Knights of the Falconflight

The knights of the Falconflight is an adventuring group in charge of Falconflight Citadel.

Ulf Skuggkrigare
A rough youth.

Ulf Skuggkrigare is an Illuskan human male, born and raised in the slums of the city Waterdeep. Ulf found riches in the pockets of those wandering the market district and was soon noticed by the local thieves guild. The guildmaster demanded he would pay the guild a share of the acquired wealth. If Ulf wouldn't accept, the guildmaster would make him accept. The naive illuskan thought he was bluffing and denied the guild their share. The next week as Ulf got back home, he found the body of his 12 year old brother against the frontdoor. His brothers throat was slit and a dagger with a note was stabbed in his back, the note read "Pay of suffer more" accompanied with the logo of the thieves guild.

Ulf furiously grabbed the dagger and went towards the thieves guild, approached the thug standing guard and yelled he demanded to speak with the guildmaster. The guard yelled back "It's the middle of the night, return after dawn and maybe you'll be allowed to meet him". Ulf didn't step back or slowed down, instead he clenched his fist holding the dagger, note still attached. The guard yelled: "Didn't you hear me?! Fuck off", as Ulf walked with ever-increasing pace towards him. Ulf was now 2 meters away as the guard stepped forward with his hand on his sword, ready to unsheathe and strike. The young thief didn't slow down, instead he jumped aside as the guard was about to push him. The guard lost his balance and Ulf unleashed his anger upon the guard, stabbing him over 20 times and killing the guard, even before he hit the floor. He grabbed the guards shortsword and kicked in the door to the guildmasters office.

The guildmaster, however wasn't there. The young thief should have known that any member of a respectable thieves guild would never be inactive during the night. Ulf went back to the entrance, grabbed the guard and dragged him to the office. He dumped the body on the guildmaster's chair and wrote on the other side of the note: "Destiny is no matter of chance, it's a matter of choice." And stabbed the dagger, with the note, in the guards forehead. As he walked out the door, he threw 12 copper coins on the desk.

Unforeseen pact.

Two years pass with no retaliations by the guild, as Ulf, aged 19, continued his dishonest way of living. When in the summer a huge fire breaks out in the slums. The fire seemed unstoppable and eventually destroyed over half of the buildings in the area, including Ulf's home. After living homeless for little over a week, a messenger stopped by. The messenger delivered a letter stamped with the logo of the thieves guild, containing the deed to a house just inside the city walls.

Ulf was naive before and he paid for it so instead of telling his parents about it, he decided to go there alone for the first few nights, investigating the plot and the surroundings. After 3 night he concluded it was very odd, but safe, and returned to his parents to tell them about the house. They couldn't believe it... but neither could Ulf. Right after his parents were on their way to their new home, Ulf set foot towards the thieves guild for an explanation.

As he approached the entrance, the guard stepped aside and told him they were expecting him. Ulf didn't trust this, but he had to find out why the guild decided to give him the property. He knocked on the office door, but the guard at the front door yelled at him to just walk in. Carefully and unwillingly, Ulf opened the door just enough to look inside. The office seemed empty.. but the guildmaster expected him? He opened the door and stepped inside, looking around. On the desk he saw a pot of ink with a pen next to it, a bag of gold coins and a contract, which was already signed by the guildmaster. Ulf took a seat in the guildmaster's chair, moved the bag aside, picked up the contract and read it. It said they have been watching Ulf over the years and are extremely impressed. Further down the contract it said they were willing to give Ulf a high position within the guild. Still unsure what was going on, he read the contract again and made sure he wasn't anything in there that could harm him, and there wasn't. Ulf picked up the pen, dipped it in the ink and signed the contract. After he laid the pen down, he looked around the room and left the building.

Collateral damage.

Half a year went by with Ulf being the enforcer of the thieves guild, when word arrives that a halfling noble in the upper ring had inherited a huge amount of wealth and valuables from his late parents. The guild knew this would mean big money, but also big risk as the noble had increased the security around his mansion, and put Ulf in charge of the heist. Ulf assembled a group of the best 3 thieves in the guild who would accompany him on this big haul, but he knew he needed a backup plan and got in touch with an old friend, Halvar, from the slums. He convinced the guy that he talked to his younger brother, who told Ulf about the conditions they lived in. The poor fella believed Ulf's lies and genuinely believed he brought him along to improve his living conditions. The heist went on perfectly. The group had to take out one guard, but could avoid the rest. They grabbed everything that looked somewhat valuable and Ulf told everyone to leave, but Halvar got greedy and stayed for too long and got caught by the guards. As he tried to escape through the window, Ulf and the other thieves were long gone. The guard grabbed Halvar's leg and pulled him back in, pinning him on the ground.

