This is the plotline for the character I am currently playing. I thought it up a little while before, and made the character once before deleting it, researching a new name and creating Elysia Venustas. The idea sort of just came out in a jumble of ideas, and me being an extravert, a lot of the story may not make sense, and I write just as I think.. If you catch my drift. But here goes nothing. Elysia's backstory
______________________________________
Elysia was born of Diaboli and Demorian; a pure Ynnwn. Her father, Akh, was a Diaboli bard, who had females throughout the land worshipping his feet with his baritone voice. Her mother was Mhaila the travelling dancing Demorian, who came across Akh in a tavern on a lonely road one night. The two fell in love, which was a rare occurrence for a Diaboli as promiscuous as Akh. The two wed, and Mhalia gave birth to Elysia.
The family name 'Venustas', means in latin, “attractiveness”, “ charm”, “grace”, “loveliness” as well as “beauty”, and that was what Elysia's father's family line had always been. However, there was nothing graceful about the Ynnwn child, and Mhaila had always hoped she'd pick up on her father's charm, but, alas, she was quite the tomboy, play fighting with the other boys she was associated with, and building things out of dirt.
Her parents watched Elysia grow older, pondering over the name 'Elysia' was right for their child. A blissful beauty. Well, she was indeed beautiful, that was a given, but blissful, she was not. Mhaila attempted to teach Elysia how to dance, but her attempts always failed. It bored her, the Ynnwn girl complained, whenever Mhaila demonstrated a new step. Elysia would always try to mimic her mother dancing, but fell on her feet. Her sense of rhythm was poor, as she learnt through her dance classes and through Akh's music classes, which were were an experiment of Akh's after Elysia was adamant not to become a dancer. The couple did not even believe Elysia had talent of worth, except that she had an incredibly vivid imagination.
At the age of 11, Elysia decided she had outgrown living with her parents. She confidently proclaimed to her parents she was leaving to travel Yliakum and that was that.
And she did. As heartbroken as her parents were, they let Elysia go, and even packed some supplies for their daughter to take with her for the first few days.
Elysia picked up the satchel her mother had embroidered for her on her 9th birthday, and left to travel. She had no regrets as she left her home and travelled the lands, seeing new sights and having experiences she had only ever dreamed of as a younger girl, until she ran into a pack of rebelling Enkidukai.
The Ynnwn girl had been travelling for 4 cycles, when she walked straight into enkidukai territory - a land made up of dust, and sand, and lacked many sources of water - and there were consequences.
"Trespassing on our land, taajho*," growled the fenki leader of the pack, Bai-Khora Anao. "No body trespasses on our land."
"I will fight you then, dirty fenki," growled Elysia, with such an arrogant attitude the fenki flinched a little. Having never come across such insolent beings, Elysia was enraged, but she was still fairly young, so she knew no better but to revel in confrontation in a situation such as this.
She then spat at the fenki's feet, which caused many of the surrounding supporters of Bai-Khora to look on in horror.
Elysia fought the fenki for not much longer than half an hour. No weapons were used, and having sparred with friends from very young, Elysia was strong. Not only did she have that advantage, but she also towered over the fenki. Nevertheless, the Ynnwn girl lost. Bai-Khora's agility was too much for the heavy-footed Ynnwn, and her sharp claws left Elysia bleeding, on the floor. By the end of the battle, she was pinned to the floor, Bai-Khora's teeth placed on her neck. She was the alpha female of the clan, so it was only natural for her to have won.
Elysia was taken into the city, which was quite a large settlement for such a small, rebellious pack of enkidukai, and thrown into the dungeons, where she would pay the penalty of trespassing, and disgraceful behaviour against the leader. The cell was dark, with just a stone shelf for a bed, and the floor was merely sand, grit and dust.
Her hands were bound together by chains made of silver, which not only restricted the movement of her hands, and cut off circulation to her slender fingers from time to time, but irritated her skin. Ynnwns have a high sensitivity to certain metals, such as silver, and the cuffs about her wrists caused her skin to swell, and itch, and ooze.
