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Ardys
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Appearance
Ardys is a blue eyed blonde. Her hair can be worn in different hairstyles. Her attire depends on what the situation demands, but she always wears gloves in order to conceal her badly scarred hands.Personality
Ardys Endor is loyal, enduring and persistent.
History
ARC 695 To 707: Childhood
Ardys was born in Fort Endor, by the governess Narda Craig, who had an affair with a married member of the Endor family. The mother disappeared mysteriously. The baby girl was recognized as a bastard child and given the family's surname. A child-less female relative (the wife of her biological father actually) was more than happy to raise her. Why give away a perfectly cute an adorable little baby who was even partly an Endor? Besides she claimed to feel responsible for trying to remedy the mess her straying spouse had created.
Ardys grew up in the duchy of Endor, in the cold northern part of Rynmere, where the winters are unforgiving and people make their homes under earth. Her father’s family was noble, but not in a foppish way. They were enormously rich miners, jewelers and traders. They owned a fleet of trade ships and had business operations all over Idalos. Down in their secret vault somewhere below the ground, the Endor family was said to keep the biggest bank in the realm. They were maybe richer than any other noble family in all Rynmere, or at least they wanted to think so. It was bad form to say it, but they profited greatly on the free labor the kingdom provided in form of convicted criminals who worked as slaves in the mines of Endor. The family's view on this was strictly businesslike. They were doing the realm a valuable service by providing the state prison no other families were prepared to run. It was only right that the Endors should gain wealth in return.
The mines was no place for children. Ardys never saw the mines from inside when she was little. She just knew that they existed. If the grownups spoke about troubles like epidemics in the slave work force, or attempted uprisings followed by ruthless reperussions and executions, they did it when there were no children around. Ardys's childhood world consisted of the mystic and wonderful Fort Endor with its halls, rooms and passages, some of it inside the mountain and under the ground. In the summers she played in the surrounding landscape with its austere beauty. In the winters she stayed indoors like all others. Sometimes older relatives took her on trips to the exiting harbor, Norr Port, were big ships arrived and departed, carrying a mix of exotic and not so exotic goods and the winds felt full of adventure.
ARC 707 TO 711: The normal education for a young lady in Rynmere
In her lower teens Ardys was tasked with learning all the things a young noble lady needed to be skilled at. The family naturally thought she would be ready to marry in a few years. They counted on a resaonably good marriage deal with another noble family. Ardys was a bastard, but as her family was enormously rich they planned to pay for a good connection. Even if the noble families were proud and money wasn't spoken about openly there were always those who were prepared to marry into money. The young girl didn't question this plan. Her family's businesslike attitude to marriage didn't disturb her.She found it easy to put duty and loyalty to the Endor family first. Or, as her step-mother explained, there was nothing wrong with striking a good deal. Why go for less when she could love a nobleman and get a good social standing,
During these years Ardys was educated in a number of skills. She learnt the necessary knowlegde about etiquette and politics a noble must have in order to be able to navigate in the top tier of society with it's constant undercurrents of powerplay and intrigue. Attempts to teach the girl to entertain by playing musical instruments and singing were cancelled after a short time though. Her talents for it weren't impressive, but she was average good enough at dancing and conversation, riding and archery. Ardys was considered promising and would probably become able to conduct herself properly at balls and hunts and other important social events.
Her education also meant working in Fort Endor in order to learn all about how to run a big household and how to supervise servants. This was what she turned out to excel at. As a consequence her further education took a turn towards household management, estate management and steward skills. The Endor family tested their young member this way and found her useful and reliable. If they would fail to marry her off due to her being a bastard and their fellow nobles being snobs, they would find use for her nonetheless.
ARC 710: "The Mine Plague" in Endor arc 712 breaks Ardys's health
However...man proposes, fate disposes. When Ardys was in her sixteenth year there was an outbreak of an unknown plague in Endor. It started in a new shaft in the mines, that much was obvious, but what caused it remained unknown. The symptoms were sometimes dramatic. People could catch the plague and die within a trial, or even within a couple of bits in some cases. Others who fell ill could bleed to death, which could take as long as ten trials. Others again could seem unafflicted, but then gradually get overwhelmed by pain until they finally died after around sixty trials. There were also those who survived, but they were weakened and there could be various permanent conditions.
