Ityak-Ortheel

Ityak-Ortheel, commonly called the Elf Eater, was a monstrous creature that dwelled in the Abyss, waiting for the god Malar, the Beastlord, to summon it to Faerûn to destroy life.

Physical description
The Elf Eater was a thirty-foot-tall monstrosity that stood on three enormous, trunk-like legs. Its flesh was tannish-brown, and its midsection was a flat, round blob of flesh with an extremely hard, domed carapace resting atop it. The midsection was surrounded by forty tentacles, each a hundred feet long and lined by large suckers. Ityak-Ortheel could re-grow severed tentacles and legs. It could also instantly reattach a severed leg by holding it to the stump.

On Ityak-Ortheel’s underside, protruding from between its three legs, was an enormous maw. The maw was toothless and constantly emitted a slurping sound, with wet flaps of skin sucking in and out of the darkness within. The mouth was the color of blood and could expand to a great width or extend downward into a long snout similar to that of an anteater. Within the mouth, hard plates of cartilage constantly ground together. Ityak-Ortheel slowly digested the souls of those it devoured, keeping it satisfied and tormenting those whom it had eaten. This slow digestion let the Elf Eater go for hundreds or thousands of years without eating.

Although the Elf Eater had no eyes or ears, it could sense all life within a radius of five miles. This sense could discern what kind of life that it was detecting, allowing Ityak-Ortheel to hunt down the elves it so hated.

History
Ityak-Ortheel was created early in Abeir-Toril's history. It was spawned from the mingled blood of Gruumsh, the supreme god of the orcs, and Corellon Larethian, the supreme deity of the elves. Ityak-Ortheel came into being in the aftermath of their titanic struggle, and it immediately fled to a deep layer of the Abyss, where it lived in solitude.

Ityak-Ortheel could not travel voluntarily between the planes, so it relied on Malar to transport it to the Material Plane to punish the elves, wreaking havoc and destruction.

Ityak-Ortheel once relied on other deities and powerful mortals to transport it from the Abyss, not knowing when it's next summoning would come. When Malar began using it as his favored instrument of terror, the Elf Eater began to visit Faerûn at least once per century, where it rampaged around elf communities.

As a result of Ityak-Ortheel’s tendency for terrorizing elves, the elves built a portal known as Fey-Alamtine on the isle of Gwynneth in the Moonshae Isles. This portal in the kingdom of Synnoria could be opened by anyone with a platinum Alamtine triangle; every elf community on Faerûn was given one such triangle. When the Elf Eater attacked, entire elven villages and tribes would retreat to the Moonshaes, often going on to Evermeet from there. This plan worked for centuries; however, in the Year of the Sword, 1365 DR, Malar divined the location of the elves’ portal and with the help of Talos the Destroyer sent Ityak-Ortheel through the portal, permanently destroying it. Thus, the Elf Eater rampaged across Gwynneth, the capital city of Chrysalis, and the ancient Palace of Ages (Argen-Tellirynd) before being banished back to the Abyss by the human princess Alicia Kendrick of the Ffolk.

In 1371 DR, Malar, with the aid of Lloth, Ghaunadaur, and a renegade sun elf named Kymil Nimesin, managed to send the Elf-Eater to Evermeet via an undersea tunnel. Ityak Ortheel destroyed many elves before being dragged to Arvandor by Princess Ilyrana Moonflower.

Although Ityak-Ortheel had not appeared on Faerûn since, with the re-emergence of elves on the continent, some believed another rampage was imminent.

Malarite schemes
A group of Malarites in the Forgotten Forest west of Evereska came across one of the Alamtine triangles that their god used to track down the portal of Fey-Alamtine. They did not understand the triangle’s significance and treated it as a holy relic, although it had lost all of its power. The Malarites were led by a cruel half-elf werewolf named Tagress. They worshiped the triangle and offered it blood sacrifices at least four times every moon cycle, hoping to summon Ityak-Ortheel so that it may destroy the lands of Evereska and its people.

The group feverishly worked to find out how the triangle was related to the summoning of Ityak-Ortheel. They kidnapped mages and other masters of lore, tortured information out of them, and then sacrificed them to the relic.

In response to the group’s plots, elven leaders launched a war against the followers of Malar. The Malarites waged their own war against the elves in retaliation.

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 * “Ityak-Ortheel, the Elf-Eater” by Wayne England