might have been starved for beauty down here in the dark for a billion years, so I can see why my face might look like it was carved by a devotee of Dibella, Goddess of Love and Sex and Beauty,” he said with deep sarcasm, “But if you’d seen a single other living soul that didn’t resemble the back end of a raisin, you’d realise that next to literally anyone else, I’m about as ordinary as it gets. I’m ignorant as fuck about lots of things. I can’t do magic. All I’m good for is sneaking about, cutting purses, breaking into places I shouldn’t be, and hitting a target dead-centre at a hundred paces with a tiny piece of steel.”

It was only when he’d finished insulting the draugr that lived down here that he remembered who and what his companion was, and he fell into an awkward silence. Then, because he couldn’t bear it a second longer, he tacked on an apology that was way too late. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to imply you’re like them. You’re not.”

“It’s alright,” he said softly. The sound was like a stone dragging across the tunnel floor. “I know what I am and what I look like by now.”

“Yeah, but you’re not like the other draugr I’ve seen.”

“Oh, goody. What a comfort it is to know that I’ll win the Annual Draugr Beauty Contest for another year in a row,” he said with caustic sarcasm.

Before Daethir could recover from the unexpected and well-deserved reprimand, the draugr rounded the corner in the steadily-rising tunnel and they came to an elaborate, carved stone door that abruptly halted their journey.

Pressing his emaciated palm against a point at the centre of the labyrinthine tangle of patterns, the draugr let his icy blue magic pour out of him and it ran through the channels of the maze like water, flowing all the way across to form a tapestry of blue and grey until, with a dull, grinding noise, the door opened slowly outwards, and a blast of freezing, snow-filled air rushed in.

The wind lifted Nyr’s white hair off his face and Daethir stared as moonlight inked silver brushstrokes across his high cheekbones and down his straight nose and delicate jawline.

For a moment, neither of them moved as the night opened up around them, but Daethir knew he had to make up for his inadvertently cruel comments, so he stepped close to the draugr and reached his hand out to cup his colourless cheek.

Nyr’s searing blue eyes fluttered closed and he sucked in a sharp breath, going rigid beneath Daethir’s touch. He traced his thumb across the Snow Elf’s high, arching cheekbone and murmured, “You really are exquisite.” He meant it too. “Thank you for saving my life, Nýráðr. I will never forget you, nor your kindness to me.”

Like a cat long-starved of affection, Nyr tipped his head into Daethir’s palm and nuzzled him once. The longing in his gaunt face cut Daethir to the quick, but he stepped back and opened his eyes. “Nor I you, Daethir,” he said in a scraping rasp.

Then his blue gaze sailed over Daethir’s head – not exactly a difficult task, given how much taller the Snow Elf was than the diminutive Bosmer – and he smiled. “Karsi, I take it?” he said dryly.

Daethir turned and had the fleeting impression of a figure standing beside a small, smouldering campfire outside the main entrance of the tomb, eyes blazing red, before the image disintegrated into a twisting swarm of black bats and Karsi reappeared right in front of Daethir, his face burning like a vengeful spirit.

“By Molag Bal’s unholy blood,” he cursed, gripping Daethir by the shoulders and lifting him away from Nyr as though he were a child that had strayed too close to a firepit. “Do you have any idea how long you’ve been gone?!” His tone was frantic and his eyes blazed red as he unleashed all his pent-up rage and fear. Then he turned with a snarl on Nyr and bared his fangs at him, putting himself between the two of them.

Magicka boiled to life in his hands, scarlet as blood and shifting eerily in the icy moonlight, and Daethir thrashed in his grip. “No! No! Karsi, no, don’t! Don’t! He saved my life, Karsi, don’t hurt him! Shit, Karsi! Fucking listen to me you overgrown, underfed leech!”

Karsi’s head snapped back to Daethir and he froze, then loosened his grip on Daethir’s leather jerkin. “That’s a draugr,” he said flatly, as if Daethir had lost his wits down in the tomb.

“Ten out of ten for observation,” Daethir sneered, looking around Karsi’s figure to meet Nyr’s gaze. “I told you he was the smart one.”

“So you did,” Nyr said dryly. He swallowed and stepped back into the shadows of the doorway, and Karsi flew at him.

The moment he hit the threshold, Karsi collided with a magical barrier and rebounded as if he’d hit a solid wall. He grunted and hissed like a wet cat, shaking himself out and rounding on Nyr again. “Why would a draugr help an intruder instead of attacking?”

Daethir blinked. It had never occurred to him to ask that question. He really was fucking simple.

Nyr’s lips twitched into his sad smile. “I couldn’t bear to see a fellow elf spend his eternity in the tomb of a human king who had been so cruel to our kind. Take care of him, Karsi,” he said, and turned away.

The door didn’t immediately close, so Daethir did something that was so perfectly in-keeping with his track record of uninhibited stupidity, and darted after him before Karsi had realised what he was doing.

