3. Ailahra Fahr

Ailahra Fahr


  • Character: Ailahra Fahr

    Player: Koragi Mydnite

    
Ailahra was born into a noble elven house, the only child. When she was very young, she was forced to watch her parents die in a natural fire, the result of a terrible storm. After a few years of wandering as an orphan, she was taken in by Bren Gisch, an old elf who eventually became her instructor in the ways of archery and stealth. She trained in the forest with him and her fellow apprentices for a little more than eighty years.

Shortly after reaching adulthood, Ailahra began traveling all throughout the forest, taking self-given patrols and clearing her home of any who dared to cause harm. During her travels, she met a wood elf by the name of Treson who showed her more about the ways of the ranger, taught her of Mielikki, Our Lady of the Forest. In the thirty years she spent with the wood elf, she came to love him. Being quiet and a bit shy, though, she didn't want to tell him of her feelings. Later in their final year together, she was traveling with Treson again and they heard tell of a necromancer who had raised an army of Undead in the forest. Ailahra had never seen an Undead creation and grew curious, but said nothing as her companion avoided the area, distracting her with tales of glory and intrigue.

One night, she sat next to him by the fire, speaking in a soft voice as she told him about her day. He wore a smile as he watched her, listening, but the moment did not last. Treson's ears perked, alerting Ailahra to the sounds he had caught. She grabbed her bow as her dear friend rose and kicked out the fire. Ailahra moved to the nearby tent to retrieve a refill of arrows for her quiver, but when she turned back, the Undead had swarmed the camp. Her eyes grew wide with fear as she watched her dear Treson meet his end by the vicious Undead beasts. In her following rage, she sent arrow after arrow into the approaching horde, but as they turned their sights on her and she realized her arrows were useless, she turned and fled, tears burning her eyes.

As she collapsed outside an old hut in a dark part of the forest, she vowed silently to herself that Undead beasts like those who had killed Treson would meet their end by her hand.

She began her work against all Undead in a subtle fashion, researching the different types of Undead, and learning the kinds of things that can destroy them. She read of divine arrows capable of destroying them, but she was nowhere close to having the skills to make such arrows.

In a more populated area of the forest, she near-constantly borrowed books from a local elven library. Coincidentally, the village had been on the receiving end of some bandit raids. The group of humans were more irritating than anything. Ailahra happened across them at times, and her only response to their banditry was usually an arrow shot firmly into their pantleg, cloak, or sleeve, pinning them to various objects. While in this way she managed to leave them for the passing patrols and rangers who lived in the village, she also managed to irritate them rather nicely.

One night as she was leaving the library, a thoughtful look on her face, she did not hear the heavy steps around her. A moment later, the book she carried fell to the ground with a thud and her eyes grew wide as a strong, callused hand gripped her throat. She recognized the leader of the bandits, and the sight of his bitter gaze so close to her filled her with fear. He slowly drew his weapon, and the ring of steel around her from his fellows made her blood run cold. That night, each of his men that Ailahra had managed to humiliate in one way or another left a mark upon her flesh, a scar to remind her of her weakness, and her foolish audacity. Luckily for her, their goal was not to kill her, but to in turn bring humiliation upon her. A beautiful creature such as her would forever be scarred with hideousness.

She was left in the middle of the road, her clothing cut to shreds, her skin bloody and terribly sore. She could barely move, as each of the cuts was deep and she had a dangerous amount of blood loss. A traveler found her, and helped her as best she could before taking her to a cleric's building, where Ailahra recovered slowly. The first time she actually saw her scars as she dressed herself, a grip of fear caught her chest. She stood in silent shock for a moment, and then slowly closed her eyes and continued. In that moment, she lost most of her youthful joy, her ability to be as light-hearted as most elves. She returned to the forest, though her willpower to go on searching for information had drastically decreased. At the same time, she realized that she felt more bitterness directed toward those criminals who had harmed her, scarred her body just to spite her…

She left the village quickly after that, continuing her travels through the forest, though she was no longer as cheerful as she used to be. She was quick to anger at times, though she was also a comfort to those who were oppressed by one thing or another. She knew she lacked the strength to protect everyone, and didn't try to or chastise herself if she failed to prevent something from happening...but she found that she enjoyed bringing happiness to people, asking for nothing in return.

