Apocrypha Reyavik

== Apocrypha Reyavik ==
Baroness Apocrypha Reyavik, was a landed knight and adventurer who lived in the northern reach during the years of 3rd cycle, she fought in many skirmishes and battles for her banner lord before taking fever from a wound. Years later, in her old age, she developed a cruel and calculating, yet insane mind from constant infection and the stress of battle. She became obsessed with war. Reyavik lands are located near the Gashes. As a result of this proximity, Apocrypha was able to collect substantial fees from adventurers seeking to quest in the gashes. One day, she encountered a traveling group of sages who sought entry into the gashes through her land. The 9 sages had no money to pay access to her lands, but instead promised intangible magical gifts. Chiefly, the gift of immortality. The 9 sages promised that if she bathed in the blood of her 3 sons before the planets aligned, their years would be returned to her. The fevered Baroness jumped at the chance to become young enough to wield a sword once more. She returned to the hordes of magic items she had collected over the years from the gashes and retrieved her Astral Compass. She teleported herself and her manor house into the astral plane to preserve herself until her sons could be located.
=== Barthandolus' Keep ===
While Apocrypha floated in the astral, she used her scrying pool of Aranka to seek out her three sons. She was visited by an astral metallic dragon named Barthandolus. The Silver dragon was intrigued by the mad baroness floating in her home through the astral. He used his magic to lessen her madness, the spell took a long time in working, and did not reduce her cruel nature. Apocrypha indulged the greed of Bathandolus by showering him in ancient magic items. One day the Baroness trapped Barthandolus in the fourth level of her manor. There, the dancing magic sword of Damocles carved the dragon into pieces. The baroness sewed armor from the dragon's scales and ate his heart and liver. Consuming the dragon endowed her with great power. For the rest of her time in the astral she called herself Barthandolus.
==== The Trial ====
While in the astral, the Baroness became obsessed with the ideas of good and evil. Using her astral compass, she teleported two parties, one of individuals she considered evil, and a party of those she considered good. The party of good even contained such heroes as David "Star-Dazzel" Falden, Shunta, Lucifer Winter, Wilhelm, among several others. The party of "good" ultimately succeeded, which intrigued the baroness greatly. Before Barthandolus returned the parties to the material plane, Lucifer Winter engaged her in a game of chance. In this instance the pair used a deck of many things to play their game. Fortune smiled greatly upon the baroness and she drew "The Hanged Man" and "The Sun", which granted her an even greater and more incredible proficiency as a fighter and a spell caster.
==== Beregan, Roebert, and the Rogue Angel ====
In the 77th year of the third cycle, Beregan, a once servant of Ishmael, broke into Apocrypha's manor in an attempt to free Malauk Tau, a warrior Angel of the old god Tharizdun. The Grand Magister of Ghillodahn at the time, Roebert Hohenstaufen, also magically brought himself to the astral in an attempt to stop Beregan from raising evil forces of the fallen god. The resulting magical combats broke the manor's stasis in the astral, and crashed it into the city of Kairihen. As luck would have it, she found her eldest son Phineas, now a knight in House Tovald's Foreign Legion, which was dispatched to inspect the manor. Pulling herself from the wrecked manor house she slit Sur Phineas Reyavik's throat using a spell and pulled herself into his pooled blood. The spell cast by the sage's a decade earlier took immediate effect, the Baroness was rejuvenated and regained a portion of her youth. Now running back to the wreck of her manor, she seized her astral compass and her Chronostaff, as well as the Sword of Damocles. She teleported herself back to her lands of WestWatch and reclaimed her seat at WestWatch keep.
=== Barbossa Hohenstaufen ===
Upon hearing that Grand Magister Lathandre and Lord Protector Tempus Thealavandron were winning the civil war in Ghillodahn by a great margin, she decided to help another player enter the game, in order to prolong the war. Apocrypha invited the rogue lord Barbossa Hohenstaufen, to her keep. She opened her city to Barbossa's imperial forces to marshal and prepare for their invasion of Ghillodahn.
==== Grievance with the Guards in Gold ====
The Guards in Gold were an organization devoted to Emperor Barbossa Hohenstaufen. They were an effective force in serving the emperor in the Reaches and Ghillodahn, alike. When three Guards in particular took a hostage, the son of a kairihenan lord, they forced that lord into submission before his forces could join the magisterial army to fight against their Emperor. Apocrypha resented the fact that the Guards had stopped those soldiers from experiencing war and she sought to kill them and set the captured hostage free. Because of the guile the Guards in Gold possessed, Apocrypha failed in her task.
==== Ten-thousand against One ====
In the battle of the River Charzenes, Barbossa's imperial forces faced a substantial Polar Coalition Northern Reach Force lead by Baron Shtoiben, Baroness Atwood, and Baron Toben Reyavik. The Coalition force was defeated and the northern lords retreated. Baron Toben Reyavik now knew what his mother had planned for him. He arrayed what remained of his forces on the misty fields of Bladen on the east bank of the Charzenes, nearly ten thousand men. Barbossa ordered the imperial forces back to WestWatch, leaving the Baroness to pursue her son across the river. Baron Toben deployed his forces to stop Apocrypha in her tracks, but with her chronostaff and Damocles sword in hand, the Baroness was unstoppable. After she slew Toben, she consumed his gray matter and drank from his skull.