The turn of events made the Endor family postpone all thoughts of marriage arrangements for their children and instead focus on the crisis at hand. It was proposed that an improvement of the sanitary conditions in the mines could stop the plague from spreading. In addition, physicians suggested a general improvement of the nutrition, to strengthen the health of the slaves. The health of mine slaves wasn't normally on the agenda in Endor, but now it had risen to top priority. The plague was a threat to the duchy's profit.
In addition, the mining masters and craftsmen started to worry about their own health not being so different from the health of slaves after all. The ducal family found it best to show that they were doing something. They gave orders about cleaning and better latrines in the mines. In order to further demonstrate that the plague was something that surely only afflicted slaves, the Endors went as far as to let their women engage in noble charity and go down into the mine with food and strengthening drugs.
This would prove fatal for Ardys. During her one and only symbolic visit in the mines she entered the new shaft, and became a living proof that the plague was not at all limited to slave workers only. This unfortunate turn of events finally made the Endors give in and shut the new shaft, despite how promising it had seemed, with it's abundance of a beautiful and hithertho unknown mineral. Some said the old duke of Endor was addled, when he openly began to blame the mine plague on the mineral and decided that every piece of it must be dumped in the tunnel it had come from, then had the entrance sealed. It was done, and when the number of plague cases actually seemed to decrease, the duke’s ideas seemed less crazy. Endor seemed to have been saved, but it was too late for Ardys.
At this point a weird old woman arrived to Norr Bay and continued to Fort Endor, where she demanded a meeting with the Duke. The tales have it she called herself Wind Woman, but she never told her true name. It's said that when she passed by, people could feel a breeze move through the air, and even when she entered a hall or room inside mountain or under earth, torches and candle flames started to flutter, and make light and shadows alike flicker over the walls. Wind Woman was of the opionion that something, somehow, had “damaged the elements” and this was the cause of the unknown illness and the deaths. Nobody understood a word. She spoke with great authority though, and offered to "put the earth to rest". It seemed like insane babble, even worse than the dukes ideas, but as they had everything to win and nothing to lose the Endors allowed Wind Woman to go down into the mines and try to deal with whatever she would find. And so she did.
The Endors never got an understandable explanation from Wind Woman of what had transpired in the underground, but the progress of the plague seemed to have been stopped. Prosaic skeptics in the family proposed that this was just the natural course of a plague outbreak. They were of the opinion that it had nothing to do with the unintelligible old visitor and her bizarre ways. The plague had just faded out, like plagues eventually use to do. It caused some debates in the family, but people tired of it after a while and focused on more important matters. They still had the young Ardys o take care of. The girl had survived, but she was weak and pale. Her hands were seriously scarred after the multitude of bleeding blisters that had covered them for many trials, blisters that had seemed to slowly eat the flesh away much like an acid. Now when the girl had bad health and a marred appearance in addition to her bastard status she was hardly in shape for a good marriage anymore. They would need to think of something else.
ARC 712-713: The family sends Ardys abroad in the hopes to get her cured
When Wind Woman managed to articulate the opinion that the family should send Ardys to better doctors outside of Endor, they felt she had a point. More knowledge and better cures could maybe be found in other places. It was decided that Ardys would travel, educate herself, work in the Endor trade operations, and look for a potential cure for her frail condition. As they would probably not be able to find a husband for her, she would hopefully be of use for house Endor in other ways instead. Trusting a babbling old weirdwoman with the protection of a bastard daughter of Endor was out of question though. The young noblewoman was given proper escort, but as Ardys had taken a liking to old "Windy", the woman was allowed to tag along as companion.
