dnd - extended edition

The Campaign So Far
Shortly Before Our Campaign Began...

The people of Erwanburne learnt long ago that they could not rely on the Lion's Claw for protection. For years, the common folk had been forced to defend themselves alone against the Orcish scourge that landed on their shores. Many fell, but the hardest loss was one of their bravest: Alys Clyff, who had rallied the town to take up arms against the last Orcish encampment.

Alys left behind a child, Merthryn 'Mertie' Tarand, who was raised by her father Luan Tarand, the local bard.

The raiding continued. One day, Luan was also - seemingly - lost.

Embittered and vengeful, Mertie left Erwanburne for Caer Tymestel in search of allies; she had heard rumours of disquiet and dissatisfaction amongst pockets of the nobles and common folk alike.

The Adventure So Far...

What Mertie found in Caer Tymestel, instead, was a tiefling. Perlesvaus was innocent, naive, and new to the ways of the world. Feeling a strange sense of responsibility - and curiosity - Mertie spent the evening of the festival with Perlesvaus. The pair attracted the attention of a young knight, Cadwal, of the very Lion's Claw with whom Mertie took issue. She tolerated his company, hoping it would serve to deliver her information and to keep her true purpose hidden.

Things went awry at the festival: the Lady of the Fountain was kidnapped, and attention turned to Mertie. Perlesvaus jumped to her defence. Blood was shed. Their bond sealed, the two fled the scene.

Mertie finds herself tracking the kidnapped queen, partly to aid and restore the honour, faith and mind of her companion - to whom she feels she owes a great debt - and partly for her own purposes. How she will act when she encounters the woman who sits atop the throne responsible for the death of her own is yet to be seen.
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Hiding in a backwater part of town, the pair encounter the fed-up halfling barkeep, Awen, and a mysterious dragonborn called Emrys. Believing Emrys' promise to guide them to the dragonborn, Gwyr, the party begin to make their way to the kidnapper's hideout...

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Luan Tarand

Bard 8 / Fighter 5	Haunted One	Megan/K
Human	Neutral Good	Milestones

PERSONALITY TRAITS

I expect danger around every corner.

I like to read and memorise poetry. It keeps me calm and brings me fleeting moments of happiness.

IDEALS

I like to know my enemy's capabilities and weaknesses before rushing into battle.

BONDS

I have a child to protect. I must make the world a safer place for them.

FLAWS

The people who knew me when I was young know my shameful secret, so I can never go home again.

I talk to ghosts that no one else can see.

CONNECTIONS

Alys Clyff, partner, local folk hero.
Merthryn Tarand, daughter.

Other: Sawin Tarand, father, Iaenbeorht Tarand, brother, Oelfwine Tarand, brother, and Reinhold Elleson, half-brother.

POSSESSIONS

Lyre

PROFICIENCIES & LANGUAGES

Common, Elvish, Halfling, [rare language].
Dulcimer, Lyre, Pan Flute

CHARACTER APPEARANCE

CHARACTER BACKSTORY

runaway squire turned bard

Shortly Before Our Campaign Began...

Strange things would happen sometimes around Mertie. Luan tried to ignore it at first, though it became increasingly difficult. Eventually he left, seeking answers from a source on the mainland. There were... delays. When Luan arrived back in Erwanburne, their house was in ruins. Mertie was dead - no, gone, thinking he was dead - away to Caer Tymestel.

He knew what would be in her heart - he know what Alys, and then himself, had fought hard to keep inside for all those years: the fury. The all-consuming fury. He set off in her stead.

Luan's Past
Decades Before Our Campaign Began...

In another life, Luan Tarand served as squire to Syr Maerwynn, a member of the Order of the White Hart. Acceptance into the Order carries significance, ensuring power and position for those who join. Sawin Tarand knew joining the Order of the White Hart would secure his family's future and, as eldest son, the task fell to Luan to restore his family's waning influence.

Whispers of a witch at court reached Luan. Syr Maerwynn instructed him to ignore the tales, adamant that they would come to nothing. Thinking of the oath he would one day swear, Luan pursued the investigation alone - confiding only in his brother, Iaenbeorht, who revealed his efforts to his father. As he had done often before, Sawin raised his hand against him.

Luan took refuge with his older half-brother, Reinhold, sheltering at the local tavern while his wounds healed. He was given lowly duties by Syr Maerwynn: cleaning out the stables, handling the laundry - things certainly expected of a squire, though that he had surpassed some years before.

