Anodyne

### Relatives

Lorn Domenach (Grandfather, Deceased), Caligo Domenach (Father, Deceased), Embla Dothlainn (Mother, Presumed Alive), Skamos (Older Brother, Deceased), Lagos (Older Brother, Alive, Head of House Domenach)

## Appearances

### Debut

https://eceros.fandom.com/wiki/Session\_1

# Biography

Per tradition, Lorn Domenach, brother to Lorian and a renowned veteran known for many great feats of combat, passed his seat as head of House Domenach to his son, Caligo Domenach, on the day of Caligo’s wedding to Embla Dothlainn, the daughter of one of House Domenach’s strongest elven vassal Houses. Caligo and Embla soon had children, two sons, Skamos and Lagos, and one daughter named Ea, before she returned to House Dothlainn to manage affairs between the two houses, as well as for her own comfort, as the lives of men and elves differ greatly, and Embla found little comfort in Eldrholm.

Though not traditional for many Wellduunian houses and without a mother to guide her care, Lorn Domenach insisted his granddaughter receive the same education as his grandsons, which he often personally oversaw. Just as he did with Skamos and Lagos, Lorn often took Ea for long treks into the mountains of the southern reaches, and taught her everything he knew of survival, battle, philosophy, history, and Wellduunian culture, as well as training her in various fighting styles. Ea was fascinated by the stories her grandfather told, and was often awed as he recounted the many great feats of strength and combat that he was well known for throughout the southern reaches. The pair often favored a mountainside hollow that allowed for comfortable celestial viewing. The stars and heavens in particular had always been an important facet of southern Wellduunian culture, and Lorn passed his reverence for the guiding light of the heavens and Procyon onto his granddaughter. As she grew, Ea began to share the resolute and unyielding, yet caring demeanor of her grandfather, and the two became close friends as she grew.

For her 15th birthday, Lorn forged what became Ea’s first weapon, the war-hammer Jökullbrot, emblazoned with the Holy Symbol of Procyon. He was also present for her first hunt, where the half-elf child slew a giant mountain goat, whose horns Lorn had fashioned into a hair ornament that she still wears in her hair. On her 18th birthday, atop the highest peak near Eldrholm, per tradition, Ea took her chosen name, Anodyne, with her father and grandfather as witnesses.

Just over 5 years ago, Anodyne’s grandfather, father, and brothers left on a two month-long hunting trip deep into the southern reaches. Lorn’s health was beginning to decline, and Caligo felt it was fitting his father have one last great hunt to remember. At first, Anodyne protested having to stay at Eldrholm with her mother, but her grandfather explained that it was his intention to leave her at Eldrholm during the hunt in order for Anodyne to gain leadership experience. It was no secret that Lorn favored Anodyne, and thought her best fit to be High Seat of House Domenach, or even follow in his brother’s footsteps as High Commander one day. He quietly lamented that Anodyne had been third child, though she did not greatly desire either the house seat or the title of High Commander. Regardless, Anodyne gladly set herself to the task of serving her people as best as she could in her father and grandfather’s absence, even providing some healing to injured or sick as a newly dedicated Paladin. Two months passed quickly and Anodyne learned much, and even gained some respect as a leader from her leigemen.

However, after a week passed beyond when the hunting party should have returned, search patrols were sent to find them. Finally, cries rang out signaling their return, but some lingering fear still twisted in her gut, and Anodyne did not rejoice. When a disheveled Lagos came into view riding her father’s horse, clothes and cloak torn and frozen hard with mud and old blood, and leading a covered wagon, Anodyne knew her fears to be true.

To those present in the great hall, the shell-shocked Lagos spun a frightful story. He spoke of their party being hunted by a pack of direwolves nearly a month into their trip. Lorn, Caligo and Skamos were able to slay three, and Lagos told of his luck in getting one of the creatures through the eye with his bow as it leapt upon him. Lorn and Caligo had lost their lives in the effort, kept awake for days on ends by the werewolves, and fighting off relentless hit-and-run strikes, slowly taking more and more wounds until they each fell. He told of how Skamos felled a werewolf in their first attack, but in his haste, both he and the wolf fell into a ravine, and his legs were deadened by a blow to his back upon landing. Skamos remained alive but unconscious for many days afterwards, but died a few weeks later.

