RAZAEL

Razael lives in the basement of a tavern called the Dancing Shadow. Nestled in the slums, this place has a reputation for housing the shadiest sorts of people, making it the perfect home for someone like him. To the underworld, Razael is known as a contract killer, sought after for his stealth and proficiency. Behind closed doors, he seeks power in the most daring of places.

When Razael was living as an orphan on the streets of the capital, a chance encounter left him with a dead man's chest of valuables. Among the treasures, he found a tome containing a lifetime of study in the dark artes. Demons and shadow magic became as much his weapons as his blades. Using experimental magic, he transformed his body into a gateway for shadow fiends to enter the world of Espiria. Bound by his blood and spirit sacrifice, they exist only to do his bidding.

The life of a contract killer was dull affair in times of peace, but with war brewing in the south, new opportunities presented themselves to Razael. A sack of coins filled to bursting with silver in exchange for a single life. All he need do is kill Lady Farrina Snowchild and all who would aid her in discovering whatever Sanctus Dei wanted to keep hidden. It made no matter to him. After all, a job was a job.

LORRICK QUAGNIGN

“It all began twenty years ago in the Eterna Mountains. My family worked in the mines. One day, we used black powder traded from the dwarves to expand a tunnel. It’s combustible; when ignited with fire, it’s strong enough to blast through rock. It’s experimental science, however. One of the engineers packed too much, and after the dust settled, the tunnel collapsed. I can still hear the screams of the poor souls as the rocks fell. Crushing us.

“But that is when it happened: my spirit awakened. I reached out my hands, wishing to be big and strong enough to hold up the rocks, and they hung suspended in midair. To this day, I’m not entirely sure how I did it, but the majority of us escaped with our lives. I was a hero! Word spreads quickly among the gnomes, and before long, the Circle caught wind of a spellweaver powerful enough to dig tunnels through solid rock. The examiners came to the mines to test me once rumors of what I could do proved true.

“I never really liked the mines; I did it because it was work. My father did it. All my brothers did it. Most gnomes like living deep underground, but I was always fond of fresh air and sunshine. So, when the Circle offered me an opportunity to study with them, I readily agreed. I had my studies at the academy in the day, and at night I was tutored in the arcane artes. By my fourth year, I was studying advanced magic with the archmages. On my tenth year, I became one of them, teaching new spellweavers to use their powers for the good of the realm.

“It wasn’t until a year ago that everything fell apart. My family was respected highly among the gnomes. Magic runs thick in our family, but many of my ancestors sided with Velian during the Sage War. They gave themselves over to the dark artes. Those still alive after the war were exiled from Azur’nth. They lived among guild cities teaching their magic for generations, plotting revenge on the Circle.

“Last year, two of my cousins came disguised as mages from a powerful magic guild overseas. They claimed they were here to reunited with their long-last family, with me. I welcomed them with open arms and led them right into the Tower. I didn’t see what they were up to until it was too late. They nearly succeeded in their plot. There was a terrible fight, and many died because of me. As punishment for carelessness, the Circle made me meek. They took away my magic forever.”

“I had nothing, no one. They banished me with nothing more than the clothes on my back. All the power and freedom I relished in was stripped from me with no more than a cleric’s prayer. All of my hopes and dreams crumbled. I couldn’t go home and face the shame I brought on my family, so, I set to performing. I sing songs, they throw money if I do well. It gets me by, but I miss magic more than anything in this world.”

DAMIAR MACPHEARSON

Damiar was made an orphan by Sanctus Dei's covert crusades against the nation of Ysaht. Lowliest in the land, orphans are prescribed to become wards of the Church and serve until they come of age. He learned the ways of the Yaruvian Faith from the friars, and to fight from soldiers in the Army of Light. When they came home wounded, he served as a physician's assistant and proved to have very deft hands.

After a few months of serving under the local physician in Sleepy Vineyard, Damiar knew he too could be a great physician if only he had the proper resources. The meager coppers he earned playing the strings and singing at local pubs were not enough to earn the money necessary. One day, his luck changed, however. A lone cleric returned from behind enemy lines. After running for his life across the expanse of the desert, he arrived in Sleepy Vineyard near death. Damiar nursed the cleric back to life, and the cleric offered him a reward.

