Thar Shaddin

Player Name: Guess
Name: Eimhir (AY veer) nicAilean (nick E lun) a'Sidheag (SHE ak), called Artisan, Dreamweaver, She Who Fades, The Colorless Lady (by her kin, anyways, and the last two are considered insulting by their reckoning, as she's thought of as a living joke).
Age: It isn't polite to ask a lady her age. She appears to be hanging out in her early thirties. She's been around Pal Tahrenor since about 800 or so BCE.
Race: fairy (deorai sidhe)
Height: 5'11
Weight: Lighter than she looks. She looks like a woman who was once charmingly rounded who has lost weight not meant to be lost, while still being a little chubby. Muscles? What muscles?!

Physical Description:

The form Eimhir took when she came to the physical world was colored like autumn, bright and crisp. Her hair was a striking auburn, her skin a light mahogany, and her eyes a deep russet brown. Or you could say she looked like a half-dead tree. That works too. She was fond of the color brown, and for awhile that's the only color she'd consider dressing with. Though never really taken seriously when it came towards all things fashionable, she did make a little bit of a stir with her monochrome palette, in a bad way. Given her reputation for being uninteresting among the sidhe, however, she was quickly relegated back into not-worth-attention and left alone with her browns.

Presently she's all emo and obsessed with the thought of her own death even though she's too much a coward to kill herself or let herself be killed. No, she fancies herself dying by inches, and therefore her current glamor is that of a youthfully middle-aged albino woman. In her old age she's come to appreciate drama, a bit, and albino people tend to get attention. Not that she'd ever admit to wanting attention, but anyone who thinks Eimhir is anything but selfish and pitiless and enamored of what she considers beautiful is probably not really with it.

Her natural hair has a curliness and waviness to it that can't be tamed and all that jazz. Her illusory hair is limp, dead, yadda yadda all the things that come with death. She likes hints. Lots of them. Being that actual corpses are actually pretty icky, she's not really into carrying the simile all that far, and so she stops short of looking like a shambling walking corpse. So, maybe she's really into looking like an almost-corpse -- you know, a lady who was once revered for her beauty and now lays dying amongst her retinue of weeping hangers-on (ambitious she might not be, but hey, she's dying here and should be appreciated for it, dammit!), somewhat wasted away and fragile and onoes, how terrible! But still pretty enough to be worth a bang (she doesn't realize, quite, that among most species looking sick is a turnoff unless you're, well, sick)!

Being that she doesn't update her concept of human fashion very often, her version of wasted still has a lot of softness to it. Because fleshy women are hot!

As for clothing she thinks traditional clothing of some of the southern settlements with those peoples are darling, and goes out of her way to buy or have made ridiculous approximations of the abaya, or kaftan, or burqa. She hasn't done much to torment the simple design that is the headscarf, but where there's a will! As for color, she tends to go for moody mourning colors. Whites, blacks, occasionally reds. She tends to waste money in the market on pretty things and useless trinkets. The idea of exchanging bishani for items is still a novel one for her, and she is constantly amazed at what sort of things people are capable of making. As well, if she sees anything that reminds her of the astral plane of her home and its shifting reality she will go out of her way to acquire it.

The bottom line is this: with her current illusion in place if you saw Eimhir underwater floating there or swimming the common consensus would likely be that she was some unholy spirit or monster that probably would either want to eat or kill you soon.

Of course, illusions aren't reality. Her natural form was chosen before she really had an idea what she was doing. As a result her features are more suggestions than actualities. Taken as a whole, she'd look rather like a poorly formed wooden doll. Maybe even the sort used as a fix for curses on specific individuals. Her eyes, however, are your normal sort of eyeballs set in those stiff-looking eyelids. The effect has something of creepiness to it. Most probably wouldn't want to be caught alone in the dark with her, even though she's essentially harmless; she looks unnatural, the bad kind of otherworldly.

Possessions:

A tiny bejeweled hummingbird. It was created by magic and is of Sidhe make. It is filled with raw magic from the astral plane, and acts as a means by which Eimhir can sustain herself.

