User:StarSword/Faernethue Vrinn

""Let Lolth fear the light of the sun.""

- her words upon taking the name "Faernethue"

Faernethue Vrinn is a reformed drow and a cleric of Amaunator. She is the leader of the adventuring company Three Elves and a Kobold.

Appearance
Faernethue is short and willowy, just under five feet tall and weighing barely 100 pounds. Her skin is onyx, she has amber eyes, and wears her wavy white hair to the middle of her back. On top of her left breast, she has tattooed a yellow sun.

In battle she wears a +1 breastplate, carries the sentient heavy mace Solar Flare, and a +1 large steel shield. She wears Amaunator's yellow sun painted on both her breastplate and her shield, and wears a gold holy symbol around her neck. She also owns a masterwork light crossbow, a phylactery of faithfulness, and an Amaunatori belt of priestly might.

When not in combat, she generally wears a simple monk's habit, cut to show off her figure. She also has a pet cat named Sandy.

Personality
Faernethue is both courageous and pragmatic. Though battling evil and bringing light to darkness gives her great personal pleasure and pleases her god, she carefully considers her actions before she implements them. (She can't bring order or goodness to the world if she's dead.)

Background
Born of House Jaelre, in a surface fortress in Cormanthor, Chalithra Vrinn was never like most other drow. The malevolence of even the somewhat enlightened Vhaeraunians secretly disgusted her. At age 30, her training as a soldier ended abruptly when she protected a human child from a Jaelre raid by killing two of her fellows. Marked for death, she fled the forest and sought sanctuary from her pursuers at Morningdawn Hall, the temple of Lathander in Shadowdale. At the suggestion of the priests, she trained as a cleric of Lathander, and took the name Faernethue (which roughly translates to “sacred-hearted champion” ) to signify her denial of both Vhaeraun and Lolth.

After a group of drow raided Shadowdale looking for her, the Lathanderites smuggled her to an oasis in the Anauroch, out of reach of House Jaelre. There, she met Andar, a sunmaster. Andar taught her about the ancient Netherese sun god Amaunator, of whom the sunmasters believe Lathander to be the current manifestation. Amaunator, a mighty deity of order, appealed to the young drow, who wished to bring light to the darkness below and redeem her people from their self-destructive culture. Learning to handle sunlight through the sunmasters' innate powers was just icing on the cake.

In the Year of the Sword, while hunting a medusa that had terrorized several Bedine communities, she took shelter from the sun in a cavern, where she found the desiccated corpse of an ancient sunmaster. She took up the corpse's holy symbol and, after hunting down and killing the medusa, returned to the oasis.

Three Elves and a Kobold
Faernethue left the oasis in early Eleint of the Year of the Banner. She took employment as a caravan guard across the Anauroch to Silverymoon, and began to make her living as a sellsword in the Silver Marches, hunting monsters and guarding caravans. She eventually fell in with an elderly shield dwarf merchant, Garth Battlehammer of Mithral Hall, and his dragonwrought kobold bodyguard Tetcaz Torunn.

During a trip to Reddansyr in the Year of the Tankard, they ran across a former assassin, a moon elven wielder of ki arts named Aramil Galanodel. Later that night, the inn was attacked by the Fire Knives, seeking to eliminate their former compatriot. Faernethue, Tetcaz and Garth helped Aramil fight off the assassins; in gratitude, he swore an oath of fealty to Faernethue.

In late Ches of the Year of the Unstrung Harp, the merchant and bodyguards came to Scornubel, where they met a middle-aged drow arcanist named Rylfal Xiluin. By trade a talented magician, but a scholar by inclination, he offered both his magic and his knowledge. It was only later, after Garth's caravan survived an attack by several low-grade demons, that the unassuming drow revealed his true nature, a warlock. He explained his subterfuge with the simple logic that even if people could see past his skin color, they were usually put off by the fiendish nature of his magic. Faernethue, however, forgave him.

Garth Battlehammer was almost 160 years old by this point, and wanted to retire. He felt he had one last good trade mission left in him, and wanted to see some of Faerûn's furthest wonders, so the group set out southwest, crossed the Sea of Fallen Stars, and ended up in Airspur, Chessenta. There, a bar crawl netted much more than hangovers; a derisive remark by a barmaid gave the future foursome their professional name: "Three elves and a kobold?  That sounds like a drink."