The vampire snatched for him and roared in wordless fury when Daethir’s jerkin slipped through his fingers behind the impenetrable barrier and he heard the weight of compulsion in Karsi’s words as he added, “Daethir, come back here right now!”

“Doesn’t work if I'm not looking at you!” Daethir shot back merrily over his shoulder and was answered with another impotent yowl of fury from his lover.

Nyr had stopped and was frowning in confusion at him. “What are you doing?” he asked. His voice was even softer now, as though talking so much had strained his fragile vocal cords to their limit and even Daethir’s sharp ears nearly missed the question.

“I… I’m not sure,” he said honestly.

“Go, Daethir,” Nyr said gently. “Go with Karsi and put this place out of your mind.”

“I’m not sure I can,” he breathed. “I… Do you have to stay here? Are you trapped by the barrier that’s keeping Karsi out? Wait, no, you just passed through it. Fuck, I’m so stupid sometimes,” he said, smacking his forehead with his palm.

Nyr stepped closer and drew Daethir’s hand away from his face. He opened his mouth to speak, but Karsi roared at him from the mouth of the tunnel. “Get your filthy corpse hands off him! I swear by all the blood in my body and all the blood I’ve ever taken in the unholy sacrament of feeding that I will rip you apart and scatter your remains to the wolves if you don’t unhand him!”

“Ignore him,” Daethir snorted at Nyr without looking around. “He’s always had a terrible flare for the dramatic, and it only gets worse when he’s like that.”

“He’s worried for you,” Nyr smiled, and he let go. “Cherish it.”

“Tolerate it, more like,” Daethir said with a sigh. “But yeah. Do you have to stay here?”

“Look at me, Daethir. Where else could I go? I’m the last of my race, if what you say is true, and you will probably be the first and only person not to take one look at me and decide I must be destroyed on the spot.” He jutted his delicate chin towards the tunnel mouth where Karsi was pacing and snarling with bared fangs, his eyes locked on the pair of them. “He’s already proven my point.”

“Pfft, you’re not that special. He’s like that with anyone he thinks is a threat to me, and with how often I get myself in a pickle, trust me, that’s quite a lot of people. It’s nothing personal.”

“It very much is personal, you dim-witted Wood Elf!” Karsi spat, though it came out as affectionately petulant now, rather than truly fearful. “Would you please, darling, love and light of my life, back away from that thing and come back out here to join me?” Sarcasm dripped so tangibly off his tone that Daethir could practically taste it.

He sighed and continued to ignore the vampire.

“Come with us. If you’re not bound to this place, come with us.”

“Why?”

“See the world? See what’s changed since you went in there,” he said, jerking his thumb down the passageway. “Get away from the shitty Nords who imprisoned you in there for all eternity –”

“-- Nords aren’t shitty anymore?” Nyr asked, surprised.

“Oh, no, they’re shittier than ever, especially to us elves, but –”

From behind him, Karsi sputtered. “‘Us’ elves?”

“Shut up. You’re a Nord, Karsi, so you don’t get a say in this,” Daethir barked without bite.

They heard Karsi’s inhalation of surprise, even above the wind that whistled around the mountaintop tomb. “He’s an elf? Daethir, the Nords who made the draugr would never have used elves for draugr servants. They thought they were animals!”

“Worse than animals, actually,” Nyr said with a sharp smile. “They enslaved us. We weren’t even afforded the same dignity you’d give a dog.”

Karsi fell still and silent at that and stood staring for a long time. Finally, he breathed, “That hair…” He let his red gaze slide up and down Nyr’s skeletally thin body and then added, “You’re a Snow Elf.”

With a quiet dignity, Nýráðr bowed his head with closed eyes.

Daethir watched his lover for a long time, sensing the kind of thoughts that would be racing through that scholar’s head of his. Making a silent ‘wait there’ gesture to Nyr, he turned and went back to Karsi.

The vampire’s eyes were unfocused, now staring unseeing at the floor near the doorway to the tomb.

“Karse…?” Karsi truly hated that nickname because it was the word for a small, edible plant that went well with egg sandwiches in some highborn circles, and sure enough, it snapped him immediately out of his reverie.

His upper lip twitched but his eyes faded from red to gold. That he wasn’t bothering with the glamour which he usually wore around himself like an old cloak was testament to how rattled he was. He sighed and lifted his eyes from Daethir to Nyr, who was still standing, much to Daethir’s relief, in the tunnel, watching them and silent as a silver spectre.

“Think of all the questions you could ask him, Karsi,” Daethir insisted quietly. “You could annoy him into a second undeath with them all.”

Karsi’s mouth lifted at one corner into an amused smile despite himself. Then he looked down at Daethir and his eyes filled with tears. He brought both hands to Daethir’s jaw and choked, “You scared the shit out of me, love.”