Halvar knew it was his own fault for being greedy and was actually happy that his old friend Ulf had escaped the live in the slums. He always claimed to be working along and sticked to the story, the guards knew it wasn't true and tortured him, but Halvar sticked to the story and eventually got sent to the prison for the rest of his life.

Journey to Thedran.

As the small empire Thedran got sucked into war by King Barthus the fifth, the area destabilized and created many opportunities for the thieves guild to make profits and expand their influence. So about two dozen members were sent toward the kingdom of Thedran to try and set up a local network of thieves. The travel itself would take an estimated two months, but five months later there was still no word of the thieves. Ulf told the guildmaster he would take of it himself and said his goodbyes to those present in the thieves guild HQ. He walked to his parents house and put on his armor, his clothes and hood, grabbed his weapons and packed whatever might come in handy. He left almost all his money with his parents, told them not to worry and set off. The journey took longer than expected and about halfway there, Ulf ran out of supplies. He moved on, hoping to find an inn along the road. He actually found one, it wasn't filled with crowd, but it was busier than one would expect from an inn along this lightly traveled route. Ulf thought it was just busy enough to steal some stuff and get away with it, so he did. In the evening as the beer was flowing and the guests were drunk, Ulf crept around the place, going from bedroom to bedroom, searching everything the travelers brought along. He found a parchment with a stamp on it, which looked like the shield of count Lenhartus, regnant of Thedran. Interesting, he thought as it disappeared in his pockets. Very early in the morning, before anyone could even think about waking up, Ulf  snuck out, continuing towards Thedran. Slept for a few hours in a decent bed, without paying of course and with his supplies refilled, courtesy of the inns not-so-well-protected storage room.

Leavhen
Curiosity Killed the Kid. Leavhen grew up beneath the mysterious Star Mounts, at the southern edge of the ancient High Forest, with only her mother and uncle being there to raise her. The dangerous wilderness of Gray Vale helped her to get strong and taught her how to hunt and survive in the forest. Leavhen was a curious child and she loved to explore every inch of the Forest. After eighteen years of exploring she finally knew every nook and cranny of Gray Vale. It was time for Leavhen to go further than she had ever gone before. She wanted to see the rest of the world. After traveling for days, a Forest Kingdom arose from behind the trees. She couldn’t stop herself and sprinted forward till she reached the edge of Cormyr. Humans, elves and half-elves all guarded the border together, the sight was stunning. She had never met other people before and was at a loss for words. What should she say, what should she do? One of the guards approached her and took off his helmet. She noticed his green eyes and copperish skin and knew he was a woodelf like herself. ‘I’m sorry miss, but you cannot enter. A dragon has been sighted a couple of days ago and we can’t let anyone enter or leave Cormyr. King’s order. Please be careful, it’s not safe here anymore.’ Panic arose as Leavhen heard the words. A dragon, sighted in the High Forest. She had to get back and warn her mother and uncle. ‘Thanks,’ was all she could manage to say and all she could think about was getting back home. The adrenaline rushed through her body and she felt like she had been running for days, when she started to recognize places. She was almost back home, but something was different. The faint smell of burning was noticeable in the air / hung in the air. She felt her heart skip a beat, this wasn’t good, this wasn’t good at all. Her feet felt heavy and her breathing deepened, she was afraid of what she might find. In the distance she saw trees, all burnt and broken. She was finally back at their camp, but her mom and uncle were nowhere to be found. ‘Maybe they got away in time,’ Leavhen told herself to calm down, but less than ten meters further two burnt bodies laid on the ground in front of her. Leavhen fell to her knees and burst out in tears. She should have been here with them, she should have died here with them, but she wasn’t here because she wanted to see the world, and now they were gone and she didn’t even have the chance to say goodbye.

A Ranger’s Companion.