Originally Elysia's sentence was a year, but her attitude towards the enkidukai was so offensive, and she was considered so dangerous whilst being imprisoned, that they kept thinking up excuses to keep her locked up.
After 3 cycles, Elysia grew bored, and scared that she would never see the light of day again. She gave up shouting taunts and insults to the menki guards that fed her bland mouldy bread and foul-smelling water, and instead began to write with her fingers into the sand on the floor of her cell.
The menki would watch Elysia writing on the floor and for a time decided she had gone insane. What were the words she was writing? They would peer through the bars of the door to try and read what the Ynnwn had written, but most of the menkis had never read a word in their lives, let alone Ynnwn scripture. Eventually, Elysia spotted a menki standing at the door, who, after making eye contact with Ynnwn, ran away.
"No, no, little menki," she beckoned softly, "Come in and I will read you my tales I have written."
So the menki unlocked the door, and trundled in clumsily. Elysia began to recite the tale she had created, and written on the floor. It was a story of love, between menki and a Nolthrir bard - an unrequited love. The menki was asphyxiated with the story; the words conjured such perfect images in his imagination, he could almost taste the air that the character, Aziel, could taste, hear the sounds of the Nolthrir's lute and fall in love with the beautiful bard with most perfect azure eyes. Eventually the menki fell to sleep, as Elysia voice was so soothing - the only trait she must have picked up from her father, she later suggests when recalling the story to others, who could send anyone to sleep with his beautiful baritone voice after a long night of drinking in taverns.
It was as if the whole thing had been planned, as the cell door was wide open still, with the menki guard slumped just inside the doorway, in a dozy heap. Elysia quietly stood up, tip-toed over to the menki as quietly as possible, and was about to escape the cell when something caught her eye. In the menki's belt was the hilt of the most beautiful knife she had seen. For a menki, it was a shortsword, but it was so small, Elysia could slide it straight into her boot. The hilt was steel, elegantly handcrafted and at the top was a single emerald in perfect condition - the same colour of Elysia's huge rounded eyes.
A little over-confidently and filled with a desire to have the knife, Elysia bent down and unsheathed the knife. As she did so, the menki leapt three foot into the air, and back onto his feet, facing the Ynnwn. Brandishing the knife, Elysia snarled.
"Let me leave or feel your blade across your throat, enkidukai," she threatened.
"But I will be killed for letting you escape!" the enkidukai whined. "I cannot win."
Elysia gestured to the markings on the floor, and responded, "Then tell them I am a witch, and that writing was a curse upon the unlucky person who guarded me today."
The enkidukai bared his teeth at Elysia, but then slumped his shoulders and walked into the cell himself. With that Elysia closed the door behind him and dashed out of the dungeons. Stealthily, she hid in the city for 3 days, as she had never seen most of the city herself and couldn't recall whereabouts the gates were. Hiding herself was difficult, where the enkidukai had acute senses, and Elysia was so large, but eventually, the Ynnwn escaped, running as far away from the city as she could.
The scars of Elysia's battle against Bai-Khora remain upon her body, as do the scars from the binding within the cell of the dungeon, as a reminder to Elysia of her arrogant attitude - something which she needed to leave behind. The Ynnwn travelled up Yliakum for another few years, training in combat, meeting many different friends and suitors, and writing within a diary she bought after leaving the enkidukai city.
Within the time she travelled before reach Hydlaa, Elysia came across a group of enkidukai guards, clad in leathers, whom she recognised from Bai-Khora's clan. She was 20 cycles when she ran into the 3, and straight away she unsheathed the knife from her boot to slay them. Instead of retaliating like the others by unsheathing weapons, one of the menki stepped forward waving his clamod paws. It was the menki who she'd told the tale to! He had recognised her and was signalling a truce.
Elysia sheathed her knife again, and approached the three with caution, who also put away their weapons.
"Ynnwn girl," mumbled the menki who had stepped forward. "I've been following your tracks ever since you escaped."
"Following me?" Elysia exclaimed, confused.
"Bai-Khora became fearful of your kind after I told her the excuse you created for me to tell her," the menki went on, ignoring Elysia's comment. "She stepped down from post and another fenki took her place at the head of the clan."