Only a few years after she was attacked, she left the solitude of the forest, feeling there was far too little she could do to help her self-sufficient home, and traveled southwest into the Sword Coast, wandering further south until she entered the realms of Amn. Her travels came to a halt as she entered Athkatla, the capital city. She heard whispers of an "underground" organization in control of the city aside the Council of Six, growing wealthy by thievery and fraud, and having nothing done about it. Her stubbornness and curiosity won and she remained in the city, claiming to be a fletcher of some repute. Her story, as it turned out, held strong. In a city of humans, the quality of her elven arrows earned her the status of a merchant. Coin was never her interest, though she was offered an admirable amount for her fine hand-crafted arrows, and in the small amount of time she'd spent in the city of Athkatla, she'd learned better than to refuse gold as payment for her services.

Soon enough, she had her own shop in Waukeen's Promenade, the center of trade within the city. She used her "Silver" reputation and skills of stealth to learn as much about this thieves guild as she could. As the years slowly trickled by, she eventually gathered that the Shadow Thieves was the thieves' guild behind the rumors of murder, chaos, and deceit. Ailahra's suspicions about the Shadow Thieves only grew as time passed, and they began to take notice of the beautiful young elf with a sharp gaze.

The leader of a sub group of the Shadow Thieves sent a newer member by the name of Kurth to her shop to spy on her, to follow her, and to use her reputation against her. She was suspicious of the friendly human who couldn't speak properly to save his life, though a part of her wondered if his poor grammar was only a façade to throw her off.

She decided that she needed to be more careful if she was going to get anything done. All her attempts to find more information, however, were thwarted by this one man. She grew to despise him with every fiber of her being. In the end, she was forced to leave her investigation into the Shadow Thieves…for fear of losing more than her shop in the process.

During this time of darkness in her life, she found solace in one thing: a friend. On a rainy day in the Promenade, she was setting things up for the next day's banquet in honor of Waukeen and Lliira. There would be many potential customers, mostly from the travelers who happen across her shop, as well as the roguish community she so lovingly detests. Outside her shop, as she was setting up a larger sign she had just had shipped in for her shop, she heard steps behind her in the puddles of the streets.

Befriending a fellow elf in that city of humans was hardly a difficult task.

Cor'avel and Ailahra weren't as close as they could have been. Ailahra assumed she was little more than a friendly face to him, but she didn't mind the company when he came to visit her. She had her shop, and her own secret searching in the dead of night, and Cor'avel had things to attend to regularly, as any citizen of such a city would. They spoke when they could, but were a comfort to each other in their own ways.

A little more than a year passed since Ailahra met Cor'avel, and she received another visit from the man she had grown to hate. Kurth stepped into her shop and she recognized the sound of his steps before she even looked up. He came to demand her arrows, claiming they were for Mercer and a band of adventurers out to kill orcs. Judging by the number of arrows for which he was offering to pay, Ailahra immediately suspected, of course. In all her time in Athkatla, she had made sure not to sell her arrows to the Shadow Thieves, those rotten rogues who plagued the city and tried to control her. She refused Kurth's offer and he instantly lowered his tone, threatening her without actually saying so as he offered her to reconsider. As she refused again, she found a dagger at her throat and a glare directly in front of her face as Kurth proceeded to tell her that she knew too much, and that her refusal had been the last straw for his…"associates".

There was little she could do. Her fingers twitched and an arrow fell down her sleeve into her hand. As she gritted her teeth and dropped her bow, she pushed his hand with the dagger away with the palm of her hand, lifting her other hand to plunge the arrow into his eye. Kurth fell back, screeching in pain, and she attempted to flee, wincing at the loud noises. He tripped, however, and as he fell, the arrow penetrated deeper until it wouldn't go in any further, meeting the back of his skull.

She had killed a Shadow Thief, and so had no choice but to flee, lest she be killed by his brothers.

She stowed the body in her storage cabinet, where she kept leathers and various knives, and then ran to her back bedroom to gather all she could. She nearly forgot to lock the door to her shop before a customer came and saw the blood smear leading to the cabinet, and as she reached the door, it opened and she screamed in alarm, only to relax when she realized it was only Cor'avel. She hurriedly closed the door behind him and locked it, then ran back to her room, leaving him puzzled as he wandered into her shop to find the blood smear.

She told him what happened and he helped her pack, saying she only needed to get what she could carry, and that he'd return for the rest that night, once she was safe out of the city. They slipped out of the city in silence, avoiding eye contact with the many citizens that they passed, and eventually found a place to rest in the trees outside the city. When Cor'avel returned late that night with her things in another bag, along with his own things, they left all of Amn behind, traveling north through Cormyr, and then heading northeast for as far as they could, until they finally came to a halt in their travels as they passed into the Narfell region, through Rawlinswood, and finally as they stepped into Norwick.

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