Arcael

Arcael is an NPC Wizard of High Sorcery (Order of the Black Robes) and a Knight of Takhisis from the world of Krynn in the Dragonlance setting. She also makes an appearance in one of the Chibiloft comics in Quoth the Raven Issue 28.

Krynn

Qualinesti

Arcael was born in the city of Qualinost, half of a pair of fraternal twins. Her father was a minor Wizard of the White Robes with an overinflated opinion of himself; her mother was a Ranger who spent more time patrolling the borders of the kingdom than she did with her family once the children were weened. Arcael was closer to her twin brother Valael than either of them was to their parents, but her brother's health was weak and he started displaying signs of a recurring lung disease around his twentieth birthday.

Against all reason and the advice of several healers, the twins' father strove to confine his son to the house, demanding that he start his studies of arcane magic, instead of engaging in exercizes in the fresh air that might have improved his health. When Arcael asked him to teach her as well - in part out of a genuine interest in magic and in part because she wanted to help her brother - her father rebuffed her, saying she lacked the proper temperament and tried to apprentice her to the city's Ranger squad. In truth, this was a snub because Arcael closely resembled her mother where their looks were concerned, and her father resented the fact that his wife had more or less abandoned him to raise their children when he had expected that to be her role in the marriage.

The twins decided to defy their father's wishes. Arcael would sneak Valael out of the house so he could spend time outside and clear the dust of their father's library from his lungs. Valael would instruct Arcael in the basics of arcane magic out of his own instruction books. They continued to do so right up to the eruption of the War of the Lance. When Qualinost itself came under attack, the twins' mother had already abandoned her post and family for a new lover; a fellow Ranger. The twins fled their homeland with a group of refugees that included their father, only to come under attack in the woods.

While their father dithered and Valael was wracked by a severe asthma attack, Arcael skillfully blended Enchantment and Illusion to make the enemy troops attack each other, saving the band of refugees. Instead of congratulating his daughter on her level of skill, her father exploded in fury, disowning Arcael on the spot for defying his wishes, and named her a Dark Elf for using magic associated with the Orders of the Red and Black Robes. The refugees forced Arcael to go her own way, over her brother Valael's wheezed objections. The young Elfmaid was on her own in a world gone to war.

Traven

Arcael made her way through the war-torn Krynn. After two years of wandering, and after the end of the War of the Lance, she found an established Wizard of High Sorcery who was willing to take her in as an apprentice and hone her talent so she could eventually take the Test of High Sorcery at the Tower of Wayreth. While this might seem like a good thing, the Wizard in question was the insane Traven, who saw her not as a pupil, but as a possible accomplice in his blasphemous research into channeling, manipulating and creating life. He fed her anger and resentment towards her father and the people who exiled her, as well as her concern for her brother Valael's health, and directed her interest towards the field of Necromancy as it allowed for the manipulating of life and death energies.

Arcael felt drawn to what her new master suggested, but was initially hesitant to plunge into a field of study that belonged to the Order of the Black Robes; joining that Order would forever make her an exile of Elven lands on Krynn. The Elfmaid meditated on the issue and had a vision of the three gods of magic. Solinari offered her wisdom and the power to defend; Lunitari offered her balance and the power to change; Nuitari offered her power and control. After everything that had happened to her up to that point, Arcael was swayed and chose Nuitari, consigning herself to darkness.

Thirteen years later, Arcael passed the Test of High Sorcery at the Tower of Wayreth and formally joined the Order of the Black Robes as an Enchanter. While she was willing to study Necromancy to further the secret work she was doing with her master Traven, she was far more interested in controlling the living than she was in mucking about with the undead; this explained the focus of her magic.

To her delight, Arcael met her twin brother at the Conclave of Wizards. Although Valael was now a member of the Order of the White Robes, and their father became nearly apoplectic with rage when he saw her at Wayreth, the twins were genuinely happy to meet again. The only dampener on their reunion was the way Valael's health had deteriorated since Arcael saw him last. She resolved to give her all to the research she was doing with Traven, so she might save her brother and grant him the long life and health he was owed by his Elven heritage. For six years, the two Wizards laboured, utilizing all the resources their respective Orders were willing and able to provide, combining her Necromancy and his Transmutation in new and disturbing ways and making great strides... and then Valael succumbed to his recurring lung disease.

Knight of Takhisis

Arcael was crushed by her brother's death, and struggled with the feeling that all of her work and study had been futile and a waste of time she might have spent with the only relative she had ever genuinely loved. What made things worse was that her father held a grand eulogy for his son before the Conclave at Wayreth, during which he denounced her as a 'pointless existence' that had stolen his son and heir's health from him in the womb.

Desperate to prove her worth, Arcael decided she needed to do something big and amazing. She petitioned Nuitari for spells she could use to shroud her true intentions even from the gods themselves, and pretended to defect to the Knights of Takhisis as a new Knight of the Thorn. What she lacked in the power of Illusion, Arcael believed she could make up for with her cunning and powers of deception. Her intent was to fool Takhisis herself and become a double agent within the ranks of the Thorn Knights, allowing her to feed the Orders of High Sorcery the information they would need to eventually destroy the Order of the Thorn for its Renegade ways.