And so a long journey by boat begun. The first destination was Viden. In order to pass the time, "Windy" taught Ardys about an odd ancient language - it was simply called "The Ancient Language". It was a hard language to master, but they were on a ship to Viden and had no duties to perform there, so they could pass the time as they wished. Learning a language was an intellectual pastime and not physically taxing for the still weak and frail Ardys. She found it fun. She practiced every trial. She repeated the words she was taught, combined words to phrases, and phrases to sentences. She had no idea what to use this ancient language for, but was vaguely told that it could be good to learn it. It would be a lie to say she became highly skilled at he ancient language, but as she could focus on it full time she became better and better at it.
Alas Ardys found no really good cures. The doctors abroad didn't seem to be any better than the doctors of Rynmere. Old "Windy" mumbled something cryptic about “elements” and tried a few odd tricks on Ardys, but it didn't help her. It only served to pique the girls curiosity. After a great deal of nagging, Ardys finally managed to squeeze out the truth of her elderly friend. To her great surprise she was told that the elements themselves could be controlled by people who knew who to befriend them and work in concert with them. This art was called "defiance". Ardys realized this seemed to be what people called magic, something she had always been told was dangerous, evil and suspect. She should have been terrified, but she wasn’t, as it was only "Windy" who practiced defiance. Ardys started to think that magic was maybe not so evil after all. She was overwhelmed with curiosity and eager to learn, but the old woman shook her head and told her no. Magic was nothing for frail people she said, in particular not defiance. The element could be cruel and harsh. Initiation, she said vaguely, was likely to kill most people. Fire would incinerate them, earth would bury them, water would drown them and air ... air, oh the air would come at them like a storm and whirl them out of existence. She wasn’t going to take any risks with Ardys. The girl nagged a bit, but it didn't sway Windy and they didn't speak about it again.
Not long after this, the two parted ways. As Ardys proved to still be too frail to be able to take part in the demanding education they had planned for her in Viden, the Endors didn't find it profitable to pay for university studies. They decided that she would instead learn what she could from Endor relatives and employees. She would be allowed to work at the pace she was able to make. Ardys moved on. Old "Windy" had her own plans and stayed in Viden. She said that she would perhaps settle down and stay there for the remainder of her life. Should Ardys ever want to find "Windy" again, Viden was probably where she could be found.
ARC 714-717: Ardys learns about Endor's trade at the pace she can make
Ardys travelled where the family sent her and loyally learnt the kind of knowledge they considered right for a bastard daughter who might end up unmarried due to bad health and scars. She was taught more about politics and rhetoric. The teachings weren't professional, and sometimes they was really biased, but people did their best. Ardys did her best to pick up what she could and learnt a bit about how create influence, build up convincing argumentation and persuade people. She gained insights in business management and how to organize and lead international trade operations. In addition to this, she learnt a bit about the cultures and etiquettes of what her family called "foreign countries".
Albeit it was possible to cope anywhere with common, it could also be a benefit for business to know a few select local languages of importance. In order to show respect and be more polite than competitors. Umaya, the qi'ora language of Nashaki, was important for the trade with those excellent crafters. It took some effort, but it wasn't impossibly hard to learn, and eventually Ardys picked up a bit of it.
Everything wasn't well though. Fuming over her own annoying weakness, young Ardys silently swore that she would overcome it and become strong and fit. She started to exercise secretly. In her rage against the weakness that kept the energy she wanted out of reach for her and force her to work at lower speed than others, she decided to rise form her life crippling condition or die trying. She took physical exercise to extremes, and bought a sword she trained with when she was alone. This was incredibly hard for the weak girl and in the beginning it nearly made her collapse and become even weaker. To die trying seemed to be a totally realistic possibility. Despite this, Ardys forced herself to endure and continue, no matter that it often made her feel like she would swoon or vomit, which also really happened sometimes. People would have been appalled if they had known about it, but Ardys kept it secret. It was best to not worry the family members.
ARC 717: The blessing of Celarion
There was however someone would learn about the young woman's efforts. The immortal Qylios was travelling in Idalos, as she often did. Qylios wanted to avoid attention and for this reason she was dressed in the simple attire of a working woman. That enabled her to blend into the crowd on the streets of Rharne, where Ardys Endor was working a the time. This disguise did however make a couple of slave hunting pirates from a ship that had recently arrived to the city think the immortal a good catch. The advanced on what they thought was a helpless female laborer, when Ardys turned around the corner on her way down to the docks for a discussion with a relative who was handling the papers and formalities for the Endor goods.
