Ruinlith

== Ruinlith Sylvannia Ghostsong ==
== Physical Description ==
Ruinlith (pronounced "Rue-IN-lith") or Rhuna as she is known by a select few, is of average height for a female blood elf, perhaps slightly shorter than most due to her poor upbringing. Coupled with this she is rather slight, though muscular from centuries of fighting. 
She has glowing eyes like all her race, a deep jade-green in colour. Her hair hangs roughly to her shoulder-blades, though she tends to keep the orange-ember strands pulled back tightly, a slanted fringe all that escapes the binding.
Like most elves, Rhuna possesses attractive angular features though she is not a surpassing beauty by any standards. "Attractive" is probably all one would call her, though hardly uncommon amongst her race, leaving her with the label of "average".
Her complexion is slightly darker than some other blood elves, but this is more due to the fact that she would rather be outdoors than in, though she is still rather pale.
Rhuna's nose is slightly crooked from being repeatedly broken, though at first it is not overly noticeable. Like many of her fellow people, she has numerous scars cover her body though hers are a result of a rough childhood, her "chosen" profession and her time spent as a scout and spy of the Quel'Thalas army. She only has two significant scars, which are well covered by clothing (usually). One runs about half an inch in thickness in a diagonal slant from the middle of her back following along her right shoulder blade wrapping around to end just under where her right breast begins. It is probably just over a foot in length if stretched out. This scar is a reminder from an Armani raiding party and one of their interrogation practices of "elven skinning" (which fortunately for Rhuna this was not a completed process). The second scar is smaller, but deeper and deliberately dyed with a deep red ink, high up on her inner left thigh. The scar is slightly raised and seems to be the image of three red lightning bolts parrallel to each other. It is no more than an inch in length. This scar is very old and personal to Rhuna, an affirmation and reminder of a promise from when she was a mere eight year old, added to again with the fall of Quel'Thalas. 
All in all however, Rhuna is very good at fading into the background, her appearance doing naught to mark her out as distinct.
== Personality ==
Rhuna tends to believe strongly in the motto "the ends justify the means". 
When she was younger, she was very hot-headed, quick to anger if not just as fast to cool down. As she has grown, while still relatively hot-headed at times(Rhuna will always have a slightly firey nature), this has been tempered with the harsh lessons of life and she has gained a lot more patience since. There are certain things Rhuna feels uncompromising about however-Enemies of her people for example (Amani/Scourge) and her intolerance for betrayal and what she considers personal weakness.
From this you could gather, she is rather "nationalistic" as her goals are to restore and rebuild her people, ensuring the distruction of any enemies.
Admittedly, Rhuna is not very well versed in knowledge of noble lineage, history or politics, being raised by the streets of a Quel'Thalas border town, but she possesses a surprising amount of intelligence garnished from sources ranging from local gossip to official political and military correspondence. Though there are holes in her knowledge base, she covers this quite well with her own conclusions and theories. 
Rhuna is never overt in how much she does know. She prefers rather to let others draw conclusions.
A result of her profession and the events of the recent past, Rhuna is rather guarded around strangers. For those who do know her, they know well how close to the edge her mischievious nature pulls her along with her dislike for authority (unless she respects them but even then it does not always save them from her pranks) and how often she seems to get into trouble and yet (normally) manages to get out of it unscathed. 
While there may be hints, the deeper and darker side to Rhuna, is not overtly displayed. The bulk of her ruthlessness, relentless drive, determination and her lack of "normal" morals, are reserved for her line of work. 
Rhuna has no qualms about killing, stealing or other such "unsavory" actions, believing in the cause. You could say this lends a fanatical aspect to her character.
== Background ==
Rhuna was born the only daughter of Siren Ghostsong, then farstrider under the well known, Ranger-General Sylvanas Windrunner. 
Siren found out she was pregnant whilst defending the Quel'Thalas borders against the constant Amani Troll raiders. The father was unknown. 
Siren, almost in hero-worship of her commander, Sylvanas and wanting simply to be just a farstrider and defender of Quel'Thalas, never-the-less felt honour-bound and carried the child to term. She stayed with the unit until a month prior to the birthing, then retired to have Rhuna at the local border town. 
For once in her life seeing two distinct paths lay open before her for her future and yet, Siren still chose that of what she had always known and returned to the farstriders and her unit, leaving Rhuna with the only thing she could, that of a name "Ruinlith Sylvannia Ghostsong", (Sylvannia after (obviously) "Sylvanas").
