Ayalen

File:Ayalen avatar.jpg

Ayalen Jora'eluris
Status	Active
Race	Elf
Gender	Female
Guild	Cleric
Instance	Prime

Description

You see Ayalen Jora'eluris, an Elven Cleric.
Ayalen has an angular face, pointed ears, and deep-set steely grey eyes. Her ash-blonde hair is long and wavy, and is worn tied back in an intricate five-stranded braid. She has fair skin and an athletic figure.
She is tall for an Elf.
She appears to be young.
She is in good shape.

She is wearing a flame-colored tiger lily, a grey nightsilk hooded cloak lined with bright firesilk, a spidersilk tote depicting an artistic rendering of the provinces, a crushed velvet pack in varying shades of grey, a lace-edged cream muslin shirt with an off-the-shoulder neckline, a wide leather belt decorated with engraved cambrinth plates, a polished belt frog with a bastard sword hanging from it, some supple leather pants with dark silk bindings, and a pair of dark grey leather boots lined with bright firesilk.

Character Notes

- As is common among her kind, Ayalen was betrothed at an early age. She has not yet met her future mate.
- She appeals to Damaris and his aspects, Dergati and Phelim, due to their influence over dreams. For similar reasons, she is also intrigued by Moon Mages' proclivity for visions and their ability to predict the future.
- She is uncharacteristically wary of healers and tends to mask her deeply-rooted bias with extreme courtesy.
- When the subject of her heritage is broached, she is quick to correct common misconceptions about her people.
- Her family name, Jora'eluris, can be translated as "friend of the snow-born" in the Common tongue.

Background

I was born mid-Winter in the year 379AV, to Zerora Jora'eluris and Rimefyrn Gesarin of the Snow Elf Clan. Due to Matron Selidhn's popular account, "The Elven Folk," my people are generally assumed to be vicious, barbaric, and intolerant of other races and cultures. Allow me to disabuse you of such misguided notions. Although there is some limited truth to latter description, my family's existence has been neither short nor cruel and most certainly not "savage." The dangers of the tundra may indeed require the ability to make quick decisions, and a strong will could very well mean the difference between life and death in a storm, but these qualities are secondary. We ensure our survival by exercising caution, not wild abandon. In fact, there is a saying among my people, for we have not the benefit of a trained clergy: It is impossible to learn from one's own fatal mistakes.

Yet, contrary to the notion that we have time for little else beyond survival, I have never wanted for art, leisure, or love, and indeed, I have enjoyed each of these in ample amounts while living among my people. I have attended lavish wedding ceremonies during the long Winter months, gazed upon brilliantly painted works of traditional stoneware, sipped icewines made from rare alpine fruit, and reclined beside the hearth fires listening to the tales of my beloved foremothers. Perhaps in an earlier time, before we had adapted to our harsh environs, life was more frenetic and less diverse. We still count each moment as a blessing, to be sure, but our actions are not guided by desperation. Our hunters are both strong and fierce, as "The Elven Folk" suggests, but each kill is calculated, such that we are able to preserve the animal populations that sustain us. If we hunted them savagely, as if each moment were our last, there would soon be nothing left for us or our children. With all due respect to the Matron, times have changed.

Because of the extremely limited nature of alpine resources, we Snow Elves spend most of our time in small groups of kin, in ancestral places where shelter and resources are reliable. Families will occasionally trade locations, in order to secure a marriage or gain access to different resources for a time, but it is not uncommon for a family to communicate through their neighbors to families much farther away. This system is not only much more convenient (and safer) than travelling by foot to deliver a message personally, it also allows for the continued maintenance of local alliances. I myself was the result of one such alliance, between the Jora'eluris and Gesarin families, in the tradition of Bile Janis oc Hul Haizeani.

The Jora'eluris are considerably wealthy according to my people's standards, owing to the craft for which they are well-known: both men and women in the family have long specialized in the production of rare, exquisite tapestries. The tapestries are woven from mountain goat fibers, dyed using natural pigments (usually bright reds) harvested from alpine plants, and can require up to ten years to complete. Such textiles are not only beautiful but offer an extra layer of insulation for the home. Very rarely, the Jora'eluris will bargain with Traders and exchange one of their precious tapestries for a shipment of goods from the outside, such as fine steel tools or heavy silks. However, they would never have agreed to allow a daughter of the clan to leave if the circumstances had not become dire.

I have always known vivid dreams and equally vivid nightmares. Ever since I was small child, I would wake from them in the dead of night, sobbing and shaking violently from some terror I scarce had the words to describe. The bouts were relatively infrequent in the beginning, but they grew worse with time. By my tenth year, I had begun to recognize the recurrent figures in my dreams: walking corpses with peeling flesh, red-eyed demons with the awful power of sorcery, and a dark-haired woman whose face I could never remember. My family, in its concern for me, sought advice from numerous healers, who created various theories to explain my "illness." Some said the cause was of the body, some said it was magical in nature, others argued it was environmental or hereditary. Consequently, I was exorcised, given draughts, hypnotized, and was on the receiving end of numerous spells, none of which were particularly effective. We simply managed, until fairly recently, when the dreams began to occur almost diurnally, and I had taken to walking and performing dangerous actions in my sleep. Fearful of what might happen and unwilling to treat me as a prisoner in my own home, the Jora'eluris matriarch did the unthinkable and called upon outsiders' aid.

There was only one who would make the journey to our settlement high in the mountains. The outsider, a missionary, managed to convince my family that my visions were beyond the help of mundane remedies and that I would need to seek help from the gods themselves. With no other recourse, they agreed that I should leave to pursue the Gods' will, on the condition that I should return once I had found a way to end my nightmares.

And so it was that I left my home among the icy peaks and began my journey to the Crossing.

OOC Notes

RP Profile:
Roleplay Stance: Heavy
PvP Stance: Open

I welcome roleplay and opportunities for character interaction and development (both spontaneous and planned), but Ayalen is generally reserved around strangers, so this may not be immediately apparent. She will, however, respond when addressed and will always jump into discussions regarding her heritage.

Recommended Reading:

Out of Character
OOC Euphemisms
DragonRealms Policy

Character Portrait

Portrait drawn by the player.