Post by Innovation on Sept 20, 2007 23:06:02 GMT -5
Innovily Akor'Lyme
Homeland: The Glimmersea
Gender: Female
Race: Moonelf
Age: 483
Class: Ranger/Priestess
Deity: Eilistraee
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Hair Color: White with locks of Silver
Eye Color: Pale White Lightless
Height: 5'2"
Weight: 99lbs
Body Type: Slender but Strong
Personality: Friendly and caring, she has a bright attitude towards friendship. Though she is hot tempered when it comes to those who wish to cause chaos out of harmony. She lives by the creedance of her Dark Maiden "Be always kind, except in the face of evil." In battle she takes more of a Drow aspect as that is who she was trained by. Weaving two deadly slender blades of length. She always has and ever will live her life to the fullest and cherish all the goodly folk of the Faerun. Esspecially the Dwarven Leaf, whom she has a strong love for.
Appearance: This Moon Elf has lost the one colored hue in her skin and now takes on a slightly gray look. The locks of her hair still keep the young elf shine, and streaks of silver dance within a mane of dark blue hair. Her eyes are pale and lightless, hardly flickering or moving at all. She often keeps them well hidden under a cowl in the brightness of the daylight hours. She walks with carefully places and light steps. Not a whisper of a noise would you hear, not the stirring of the dust or her feet echo upon the flagstones if she did not wish it to be so. Her life is a story, and by looking at her, one of great length, even for her age. Though she seems more than willing to share it to those who will listen.
Abilities: The Drow trained Moon Elf, takes on the Draa Velve (Twin-Blade) style of fighting. She rarely likes to use traps in battle, preferring to rely purely on the blade and bow skill alone. Innovily true abilities though come from the graces of Eilistraee, her Drow Goddess. She cannot summon Globes of Darkness or Faerie Fire through inherited traits as she is not Drow, but the Dark Maiden grants such to her through the devoted prayers of her servant. Trained much in the tactics of sabotage and stealth by her Drow step-father, as well as the Prayers of Faith by her Adoptive Drow Mother, she has a nice balance between faith and pure hunting skill.
Combat and tactics: Innovily fights with two long and slender, yet edged Rapiers of great value. Decked out in entirely black Adamantite armor of her people, she wears a white cowl and cloak to symbolize Her Dark Maidens skin and White flowing hair. Her armor is light yet strong letting her move silently in the shadows, yet hold up enough in battle.
Equipment: Eldrith, her off handed blade, is named after a great commander of the Sword Coast who was defender of Baldur's Gate until she turned on the city itself after being her banishment. Her Cruelty and malice burned like fire and such the name came to Inno when she purchased the blade, as flames constantly dance and flicker within its metal.
Shimmergloom, her main weapon was forged by the Elves of the Hullack to fight against the Undead, Fey and Were-creatures that constantly loom the forest. It was purchased for her by her first Love Alkabiatese, for her when she took her first steps within the Hullack. Shimmergloom was a great and powerful Shadow Dragon that pushed the Battlehammer Clan out of Mithril Hall centuries ago, and took residence within its halls. When Bruenor Battlehammer found the lost city of his birth once more he slew the dragon and inspired a great legend in the Silver Marches. This blade shines and glitters with Magical energy when Fey, Undead or creatures of Malar are near, hence why she thought of the Dragons name.
Homeland: Below the Sea of Fallen Stars lies a vast Underdark ocean called the Glimmersea, or sometimes the Sea of Starry Night. The Glimmersea lies 20 miles below the floor of the Sea of Fallen Stars. Its horizontal area overlaps that of the surface ocean for most of its extent, although the Glimmersea extends under some of the land surrounding the Sea of Fallen Stars, such as Altumbel and Aglarond. Similarly, certain portions of the Sea of Fallen Stars, such as the Easting Reach, have not arm of the Glimmersea beneath them. The Glimmersea's waters fill dozens of immense vaults. This waterway is noted for a number of spectacular water-cascades that extend down into it from the cavern ceilings, thousands of feet overhead into the waters below. In some of the Glimmersea's chambers, luminescent rocks in the ceiling glow like stars in a surface-world night, striking perfect reflections from the still waters of the sea's surface. This effect gives travelers the illusion of sailing amid a sea of stars. Despite its great beauty, few travelers cross the Glimmersea. Several powerful aboleth cities lurk within its starry depths, and in the shallows stand numerous kuo-toa outposts.