Siren rather short-sightedly made arrangement, left a small fortune for Rhuna's upkeep with the local innkeeper who was to look after Rhuna and left to rejoin her unit (Rhuna to date has only the knowledge of her mother passed down from the inn-keeper and the villages she was raised with until she was 6).
Rhuna was raised, knowing about her mother from the innkeeper who considered Siren a hero, living in a town on Quel'Thalas borders as they did and under constant threat of the Amani raiders. They relied heavily on the Farstrider Units and wider Quel'Thalas Army to keep them safe. This however was to fail when Rhuna was a mere 6 year old.
At this time, the Amani finally succeeded in buring the village to the ground, the farstriders stretched thin as they were, many villages were taken prisoner, several killed and many fled closer inland to the local lord and the promise of safety behind a more secure stone wall not to mention a well trained permanent resident defence. Rhuna, seeing the violation and murder of her foster mother before her wide innocent eyes, hiding in the cupboard as she was, fled with the remaining villagers towards better security when discovered clutching her the lifeless inn-keeper's hand, still in shock, by another local.
Rhuna was placed in an orphanage for the refugees shortly after reaching the security of real stone walls, actually within the runestone boundaries, however, still on the coastal frontiers of Quel'Thalas. 
For the two years she spent roughly at the orphanage, Rhuna was in a daze of shock and incomprehension. Being older, there was little to no chance of adoption and the local priest looking after the orphanage barely had time to notice that Rhuna was obviously going through some trauma. It was not until she was eight, and forced out of the orphanage due to overcrowding, that Rhuna came back to herself, more as a result of survival instinct than anything else. Having no where else to go, Rhuna lived off the streets, begging, stealing where she could and fighting for prime sleeping spaces. The first six months were terrible for Rhuna and she came close to "taking the easy path" and selling her body on the streets like she saw more of the "richer" children doing (though they could not really be classified as children anymore). 
Rhuna however, always managed to scrape by and soon discovered she had a "knack" for this line of work. 
At the age of eight, she joined a local gang of older teens, having proved her worth by defeating one of the member in a street brawl. Her nose broken, but victorious, she was initiated, a single lightning bolt etched deeply into her skin on her upper thigh, the red ink rubbed in with sand to ensure the scarring, it then left to scar over. 
It was later that night, alone, that Rhuna added her second lightning bolt, parrallel to the first, reciting her own promise-to remember the fall of her village, her foster mother's last moments and to repay the Amani for the attrocities caused. 
At eight years old she was no longer a child.
Rhuna rose quickly within the ranks of the gang. Within two years she was the new leader and had gathered a slightly larger following. While things were not overly prosperous, Rhuna ensured everyone had enough food, and she had enough sense to save a portion of the pooled funds for the leaner times. It was her loyalty to the group that was most admired, followed closely by her daring, complete disrespect for authority and ability to curse better than most grown soldiers. 
Rhuna was extremely territorial about her group, often fighting other gangs for the better profit areas, perminant sleeping places, etc. While not everything was a win, Rhuna's group became known for standing up for what was theirs and were not one to be messed with lightly. 
Living as roughly as she did, Rhuna allowed no second chances with her group members. Any rules that she had set down and were broken, she punished ruthlessless and would allow no excuses to sway her judgement. In her world, anything less would be seen as a weakness and an invitation for challanges.
Despite the harsh and rough world she lived in, Rhuna never lost her mischievious nature, which more often than not got her into trouble, though nothing overly serious. 
Her favourite past time was tormenting the dour and serious, and humilating those who were "above" her station. Rhuna had a distinct dislike for the snobbery of the nobles, in part envious of their easy life, though more importantly their seeming limitless gold fund. 
There were two in particular Rhuna liked to torment the most. One was in the employee of the local lord's commander of the guards, his second lietentant. 
A dour, hardfaced man, Rhuna had taken an instant dislike to him as he offered the children of the nightime streets coin for the use of them. He had not taken well to Rhuna's refusal, particularly at a slightly increased price, and were it not for the fact that Rhuna had several of the older male members of her group with her, and that he did not wish to get caught by any of the local militia guards, Rhuna believed he would have made an example out of her. 
It was after that incident that Rhuna cut her hair, posing more often than not as a male. However, second lietentant Deluruth was, ever after that, a favourite on her list for pranks. 
The other member to join Deluruth was the ex-mage come priest Aeselrune. Aeselrune was on a mission to cure all the "sinfulness" from the poorer quarter, particularly that of the children. 
The sinfulness, he claimed, was why the Amani did not give up their raiding. Utterly fanatical as he was, Rhuna delighted in shocking him to complete silence time and time again. The more he tried to save her soul, the more determined Rhuna became to keep her crude and crass ways. 