The pirates looked at each other. Better and better ... there were now two new slaves for them to catch, as they saw it. Their victims were only two weak women, so what could go wrong? One of the pirates turned on Ardys. She looked like easy case. As it was stupid to damage the prey too much and risk to lower the price he could get for her, he found it smart to rely on raw physical strenght instead of weapons. He dropped his sword on the ground before he attacked. This was a fatal mistake, as Ardys had now been exercising swordplay for several seasons. She dodged, bent down, grabbed the sword and shouted at the other woman to "join in, fight and win". The immortal hardly needed to be encouraged by a mere mortal trader like Ardys. She joined the fight! After this everything happened extremely fast. A blinding light exploded in the air. To Ardys is felt like lightning had struck. She felt herself instinctively team up with the power of that light, without any hesitation. It carried her movements and made her more skilled with the sword than ever before.
Next, she found herself standing on the street, sword in hand, facing another armed woman. Her ally. There was blood on their swords and the pirates lay in a silent heap on the ground.
A short and stunned silence followed.
Ardys felt like they had bonded by fighting side by side. Then the unknown laborer woman moved her sword from her right hand to the left, and extended her right hand to Ardys. Ardys did the same and they shook hands. "I am Qylios. Bless you" was all the laborer woman said. Then she smiled, raised her had in a farewell, and walked away. Perplexed, Ardys realized that it wasn't just words, but a true blessing she had received, from an immortal she had never given much thought. She turned around and stood looking at the woman's back until she disappeared out of sight.
Qylios. The explosion of light. The battle and the victory. The blessing of a being so powerful that a mortal wasn't even able to understand it.
Ardys looked down at her left hand, still holding the sword. Around her left wrist, over the glove she wore to conceal the disfigured hand, she now wore a softly shining bracelet, simple, elegant and ... totally surreal. It could be mistaken for glass, but when she touched it her fingers pass right thought it. It was a band of pure light, no less. It was not a thing that belonged to the world of the mortals, but a divine sign she had heard about in tales. A tremor shook her, and she fell down on her knees, unable to stand due to the profound awe that seized her. Tears ran down her cheeks. She had no words for what she experienced in that moment. The immortal Qylios had seen Ardys Endor and granted her an unbearably great honor. Ardys didn't know what to do with it. Time would tell.
ARC 717-718: Go East - Ardys health improves and she is sent to work in Nashaki
After exercising for arcs Ardys felt like she was healthy and fit enough nowadays, so the family decided to let her advance in knowledge by entering the eastern trade operations. They sent her to Nashaki, where they had particularly good contacts with the Qi'ora. Ardys was tasked with assisting the manager running the local trade office over there, which was a challenging but interesting job. It was during this period of time she learnt about one more kind of magic, named "graft". It was said to "repair people". To Ardys with her damaged hands this seemed like a good thing. As her attitude to magic had already been softened up by "Windy" she was open for thinking magic could be used for good ends as well as for bad. To repair people and replace destroyed body parts and organs with new ones in order to save people from a life as cripples seemed definitely good to Ardys, even if the means might be questionable.
If she had just known more about the graft she might have wanted...but the Qi'ora who told her about graft said they were only using it for plants, and it was an uncertain thing how it would work on people. Ardys hands were terrible to look at, but they were fully functional, so she didn't want to take any risks with them. Function was more important than beauty. She greatly preferred ugly hands to no hands. More knowledge would be needed before Ardys would (perhaps) want to try anything. There was also the attitudes to magic to consider. People in Rynmere tended to think it was either fairy tales or evil, perhaps mostly evil. Ardys decided to wait and think. Time would tell what her knowledge about the existence of graft could bring.
ARC 719: To Be Decided
In present time she is ... somewhere
Ardys was born in Fort Endor, by the governess Narda Craig, who had an affair with a married member of the Endor family. The mother disappeared mysteriously. The baby girl was recognized as a bastard child and given the family's surname. A child-less female relative (the wife of her biological father actually) was more than happy to raise her. Why give away a perfectly cute an adorable little baby who was even partly an Endor? Besides she claimed to feel responsible for trying to remedy the mess her straying spouse had created.