“I know,” Daethir replied, placing his hands on Karsi’s waist. His heavy, wine-red robes were lashed around his slim middle with a thick band of black silk, into which was tucked a ruby-hilted dagger, and Daethir felt its cold bite against the bare inside of his wrist. “I’m sorry. I’m here though, and it’s entirely because of Nyr. He saved me from a Death Lord, and then when I freaked out over him being a draugr too, he saved me all over again and led me through a wall and then up here. To you. I’m alive because of him.”

He paused and tilted his head sideways in a way that he saved for special occasions just like that one: unfortunate situations (usually of his own making) when he needed Karsi to be thoroughly wrapped around his little finger and eating out of his hand and helplessly unable to say no.

Karsi swallowed.

“I owe him my life, Karsi. You owe him my life. Shouldn’t we give him another chance at living too? Let him come with us…”

Karsi’s right eyelid twitched, and although he hadn’t uttered a word, Daethir knew he had him.

He popped up onto his tiptoes, pecked the vampire on the cheek, and scuttled back to Nyr in the dark tunnel.

He took the draugr by both hands and backed up towards the doorway, and to his surprise, Nyr followed. His movements were soft, graceful and fluid as a dancer, and Daethir thought again how strangely beautiful this creature was.

Nyr stopped just shy of the threshold though, and met Karsi’s eye. He let go of Daethir’s hands and lowered his arms to his sides. Something wordless seemed to pass between the two that Daethir couldn’t unpick, and he looked from one to the other in helpless confusion.

“Kay?” he chirped after a moment. “Nyr?”

Finally, Karsi drew in a long breath, held it, and then let it go in a rush. “Do you have anything you wish to bring with you?” he asked and Daethir almost yipped with the sudden rush of joy that bubbled up inside him. He hadn’t quite dared believe it until then.

It was the same kind of excitement and trepidation he felt at the start of a new journey. No matter how many times he and Karsi had set off to find some new book or scroll or sacred offering pot, he felt the exact same flare of unbridled, effervescent joy, and now as he looked between the two undead creatures before him, he felt it again.

“If I go back down there now, I will not come out again,” Nyr said in a barely there rasp. “The Death Lords will all know by now what I did, and how I betrayed them to get Daethir out. They will forget in a week perhaps, but I would have to conceal myself, and Daethir would freeze to death up here waiting, even with a fire.”

Daethir paused and watched Karsi’s expression as the realisation dawned on the vampire of the risk Nyr had taken to get his lover out alive. Then, he surprised Daethir by raising the inside of his left wrist – the side closest to his now-silent heart – to his canines and biting his own vein, sending droplets of his precious blood spattering onto the snow rimed stone at his feet. With ritualistic intonation, he said, “You’re right. I owe you the life of my beloved. By my blood I swear to do you no harm, and to protect you to the best of my abilities until my death or such time as you release me from my oath.”

Daethir’s eyebrows shot up. He’d never heard Karsi speak like that, and he’d certainly never given a blood oath to anyone, not that Daethir knew of anyway. Astonished, he looked at Nyr.

The draugr stepped out of the doorway and around the small pool of blood that sparkled like a handful of rubies cushioned on the snow. He tilted his head slightly to one side, and smiled. “I shall do my utmost to be worthy of such an oath, vampire.” The word came out like an honorific, not an insult.

For the space of ten heartbeats – twenty, if Daethir’s pounding pulse was the cadence by which such measurements were to be judged – no one moved or spoke. Finally, Karsi turned away and walked towards the fire, his long black hair blowing loose in the wind. He looked softer now, the tension melting from his shoulders, but Daethir knew his lover to the core, and he still bore some internal struggle.

Daethir made a mental note to question him about it later, and then turned to Nyr. “Where to now?” he asked.

“I will follow where you lead, Daethir.”

At that, Daethir sucked air in through his teeth in a comical grimace. “Terrible choice,” he grinned. “Luckily for you, I follow where Karsi leads, and Karsi is full of excellent ideas and great judgement.”

“I’m not so sure of that,” Karsi said over his shoulder as he stalked six paces ahead of them. “I just gave a blood oath to a draugr. You’ve rotted my brain with your company, Dae.”

Daethir grinned again and elbowed Nyr in his ribs. “You’re gonna fit right in, I just know it.”

Nyr smiled faintly and it was only then that Daethir realised that the draugr was still wearing just a linen shift and no boots.

“Shit, Nyr, you must be freezing!”

“I’m not going to die of exposure, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Karsi snorted faintly, looking surprisingly amused until Daethir told him to take his own coat off and give it to Nyr, which he flat-out refused to do.

“You can’t expect him to walk around barefoot, Karse!”

“He can strip one of the bandits in the entrance for armour,” Karsi shot back, gesturing at the main door to the tomb. “It’s not like they need it. I swore to protect him, not divest myself for his comfort.”

Without a word, Nyr left in the direction Karsi had pointed, and a few minutes later, he returned wearing the black mage robes of one of the frozen corpses just inside the door, with a long fur-trimmed cloak that caught the wind and flapped like bat’s wings, and tall, black leather boots cuffed with soft fur. The cloak had a hood, which he pulled up over his head, and with the shadows it cast, he almost looked unremarkable save for that long, silver braid that hung elegantly down over one shoulder. With those new clothes on, he looked thin, yes, but not undead. Until Daethir met his blue eyes.