A couple of months had passed and Leavhen decided it was time to move on. She gathered her stuff and walked towards Cormyr. Maybe there she could find a purpose to her life. A day had passed and she knew she should be halfway there. While she was walking through the forest, a loud growl came from up ahead. She readied her bow and stealthily walked further. In the distance she could see a brown bear growling at something. She approached while hiding behind trees and bushes, until she could see what the bear was growling at. The tiny ball of hair was a newly born wolf cub, crying for its dead mother, who was probably killed just a second ago by the same bear. Leavhen knew she had to do something, or the cub wouldn’t survive his unlucky encounter. Her bow still readied, she stepped out of hiding and screamed as loud as she could. She now had the bear’s full attention, it stepped on two legs and growled even louder. Leavhen screamed again, this time with more conviction, ‘GO AWAY!’ Another growl and the bear came closer, he was about to strike, but Leavhen quickly dodged his attack and shoot an arrow right in his head. She walked up to the bear and held her hand on his head, ‘I’m sorry.’ She skinned the bear and took anything she could use, she also left something in a nearby tree as a favor to the God Silvanus. She gave a piece of meat to the wolf cub and walked along. Every step she took, she heard the grass and twigs behind her crack, she turned around to see the wolf cub following her, carrying his piece of meat along in his mouth. She shook her head and petted the cub, ‘funny little thing.’ When she wanted to walk away from it, the cub still seemed to follow her. She looked back once more and smiled. She picked up the cub and continued her journey to Cormyr. She was allowed to enter the city this time, but finding a purpose wasn’t that easy. For over a year she would walk the streets of the forest kingdom, not knowing what to look for. Most of her time she spend in the forest with Wolf, now her best, and only, companion. She had already given up on the idea of actually finding a purpose, when she was approached by one of the kingdom’s hunters. This hunter taught her the tricks of being a hunter-gatherer and a ranger, and she was hired by the hunters of Cormyr to work for them to find food for the city and help protect the city against intruders such as wild beasts. The Lone Wolves. Two Years of working as a hunter in Cormyr, Leavhen still didn’t feel as if she belonged here. When hunting in the forest one day, she stumbled upon a group of elves. They sat around a campfire, laughing and drinking and telling each other adventure tales. She couldn’t help herself and stayed in a tree near the campfire to listen in. One of the elves noticed her and told her it was okay to join. She felt embarrassed, but still decided to take up on the offer and join. One of the elves asked her if she had a story to share, but Leavhen hadn’t lived an adventurous life, so instead she told about how she lost her mom and had to survive on her own, but soon thought to herself that they probably wouldn’t understand. It appeared she was wrong, and one by one they all shared a story about losing a friend or a family member and about ending up alone. There was a connection between the elves, and soon a friendship started to grow. They all stayed together, hunted together, explored together and one day one of the elves said with a laugh, ‘look at us lone wolves, forming our own pack.’ And that’s when they started to go by as The Lone Wolves, adventuring through all of the High Forest. To Find a Cure. The Lone Wolves’ next adventure was exploring one of the old ruins present in the High Forest. It was a damp and dark cave, with not much space to walk. After what felt like five hours, they reached a larger room in the cavern, filled with all kinds of treasure. The others all rushed forward to investigate the room, but Leavhen didn’t trust it. Something wasn’t right about all this, it had been too easy to find. And she was right, one of the elves accidentally pulled a trigger, and a demon fled out of one of the Purple Diamonds laying in the middle of the room. ‘You foolish children!’ it snarled. While the others fled the cave, Leavhen tried to shoot an arrow at the demon to protect the rest and slow the Demon down, but it didn’t do a thing. The demon rushed forward and tried to attack her, but Wolf protected her and got hit instead. A nasty cut was visible at the back of his neck and a red glow surrounded the cut. She picked him up and ran as fast as she could. Outside she met the others and told/showed them what happened. They tried to cure Wolf, but no ordinary magic seemed to work. For a month they searched all of High Forest to find a cure, but there was nothing that helped. When reaching one of the smaller elven villages, an elder told them they had to go to Thedran, to the Berganberg woods. Supposedly an elder elven mage were to live in these woods, and he would be sure to know what to do. The mages name: Theran.

Determined to find this elven mage, Leavhen set out for Berganberg Woods. Where she would soon meet a group of adventurers. The adventurers laid passed out on the ground in front of a hanging bridge, they all seemed to be having some sort of nightmare. Since she didn’t know what to make of this, Leavhen decided to wait it out and talk to them once they would wake. Maybe they knew more about the elven mage.

Juwain 'Flyfoot' Oltrae
Hollowed out

Juwain was born out of a human father and an elven mother in Rhonar, however they couldn´t keep the child. Both parents were still young and in the prime of their youth. The elven mother hadn’t even claimed an adult name and was many years away of doing so. Because of the differences between human and elves, he would never fit in with either of their worlds. Thus his mother wrapped him in a blanket and brought him to the Wood of the Druids nearby the city. She left him inside a hollowed out tree, hoping he would be found by one of the druids that roamed these woods. She left him in a blanket, only a blanket and his name.

