Female halfling, oldest of 13, set to inherit family tannery, made Teala's handdrum
Disappeared: 2 years ago
Location: Yon?
Hither tie in: ?
The Lyeburn family is one of several that had lived on Elanara land and served the family for generations. True to their name, the Lyeburns are master tanners and leather-workers. As rent for the land they lived on, they make and maintain goods for the Elanaras - ranging anywhere from basic tools for the servants to finely crafted belts, pouches, and clothes for the family itself - but they also have a small storefront in town where they sell their goods.
Veridiana is the oldest of thirteen children - eight girls and five boys. She is a year older than Teala, although her position as the oldest and as a frequent extra caretaker of her siblings has led her to generally be more responsible and slightly more reserved than her half-elf friend. Whereas Teala is used to having too much of her parents’ attention focused on her, Veridiana is accustomed to fading from her parents’ minds - not out of any deliberate neglect, but simply because with that many children, a daughter who takes care of herself and doesn’t openly cause trouble was one they don’t actively need to worry about. But behind that quiet facade is a ferocious temper, bottled up until it explodes.
In fact, Teala’s first meeting with Veridiana resulted in a knock-down, drag-out fight. An five-year-old Teala had snuck away from her lessons; a six-year-old Veridiana was longsufferingly playing hide-and-seek with three of her younger siblings. Veridiana hid behind the tree Teala had climbed just as Teala fell out of one of the lowest branches and landed on her. More startled and bruised than truly injured, Veridiana shoved the half-elf off and started to yell at her. Teala, jolted and trying not to cry from the pain of her sprained ankle, screamed back. Neither of the girls remembered who threw the first punch (it was Veridiana), but it quickly devolved into them rolling around in the dirt, clawing at each other, yanking hair and tearing clothes. When they finally both ran out of energy, the sleeve of Teala’s fine dress had been ripped off, revealing blossoming bruises and friction burns on her arm. Veridiana had a nasty set of nail marks near the hinge of her jaw; one of them would leave a small scar. Both girls were dusty, disheveled, and breathing hard when they looked over at each other, and both started laughing at nearly the same time.
That was the start of the sort of adamantine-strong friendship that can only form when two young children immediately recognize a kinship in each other. The girls sloppily patched each other up at the Lyeburns’, only to be found halfway through and properly seen to by Veridiana’s father. Teala returned to the manor and, with a straight face, told her parents her bruises and scratches had come from falling down the stairs on the way to her lessons. This wasn’t a very convincing lie, given both the dirt and the handprint-shaped bruises, but she was committed to her story.
Even at five years old, Teala knew that her parents would never approve of her associating with ‘common rabble’ like Veridiana. The fact that the Lyeburns were tenants and employees of the Elanaras wouldn’t have helped her case, but it was her non-elven heritage that would have put the final nail in any chance of them seeing their friendship as a worthwhile relationship. Oh, the elder Elanaras value other races for their unique talents and gifts, but they are also genteelly convinced of their inherent inferiority compared to the elegance, wisdom, and splendor of the elves. If they ever found out about Teala’s friendship with the daughter of their halfling employees, they would do whatever they could to put a stop to it - up to and including threatening the Lyeburns’ employment or revoking their right to live on the manor grounds.
Knowing this, Teala got creative in continuing the friendship. While she still snuck away from her lessons to play outside, she was rarely playing alone anymore. She frequently bribed Veridiana’s younger siblings with sweets stolen from the manor kitchen and shiny beads or tiny gems taken from the jewelry and clothes she managed to ruin, directing them to keep watch and warn the girls if any adults from the manor were approaching or occasionally run interference. The girls also developed a complex, rhythm-based code and a network of hiding spots to exchange clandestine messages.
Sneaking out to visit the Witchlight Carnival was Teala and Veridiana’s greatest escapade, at least until they started their visits to the taverns. It took a solid month of planning, which was an extraordinary amount of time for a nine-year-old and a ten-year-old. Teala made a rope out of her bedsheets. (Her room was on the first floor.) Veridiana squirreled away a loaf and a half of bread, along with three-quarters of a berry tart, as “supplies”. (One of the more troublesome Lyeburn children unwittingly took the fall for the theft. By the end of the night, the bread had only been nibbled at, but the tart was completely consumed.)
