Difference between revisions of "LongestRoad Sil"

Revision as of 15:44, 2 August 2008

Silian Xiroscient, elf/dragon monk-twinkie extraordinaire! Also, I have trouble spelling.

Seriously, she's a twinking character. For shame to me. But, she's fun! Really! I think she shouldn't really be doing damage, but instead be more of the "jump into the middle of things and dodge like a mofo" type, but once we start fighting evil, that might change. We'll see.

Sil's Character Sheet

Sil's the daughter of an elven cleric and a gold dragon. Sounds messy, doesn't it? Figure a polymorph spell came into play. Basically, her dad was a priest of Nirsi in an elven village. One day, an elven woman was found on the temple doorstep grievously injured. He nursed her back to health and there was a whole thing--whassit called? That thing where Marty McFly's dad fell in love with his mom after her dad hit him with a car? Doc Brown knows the syndrome. Yeah, it was like that. So after a few years (hey, they're elves (and dragons)) they get married and get a house and stuff. And she gets pregnant, and everyones happy, 'cause hey! it's hard for elves to have kids and stuff. But people were less happy when she laid an egg, and then she disappeared, and Sil's dad was all sad and junk, but someone knew to put the egg in the fire (or forge, or whatever) and little baby Sil was born N months later.

So Sil was raised in an elven village by her cleric dad and never knew her mom. She joined the monastery to try to gain some of the mental calm that all her peers had (stupid elves). Eventually she decides that she needs to find her mom. Previous to this, she probably gobbled up all information she could on gold dragons, and after leaving the monastery, she tries to emulate them as best she can. This involves collecting a horde, learning to speak draconic, and possibly fighting evil, though she's a little unclear on the last part.

Sil's backstory

Her heritage

Silian Xiroscient was hatched in the fireplace of her father’s study early one morning. Her father, Ethan Xiroscient, was a devoted cleric of Nirsi. Her mother had been, by all appearances, a good elven woman named Silara. She had come to the village as a refugee, an injured ranger who did not volunteer details of her journey. Ethan was her healer and host. She had only intended to stay a short time. Then the weeks grew into months, and years. Silara and Ethan found themselves together much of the time. They were married by the head priest of Nirsi on the summer solstice. Even still, Silara warned that she would someday have to leave him. Ethan always had the response: I’ll be sad to see you go.

Within a few years of their marriage, Silara became pregnant. The tight-knit village was overjoyed for the couple, but Silara was withdrawing from all those around her. She frequently gazed at Ethan as if there was something caught in her throat, some secret to tell him. She was also often found on rooftops, gazing at the skies.

She went into labor after only another year. The house was in a panic over it. The other clerics tried to get her to let them magically delay the birth, but she refused. They reasoned with her that a baby born so early would have no chance, and that she might die as well. She shoed them away, keeping only her husband with her. She asked him to prepare a fire—something that would burn as hot as possible for as long as possible. He did as she asked, and she lay beside it for days. After excruciating effort, she gave birth to an egg. She confided in Ethan as she put it in the fire, remarking that humanoid bodies were not made for this.

Ethan stayed with her while she slept afterwards, watching the glowing gold egg in the fire. He left for a moment to disperse to the crowd waiting outside the door. When he returned, she had vanished. He was sad to see her go.

Her childhood

Sil was always a rowdy child. She was small when she hatched, but grew like a weed. She ended up being bigger and tougher than all the children her age, and rarely had patience for their complicated games.

When she was 30, the village took in a human mother and her baby boy, Jace. Soon the baby grew to be a child, and for a while Sil had a partner in her adventures. Eventually, Jace grew to be a man, and outpaced Sil in how fast he learned things. Bored with the pace of life around him, he left the village to seek his fortune. Sil helped care for his mother in her later years, and Jace returned before she died. He had become a fearsome warrior, and while Sil was just entering her gawky adolescent decades.