Strengths:

Capable of weaving impeccable visual/audio illusions. They would be difficult, though never impossible, to detect or throw off. Particularly, her personal glamors, or illusions that affect herself, would be almost impossible to see through.

She is phenomenally sensitive to magic. Naturally she would have some sensitivity, but the slow starvation of never having enough magic has made her even more so; she can vaguely sense the use of magic for at least a square mile. However, it has to be within her immediate presence for her to be able to have a better idea of what is being cast. The only magics she can immediately pinpoint for what they are are those that fall under the realm mental magics (charming, illusions, etc). Especially so can she target magic other fae cast. In some ways it is similar to the way a dog follows a scent trail, though she is less able to distinguish specific magic from far away.

Eimhir is immune to most physically addictive substances due to her sidhe heritage. In order to become addicted to something it would have to be powerful both physically and magically.

Long, long years of practice as well as her natural stoutheartedness when it comes to corpses has left Eimhir adept and skillful in the dissection of pretty much anything. She can identify innumerable causes of death.

Biology is something that fascinates Eimhir, and she keeps and maintains a personal library that deals with research on animals and other, more intelligent species. Her long life has enabled her to have quite an array of exotic books, as well as exotic knowledge. Not all of it is strictly legal depending on where she travels.

She has numerous connections due to who has come forward to her throughout her long life, as well as her drug habit, though her wandering mind and other such issues have made those connections tenuous things at best.

Weaknesses:

Prone to weeping spells caused by an aching and terrifying sense of loss for something she cannot completely understand or describe.

She can't lie, and if she gives an oath she is magically bound to it.

She is slow to adapt to new ways and things and ideas. No matter how long she spends within it, she is not a creature made for the physical reality of Pal Tahrenor, and rapid change can easily overwhelm and frustrate her. Her usual method of dealing with change is to deny it any way she can, and if that doesn't work she will typically withdraw. She used to force herself into a magical coma of sorts, but being that the world keeps moving on without her she has become too scared to. Which, as it happens, isn't entirely possible for her without severe drawbacks. If she does not have enough time to process the world around her, or the means, she will lose much of her carefully constructed mental barriers that have kept her sane in a world that is, to her, insane. This could break down her ability to function in any real sense, and in a long-term worst case scenario she could drive her into a gibbering mess unable to cope with even the most basic contact with the world at large. Given that her body is physical and has biological requirements, this would mean that she would likely die of thirst, hunger, or unintentionally killing herself in a frenzy.

Very much afraid of death, and the idea that death is inevitable on Pal Tahrenor.

Eimhir sometimes gets lost between one word and the next. This functions somewhat like temporary memory loss, though in truth it is a product of her magical self interacting with her physical self. The world, and her time spent in it, has been hard on her body. She is an ageless creature forced to live in an aging world, and the long time she has spent in Pal Tahrenor has not been kind to her. This manifests sometimes like the early stages of Alzheimer's, though not too often. Most usually she wanders, becoming distracted from her tasks. Sometimes she'll forget how to speak, or won't remember what she was going to do. Being as how she is a proud person in her very core, she does not react well to what she perceives to be a shameful disability. When she is struggling she will react with rage or despair -- those being the only two emotions to ever get a strong hold in her mind -- often perceiving little things as cutting insults.

She does not understand most kindnesses because of this, and due to her culture and heritage she struggles with trust. She does not fully understand that most other species function differently, emotionally and logically, from her people even despite her long study of them, partially because it is an almost unfathomable thing to her. Her opinions and expectations were formed a very long time ago, and her people are not particularly adaptable. Change in most things not having to do with creative endeavors is difficult for her, mostly because she doesn't realize people and generations are capable of such changes. Treating her in a way she finds familiar is therefore a good way to manipulate her; old patterns are easy for her to fall into and due to her lack of ambition and drive whatever sense of revenge or hatred she might harbor would play out over a long time.

It is possible to bind her in a way similar to other beings from the Astral Planes, even though she is --without the aid of a strong and intelligent mage -- permanently stuck on Pal Tahrenor.

If Eimhir were to be cut off from the Astral Plane and her hummingbird, she would die almost instantly.