Background: It was 482 years ago when I awoke in the place of darkness, to a world of which I did not belong; and to a people who were not of my own. But my tale begins before that I am told. Though what knowledge of my past is fragmented at most from guesses and clues brought together by my new family. It was told to me that my Mother and Father were of an Elven Race known as Moon Elves and that they had been from the Moonwood just south of what is called The Spine of the World. What my Foster Parents do know is that my Mother and Father were Elves captured in a Drow Raid to our surface home, and that the Lolthians had hopes of bring them back to their city as slaves. In an effort to save Kin of their own, my yet to be kin sent out Patrols into the Underdark looking for traces of the Raiding Lolthians. One Patrol group was fortunate enough to stalk the Drow long enough to wait for them to pass into a small bottlenecked cave where the battle begun. My adopted father tells me that in the battle, he had never seen an Elf fight so hard to protect the one he loved, than my father did that day. He fought back in the fray as instinct took over, but was felled by a Drow Blade in his effort. My mother struggled to break free of her bindings but was caught up in the fight as she lay on the cold stone. In the end, my Kin came out on top over the small group of Lolthian, but not without much loss. My adopted father was there that day, leader of the Patrol that my Parents fought beside to protect the one thing they had down there in the darkness; me. My mother, from what I am told, was wounded beyond recognition as the blood poured from the series of cuts from blades and armor alike. She was curled up in a ball, Eclave told me, in an effort to save the young life which grew within her. She was taken to to the Temple of Myr'Lyme or Lost Light, and there with what strength she had in her and what the priestesses gave her to keep her alive, she gave birth to small Moon Elf female before passing into shadow herself. With her dying words she whispered to my father my name, Innovily. Though I never knew my parents names I cherish the one name they gave me more than anything in the world.
I feel no pain of loss for them, I wish I did. I wish I knew them and could love them like a daughter would love her parents, but they do not live in my mind by anything else but words.
I grew up in Ruins of Faer'Jan (Sworn Shield) near the Glimmersea, surrounded by Eilistraeen Drow. Placed in the darkness to a harsh world that was not my own. My sir name given to me by the Priestesses of Eilistraee at my birth was their hope, that I might one day bridge the gap between our worlds. Akor'Lyme, the Beloved Light.
My Father, Eclave was a Teacher in the School of Melee and a Patrol leader for the Underdark patrols. My mother, Idilstra, was a Priestess in the Temple to Eilistraee and servant to the Dark Maiden. At the age of seven I had already begun my training as a Servant of the Dark Maiden in the Temple of Longing Light. Thirteen years I spent learning the ways of Eilistraee and her followers before Eclave came to take me away. On that last day in the temple I said Aluve' to my life in the Sisterhood of Priestesses and began my training in the School of Melee. I was already four years behind the rest of the students but I quickly picked up and even surpassed them in many forms of combat, stealth and infiltration. 15 years I spent in the School of Melee, only leaving to do my duties at the Temple as my mother deemed fit for me to do. At the age of thirty five my schooling in the arts of Melee were completed and I was deemed ready to go out on my first Patrols. Decades I spent in and out of Faer'Jan on Patrols, learning of the Beasts, Aberrations and Denizens of the Underdark before return back to the School of Melee to teach classes in Underdark Beastiology. Another decade and a half did I spend teaching students of the creatures that lurk in the deepest parts of the Underdark, before deciding to return back as Patrol leader to the new graduates of the School of Melee. For another Century I Patrolled the Underdark, killed several hundred Drow in battle and saw twenty-three Drow redeemed to see the way of Eilistraee. The Decades were long and Faer'Jan was always hard pressed in troubles of all kinds; but I was there to see it through, as were all who called this place home.
Just after my third hundredth birthday I was sent to a small Ex-Slave city known as Sanctuary. I was sent in hopes that a Moon Elf would have luck in opening trade and commerce with the city and Faer'Jan so they may better aid each other against the Drow who had been ever so quite in those parts of late.
I entered on the peak of battle. Sanctuary was at war with a Group of Lizard-folk that inhabited the caverns to the west of the old Svirfneblin city the slaves made a home in. It was not long before I too joined them in their fight against the Lizard-Folk and was asked to use my talents by a group of Surface Elves lead by one named Amyweign. The elves of the War Band accepted me, but watched me closely and untrustingly knowing of my background, but Amyweign always put faith in me. It was not long before I was leading the Elven Scouts on patrols to the Lizard-Folk city. The war was long and hard on the people of Sanctuary, but it brought us together made friends of people who weren't and brought races together who normally clashed.
I remember the first day I was summoned to the Dwarven Stronghold known as the Stoutheart Hall. I was to serve beside the Thane of the Stoutheart Clan in the last battle with the Lizard-Folk. One final push into the darkness. Thane Dain the Mithrilplated summoned all the greatest of minds and warriors to his Hall that day. That is where I met some of my closest friends that day, the companions who I traveled with for the rest of my days in the Underdark, and that is where I met her.
Morwen Vanamoinen, a Wood Elf Ranger from the surface; who served the Elven War band, but a member who I had never met before. Our eyes locked and since that moment we had been at each others side through more battles then most could see in their lifetime. She was my most loyal Friend, my most skilled blademate. A companion who never let me down, never judged my actions. We fought with the most fluid of movements, fueling ones attack by the others defensive movements.
Among the others were Fenwick, a human Paladin of Tyr and his wife, a Half-Orc of the same Patron. Dain the Mithrilplated, a Stout Paladin of Moradin and his wife Clara the Goldenhanded, a Cleric of Berronar Truesilver. Then there was Delly. Delly Nightshade; a Transmuting Mage of Silverymoon, who was teleported to the Underdark from a portal in Undermountain. She became one of my most trusted friends and leader in the times to come. As well as her Adoptive Father Tagnar Delzoun Rockcrusher, who was a Dwarf Gutbusting Battlerager who was taken from a Dwarven Stronghold known as Mithril Hall in battle with the Drow.