Jace brought his wife with him to the village, and her sister, a human monk named Song. After his mother was buried, Jace and his wife prepared to leave. Song chose to remain behind, as she felt the peaceful village was good for her soul. Sil was inspired by the very elven qualities monkhood had brought about in this human. Song taught Sil how to meditate, and took her on as an apprentice. After ten years of study, Song asked to take Sil to her monastery to complete her education. Ethan reluctantly agreed, and Sil left her village for the first time.

Her training

(Aka: Stop. Monastery time.)

Sil’s life in the monastery marked the beginning of strict discipline and a rigid daily schedule. The elven village had been very carefree—meals that lasted hours and games that lasted days. Sil thrived in this new structure. She was punctual and enthusiastic about their tasks. She excelled at physical tasks, whether it was mastering the fine movements of a throw or sanding down the wood for a new deck. The mental aspects took more time, but gradually she acquired the foresight to anticipate her opponent’s attacks, and the presence of mind to remain silent and listen to the world.

Eventually she was recognized as a full monk in the order, and her duties changed. She was given a class of young children to teach, and she found herself with more free time on her hands. She spent much of it in the library, finding every book on dragons and absorbing the information within it. She came to realize how little she knew about herself, and how much she wanted to learn.

Song was an old woman by this point, and Sil was nearly of age. Sil talked to her master, asking for guidance. Song suggested that she give herself a quest, leave the monastery, and find her own path. Sil considered this for a time, and decided it was the right course. She asked Song how to start such a quest.

Song told her a story about her early life. When she was a young woman, she took a similar quest upon her before leaving the monastery. She took a vow to live her life with some restriction until her quest was done. Then she packed her bag and started walking.

Sil agreed that this was a good place to start, and asked what kind of vow she should take. Song detailed the common ones: poverty, pacifism, obedience, sobriety. Sil made hilarious faces at each of these, which amused Song. She suggested that, for a young woman with all of Sil’s gifts, perhaps chastity would be appropriate. Sil expressed her doubts—a vow is supposed to be a challenge, after all. Song was sure that, once she was out in the world, Sil would find the challenge in this.

Before leaving, Sil hesitated. She asked Song if she ever finished her quest. Song smiled a little, and nodded. With that encouragement, Sil started off on her quest to find her mother.

Sil the adventurer

This is the story of how I first met Zahn.

I wasn't long out of the monastery--maybe six months or a year. I'd traveled out of the mountains down the river, spending some time in a few towns on the way doing research and odd jobs on my own. When I was first out on my own, I adopted Song's mode of dress, manners, and attitude as best I could. She was the monk I was striving to be. Consequently, I was very quiet and conservative, wore full robes and covered my hair, and spent a ton of time contemplating my navel. I eventually made my way down the river to the ocean, into a pretty town named Port Brightside.

I stayed a the Stodgy Lobster and spent the days looking through their libraries and talking to scholars. I took meals in the common room at night. After about a week there was a bit of entertainment in form of a very loud argument in the common room. Some men were arguing about a girl. I tried to focus on my meal and not their fight, as it seemed like a very personal subject. ThreeTwo men accused the fourththird of having absconded with a magistrate'smayor's daughter on the eve of her wedding.Seriously? Now you're just making things up.

... So some smartass just begging for a face-punching was involved in an argument that interrupted my meal. If I'd known then that he'd never let me finish my own damn story I would have changed inns at that point and never seen him again.

I'm just saying that if you want people to think that you're wise and observant, then maybe you should do some fact-checking before writing down that sort of stuff. The bit about taking yourself too seriously was spot-on, though.

Argh. If you're going to be like this then I'm not going to write this thing at all.

You're barely writing it now. It took you three days to get through two paragraphs. Now you're just leaving it here for me to see, and I know very well that it's because you want me to respond. Will you please, darling Silian, commit your side of the story to paper? And if you can find it in your ancient elven heart to do it sometime before I'm thirty, I'd appreciate it.