Eimhir craves mind altering substances. Due to her odd physiology, the ones capable of affecting her have to be magical in some capacity. She is willing to put herself in danger legally in order to acquire these substances so that she can spend a good part of her day (or week) forgetting.

History:

Part I: A Child's Boring Life

The Astral Planes are a fun sort of place, if you like crazy. Eimhir likes crazy. She was born there, after all, so it sorta comes natural. But, perhaps crazy isn't the right word for the job at hand. Weird, surreal, creepy, bizarre, unnatural, fantastic, extraordinary: these are the things that she held dear. Except, well, to her they were normal.

The system of rules under which the sidhe lands in their magical astral plane operated were perhaps best counted as chaotic and subject to warp. There were two things only that bound Eimhir, therefore, and they were Truth and Oath. She didn't count either as particularly bothersome.

Born to Ciaran mac'Ailean a'Niallghas and Oighrig nic'Slaine a'Sidheag, a lord and lady of the lower Court, Eimhir wasn't anything special. She was thoroughly average. Her parents were practically a step above peasantry, or what passed as peasantry among them, and she was therefore ignored. Thoroughly. By anyone and everyone who mattered, and anyone and everyone who cared what those who mattered thought. She was nothing more than another fawner on the tail of the throng who worshiped their betters, the noble and powerful among them. She was pretty good at the fawning.

Her childhood was spent as most children's are: becoming inoculated to the beliefs of her people, to the intrigues and necessary lifeblood that is power and finding your place within all that power. As with many sidhe children, she was a lighthearted thing enamored of tricks and trouble during childhood. Even as a rather fast learner, there were many intricacies to their society, and running afoul of them was expected of the children even as it was held against the parents.

Though all of fairykind have some power over illusion, Eimhir reveled in it. She was good at it. Being that it was only a minor power and not particularly useful in the larger scheme of things, or particularly powerful, it didn't draw any great comment or acclaim. The other children and youths were drawn to it only so far as it allowed them to focus better on their games and pranks. Eimhir would sometimes lead those games, but more often than not the nobler children in the group would command, and she would follow as the rest. Even as a follower, she was inventive and creative. She was always praised for her illusive artistry.

Otherwise her childhood was largely unremarkable. Though seldom allowed into the games of the children of the high court she was not wholly disliked. There were few enemies among children, though a few petty rivalries, but she had none of those. She was, after all, nothing special. None were threatened by her, and in a society where negative regard was fostered by fear and jealousy, who would feel those of Eimhir? Likewise, allies were formed by necessity and mutual benefit, and not many had need of Eimhir. Some regarded her like a pet, a fun distraction. Some saw her as nothing more than a stage prop, taken out for certain scenarios and left covered in the back room once her use had been fulfilled. She was not disheartened by this, or overly upset, either: this was how they were. Their emotional triggers were less severe than that of humans, and such things were considered normal and encouraged. Happiness was the joy of power and use and place, and she took pride in what distractions she was able to offer. For one of the sidhe, as a child, she was not marked with ambition.

Though bright and gay, she had a somber quality to her that wasn't prized among them. Too, sometimes she'd be ferociously energetic, almost upsettingly so in a court that held decorous conduct as a mark of good breeding. She did nothing for the status of her parents, or of her own self, and was considered among the least of her generation, and being that children were not abundant among the sidhe, it was a noticeable thing. Rather than act from cunning and wit, she played with the other children like a mindless toady out of the desire to have her head patted by those brighter and more brilliant than she. Not much was expected from her. She would worry about it as she grew -- later in life that frustration would come to haunt her in ways no one could have understood during the time of her childhood -- but despite her desire to earn the praise of those around her and be what was wanted, she could not. It wasn't that she loved life or didn't want to hurt others (she had no such inkling, and no qualms with causing suffering) it was simply absent. A void. A flaw.

