Public Gallery

🎮 Elder Scrolls Online

Dunmer Magicka Dragon Knight

# Sarys Telvayn — The Curator *Your life is a story, and you are its author.* --- ## The Telvayn Line Sarys Telvayn is a unique circumstance. She is a Dunmer, a people who pride things like lineage and ancestors above all else. Yet, She has no deep knowledge of her heritage or family line. She is vaguely aware that her family originated in Morrowind, specifically on Vvardenfell, but she's lived in Cyrodiil her entire life. Her father died when she was an infant, she was told. Her mother raised her alone, but she too has passed on from this world. There is a family tomb, she's been told, back on Vvardenfell. She's never really felt the urge to visit it, but she can't deny that she occasionally gets a bout of wanderlust, with images of her ancestral homeland dancing through her mind. These are, however, short lived flights of fancy. What little she knows of her family line doesn't paint the most appealing picture for the land of her ancestors, either. She is of the great house Telvanni, but only just barely. Were she to try to fall into that life now it's likely she would be considered barely more palatable than a slave. So instead she lives the life she's built for herself in the heart of the Empire, even now during the War of Three Banners. --- ## Birth and Flight Sarys was born in 2E 502, in Vvardenfell. Her Mother, Iveri Telvayn, was a low-ranking Telvanni with no real prospects. She was a servant for a High Ranking Magister, a cold and brutal mer who looked at Iveri with equal parts disdain and desire. The stories that Sarys was told about this magister were always underpinned by hatred and fear... Iveri told Sarys that her father died when they were fleeing Morrowind shortly after Sarys' Birth. They fled south through Morrowind and eventually settled in Cyrodiil, near Leyawiin, hopefully far enough south to escape the Magister's sphere of influence. --- ## Growing Up in Cyrodiil Iveri was an Alchemist by trade, and Sarys grew up with a love of the craft derived from time spent with her mother. The pair of them worked a small Alchemist shop in Blackwood, outside of Leyawiin, squirreling away gold every month with a goal of one day moving out of Blackwood into a more refined part of Cyrodiil. It was a shared dream that at first, neither of them fully believed but it kept them going. *"Your life is a story, and you are its author."* Her mother would often say this as they scrounged up their nightly meal and prepared for an early morning of exploring the forests in Blackwood in search of Luminous Russula or Violet Coprinus. It was a phrase she to heart. Even as she grew older, and her world expanded beyond simple alchemy. In her early adolescence, a local sorcerer took an interest in the pair of them, and offered to teach Sarys. Iveri was hesitant at first, wary of mages in general from her time in Vvardenfell and not eager for her daughter to follow the path that she felt was so dark. Her mind was changed however when she saw just how much of an aptitude she had. Sarys took to Magicka like a Guar to Mud. Even her new mentor was shocked at how quickly she learned, how ravenous her hunger for knowledge. By her early post-pubescence she'd already reached a level of competency that her mentor hadn't expected. Rather than continuing to teach her himself, he insisted that independent study was a better path for her. But that would require Sarys to leave her mother behind. And that was untenable. Her mentor was sad to hear it, but understood. He would return from time to time with new tomes he'd found to gift to Sarys, but her magical education slowed considerably for years. By 2E 574, as if all of a sudden, Sarys and Iveri realized that they'd finally obtained the money needed to move into a very comfortable new life in the West Weald. So they started making preparations for their move. A move that would change Sarys' life forever. --- ## The Night on the Road (2E 575) It was mid-autumn when they began the final leg of their journey. After a year of preparation Sarys and Iveri had found a home outside of Skingrad in the West Weald. They had sold off all their belongings too big to move back in Blackwood, and they were on the road traveling together with optimism filling the air around them. Sarys is an accomplished mage, and Iveri had enough knowledge to fight if necessary, so neither of them felt particularly threatened. As evening descended and the sun set behind the orange leaves of the forest, the pair walked a bit into the woods to make camp, knowing that the next day when they awoke they'd be able to reach their destination by the afternoon. But as the embers of their fire began to die, and as the two of them laid their heads down to rest, Catastrophe struck. Pallid figures moving through the shadows descended upon them. Sarys was first to rise from her bedroll but it was a lost battle from the start. The pair fought as best they could, and Sarys heard her mother shouting "Run, just Run! We have to!" And Sarys listened. Even as a pit formed in her stomach from the subconscious realization that her mind wouldn't let in. Her vision blurred and her veins burned. Blood dripped down her arm, and her body hurt so much that she was starting to be unable to feel it at all. She had only two pursuers, which