“Karsi, can you cast a glamour on him or something? Like the one you use? He shouldn’t have to worry about every last person we meet trying to hack his head off.”

The vampire nodded, and crossed their frozen campsite to meet him halfway. “If I may?” he asked, raising his right hand. Black and red magicka bubbled into his palm and Nyr eyed it warily, but nodded once.

“I can do it myself,” he added, “But I think you’re a stronger mage than I, and you have more experience with alteration magic, I’m sure.”

Karsi just grunted something and circled his fingertips over Nyr’s face. In place of the haunted, sunken eyes and gaunt, hollow cheeks of a corpse, a beautiful, porcelain face stared out from under the hood, and the undead, blue glow of his eyes faded to the forget-me-not blue of a wild meadow in summer.

“Holy shit, Karsi,” Daethir exhaled. “You don’t do anything by halves, do you?”

The vampire rolled his eyes and cast the same spell on his own face, and the black sclera faded to white, and the gold deepened to a warm brown, and Daethir tried not to mourn the loss of the ‘otherness’ in his two companions.

“Karsi?”

“Mn?”

“Can you… Can you make it so that I can see you both?”

“Without affecting the way others view us?” he clarified, and Daethir nodded. He looked to Nyr for his opinion, and when the draugr just shrugged, seeming almost curious about whether such a clause could be written into a spell like that, especially after it had already been woven, Karsi took it for the challenge it undoubtedly was, and made another gesture at the side of Nyr’s face.

The face of a draugr stared back at him once again, and Daethir beamed. “I fucking love magic,” he laughed, and to his surprise, Nyr laughed too, shaking his head. “Do you mind? I mean, I was pretty rude about draugr a while ago, but I really didn’t mean to include you in it.”

“What, when you called my kind ‘the wrong end of a raisin’ or thereabouts?” he said, arching an eyebrow.

Karsi burst out laughing, and the sound was so loud and honest and off-guard that all three of them began to laugh. It took a lot to make Karsi laugh like that, and the sound of it filled Daethir’s heart to bursting.

He looped his arm through Nyr’s elbow and then dragged him round so he could stick his other arm under Karsi’s, and he dragged the two of them towards the fire and their discarded travel packs.

“Come on,” he said, glancing up at the two of them. They were almost a match in heights, he noted from about a foot below them. “Let’s put this place behind us. Karsi, what was the next item on our list?”

“The Lunarstone Chalice,” he said dryly. “Last rumoured to be in a ruined temple in the mountains north of Markarth.”

“Ooh, Markarth. My favourite place in all the world,” Daethir chimed sarcastically, unlinking both arms so he could gesture grandly while walking backwards. “Second only to Windhelm in its snobbery towards elven kind, and the whole area is bristling with rabid, frothing lunatics called the ‘Forsworn’. Can’t think of a place I’d like to start Nyr’s tour of Tamriel more than bloody fucking Markarth.”

And then he caught his heel on a flagstone and pitched backwards with a sharp cry of surprise, only to find hands shooting out to catch him on either side.

Nyr and Karsi hauled him upright before he landed ass-first on the icy stone, and Daethir grinned up at both of them.

“Alright,” Nyr said in his hoarse croak. “Let’s begin.”

If there's interest in these three, I'll happily add it to my 'to work on' list. Consider letting me know you enjoyed it by reblogging it or leaving a comment/ask.

Take care of yourselves, and I hope you have a lovely day/night wherever you are, and whenever you read this.

| Masterlist | Ko-fi (tip jar)

(if you enjoyed this draugr/lich boy, you might also like this story, featuring an altogether more shy and retiring draugr named Kalle, and the adventurer who falls in love with him over several visits to his tomb - m/f pairing).

#lich #draugr #vampire #elf #wood elf #bosmer #skyrim #skyrim story #skyrim oc #you don't need to know skyrim to read this though #polyamory #m/m/m

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justalittleraven · 3 months ago

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LFRP/FFXIV Friends

Hi! I'm Nihil, or Raven to some, and I'm looking for more people to RP or just chat with about FFXIV ocs, lore, and RP. I have a fair few ocs at this point, and most are listed below.

Feel free to message me! Important to note: I don't do ingame RP, as I prefer writing multi-paragraph (usually 2 to 3 paragraphs) messages and replies.

Idun - Budding Blood Mage

Sideblog: @idun-monnawesfv - NonWOL - He/They - Gay - Shipped (It's complicated)

A young Veena only in his 20s, they fled their master after enduring vicious attacks due to not perceiving themself as being male. Since, he has taken up work as a dancer, traveling around Eorzea before meeting a certain unscrupulous doctor in Ishgard. They are affectionately described as a "temperamental little spitfire".

