Out of the Blue

[MasnDixn]

Name: Engole Aiarel
Race: Sea Elf
Class: Bard (eventually would like to PrC Pale Master using this history as basis [I realize that I must apply with a CDQ at that time])
Alignment: Neutral
Deity: Shindaleria

Engole had long watched the armadas of men fight on the waves above him. He watched their lifeless bodies float in the swell of their sinking ships. The embrace of Mother Ocean eventually pulled them down to the depths. They were the lucky ones that died.

The others drifted on the crests where the sharks awaited, always aware that the noise of battle brought food. Even if the sharks or other predators of the Blue did not find them, dehydration or starvation would. Precious few surface-walker souls escaped the leagues of sea.

Engole felt pity for those souls who waged their wars and lost their lives above his home. They had no family within the brine to give them passage to death’s final rest. They had no songs of glory for the battles they fought.

Those dead marines only had Engole to keep them company.  He collected the dead and made mausoleums of the broken ships that lay on the silt floor.

He regarded their lifeless faces and lauded songs for lives that might have been. They were fictions he knew. He had never known one of his guests personally. He sang to them so they might not become restless.

They were his guests, his friends in the depths. He tried to be a gracious host and stayed many long hours over the years, talking and singing to them.

He often wondered about their world, the world with no currents. Did his songs do justice to the lives that he imagined they had led?

[MasnDixn]

He awoke naked and scared.  No, it was more than scared.  It was the brink of hysteria.  He remembered traversing the realm of dream, though he did not sleep.  A dragon, a quest, and his pledge were clearly marked in his memory.

However, how he came to be on this parched land the surfacers called home, he could not remember.

The blaringly gawdy sounds, smells, and sights assaulted his sensories.  The sky pushed down on his frame with a pressure more uncomfortable than the depths of the great rifts.  He had always wondered about these surfacers' lives above the waves, but dear Mother Ocean he wanted to return to the peace of the surf.  He felt madness creeping upon himself.

Then they noticed him, the surfacers.  They started coming towards him from every angle, great hairy horned things with packs upon their backs.  "Mooooo," they brayed on their approach.  The smell was more than he could tolerate and he bolted for a sanctuary.  

The domicile was familiar but alien in design.  Its entrance had none of the beautiful symmetry of the great abalone gates of home, but a door was still a door.  He entered quickly to escape the pack creatures.

It was some kind of macabre feast hall.  Engole was sure he did not want to know how these creatures of the lands prepared their meals.  Fire and sparks flew from machines around the room.  The hides of beasts adorned the walls and scraps of various metals lay haphazardly on the floors and tables.

Nothing in life beneath the waves had prepared him for this.  Engole reached for his trident; the thought of ending his torture took over his thoughts.  A voice spoke out of the shadows to him.

"I have never seen a sea elf in Hlint.  Are you ok?" a purple-robed female surfacer came from behind one of the tables.  "Relax," she said.

[MasnDixn]

"Unbearable"

That was the only word that came to his mind.

He had been among the surfacers for the best part of a week and still he did not feel comfortable.  "Fetch me a badger skin."  He would if only he knew a badger.  

"Would you like some of this grilled pork?"  He didn't know how to answer.  What was pork?  Did one eat it or stuff it in packs the way the others did.  It smelled funny, maybe it was meant to keep away the incredible amount of bugs on the land.

"Why are you so nervous?" If they were surrounded by sharks, would they be so calm?

Engole longed for the quiet of his friends.  The dead who did not speak, but let him tell their stories, even if they were only fables.

[MasnDixn]

Storm giants were kings of the sea in their own right, terrible in power and legendarily fickle of mood.

Engole learned more about these surfacers each day.  He had seen half-giants in town from a distance.  He never closed the gap to get a clear view of one, of course.  Anything with giant blood was a danger to be avoided.

One half-giant in particular, had made Engole's life stressful.  He often ran through town carrying a tambourine and bellowing at every individual he met on the road.  As always, Engole felt discretion was the best course of action and cleared the area when he came.  However, this tambourine carrying abomination felt it necessary to speak to Engole.

Engole managed to evade it and lead a semi-normal existence in Hlint, if such a thing was possible.  Days later, when Engole was pursuing a contract with the city to obtain goblin ears, a strange twist of fate occured.

As the surfacers' saying "Like a fish out of water" went, Engole was still not quite accustomed to fighting on dry land.  He engaged the goblins and the fight was going well, then everything went black.  

He awoke to the smell of fetid breath and an overly large misshapen face a fraction away from his own.  "Mes saves youz frum gobbys."  

Engole needed to relearn everything he had been taught.

[MasnDixn]

That was long ago now.  Engole had learned that the land-born were not as ignorant as he once thought.  They could be trusted at times, but he did not wish so much contact with them.  Engole was only curious about their rites and rituals.  He was learning but felt something missing, a certain reverance that he thougth must be there

[MasnDixn]

A breakthrough in study finally occured.  For the longest time he had observed the crypts in Hlint, but never ventured close to them for fear of intruding upon these land-born peoples' beliefs.  Engole chanced on a group that said they would take him into the crypts and show him, first hand, how the humans of the area cared for their dead.

It was frightful and tragic.  They interned their dead in cold stone with little effort given to their memories.  Those dead, hateful for being forgotten, walked the halls.  Engole could sense the pain of loss that lay at the root of their hatred.  The dead raced toward him and in Engole's mind he could hear them screaming their names, screaming they once lived.  The entourage he accompanied tore through these poor souls, heedless that once they were men and women each with their own story forgotten.

Engole sang to them as he too used sword and spell to send the lost spirits to rest.  Tears welled in his eyes and strings pulled at his heart, he sang about the glories of simple men that lived and loved life.  With each blow that sent one of their number to its final repose, he could sense the spirit thanking him.

Were all the land-born's dead thrown away so carelessly?  Engole knew he must find the ones that needed his succor.  He must seek them out and sing to them of deeds forgotten by others.  Allow them to rest in comfort knowing that one still sees that their undeath is but a shade of the life they did not wish to give up.