Eventually, Luan found the witch at court. Syr Maerwynn's daughter had entered a covenant with an unknown woman. Desperate for knowledge, for the power to play with light and time, to access tomes and revel in their revelations, Osorydd had opened herself up to corruption - and exposed Luan's world to it, too.

He drew his sword and, though the battle was fierce, smote her. He would not return to his father's halls, even if he had been welcome. He did not set eyes on Syr Maerwynn again. He left his dulcimer with Reinhold and, carrying only his lyre with him, Luan departed, aimless.

A Meeting in Erwanburne

Luan made his way across the land with tales and songs, learned and handsome as he was. Eventually, his feet took him to Erwanburne, a town at the edge of the world. The people of Erwanburne were hardy folk, who knew the value of a good song by a warm hearth. Though their nights were already full of song and joy and laughter, they welcomed every new twist and tale and harmony. The days of jostling and vying for position in Halidon were long behind him; these people spoke only plainly and openly, and he loved them for it.

Alys Clyff should have been intimidating, with her scars and brawn and metal - but she smiled, big and wide, at everyone, and they smiled back. A local hero, Alys was received with admiration and affection wherever she went. Luan had never seen such genuine regard, and he very quickly realised he felt it too.

Alys was not won over by his sweet songs, no matter what the bards say - himself included. Truthfully, he does not know what he did. He wonders, sometimes, whether something shifted when she learnt his scars had come not from battles like hers, but battles fought in his father's halls. He wonders if she sensed, like he did, as it happened - the moment he fell under her protection.

Luan loved her not because of her strength and courage and skills, but because of how she used them. Alys loved him not because of his looks and charm and talents, but because of how he didn't use them. Luan was never like his father: he was soft and kind and loyal.

Their daughter, Merthryn, came - the same month that, by the customs of Erwanburne, the two had lived together long enough to be considered wed. No oaths were sworn.

The Orcish raids which plagued the island continued and, eight years following Merthryn's birth, Alys was slain.

Luan's Secrets
Though it would plague him to admit, Luan Tarand was a little like his father: he was a man of secrets.

When Mertie would ask where he came from, Luan answered the same way he had her mother: he would point to the closest part of the coastline and say only that he 'washed up right there, on the shore.' He did not tell his loved ones of his noble birth, his serving, his hunting, his leaving.

He did not share his fear of magic, even living as he did in a town with gentle magic folk. The performer he had grown to be kept his discomfort hidden from the attention of his audience.

He did not share with Mertie the things he had noticed - the way her eyes could shift to gold. He prayed that he could undo what he feared was another of Osorydd's curses.

The first curse, Luan never spoke of. He never shared that he saw her; that in every tome he opened, Osorydd stared at him from behind the print or scrawls - and if he looked too long, she would start to approach. Closer and closer, reaching out - he would close the tome. He would burn the letters. Who needs heavy volumes; sweet songs carry a learning of their own. He could talk and sing and charm: he had no need for the written word. Who would he ever need to speak with that was not stood before him?

Luan grew terrified of the force brewing inside his daughter. Eventually, he begged for a meeting with a sorcerer who might be able to help them. He left for the mainland in secret, the morning of another orcish raid, and returned to the news that Mertie was gone.

His pursuit began. He knew his daughter had left Erwanburne with a familiar vengeance in her heart - and perhaps, he feared, the witch had gone with her.

The Encounter
Osorydd was younger than Luan, but older than his brother Oelfwine.

The woman had promised so much in exchange for so little. Osorydd just wanted to read her books at night - to summon light by which she could read until morning, to keep herself rested, to slow down time that she might steal more moments for her own.

She was scared of the man in mail, red-faced and trespassing in her chambers. When he came at her, she used her magic to push him back, crying for her mother. Hoping to restrain him, she blocked his blows.

One push sent him backwards with a force. His head met the corner of the table, his blood dripped onto the floor. Dazed, his eyes locked onto the book which had fallen open beside him. He took it up and read the words inscribed by his father's hand. It was then he learnt that Osorydd was his half-sister.

Osorydd was afraid but, hoping this may be the path to their amity, spoke in a tongue unfamiliar to Luan. A novice, she was unaware of the fickleness of the magic she summoned.