Ardys grew up in the duchy of Endor, in the cold northern part of Rynmere, where the winters are unforgiving and people make their homes under earth. Her father’s family was noble, but not in a foppish way. They were enormously rich miners, jewelers and traders. They owned a fleet of trade ships and had business operations all over Idalos. Down in their secret vault somewhere below the ground, the Endor family was said to keep the biggest bank in the realm. They were maybe richer than any other noble family in all Rynmere, or at least they wanted to think so. It was bad form to say it, but they profited greatly on the free labor the kingdom provided in form of convicted criminals who worked as slaves in the mines of Endor. The family's view on this was strictly businesslike. They were doing the realm a valuable service by providing the state prison no other families were prepared to run. It was only right that the Endors should gain wealth in return.
The mines was no place for children. Ardys never saw the mines from inside when she was little. She just knew that they existed. If the grownups spoke about troubles like epidemics in the slave work force, or attempted uprisings followed by ruthless reperussions and executions, they did it when there were no children around. Ardys's childhood world consisted of the mystic and wonderful Fort Endor with its halls, rooms and passages, some of it inside the mountain and under the ground. In the summers she played in the surrounding landscape with its austere beauty. In the winters she stayed indoors like all others. Sometimes older relatives took her on trips to the exiting harbor, Norr Port, were big ships arrived and departed, carrying a mix of exotic and not so exotic goods and the winds felt full of adventure.
ARC 707 TO 711: The normal education for a young lady in Rynmere
In her lower teens Ardys was tasked with learning all the things a young noble lady needed to be skilled at. The family naturally thought she would be ready to marry in a few years. They counted on a resaonably good marriage deal with another noble family. Ardys was a bastard, but as her family was enormously rich they planned to pay for a good connection. Even if the noble families were proud and money wasn't spoken about openly there were always those who were prepared to marry into money. The young girl didn't question this plan. Her family's businesslike attitude to marriage didn't disturb her.She found it easy to put duty and loyalty to the Endor family first. Or, as her step-mother explained, there was nothing wrong with striking a good deal. Why go for less when she could love a nobleman and get a good social standing,
During these years Ardys was educated in a number of skills. She learnt the necessary knowlegde about etiquette and politics a noble must have in order to be able to navigate in the top tier of society with it's constant undercurrents of powerplay and intrigue. Attempts to teach the girl to entertain by playing musical instruments and singing were cancelled after a short time though. Her talents for it weren't impressive, but she was average good enough at dancing and conversation, riding and archery. Ardys was considered promising and would probably become able to conduct herself properly at balls and hunts and other important social events.
Her education also meant working in Fort Endor in order to learn all about how to run a big household and how to supervise servants. This was what she turned out to excel at. As a consequence her further education took a turn towards household management, estate management and steward skills. The Endor family tested their young member this way and found her useful and reliable. If they would fail to marry her off due to her being a bastard and their fellow nobles being snobs, they would find use for her nonetheless.
ARC 710: "The Mine Plague" in Endor arc 712 breaks Ardys's health
However...man proposes, fate disposes. When Ardys was in her sixteenth year there was an outbreak of an unknown plague in Endor. It started in a new shaft in the mines, that much was obvious, but what caused it remained unknown. The symptoms were sometimes dramatic. People could catch the plague and die within a trial, or even within a couple of bits in some cases. Others who fell ill could bleed to death, which could take as long as ten trials. Others again could seem unafflicted, but then gradually get overwhelmed by pain until they finally died after around sixty trials. There were also those who survived, but they were weakened and there could be various permanent conditions.
The turn of events made the Endor family postpone all thoughts of marriage arrangements for their children and instead focus on the crisis at hand. It was proposed that an improvement of the sanitary conditions in the mines could stop the plague from spreading. In addition, physicians suggested a general improvement of the nutrition, to strengthen the health of the slaves. The health of mine slaves wasn't normally on the agenda in Endor, but now it had risen to top priority. The plague was a threat to the duchy's profit.