The final press against the Lizard-Folk cost many lives of good friends, but Sanctuary was finally at a peaceful moment in its history, as much as you could have one in the Underdark at least.
Morwen and I spent many years in peace, working as Patrol leaders to the city and training the Elven War Band the skills of Underdark battle. It was not long before Delly's eyes were once more upon us to aid her mission of freedom, the path to the Surface and home. Delly brought Morwen and I into a Secret organization she had rooted in the Sanctuary's cold stone. Her Harpers served as the listeners to the city, and our best hope of reaching the surface. The Seekers, a group who had always put finding their way to the surface and leading the people there as their top priority had all but died out, and the ones that did remain lost sight of their goal. Now Delly put it in our hands, and it was some years before we even got a lead. The first lead came in the form of an object.
Demetrius Bhast, a high ranking official who only got that way by his wealth, was seen carrying around an Apple Tree Staff which had never been seen in the depths of the Underdark before, but we shrugged it off as nothing. It was not long after that that the Mayor of Sanctuary, the only descendent of the original founder of the city, as well as the Lylvsar, a 532 year old Sun Elf who was the founder of the Seekers, was assassinated, leaving the last two surviving members of the Old Order of Sanctuary to pass away. This left, a void that Demetrius Bhast as the richest in the city filled. Now known as Mayor Demetrius Bhast the city was thrown into utter chaos. The upper city of the rich folk and the lower city where the poor resided waged a civil war for many years before one thing brought the people together against a enemy that was far worse than any we have faced before.
Delly Nightshade suspected that Mayor Demetrius Bhast had something to do with the murder of the Mayor and Lead Seeker. She ordered Morwen and I to look in Mayor Demetrius Bhast's Estate for clues to such a crime, but what we found was much worse. There behind a large bookshelf was a secret room containing a blue glowing portal and surrounding it was art, gold, food, and items from the surface. This is what started the final battle of Sanctuary. The War of Longing Light as it was so given its name by Delly for my work done to aid the people.
Delly, under a banner of peace gathered all the feuding citizens who wanted nothing more then to return to the light all and brought them into the Beacon, a shelter for all who have no place in this lightless world to turn. There is where the war began, there our lives as the weak and strong, the rich and the poor, and the good and the bad ended. The city came together and from the Lower Slums to the upper streets we fought. Elves of the War Band assassinated the Spellguard Agents who were sent to kill any who walked under the banner of freedom fighter. Stouthearts ripped their way through the Watch, who under orders of Demetrius Bhast, were to kill any who opposed them. The war against those oppressors was fueled by the longing for home, and the strength of one person with the will to return to their home to fight and die for their freedom proved more than a match for 5 soldiers each.
Then we found out why the Drow had been ever so quiet of late. On the eleventh day we met heavy resistance in the eastern quarter of the city, the area in which housed Demetrius Bhast's Estate. Elves in Dark Adamantine armor ripped through ranks of Dwarves and Elves alike. Demetrius Bhast had made his deal with the Drow, given precious gifts from the surface and in return got the aid of them should he be in need. That is when the war went sour.
Once regrouped, the Dwarves holding off the Lolthian Soldiers and the Elves using bows from the rear to fell Drow and Kobolds alike, we finally started to hold the line against them, until she came. A female Drow, dressed in little, but bearing the symbols of Lolth turned what was an even fight into certain doom for us. We were forced to fall back and lose the upper city to Demetrius and what was left of the Watch, Spellguard and the Drow.
The peoples faith was waning and we had lost many of the best fighters and heroes we had. Delly was in wreck over the power of the Lolthian Priestess and what it took out of her to shield herself and the Freedom Fighting Army from the power of Lolth. That is when I realized my purpose here, why I was sent to Sanctuary and why I had no longing for home once here. Eilistraee guided me to these people, and I would not let them descend into darkness now.
I told Thane Dain and Delly what I was to do, what I could do and why I must, and with Morwen there begging me to stay. That it would be too dangerous, too much of a risk that she would lose me. Delly just looked right into my Pale White eyes and nodded.
I crouched upon a rock face fifteen meters above the army of Drow, my Piwafwi hiding me from their heat sensing vision, and there I saw her. Walking amongst the soldiers, rage gripped me then as I went to dart off through the army strait at her, but something caught my arm. Morwen stood there, tears running down her smooth cheeks and quivering in fear for me. "You don't have to do this, we will find another way." She said. I stood there not answering, and then darted off towards the Priestess leaving Morwen above on the cliff.
Delly and what was left of the greatest fighters Sanctuary had ever seen stood upon a flat area of terrain not 50 meters from the entire drow blockade. Shrouded in an invisibility and silence sphere created by Delly they waited for a signal.
Using the cliff face of the gorge that lay behind the army I climbed along to the back of the army and awaited the Priestess to come back to the rear where she could be most effective in battle. It was some time before she was closer to me now then the rest of her army, and my fingers tingled from the lack of blood as I held myself to the cliff face.
I jumped up and drew my Blades then focused on her as I engulfed her in a spell of Faerie Fire lighting her up in blue glowing flames, but she was not alone. Beside her stood two Drow Magi and a Warrior dressed in heavy regiment. A Weapons Master brandishing a great sword glowing red.
