Races of Syann: Elves

The Seeding   Like all the fey-born races the elves were created by the lords of the fey realms as slaves. The beautiful and ethereal beings known as the Sidhe were the first of their kind, created to serve as courtiers and living objects of beauty for the fey lords to amuse themselves with. When the fey-lords first came to Syann they marveled at the amusement of this mortal world and would send many of the fey-born to colonize this realm, others would be given to their allies the Gods Born as gifts and servants and through both many fey-born would come to call Syann home. It was here where the first fey-born discovered the freedom of a mortal soul, where for the first time they were not chained to the whims and will of the fey-lords. For the Sidhe who were already remarkably free willed servants of the Fey-lords this came quickly and it wasn't long before Sidhe started to wonder what it meant to break from their fey masters and experience true free will.   The curious Sidhe would become more of a thorn in the side of their fey-masters as they explored freedom and the mortal realm, rebellion's followed and Nori (who would someday become a goddess) was an instrumental figure in the fight for freedom. While the summer court was reluctant but not unreasonable about freeing their fey-born the winter and other less savory fey fought bitterly to keep their slaves. When the Godsborn joined the Fey-Born it tip the sides of the conflict fermenting a bitter distrust for the gods among the lords of the fey and see a large number of Fey-born separated from the eternity of the fey realms. This sundering of their eternal fey spirit would have surely killed them had not several of the godsborn tore at their divine sparks and granted them mortal souls.   Among the Sidhe it was the goddess Nori who gave of herself for them and those Sidhe who were granted mortal souls would become the first elves. Like the Sidhe they would be lithe, beautiful and possessed of grace and yet separated from from the fey nature that forced them to act in strict roles the fey-lords had intended for them.   The Rooting   As the fey-lords retreated and the Sidhe who were unwilling to trade freedom in exchange for immortality dwindled the first elven people would build the city of Vidir Gleann Tiae (roughly translated to the Willow Grove Home) The early elves sheltered themselves in the forest and learned the ways of magic and nature embracing the beauty of the world they lived in and the magic that flowed through it.   The First Branching   As the elves developed there came to be two major groups, the Alflar and the Elsa. The Alflar embraced divine magic and nature magic as the better type of magic and believed that the elven peoples should do the same. The Elsa however favored the power of arcane magic claiming it was the future of their race. While both used both kinds of magic each one respectively felt that one should hold a higher place than the other. Soon other disagreements occurred and many philosophical debates would consume the days and nights of the Elves. The Alflar had no great love for ivory towers or book learning while the Elsa felt that intuitive learning and allowing the divine or nature too much control of them would slow progress.   When both groups could not come to an agreement the miracle of the First Dreaming came. Elves do not often dream but have a strong connection to the dreamscape so when an elf does dream it is almost always seen as a vision of great meaning. When the leaders of the Elsa and Alflar dreamed it was of them having grown, no longer children they did not need the protection of the Willow Glean and it was time they seek their destiny if they so willed it to be so. For the elves the First Branching was a true act of mortal free will and a symbol of their growth as a people of the world.   So it would come to pass that the Elsa would travel to the lands East of the Vidir Gleann Tiae and the Alflar to the West. The Elsa would call themselves the Nytalf Elsa and the Alflar the Te'ra Alflar (respectively translated to Not of the Alflar tribe for the Nytalf and Earth People for the Te'ra Alflar). It could come to pass that all elves can trace their linages to these two elven peoples and many Branchings would follow as ideology and cultural variations would arise as the elves spread across the Dothmyrji Sub-continent.

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