The Lore of Elves

The Elves are the eldest of all the races of Mantica. Their
kind has raised cities and song since time immemorial, since
even before the advent of the Celestians. They are a people
in decline. Many of their ancestral lands are gone, all
of the Western Kin’s holdings, bar the city of Therennia
Adar, are lost to the sea, most of those of the Southern
Kin’s and a good deal of the Eastern Kin’s are buried
under desert sands. Still the Elves are mighty, masters
of magic beyond compare. Their mages are the greatest
the in the world. Their armies are disciplined, as effective
as individual warriors as they are as in ranks. Bows and
spears are their favoured weaponry, and regiments
equipped with such are deadly indeed.

A host of creatures accompany the Elves to war and
among the greatest are the dragons. Only the Elves have
ever truly mastered these ancient reptiles. Others have tried
but the ties of respect that a dragon forms with an Elf are
unsurpassed. These bonds are so strong that should an Elf
Dragon Lord die his mount quickly pines and falls into a
deep sleep from which it can only rarely be roused.

Elves are slender, much thinner than a man, but
deceptively strong. Their muscles are hard and supple,
and they can perform athletic feats that other races
could not hope to perform. Next to an Elf, a human
is graceless and ungainly. They are beings of poise,
uniformly beautiful, quick to laugh and quick to anger.

They are long-lived and wise, and yet impulsive. They
love to create, their arts are beyond compare, and
an Elven sword is as fine as it is sharp. They are less
joyous than once however, the passing of their golden
age has given many cause to regret, and some have
become bitter. Others are seized with sorrow so deep
they die of it, or gripped by lassitude that leaves them
helpless for months. The Elves also bear terrible guilt,
for they are responsible for much folly. It was the Mage
Calisor Fenulian who forged the mirror that caused the
Sundering of the Celestials and ruined the world. If that
were not a heavy enough shame to bear, more recently
their affection for a human youth blinded them to his
propensity for evil, and so the necromancer Mhorgoth
was made by their love.

Elves are born of the deep green places of the world, their
primitive ancestors creeping out from under the boughs of
the greenwood to gaze upon the young world. Leaving the
trees behind, they made the world their own, but always
they have kept an affinity for nature, wherever they dwell.
When the Celestians came to Mantica the Elves were readily
adopted by the female known as the Green Lady, whom
they hold her dear to this day. Most Kins can call upon her
aid in battle, summoning Tree Herds, Forest Shamblers and
elementals of the earth and forest to their armies.

The Kins of the Elves
There are many kindreds of Elves, ranging in size from
small bands to entire nations consisting of subclans and
different tribes. Below are the largest and most renowned.

The Sea Kin – The lands of the Western Kin were located
to the far west, and are now under the waters of the Great
Ocean. Only the Brokenwall islands and the City of Therennia
Adar – known by men as Walldeep - remains, saved by the
sacrifice of Valandor the Great, although its Sacred Groves
are drowned. The Western Kin are more commonly called
the Sea Kin or Sea Elves in this age, for those that remain
have become masters of the oceans. Their thin-hulled ships
leaps like gulls over the waves. Their Sea Mages can sing
up a storm, and command the mighty Kraken with a word.
These mariners furnish the Elven Kins with their navy, and
are the finest sailors in Mantica.

The Northern Kin – The most powerful of all the Kins,
the Northern Elves counts the Mage-Queen among their
number. Ileuthar, the de facto capital of Elvenholme in
these dark days, is their city, and the Twilight Glades
grow upon their land.

The Dragon Kin – Once a tribe among the Northern Kin, the
Dragon Lords’ power is out of all proportion to their Kin’s
small size. Inhabiting the peaks of the Alandar mountains,
the Dragon Lords are arrogant people, if noble to the core.

The Eastern Kin - These Elves were once renowned as
the most carefree of all. In their silk-covered wagons they
roamed the savannahs of the east, making camp under the
stars. The most talented musicians and poets were said to
be of the Eastern Kin, quick-witted and mirthful. Now
they are a dour people, victims of the encroaching desert
and the depredations of the Twilight Kin, they are better
known for blade craft than poetry. The bladedancers and
Drakon riders are their greatest warriors.

The Southern Kin – Proud and haughty, the southern
kindred defy the moving desert with magic and, when
that fails, sheer stubbornness. Most of their cities are
wind-blasted ruins, but they remain in their tall towers,
standing sentinel over the unending southern wastes.

The Ice Kin – Inhabitants of the Bitter Lands, masters
of ice magic, the Ice Kin are the most enigmatic of all
Elves, even more reclusive and hostile to strangers than
the Sylvan Kin. Followers of the renegade King Tyris,
they permit access to their lands infrequently, and travel
rarely to the courts of the Twilight Glades and Walldeep.

The Sylvan Kin – Living deep in the green places of
the world, the Sylvan Kin are at one with nature. Long
ago they rejected the ways of the other kindreds, and
fully embraced the arboreal origins of all elves. They are
antagonistic to any who would alter the natural order of
the world, and have little contact with other races. Most
dwell inside the bounds of the mystic forest of Galahir,
but a large contingent live in Ileuthar, and several are the
closest confidantes of Mage-Queen Laraentha.

The Twilight Kin – Of these dark-hearted Elves, the
other kindreds will not speak to outsiders, but that they
remain a part of wider Elven society is without doubt,
for ambassadors of their kind are found in Ileuthar.