Off in the distance Delly saw the signal, and in one fluid movement dropped the globe of Invisibility and started to spell cast as Sanctuary's Freedom Fighters cut a wedge in the Drow opposing lines.
My blades flowed back and forth parrying the Weapon Masters forceful attacks, while the Priestess turned her attention to the battle. Both Drow Magi were concentrating on destruction spells aimed right at Delly who quickly countered them with her own, before summoning two diatryma's, large Underdark birds, which quickly flew over the Drow Magi and raked their claws in ripping out their eyes, before attaching on and pecking at them cutting their Magi's tongues out.
The Priestess did not concern herself with the Drow magi or myself fighting the Weapons Master, no she just looked strait on grinning wickedly, and ever chance I got to see her she stood the same. I didn't know she was grinning at a Wood Elf coming strait down the wedge the Dwarves and Elves had made in the drow blockade, Sword and Dagger in hand. My blades parried his attacks and I returned with a series of kicks and sweeping slashes but to little effect.
Dain the Mithrilplated ran full speed down the wedge not slowing his momentum seeing my battle with the Weapons Master. His Mithril axe arched back over his head and I noticed him as I ducked a sweeping slash at neck height from the Drow. Next thing I knew the Drow was falling forward on top of me with a Mithril Axe dug deep into his spine and his life leaving his eyes. Dain approached still running and pushed the Drow off of me setting a foot onto him and trying to jerk the axe out of his spine.
The next thing I heard has haunted me every day since then. "Innovily!" a scream from an Elf who's voice I knew. I spun around only in time to see a long curved blade slice down from Morwen's collar bone to the middle of her chest and to hear her scream and then go silent. Dain still trying to yank the axe out of the Drow yelled at me not to go fight her alone, but I did not hear it. I picked up a small hand held crossbow and concealed it as I ran at her then flicked it out and fired letting the bolt impact her in the thigh. The Priestess looked down at the bolt she did not feel go in as the Paralysis Poison set in. Never slowing my momentum I jumped up as I ran and kicked her from her footing sending her falling into the lower city some seven-hundred feet below over the edge of the gorge, and unable to levitate on the fall.
The battle continued and the Dwarves and elves, Humans and Half-Orcs, crippled what was left of the Drow. As for me, I sat there with Morwen in my arms feeling the warm of her blood flow onto me and the flicker in her beautiful eyes fail. It was over, but at the cost of everything I held dear to me. My friends, my home, and my companion.
The sound of clanking armor and bashing blades on shields along with the Arcaic chanting from Spellguard woke us from our mourning. Delly quickly dropped Invisibility Spheres around the thirty-five hundred civilians of Sanctuary and then turning around cast a fireball blowing the front door of the Bhast Estate into rubble. What was left of the Heroes of Sanctuary rushed the people through the portal ten at time.
"Time to go my dear elf." I heard Dain say to me. I looked at him with Morwen in my arms. "They will need a leader and a guide should the portal not come out right upon the surface." He said to me. I got up leaving Morwen there on the stone and entered the Bhast Estate which was now full of refugees and the open of the door was being fortified.
"Ye could have left the door intact ye durned Wiggling Girl!" I heard Tagnar say to his Adopted Human daughter Delly. "It ain't be the time te fight about it father." I remember her saying. Tagnar and Dain took up their places at the Archway, and the Dwarves of Clan Stoutheart stood behind them. "Ye get em home Priestess Inno! Ye get em where they sapoosed ta be!" Was the last thing Thane Dain said before clanking steel clashed against clanking steel in the archway.
I watched as what was left of the Stouthearts fought against what was left of the City Watch. I watched until the last of the people had gone through the portal. I yelled and the Stouthearts pulled back towards the portal room. They started jumping in until it was but Thane Dain Tagnar and I left in the house. "Ye two go I be ending this one Me friends" Tagnar said as he held the Watch at bay. Dain the Mithrilplated threw Tagnar his Enchanted Axe and grabbed my arm and pulled me towards the portal leaping in. Last thing I saw was Tagnar's charge into the Watch swiping the axe back and forth chopping them down and fighting an overwhelming sum.
Dain and I came through the portal with Delly standing there waiting for us, and below our feet the blue hue of energy faded into nothing leaving the cave dark, but one little beam of light at the end of a long tunnel beamed through. "The Portals energy was expended this day. It is gone." Delly said before she noticed Tagnar did not stand with us. "My Father? where is he?" She asked me. Thane Dain told her the truth of what had happened, how her father saved us and went out in battle as he had always intended on doing, and maybe it was her strength or her love for what her father had done, but she just nodded sadly and began walking alone towards the light.
Delly and I parted ways outside of that cave that day. She knew that was to happen, that I was to choose to walk alone after Morwen's death. Delly turned to look at the people we had saved, and when she turned back to where I stood, but I was gone. We will meet again I am sure, in Silverymoon where she did take the refugees, but that time is not now. I have to walk my path alone again as I have always done. Always in the company of friends but always tormented by the pain of loss. To lose Morwen and the thought of how I jeopardize others from whom I am, what I am. I am stranded with no way home, not knowing the way. I am an exile to elves because of whom I serve for they do not understand her meaning.