As Gerth Stromwind, a human druid of Illuskan ancestry, was wandering the woods, looking for ingredients to make his world famous soup (at least in his mind it was world famous), he heard a faint crying coming from inside a tree. He followed the noise and discovered that there was a baby inside of  it ,wrapped in blanket with his name on it. He couldn’t leave the child out here to die, so he took the baby home and raised him as his son. He gave him the last name Oltrae, a word out of the druidic language, meaning treestump, hence the place he found him.

Juwain was raised in the ways of the druids and developed a deep connection with nature. Growing up, he was always exploring the Wood of the Druids, or as it was known to the druids: the forest of Ferrrindel. Time and time again he climbed the trees, each year they reached farther and each year Juwain learned to climb higher. He did this with such grace, that his adoptive father gave him the nickname Flyfoot.

During his childhood, many travellers came passing through these woods, sometimes they were adventurers, sometimes they were merchants. Whatever the case, he tried interacting with them whenever he could. He was a curious kid, always learning new things about the place is the world, hoping to set out one day and have his own adventures. He believes all creatures are born good and that evil is made. As such, he has always been very trusting of people.

´´Freedom´´

When he was about 15 years old, during a nightly stroll, he saw a pack of wolves coming towards him. As he quickly hid in a tree, the wolves gracefully strolled by. He admired them, such formidable and proud creatures. Free to do what they wanted, running through the woods, hunting for prey. One day he hoped to master the wild shape of the druids, so he could experience such things himself. As he looked up to the sky, he saw a falcon sitting on the branch above him, not scared away by his presence. He also wanted to fly one day, seeing the world from above. This way he could perfect his geography skills and make his maps even more detailed then before.

By the time he reached his early twenties he was ready to set out and see the world. He had learned much about the ways of the druids from his father, but wanted to see the different kinds of nature, not just the woods he grew up in. However, without his knowledge, his father was beginning to go blind. One day when he returned home from a trip to the city, he found his father sitting there with a broken leg. It was then that he told him that he was slowly losing his vision and was beginning to grow old. Juwain decided that he would stay with his father and care for him, as long as was necessary. Being a half-elf, he had lived about twice as young as normal humans, so he would still be fairly young once he would set out on his journey. During this time his father taught him everything there was left to learn about the ways of the druids.

After about 30 years, his father passed away, nearing the age of a 100 years. Juwain, still retaining his youthfulness, buried his father, grabbed the things he found most important and left home to see the world.

Aerendyl
Growing up amongst Drow I quickly grew tired of their behavior. I wanted to help the weak, which is why I ventured out to join an army that protected the good. My family always had a thing with fire, which probably was due to an ancestor of ours which was said to be a golden dragon. My magic and my superior darkvision quickly stood out, this yielded me the rank of officer carrying leading assault against the enemy during nights.

Over the years the army was starting to use its power for the wrong means. This lead to my decision to leave and venture out by myself in order to do good.

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Loradove Songsteel
Backstory

 

Even though her parents tried to give her all the love in the world, Loradove never felt like her duty was to live on her parents’ farm for the rest of her life. She wasn’t a particularly happy child, and with every year that passed she grew unhappier. On her 18th birthday she took her belongings, wrote a note to her parents and ventured into an unknown scary world. And so her story began.

Inexperienced, alone and afraid Loradove did not have a great chance in this world. For a year she wandered around, occasionally working as apprentice of blacksmiths or bakers, but she was never good enough for any job, because her heart was never in the right place. She once worked for a chicken farmer for a few weeks, but the chickens didn’t like her at all. She quit after a horrible accident happened, which left her with an irrational fear of chickens for the rest of her life.

When all her money was spend, Loradove asked locals for refuge. But if that didn’t work, which was the case this particular night, she slept under a tree or under a bridge. When she subconsciously started singing a song her mother used to sing to her a captain was impressed and decided to ask her a favour. He explained how much he missed the voice of a female every time he had to sail. She had to sing for an hour every day, and in exchange she got 3 meals a day and a bed to sleep in. Lordove agreed with this proposal and the next day she left Seloorn and boarded a ship called ‘The Coralina’.

Being the only female wasn’t always easy, but the captain always made sure to protect her. At first Loradove just made sure she her did her duty and kept herself out of the sailers’ business. But after a month she started to get to know some of the sailers, and they helped her learn what a life on the sea is like. Loradove learned how to read a map, how to predict when a storm is coming, eventually she even learned how to hoist the sails. The captain was fine with all of this, as long as she still sang to him for an hour after the sun had set every day. Every day her voice became stronger and her words more meaningful. Loradove never asked the captain about the purpose of his journeys, she was happy living this life and always felt very thankful. Everyone on this ship was human, except for Loradove. After she took over the foul language and dirty sense of humour, the crew decided just one name was to elf-like and so they inaugurated her ‘Loradove Songsteel’.