Domitien Ormesang - Cursed Marksman

NonWOL - He/Him - Pan - Heartbroken and Recovering

He was not always a wanderer, in fact he was a weaver of some renown from Gridania before deciding to set out for Ishgard with his companion and lover. They suffered a terrible fate on that journey, however, leading to his lover's soul being consumed by the cursed weapon that he now carries. Now he searches for a way to break the curse and put his lover's soul to rest, by any means necessary.

White Masque - Cursecrafter

NonWOL - Any pronouns - Questioning - Single but Be Prepared

A being so old he has forgotten his birthname, and all that remains of who he was is the mask he takes his name from. His soul carries a stain, one which he routinely excises into cursed items. Feeling no attachment to these, they have been left behind wherever he has traveled, leading to some unfortunate souls stumbling upon one without realizing the price they demand.

Elenwe Celebrindal - Elven Knight

NonWOL - She/Her - Sapphic - Single

Hailing from a line of elves which were blessed long ago by the Pixies, she defends her home from Sin Eaters wherever they appear. She has lost many to the Light, yet she remains as brilliant as a star herself, determined to save any she can from being devoured or transformed. Many who have found themselves alone, without family nor friend after the Flood of Light or attacks by Sin Eaters, have found themselves welcomed by her.

Erravi goe Corvus - Raven Run Astray

NonWOL - He/Him - Gay - Single and Stressed

A former Imperial assassin, titled Censor, Avi was loyal to the empire until he became too much of a threat to leave alive. Every assassin of his order has been executed in secret after a certain number of years in service, and this was his fate too. Though he does not believe in gods, he thought it a miracle when he was taken in by a nobleman who happened upon him on death's door. As fate would have it, the man was a relative of the Lady of Haukke Manor, and Erravi escaped with quite a few new scars after his experience.

Micans Lilius - Naturalborn Lightwarden

WOL - He/Him - Gay - Shipped (Soulmates Beyond Time)

Micans was born in Garlean territory, the youngest of four children. His mother passed away shortly after his birth, something his father blamed him for until his dying day. Before that though, it was 12 years after Micans' birth that his father almost killed him, leaving him with a scar from the gunshot. His siblings bid him to run, and so he did, eventually making his way to Eorzea and starting his journey as the Warrior of Light. At times he believes Hydaelyn made the right choice, as the very Crystal of Light She bestowed upon him was furthering his light poisoning.

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swampshi · 4 days ago

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Evanuris to old gods Linked

yeah yeah, we all saw that codex but I feel it's not... correct. Yeah, I'm sorry bellara I'm actually way smarter and totally not fixated on evanuris for more than a year reading far to deep into the codexes.

1. Dumat -> Dirthamen. Secrets, silence – you get it. Also:

1. Statue of Dumat in Dirth temple.

2. Interesting situation, where a follower of Dirth weirdly follows the fate very VERY similar to corepheys, a follower of Dumat.

2. Zazikel –> Andruil.

1. Andruil is the only one actively referred to as 'mad' in dalish legends, and it was confirmed in datv that yes she was blighted. the high priest of zazikel is literally called "madman of chaos"

2. Looking back to the constellation associated with zazikel (kios) we can see someone, clearly representing andruil. It was said that she had wings, and a legendary spear – well, here they are!

3. Andoral -> June

1. I saw a great post on here, remarking than fenris's marking do look quite similar to June's vallaslin, and considering the note below, it wouldn't be stretch to think, that June was the one to create the whole vallaslin and soldiers like fenris thing. he was said to worked with lyrium

2. it also ties in with the fact, that I'm the codex there is a remark, that June's domain has shifted after time, likely because that disappeared from elven culture. slavery did disappear (in elves enslaving elves), so did the work with lyrium

4. Urthimiel-> sylaise. controversial topic I KNOW. hear me out

1. Sylaise is said to be the architect of elven cities (codex and solas dialog w elg), while high priest of urth is called architect of Beauty

2. the constellation associated with urth is called 'the maiden'. Sylaise is a goddess closely associated with femininity, motherhood

2.1 also, the maiden looks awfully close to sylaise mural and symbol with this point crown thing.

5. Toth-> Falon'din

AGAIN hear.me.out. alot of people link toth to sylaise, but actually, I feel like no old God feels Falon'din like sooo.

1. working around what we had we take a look at the constellation associated with toth. it is a man in flames, in agony. how tf does this relate to Falon'din? well I can imagine one particular part of lore where Falon'din LOST to Elgar'nan, who is heavily associated with fire and the sun. constellation seem to represent the evanuris themselves (I DONT KNOW WHAY HAPPENED W TENEBRIUM AND LUSACAN). it's actually strange, it feels like lusacan and toth were switched.

lusacan is the Dragon of the night and here is the literal song to Falon'din

The People swore their lives to Falon'Din

Who mastered the dark that lies.

Whose shadows hunger

Whose faithful sing

Whose wings of death surround him

Thick as night.

and toth being literal Dragon of Fire seems fitting for Elgar'nan, son of the sun. But probably, the fight ensued, and the winner (Elg) got the bigger cooler dragon.