It was when she was about 17 that Rhuna ran into the local lord's son. 
Rhuna, a favourite of a few of the soldiers for her unseeming behaviour and sheer cheek often drank late into the night with them, never as drunk as she seemed (though still relatively drunk). 
Caeselwynn, 27ish at the time and her second, was never far from her side along with a few of her group scattered here and there. 
Rhuna found that the soldiers had a good source of knowledge, and the inn was a great place for gossip and to pick up future jobs. 
She rarely posed as a boy anymore in public, having the confidence in her abilities and protection of her group. That she reserved for her "work" and as such, the female Rhuna and her older "cousin" Caeselwynn were often seen at the inn, her other identity protected.
Rhuna and local lord's son became close childhood friends. Rhuna seemed to provide comfort from his overbearing father and the disappointment and failure he felt he was in his father's eyes. She could always manage to get a smile from his lips at her various antics. 
It was his influence that got her learning to read and write, in exchange for him teaching her a soldier's training. She in turn taught him the rundaments of street brawling, even pick-pocketing, though he was never very good at it, often returning the stolen item/gold when he did manage a successful grab, claiming to have seen the elf drop it in the street, much to Rhuna's disgust. 
A game soon developed between them, he always trying to get Rhuna a "decent" job and she always managing to get herself thrown out. 
He used his influence to gain her the first position as maid to a minor cousin's cousin of his at the keep itself. Rhuna, obligated to go through with it because of this, never-the-less managed to keep the job a mere week before she was given a weeks wage in advance and told to leave. 
Rhuna it seemed, had been teaching the impressionable 16 year old where to knife a male should his advances not be wanted.
This continued for several years, as he had a slight stubborn streak refusing to give up, and got her a job as cook's help in the kitchens of the keep. This she kept slightly longer, until one of her pranks misfired, and instead of the dour Deluruth being covered in chicken guts, gore and feathers, it seemed he and the unfortunate lady he was escorting to the celebration both got caught in the down pour. While it could never be proven, Rhuna never-the-less got told not to come back the next day. 
It seemed the cook had got a tongue lashing from the local lord, whose father the lady in question had been rather insulted by the lord's hospitality, the incident ruining the lady's reputation for several months and the cook, assuming rightly Rhuna was to blame told her in distinct terms never to return.
It became a local joke in her group as to what job Rhuna would next be forced into and bets were placed on what it was to how long Rhuna would last. 
Some Rhuna dragged, ensuring her own betting terms were met, before she would get spectacularly disgraced and told never to return. 
In the end, Rhuna proved that she was never going to be totally "civilized" to a lord's standards, however the games between the two continued out of sheer amusement and friendly competition between the two.
As the years progressed and Rhuna gained more notoriority for her "real" profession, the time came when Rhuna, for all her careful preplanning, was outmanovered, and the gang stole a sizeable amount from the leader of the guild of thieves himself. Whether this was a set up to ensnare Rhuna and her influence, is debatable, never-the-less it was a good two months before the error was realised and by then it was too late to retract half the funds spent. 
Rhuna did what she could to minimize the damage and moved as many out of harms way as she could. Only Caes and three others, remained with her to bare the consequences and when they were all visited one night in their beds, they did not fight, merely standing and following silently, accepting for now to conserve their energies. 
It was here the five were given the choice to join with the thieves guild or to chose the limb they would lose first, and the subsequent ones each week as they failed to pay back the amount plus the 10% interest owed. Essentially, it was no choice at all, and all five agreed to join, swearing their allegence to the guild. 
Rhuna, suspecting all five of them would not return had already made arrangements for her old group, promoting Requilla as her replacement, knew her old group would be alright.
The only outward change in Rhuna from her involvement into the official theives guild, was that she was slightly more guarded and secretive than before, otherwise there was no other major change. 
Rhuna and Caes kept their alternative identities at the inn, finding it even more useful in their profession, both moving rather swiftly up the ranks. Ruinlith and Caeselwynn were soon the only two left of the five that had joined the thieves guild (One having been discovered by two mages to have developed latent arcane abilities and wisked off the street then and there for training, the other two joining the Army itself once their debts had been settled). 
A mere 40 years passed when Caeselwynn gained leadership of the theives guild, Rhuna at his side. Caes, surprised that Rhuna had not challenged the leadership, decided to challenge it himself. Rhuna backed him as second in his bid. 
While Rhuna desired the leadership role, she still had not forgotten her eight year old promise, and the Amani threat. With Caes as leader, Rhuna was able to take on jobs that required long absences without worrying about her position as leader of the guild of thieves. 
