Elves

One of the first races of Katelikessar's children to walk the surface of Linnath, to elves belong the highest portions of grace, beauty, and charm. Though in recent years man has come to the fore and pushed the elves back into their forests, the memories of their ancient glory still dwell proudly within this mighty race.

Appearance
Graceful and lithe, it is rare in history to ever hear of an ugly elf. Often sharing a similar height to humans, elves may nevertheless be differentiated by their pointed airs, aloof air, and more angular build.

High elves are the tallest of the elf-children, often towering a foot or so over the tallest man. Their eyes appear narrowed as if in concentration and their cheekbones are far more prominent than those of men. Their skin is often pale and silvery and their hair kept long and silky, it is said that one of the greatest prides of an elf lies in his hair. Often considered by man to be aloof and cold, they take little interest in the matters of other races and remember most vividly the days and ideals of empires past when they could roam the world and control magic better than any mage from the lesser races.

Wood elves by contrast are often shorter than men, and their features are considerably softer than their high elf cousins, with subtle curves to counter the more angular ones of the High Elf. Their skin tones range from chestnut brown to copper and their hair is often kept short in tones resembling the leaves of autumn. The forest dwelling people easily blend in with their wooded surroundings, and it is rare indeed that explorers in their territory would see one of the elusive wood elves before they themselves are spotted.

The less that is said about the Shadow Elves the better, though they had in days past been called the Mountain Elves. But they have been corrupted by wickedness, and today are spoken of more in legend and whispered tones than anything else. Their dwelling lies beneath the surface of Linnath, and it has been said that they most often of any races travel to and find delight in Rassekiletak’s Plane. It is said that their skin is dark as the night, though their hair retains the often silvery or white colours of their ancestors. There are rumours that they have grown massive fangs and prowl about on all fours, ready to rip the throat of any goodly person they come across.

History
=== Origins === The elves were the first servants of Katelikessar to appear upon Linnath, though it was the humans who Katelikessar first revealed himself to. This has led to conflicting beliefs even as to their origin, whether it is from Katelikessar or from the Others whence they come. This has led in recent centuries to the human belief of superiority over the elves, treating them as wicked offspring of the Others, and not fellow children of the goodly Katelikessar.

Whatever their origin, it is generally accepted that the High Elves were the first breed of elf to walk Linnath, for they most resemble the tales of the Others of old. Though the High Elves were the closest to the Others in appearance, they were not spared oppression and slavery, and even today it is the High Elves which hold in most hatred the rule of the Others.

Living perpetually under martial law and occasionally used for experimentation, it is believed that the High Elves were infused with their natural grasp of the arcane by their overlords, whether intentionally or not. This infusion has grown so deep over the generations that it is difficult for a High Elf to live without some use of magic in their lives, some scholars theorizing that if a high elf were to reach adulthood without training, they would wither away under their own arcane power.

Rebellion
But not all elves were content to bide their time and wait for the moment to rebel against the Others. A contingent of High Elves one day took up arms in rebellion and fled the cities, escaping into the heavily wooded countryside and practically vanishing. They did not fight the Others in open fields, but rather secretly and using the mask of the forest to hide themselves.

Being far from the magical cities of the Others, and no longer subject to the relatively easy lifestyle of their fellow Elves, these groups of rebels soon began to lose the prodigious height of their kin, adapting to the life of the forest around them. These would become known as the Wood Elves in the present day.

There were factions of escaped elves who did not counsel fighting the Others, however. Some elves desired nothing more than peace, peace to roam and wander the wilds and forests away from the wicked touch of the Others. This contingent became known as the Wild Elves, completely abandoning the war against the Others and eventually finding what they had hoped for – attunement with nature. They discovered a pantheon of beings who spoke with them, telling them of worlds long passed.

No one knows the origin of these beings or who was around to worship them, and the Wild Elves had no interest in finding out. They would adopt the ways of the animals and plants to an extent unknown even to the Wood Elves, becoming less mortal and more fey. Today the Wild Elves are rarely heard from, but they are known to live in the Wilds. They are said to perform bizarre rituals honoring their strange deities from ages which seem to have never existed.

The last of the elven races were the Mountain Elves. Like the Wild Elves, they stemmed from the Wood Elves; unlike the Wild Elves, they adapted to a new environment instead of delving deeper into the woods. These elves realized the strategic advantages offered by the mountains – veritable fortresses which offered the high ground to whoever was willing to take it. Using the mountains as their new home, the new elves continued the fight with the others, allowing for flaking attacks from armies coming from both the forests and the hills.