Even the flawed had their circles. Eimhir had but a few 'friends', as such things went among the sidhe. One was Cass, a sidhe born of the same line as herself: Sidheag. The other was Muireach, born of Murchadh's line. Cass was similar to herself, though less skilled, and they stayed together due to their similar status and obsession with creation. Muireach was born to the lower court, and had a higher birth than Eimhir, and a higher consideration for future talent. Not by enough to pull him into the gilded throng of those of whom much was expected, but enough that he saw in Eimhir and by extension Cass two underlings to whom he was superior enough to to put to use. Given Eimhir's lack of ambition and Cass' very low standing, neither were poised to be a threat to him. He could in turn give them what they wanted.

Those days were spent carelessly. They stretched long and lovely as if they existed in an endless summer. It seemed the pattern of games, tricks, rule-breaking and punishment would never end, and Eimhir and Cass were content with that. Muireach was not. Instinctively did Eimhir know that every plot he shared with them in secret had a purpose for the long run: he was truly heir to their species, after all. Even knowing, she let herself be swept up in the grand play as if its purpose was only for fun and a test of her skills. There, she was valued and wanted, even if only in a minor way. She and Cass learned to weave their illusions together, and even for children they were a magnificent accomplishment, if only a gaudy trinket in the larger scheme of things.

Muireach used them, and used them well. But they were all growing in knowledge and power, and even Eimhir all wrapped up in her dreams had to come back to reality. One day when Cass was off chasing sprites in the Wildlands with some of her peers, Eimhir approached him. Within the shifting, warping architecture that formed their city, she stopped him and turned him away from his endless scheming. They were not babies any more, but younglings on the cusp of adulthood. They were a hairsbreadth away, separated only by the manifestation of their adult powers. Once that came on them, they would be welcomed into their stations as true sidhe, and their parents would support them no longer (because while children were valued by the sidhe, none of them could stomach their own children longer than the horrific stretch of seeming endlessness it took for them to become adults). Any transgressions would fall upon their own heads.

All of them within their generation had learned how to ply the line. It was a good sign, part of being sidhe. To understand the rules and toy with them without ever breaking them was considered a mark of intelligence, of greatness. Muireach was clever. Everyone knew it. But clever enough to outstrip his station of birth and rise to make his own fortunes? There was much interest in him. So much so that Eimhir often got dragged into the parties of the high court, to be used like a dog performing tricks. Cass was too low class for that. They were beginning to drift apart.

Eimhir couldn't name the emotion, but she feared for the future. She was jealous of Muireach without actively wanting to take his place. She wanted their arrangement to go on forever. If Muireach left her behind, would Cass still want to mix illusion with her, or would she leave to find another master?

"Will you take me with you?"

It was a terribly direct question. It was what made Eimhir so very poor a choice for an underling, though she always tried to swallow the words back. Embarrassed, her form tangled and shifted between many forms. She was remarked on as being lovely by most, though it was a useless trait unless she could be more than a decoration. Loveliness was easy to acquire, after all.

He never quite answered her question. He told her a story, instead. His story. It was not hubris, to form a tale about oneself. It was something to be admired; certainty in egotism was valuable -- just as long as you were capable of turning it true. She was never mentioned in that story, though she watched him with the eager fawning of a good minion.

Only after he left her did she wonder just what that meant.

After that day she tried to attach herself to other sidhe more powerful than herself, but she knew the bitter truth. She'd formed an attachment to Muireach that was unusual in its dedication, in its insistence that he be the one to be her liege. Partnerships for the sidhe were always shifting, never permanent. Becoming attached to another sidhe was a sign of weakness, of mental instability. Eimhir had always been considered weak. Still, she kept trying because that was the only other option available to her, because as time marched on she knew with more and more of her instincts that she was going to be left behind. That was the way of things, after all.

It was therefore surprising when she was the second of their generation to reach majority and come in to her magic. She manifested strongly. For the sidhe, each of them carried the mark of one of their gods. Said to be descended from those lines, they each had specific magical abilities that were within the sphere of that line. Eimhir's line, Sidheag's, was known for its ability to create and to have control over those creations. Rarely did they have the power to control the strange and vicious creatures in the Wildlands.

Eimhir had it all. It was outrageous. It was unexpected. Even without her ambition, to manifest the line -- any line -- so clearly was treasured among them. Though she was still considered stupid and dull, she was suddenly desired and made much of.