#dragon age #dragon age elves #evanuris #dragon age lore #dragon age the veilguard #datv #elgar'nan #falon'din #ghilan'nain #andruil #june #sylaise #dragon age 4 #da veilguard #veilguard spoilers #da: the veilguard #veilguard

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kinghomebody · 3 months ago

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Dragon Age： The Veilguard ｜ Release Date Trailer

Dragon Age: The Veilguard Release Trailer did a lot for me in different ways and I have a lot of questions and theories.

1.) Lets talk about how there are stark similarities between Inquisition and The Veilgaurd.

The protagonist is found again in the Fade, this time it looks more grey than green and they do not inherit a mark. it also looks like Rook and The Inquisitor share the same physical position that they found within the fade at the start of their stories: Lower than someone thought to be much more important than them :Inquisitor the Divine, Rook, Solas.

With Rook you see more of what's happening within the fade and the statues of the Elven Patheon which what looks like a split amongst them. Three on the left near Rook and four on the right near Solas. Does this symbolize something? We know that the Evanuris did not always get along but does the positioning of the statues foreshadow that more of the elven gods side with him in wiping out everything and bringing back the days where everything is ruled by magic?

2.) The trailer did a wonderful job sprinkling nostalgia here and there and I have a few observed opinions.

The model they used for this Rook makes me think of two things of Dragon Age. Duncan and people from Rivain who have similar skin tones. Rook, in this trailer wears armor that on the shirt collar has wings. Apart from the Antivan Crows the only other faction you could think of that could be represented with wings are the Grey Wardens because of the griffins.

It’s also good to hear Morrigan’s voice again and see her also reminding me of Origins and Inquisition. For me I let her drink from the Well of Sorrows so she might either be completely under the control of Flemeth or have mastered it’s power. Of course Varric and Scout Harding who are still with the Inquisition will be with us. If we align with the Antivan Crows will we see Zevran?

There is an elf that looks like they have been captured by tentacles and you cannot see their left arm. Is that the Inquisitor? Or the Hero of Ferelden? I only speculate this because the Grey Wardens are center stage again and besides Hawke, if you allowed him to go with them for a time, The Hero of Ferelden who is on a quest to defeat the calling could have gotten themselves trapped somehow.

Titan lore will be most likely explored through Lace Harding seeing as she can freeze enemies similar to Solas and Sandal. Her body and eyes glow however it starts to change. In my opinion it might be because she is channeling magic directly through her body and dwarves are supposedly not suppose to have the ability to do magic. Sandal always uses a rune and Solas is an elf.

> In Sandal’s case we know that Bodan found him far in the Deep Roads and being exposed to lyrium for too long could have done something to him to wear he won’t get the negative symptoms of overusing it.

> In Lace’s case, she has no idea what’s going on, her body is changing, we know that when Dagna is face deep in a rune she feels “mountain- tall” and around all her people and they think as one and since we know the Ancient Elven Patheon fought the Titans at one point and separated them from their hearts that the dwarves might have lost their magic in a way – this is something I’m still working out from the Trespasser DLC. Harding might need to find the heart of a Titan if she want’s to survive with her new magic abilities or she might even become one – this is another theory. Also, her being able to create a stone wall. Does that mean the dwarven people could build cities with their bare hands. The “connection” with the “Stone” doesn’t sound too far off when you think about it.

Solas fighting the old gods in his Dreadwolf form was amazing to see. It’s interesting to visually see the difference in size between him and those he his up against even being as powerful as he is. With this and the darkspawn looking blighted along with the dragons that you see at the end of the trailer, there might as well be two blights at once, the veil being destroyed, the elven gods reeking havoc and (personally I didn’t see this but there's no way it won’t be brought up) maybe the Qunari invasion – unless it was settled before the events of The Veilgaurd. From combat finishers looking to be back, Griffins, Morrigan and Varric and everything literally being validated and lore accurate I’m very happy with this trailer.

#Dragon Age #Dragon Age: The Veilguard #Rook #Elgar'nan #Ghilan'nain #Solas #Varric Tethras #Bellara Lutare #Davrin #Emmrich Volkarin #Lace Harding #Lucanis Dellamorte #Neve Gallus #Taash #The Inquisitor #Morrigan.

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khyann · 3 months ago

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Fantasy SMP Mythical Sausage Lore Recap (so far) ((that i know of)) (((updates coming)))

So fantasy!Sausage is a 200 year old high elven prince on a journey of self-discovery endorsed by his father, the King.

According to Sausage, high-elves live to about 800 years so he is pretty young for an elf (he said teen but if we take 800 elven years to be the equivalent of 80 human years then he is about 20 for elven standars). But he is also a bit spoiled and his adventures in Fantasy SMP is meant to be a journey for him to see the world and learn about how things work before he becomes king.

He is fond of wood elves because he was raised by a wood elf nanny named Gwynevere (which he as a kid mispronounced often). The reason why he was raised by a nanny is because his father was always too busy ruling to take care of him.