Fine. But you're not allowed to correct anything in it until I'm done.

Wonderful. Perfect. And you're not going to hide it in the meantime, are you? You're going to leave it out for me to read, rife with spelling errors, logical inconsistencies, and outright falsehoods, aren't you?

That's the plan. Also, I get to correct your side of the story when you tell it.

That will be something to see. I'm really looking forward to that. I'm going to find some gold crayons for you to use.

How I met Zahn

Zahn and I first met in the hallway outside our rooms in the inn. We passed by each other, and he said hello. He apologized for being a part of the argument downstairs. My first impression of him was that he was young, friendly, handsome, and human. I guess I was mostly right.

I remember him staring at me. At the time, my usual outfit was a green robe and hood that I positioned carefully to hide my hair and ears. I was deliberately trying not to be noticeable, and hiding as much of gold skin as I could. If you really wanted to not be noticeable, maybe bright green silk wasn’t the best idea in a drab fishing town. He looked like he wanted to talk some more Read: sleep with her, but I wasn't feeling chatty, so I excused myself and went to my room. Foiled again! No, wait, foiled for the first time. It’s amazing how early in our relationship we hit on our theme.

Zahn's room was next to mine, and the walls were thin. I heard him settle in to sleep as I was preparing to rest for the night. I hadn't yet gotten into the practice of sleeping on a pile of gold--in fact, at that point I didn't have much to make said pile. Instead I meditated and got my four hours of elven restfulness (preemptively: shut up.) and was alert again when a group of people walked down the hallway. It's hard for so many humans to be sneaky in such a setting, and they weren't very well trained. They entered his room, and I heard a scuffle, and then said scuffle moved quickly into the hallway, down the stairs, and out of the inn.

I didn't confront them when they were in front of my room, though I would now. I was still considering my course of action when I saw the group of them outside my window, carrying him down the street. I snuck after them, unnoticed. Despite the noise they made, they didn't wake anyone else up. You'd think that the people of the town wouldn't be so heartless to ignore Zahn's screams, as he sounds so much like a little girl, but there you have it. I was gagged. You didn’t get to hear me scream like a little girl until much later.

I followed them down to the docks and caught up just as the men had finished pummeling him and started binding him tightly. This was the point when I jumped into the fray. I caught a glimpse of him right before they kicked him off the end of the pier. He looked a lot more worried about seeing me there than he had when they were tying him up. He sank when he hit the water. I took a few heavy blows before I could get to the water to go after him. It nearly knocked me out and I staggered as I fell into the water, but recovered after sinking a bit.

At the base of the pier Zahn was struggling with his ropes. I swam down to him and he started spazzing. I thought it was some combination of him running out of air and not being able to see what was grabbing him in the dark. I hauled him up, keeping underneath the pier as much as I could so the group above us wouldn't see us. He got his arms free and held on to me, while I kept a grip on the support of the pier to keep us from drifting out. There was very little moonlight, and we could hear the men arguing loudly over the crash of the waves.

One of them insisted that I had been knocked out before I hit the water, and must have drowned. Another wanted to know where "the hell" I'd come from. There was some argument about who was going back to the inn to get rid of Zahn's stuff, and who was staying here to bust our heads if we came up for air. They said something about trying to find my room, too, and getting more keys from the innkeeper. Eventually, they split up, and we snuck out from under the remaining thug's nose.

We made our way back to the inn, Zahn keeping a few steps behind me the whole way. Ever wonder why? I’ll give you a hint: it involved you being soaking wet. I helped him climb up the wall and into my room through the open window. Once we were safely in the room, we introduced ourselves and I asked him what the story was.

The men were from the mayor. Some of them were actually part of the town guard, so it we wouldn't be able to get help from official channels. The mayor's daughter had actually disappeared, and Zahn was partially responsible, but it was part of a grand scheme for her to get away without any pursuit from her very nasty family.