I am Innovily Akor'Lyme, Priestess and Darksong Knight of the Dark Maiden Eilistraee.
Homeland: The Glimmersea
Gender: Female
Race: Moonelf
Age: 483
Class: Ranger/Priestess
Deity: Eilistraee
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Hair Color: White with locks of Silver
Eye Color: Pale White Lightless
Height: 5'2"
Weight: 99lbs
Body Type: Slender but Strong
Personality: Friendly and caring, she has a bright attitude towards friendship. Though she is hot tempered when it comes to those who wish to cause chaos out of harmony. She lives by the creedance of her Dark Maiden "Be always kind, except in the face of evil." In battle she takes more of a Drow aspect as that is who she was trained by. Weaving two deadly slender blades of length. She always has and ever will live her life to the fullest and cherish all the goodly folk of the Faerun. Esspecially the Dwarven Leaf, whom she has a strong love for.
Appearance: This Moon Elf has lost the one colored hue in her skin and now takes on a slightly gray look. The locks of her hair still keep the young elf shine, and streaks of silver dance within a mane of dark blue hair. Her eyes are pale and lightless, hardly flickering or moving at all. She often keeps them well hidden under a cowl in the brightness of the daylight hours. She walks with carefully places and light steps. Not a whisper of a noise would you hear, not the stirring of the dust or her feet echo upon the flagstones if she did not wish it to be so. Her life is a story, and by looking at her, one of great length, even for her age. Though she seems more than willing to share it to those who will listen.
Abilities: The Drow trained Moon Elf, takes on the Draa Velve (Twin-Blade) style of fighting. She rarely likes to use traps in battle, preferring to rely purely on the blade and bow skill alone. Innovily true abilities though come from the graces of Eilistraee, her Drow Goddess. She cannot summon Globes of Darkness or Faerie Fire through inherited traits as she is not Drow, but the Dark Maiden grants such to her through the devoted prayers of her servant. Trained much in the tactics of sabotage and stealth by her Drow step-father, as well as the Prayers of Faith by her Adoptive Drow Mother, she has a nice balance between faith and pure hunting skill.
Combat and tactics: Innovily fights with two long and slender, yet edged Rapiers of great value. Decked out in entirely black Adamantite armor of her people, she wears a white cowl and cloak to symbolize Her Dark Maidens skin and White flowing hair. Her armor is light yet strong letting her move silently in the shadows, yet hold up enough in battle.
Equipment: Eldrith, her off handed blade, is named after a great commander of the Sword Coast who was defender of Baldur's Gate until she turned on the city itself after being her banishment. Her Cruelty and malice burned like fire and such the name came to Inno when she purchased the blade, as flames constantly dance and flicker within its metal.
Shimmergloom, her main weapon was forged by the Elves of the Hullack to fight against the Undead, Fey and Were-creatures that constantly loom the forest. It was purchased for her by her first Love Alkabiatese, for her when she took her first steps within the Hullack. Shimmergloom was a great and powerful Shadow Dragon that pushed the Battlehammer Clan out of Mithril Hall centuries ago, and took residence within its halls. When Bruenor Battlehammer found the lost city of his birth once more he slew the dragon and inspired a great legend in the Silver Marches. This blade shines and glitters with Magical energy when Fey, Undead or creatures of Malar are near, hence why she thought of the Dragons name.
Homeland: Below the Sea of Fallen Stars lies a vast Underdark ocean called the Glimmersea, or sometimes the Sea of Starry Night. The Glimmersea lies 20 miles below the floor of the Sea of Fallen Stars. Its horizontal area overlaps that of the surface ocean for most of its extent, although the Glimmersea extends under some of the land surrounding the Sea of Fallen Stars, such as Altumbel and Aglarond. Similarly, certain portions of the Sea of Fallen Stars, such as the Easting Reach, have not arm of the Glimmersea beneath them. The Glimmersea's waters fill dozens of immense vaults. This waterway is noted for a number of spectacular water-cascades that extend down into it from the cavern ceilings, thousands of feet overhead into the waters below. In some of the Glimmersea's chambers, luminescent rocks in the ceiling glow like stars in a surface-world night, striking perfect reflections from the still waters of the sea's surface. This effect gives travelers the illusion of sailing amid a sea of stars. Despite its great beauty, few travelers cross the Glimmersea. Several powerful aboleth cities lurk within its starry depths, and in the shallows stand numerous kuo-toa outposts.