The captain was an old man, and eventually his soul had to become one with the sea. Without the captain to lead the ship, the crew quickly fell apart. Loradove Songsteel decided after all these months that even though her time on the Coraline was the best of her life, she was never supposed to be a sailor. The next time the ship moored was her time to leave the crew. As a gift in return for her beautiful songs the crew decided to give her a lute as a present. And with that a new life for Loradove started again, but this time in Thedran.

The people of Thedran noticed that Loradove was not from here, with clothes like a pirate but the face of an elf. That is why Loradove always had an audience for her tales and songs. She became one of the best known bards of Thedran, travelling from town to town and singing songs about the sea. She sang about the captain a lot, in order to keep his soul alive. Many inns wanted her as a performer, and every village looked forward to the day Lora the bard would wander back in town. Money was never an issue because she always had somewhere to sleep, but she could never save for the future.

A mysterious man noticed the success of this bard and approached her with yet another proposal, this time she had to spread negative words about a certain villain. If she succeed tot do this and got the crowd on her side without raising too much suspicion, the man would give her a pouch full of gold. Dreaming of owning her own inn one day, Lora accepted.

The mysterious man was more than happy about the work Lora did. He told her the villain’s name was Hester Bruckmore, and he was the leader of a criminal organisation who stole from the poor. After the man told showed her all the evidence he had Lora the bard was more than happy to tell the public all about how evil this villain was.

The public loved it. Lora stepped out of her shell and made Hester Bruckmore look like the most selfish, uneducated and evil man to have ever lived. And she made a lot of money doing so.

The people quickly started talking, and the new spread very fast. So fast, that after a couple of  weeks this news had reached the wrong ears. On a beautiful summer’s day Lora was doing her job as usual, this time she was talking about her life at sea. Around her on the ground 20 children were seated, eagerly taking in all her words. A loud grunt was heard, and towards Lora stormed a huge figure with a flat nose and squared jaw. Hester Bruckmore decided to kill her right then and there, he grabbed her by the throat en lifted her high above the ground. The children screemed, the townfolk gasped, but no-one dared to do anything against him. Lora panted for breath, squeezing Hester’s arm, but nothing worked. Just when Lora gave up she discovered this hellish pain in het back. As the pain got more and more unbearable, she let go of Hester’s arm en reached for her lute. The moment she touched her lute a powerful force push came forth knocking Hester a couple feet away. Completely in awe because of what just happened, but still scared for her life she took the lute in both hands and instinctively sang an old Viking’s song about war. She focused on Hester, and he was frozen in his spot. The people started cheering, Lora felt her power grow stronger. She thought about Hester, and what she wanted to do to him. As she sang, loudly, out of control she could see his body moving. The more fired up she got and the harder she played the lute, the more Hester started moving. She made him dance, for minutes, and she felt a power she had never felt before. When he begged her to stop she stopped, and she told him to never come back to this town ever again. Hester Bruckmore fled and was never seen again.

After everyone was about done cheering, an old man stepped forward. He told Lora that what she just witnessed was a power only some bard have, and that is to make their instrument their spellcasting focus. This meant that she had magical powers. Lora started to think about her life, how she was always able to survive in the wild, and manipulate people with her words. She always felt like she had some sort of powers, so when this man told her to head for the college of lore, she did.

In this college Lora learned a lot about how to fight, and cast spells. But also how to perform for royalty and noblemen, and how to travel with groups to festivals and poke fun at authority. But mostly, how to inspire people.

During these years in bard college, Thedran was stricken with war. When she graduated this college, Lora made a pact with 5 of her bard friends, to do anything they can against this evil.

So Lora started to travel around again, singing about the corruption that was caused by the war in the south. For 2 years Lora was able to live like this. Travelling around as a bard, fighting crime when necessary. She kept inns free of villains, protected mayors from getting killed, and once even guarded a group of 20 wives and children on a journey to a safer place. But eventually the evil powers became too strong for Lora the bard, and the innkeeper named Waxon, who used to be a good friend of Lora, didn’t want her in his inn anymore and told her an evil warlock was looking for her.

Lora decided to lay low and try to hide for a while, but after 2 weeks she was captured.

Hrothgar Bergrisi


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Shamash
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Barbarian
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