Anodyne sat in her father’s seat in House Domenach’s dining hall, listening to Lagos, and growing more and more frustrated as he spun lies. Lagos always had been the most intelligent of the three siblings, and his story was lavish with detail, but Anodyne and Lagos had been both closest in age and as siblings, and she knew he was not speaking the whole truth. When Lagos finally requested to be taken to his chamber to rest, he sagged in her arms and told Anodyne what had truly happened. There had been no direwolves at all hunting them. In fact, there had been no outside threats at all. There had only been Lorn, their grandfather.

Lorn had grown stranger and more distant in the past year, something Anodyne had attributed to his old age and the many wounds he had taken during his 30 years as High Commander of Wellduun. Lagos claimed that almost as soon as they set out, Lorn began to act unusually, muttering to himself late into the night, sometimes not sleeping at all. If he was ever interrupted in these moments, he would fly into a rage. Just over three weeks in, Caligo successfully convinced his aged father to turn back for his own sake during an increasingly rare moment of lucidity.

During that night, Lagos woke to the sound of screaming as Skamos was dragged from his tent. Lagos lept from his tent to see Lorn, crazed and roaring inhumanly, hurl Skamos across the camp with inhuman strength, breaking his body against a tree. Lorn then spun on Lagos, baring his teeth and racing toward him. However, Caligo lept upon Lorn, who howled in rage as his own son struck fiercely with blade and shield in hand, dealing what would have been fatal blows to any mortal man. As Lagos watched, paralyzed momentarily by shock and fear, he saw how his grandfather’s body had twisted and changed. Lengthened limbs and a nearly bestial face made clear that Lorn Domenach was afflicted with lycanthropy, a much feared curse that plagues the deep wilds of Wellduun. As Caligo fended the creature away, Lagos regained his senses and was able to let fly an arrow into its side until a mighty swipe shattered Caligo’s shield, sending him tumbling backwards. Then, with one last furious, wounded howl, Lorn fled into the night. Lagos and Caligo built a sled for the unconscious Skamos as quickly as possible, though Caligo’s shield arm had been badly broken, and it didn’t take long for signs of infection to set in. Knowing what laid in waiting nearby, Caligo and Lagos hitched Skamos’s sled to their horses and fled back toward Eldrholm as quickly as possible. In a week, Caligo’s infection caused him to join Skamos on the sled. Three days after that, he was dead.

Lagos finally arrived, barely conscious, at a farm on the distant edges of Mt. Islogi. He was told by the farmer when he awoke that he had slept for 4 days, and that Skamos had died the previous night. Lagos paid the farmer for his help and one of the farmer’s cart and journeyed further towards Eldrholm before being found by a search party, painfully aware his grandfather had continued to stalk him as he climbed the mountain. Finally done with his story, Lagos pleaded with Anodyne to find Lorn before he killed again, but she needed no convincing, and already knew where Lorn would be.

With Jökullbrot and some improvised fire bombs in hand, Anodyne set out alone to face her grandfather. With sadness in her heart, she recalled knew camping spot Lorn had favored when Anidyne was a small child, where he had told her tale after tale, and had imparted the wisdom of the guiding heavens. As she climbed the familiar path toward their favored clearing, Anodyne paused briefly, taking in the sky, shimmering with aurora. She noticed as she walked, that the stars seemed to be guiding her, as Lorn always told her they would.