Background: It was 482 years ago when I awoke in the place of darkness, to a world of which I did not belong; and to a people who were not of my own. But my tale begins before that I am told. Though what knowledge of my past is fragmented at most from guesses and clues brought together by my new family. It was told to me that my Mother and Father were of an Elven Race known as Moon Elves and that they had been from the Moonwood just south of what is called The Spine of the World. What my Foster Parents do know is that my Mother and Father were Elves captured in a Drow Raid to our surface home, and that the Lolthians had hopes of bring them back to their city as slaves. In an effort to save Kin of their own, my yet to be kin sent out Patrols into the Underdark looking for traces of the Raiding Lolthians. One Patrol group was fortunate enough to stalk the Drow long enough to wait for them to pass into a small bottlenecked cave where the battle begun. My adopted father tells me that in the battle, he had never seen an Elf fight so hard to protect the one he loved, than my father did that day. He fought back in the fray as instinct took over, but was felled by a Drow Blade in his effort. My mother struggled to break free of her bindings but was caught up in the fight as she lay on the cold stone. In the end, my Kin came out on top over the small group of Lolthian, but not without much loss. My adopted father was there that day, leader of the Patrol that my Parents fought beside to protect the one thing they had down there in the darkness; me. My mother, from what I am told, was wounded beyond recognition as the blood poured from the series of cuts from blades and armor alike. She was curled up in a ball, Eclave told me, in an effort to save the young life which grew within her. She was taken to to the Temple of Myr'Lyme or Lost Light, and there with what strength she had in her and what the priestesses gave her to keep her alive, she gave birth to small Moon Elf female before passing into shadow herself. With her dying words she whispered to my father my name, Innovily. Though I never knew my parents names I cherish the one name they gave me more than anything in the world.
I feel no pain of loss for them, I wish I did. I wish I knew them and could love them like a daughter would love her parents, but they do not live in my mind by anything else but words.
I grew up in Ruins of Faer'Jan (Sworn Shield) near the Glimmersea, surrounded by Eilistraeen Drow. Placed in the darkness to a harsh world that was not my own. My sir name given to me by the Priestesses of Eilistraee at my birth was their hope, that I might one day bridge the gap between our worlds. Akor'Lyme, the Beloved Light.
My Father, Eclave was a Teacher in the School of Melee and a Patrol leader for the Underdark patrols. My mother, Idilstra, was a Priestess in the Temple to Eilistraee and servant to the Dark Maiden. At the age of seven I had already begun my training as a Servant of the Dark Maiden in the Temple of Longing Light. Thirteen years I spent learning the ways of Eilistraee and her followers before Eclave came to take me away. On that last day in the temple I said Aluve' to my life in the Sisterhood of Priestesses and began my training in the School of Melee. I was already four years behind the rest of the students but I quickly picked up and even surpassed them in many forms of combat, stealth and infiltration. 15 years I spent in the School of Melee, only leaving to do my duties at the Temple as my mother deemed fit for me to do. At the age of thirty five my schooling in the arts of Melee were completed and I was deemed ready to go out on my first Patrols. Decades I spent in and out of Faer'Jan on Patrols, learning of the Beasts, Aberrations and Denizens of the Underdark before return back to the School of Melee to teach classes in Underdark Beastiology. Another decade and a half did I spend teaching students of the creatures that lurk in the deepest parts of the Underdark, before deciding to return back as Patrol leader to the new graduates of the School of Melee. For another Century I Patrolled the Underdark, killed several hundred Drow in battle and saw twenty-three Drow redeemed to see the way of Eilistraee. The Decades were long and Faer'Jan was always hard pressed in troubles of all kinds; but I was there to see it through, as were all who called this place home.
Just after my third hundredth birthday I was sent to a small Ex-Slave city known as Sanctuary. I was sent in hopes that a Moon Elf would have luck in opening trade and commerce with the city and Faer'Jan so they may better aid each other against the Drow who had been ever so quite in those parts of late.
I entered on the peak of battle. Sanctuary was at war with a Group of Lizard-folk that inhabited the caverns to the west of the old Svirfneblin city the slaves made a home in. It was not long before I too joined them in their fight against the Lizard-Folk and was asked to use my talents by a group of Surface Elves lead by one named Amyweign. The elves of the War Band accepted me, but watched me closely and untrustingly knowing of my background, but Amyweign always put faith in me. It was not long before I was leading the Elven Scouts on patrols to the Lizard-Folk city. The war was long and hard on the people of Sanctuary, but it brought us together made friends of people who weren't and brought races together who normally clashed.
I remember the first day I was summoned to the Dwarven Stronghold known as the Stoutheart Hall. I was to serve beside the Thane of the Stoutheart Clan in the last battle with the Lizard-Folk. One final push into the darkness. Thane Dain the Mithrilplated summoned all the greatest of minds and warriors to his Hall that day. That is where I met some of my closest friends that day, the companions who I traveled with for the rest of my days in the Underdark, and that is where I met her.
Morwen Vanamoinen, a Wood Elf Ranger from the surface; who served the Elven War band, but a member who I had never met before. Our eyes locked and since that moment we had been at each others side through more battles then most could see in their lifetime. She was my most loyal Friend, my most skilled blademate. A companion who never let me down, never judged my actions. We fought with the most fluid of movements, fueling ones attack by the others defensive movements.
Among the others were Fenwick, a human Paladin of Tyr and his wife, a Half-Orc of the same Patron. Dain the Mithrilplated, a Stout Paladin of Moradin and his wife Clara the Goldenhanded, a Cleric of Berronar Truesilver. Then there was Delly. Delly Nightshade; a Transmuting Mage of Silverymoon, who was teleported to the Underdark from a portal in Undermountain. She became one of my most trusted friends and leader in the times to come. As well as her Adoptive Father Tagnar Delzoun Rockcrusher, who was a Dwarf Gutbusting Battlerager who was taken from a Dwarven Stronghold known as Mithril Hall in battle with the Drow.
The final press against the Lizard-Folk cost many lives of good friends, but Sanctuary was finally at a peaceful moment in its history, as much as you could have one in the Underdark at least.
