A bard on a mission, even if he's not sure what it is.

My name is, Danedarin Azurelson Ffelphi, for that was the name given to the gatekeeper when I was brought to the abbey as a babe. Growing up I was made to study the arts, history, magic, and mathematics, but found a special love in music, which I then began to include in almost everything I did. My ears taper at the tip, marking me right away as having elven blood, which along with the tattoo on the outside of my left shoulder which I’ve had for as long as I can remember, has marked me as an outsider. I know it has a greater meaning, I’ve ascertained it’s faintly magical, and that it’s mine in a way that makes it part of my very identity, but I don’t know what it means or who placed it on me. My earliest memory is of faces, angry faces standing over me, looking, and hating what they saw. These days I think they must have been relatives I’ve never met as they disapproved of my birth. The floating, glaring, venomous disembodied heads is a nightmare that recurs every so often at night.

I grew up in an abbey deep in a hidden woodland vale, sheltered from the outside world. When I was young, around the age of nine, I snuck out at times to go wander into the forest where I often felt at home more than in the cloistered halls and orchards. Once when wandering alone, both when and where I shouldn’t have been, I came across a stranger who’d been mauled by a boar in a terrible battle that saw both stricken down. He needed help badly, and was lying unconscious across the dead animals body, yet I was terrified and frozen in place. The smell of blood was everywhere and the horrific sight transfixed me to the scene. I’d never seen a ‘stranger’ before as I knew everyone at the abbey, and anyone who ever came to visit had either been before or had lived there in the past. The gore, the stranger, and the knowledge that I wasn’t supposed to be there in the first place scared me stiff and silent, and when finally I forced my frozen limbs to obey it was to run all the way back to the Abbey. I could not bring myself to tell anyone what I’d seen though the stranger was eventually discovered and brought into the abbey, now dead. Throughout the funeral and burial I blamed myself for not being brave enough to come to his aid and save his life.

The years passed and more pleasant days were ahead of me. I can remember singing with the skylarks and a girl under a willow tree near the abbey pond. It was the night before I left the abbey, and one of the few times I’d ever been truly at peace with the world and myself. A cherished memory. Though I was generally a popular person amongst my peers I was a bit of a nuisance at times to the older generation, playing pranks and such. But since I was a good student and such a gracious friend and servant to those in need (especially after the stranger in the woods incident) from a fairly young age, I generally got along with everyone. Especially the ladies. I wasn’t the toughest, the strongest, or the fastest, but I was smart and charismatic enough to be close friends with those who were, and was able to influence most others to my satisfaction and more often than not theirs as well.

Except for one fellow, who from a very young age had set himself against me. My first real conflict, and fight was with him, and in it I did very poorly for myself. It almost killed me in fact, but that was somewhat more my doing than my opponents. On the sparring ground (all students were required to learn swordplay for self and abbey defense, though at this I never excelled, but was proficient enough) I was paired off against this other member of my age group. He was slightly older and much stronger than I, but was a bully and someone I generally disdained as a bit of a blowhard. Something of which we were both keenly aware. He proceeded throughout the day’s training to bludgeon me a good many times in succession, and also began throwing insults my way for good measure. Things progressed as they will, to the point that instead of focusing on their own practice, my friends had begun looking on with concern with grumblings about stepping in before I’d finally had enough of his jibes (they were pretty lame, I was in general much smarter and better at my studies than he was, at this point I was just tired, beat up, and frustrated enough to be baited) and replied with one of my own… a cutting diatribe that angry as I was had unknowingly and accidentally infused with magic and hurled it straight into my malefactors thoughts. The boy faltered, in real actual pain as I hit him full force with the mental assault. I backed off immediately from the spell, shocked and a little horrified of what I’d just done. Everyone else around me was staring slack jawed at what they’d just heard and seen (though even the instructor would later state that the fellow had at least that much coming to him they way he’d carried himself throughout the training session… I did technically after all only insult him back) as the instructor rushed straight over toward us to break up the confrontation. That of course was when the fool went and pushed me over the edge. He pulled himself together and though I’d dropped my practice sword out of concern that I’d actually injured him, he came attacked me at full force. His assault cracked two ribs, bruised several others, gave me cuts all over, and left me with a bloody and broken nose lying in the dirt. All of which I cared nothing about because my eyes had misted over in rage over what he said next;

“You bastard mistake of a whore!”

