Adelliah of the Axe

*Do not read beyond **this point** if you want to avoid being **spoiled!***

*"Glamon, I'll come get you in a second..."* - Adelliah of the Axe

*"If you are an undead monstrous creature summoned by an insane child we will be forced to kill you."* - Adelliah of the Axe

**Adelliah of the Axe** is an elf barbarian and Glamon Desmognathus's friend. She grew up at the circus Glamon ran away to, and served largely as security, specialising in combat with twin axes. Like most Rivelloni elves, she is also cannibalistic, allowing her to glipse the memories of the deceased.

## Biography

### Friend of the Chicken Bard

Adelliah joined Ensatina's group after being invited by Glamon, Ensatina's estranged sister. As she did at the circus, Adelliah helped in providing security, fighting at the inn against the turned infected. Her friend in Ruben, Earlian, was a witness to the fire at the Desmognathus mansion, and corroborated rumours that suggested that Ensatina's aunt, Sashati, had contributed to the near-total destruction of the Desmognathus family.

Later, after reaching a beach near the fisheries where the dead fish were seen, Adelliah found the corpse of a dead fisherman and chose to cannibalise him. She found out that he had been killed by pirates, who were dumping barrels overboard and killed him in a cover-up, the body washing up. Shortly afterwards, she consumed the flesh of another dead person, this time a pirate, for little effect, being distracted by a song she saw the pirates singing in the memory.

After observing the weird fogs apparently generated by the alchemical waste the pirates were dumping offshore, Adelliah told Glamon that although she would have preferred to be paid, she would work for free as her family had been killed by a similar "death fog", though warned Glamon that Ensatina should watch her back if the elder sister continued dismissively addressing Adelliah as "the elf" and scorning her flesh-eating habits.

During the boarding action on Captain Ironhand's ship, Adelliah was initially frustrated by being unable to engage in hand-to-hand due to the clustered battlefield. She joined Ironhand in a fight against an enemy, and was perplexed by the importance he placed on getting a kill. After Glamon inadvertently subverted negotiations to get the pirates to leave and to hand over their orders, Adelliah facepalmed at Glamon's antics. Later, Adelliah managed to blind the pirates using a skill her mother had taught her before drowsily (due to loss of blood) walking up a ladder onto a fighting top, all covered in fire, and promptly briefly dying before being resurrected by Ragnar.

While dying, Adelliah vomited up the contents of her stomach, which could have turned her into a zombie. As she was resurrected by her allies and did not give into the plague urges, she was not turned. Once the crew had defeated the remainder of the pirates, Adelliah rejoiced in the trinkets she managed to loot from them. Adelliah also received an axe from the ship's captain, whom she had struck up a strange friendship with beforehand due to their mutual liking for axes. She considered it the greatest gift anyone had ever given to her, and promised to treasure it.

When the four went in search of Gaius the Alchemist, who had been implicated in getting the pirates to dump the alchemical waste, they ran into a trader, Lindsey von Baal, who offered them a small reward for doing some minor errands and killing some hostile ghouls and to find her cat for her. Adelliah managed to convince Lindsey to up the reward and Lindsey gave them an additional task: to get rid of some "weeds". In truth these were some very dangerous and very hostile magical plant growths, but they were eventually defeated by the group; Adelliah nearly managed to alert the ghouls before they were ready to fight due to her lack of subtlety, but Glamon pulled her away in time. Lindsey's cat was found, albeit affected by the alchemical waste, and returned. While getting the reward from Lindsey, Adelliah used it to buy books to refine some of the skills her mother taught her (including some lightning magic) and to offload the junk she was carrying around, including a painting.

Later when the group ran into the bone creations, Adelliah was immobilised for part of the fight by the bone spider's web, but eventually killed it, having also utilised her blinding skill to disable the spider at one point. Later she reassured Glamon, who was having difficulty coping with the fact that her mistakes had nearly gotten the group killed, reassuring Glamon that everyone made mistakes and had issues coping. Adelliah herself stated she copes with humour, and that while she was not capable of much unlike the rest of her family, she did know how to protect people. When they neared Gaius' house Adelliah was uncertain over whether to kill Gaius or not immediately, in order to get information from him.

After they were warned of elf ambushers ahead by scavenger dogs, Adelliah and the others quickly overcame the group, who turned out to be a male and a female. Adelliah ate the flesh of the dead, learning that a lord's emissary had placed a bounty of 350 per head on them. On eating the second, Adelliah glimpsed part of the elf's memories with a younger elf, potentially family. She was somewhat shaken by this, but stated that it was simply an uncomfortable reminder that they killed someone, but a necessary evil and also kept her grounded.

