Avach, warlock of Hlal, Knight of the Order of the Green Fey under the Archfey Oberon, Lord or Stories, The half, The quick, and The undying narrative dying.
As a class, Avach is a Hexblade Warlock, carrying a glaive called “Cembirian” which is tipped with the tooth of Hlal, his warlock Patron, who is a draconic diety to some of the Fey elves.
As an occupation, Avach has been a fighter in the “Green Fey” a host of warriors who fight on behalf of Oberon, protecting the Fey courts and the Feywild from the foul creatures of the settled lands of the ‘ordinary’ folk.
Avach is tall for a half elf. He has light skin, as if accustomed to the night but somewhat tanned by long months in the forest. He moves easily with the directness of swordplay but without the stockiness of a brawler. You see the hint of armor, inconspicuous under an outfit that would suit a forester. He wears a shirt of greenish gray wool and a long dark traveling cloak. From a cord around his neck hangs what looks to be some predator’s long silver incisor. He is half elven: half Eladrin elf and half human, though his father is long forgotten. His mother was Eladrin and raised him in the Feywild in the Court of the Archfey Oberon. His mother was also in the Order of the Green Fey, a hunting party that patrolled the borders of the Feywild to keep out goblins and monsters from the “settled lands” of the normal world.
Avach’s patron is Hlal, who is a draconic deity, a celestial dragon, having the titles(s) Messenger of Asgorath [1] The Jester[2] The Pursued[2] Quicksilver[3] Aspects/Aliases Aasterinian[4] Avachel (male elven manifestation) Hlal (pronounced: /həˈlɑːl/ huh-LAL[6]) was the chaotic good dragon goddess of humor, inventiveness, and pleasure.[4] Of all the dragon gods, she was the most friendly to non-dragons,[2] and her symbol, a single white flame, represented the light of wit.[4] In the Outer Planes she was more commonly known by the name of Aasterinian[4][11] and was often regarded as chaotic neutral in alignment. She was the draconic god Asgorath’s messenger, although she was known for being an unreliable messenger.[1][7] The Jester also had a male aspect known as Avachel or Quicksilver, who featured prominently in elven legends.
As we find Avach…
Avach stepped across the bridge easily, as he had a hundred times before, breathing a sigh of happiness. Behind him was swamp and a muddy road, shimmering as if through a mirage. Before him the lush green grass, tall sycamores and bright purple mushrooms as large as housed, which lined the path back to the camp of the Green Fey.
Avach stepped off the bridge, and walked down to the stream running under the bridge and bent to the wash his face. The water was clear and cold. He gasped at the cold fresh feeling of the feywild cleansing him of the dust, the nearly invisible yet unmistakable taint of settled lands. When he traveled into the settled lands, the thought was always with him that they were ‘settled’ not by people, but ‘settled’ as in they had been stripped and eroded of the wonder and light known in the feywild. The most base elements remained. Such a dirty and desiccated existence they had, Avach thought.
The cold, pure water dripped from his angular elven face. Avach extended his hand. A liquid jet of mercury poured from Avach’s palm. The magical torrent flowed and formed, 3, 6, then 10 feet into a glistening weapon of proven deadliness, a glaive with the pole of pure polish, the three feet of tip was the unmistakable silver tooth of a golden celestial dragon, razor sharp on it’s fore-edge and tip, and serrated along the back. Cembirian it was called, “Tooth of Hlal.” Hlal had gifted the tooth herself, the tooth was that of the celestial dragon goddesses, messenger to Asgorath himself.
Avach could see the streaks of goblin blood along Cembirian’s blade. Avach dipped Cembirian in to the fey stream, then began cleaning the blood and grime of the settled world from her. The pole and the blade were celestial and immortal, but the act of cleaning her was the least service he could offer.
Avach’s mind was as steeped in the liquor of the air of the Feywild, the memories washed into him as tangibly as the goblin blood washed away.
“What do you ask for,” Hlal had asked him, speaking from her nest in the lowest constellation at the end of the evening on the last day of week of celebration in Oberon’s court for the summer solstice. Avach, who had climbed to the top of a mountain to speak to her, replied, “please, I need a weapon, so that I can join Oberon’s host to go fight the goblins who pollute the settled lands, so that I can sing my songs among the others.