Relationships

 * Solar Flare: Faernethue's intelligent mace has the soul of a Netherese Amaunatori cleric named Adrian Valarh.  After recovering the weapon from Harrax, a ruined town in the Anauroch, she worked hard to gain the weapon's approval.  She views the Valarh persona as a venerable teacher; the mace itself sees her as a talented student, and almost a surrogate daughter.
 * Rylfal Xiluin: Despite the fact that they are completely opposite in outlook, Faernethue has always felt a distinct connection to the party's resident warlock, who is almost 350 years her senior.  Perhaps it is their similar upbringings and mutual rejection of the Dark Seldarine (apart from the Lady of the Dance).  Or maybe she's beginning to fall in love with him.
 * Aramil Galanodel: Faernethue sometimes finds her feelings conflicted regarding Aramil, a former assassin for the Fire Knives.  Mostly, though, she sees him as a trustworthy ally.  Aramil's methods are distasteful to her (she prefers to face a problem head-on rather than work around it), but he occupies a valued role as the group's "intrusion specialist."
 * Tetcaz Torunn: Decades ago when Faernethue went by the name Chalithra Vrinn Jaelre, her family owned kobold slaves.  She disliked the little reptiles intensely, and never expected to be on the same side as one.  But the dragonwrought kobold spearman who is the group's main combatant has proven a valuable friend.  His accepting, optimistic outlook and love of adventure helped her to become more open about her drow heritage; she no longer hides her black skin under a hood when she enters a new town.

Statistics, 3.5E
Faernethue Vrinn: Female drow cleric 3 of Amaunator/fighter 2/sunmaster 3; Medium humanoid (elf); HD 2d10+5d8+14; hp 64; Init +4; Spd 20 ft; AC 22, touch 12, flat-footed 20; Base Atk +5; Grp +9; Atk or Full Atk +13 melee (1d8+7+1d6 fire, +2 intelligent disruption flaming light burst heavy mace) or +8 ranged (1d8+2/19-20, masterwork light crossbow); SA glaring eyes 1/day, spells, sun spells, turn undead 8/day (+5, 2d6+8, 3rd); SQ Drow traits, spell-like abilities, spell resistance 18; AL LG; SV Fort +11, Ref +3, Will +10; Str 20, Dex 15, Con 15, Int 15, Wis 19, Cha 20.

Skills and Feats: Climb +9, Concentration +10, Handle Animal +10, Knowledge (geography) +7, Knowledge (history) +10, Knowledge (religion) +7, Listen +6, Ride +4, Search +4, Spot +8; Blooded, Initiate of Lathander , Power Attack, Servant of the Fallen (Amaunator) , Weapon Focus (heavy mace).

Languages: Abyssal, Common, Drow Sign Language, Elven, Loross, Undercommon.

Special Abilities:
 * Glaring Eyes (Sp): Faernethue's eyes glow with the brilliance of the sun.  She can produce a searing light effect from her eyes once per day (+7 ranged touch; caster level 7th).  She can never be blinded or dazed by spells or effects with the light descriptor, or by natural light of any kind.  This also negates her racial light blindness.
 * Sun Spells: Faernethue can prepare any Sun domain spell as if it were on her divine spell list.  The spell uses a spell slot of a level equal to its level in the Sun domain list.

Special Qualities:
 * Drow Traits (Ex): +2 racial bonus on Will saves against spells and spell-like abilities, darkvision 120 ft.
 * Spell-like Abilities (Sp): 1/day -- dancing lights, darkness, faerie fire.  These abilities are as the spells cast by a 7th-level sorcerer.

Cleric Spells Prepared (caster level 5th): 0 -- create water, detect magic, guidance (2), light, purify food and drink; 1st -- divine favor, endure elements (D), invisibility to undead, shield of faith, rosemantle; 2nd -- consecrate, heat metal (D), lesser restoration.
 * D: Domain spell. Domains: Law (cast law spells at +1 caster level), Sun (greater turning against undead 1/day).

Major Possessions: +1 breastplate, +1 heavy steel shield, Solar Flare (+2 intelligent disruption flaming light burst heavy mace), masterwork light crossbow, 20 masterwork crossbow bolts, gold holy symbol of Amaunator, Heward's handy haversack, phylactery of faithfulness, Amaunatori belt of priestly might, 10 potions of cure light wounds, scroll of detect evil (12), scroll of delay poison (12), scroll of spiritual weapon (12). 9,577 gp, 8 sp, 8 cp.