Sausage's parents marriage was an arranged one between two royal houses, his mother wasn't really happy about it because she wanted to become a warrior, but she eventually came to love Sausage's father and seemingly left her battle desires in the past. Sausage suspects tho that she still kept battling in secret because as a kid his mother would disappear for weeks and upon returning would say she "was away visiting some friends/relatives". Sausage's mother is a skilled ice magic user.

Sausage's father is currently 450 years old, he is really tall (even for elf standars), a master of all the types of magic and a very loved king so chances of an assassination attempt are really small. He is very loved because when Sausage was about 50 a war broke between all the elven classes and he fought to stop said war and bring peace back, the war lasted for 50 years and the past 100 years have been nothing but peaceful. During this war Sausage was kept in hiding and moved from town to town because his father worried he could get kidnapped and used to take him down, Sausage doesn't remember much from this period of his life, just having fun going to all the different towns of the kingdom.

Part of the reason why Sausage's father sent him on this journey is because he was just 200 years old like Sausage when he ascended to the throne. He regrets never getting to see the world before he had to take the crown so he hoped that exploring the world would give Sausage a better outlook of the world. And it seems to have worked because where Sausage's father is traditionalist, Sausage has some changes he plans to make once he becomes king (but there's no hurry since he can only take the throne when his father passes away).

Sausage is also not a natural brown. He was born with blond hair, an average elven slim body and a clean face, but he hated everything about this (specially how smooth his face was). So he took a potion that allowed him to grow a beard, turned his hair from blond to brown and gave him a more build bodytype (for elven standars he is pretty beefy). The potion's effect hasn't ran out yet but he has more ready for when that happens.

(Someone in chat directly asked him if Fantasy Sausage is transmasc and cc!Sausage agreed).

Sausage admires his father greatly and is trying to be like him, which is why he is trying to learn all the kinds of magic.

All this info is from Sausage's second Fantasy SMP VOD. I'll update as I find stuff in the vods😁.

#fantasy smp #mythicalsausage #fan!mythicalsausage

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birmit · 3 months ago

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Ilandis Scarletveil

✧ Name: Ilandis Scarletveil ✧ Race: Night Elf | Kaldorei ✧ Occupation: Druid, one of the senior alchemists of the Cenarion Circle ✧ Age: about ~10,000 years ✧ Gender: Female

Note: I am not very knowledgeable about the lore of the night elves, especially their history. Therefore, there are not many details regarding traditions here, but I plan to add them in the future. Also, Ilandis is my character in the ttrpg "A Time of Changes", so some fragments of her biography may change. The article also intentionally omits some details from future events, so as not to spoil the plot of the personal quest for fellow players (and also because at the moment I want to focus on the image and life of Ilandis "before" certain events).

Appearance

Ilandis is a tall, thin night elf with long green hair. She has sharp features, and her skin is already showing the first signs of aging in the form of dark circles and wrinkles around her eyes.

One of the most obvious features of her appearance is her long, knife-like ears. Ilandis has longer ears than many other night elves, which often becomes a problem, especially in cold climates.

Her body is covered with traditional tattoos of her race, which she has applied throughout her long life. The first were patterns on her face and ear, which marked her coming of age. Otherwise, Ilandis's figure can attract attention only by its excessive thinness and even bonyness. The druidess rarely eats anything other than decoctions and infusions, which has greatly affected her appearance over the years. The fact that Ilandis does not disdain to test the results of her own researchs on herself also adds to the sickliness of her appearance.

Headcanon: Night elves (especially those who have mastered the art of druidism) require much less food and sleep to survive. This is why Ilandis can go longer than others without rest.

Сharacter traits

— An old and grumpy elven woman, that says it all. — She distrusts and disdains all races except the Kaldorei. She considers them inferior and unworthy of much attention. She is tolerant only of representatives of other elven communities (except the Sin'dorei). She despises the Horde and can agree to cooperate with them only in cases of extreme necessity. — She can rarely be seen smiling or simply content with life. Most of the time she is gloomy, and her eyes look as if in her thoughts she is somewhere very far away. Ilandis has difficulty expressing emotions, but she herself does not suffer much from this. — She prefers the company of books and her own research to society.

Background

Most likely, Ilandis had some kind of psychological (or congenital) deviation from birth, which in the realities of Azeroth simply went undiagnosed, since no one really cared about it. Since childhood, she was withdrawn and silent. She was not interested in playing with others and was always busy with her own things. With endless persistence, she could repeatedly move things from one place to another or arrange tree leaves by shade and degree of sickness. No matter how much her parents and teachers studied with her, she remained terribly straightforward, although she could perfectly well repeat every line from etiquette books by heart. As a teenager, she was not interested in relationships with others or events and could spend days in her own room, which was more like a library.

Note: I don't know enough about medicine or psychology to make a specific diagnosis (and I don't want to put a label), but Ilandis most likely had some form of autism from birth.