Unfortunately for her, Arcael overestimated her powers of duplicity. Takhisis was well-aware of the Dark Elf's intentions, but allowed her to join the Order of the Thorn on the basis that she could be used to feed her enemies misinformation as well.

When the Orders of High Sorcery finally attacked the Knights of Takhisis, the doublecross bore exactly the kind of fruit one might expect. Arcael, who had expected to join her brothers and sisters in the Order of the Black Robes during the attack, instead became caught between the two opposing forces. On the one hand, the Orders of High Sorcery believed that she had genuinely betrayed them, due to the erroneous information she had been providing. On the other, the Knights of Takhisis already knew that she was a spy and a traitor in their midst. With no allies and no way out, Arcael found herself lashing out at everyone who came close with all the power she could muster, until all that remained to her was a single spell to conjure a fogbank. Hoping to cover her escape for a few precious minutes, Arcael invoked the spell... but instead of the magical fog she wanted, what washed over her were the Mists.

When the fog rose on Krynn, Arcael was simply gone and soon enough she was mostly forgotten. But when the fog faded before Arcael's eyes, she was in the domain of Keening. The year was 644 BC.

Demiplane of Dread

Keening

Even with all her spells expended, Arcael's every instinct screamed at her that Mount Lament - upon whose flank she found herself - was not a safe or healthy place to be. She fled north, somehow managed to keep one step ahead of the domain's natives and crossed the border into Darkon. Tristessa either did not notice the terrified Dark Elf or deemed her not worth bothering with. Regardless, Arcael made it out.

Darkon

Arcael made her way to Nevuchar Springs, where she was tentatively accepted by the local Elven community, and tried to make sense of what had happened to her. Typically, the locals gave no warning, and so the Claiming took Arcael unawares. Now named Lalael Illuri, the Dark Elf initially took a job working for the Nevuchar Springs city guard. Her training as a Knight of the Thorn made her a decent Diviner and swordsman, making her a useful agent to have.

After ten years on the job, however, 'Lalael' was bored with the work and disgusted by the corruption she often encountered. She had saved her wages, and used these to relocate to Il Aluk in 654 BC. Here she attended the University and studied various subjects, but specialized in magic, medicine and history, some inner urge steering her to continue the kind of work she had done in the past she could not remember at the time.

Over the next thirty-five years, 'Lalael' variously pursued postdoctoral studies in magic and history and served as a lecturer in history at the Brautslava Institute. After this time, she returned to Nevuchar Springs to work as a private tutor for what she believed to be her people, and started submitting articles to the arcane periodicals of Darkon.

For a time, 'Lalael' seriously considered marriage as a guardsman she had once served with - an Elf named Janius Viltaeri, who had been promoted to captain during 'Lalael's' absence - started courting her. What enthusiasm she felt for the courtship soured when Janius' previous lover tried to poison her. 'Lalael' dragged the offending Elfmaid to a public square by her hair and publically challenged her to duel her with the sword or else swear to leave her be. Her would-be rival chose to fight, but was soon overwhelmed by the more experienced 'Lalael', who killed her and ended the courtship immediately afterward.

The articles 'Lalael' had submitted to the periodicals would lead to a fateful reunion: Traven had arrived in Martira Bay in 694 BC, and was likewise making contributions to the periodicals. The mad Wizard wrote to 'Lalael' in 715 BC due to the similarities he had found between their lines of thought, and the two of them once again started to study and experiment together, seeking to push the limits of knowledge in the field of channeling, manipulating and creating life.

Souragne

The two Wizards' research made great strides until they hit a dead end around 722 BC; the next step in their shared interest eluded them. As they had heard rumours of advanced uses of Necromancy and unique magical practises in Souragne, they chartered a ship to take them to the distant island. Barely had they left Darkon's territorial waters before the effect of the Claiming was undone and their true memories came flooding back.

Traven still carried a grudge for the way Arcael had left him on Krynn; Arcael still resented the way their shared research had taken time she might have spent with her brother. Bitterness on both sides led to angry words, and angry words led to violence. Although Arcael's skills as a warrior had not diminished significantly, she soon found the tide of battle turn against her and fled the conflict, using Conjuration to flee back to the Core.

Nova Vaasa

Repulsed by the idea of returning to her life in Darkon and losing her memories once again, yet feeling a need to reclaim the finances and trappings of that life, Arcael moved to northern Nova Vaasa, where she built herself a tower home in the boundless grasslands and sent for the things she had left in her home in Nevuchar Springs. The first delivery came with something she had not asked for; Janius Viltaeri, the guardsman who had courted her, accompanied the first sending of goods in an attempt to convince 'Lalael' to return with him and become his bride. When charm failed, he tried persuasion; when persuasion failed, he tried to drug Arcael and abduct her; when this failed because Arcael's divinations warned her, Janius tried to take her by force. And then Arcael killed him and buried his corpse in her midden.