Adelliah, on entering Gaius' lab, was disgusted by Gaius' actions and treatment of his "pet", David, whom Gaius now kept as a dog of sorts despite David being human with some brain problems that Gaius had simply exacerbated, insisting that Gaius was making Dave suffer for longer rather than put him out of his misery.

Adelliah managed to "persuade" Gaius to give up further info, and after the brief fight initiated by Ensatina's arrival and subsequent attack on Gaius, persuaded him come with them. However, after getting information about the cure, she shoved him in a cabinet and barred the door, threatening him that if they ever saw him again, she would eat him. They then left him in the cabinet as Ensatina burnt the house down, and Gaius was ultimately burnt alive by Ensatina after he managed to escape. Adelliah had no wish to keep Gaius alive, but considered it a point of honour that she would not take part in his death, since she had made a deal with him not to kill him unless she saw him at another time; she had no issues with Ensatina killing him. Adelliah also managed to understand Gaius' notes, but not as well as Ensatina.

### The Elf Barbarian

En route to Carolia, Adelliah sympathised with Ensatina's conflict, frankly discussing with the noble scion about their shared histories as daughters with lost families, and their relationships with Glamon. Adelliah also got drunk on the alcohol onboard the ship.

Arriving in the city, Adelliah stopped some thugs from attacking a lizard beggar. Initially failing to convince the elf among them to leave the thugs, who discriminated against non-humans, Adelliah thumped the leader, "Rizz" Sirius, on the nose causing him to flee. From the beggar they learned that Lord Caligo had not been seen for ages, and that Lady Caligo was mainly administering the town, seeing traders often. Adelliah also tried to speak to some children on the street, to get information from the plague, and was disgusted that the town had no hospital and was annoyed that the children could not give that much useful information.

When the others failed to get some cheese from Branderson Goudamaster, they stumbled into a garden with chickens in. It transpired that their owner, Ilia Redcloth, was Lady Caligo's handmaid, and Ensatina attempted to get Adelliah to impersonate her, which she stringently refused to do, as she believed it to be impractical and that she wouldn't have her axes. Ensatina took the others to the castle, where Adelliah and the others agreed that if Ensatina was arrested, they would pretend to be her bounty hunters. Ultimately, Ensatina bribed their way in and they snuck in the castle, Adelliah helping the others kill Lady Caligo when she turned hostile.

Glamon had encountered Lord Caligo's creepy daughter, Esmerelda Caligo, who disappeared and spoke to the others. When Adelliah tried to speak to Esmerelda, she did not respond, though at one point Esmerelda mentioned that she knew Adelliah's mother. In the basement annex to the old castle, the Firestarters found the corpses of dead magisters, and Adelliah ate them to find out that the magisters were planning on arresting a local lord for misuse of Source. It was clear that Lord Caligo was involved, and when Glamon was uncertain about it Adelliah reminded her that the circus could never return if they left now. Ensatina secured entry to the hall for them, but Adelliah was unhappy to surrender her axes when Ensatina told them to drop their weapons in order to be escorted away to the dungeon to find a cure for Esmerelda.

When they were forced to break out due to the cell filling with blood, Adelliah did very little as all of her gear had been seized; when she did join the fight against Captain Octarus, she detonated a barrel destroying some of their gear and many of Ragnar's grenades. Glamon then opened a door revealing a torturer in some metal BDSM outfit and a flesh golem, to Adelliah's dismay. After killing them and a Blood Beast that had appeared from their former cell, they encountered a woman and a male Lizard, Belladonna Young and Portnoy Godfrey, in a cell who asked to be let out. Adelliah explained to them what they were doing, advising them against joining them to kill Lord Caligo, but they joined regardless, Adelliah giving them bread they ravenously ate.

Returning to the throne room, Adelliah killed Artur Caligo and helped in killing Lance and Lord Caligo, cheering when Glamon appeared to turn Lord Caligo into a chicken and stabbed him to death, only to facepalm when Glamon accidentally turned Ragnar's cat into a chicken but still killed the human Lord Caligo. From Caligo's books Adelliah refined some skills her mother taught her. After escorting the kitchen staff, Belladonna, Portnoy and Scholar Gilcrease out of the castle via the sewers, which despite the beggars' warnings did not have large rats in them, Adelliah conversed with Glamon and Ragnar in the marketplace while Ensatina went off to haggle, assuring Glamon that Ensatina still wanted the best for Glamon, just that Ensatina thought that what was best for Glamon wasn't what Glamon wanted. Ensatina returned with more spellbooks for them to study.