“I recognize you. You are Avach. You are my namesake,” Hlal had said, the silver light of the stars twinkling with her laughter, “I praise your fey mother’s humor for while I am everlasting you are ever closer to death, namesake. I should not give you a weapon, for you wish for something which is not for mortals. Oberon’s host of warriors, they fight for the eternal song. When the Green Fey cry the horn and when they drink their feasts, they have done so according to the pattern of ages, repeated as they have done since we elder gods woke them with our dreams. Namesake, you are not one of them. When they perish in battle with the goblins, it is but a sigh in the moment, a coda to the song, a bad dream in the night of a day, and a single element of tension to the grand play, before they reawaken to resume the song and find their victory. You are not a player in that play. From the moment you were born, even now, you grow closer to stillness of a mortal.”
“Such is the curse of the blood of the mortal man that my mother seduced and brought back to the autumn feast, and who died and whose body feeds the brilliant mushrooms,” Avach said, calmly.
“No,” Hlal said, “it is not a curse. It is a nature. It is the nature of stone to not move but to remain. It is the nature of mortals to move but not remain. Such is the structure and the pattern of the song. You waste what little time you have spending regret on that which is eternal.”
“I… I do not regret. I wish to join them. If it is not my part to survive the coda then I should sing small piece of the song, even if I am not a true player. It… it makes my heart yearn to hear the Green Fey tell their exploits while I must wait each time they cross the bridge to sing the song with their blades. I see Oberon walk at the head of his host… and I feel pride, but I also feel… longing.”
“Such is your mortal blood seeing the fey and knowing what they lost when they settled,” Hlal said. She laughed. The laugh of a celestial dragon is the sound of lightning striking beyond the reach of sight and echoing across the loving and unforgiving ocean of the stars.
“Why do you laugh at me,” Avach asked, not without the lilt of Fey humor, “is it because my father’s blood came from the banks of the Shel’t in the settled?”
Hlal smiled at Avach at this, “In your question, you said two things incorrectly. One thing you know to be false. One thing you know not at all. Tell me the first, and I will tell you the second”
“A riddle,” Avach said.
“I would not have taught my children riddles if I did not love them myself. Those first thousands of millenia, you cannot imagine how many forgotten riddles we wove.”
Avach looked up at the stars, pensive as the airs of celebration wafted up the mountainside from Green Fey’s camp far below.
“The first part of the riddle,” Avach said, the wrinkle of his mother’s grin appearing at the corner of his mouth, “That thing I know to the be false… I know that you do not laugh at me because of my father. You laugh of me… because of my ruse. You read me and knew that I was aware that I am not… not truly… equal of Oberon’s kin. And that I sought you for another reason.
Hlal chuckled and Avach in that moment felt the warmness of the starlight, “go on,” she said.
“You know that I sought you, Mistress Hlal, because you are our goddess of humor, of pleasure of being sly, of the pleasure of inventiveness. If anyone might know, how I might join the hunt, it would be you, my Mistress.”
Hlal nodded, “this is true. Your soul was appropriately sly and so I take it as a compliment that you attempted to… twist things. And I take it as respect when you know that I see through you, namesake. So shall I call you… quick.”
“Can you tell me then, Mistress, how might I join the hunt of the Green Fey?”
“Yes, though… do you wish to guess at the second part of the riddle? Before I tell you… as promised?”
Avach’s brow furrowed, “My statement… something that I did not know was false? I already said that I knew that you did not laugh at me because my father was born along the river Shel’t on a muddy bank in the Shel’t.
“Yes, my namesake. The ruse was false, but the premise was false as well. Your father was not born on the banks of the Shel’t. Your father was not born in that branch of the settled at all.” Hlal said.
Avach opened his eyes wide, as common to the Fey as they listened around the magical fires listening to one of their kin weaving a song of deeds in past. “Then… where was he from?”
The stars glistened with Hlal’s laughter, “my namesake, when you look at the stars at night… you should try to ask only one important question each night. Do you seek my inventiveness? Or do you wish to know where your sire was sired?”