"It was a brilliant plan," he said softly. "We're seen together a lot for a couple of days, then she vanishes. I'm a stranger here, so I'm blamed. They harass me for a little bit, then there's some swift mob justice with ends up with me drowning in the ocean."

"How is drowning a good plan?"

"A well timed potion of water breathing." He grinned at his own genius. Because it was brilliant. I still challenge you to come up with something better.

I pointed out the large number of things that could have gone wrong with this plan, but he brushed them off as either being contingencies he'd planned for, or too unlikely to be worth considering. The latter included the concept of the thugs being vaguely competent.

"The only thing that went wrong was you showing up. I'm sorry I got you involved." His smile disappeared and he looked genuinely contrite over this, blaming himself for having talked to me earlier, and getting my attention. He said he hadn't realized I was the type of person who'd come to the rescue of a stranger. I had a very skinny, dripping wet young man sitting on the floor of my room, looking very foolish and pleading with me. I know now it was an act, but it was adorable and I fell for it. It didn't take him long to convince me that I was in danger, and that I had to leave town and come with him. There was some ridiculous thing in that speech about him protecting me, but even then I knew it would be the other way around. I didn't mind. I'd forgotten how much I liked good company.

Do you think that whole “I’m pathetic” act would still work on you?

With you, it’s not an act.

In other words, yes. That one gets added to the list.

... You just wait until I get my gold crayon.

How I met Sil

It wouldn't do any good to rehash Sil's version of our first encounter, so instead I will continue from where she left off ... though I don't promise that I'll leave her version as it is.

We snuck out of town that night. I took a couple of precautions to not leave evidence that we'd survived, drying out the room and our tracks. I led Sil to the meeting point with Margaret and John. Sil doesn't even remember their names, apparently. I introduced them, and explained the situation. We traveled with them for a couple of days before parting ways. Sil and I agreed to keep each other company on the way to Greenmarsh.

That's where we met Maggie and John! They have a little kid now. Jack, I think. Weird names.

Sil and I were alone for a day or two before we made it back to civilization. I don't really like camping out, but the situation called for it--we had to stay off regular roads and away from wayside inns. Sil seemed to do great out in the wild, and we got to know each other better.

Our first in depth conversation was about camping versus creature comforts. And, unlike Sil, I committed our conversations to memory. I guess she just doesn't have the brains for it. Bite me, pretty boy.

I'd laid out my bedroll and was settling in for another uncomfortable night's sleep under the stars. "I will be much happier when we get to THE NEXT TOWN. I miss having a nice, soft bed to sleep in, don't you?"

Sil had been staring at the fire. She shrugged. "Not really. I don't usually sleep in a bed. I guess I think of them more for the old and sick ... to make people comfortable."

"Well, they're for more than that." I said it with a smirk that she either didn't catch or ignored deliberately. "Besides, I like being comfortable. Good food, good drink, and good company."

Sil turned her attention to me. "Wouldn't that make the bed a bit messy?" Her little smile implied the joke.

I laughed. "Messy can be fun, too." She shook her head and turned back to the fire, but the smile stayed on her face. "I was afraid you didn't know how to joke."

"I'm glad to have put your mind at ease."

The next day led to more discoveries about her character. We walked through the woods along a tributary of the Bingly River. Up until this point, we'd been essentially backtracking Sil's path into Port Brightside, but now we were headed in a different direction than either of us had been. This time she struck up the conversation.

"How old are you?" Sil asked, out of the blue. I think she'd been meaning to ask it for some time.

"Eighteen."

"That's ... young for a human, isn't it?"

I got indignant. "It's not young!"

"You look young, though."

This put me off my guard. I do look young, but I was afraid of anyone guessing the reason for it. "Well, how old are you?"

"One hundred and ten."

I stared at her for a bit. "You're an elf, then?"

She looked surprised. "Yes. Well, half."