Despite Adelliah's advice to hire some horses and to ride around the Whispering Wood to pursue Esmerelda to the Source mine she fled to, they went through it on foot. Adelliah stumbled into a lupine nightmare, some multi-headed massive wolf-creature with armour that could teleport and turn invisible, but it was quickly finished off by Ensatina; they encountered other void-touched animals that were also easily slain.

## Physical description

### Gender

Female

*"I mean I'm sure we'll be back... I'll make [Glamon come back]."* - Adelliah of the Axe

In the bottom of the mine they faced down the Source-infused form of Esmerelda Caligo, who summoned many elementals as allies that Adelliah fought to keep their attention off the others who attacked Esmerelda. When the Source-infused form was destroyed, Adelliah teleported the human form of Esmerelda that appeared in its place out of the fire that now coated the mine floor. When they spoke to her it was clear that the demon thing inhabiting Esmerelda was still there, and after some struggling Adelliah managed to grab Esmerelda and hold her in her arms to stop her from escaping. After some prevarication and taunting from Esmerelda, Glamon slit the girl's throat, and they helped Ensatina collect her blood to make a cure. Afterwards, Adelliah mentioned that they had no reason to trust the demon as Ensatina confirmed that Esmerelda was already undead beforehand.

As the Desmognathus sisters tearfully embraced, Glamon also hugged Adelliah, acknowledging her and the circus as part of her family too, and that the elf was her second-favourite circus member after herself.

Adelliah ended the journey without title or revenge, as Ensatina had sought, nor wealth, as Ragnar had sought, nor family and recongition, as Glamon had sought. Yet she had asked for none of these things, and had expected no payment either. While she had profited from the amount of loot she had carried out of the Source mine, Adelliah had started expecting nothing in the way of payment anyway. Adelliah would leave the others to check on her own family, with Glamon choosing to join her, Ensatina having to rebuild Epidicae, and Ragnar entering retirement. Before they left Ruben Adelliah ensured Ensatina that they'd be back, regardless.

## Personality and traits

*"I see him, I wanna stab him, I don't like him..."* - Adelliah of the Axe

Brusque, short-tempered and vocal, Adelliah was raised in some degree of poverty by her late mother, who was skilled at wind magic, at a travelling circus. Not particularly skilled at anything that made employ at the circus certain, Adelliah chose to stay out of a desire for companionship and community. When she grew up she served as security for the travelling circus. Her family was apparently killed by a "deathfog"; her mother at one point "got around a bit". Adelliah regretted not learning more from her father, but learnt the ability to glow brightly and to blind her opponents; as it was learned from her mother while her mother was a circus performer, she pirouettes while doing so.

She had some internal conflict between the expected combat style of an elf - archery and daggers - and her preferance to get in close and personal and see a foe die. Thus, she prefers the use of twin axes in combat. However, being quite practical, Adelliah has learnt some magic by herself and can use some magic in combat, though some of the magic were refinements of things her mother taught her. Adelliah is also quite protective of her axes.

As a Rivelloni elf Adelliah can on occasion glipse the memories of the dead by eating their flesh, which she has done before to regard herself as a bit of a connisseur. However, she does have a degree of self-preservation regarding this, and is reluctant to eat questionable flesh (having some experience in eating chemically and magically-contaminated flesh). She is also aware that it is quite frowned upon in society and is sensitive about the matter. She is prone to twitching and making exclamations while experiencing others' memories.

Adelliah is a close companion to Glamon, and arguably a closer sister-like figure than Ensatina, and often responsible for trying to get Glamon out of trouble from her antics. She has become somewhat desensitised to this, facepalming when Glamon's failed attempt to steal orders from the pirate captain resulted in Glamon losing her invisibility right behind the pirates and getting spotted immediately.

Adelliah, having grown up in relative poverty, had a great deal of sympathy towards the disenfranchised and a great deal of dislike towards the haughty and the discriminatory, having initially disliked Ensatina for this reason. She displayed these qualities a number of times throughout her journey with the Firestarters, but also had a strong sense of justice in stopping those responsible for the plague.