Avach glanced down at the celebration in Oberon’s camp below for only a second, “I wish your inventiveness, Mistress, of course. And I pretend ignorance no longer, I know the method to reach my desire. I know the song of glory, but my blood does not have the fey power of Oberon’s kin, so I cannot sing it.”
Hlal nodded.
Avach continued, “Mistress, I wish to ride with them, to sing a song of glory in the feasts afterwards… I wish to fight in their battles at the side of my mother’s kin, but the song I would sing… is yours, Mistress Hlal.”
Hlal nodded. The stars twinkled their approval.
Avach watched as Hlal stretched her great golden arm across the sky and plucked a star from the heavens. She pulled it back and placed it on the ground. Avach saw one of Hlal’s teeth, the silver of liquid mercury, broken at the base. Hlal waved her hand and the base healed and extended until it joined to a pole, completing a weapon.
“Namesake, I have broken off an an almost infinite number of teeth over the thousands of millenia that I fought by Asgorath’s side. As we cleared the unbeing from the being, in this universe and many others, I have scattered teeth across countless galaxies. This was the time before Oberon and the first Fey even awoke. Each tooth holds a memory of a battle that I have won, and that memory is as ageless as I am. From this tooth, I make a weapon for you. I lost this tooth in the stony neck of a tentacled beast of the unformed night. I shall name the tooth, Cembirian, in memory of a dragon of my kin. His beautiful silver flame died in that same battle.”
Avach reached for it.
“Halt,” Hlal said, and Avach froze. “You do not pick it up from the ground like a shovel. You summon my memory by summoning the memory of me.”
Avach paused and thought of his Mistress, for the first time he felt the rush of time immaterial as the liquid mercury of her memories poured from his hand, the weapon flashing up and out in deadly polish.
“Cembirian, the silver flame. You carry it for as long as you carry my memory,” Hlal said, “your glory will be tribute to me, even if your flame is slight and short lived. Take care, namesake, take care that your glory in battle celebrates the brilliance of my memory. Like Cembirian, you are doomed to die, then his memory with return and remain with me.”
Avach nodded, “I will carry it as I join the Green Fey. I will honor you, and your memories of Cembirian, by vanquishing the unclean just as you vanquished the unbeing.”
“Large words, too large. But I read your soul, namesake, and I trust that you will try… until you die. Know that even by Asgorath’s side, my flight did not destroy unbeing completely,” Hlal said, then the stars twinkled with her laughter, “though, undoubtedly you will die long before the races of the unclean are erased. And so. Soon enough my memories of dear Cembirian will return to their place in the heavens.”
Hlal’s nest of stars was drifting away from the mountaintop and Avach could tell that his time with her was over.
Avach bowed and turned to walk back to the Green Fey and show them Cembirian and prepare to ride with them in the morning… of his first time over the bridges into the Settled.
“Halt,” Hlal said from behind him, “Are you not going to pester me about the origins of you sire? Namesake, do you truly poses such restraint?”
Avach turned and his mother’s smile appeared in the corner of his mouth. “Mistress, you have already told me. I do not know which… universe it was, not yet. But I know that you have seen it. I am not ungrateful for your gift, so I wish more time to find the answer to your riddle.”
Hlal’s only response was the sound of her approving laughter, thundering in the distance, echoing across the sky of the Feywild.
The memory passed like a dream. Avach was not disturbed. The Feywild was half dream always. Whether it was true of not, Avach was not concerned, it seemed to hold truth.
Avach wiped the last of the goblin blood from Cembirian. He knew that the tooth was a piece of a celestial dragon. There was no reason that it retained the stain of blood at all, but he suspected that the Hlal’s tooth liked the blood… as well as his attention in cleaning it.
Cembirian disappeared from his hand and stored itself in to his thoughts. Avach arranged his breastplate as he walked back toward the camp of the Green Fey.
One of the ironies he had discovered in the many years of his life since he had taken up Cembirian, was that his lust to cross the bridge and take to battle was much greater than his brothers in arms amongst the Green Fey. Mostly, he believed, it was that others in the Green Fey were content in their immortal time frames to wait to sally forth… until after auspicious dates and and grand banquets under the orchestras of pixies.