In addition, the mining masters and craftsmen started to worry about their own health not being so different from the health of slaves after all. The ducal family found it best to show that they were doing something. They gave orders about cleaning and better latrines in the mines. In order to further demonstrate that the plague was something that surely only afflicted slaves, the Endors went as far as to let their women engage in noble charity and go down into the mine with food and strengthening drugs.
This would prove fatal for Ardys. During her one and only symbolic visit in the mines she entered the new shaft, and became a living proof that the plague was not at all limited to slave workers only. This unfortunate turn of events finally made the Endors give in and shut the new shaft, despite how promising it had seemed, with it's abundance of a beautiful and hithertho unknown mineral. Some said the old duke of Endor was addled, when he openly began to blame the mine plague on the mineral and decided that every piece of it must be dumped in the tunnel it had come from, then had the entrance sealed. It was done, and when the number of plague cases actually seemed to decrease, the duke’s ideas seemed less crazy. Endor seemed to have been saved, but it was too late for Ardys.
At this point a weird old woman arrived to Norr Bay and continued to Fort Endor, where she demanded a meeting with the Duke. The tales have it she called herself Wind Woman, but she never told her true name. It's said that when she passed by, people could feel a breeze move through the air, and even when she entered a hall or room inside mountain or under earth, torches and candle flames started to flutter, and make light and shadows alike flicker over the walls. Wind Woman was of the opionion that something, somehow, had “damaged the elements” and this was the cause of the unknown illness and the deaths. Nobody understood a word. She spoke with great authority though, and offered to "put the earth to rest". It seemed like insane babble, even worse than the dukes ideas, but as they had everything to win and nothing to lose the Endors allowed Wind Woman to go down into the mines and try to deal with whatever she would find. And so she did.
The Endors never got an understandable explanation from Wind Woman of what had transpired in the underground, but the progress of the plague seemed to have been stopped. Prosaic skeptics in the family proposed that this was just the natural course of a plague outbreak. They were of the opinion that it had nothing to do with the unintelligible old visitor and her bizarre ways. The plague had just faded out, like plagues eventually use to do. It caused some debates in the family, but people tired of it after a while and focused on more important matters. They still had the young Ardys o take care of. The girl had survived, but she was weak and pale. Her hands were seriously scarred after the multitude of bleeding blisters that had covered them for many trials, blisters that had seemed to slowly eat the flesh away much like an acid. Now when the girl had bad health and a marred appearance in addition to her bastard status she was hardly in shape for a good marriage anymore. They would need to think of something else.
ARC 712-713: The family sends Ardys abroad in the hopes to get her cured
When Wind Woman managed to articulate the opinion that the family should send Ardys to better doctors outside of Endor, they felt she had a point. More knowledge and better cures could maybe be found in other places. It was decided that Ardys would travel, educate herself, work in the Endor trade operations, and look for a potential cure for her frail condition. As they would probably not be able to find a husband for her, she would hopefully be of use for house Endor in other ways instead. Trusting a babbling old weirdwoman with the protection of a bastard daughter of Endor was out of question though. The young noblewoman was given proper escort, but as Ardys had taken a liking to old "Windy", the woman was allowed to tag along as companion.
And so a long journey by boat begun. The first destination was Viden. In order to pass the time, "Windy" taught Ardys about an odd ancient language - it was simply called "The Ancient Language". It was a hard language to master, but they were on a ship to Viden and had no duties to perform there, so they could pass the time as they wished. Learning a language was an intellectual pastime and not physically taxing for the still weak and frail Ardys. She found it fun. She practiced every trial. She repeated the words she was taught, combined words to phrases, and phrases to sentences. She had no idea what to use this ancient language for, but was vaguely told that it could be good to learn it. It would be a lie to say she became highly skilled at he ancient language, but as she could focus on it full time she became better and better at it.