Elven age smoothed out all these nuances and taught her to better adapt to society. Or, at least, to pretend that she was at least a little interested.

Even before women were officially allowed to become Circle druids in Kaldorei society, Ilandis became interested in this art. Since childhood, she was attracted to everything related to nature: from studying plants to collecting butterflies and insects. And — their dissection. She was interested in how it all worked, how she can "reassemble" any manifestation of life and what it can be used for. Secretly, she eavesdropped on the lessons of other druids, and so gradually, step by step over many years, she was able to master this magic herself.

Ilandis' views on nature and the druid way have always been quite different from the mainstream. Instead of blindly protecting any living thing, she followed the principle of "survival of the fittest." Therefore, she studied all manifestations of life and death.

Another favorite hobby and the meaning of Ilandis's life was alchemy. Even before she came of age as a Kaldorei, she began making potions, decoctions, and poisons. This direction opened up a whole new path for her experiments, which she did not fail to take advantage of. Very quickly, her house turned into a storage room for all sorts of ingredients, notes, and experimental samples. The elf often tested the effects of various mixtures on herself, which is why her body, especially on the inside of her arms, has faded remnants of specific scars.

Artwork by aunhana

After her talents as a druid and scholar became known to the community, she was forced to become a member of the Cenarion Circle. Ilandis always felt love and a certain patriotism for her people, so despite her reluctance to interrupt her studies, she still agreed to move to a new position. Thus, Ilandis became one of the first female druids invited to the Circle.

Despite the fact that experiments on living beings were not very approved by the druid community, the results of the work of the Scarletveil always justified any risks. For example, she made some of the best healing potions, whose recipes could not be repeated by other alchemists. In matters of antidotes, she often had no equal, since she could determine by the smallest signs what exactly the wounded were poisoned with - and how to provide them with first aid. On the battlefield, she remained cold-blooded even in the most frightening situation, which saved the lives of many kaldorei and representatives of the Alliance. Therefore, for a long time, everyone turned a blind eye to what other dubious concoctions Ilandis made and what ingredients she used for them.

Ilandis always refused any titles in the community and preferred to remain in the shadows. But despite this, she was still appointed senior alchemist - and later mentor. After all, even the Circle is not averse to politics, and they were well aware that sooner or later Ilandis could cross the line. And losing her work would be too inconvenient in view of the constant aggravation of conflicts between the Alliance and the Horde. Therefore, they tried to assign students who showed talent in alchemy to her many times. But, except for one, no one could withstand her difficult character and teaching methods.

Artwork by CHELOBEK

A Time of Changes

Note: Northrend - about 25 years from the opening of the Dark Portal, until the start of the full-scale war with the Scourge.

Ilandis Scarletveil rarely left Kalimdor for official reasons, and even more rarely as a member of an expedition. But this time, when the Circle approached her with a request to join a group of other druids traveling to Northrend, for some reason she agreed. It is currently unknown whether this was due to an unexpected surge of altruism, or if the night elf was pursuing her own goals.

Having safely reached the northern continent, the expedition set up camp in the Borean Tundra. But during the night, their camp was attacked by undead, who killed most of the druids. Ylandis miraculously managed to survive, but she woke up on the cold stone floor of a frozen prison, completely without equipment and even without clothes. And more importantly - surrounded by unknown and motley representatives of the peoples of Azeroth.

Among them, a huge furry mass stood out, taking up most of the cell. This "mass" eventually turned out to be a tall tauren - and moreover, a druid, who, however, could not possibly be part of their expedition. In other darknesses of the small room were, as Ilandis then decided: two obvious elven women with ears similar to sin'dorei; a man in a cloth mask, which for some reason was left to him; and a blood elf with eyes burning with the fel fire.

At that time, Ilandis could not yet imagine that she would have to forget about her principles regarding other races and enter into a temporary alliance with this inveterate group of adventurers.

Artwork by SYR

Facts

— Ilandis is ambidextrous and can use both hands equally well. She also speaks Darnassian, Druidic, and Common. Ilandis is 230 cm tall.

— She believes that life in animal forms is a humiliation for true kaldorei. She herself also rarely uses them, preferring to rely on the magic of the stars, as well as healing spells. The only forms she uses are the half-elven moon and tree forms.

— Ilandis is asexual, she does not feel attraction to others and is not interested in romantic relationships.

— She runs a store with potions. She herself never appears there, having shifted all the work on interacting with clients to hired employees. Over her long life, she has accumulated quite an impressive capital, but does not monitor it in any way.

— She has a huge collection of various dried insects and animal skeletons. She was into taxidermy for a while.

— She loves herbal teas and can survive for a long time eating only them. She does not tolerate alcohol well.

— Her only "successful" student eventually ran away from her to another continent and even refused to join the Cenarion Circle.

#my oc #Ilandis Scarletveil #OCs bio #world of warcraft #warcraft #dnd #ttrpg #some people where interested in reading my blorbos lore so I will translate it and post here

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