Morwen and I spent many years in peace, working as Patrol leaders to the city and training the Elven War Band the skills of Underdark battle. It was not long before Delly's eyes were once more upon us to aid her mission of freedom, the path to the Surface and home. Delly brought Morwen and I into a Secret organization she had rooted in the Sanctuary's cold stone. Her Harpers served as the listeners to the city, and our best hope of reaching the surface. The Seekers, a group who had always put finding their way to the surface and leading the people there as their top priority had all but died out, and the ones that did remain lost sight of their goal. Now Delly put it in our hands, and it was some years before we even got a lead. The first lead came in the form of an object.
Demetrius Bhast, a high ranking official who only got that way by his wealth, was seen carrying around an Apple Tree Staff which had never been seen in the depths of the Underdark before, but we shrugged it off as nothing. It was not long after that that the Mayor of Sanctuary, the only descendent of the original founder of the city, as well as the Lylvsar, a 532 year old Sun Elf who was the founder of the Seekers, was assassinated, leaving the last two surviving members of the Old Order of Sanctuary to pass away. This left, a void that Demetrius Bhast as the richest in the city filled. Now known as Mayor Demetrius Bhast the city was thrown into utter chaos. The upper city of the rich folk and the lower city where the poor resided waged a civil war for many years before one thing brought the people together against a enemy that was far worse than any we have faced before.
Delly Nightshade suspected that Mayor Demetrius Bhast had something to do with the murder of the Mayor and Lead Seeker. She ordered Morwen and I to look in Mayor Demetrius Bhast's Estate for clues to such a crime, but what we found was much worse. There behind a large bookshelf was a secret room containing a blue glowing portal and surrounding it was art, gold, food, and items from the surface. This is what started the final battle of Sanctuary. The War of Longing Light as it was so given its name by Delly for my work done to aid the people.
Delly, under a banner of peace gathered all the feuding citizens who wanted nothing more then to return to the light all and brought them into the Beacon, a shelter for all who have no place in this lightless world to turn. There is where the war began, there our lives as the weak and strong, the rich and the poor, and the good and the bad ended. The city came together and from the Lower Slums to the upper streets we fought. Elves of the War Band assassinated the Spellguard Agents who were sent to kill any who walked under the banner of freedom fighter. Stouthearts ripped their way through the Watch, who under orders of Demetrius Bhast, were to kill any who opposed them. The war against those oppressors was fueled by the longing for home, and the strength of one person with the will to return to their home to fight and die for their freedom proved more than a match for 5 soldiers each.
Then we found out why the Drow had been ever so quiet of late. On the eleventh day we met heavy resistance in the eastern quarter of the city, the area in which housed Demetrius Bhast's Estate. Elves in Dark Adamantine armor ripped through ranks of Dwarves and Elves alike. Demetrius Bhast had made his deal with the Drow, given precious gifts from the surface and in return got the aid of them should he be in need. That is when the war went sour.
Once regrouped, the Dwarves holding off the Lolthian Soldiers and the Elves using bows from the rear to fell Drow and Kobolds alike, we finally started to hold the line against them, until she came. A female Drow, dressed in little, but bearing the symbols of Lolth turned what was an even fight into certain doom for us. We were forced to fall back and lose the upper city to Demetrius and what was left of the Watch, Spellguard and the Drow.
The peoples faith was waning and we had lost many of the best fighters and heroes we had. Delly was in wreck over the power of the Lolthian Priestess and what it took out of her to shield herself and the Freedom Fighting Army from the power of Lolth. That is when I realized my purpose here, why I was sent to Sanctuary and why I had no longing for home once here. Eilistraee guided me to these people, and I would not let them descend into darkness now.
I told Thane Dain and Delly what I was to do, what I could do and why I must, and with Morwen there begging me to stay. That it would be too dangerous, too much of a risk that she would lose me. Delly just looked right into my Pale White eyes and nodded.
I crouched upon a rock face fifteen meters above the army of Drow, my Piwafwi hiding me from their heat sensing vision, and there I saw her. Walking amongst the soldiers, rage gripped me then as I went to dart off through the army strait at her, but something caught my arm. Morwen stood there, tears running down her smooth cheeks and quivering in fear for me. "You don't have to do this, we will find another way." She said. I stood there not answering, and then darted off towards the Priestess leaving Morwen above on the cliff.
Delly and what was left of the greatest fighters Sanctuary had ever seen stood upon a flat area of terrain not 50 meters from the entire drow blockade. Shrouded in an invisibility and silence sphere created by Delly they waited for a signal.
Using the cliff face of the gorge that lay behind the army I climbed along to the back of the army and awaited the Priestess to come back to the rear where she could be most effective in battle. It was some time before she was closer to me now then the rest of her army, and my fingers tingled from the lack of blood as I held myself to the cliff face.
I jumped up and drew my Blades then focused on her as I engulfed her in a spell of Faerie Fire lighting her up in blue glowing flames, but she was not alone. Beside her stood two Drow Magi and a Warrior dressed in heavy regiment. A Weapons Master brandishing a great sword glowing red.