In that moment, the lashing wind and biting snowfall suddenly ceased, and a presence surrounded her, bearing down with impossible weight. Anodyne collapsed to her knees, and panic rang sharp in her mind as she saw that the familiar forest and mountains were gone, and only thick green-tinged ice stretched around her in all directions beneath a dark, nebulous sky. Before she could gain her bearings, the ice beneath her abruptly fractured, a deep, warbling boom resonating ominously as though she knelt on the frozen surface of a great, bottomless lake. Unable to scramble back, the fracture rapidly grew before her, opening not to frigid water, but to absolute abyss. Both terrified and curious, Anodyne extended a hand toward the abyss, and stardust erupted from her fingertips, flowing into complex luminescent shapes until a creature that defies reality formed before her. The being took on a humanoid shape, with pale, unnaturally drawn skin and a knot of what looks like mangled tree roots where features might be. From where its fingers might be, the inky abyss flows steadily, ever-consuming the world around it. The figure then spoke to Anodyne, who still knelt, frozen in fear. A soft, androgynous voice filtered into her mind. It  told Anodyne that it has observed her righteousness and kindness, and that it is a being of starlight, held earthbound by evil forces. It gave her a name - Xephtis, and offered a gift in exchange for a promise to help it return to its home among the stars. Awestruck by the being before her, Anodyne accepted the offer. Tendrils of darkness spread from its limbs, wreathing Anodyne and her warhammer with the energy of burning starlight.

Surrounded by light and darkness, Anodyne’s vision faded, leaving her once again in the wintry mountainside forest. The great, frozen lake, alien sky, and the being had all disappeared entirely, but wisps of starlight emanated from Jökullbrot a moment longer, and Anodyne felt her body and senses invigorated with power.

Now strengthened by her pact, Anodyne felt as prepared as she could be, but, having arrived at the memory-laden hollow, the sight Lorn’s twisted lycanthrope form shocked her. Still, Anodyne hesitated for only a moment, channeling a rush of strange magic, sprinted forward to strike the creature, causing it to shriek in pain and leap away. A thunderous boom then erupted, harming it further. Disoriented, it hesitated for one moment to long, and a well-placed firebomb set alight coarse fur, the night suddenly dominated by firelight reflected off of falling snow. Anodyne swiftly dodged, treating the creature’s mighty claws as she would swinging halberds, deftly intercepting a wild swing with a strike of her own before dodging inside the creature’s reach. Blinded by the flames, Lorn could not track her motion well, and in a series of precise, heavy blows from Jökullbrot, Anodyne sent her grandfather sprawling to the ground, where his still-burning form laid unmoving. As Anodyne waited for her grandfather to burn, she beseeched the stars to guide his spirit to the world beyond, and wept.

Anodyne understood Lorn’s lycanthrope affliction had to remain secret, as it would forever tarnish the image and honorable reputation of House Domenach. The strength gained from Lycanthropy was likely what allowed Lorn to rule as High Commander for such an unusually long time. As Lagos assumed his rightful position as leader of House Damorach by petition of all vassal houses, Anodyne fled her home and travelled for the first time across Wellduun, bearing witness to the harsh conditions faced by the common people under the dictatorship of the High Commander.

Slowly, Anodyne began to despise what she saw throughout her nation. She began to see the deep flaws in the system that forced her beloved grandfather to accept lycanthropy in order to rule in his vision, a vision of peace and prosperity over endless war. Infuriated over her loss and the suffering of Wellduun, Anodyne participated in the competition at the Quinquennial Festival. Unfortunately, she was wholly defeated and greatly wounded in the tournament. Utterly dejected and enervated by her wounds, Anodyne wandered aimlessly, receiving no guidance from her patron, or so she thought, until she found herself at the gates of an ancient monastery.

The monastery welcomed her, injured and despondent, and Anodyne slowly recovered physically and mentally, thanks in large part to the conversations she had with a human monk named Ziad. Anodyne would speak with Ziad at great length, and he was patient with her as they broached more and more philosophical topics. When she was well enough, Zaid encouraged her to train in combat with him. When Anodyne could match Zaid in nearly every bout, he extended an offer to her. A place among his organization; an organization founded on the very ideals they had discussed, and that each felt with great fervor. Soon after, Anodyne was welcomed as an agent of the Saladin Protectorate and issued her first mission.