Both her and Caes had talked long into the night about spying missions and retrival of elven prisoners from the Amani. Caes having also lost his family to Amani raiders. 
Several years passed before this dream was realised and Rhuna set up her own unique unit for the purpose of gaining Amani intelligence, which Caes, enough of a rogue, still sold back to the local authorities, though not anything near he could have gotten. 
While the farstriders, and local authorities did have their own scouts, Rhuna's often times reckless audacity got her the information most scouts could not in a week. 
As her success with the lone Amani scouts, messengers and small raiding groups gained, so too did her cockiness. Eventually, Caes, seeing her hotheadedness and unable to curb it, fearing the recklessness would get not only her killed but also the people working with her as well, made a decision, and had her confined for her own good. Seething, Rhuna eventually escaped and determined to prove her point, went out alone against the Amani. She spent five years out on the field against the Amani alone, often coming close to death herself but somehow managing not to be killed, taking on no more than one or two lone Amani at most, but mainly just hounding the enemy from the fringes, careful not to be seen, gaining what information she could and sending it back to Caes via untraceable sources. 
It was not until she was frustrated, feeling she was making not making any substancial difference, that she blundered and was captured by the Amani. Were it not for the luck of the farstriders attacking that particular raid group, she would have been killed. 
Rhuna, assumed to have been captured from one of the border towns, was released without a repremand into the care of the local priest, her wounds tended. Never one to take orders and unable to take her welling despair at the overwhelming enemy and her lack of achievement, Rhuna hobbled down to the inn where she so often had hung out five years prior to drown her sorrows. 
It was here that Caes and the lord's son found her once again. After a serious reprimand from the lordling, and Rhuna's subsequent pert response, the tension was broken and the three drank well into the night catching up, Rhuna finally smiling again since the five years she had been absent.
Much later after the lordling had left, Caes and Rhuna caught up themselves, Caes filling Rhuna in on the going ons of the guild of thieves. Caes, had been overly concerned for Rhuna, and had turned the guild of thieves over to Aegsen, in order to search and try to talk some sense into her. For a full two years he searched, unable to locate her, finally giving up, and returning to the guild of thieves, but not taking back the leadership, instead content with a position of authority under Aegsen. 
As the night wore on, it became evident there was more between Caes and Rhuna than friendship and the two became closer while still keeping things on the outside as if nothing had changed. Caes, knowing Rhuna for a free spirit did not push her, allowing things to develop as they would.
When lordling came with the news of his recruitment into the army and his moving to the city centre for training, Rhuna's promise again rang in her ears. Caes, seeing a familiar if slightly less than usual recklessness in her eyes, gripped her arm tight fearfully however, the it did not go unnoticed by their third friend and between them managed to gain an ambiguious promise that Rhuna was honour-bond to obey if only until she found a means of getting around it. The three organised a private send-off at the inn for their friend's last night.
Rhuna rejoined the thieves guild shortly after, and resumed working with their unit against the Amani, this time with more care for the people she was with particularly as Caes was now with her. 
Aegsen had seen benefit in the idea, but more so the profit, which in the end resulted in the unit itself being overtaken my the army and placed in local Farstrider Scout Unit. 
As time wore on, Caes and Rhuna returned to just friendship. Caes, having been injured badly by an Amani raider arrow and forced into retirement with even a bit of land awarded to him for his services, had elected to take on the intelligence position of the city militia, his links to the guild of thieves useful. 
Rhuna remained with the unit, and without either her two close friends' stabilizing influence took a vital risk that almost ended her life. 
Often working alone or in no more than threes, the scouts of the farstriders had high mortality rates due to the recklessness of their job and the intelligence they carried. 
Each scout carried means to ensure that, should they be captured and no longer able to resist torture, the intelligence they carried was not passed on to the enemy. As such, many ended it before they were even captured. 
Rhuna, having risen within the ranks and gained a bit of a reputation for her audacity, was the only one of three assigned scouts that day captured by the Amani. 
Knowing the risks, Rhuna had accepted the job to hound the raiders alone in order to bide time for the other two scouts to relay intelligence of the rather large group of Amani raiders to the two units of farstriders (and thus the rest of the Quel'Thalas army they were attached to) currently situated on either side to the Amani but two days ride away. 
A border elven village lay but a days ride from the enemy raiding party. 
The first day Rhuna managed to hound the Amani, slowing their progress down, disrupting supply lines, spooking the mounts, fouling their water, taking out the odd border scout, etc. 
She continued her relentless hounding, getting more and more desperate as she saw the enemy getting closer towards the village, seeing in her minds eye her own village at age six. 
