Kele

Kele was the first child of four born to Adejoh Sequoyah, a weaver in the Muani tribe. In a culture where so much of their ability to survive depended on hunting, scavenging, and defending the tribe from marauding orcs, goblins, and gnolls, having multiple children was an anomaly. But even worse was the way her mother yearned to be reunited with civilization. News had spread that the culture south of the forest was bustling with life, and though the subject was taboo, many of the women wanted to rejoin their human counterparts.

Kele grew up with this dilemma constantly looming over her head, constantly wondering if it was truly better to stay here with the tribe or try to rejoin society. To distract herself, Kele made friends with a strong hunter named Adexia, and as the years progressed she realized her feelings for Adexia were serious, and was overjoyed when she finally got up the nerve to ask her if she would father her child and Adexia agreed. Joking about who would father whose child was common in the village where the father had almost no ties, but to Kele this agreement was important, and she wouldn't soon dismiss it.

But Adexia was a warrior, and Kele, while good at tracking animals, was never good with any weapon aside from the sling. And the day came that Adexia was chosen to hunt a camp of orcs that were too close to the village and Kele would have to stay behind. Kele asked Adexia to join her in her tent before she left, and took the opportunity to kiss her and express her love. Adexia promised to return safely and left with the hunting party. None of them returned.

In the coming weeks, Kele was in shock, hardly able to perform her duties for the tribe, and turned to her mother for comfort. Adejoh tried to comfort her daughter by telling her the hunting party was traveling due south, and was over halfway to the settlement. Perhaps they took a detour to reunited with the other humans. Adejoh seemed to think this was comforting, but to Kele this was far from it. If Adexia had rejoined human society, would she have lost favor with Lenmana? Without the blessing of Lenmana, would she be able to return to the village? Would she want to? And would they be allowed to have children?

Unhappy with the comfort of her mother, Kele turned to Panra, a druid and leader of the tribe. She expressed her concerns to Panra, who smiled, saying "there's no easy answer to any of that. Lenmana's blessing is as the green beauty woodlands itself; fleeting, but ever-present; dying, but recreating itself anew. When Adexia returns, she'll have a number of choices to make. And you'll have to make a choice too."

Wait... "when" Adexia returns? Kele plead with Panra to tell if she knew whether or not Adexia would return, and whether or not she was alive and with the settlement. Panra again smiled, and asked how much she would like to know. Kele of course wanted to know everything, and Panra explained to her that if she really wanted to learn all there was to know, she'd have to learn to divine for herself. Kele agreed, and began he study under Panra.

Panra was a wise yet cryptic teacher, seeing in Kele a determination that her tribal sisters did not share. She never outright told anything to Kele, instead extending invitations to Kele to learn everything from experience and with her own initiative. Kele was extremely gifted, and began to master the way of the druid quickly.

Once she had learned to language, Panra took Kele to a druidic meeting somewhere deep in the woods. Kele had never seen so many orcs in one place, nor had she seen an orc that her tribe didn't slaughter. But here she was, with the leader of her tribe, sitting among orcs, goblins, elves, men, firbolgs, and others both humanoid and otherwise of races she had never before witnessed, peacefully and in harmony as they all spoke softly, chanted, sang, and passed among them herbs and incense.

As the night grew early, Panra told Kele "Look, deep into the fire." Kele did so, and the flickering flames turned into a vision, where in an instant she was shown the land from the sea to the village, from the village to the settlement, the deserts to the south, the enormity of the great plateaus to the west, the spots of the forest that intersected with the feywild, and all manner of natural creatures that dwelt there. And then back to her village, which now seemed so small and so remote.

As her consciousness once more drifted back to the real cracking of the flames, Panra patted her on the shoulder. "Kele, all that earth is open. The sea, the land, and the settlements. Your sisters deserve to know what's out there. When the time comes, you should join her, as I once did with Winona, and then tell the people what exactly they've gained and lost by staying in the tribe of Lenmana."

This burden, which exciting to reunite with Adexia, wore heavily on Kele. From her shaman's words, the tribe would split someday soon, and she would be the arbiter of that schism. But some of her sisters already wanted to leave. It was best that they knew all that was out there, and Kele's mission was to bring that information to them.