"But that does not explain why you are following me, enkidukai," Elysia said, watching the menki shuffle from one foot to the other.
Another menki stepped up, a little smaller than the guard who was addressing her, and exclaimed, "It is because he fell in love with you, ynnwn."
Elysia was taken aback. Her eyes widened, and was even more confused than she was before. She examined the menki in front of her, who now blushed beneath his fur and hunched his shoulders, bashfully.
"Your tale stole my heart," he murmured. "I know I am only enkidukai, but I want you to come back with me to my home, so I can steal yours. I couldn't stop thinking about you from the day you told it to me, and I couldn't live another day thinking I'd never hear for voice again."
So, after much discussion, Elysia went back with the three menki to the enkidukai city she had vowed never to return to. For a while, she didn't quite understand what had possessed her to go back, but left it down to fate. It had been, after all, by fate that the three menki guards she once loathed had found her.in the wilderness of another land.
The menki was named Raluo, and for a while, a lot of the pack living in the city shunned Raluo for bringing back the wretched trespasser as a lover, but eventually, the enkidukai warmed to Elysia - even the new alpha fenki, who was named Akkaria. There was one bitter fenki, however, who never felt comfortable with Elysia living in the city.
Bai-Khora Akao.
The fenki could not sit still when Elysia, or even Raluo, passed, and mumbled curses under her breath.
"Dirty Ynnwn witch, treacherous menki scum," she would usually say, "Not long until you'll be slain."
It had almost been a full cycle before it happened. Raluo and Elysia were truly in love. To add to her collection of rings about her fingers from different suitors, Raluo presented his love an engagement ring. It wasn't long before their marriage, and the couple were looking forward to starting a family.
Their plans, however, were ruined, when one night, on their way back from the tavern in the centre of town, Bai-Khora jumped out from the shadows, with speed faster than lightning, and slit Raluo's throat with a jagged dagger. It hadn't been to kill the menki, but to distract Elysia, who, Bai-Khora had plotted, would heal Raluo using her magic, but Elysia had no knowledge of magic.
Seeing the blood pouring from Raluo and his body in spasm on the ground, she cried out in despair and pulled the knife from her boot. She spun round to see Bai-Khora standing behind her ready to slit Elysia's throat when she was unaware.
Realising who the assassin had been, Elysia instantly knew what Bai-Khora had plotted, just from the way she had set it all up. With one swift attempt, she slashed at Bai-Khora with the knife, which cut deep from the fenki's waist up to her shoulder. In shock, Bai-Khora fell back, which gave Elysia a chance to kick the fenki down. She pinned Bai-Khora to the floor and held the knife up to a golden locket dangling about her throat.
"You dirty fenki," Elysia screeched in hysteria. "You will pay for what you have done."
The Ynnwn then prized the dagger from Bai-Khora's paw and, seeing it dripping with both Raluo's blood and a poison so pungent it almost knocked her clean out, her lip curled into a snarl.
"Poison?" Elysia spat at the fenki. "There is no magic or elixir that can save Raluo from that. Even if you do still believe I am a witch, I would never have been able to save him."
Bai-Khora's ears drooped and her eyes widened as she knew her destiny from the look of revenge in Elysia's emerald-green eyes. The Ynnwn plunged the dagger down into the fenki's chest and left it there. She watched the fenki writhe in pain, and listened to the gurgling sound of life leaving her lungs. When she was sure the fenki was dead, she tugged the locket hanging on her throat - the chain on which broke instantly - and placed it into her satchel to dispose of later, as a sign of disrespect for the one who killed her one true love.
There was a burial for Raluo, and Elysia mourned for years in the enkidukai city, before she decided to move on. It hurt too much to keep a seventh ring upon her finger as a reminder of the romance she shared with Raluo, so she disposed of it, but the Bai-Khora's locket she kept. She had a new chain link made for the locket and stretched it so it would fit around her neck. At 22, she left her home in the enkidukai city and travelled all the way to Hydlaa. It was there that she stayed, and she vowed to forever write tales in dedication to the one she would always truly love.
*taajho in Enki apparently means 'stranger'.