Off in the distance Delly saw the signal, and in one fluid movement dropped the globe of Invisibility and started to spell cast as Sanctuary's Freedom Fighters cut a wedge in the Drow opposing lines.
My blades flowed back and forth parrying the Weapon Masters forceful attacks, while the Priestess turned her attention to the battle. Both Drow Magi were concentrating on destruction spells aimed right at Delly who quickly countered them with her own, before summoning two diatryma's, large Underdark birds, which quickly flew over the Drow Magi and raked their claws in ripping out their eyes, before attaching on and pecking at them cutting their Magi's tongues out.
The Priestess did not concern herself with the Drow magi or myself fighting the Weapons Master, no she just looked strait on grinning wickedly, and ever chance I got to see her she stood the same. I didn't know she was grinning at a Wood Elf coming strait down the wedge the Dwarves and Elves had made in the drow blockade, Sword and Dagger in hand. My blades parried his attacks and I returned with a series of kicks and sweeping slashes but to little effect.
Dain the Mithrilplated ran full speed down the wedge not slowing his momentum seeing my battle with the Weapons Master. His Mithril axe arched back over his head and I noticed him as I ducked a sweeping slash at neck height from the Drow. Next thing I knew the Drow was falling forward on top of me with a Mithril Axe dug deep into his spine and his life leaving his eyes. Dain approached still running and pushed the Drow off of me setting a foot onto him and trying to jerk the axe out of his spine.
The next thing I heard has haunted me every day since then. "Innovily!" a scream from an Elf who's voice I knew. I spun around only in time to see a long curved blade slice down from Morwen's collar bone to the middle of her chest and to hear her scream and then go silent. Dain still trying to yank the axe out of the Drow yelled at me not to go fight her alone, but I did not hear it. I picked up a small hand held crossbow and concealed it as I ran at her then flicked it out and fired letting the bolt impact her in the thigh. The Priestess looked down at the bolt she did not feel go in as the Paralysis Poison set in. Never slowing my momentum I jumped up as I ran and kicked her from her footing sending her falling into the lower city some seven-hundred feet below over the edge of the gorge, and unable to levitate on the fall.
The battle continued and the Dwarves and elves, Humans and Half-Orcs, crippled what was left of the Drow. As for me, I sat there with Morwen in my arms feeling the warm of her blood flow onto me and the flicker in her beautiful eyes fail. It was over, but at the cost of everything I held dear to me. My friends, my home, and my companion.
The sound of clanking armor and bashing blades on shields along with the Arcaic chanting from Spellguard woke us from our mourning. Delly quickly dropped Invisibility Spheres around the thirty-five hundred civilians of Sanctuary and then turning around cast a fireball blowing the front door of the Bhast Estate into rubble. What was left of the Heroes of Sanctuary rushed the people through the portal ten at time.
"Time to go my dear elf." I heard Dain say to me. I looked at him with Morwen in my arms. "They will need a leader and a guide should the portal not come out right upon the surface." He said to me. I got up leaving Morwen there on the stone and entered the Bhast Estate which was now full of refugees and the open of the door was being fortified.
"Ye could have left the door intact ye durned Wiggling Girl!" I heard Tagnar say to his Adopted Human daughter Delly. "It ain't be the time te fight about it father." I remember her saying. Tagnar and Dain took up their places at the Archway, and the Dwarves of Clan Stoutheart stood behind them. "Ye get em home Priestess Inno! Ye get em where they sapoosed ta be!" Was the last thing Thane Dain said before clanking steel clashed against clanking steel in the archway.
I watched as what was left of the Stouthearts fought against what was left of the City Watch. I watched until the last of the people had gone through the portal. I yelled and the Stouthearts pulled back towards the portal room. They started jumping in until it was but Thane Dain Tagnar and I left in the house. "Ye two go I be ending this one Me friends" Tagnar said as he held the Watch at bay. Dain the Mithrilplated threw Tagnar his Enchanted Axe and grabbed my arm and pulled me towards the portal leaping in. Last thing I saw was Tagnar's charge into the Watch swiping the axe back and forth chopping them down and fighting an overwhelming sum.
Dain and I came through the portal with Delly standing there waiting for us, and below our feet the blue hue of energy faded into nothing leaving the cave dark, but one little beam of light at the end of a long tunnel beamed through. "The Portals energy was expended this day. It is gone." Delly said before she noticed Tagnar did not stand with us. "My Father? where is he?" She asked me. Thane Dain told her the truth of what had happened, how her father saved us and went out in battle as he had always intended on doing, and maybe it was her strength or her love for what her father had done, but she just nodded sadly and began walking alone towards the light.
Delly and I parted ways outside of that cave that day. She knew that was to happen, that I was to choose to walk alone after Morwen's death. Delly turned to look at the people we had saved, and when she turned back to where I stood, but I was gone. We will meet again I am sure, in Silverymoon where she did take the refugees, but that time is not now. I have to walk my path alone again as I have always done. Always in the company of friends but always tormented by the pain of loss. To lose Morwen and the thought of how I jeopardize others from whom I am, what I am. I am stranded with no way home, not knowing the way. I am an exile to elves because of whom I serve for they do not understand her meaning.
I am Innovily Akor'Lyme, Priestess and Darksong Knight of the Dark Maiden Eilistraee.