Alas Ardys found no really good cures. The doctors abroad didn't seem to be any better than the doctors of Rynmere. Old "Windy" mumbled something cryptic about “elements” and tried a few odd tricks on Ardys, but it didn't help her. It only served to pique the girls curiosity. After a great deal of nagging, Ardys finally managed to squeeze out the truth of her elderly friend. To her great surprise she was told that the elements themselves could be controlled by people who knew who to befriend them and work in concert with them. This art was called "defiance". Ardys realized this seemed to be what people called magic, something she had always been told was dangerous, evil and suspect. She should have been terrified, but she wasn’t, as it was only "Windy" who practiced defiance. Ardys started to think that magic was maybe not so evil after all. She was overwhelmed with curiosity and eager to learn, but the old woman shook her head and told her no. Magic was nothing for frail people she said, in particular not defiance. The element could be cruel and harsh. Initiation, she said vaguely, was likely to kill most people. Fire would incinerate them, earth would bury them, water would drown them and air ... air, oh the air would come at them like a storm and whirl them out of existence. She wasn’t going to take any risks with Ardys. The girl nagged a bit, but it didn't sway Windy and they didn't speak about it again.
Not long after this, the two parted ways. As Ardys proved to still be too frail to be able to take part in the demanding education they had planned for her in Viden, the Endors didn't find it profitable to pay for university studies. They decided that she would instead learn what she could from Endor relatives and employees. She would be allowed to work at the pace she was able to make. Ardys moved on. Old "Windy" had her own plans and stayed in Viden. She said that she would perhaps settle down and stay there for the remainder of her life. Should Ardys ever want to find "Windy" again, Viden was probably where she could be found.
ARC 714-717: Ardys learns about Endor's trade at the pace she can make
Ardys travelled where the family sent her and loyally learnt the kind of knowledge they considered right for a bastard daughter who might end up unmarried due to bad health and scars. She was taught more about politics and rhetoric. The teachings weren't professional, and sometimes they was really biased, but people did their best. Ardys did her best to pick up what she could and learnt a bit about how create influence, build up convincing argumentation and persuade people. She gained insights in business management and how to organize and lead international trade operations. In addition to this, she learnt a bit about the cultures and etiquettes of what her family called "foreign countries".
Albeit it was possible to cope anywhere with common, it could also be a benefit for business to know a few select local languages of importance. In order to show respect and be more polite than competitors. Umaya, the qi'ora language of Nashaki, was important for the trade with those excellent crafters. It took some effort, but it wasn't impossibly hard to learn, and eventually Ardys picked up a bit of it.
Everything wasn't well though. Fuming over her own annoying weakness, young Ardys silently swore that she would overcome it and become strong and fit. She started to exercise secretly. In her rage against the weakness that kept the energy she wanted out of reach for her and force her to work at lower speed than others, she decided to rise form her life crippling condition or die trying. She took physical exercise to extremes, and bought a sword she trained with when she was alone. This was incredibly hard for the weak girl and in the beginning it nearly made her collapse and become even weaker. To die trying seemed to be a totally realistic possibility. Despite this, Ardys forced herself to endure and continue, no matter that it often made her feel like she would swoon or vomit, which also really happened sometimes. People would have been appalled if they had known about it, but Ardys kept it secret. It was best to not worry the family members.
ARC 717: The blessing of Celarion
There was however someone would learn about the young woman's efforts. The immortal Qylios was travelling in Idalos, as she often did. Qylios wanted to avoid attention and for this reason she was dressed in the simple attire of a working woman. That enabled her to blend into the crowd on the streets of Rharne, where Ardys Endor was working a the time. This disguise did however make a couple of slave hunting pirates from a ship that had recently arrived to the city think the immortal a good catch. The advanced on what they thought was a helpless female laborer, when Ardys turned around the corner on her way down to the docks for a discussion with a relative who was handling the papers and formalities for the Endor goods.