"Right." I scoffed. "Half-elves are not so pretty and spry at that one hundred and ten."

She rolled her eyes and looked annoyed. "I didn't say I was half-human." She picked up the pace and quickly got ahead of me.

"Okay, sorry!" I had to jog to catch up with her. Monks can be so obnoxious. Some time passed and she didn't seem like she was going to continue the conversation on her own. "Ok, so... What's your other 'half'?"

She stopped and stared at me. "It's not ... obvious?"

"What is obvious? I haven't seen any more of you than your face! You keep that silly robe on over everything interesting." Truthfully, I had already guessed, but it was more entertaining watching her have such a reaction.

She pulled the hood of her robe down, showing the rest of her head and ears. Her blond hair was pulled back into a braid, showing a small pair of rippled horns at the top of her head. Her ears were elf-pointy, but scaled. She also had tiny scales on her hairline and neck. The mottled rays of sunlight coming down through the canopy reflected off her hair and skin. "Better?"

I stared at her for a long moment. She was dangerously pretty--I should have known better. I prepared myself, hoping I could keep a straight face. "Well, you're sort of ... bronze?"

The effect was immediate. Her face ran the gamut of shocked, mortified, and furious. "GOLD! I'M GOLD. I'M HALF GOLD DRAGON!"

The woods went silent. All wildlife had fled at her roar. I managed to not do the same. She loomed over me. I'm not really sure how because I'm at least half a foot taller than her, but she did. "Ah," I managed to squeak out. "Yes, gold. Ok. I see it now." This admission did nothing to mollify her. "Please don't hit me."

She almost immediately backed off, and I made a note that an angry Sil was to be treated as an alpha to avoid her temper.

That was a JOKE? You're such an ass!

When we hit Greenmarsh Lake, we stopped to camp for the night, right at the edge of the water. Sometime during the night I woke up, and Sil was bathing. She probably didn't think I could see her, since the moon was at just a sliver, but I could, and I watched her. I have it ingrained in my memory. If I could convince her to do it again now I would hire the world's greatest painter and have it committed to canvas, framed in gold and platinum and hung over the mantle in my bedroom. She ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

I'm sure no one really wants to read about that. Also, you're a pervert.

Damn-it! You can't just edit out entire sections like that.

You're the one who gave me the crayon. It works great!

There was a point to this part of the story.

And now you can tell it. This is a memoir, not a romance novel.

Can't it be both?

For posterity, it should be noted that I now have a sizable bruise on my shoulder. Sil lets violence answer when she can't think of the right words.

You're a big baby. Get on with this "story."

I didn't look away until she got out of the water and closer to the firelight. She was very well muscled, and I didn't want to anger her again. She sat near the edge of the camp and started working on brushing her hair.

Her hair used to be very long--down to her thighs, I think. She had been keeping it in a braid, but she'd washed it in the river and was working on getting the tangles out of it. I could hear her getting more and more frustrated at it, and she finally snapped, throwing her brush aside with a loud grunt.

I propped myself up on my bedroll. "What's the matter?"

Don't make me edit out more of this.

... Long story short, I helped her brush her hair while she was half-naked, touched her tenderly, shyly tried to kiss her, and basically attempted the innocent-boy-in-love seduction technique. I failed. Utterly.

Once again, I couldn't tell if she was oblivious or pretending to be so to spare my feelings. It was very ... frustrating. There's something dirty about those ellipses. However, I had accomplished the goal I'd set out for myself upon leaving Port Brightside--I'd seen her out of her robe.

Also, there was a great revelation of one of the things that annoyed Sil about being a half dragon. Her hair is thick and wiry. It eats brushes and it's a pain to untangle. I had to use a cantrip. Years later she ruined a set of jeweler's snips cutting it. She was always jealous of all the full-blooded elves she grew up with, and their lovely elven hair. I think her hair is fantastic, though, and I like it better short. I use fewer cantrips now.