Eventually, the combination of the Wood Elves and the Mountain Elves were enough to liberate the High Elves and even, through the intercession of Katelikessar, all of Linnath from the rule of the Others. The three elven races were able to exile the Others and create a new empire: The Silver Woods.

The Separation
This new empire was much hated by the Others, who did everything in their power to destroy it. Of all the curses, plagues, and monsters sent by the Others, the most successful by far was the Separation. Realizing, like the elves had decades before, that direct attacks were ineffectual, the Others attempted their own style of guerrilla warfare, giving the Mountain Elves a sinister parting gift.

The Shadow Elves would discover a new mineral from the depths of the earth – Glimmerstone – which had veins of solidified ley energy within it. This allowed them to access other worlds with ease, communicating with alien beings who promised them power. Always the weakest of the clans of elves (with a few exceptions), they were seduced by the promise of power, and convinced that they were now just being oppressed again, this time by the other elves and Katelikessar. They demanded more from their cousin races, more than was possible to give; so it was decided to take it instead. A civil war broke out, with the Shadow Elves outnumbered and out powered by the High and Wood Elves who drove them underground, where they remain to this day.

It is unclear why the Others didn’t capitalize on this chaos and enforce their will upon the elves once more, but there is speculation that the Wild Elves pushed the Others further from Linnath, with the help of their mysterious Old Gods. Whatever the reasoning behind it, the Others have not harmed the elves – nor any other race – since their final, bitter victory.

Golden Age of Elves
The chaos and harm of the Separation did not have the lasting impact the Others had hoped though, and soon enough Elven society began to grow unified and powerful once more. Ever since the exile of the Others, dragons had descended from the North; once fearful of the Others’ power, these terrible beings were intent on claiming what they believed to be theirs – everything. Time and time again, dragons would arrive to terrify a city and loot it for riches; time and time again, a hero of the elves would step forward to defeat them. One of these heroes, Noonfaddle Brightburst, even created a new race in his adventures fighting a dragon kabal.

Despite the threat of the dragons, elven society became richer, grander, and more magnificent in every way as the years went on. Magic reached new heights (many known spells originated from this period) and all of Linnath profited from the success of a new, goodly race to rule over it.

One change that would affect the elves drastically, however, was the arrival of the dwarves. When they had cast their traitorous kin into the depths of the world from their vast heights, the elves had left the mountains, having no interest to re-live painful memories of betrayal and friendship turned sour. This had tacitly invited an infestation of other beings – orcs, goblinoids, and the like – to take up residence in the undefended mountains. Septark redeemed one of the deep races in order to fight this growing menace, and thus the dwarves stepped foot on Linnath.

The Beginning of the End
This was certainly a shock for the elves, who were now wary of any race claiming to dwell within the mountains which had ruined their cousins the Dark Elves, mountains which they had grown to view as almost supernaturally evil. Eventually the two races came to an uneasy truce and the elven empire went on mostly undisturbed. The true descent of the elves’ society would not come until the arrival of humans in Linnath.

Humans were created quickly, without the subtlety of the elves or the dwarves. They gradually overthrew the elves politically, gaining more and more territory. They originated where Cziskilamonia would be founded, and quickly spread out to claim dominion over the lands of Linnath. For within humans resided something which was not found even in the most passionate of elves, Katelikessar’s Flame. This gave them a passion, drive, and desire which was all the more increased by their short lifespan. To them was given a drive to impress their will upon the world far exceeding that of the elf’s, and with this determination came many surprising victories and advancements.

First they headed east, becoming the desert dwelling Wransians, whose land was gained easily – elves care little for sand and heat. The islands of Savice were similarly uninhabited by the elves. Bourlés, however, took much more time to form, gradually outnumbering the elves and winning land by concession and conquest.

It was around this time that Katelikessar revealed himself to the world personally. This led to the meteoric rise of Cziskilamonia and the Katellikessan Church.

The Second Separation
All of this was until Linden Telperiath, the queen of the Silver Woods, had had enough. She hated the compromises that she had to make with the humans of Bourlés and Cziskilamonia, and desired to regain the land lost to her people. She became more and more power hungry and cruel, until a group of elven heroes were forced to take matters into their own hands, slaying the queen and splitting the elven people into two kingdoms; the Red Woods for the Wood Elves and the White Woods for the High Elves.

After this time, the elven kingdoms only gave more and more land to the humans of Bourlés and Csiskilamonia until the effective destruction of both the Woods as governmental structures in the Sacterram Conquests. The buildup to this event included the slandering of the elven race, with stereotypes of elves forming and evolving to paint them as the enemies of humans and gods. As a result of this racism, elves are treated as second-class citizens and even outright enemies of the state in Sancterram, though Bourlés does its best to protect its allies, especially in the Red Woods.