It was something none of them expected, least of all Eimhir herself.

Part II: Curse Your Sudden but Inevitable Betrayal

The practice with illusions, the obsession with creating realistic things through her play: they paid off. They paid off handsomely. Eimhir could make her illusions come to life. Certainly, the magical draw it took to sustain such things, control the wild things as she wished, was a huge one. She was capable of handling it, delighted in it. Determined to become the best at her craft, she dumped Muireach and Cass as if they were nothing more than waste. Cass had expected the day would come, of course, and she was not in the least offended. But Muireach, oh, he hadn't been done with her, and her sudden importance and power was something to fear, be jealous of, because it fouled his own plans.

She made her very first enemy. It was a good time for her.

But among the rest of her peers she still wasn't much of a threat. Her ambition was lauded as being worthy -- if still a little strange, at least it was something -- and she earned herself a title among the sidhe. Artisan. Considering that most of them cared only for the careful dance of power, it was a word not often applied to one of the sidhe. Other fey creatures, certainly, but most of them could not be bothered to take the time it required to excel with any form of creation. Eimhir was like an interesting pet to them. Her skills were much remarked on (often in a mocking sort of way), and they were at the same time in high demand. She reveled in it. She was desired among the High Court sidhe, and spent vast periods of time at the beck and call of one or the other.

For a time, you were not considered vogue unless you had Eimhir's hand in your parties, your tricks, your ploys. Eimhir drifted about the High Court like a ghost, going to those whose vision was the most interesting, the most difficult. Challenges were her lifeblood. It became a game among the powerful, a tidy pastime to see who could come up with the most outrageous dreams for Eimhir to weave into reality, who could charm her to their arm. Passed back and forth like a toy, she never quite noticed how they indulged her like she was a lesser creature, or how they tittered at her earnest obsession behind their glittering gilding. She never wanted for anything. She was their lovely decoration, their living muse.

Eimhir was powerful. If she'd had ambition it was likely she could have belonged in the High Court in truth. Her parents, separately of course, used her fame and popularity to drag themselves up into the lower echelons of the High Court, and made sure that everyone and anyone knew of her kinship to them. They prospered. And as more and more of her generation reached their majority and their power, it became apparent that Eimhir's power was one of the greatest among them. One of the purest. It was a waste. The qualities that made her Dreamweaver to them also made her utterly useless in the wider scheme of things, and the elders among them lamented where their peoples were heading with such a dichotomy as one of the brightest amongst their newest, youngest members. Even so, Eimhir was something interesting to them, and they used her without regret or remorse.

She didn't mind. She was allowed -- celebrated, even! -- to engage in the only thing that mattered to her. She was drunk on it.

Muireach reached majority, Cass at his side. He was insulted that the clingy Eimhir had abandoned him so readily. If she'd been ambitious, it would have been different, but she was a subservient thing, a servant more than a sidhe. She was beneath him in demeanor, and yet she had dismissed him rather than he her. That fact made him an object of faint ridicule, a joke. To the sidhe, that was one of the worst places to be. He was determined to put Eimhir back in her place.

Of all the sidhe, Muireach knew Eimhir the best. Creation was her only passion, but to create with another was perhaps the ultimate for her. It required skill, and a fine control. Cass was not at the same level of Eimhir, of course, but that didn't matter. What mattered was that Cass knew how to create with Eimhir, knew how the other woman formed her illusions and was patient enough to play second fiddle at Eimhir's direction. Muireach himself was powerful, though not as powerful as Eimhir. It didn't matter. He was smarter, more manipulative. He knew how to bring her to heel.

Eimhir was too full of her creations to question when Muireach brought the suggestion to her. She was delighted. The Courts knew of their old relationship, and they gossiped about what trick he was planning. Muireach was one of the most canny of their generation, and it was expected that he was greatly displeased with Eimhir. She was aware of the gossip, of course, but she did not pay it much heed.