The pirates looked at each other. Better and better ... there were now two new slaves for them to catch, as they saw it. Their victims were only two weak women, so what could go wrong? One of the pirates turned on Ardys. She looked like easy case. As it was stupid to damage the prey too much and risk to lower the price he could get for her, he found it smart to rely on raw physical strenght instead of weapons. He dropped his sword on the ground before he attacked. This was a fatal mistake, as Ardys had now been exercising swordplay for several seasons. She dodged, bent down, grabbed the sword and shouted at the other woman to "join in, fight and win". The immortal hardly needed to be encouraged by a mere mortal trader like Ardys. She joined the fight! After this everything happened extremely fast. A blinding light exploded in the air. To Ardys is felt like lightning had struck. She felt herself instinctively team up with the power of that light, without any hesitation. It carried her movements and made her more skilled with the sword than ever before.
Next, she found herself standing on the street, sword in hand, facing another armed woman. Her ally. There was blood on their swords and the pirates lay in a silent heap on the ground.
A short and stunned silence followed.
Ardys felt like they had bonded by fighting side by side. Then the unknown laborer woman moved her sword from her right hand to the left, and extended her right hand to Ardys. Ardys did the same and they shook hands. "I am Qylios. Bless you" was all the laborer woman said. Then she smiled, raised her had in a farewell, and walked away. Perplexed, Ardys realized that it wasn't just words, but a true blessing she had received, from an immortal she had never given much thought. She turned around and stood looking at the woman's back until she disappeared out of sight.
Qylios. The explosion of light. The battle and the victory. The blessing of a being so powerful that a mortal wasn't even able to understand it.
Ardys looked down at her left hand, still holding the sword. Around her left wrist, over the glove she wore to conceal the disfigured hand, she now wore a softly shining bracelet, simple, elegant and ... totally surreal. It could be mistaken for glass, but when she touched it her fingers pass right thought it. It was a band of pure light, no less. It was not a thing that belonged to the world of the mortals, but a divine sign she had heard about in tales. A tremor shook her, and she fell down on her knees, unable to stand due to the profound awe that seized her. Tears ran down her cheeks. She had no words for what she experienced in that moment. The immortal Qylios had seen Ardys Endor and granted her an unbearably great honor. Ardys didn't know what to do with it. Time would tell.
ARC 717-718: Go East - Ardys health improves and she is sent to work in Nashaki
After exercising for arcs Ardys felt like she was healthy and fit enough nowadays, so the family decided to let her advance in knowledge by entering the eastern trade operations. They sent her to Nashaki, where they had particularly good contacts with the Qi'ora. Ardys was tasked with assisting the manager running the local trade office over there, which was a challenging but interesting job. It was during this period of time she learnt about one more kind of magic, named "graft". It was said to "repair people". To Ardys with her damaged hands this seemed like a good thing. As her attitude to magic had already been softened up by "Windy" she was open for thinking magic could be used for good ends as well as for bad. To repair people and replace destroyed body parts and organs with new ones in order to save people from a life as cripples seemed definitely good to Ardys, even if the means might be questionable.
If she had just known more about the graft she might have wanted...but the Qi'ora who told her about graft said they were only using it for plants, and it was an uncertain thing how it would work on people. Ardys hands were terrible to look at, but they were fully functional, so she didn't want to take any risks with them. Function was more important than beauty. She greatly preferred ugly hands to no hands. More knowledge would be needed before Ardys would (perhaps) want to try anything. There was also the attitudes to magic to consider. People in Rynmere tended to think it was either fairy tales or evil, perhaps mostly evil. Ardys decided to wait and think. Time would tell what her knowledge about the existence of graft could bring.
ARC 719: To Be Decided
In present time she is ... somewhere
Housing
Renown
Skills
Knowledge
Skill Point Ledger
Total Unspent Points : 0
Marks
Items
- Starting Package(SP)
- Cloak, blouse, skirt, undergarments, and a pair of boots. All clothing is standard quality.
- One Set of Toiletries: Soap, A brush, toothbrush, toothpaste,
- One waterskin, Two sets of eating utensils, Tinderbox
- One set of SP housing equipment (see under housing)
- One Potted Plant !
- Bought Items (Ledger)
- Brown all purpose dress, embroidered, fine cool wool, Ymiden 1, 717 (CS at start)
- One-Handed Sword (CS at start)
- Thread rewards
- Reward, thread
- Reward, thread
Wealth Ledger
Total Currency: WP
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