Rae

The Oracles of Slumber are a Dark Elf sect that offer glimpses of the future, though their 'visions' often beg more questions than they answer. Rae was born into this cult and as a child, her visions were of things such as when lashing rains would fall or when a ravenous predator might attack. Rae's premonitions were different to the abstract 'knowledge' the Oracles possessed, hers were tangible and real. Rae had true foresight. The Oracles feared Rae’s gift would make them obsolete and several of their number claimed to 'see' that Rae was a danger to the entire cult. Rae’s mother, Masarna, did not need foresight to see what the Oracles planned. With instincts alien to most Dark Elves, she stole her daughter away and ran deep into the wilderness of Durham Forest before the Oracles could strike. Masarna took nothing but the clothes on her back and her treasured bone knife, relying on Rae's foresight to guide the pair to safety. Eventually Rae’s dreams led them to a hut perched on a endless patch of twisting briars, far away from the reach of the Oracles. For years, they were safe. On a day that began like any other, Masarna went to wake her daughter only to find Rae still deep in her dreams. Thinking Rae needed rest, Masarna left their hut to forage alone. When she returned, Rae was still sleeping, her blanket soaked with sweat. Masarna did what little she could but she was no healer. As dusk settled, her panic rose. Rae still slept. Masarna left her daughter to find help. As Rae slept, she saw everything. Each step Masarna took was a thread weaving into a tapestry of certainty. Her path would lead to her death. In her dream, Rae screamed warning after warning to her mother, who could not hear her. Helplessly, she watched her mother enter the nearby canopy-town. She saw the flicker of robes, the notching of an arrow, her mother's eyes as her doom approached. When Rae’s eyes opened, she was alone in their hut. Grief swallowed her like a raging fire. She wished for nothing but for this to be a terrible dream. The pain nearly drove her to the brink of insanity. Frustration boiled under her skin, and no screams or tears could set her free from it. She smashed what little furniture they had, threw trinkets they’d collected over the years against the wall, and pummeled the ground with her fists. Still the rage at herself would not subside. She realized she was the reason they had fled from the Oracles, she was the reason her mother had left the safety of the hut, and so she was the reason her mother had been killed. Rae only halted when she found her mother’s knife. In the throws of her madness, an idea formed in her mind. Her visions were her enemy. She decided to do what she thought in her childlike mind would make it impossible for them to return. She clenched her stomach, raised the blade, and plunged it into her eye, intent on taking the next immediately after. But the moment the knife’s point pierced her eye, Rae received a vision more powerful than she had ever had before. In it, she stood among frozen wastes which she knew, somehow instinctively, as the Winterlands, shuddering in the snowdrifts as towering mountains loomed above. Among flurries of snow were figures, shadows moving inexorably to an unknown destination. Before she could wipe the snow from her eyes, the vision faded. She lay on the floor of her hut, her hands sticky with blood. A longing overcame her. She had to go back there. She had to see more. She had to know if what she saw was real. Rae left her life behind after blinding her eye, all thoughts of taking the other forgotten. She strode to the nearby canopy-town, finding the Oracle’s assassin dozing fitfully. In one clean movement, she sliced his eye open. To her complete surprise, the vision returned. The wasteland. The white mountains. The figures, a little closer. When the vision faded, the man lay dead before her. Ever since that day, Rae has sought to uncover the mystery of her visions. She has sold her knowledge of the future, paid for tutelage in dark and ice magic with the funds, and slowly traveled northward. Still bitter from her life of suffering, she is a ruthless being, one whom would kill much sooner than talk. She is determined she will know the truth of the beings who walk through Winterlands snowstorms. It is the only purpose she has left.