Desert Elves

Those Who Raised the Stake

History

History of the Elvenkind

Physical Description

The most often mistaken race for humanity, the Desert Elves are a secluded folk compared to many of the more open-minded of their elven kin. Standing at the average same height for humans, and among the shortest of the other elves, the desert folk are smaller, stouter and less lanky than many of their kind, but this does not equate to an inherent lack of elven traits. Their ears remain as obvious as ever, and their almost supernaturally smooth skin, in no extra part due to the sands, remains as supple as ever, with both pale skinned and darker toffee color variations dotting the population. Their subtle eyes blend with the backdrop of the sands they live in, often coming in colors of brown, orange, and rarely even gold.

Often wearing thin but dense clothing capable of preventing damage from sandstorm exposure, the Desert Elves pride themselves on outfits made of silk, linen and sunbreath, though the latter is now scarce due to the lack of natural deposits available anymore. They pride themselves on wearing much jewelry and coverings embedded with fanciful and shiny metals, seeming almost gaudy to other civilizations where it is merely a form of art to them.

• Common Height:
  • Male: 5'6" - 5'11"
  • Female: 5'4" - 5'10"
• Common Build: Ectomorph, Mesomorph, Endomorph
• Common Eyes: Brown, Orange, Gold
• Common Hair: Brown, Black, Orange, Yellow, Blond
• Common Skin Tone: Pale with brown tint, Dark brown toffee hue.

Culture

Desert elf society was less structured than that of other races, largely consisting of roaming caravans rather than a single united state. These large groups were generally composed of three to five extended families that often formed together to establish temporary communities and then break apart if needed. Moving across the arid wastes the desert elves stop at oases, taking what they can before moving on.

In addition to foraging, desert elves regularly traded with other races, exchanging goods for produce, and vice versa. However, within larger communities and gatherings of desert elves, trade was often made solely through bartering rather than the exchange of currency. While the tradesmen of a caravan may come and go, the core unit in Desert Elf society is the family, which only separates upon marriage or death. Such families often occupied a single caravan train, the size of which varied depending on their own personal statuses.

Far isolated from the vast majority of the land, few Desert Elves knew anything but their native elven tongue and variations thereof. While it is not uncommon for one of their kind to pick up another tongue or two if they venture into the world beyond, their general inexperience with all other languages will often leave them with some near permanent accent roughly denoting their place of origin.

It was customary that desert elves set aside a small portion of their morning meal to burn as an offering to the lost god Sol in hopes that the scalding sun might be satiated and cooled. Water is considered holy, and to spill it upon the sand is considered a slight to the lost god Bahari that must be immediately corrected by salting the dune lest it boil away beneath Sol’s gaze. To do otherwise is considered to have invited misfortune and drought upon yourself and kin.

Once every Quadrianno when the cacti begin to bloom is the date that each desert elven community came together to celebrate their survival and endurance throughout all the horror that the world has hurled at them. When the first blooming cacti is found begins a festival that lasts until their flowers wilt again, where excess and festivities become the norm. Each night during the festival’s course, the collective light of their many lanterns will only be doused with water intermixed with offerings of blood, a reminder of and a ward against the Arid Dragon.

In the sparse and empty deserts of the old world, food was scarce. Though to a roaming caravan of desert elves, this posed little issue. Commonly a caravan would keep preserved meat and fruit as a reserve, though their nomadic lifestyle is complimented by an enhanced digestive system. Countless years of wandering through the sands had left them uniquely adapted to subsistence off the strangest of foods. A desert elf is capable of eating quite almost anything as long as it possesses some semblance of nutrition. In desperate times, some were known to even consume boiled leather.

Permanent settlements among desert elves are rare, though in the past they could be found nested on the fertile banks of rivers, and within the sanctuary of oases. As a largely nomadic people, the majority of desert elves take upon great treks that straddle the continent, stopping at foreign towns and cities to do their trade and craft. These roaming towns of elves can range from great wagon trains as long as city streets, to smaller more amateur trains of overburdened camels.

Faith among the desert elves was a vast and varied thing, but among them a particular interpretation of the fallen pantheon had grown to encompass the religious views of the majority of their race. While as a whole they recognize the existence of the entirety of the fallen gods, Sol and Bahari were worshiped with the greatest reverence. It is often thought that a desert elf’s life rests entirely in the hands of Bahari in whether or not they might have had the water to survive another day, or the rains and flooding necessary to nourish crops. Sol was considered both caring and as well a cruel taskmaster, responsible for whether a community might flourish or burn away beneath the sun’s gaze. Prayers almost entirely consisted of offerings of appeasement to the duo in hopes that they might live and thrive another day. Oklamat also saw a great deal of worship among their kind in hopes that they might face good fortunes and a safe journey. Other gods saw far less devotion and respect. It was not unknown for the occasional heretic cult worshiping the Arid Dragon to arise among the desert elves, but few such groupings lasted very long.

Mechanical Differences

• Mastering the art of sand, Desert elves are capable of, once per stressful scenario, channeling their sandy origin for three turns to create a facsimile of themselves up to 6m away where they can see. These “props” so to speak can only survive a single hit of any kind, but can be manipulated to look and act, but not talk or move, by their original owner, and last either five turns, or until the owner goes out of range of them. If they or their creator are wounded in any way, or the owner leaves a 10m radius around the prop, it will fall back into a pile of sand.

• A Desert Elf is naturally resistant to all poisons and toxins from the desert to the point that they do little to affect them, although this resistance barely alters the potency of substances foreign to them.

• Desert Elves are possessed with not just one pair of eyelids, but two. Beneath their outer eyelid is a second pair of lids that can be operated independently of the first. This membrane is partially transparent, reducing their vision to approximately fifteen feet, but it protects their eyes from the harsh and blowing grains of sand caught within the desert winds, as well as other airborne dangers. This second eyelid works in almost any non-magical terrain, such as snowstorms, dusty caverns, and even darkness.

• The Desert Elves lack the grace of their kin, instead they are only as agile as a human outside of the desert, although they are just as strong in turn no matter where they are. Inside the desert however, the Desert Elves are one tier faster then even their kin.

The Realm of Ephimoria • Beyond the Fracture