she managed to incinerate with the last of her Magicka. And as their burned bodies crumbled to ash before her, she collapsed beside a large tree, falling into a pile of fallen leaves. --- ## The Aftermath When Sarys finally woke, covered completely by leaves, it was clear she'd been unconscious for some time. She immediately knew that something was...different. Her skin was pallid and cold to the touch. The world around her was clearly wrapped in night, but she could see clearly the world around her as if it had been illuminated by the afternoon sun. Again that pit in her stomach began to form as her subconscious accepted that which her conscious mind would not. She stumbled through the woods, doing her best to retrace her steps. Before long she found herself at the scene of their assault, standing over a number of corpses. None of them belonged to her mother. But she did find scattered across the ground a number of their belongings, including her mother's locket and the paperwork, still somehow intact, for their new home in the west weald. She didn't have much time to dwell on this, as reality forced her to come to terms with her new life. The stirring of small animals all around the forest began to fill her ears. Dawn was approaching. And with it, a fear gripped her that felt both intellectual, and deeply primal. She was a vampire now, of that she had no doubt. The pallid complexion, the insidious and shadowy nature of her attackers. Her newfound affinity for the dark. It all pointed to one natural conclusion. Her fear pushed her to flight, running through the forest in search of anything to protect herself from the coming sun. She was no expert, and couldn't yet separate fact from wives' tale when it came to the ancient boogeyman that was Vampirism. As she sprinted through the woods, sunlight creeping over the tops of the trees, she panicked even more. As she pushed past the tree line, salvation came into view. A Small hunter's cabin, respite from the tyranny of the sun. She burst through the door, her supernatural strength combined with the Adrenaline pumping through her undead veins made short work of the lock on the door. A Man bolted upright, startled, screaming at Sarys. *And the strangest warmth filled her mouth as her vision slowly faded.* She spent the day in the cabin alone, drifting in and out of sleep, counting the floorboards, thinking about her mother. Her world had changed, there was no denying it. *"Your life is a story, and you are its author."* She could hear her mother's voice. But of course, she didn't. She knew she didn't. But she took odd comfort in it nonetheless. And as the sun sank below the treeline at last, she left the cabin behind, never looking back. --- ## Cover and Condition It was getting to the end of the twilight hours when Sarys approached her new home. But she was no fool, and she knew well before arriving that her new neighbors wouldn't be eager to give any newcomer the benefit of the doubt. She instantly began to buy herself some time. It was still the early hours of the morning, but these were mostly farmers and laborers, undoubtedly awake but inside. As she walked with her belongings toward her new home, she put on a display of being exhausted, and complaining about her sleep schedule after the long trek here, the dangers she faced on the road... Enough that if she didn't emerge from her home until the next evening it wouldn't be immediately suspicious. The following night, she made a point of showing face again, discussing how world-weary she was, but lamenting that she absolutely had to take another trip in the next day or so. She explained that her trade was that of an Alchemist, and learned of a book containing rare alchemical formulae up north in Bruma. This was a only a half lie. She did have to go to Bruma, and it was for knowledge. Ancotar Rilis, an Altmer, was currently staying in Bruma. He was, to her knowledge, the foremost expert on Vampirism. She needed to understand her condition better if she was to be the author of her own life. She asked around under the pretense of having a parcel to deliver to him, and she quickly located his home. When he opened his door, he recognized the symptoms of his life's work instantly, and brought her inside without hesitation. The two spent several days conversing, her learning exactly how her life had to change, him using a rare live, cooperative subject to test his less.... painful theories. It was scholarly collaboration despite the odd circumstances. Eventually, they parted ways. But they remained in contact for many years, both sharing new insights and theories with one another any chance they got. Sarys returned to her home in Skingrad, armed with the knowledge she needed to make a life for herself. The sun, while an inconvenience to be avoided, was not instantaneously deadly. And her instinct to hunt could be controlled and maintained with enough care and attention to detail. Her new life began when she set up a small shop in the West Weald, making potions and enchanting tools for the locals. She intentionally formed a relationship with those around her that made her invaluable, knowing full well that if anyone ever got curious and started asking questions, people are less likely to burn her at the stake if they remember the time her potion saved their grandmother...