Astralith

Deep in the uncharted thickets of Durham Forest gurgles one of the sourest swamplands in all Teleria. Dark Elves here scratch meager sustenance from the earth, their lives blighted by the poisonous mushrooms and flesh-eating fauna they’re forced to share their habitat with. Astralith was sold into this life with nothing but her name, her mother’s only gift, for her eyes were dark and glittered like the stars. She was an excellent harvester, squeezing her lithe frame into the sinkholes where the most bountiful crops were found. One day, delving into these depths, she lost her sure footing and fell into the unknown darkness, her head slamming against a rock. She was roused from her stupor by the shouts of another slave as they reluctantly dropped a rope. Such acts of compassion are rare among Dark Elves, but Astralith was a valuable worker. It took hours for the injured Astralith to climb to safe ground, only to be met with disdain. In her unconscious state, the carnivorous plants in the darkness had attempted to digest her, leaving her face and neck burnt, bubbling, and hideous to look upon. Shunned from the worker’s camp, she was branded an ill-omen, becoming an example of what may happen should feet fail or hands slip. Half mad with hunger, she wandered the swamplands, unable to speak due to the burning of her throat. Other children were cruel when she approached, throwing stones and shouting insults at her. After one particularly brutal attack, Astralith responded. A blister of desperation burst within her, and she tore out their throats with the only tools she had, her nails and her teeth. News of the feral Dark Elf soon reached more 'civilized' areas of Durham Forest, its dark deeds becoming grander with each retelling, until the story reached the wooden spire of Bralvid the Collector. This Dark Elf master was known for his menagerie of strange beasts and he was fascinated by the stories of Astralith. Bralvid sent an assassin in his employ, Drolna, to capture the feral Dark Elf and bring her to serve in his house as a curiosity and guard dog. Astralith proved an easy quarry to catch. Food enticed her into the maw of Drolna’s trap. As the cage’s door slammed shut, her blood curdling scream stoked fear even in her captor’s heart. Drolna grinned. With her scarred visage and bestial movements, she was a perfect deterrent to any who sought to harm his master. But Astralith would not prove an easy monster to bring to heel. For the longest time Drolna believed Astralith to be unbreakable. Slowly however, as she grew accustomed to hot meals and a warm bed of straw, she became malleable. Drolna taught her how to hold a blade, to weave magic into handheld bombs, to become one with the shadows. Astralith was his greatest triumph. Her ascension stoked his ego, for he had molded her from the mulch of the swamplands into a killer. Though there were things she never bent her mind to. She never learned to speak. Silence suited Astralith, her blades and the porcelain-white mask Drolna gave her that covered her burned face spoke louder than words ever could. It was not long before Bralvid relied on his new pet for all his awful deeds, each mission more twisted than the last. Astralith burned houses, butchered bloodlines, and with every throat she slit she saw those who had mocked her in a previous life. She had power now, more power than she had ever wielded. That hunger which had once driven her to violence now drove her to insolence. She was an animal to Bralvid, petted when loyal and beaten when she blundered. Why should she chafe under the chains of an unkind master? Bralvid saw this growing arrogance and in his desperation to assert dominance he made a fatal error. He ordered her to kill, as he had so many times, but this time the target was Drolna. The wily assassin had grown old and beyond use, Astralith was to dispose of him. Her blades whispered from their sheaths, a guttural howl forming in her ruined throat. She stalked Bralvid’s guards, tearing jugulars from throats in surges of hot blood. By the time she reached her cowering master, she was painted in the viscera of her enemies. Astralith did not strike the final blow. She simply opened the cages to Bralvid’s menagerie and they tore him to shreds. Now, Astralith grasps the reins of power, learning there is little Dark Elf masters fear more than a slave revolt. She has emerged as an unwitting figurehead for a quiet revolution, those who would replicate her actions wear her mask as though in solidarity. Enemies lurk in every shadow and Astralith remains resolute. She will not be stopped without a fight.