Endshadow
The Anomaly
IC:
Age: Unknown
Gender: Female
Race: Unknown
OOC:
Class: Ranger (80)
Factions: Brittle Blade, Scarlet Circle, Yellow Priests, Wolves of the Steppes
Alts: Amma, Lenely, Ameli, Amela, Amathees, Ammati, Endshadow, Kireah, Elix, Amhen
An Old Crone's Tale:
The world was not always as it is now. There was an age once, before the rise of Acheron, before the fall of Atlantis, when humankind sculpted matter from the very essence of will, and the brightness of the human mind outshone the sun. It was an age when the greatest of beings were not gods but men: wizards and sorceresses. When demons were shackled like dogs, and strange visitors from other worlds came to behold and share in the splendor of man. Few now can remember the glory of that age. Fewer still believe it was ever so.
But pride has always been the undoing of great things, and the universe is vast. For those who seek too far, too greedily, there is always something more powerful. Such it was with the thin ones. I do not know where they came from, only that the Book of Dead Names warned of them. Was there another age, even older, that was disturbed by the thin ones? Is that how that dire tome came to chronicle them? I know not. But I know that in the age I speak of now, the thin ones made themselves known once more.
They moved in the space between spaces, in the crevices and shadows. They whispered in ears and corrupted minds, they stopped hearts with a caress. Weapons touched them not, and the greatest of spells could only force them into hiding for a while. Slow things they were, but they spread. They devoured whole cities, left them empty shells devoid of life or bodies, except for a few screaming madmen who might once have been wizards.
There was a sorceress in this age. Pale and beautiful she was, and evil too, perhaps. Some say it was she who brought forth the thin ones in her desire for power. I know not. But she found the way to stop them, to drive them back, to seal them away beyond the gate from which they had come. But there was a price. The gate could not be closed, only protected. Guardians would be needed, ever vigilant, not in this world, but in a place between dimensions; a living barrier, unthinking and undying.
Two hundred wizards were chosen. They were to be the color in the darkness, the end of shadows. She was among them. I do not know if she volunteered or was forced to join them. I know only the results. The thin ones were defeated, driven back and sealed away. And the world of man was weaker for it.
And it has been ever since. The cataclysm came, and the world changed. The thin ones are still trapped, if they were ever truly real. Yet some say the tome of portents, the Book of Dead Names, still mentions them, that though it has been lost and rewritten a thousand times by a thousand men, its words remain unaltered.
But I am old, and they tell me my mind wanders.
Personality
Endshadow never uses her real name. An incredibly beautiful woman, slender, pale and regal, she comes and goes at unusual times, sometimes disappearing without a trace for long periods. Often light-hearted, she can become sour and threatening in a heartbeat, then laugh again a moment later. Curiously, she possesses a vast knowledge of ancient history and magical lore, but can be oddly ignorant of the world as it is now.