Abandoning all caution but a few hours into the morning, Rhuna was caught by two enemy scouts as she was finishing a kill of the third. 
Bloody and defiant, she was dragged before the leader of the party, stipped naked and paraded around the camp. She was then tied to a post she was told in a rough mulated Thalassan exactly what was going to be done to her but that if she co-operated a clean, quick death was guarenteed. Knowing it would be a full day before the Army arrived and the village lay but several hours away, Rhuna made a decision and spat in the leaders face. Deciding to break her in himself, she was then violated, but Rhuna knowing what was coming from the scene of her childhood had already steeled herself for the abuse. 
Seeing nothing but a blank reaction and seething contempt in her eyes, the leader angered used her to relieve his frustration, informing his voodoo priests to ensure she did not die and to have her revived within the hour. 
He was determined to gain the intelligence Rhuna possessed. 
Rhuna, coming to finally to the extreme pain of her battered and abused body, pushed aside all her fragile emotional instability and clung to the need to hold up the Amani raiders until the army arrived. Thus she endured the burnings, whippings, intermingled with more violation and finally losing patience, seeing that even his voodoo priest would soon not be able to revive Rhuna, the leader called for his skinning knife. 
It was at this point, Rhuna in a haze of pain, her blood curling scream ringing out across the fields, half-in half-out of conciousness as her skin was being pull from her still living body, that the Quel'Thalas Army arrived, the two units decimating the raiding party between them, taking them totally unawares. 
Rhuna, slumped into unconciousness, woke only once to find the familiar eyes of a childhood friend locked on hers before she passed out again in his arms, surrendering to the pain.
It took Rhuna five full years to fully heal, both her body and her mind. She spent that time mostly within the city centre itself, in the care of Tamir, (a former member of her street gang, and one of the five coerced into joining the thieves guild) and her healer husband Phaylen, whom Rhuna had been in the care of when she was brought in from the border lands by the army. Tamir, recalling Rhuna fondly, took her in when she was too restless to stay any longer at the hospice, her and Phaylen and their small child helping to heal her wounded soul, their happiness and love proving that not all was ugly in the world.
Not wishing to lose her skills, Rhuna trained hard to return her body back to what it once was after so long abed. 
Tamir had done rather well for herself, raising up the ranks to now have a official position as assistant of one of the influencial mages in the order. She tried to teach Rhuna the complexities of court politics, protocols, etc but Rhuna grasped only the bare basics, seeing them as over-the-top and unnecessary. 
Never-the-less, Rhuna surprised herself at the delight of dressing up for a ball or feast that Tamir had insisted on taking her along to, claiming Rhuna as a rough country cousin to excuse her poor table manners. 
During this time, Rhuna lost a little of her negitive authority image, though some of it still was confirmed in her eyes, she gained a slight understanding of the "upper class". 
However, whenever asked about how she liked her induction into the upper class by Tamir and whether her views had changed, Rhuna, her mischieviousness returning, would always confess that she saw it as her personal duty to keep the "upper class" from reaching too high an ego. 
As the five years wore on, her scars healed, Rhuna returned to the border town she called home to spend a few months with Caes, who was still working intelligence for the local militia. Caes made her stay a few more months doing odd bits and pieces for the town, making sure she was completely fit to return to a farstrider unit. 
As her old unit was deep in Amani territory, she was assign to a new unit, and though she seemed stronger than ever, she was relieved not to be constantly surrounded by those who knew her story and the means she had gone to to hold up the Amain raiders from the distruction of the small border village.
((more to come-story still to be edited))
Rhuna continued to fight the Amani for many centuries and until the fall of Quel'Thalas. Rhuna, now Scout-Leader, was deep behind enemy lines when rumours of the news filtered in, and as such, she made her way back as quickly as she could, slaughtering those enemies which crossed her path.
Seeing the distruction and havok of her people and beloved city, Rhuna declared herself a blood elf, again adding to her old scar, promising to avenge and restore her people and lands, a third lighting strike running parallel to the other two high on her inner thigh.
Rhuna was approached soon after by an agent, offering further training within the intelligence of the new Silvermoon City, gearing more towards assassination type work. Rhuna, her belief in the ends justifying the means and deep hatred of betrayal, agreed (especially after the fall of Silvermoon was, in her mind, a result of betrayal). 
The loss of the sunwell has not effected Rhuna as harshly as some, perhaps because of her fierce and stubborn nature. Rhuna, while not uneffected by the loss, never overuses her mana-tapping abilities, seeing the effects of the abuse in the wretched that populate the ruins of Silvermoon.
She is currently in training, her driving desire, the betterment of her people.