Memories of a Madwoman — Life of an Oathbreaker Paladin in Eberron
[Disclaimer: I’m writing a loose diary for one of my D&D characters in English and German. This obvisously is the English version. The German version and further entries will follow.]
Dear diary…isn’t this how you’re supposed to start something like this? Well here it is then.
Dear diary, there will be death. Final death. In my dreams I can hear their screams and see their bodies burning. All the frivolities and decadence of Aerenal will be cleansed. I will help HER errect a beautiful kingdom built upon the skulls of the Undying Court. Their rules and expectations lay like icy fingers around my neck suffocating me from the day I was born. Now the ice has cracked and I will tear these fingers asunder once and for all.
You might ask: what happened to the noble girl of Aerenal? We’ll today I can tell you, she found her way. Her fate wasn’t laid out. She had no path to follow. Yet here she is, at the brink of tearing down what once held her back. But, dear diary, these are not lines in celebration of a victory at hand. They are etchings of the moments that made me a paladin of Lady Illmarrow.
If you haven’t gathered it by what I’ve written so far, I’ll spell it out for you. I never fitted in on that forsaken island. I see no need to go into detail about my youth and decadent family. I want to tell you about the first real decision I took. The order of paladins, the knights of eternity, my family had forced my into, had sent me out on a final mission. But it was much more than that, dear diary. It was a test of character and a deep betrayal by my so called betters, as I would learn later. While the esteemed squires I had been serving with for the past year were allowed to take their vows on castle grounds, I was supposed to take mine on a trip to Sharn in Breeland.
Our vessel run by House Lysandar had been taken to shore for emergency repairs. Corym, probably the only person I’d call a friend and I were posted as guards at the top of the cliff. Eerie ruins lay to our feet as we stood watch. We watched tendrils of fog caressing the dark stone, hiding unknown secrets beneath the ancients walls. At some point our attention was caught by sounds of a fight. Leaving our post we crept into the ruins, trying to find the source of the noise. We came upon five orcs in leather armour caught in an intense fight against a knight who had surrounded himself with four skeletons. A cape was drawn up, hiding his face, yet the skulls on his armour as well as his boney friends made his nature more obvious than his face would have. Two orcs were balancing atop the dilapidated walls, firing arrows at the knight. The arrowheads screeched across the dark plate in a futile attempt to penetrate. The Knight swung his mighty two handed blade while his skeletons made attempts to bring down their masters foes. The battle waged for a little but the knight started to prove to be too much for his attackers.
Corym and I decided to take action and we rushed forward. Blinded by the skeletons and skulls I thought I was fighting evil. Dear diary, I admit to being foolish at that moment. Yet I do not regret it, because after slaying the bone knight I claimed his sword for myself. It was a dark instrument of violence and should have been too heavy for an elven girl from Aerenal. When I closed my fingers on the hilt, it felt as if it had been made for me.
Bear with me for a few more lines, as my telling reaches its end. Dark was the night when I looked up to the moon and saw it hiding its full figure behind thick clouds. It was the night of my oath. I had seen that knight proud, fearless in all his glory and realised I wasn’t seeking servitude. I wanted to be free. Yes, I know I wrote about serving HER. But that’s different. We set up a pyre to burn the orcs. When I felt midnight approaching I took the vellum I had written the oath on. For a moment I saw myself wearing the armour of the knights of eternity. It was a moment of weakness. There weren’t going to be many more of those. With fire consuming the vellum I gave my unspoken oath to the hungering flames. I was free.