I was not the only orphan at the Abbey, but I was one of only two who did not know who either of my parents at least were even named. The other was the Abbess herself though I only found out about that fact after this particular incident was over in a counseling session. I had always been touchy about the subject of my birth parents, mostly because I knew nothing about them. Calling my mother a whore, stating my father had no honor, and calling me a mistake after beating the crap out of me for over half an hour coupled with the recent damage he’d inflicted made me very, very angry. I reflexively reached deep inside me, feeling more than hearing myself scream, and touched some primal force deep within. The power I brushed against called to something in my heritage and past, and I grabbed hold of it. Purely by my will alone I demanded that it hurt my enemy. The eldritch fire that burst from my outstretched hand came seemingly from the feywild itself and it hurled my foe away, nearly killing him with its impact as the flames wreathed over his body. I was of course not in the least bit of control over what I had just unleashed and it nearly consumed me. Only the presence of the instructors who helped contain that inner fire saved my life from being burned away. After a long and painful healing process, I was left with a spiral shaped pattern on my right arm of slightly darker skin than normal, where the energies had spiraled towards my foe. I had almost killed my opponent, who barely ever even spoke to me again. I’d almost killed myself. And I’d managed to scared the living hell out of most everybody there. I still do not feel pity for the other guy, he recovered fine and never bothered me again, but I had lost control over myself. Something which I vowed not to let happen again. Doing so had scarred me, and not just physically. My ribcage and right arm had pretty much shattered of course, but my mind also was lost in turmoil. Even my muscles had seemingly been consumed from the inside to feed the fires while my skin had split in several dozens of small places because of the power running through me… I almost died from blood loss alone. It took a long time for the healers to work on me, I am told it was on the order of days, though I cannot recall the time myself. Even longer still however, for my mind to recover from what I’d almost done. There’s still the darkened spiral down my arm, and to feel my ribs would be to notice slight bumps where the breaks had occurred, but the mental scars though hidden are just as real. I am still not as physically strong as I once was either, and it will take a very long time if at possible indeed, to push my body beyond the average after the ravaging I subjected it to.

Then, I grew up. The forest wanderings of my youth gave way to talking and laughing with friends, making up stories and songs, writing poetry and trading riddles, and practicing my magic and telling terrible puns. I never really got a knack for it, but I try anyways thinking I know what I’m doing. I even had a pet of my very own, a cat named ‘Tac’. Two of my friends had the sister kittens which they kept named ‘Tic’ and ‘Toe’, though I named mine first. When younger, you think it clever when your cat is a palindrome of itself, and they just continued the joke.

Now however, I carry myself with poise and confidence. I will not allow others to intimidate me into doing what they want, but nor will I let others goad me into irrationality. I am a little uncomfortable with the idea of not being in control of myself after all. Most of the time I’ve discovered, a redirected remark will diffuse the situation, and I often go out of my way to seem like I would be a desirable friend, even if I don’t much like the other party. Since it also helps that to make me angry probably gets you kicked out of whatever tavern I happen to be playing, and since I’m the one singing the songs and telling the stories I can mock you in front of an attentive crowd (most of whom owe me a drink anyways and like me already) if you get testy, I rarely have problems with people.

The three defining moments of my life were failures of discipline and self sacrifice. To help the dying stranger (though while he probably was already dead when I found him, I never did check, I still felt as if I sacrificed him to save my own skin I guess), the incident at the training ground that nearly killed myself before even learning who I was, and the arrival of a letter from my sister, one I never knew I had. After the first two failures of character in my eyes, this last was something I did not want to give up on, and it has become my own personal mission. From then on, I vowed that I would seek compromise where I could, and look always to find common ground on which to settle my differences peacefully and avoid conflict whenever it’s possible, while finding my only kin. When I left the monastery to begin my search, I wasn’t allowed to take three objects that I cherished above all others. First was a platinum locket containing a kyanite visage of my mother and an engraved blessing from Corellon. Second, an ebony carving of a hippogriff made for me by my foster brother. And lastly,the very letter from a sister that I never knew I had, received on my 18th birthday slipped underneath my door. No one would admit to putting it there, and no one knew where it had come from. The Abbess could only promise me that it was real and not a hoax.

And so I began wandering, looking for clues. Since they are so scarce, following the work has served me just as well as any preplanned route. There was a need for my services here in town, and so I have come. I’ve been here for almost five months, and know almost every logger and low level worker there is to know, at least in passing and a first name. Many of the managers and traders have come to find my services as a mediator in disputes to be also be desirable so I’ve been able to create a small network of people who know me. All with the goal of tracking down my sister. Information in this regard is like ambrosia for me, and there is almost no length to which I won’t go to obtain it. I figured that there must have been some reason for her to hide the details from me about where she was, who she was, and how she found out about me, so I keep it a very closely guarded secret that I’m looking for her. I know her name, Mirabelsi, and that she speaks Anuirian (what the letter was written in), and that she’s well educated judging by the handwriting but that’s about it. The information seems to be drying up however scarce it was before. The traders and people who travel to this place were why I have stopped travelling for a while to see if I could learn anything. No one seems to want to talk about anything at all recently and since they’re not talking, to me or each other, I can’t even figure out why and it’s beginning to be frustrating. Something bad seems to be coming, and I haven’t managed to get a mention of my sisters name at all in nearly two months.

Oddly enough, I’ve found that I’ve taken some things with me from the abbey. Things I’d never have thought would stay with me. Though I’ve been away from home for almost a year, I’m still nervous around elves as they’re more rare that humans in these parts, and I don’t know who they are. I could be related somehow and to not know is unnerving. With humans it is the same but to a far lesser degree, I’ve been around them so much now that I’m used to this idea, though younger women with even a passing resemblance to me often get my attention if only because they might be her! I’ve found myself in the habit of folding my hands just above my waist as the monks from the abbey are prone to as well. One thing I did take that is very real however was a ‘lucky’ coin that I now wear around my neck. Given to me by the Abbess herself when I left, it was her lucky coin when she was wandering in her youth as well. I also started with some basic traveling gear from the Abbey of course, and have added to that as I have moved along on my journey.

I want earn my way towards my answers. Because until I’m satisfied with myself I can’t return to the Abbey in peace and be welcome. I need to know; who are my parents? Where is my sister and how did she find me when I can’t find her? And what the hell is this mark on my arm anyways?