Everyone knew it would not take much to bind Eimhir to any one of powerful. She was easily distracted, often full of the thoughts of fancy. She was their Dreamweaver in truth, because by their reckoning that was all she was: an embodiment of creation. Celebrated for that in truth, dismissed for it in the same breath: it was considered fact. But none of them had seen the need to bind her, because she was no threat. She was a powerful, intoxicating form of entertainment. No one would bind her any more than they would collar a decoration. Among the powerful it was unspoken that she belonged to each of them equally, and it amused them to see who could lure her into their retinue when the Court was in a lull.

But none of them had history with her as did Muireach. Enticing her to him was a simple matter for him, and he whispered sweet suggestions to her, with Cass as his bait. No one in either of the Courts cared enough to stop his scheming: they were all interested to see what would happen. And as Cass drew Eimhir into a creation that would dwarf all the others she'd ever created, she became biddable and dreamy. That was when Muireach drew his binding around her. And when it was time for them to display what they'd created at a special party Muireach had prepared, the noose drew tight. By the end of the event, Eimhir belonged to Muireach.

He hid her away. There was some protest about it, in the way children complain when a favorite toy is taken away. But Eimhir had only been a distraction; she had no true allies. As was the way of things with them, she was eventually nothing more than a memory and a story.

She was terribly confused. Ensconced within her creation and dreaming for so long, it took a long while before she could fully understand what had happened, and why she had been cut off from the fantastic. When she was at last fully cognizant of the what and the why, she went to Muireach. She'd been trapped in his estate, after all, bound by an oath she only barely remembered giving in the heat of the moment, when her and Cass' illusion had been on the cusp of the life only she could give to something that complex, when she had no walls, and might say anything at all with the right sort of urging. She belonged to Muireach. She asked him why. When he told her, she railed. Anger was an emotion that often manifested in a long, slow boil for the sidhe. Rages were uncommon among them.

Eimhir raged. It was only her oath that kept her from murdering Muireach, because he threatened the only thing she held dear; he owned not only her but the reins to her power. And he was not interested in using her for entertainment, not mostly: he saw in her a means to build himself a base of strength the likes of which was rarely seen. Rather than grand creations, frail and beautiful and bursting with life, he had her create protectors of his estate. Rather than control elusive, marvelous creatures and creations, he had her draw forth the most dangerous of the wild creatures to use as guards, as soldiers.

With Eimhir at his side, he became a power in the High Court. She was exalted for her usefulness in a new way, praised for her ability as Muireach was praised for his mind. He made many enemies, and allies. Eimhir had none. She was where she'd always been, a tool to the desires of others. But then, and only then, she realized the meaning exactly. She despaired.

Her fantastic creations and wild dreamweaving were not often allowed her. Much of her time and power was spent maintaining Muireach's power base. She was feared for that reason, but she did not delight in it. The use of her power was better than nothing, but she craved what she'd lost.

She hated Muireach. There was nothing she could do about it.

Part III: The War that Touched the Planes

The sidhe are drawn to power. The Changer's War connected Pal Tahrenor to the Astral Planes in a way never before seen. Three of the High Court's most powerful aristocracy were intrigued by the draw of the physical realm, and they decided to establish holdings there. Together with the majority of their retinues and some of their entourages, they made their way to Pal Tahrenor. Muireach was one of those three. Eimhir, naturally, came with them.

They popped out in the area today known as Pretana. The sky, land and sea was rather overwhelming to them, and so Muireach had Eimhir find a suitable place to replicate their home in part. She, not desiring to do any more work for Muireach as necessary, chose what was a starting hole in the ground, and used her illusions in conjuncture with highly skilled courtiers in other lines of magic to create a pocket of wyrding in what was, without their knowing, the barrows of the local humans.

At that time, before the Seal had been put into place, the sidhe were capable of changing their base forms to be whatever they desired at a high magical cost. In those years they adapted themselves as they wished. Some of them found humanity quite amusing, and changed to be like them, in theory. Art is often in the eye of the beholder, and for something so complex as the human consideration of beauty and what is actual human form, some were more successful than others. Muireach was successful. Eimhir didn't give much of a crap but since Muireach kept insisting like the lowlife bastard he was that his retinue be like him, Eimhir made herself near enough to one until he got bored of her so-called "failures" (along with the court and their teasing of her for her obsession with the color brown) and let her be so that she could continue to fulfill his whims.