Betwixt the written lines I bind
My visage in your mind's own eye.
The book hit the wall. The fury burnt: Syr Maerwynn and his father. Afraid of the unknown words the witch was speaking, and reeling from the realisation of his father's unfaithfulness, duplicity and dishonour, Luan took up his sword and ran her through.

How could she harbour a witch? How could she break her vow? Was he only taken into her service as a favour to her lover - his own father? Was it all false? Did they think he would be, too?

No. He had proved himself. He had slain the witch. He was capable of facing that which they could not. He had shown them. He had done it. He had done it. He-

He turned away from her slumped body and cried.

The trembling hand of Osorydd reached out. Muttering under her breath, she drew symbols in the blood.

And with this blood of thine and I
That you with fury intertwined
I now commit you earthly find
A way to quell that fury blind
With which much hatred unconfined
Wreaks endless pain on humankind.
Hearing her, fearing her, overwhelmed - Luan dealt a mortal blow. Through her dying breaths, Osorydd continued:

As I am surely now maligned,
And you are surely disinclined,
A lesson maybe you will mind:
Your firsborn shall be of my kind.
She looked him in the eyes and with the last of her strength, uttered in the Common tongue: 'May you grant her more forgiveness, and may she grant you less.'

Consequences
Luan lost all faith in the words of men. Syr Maerwynn had betrayed her oath to the Order. His father had betrayed his oath to his mother. The mere thought of the Order's oath had rendered him kinslayer.

Luan would find himself bound by only two commitments; the first, Alys, and the second, Mertie.

From his encounter with Osorydd, Luan learnt the danger of anger and haste, but not the danger of fear.

Happy Endings...?

This remains to be seen. If Luan can accept his daughter, and learn to open his mind to magic, he will be freed from Osorydd's spectre.

Perhaps, once reunited, Luan will confide in Mertie. He could describe the fear he felt for the unknown, the frustration and anger he felt towards those around him, those he felt had failed him. Perhaps he tells Mertie that he wishes he had been brave, as her mother had always been.

Mertie might realise, then, that - no, her mother wasn't brave. She was scared, too. They both were. Always fearful, always angry. Her mother feared the unknown of the orcs - those looking for safe harbour - and her endless pursuit led to her death. Alys had raged against those she felt had failed them - just like Luan. And that had bled from them both into Mertie.

Luan and Alys both charted new courses: Alys broke the people of Erwanburne out of inaction and passivity, and Luan had put as much distance between himself and his father - physically, materially and behaviourally - as possible. But their work was not done.

Mertie needs to overcome the 'fury blind' that Osorydd spoke of in her curse, and which her father will surely caution her against. She needs to learn to take a breath.

She needs to step beyond her parents and learn not to fear the unknown. She needs to learn to push for adding more voices to the choir in the Song of Lon Vi'al.

Erwanburne
an old folksong sung by the people of erwanburne, describing the origins of the island
Back in summer days of old, a dreadful war began.
And bravely though each soldier fought, the victor, then, was man.
/ Returning home, his sword still clean, one soldier cursed the peace.
He asked on high for glory, please - and then the earth did cleave.

A tiny serpent fast emerged, born forth from under foot.
The soldier cursed, besmirched the earth - and on her, quick, did trudge.
/ He turned his nose up at the gift, he bathed the ground in blood,
He tried to send the newborn worm back into the mud.

Wroth was he, then, when she grew each second two by two.
Aghast, he cast the lowly worm deep into the blue.
/ But there she blossomed, in the darkest waters then she reigned -
With eyes of gold, a face anew, in depths her body changed.

Her scales could shift to any hue, her wings would help her glide
And with her gills, amongst the froth and foam the tide she'd ride.
/ But the wrathful soldier heard the tales of the worm beneath the waves
He sought her out and once again, he swore she would be slain.

Despite her size and speed and pleas, a mortal blow was dealt.
Her scales were no match for his steel, the sea sang her lament.
/ The gods on high could hear her cry, what wrong was done by I?
The prideful soldier took my life, and wonder, now take I.

The wind took up, the waters rose, all beauty fled the deep,
From then on men who left the shores, only foes would meet.
/ The waves would wrap around their ships and crush them with such ease,
The very waters that were hers can never be appeased.

But the mighty serpent of the sea left traces you can see,
And on her bones so kindly left, remember and be free:
/ Be safe from evil, safe from churn, from hands that seek to harm,
For raised up high atop her crown is ever Erwanburne.

Fighter 13	Folk Hero	Deceased
Human	Neutral Good	Deceased