Damiar asked for enough money to buy a horse, sword, bow and arrows, and enough provisions to travel to the Riverlands. Here, he planned to study under Malyn the Healer, chief physician in the kingdom. The recovering cleric offered to give Damiar the money, but only if he promised to do something for him in returned. From the folds of his robe came a leather-bound journal.

“This must find it’s way to the king,” the cleric insisted. Damiar shook his head and explained he was nothing more than a lowly orphan. Someone like him could never hope to gain an audience with the king. The cleric made him swear to try to the best of his ability. After a reluctant agreement and a pocket filled with gold, Damiar finally attained the means to make something meaningful of his life.

 Perhaps on his journey from the Southlands to the Riverlands, he might even have an adventure or two. What more could a twenty-one-year-old orphan ask for in this life. With horse saddled with provisions to traverse the land, Damiar set off from Sleepy Vineyard, leaving the life of an orphan behind and running at a full gallop to the renown and prestige of medicine.

FARRINA SNOWCHILD

Farrina Snowchild is the oldest daughter of Elliot Snowchild, Lord of Eterna. Rather than follow the parameters of Azur’nth’s painfully patriarchal society, Farrina made a career of serving as the king’s chief advisor and his Ambassador of Foreign Affairs. Her stunning beauty is matched only by her quick wit, sharp tongue, and hot temper. Determination and hard work helped her master more than a dozen languages and develop a political prowess unmatched in the world. With the King’s Summit fast approaching, His Majesty could ask for no better companion to weather the storm.

Her attention has been drawn to domestic affairs as of late, however. Talk and controversy stirred throughout the realm as the Church, known as Sanctus Dei, recruited boys coming of age to join the Army of Light. Reports came of forces marching south and revealed an increase of activity between the kingdoms of Azur’nth and Ysaht. Rumors of a crusade brewed, but no official announcement had been made. Secrecy shrouded the details and Farrina smelled a scandal.

The Ysaht people were a hard and hostile people. Broken tribes gathering around meager oasis amidst of sea of sand were of no threat to the great nation of Azur’nth, much less the Church. What could possibly motivate the Archbishop to invade their lands in the name of a god they had never heard of? Farrina intended to find out.

That is why, on a day like today, she needed the perfect dress. She needed to command presence if she was going to attend a meeting with the three most powerful men in the kingdom. The leaders of Church, Crown, and Circle were meeting today to discuss Sanctus Dei’s actions, and Farrina had every intention of dismantling whatever conspiracy had been hatched. To stand shoulder-to-shoulder with men of such authority and renown, Farrina could show not even the hint of vulnerability.

She took a deep breath and set to her task before her.

TYPOTHANAS TREMIRALAN

Typothanas Tremiralan is a young elf born in the Azur'nthian Forest. Only eighty-two years old, he is one of twenty-seven children born since the end of the Sage War transpiring three and a half centuries ago. Though not yet come of age, this elf serves as a Sentinel of the Forest--a guardian of its perimeters. He spent decades devoting his mind, body, and spirit to the art of archery, fencing, and feral combat.

Protean among his people, he possesses the fiercest of fighting instincts, and most formidable of minds. Inquisitive and discontent with the status quo of Elven communism, Typothanas turns to the world outside the Forest, the world of Men. The Elders of the Wood mandated exclusions between the races for centuries. No one comes in, and no one comes out. This, of course, as a safety precaution for the peace and preservation of the people.

But while three and half centuries seemed like only yesterday to the Elves, generations had passed in the kingdom of Azur'nth. No man living had seen the Sage War save for the drawings in history books. Though their sins against the Elven people were egregious, Typothanas could not beholden them to their ancestors crimes.

After discovering years of unanswered correspondence from the Crown of Azur'nth, Typothanas decided to establish a dialogue with the king's chief advisor: a noble lady. With invitation and promise of diplomatic immunity, she extends to him an open invitation to the capital.

The only task remaining to him now was to convince the Elders to let him leave. Night and day he paced the floors of his treehouse, trying to think of what to say and do. All the while, he struggles maintaining his secret from his neighbors always nosing about his business. If they tell the Elders about his crimes before he has time to explain, he will be punished.

Best explain it to them now, he thought to himself. And so he set out to do what no elf had done in hundreds of years, and leave home.