In those early years, those whims were many. The sidhe would often travel back and forth between estates in the Astral Planes and Pal Tahrenor. Eimhir was expected to set up the estates on Pal Tahrenor after appointing a replacement back home, and she quickly learned the limitations of a physical body. They all also learned that creating functioning bodies was a necessity for comfort; though they were magical creatures -- who needs to piss anyways, right? -- they still had to conform somewhat to the rules of the world. And once the bastard creations Eimhir had created for Muireach started dying, he demanded she get it right or face some sort of diabolical punishment yadda yadda. Eimhir had heard that line so often she'd ceased to be impressed by it. He was, however, her liege. She obeyed.

Eimhir started by dissecting animals. Which, she learned very quickly, was a surefire way to kill them. Everything was so strange, and new, that she eventually stopped resenting Muireach for his order, and began in earnest to learn how the beasts functioned. When she discovered the differences extended beyond outward physical appearances, she began opening up every living creature she could get her hands on. It was a distraction for her, a new source of creative inspiration. She'd never considered what went into her illusions, what went under the shape and form. It opened a new avenue of possibilities.

The first human she opened up (Muireach, after all, was uncomfortable with his quasi human body, and the organs of animals simply didn't fit right) was a pet of one of the other sidhe, who had enchanted the thing. By then, she wasn't the only one doing the experimenting, but she was possibly the most interested. There were few others who showed such a lack of interest in court politics as she, and even then their interests typically diverged from her own; few of them were so alike as to be identical in their ways.

Eventually they had a great enough understanding of how the human body worked to be good enough at mimicking them physically to still the discomforts that came from being a purely magical adaptation in a mostly physical world. But Eimhir wasn't done. And since she had become boring to Muireach over the long period of time she'd been stuck with him, so long as she saw to his security he let her do what she wanted.

She'd become withdrawn in her long imprisonment within Muireach's gilded cage. Quieter than she had been. She'd lost the wild wonder of the youthful, creative mind, and come into a darker adulthood full of brooding and resentment. Some days she hated herself for her own lack of ambition, for being effectively neutered as a sidhe; her inability to understand and crave power, to protect herself in truth half so well as she protected Muireach: she understood then that she was, as the sidhe went, lesser. It was only a trick of birth that had allowed her to haunt the High Court, to be of use to Muireach at all. She should have been lowborn among them; that was her temperament. And yet to have all the power she did have -- she was ashamed. She knew, had become aware, of what was said about her. She knew too that she would be expected to have children because of her power, and not because any wished alliance from her.

For the first time in her life, she became fully aware of her status. She could do nothing for it but to hate Muireach, herself, and the rest of the sidhe. She gave herself in to her experiments, her learning, to the only avenue of creation she was allowed to pursue: that of Muireach's defenses. She talked to few, kept herself alone, and found it suited her just fine among the rumors. She knew that, as always, her motives and silences would become uninteresting to the powerful throng, and they would move on to other things. Newer, older generations. Muireach himself. She was just his tool, after all, and could be counted on to behave as a tool would, without doing anything without first being directed.

She hated herself more, because despite her despair, her frustration and displeasure with her station and life, she did not have it in her to plot her escape, to form the alliances necessary to break free of Muireach's geas. She threw herself into the world of mortality even as her quiet work slowly strengthened Muireach's hold on the Court. Tuning in to the ripples of magic from the War that rocked and twisted even their wyrding barrows, Eimhir was dimly aware that something was happening in the world. But she'd resigned herself to drudgery, and had no thought for what it might mean for her and her kith and kin.

Still, she did not show much dismay or surprise when the Seal slammed down, cutting them off from the magic they so easily drew from the Planes, from the magic that sustained and succored them.

They could not go home.

Eimhir was too far gone to care.

Part IV: All the World's a Plague

There wasn't panic, not at first. Muireach and Ceana (keh na) were strong and capable leaders. Beathag, however, had been lucky in that she'd been back in the Planes when

** mortician who uses illusion to make bodies look nice // cuts them up to try to figure out some elixir of life so to speak to stop her inevitable death