Consecutive sendings of Arcael's things would occasionally come under attack by native Nova Vaasans from a nearby town, who considered her to be an effete heretic and thus no more entitled to her belongings than any man with the strength and 'courage' to take them. Arcael amused herself by tracking down each 'uneducated heathen', as she personally considered the raiders, and educating them as to who was stronger between them. As the Nova Vaasans continued to steal Arcael's things as they were shipped to her and she kept strolling into town to visit misery on the locals before she took them back, relations between the Dark Elf and the local humans grew steadily worse.

Even after all of Arcael's things had been either shipped to her or destroyed, the townsfolk and the Elf continued to lash out at each other at every chance they got. Arcael mostly busied herself with correspondence and research in an effort to understand the world in which she now found herself and maybe find her way back to Krynn, but she considered tormenting the villagers a good way to maintain her combat skills. Her comfortable routine was disrupted in 751 BC, when Traven wrote to her for the first time in twenty-nine years to ask for her help in locating his dead daughter's soul, and offered to bury their respective hatchet in return. Eager as she was to finally be rid of her old mentor, the Dark Elf taxed her powers of Divination to the utmost against the shrouding effects of the Demiplane of Dread, and finally provided Traven with a cryptic message that he needed to find 'a girl mantled in power and theft'. Given that she knew more about the Demiplane in general, she was able to suggest to Traven that he consult a Vistana raunie, who were known to be masters of explaining omens and prophecy.

Although Traven would continue corresponding with Arcael over the following years, he kept his word not to otherwise bother her or visit violence on her house. Rather, he sometimes told the Dark Elf about scholars who might help with her research.

Chibiloft

In the summer of 766 BC, Arcael decided to leave her tower home and Nova Vaasa altogether. As a way of saying goodbye, she played a cruel prank on the nearby human town, pretending that she now knew an Evil spell capable of permanently enslaving people. While her possessions were shipped to her new home, Arcael tormented the humans, forcing them to work themselves ragged and debase themselves under threat of magical enslavement. Her claim was a complete fabrication, a lie meant to break her old enemies' spirits before she left them behind, but the locals believed her.

One villager snuck away to find help. He returned with three adventurers: Comoară, Slice and Ooglie of the Chibiloft Crew. The three managed to catch Arcael unawares - a considerable achievement given her powers with Divination - and severely injured her, forcing her to flee. While Arcael accepted that she had brought it on herself by indulging in her mean-spirited prank for too long, she had reasons to pursue the adventurers again in the future.

For one thing, she was humiliated by her defeat at the hands of three random mercenaries; as a Wizard of High Sorcery and a Knight of the Thorn both, such a defeat could not stand. For another thing, she was becoming bored again, and her efforts to understand the Demiplane of Dread had stalled out. Third, there was something about Comoară that intrigued her, and she had suspicions. Suspicions she needed to pursue...

In Quoth the Raven Issue 30, Arcael finally returns to plague the Chibiloft Crew. Disguised as cruise director Julie, the Elf welcomes the adventurers aboard the ship Dead Reckoning, only to later reveal herself once the undead hidden in the ship's hold have already hurt Slice. As she appears in the company of D'Vaal, the Levkarest Lycanthrope, the Toothless Nosferatu and Urtica, it is possible that Arcael has formed an alliance with these villains at some point to get her revenge on the 'Crew.

Personality

Unlike her former mentor Traven, Arcael is rational, coolheaded and methodical. She is highly focused, but not obsessed to the point that she ignores important details or daily necessities. Most of the time, Arcael is perfectly content to keep to herself and follow local law - but not if that law is patently foolish or harmful to her. Arcael is at her most dangerous when she gets bored and 'lets her hair down' to amuse herself; this is when she is most likely to do harm to others. Intensely prideful as she is of her achievements, there is no easier way to make Arcael your enemy for life or motivate her to do something grand and unexpected than by insulting her or wounding her self-image.

Religion

Arcael still worships Nuitari the Devouring Dark before all other gods, even though the only place she could see his black moon's umbral glory in the Demiplane was once Sithicus; she used to make pilgrimages to the dreary Land of Specters just to honour her dark patron. With the transformation of Sithicus' moon, the Dark Elf has started to give at least a moderate amount of worship to Solinari and Lunitari as well. She is not certain what the moon's transformation means, but she hopes it might indicate that there is a way for her to return to Krynn.

Although she continues to identify as a Knight of the Thorn, Arcael has no love of Takhisis, only a wary respect and fear. Typically she directs a brief prayer to Krynn's goddess of evil before and after battles - if at all possible.

Path of Corruption

Arcael has entered into the Path of the Ermine. Associated transgressions:

• 1. Use of her powers of Divination to assist Traven to find the soul of his daughter, in spite of knowing full well what he is like.
• 2. Continuing and escalating a cruel and pointless feud with Vaasi peasants for her own amusement.

Statistics

Lawful Evil female Elf (Qualinesti) Fighter 1 / Enchanter 5 / Wizard of High Sorcery (Black Robes) 3 / Knight of the Thorn 4

(Opposition schools: Abjuration, Illusion (3rd), Transmutation)

Familiar: a female weasel named Méchante.