Avach knew his own father had died of exhaustion during one of these banquets, loving life a bit too thoroughly for a mortal to endure. Avach’s mother had told Avach as much, for she still remembered his father fondly. Avach smiled as he walked. It was moments like this that he wished that he could remember his mother’s name when she wasn’t nearby. But some things in the Feywild were simply difficult to grasp and harder to hold on to.
Avach had less interest in the banquets. He also keenly felt the passage of time, just as Hlal had predicted. The host of the Green Fey had become used to Avach disappearing to make his own treks into the settled areas. The others of the Green Fey loved him greatly, and they loved his great fortune for not having died yet, and they always drank to his health when he returned and his bravery when he left.
Yet this particular return felt different to Avach, as he crossed into the ring of logs and stones and couches and wide feather beds that surrounded the great fire at the center of the Green Fey’s encampment.
Avach saw a small group of his fellows talking.
A short time later, he knew what disturbed the Fey.
They told Avach that the current disturbance had been triggered by news brought by a visitor.
Fyrendil
Some weeks before, a friend of Oberon’s, and this was a significant detail, because while many of the Fey knew themselves as Oberon’s kin and sang their song before his throne, few of them would call him ‘friend’. This friend was one of the legended companions of their liege, of whom Oberon told stories of himself, of their travels and misadventures throughout the settled lands. Oberon, their liege, their lord of the song, was first among them to depart without warning for an adventure across unknown lands and times – and to take strange companions. Still more uniquely, this ‘friend’ was a mortal… or the other members of the Green Fey believed him to be mortal… or perhaps the immortality of his Fey dream had not been tested in a very long time. Oberon’s friend himself was known to unreliable regarding this matter.
Avach asked about the ‘friend’s’ arrival and the other’s had not been sure even how Oberon’s friend had made his way into the Feywild. Oberon was gone at the time. By the time Avach arrived, Oberon’s friend was gone as well. Avach’s fellows in the Green Fey thought it amusing that Avach wanted to know more about Oberon’s mortal friend.
What they did know was that the friend brought word of friction brewed between the Feywild and the settled lands.
Someone or perhaps multiple people had been crossing over the bridges and opening Gates of Dew and had been causing mischief in the Settled lands.
Avach smiled at the irony of his brother’s misunderstanding of the situation, because many of the Green Fey thought some of the hijinks funny. Magical artifacts were being granted to mortals, with humorous and unexpected results. They described it as real life echoes of the morality plays of troubadours.
Avach had a less appreciative view of such disregard for the mortal races. Treating them as playthings seemed unnecessarily cruel considering their mortality.
However, the other Green Fey had grown concerned as their stubborn cousins among the Grugach had begun to make whisperings that if the incursions did not stop then, the wild elves would not be joining their eladrin brethren for the planned goblin hunt in the fall. It was embarrassing for them and even some considered traveling to the Seelie and Unseelie courts to see if they could find Oberon and seek his counsel.
Avach as he listened knew the end of this story before they reached it. He knew they were sending him back across into the settled lands.
He was the best candidate, by blood and disposition. He smiled at the irony of having just cleaned himself of the dust of the settled lands.
He visited his mother, climbed the mountain to watch the stars, and then the next morning left the Feywild, heading for a bridge to the south of the settled continent.
(Current event as you described them haven’t really been revised… though I might rewrite them at some point just for fun.)
Synopsis…
Myrvirdr (dimwood), in Keoland, a nice enough area reletive to other parts of the Settled land.
Oblix, hunter type. Not a lot of talk.
Dryad who reported a stolen pavofawl, a bird/handmaiden of the Spring Queen, the “Fey game hen” that needs to be brought back to the Spring Queen’s court.
Felusial, half elven wood elf, acting sheriff of Frog Eye, nice but provincial elf of the the settled lands, nicer than most wood elves by Avach’s experience.
Places of Suspicion (Avach’s note to self, unknown if true bridges or summoned Gates of Dew)
Farm that had a Gate of Dew appear.
Town, magical plow. Typical give too much fey gift.
Town, mandrake in well. Typical anti-mortal gag.
Pixie smugglers, got help from Oblix, Oblix’s unsubstantiated belief that there was a person behind the smugglers.