The time of elves, it seems, is over. It is unclear where the path of this once mighty race will go, but it is clear that elven society will never again reach the heights of its Golden Age.

Abilities and Traits
Being one of the oldest races on Linnath, elves have an attunement to the world which gives them a variety of abilities. In High Elves this manifests as an aptitude for and understanding of  magic that comes to them almost as easily as breathing.

Wood Elves, in contrast, are more in touch with the physical world around them, granting them impressive capabilities for stealth, survival, and moving around a wooded environment. This connection is only heightened in the Wild Elves, who seem to be one with nature themselves, and who learn natural magic as easily as a High Elf would learn arcane magic.

Even the Shadow Elves would never have survived in the cruel underbelly of the earth without their connection to the mountains, caves, and stones which they had loved so fondly in their ancient days.

In addition to these, all elves are able to boast heightened sensibility not just to immaterial realities, but physical ones as well, with sharp hearing, keen sight, and an intricate sense of smell and touch. Elves are also long lived, some reaching ages of 600 or even longer with the aid of magic.

Finally, elves’ minds inhabit a perpetual state which is halfway between the material and immaterial – the dream and the waking world. As such, spells of enchantment have a harder time taking hold, and elves do not require the deep sleep of other races, instead choosing to go deeper into the dream side of their minds for short periods in order to rest.

Culture
Unfortunately, the elven society cultured over thousands of years is currently in a state of near-extinction. Ever since the Sancterram Conquests, more and more of the elven culture has been razed. Elves now live as fugitives, lacking even their traditional art of Bladesinging to defend themselves.

Once, however, the culture of the elves was the culture of Linnath. During the Golden Age of the elves, their art was just as much magic as ink or paint. The elves loved beauty above all else, and knowledge and art were seen as the ultimate methods of seeing beauty. The worst criminals and traitors of elfkind were seen as those who valued other ideals – most notably power – over this beauty.

The architecture of the elves grew into and from the trees of the forest -- with entire towns sometimes being built from a massive tree. These communities were loosely defined, and rarely had walls or boundaries, and the inhabitants were equally open. doors were unheard of in the Silver Woods. The closest that people ever got to closing their doors or windows from the elements or others were curtains, though some more paranoid elves would enchant such curtains to be just as effective, if not more so, more effective than the doors of humans and dwarves.

Because of this love for beauty, elves also have a strong desire to maintain tradition; beauty is defined by the development and growth of the past’s ideas. As such, elves would spend decades learning the ways of their ancestors. During this time (up until at least an individuals’s 100th year) that elf will work as a servant of a noble or similar position in order to help contribute during their studies.

Subraces
High Elves are the most inclined to arcane magic out of all the elves, and are also the group of elves most similar to the Others. Even a young High Elf knows something about magic, and they are able to incorporate it into their lives. They are taller than their cousins – indeed they are even taller than some humans, though more slender. Their skin tends to be paler than a humans, sometimes with a twinge of blue or yellow, and they also grow long hair which tends toward lighter colors.

Wood Elves are an offshoot of the High Elves who grew more in touch with nature than with the arcane. As such, a Wood Elf feels most at home outside of a city – living under the open sky, with the trees as their only walls and the canopy as their only ceiling. They are also able to hide in such environments almost instinctively. In appearance, Wood Elves are somewhat short, slender, and brown or copper skinned, often with a hint of green. Their hair is shorter than their High Elf brethren, and is usually very similar in color to their skin.

Grey Elves, one of the two “lost tribes” of elves, separated from their cousins not long after the overhaul of the Others. Consumed by greed and envy, they were cast into the depths of the earth, where they struggle on to this day. Even slighter than the Wood Elves, the Grey Elves have skin tones true to their name, with hair ranging in neutral tones from black to white. Over the millennia they have spent in exile, they have used magic to permanently augment themselves to better survive in the bowels of the world, resulting in better darkvision, but sensitivity to sunlight, were they to ever see it again.

The Wild Elves are the second of the “lost tribes” of elves. They have a near religious aversion to civilization, and so very little is known of them. Spending years under the tutelage and guidance of the Old Gods, the Wild Elves barely resemble their cousins. Unlike the Wood Elves, who seem to blend into nature, the Wild Elves look as though they emerge from it. With clothing made of leaves and bark and skin that sometimes changes with the seasons, it can be hard to pin down where the Wild Elves end and the fey servants of Sara begin. As such, it is not unheard of to discredit their existence as a misunderstanding of the workings of nature.