Their ploy for actually getting Teala into the carnival was similarly a mixture of overcomplexity and childish straightforwardness. For three weeks leading up to the carnival, Teala hoarded her pocket money, the silvers given by her parents to teach her responsibility and by their indulgent business associates. Two days before the Witchlight Carnival arrived, her pleading eyes and wistful smile convinced one of the servants who lived in town to buy her a bag of candy using the money. (The servant secretly paid for part of the bag himself, hiding the rest of Teala’s coins back in the candy bag so she would have some money left over.) In the bustle of trying to get all nine of the Lyeburn children (at the time) crammed into the wagon that would take them to the carnival, Teala blended into the crowd, despite being a full foot taller than the tallest halfling child. The entire way, she and Veridiana fed the stockpiled candy to the other children, so they were nearly vibrating with the sugar running through their systems. Standing in the ticket line, just before they got to the gate, Veridiana surreptitiously untied the ribbons keeping her siblings attached to her parents while Teala hid behind a nearby goliath family. Suddenly faced with eight shrieking, sprinting halfling children on a sugar high (plus one who was pretending to be), both the Lyeburns and the ticket taker were too distracted to notice Teala sneaking in the gate.
Teala’s first visit to the Witchlight Carnival remains a blurred impression of colors and music and laughter and magic. She knows that she and Veridiana ran off to explore the carnival together. She knows that, for the first time, she felt free and wild and fey. Everything else is a rose-tinted haze, but deep in her heart, the emotions still linger.
She isn’t even sure when or how she lost her song. She only knows that the next night, when Veridiana started to play the rhythm that should have been as familiar as her heartbeat, it was gone. Not only was Teala unable to remember either the words or the melody, but she also found that as Veridiana sang and played, the song itself seemed to flow right by her ears without sinking in. Afterwards, she could barely even recall that Veridiana had sung at all, let alone remember anything about it. The realization was particularly devastating because that was a song the girls had crafted together, with Veridiana penning the words, Teala figuring out the rhythm, and both of them together building the melody. Although the girls wrote other music together, the loss of that particular song left a small, echoing silence in the core of Teala’s heart.
But even that silence was drowned out when Veridiana vanished. It happened two years ago, just after her sixteenth birthday. Her parents and siblings were devastated when they awoke to find her missing without a trace. Some of the town gossips learned that some of Veridiana’s clothes and personal belongings were also gone, and the theory that she had run away to seek her own fortune rapidly became the accepted explanation. As reluctant as they were to admit it, that explanation sounded logical even to Mrs. and Mr. Lyeburn. They had long been aware that behind their eldest daughter’s reserved and caring exterior lurked a growing bitterness for the responsibility placed on her shoulders by virtue of being the oldest. The next oldest Lyeburn, a girl named Marelle, muttered not-quite under her breath that she was only surprised it had taken Veridiana so long to leave.
Teala knows they are all wrong. Oh, she doesn’t doubt that her friend was chafing for something better than taking over a leather-goods shop and being a third parent to her twelve younger siblings. After all, the two of them had wistfully talked for years about leaving both the town and their parents’ expectations for them behind. At sixteen, it wouldn’t be surprising if Veridiana had decided to do more than just talk about it. But there is one glaring flaw in that way of thinking - she would have never left town without saying goodbye to Teala.
Perhaps this was foul play and merely staged to look like she had left willingly. Perhaps she had even started off on her journey, but something happened to her between her house and the manor. Perhaps there is some sort of missing message that never made its way to Teala. Either way, there are answers to be found, and Teala means to find them.
She has spent the last two years training her skills with sword and shield. Her parents think of it as a noble sport, all grace and elegance and no actual combat; it’s why her weapons are so ornate. The leather armor she wears was acquired from the Lyeburns’ store at a time when the fourth-oldest child, Zenyas, was watching the business. Teala looked him in the eye and told him, “You and I both know she didn’t just run away. I’m going to find her, but I need supplies to do it, and I need my parents not to know what I’m planning. Will you keep a secret?”
And, for the three months since Teala finally saved up enough money to buy the armor, Zenyas has. Those three months have been filled with Teala preparing to set out - even as she hesitates to actually leave. As desperately as she longs to find Veridiana, the strings tying her to her parents and the manor, keeping her entangled, are hard to break. And with the trail long cold, she is at a loss for how to begin.
Deep down Veridiana yearned for freedom; freedom from responsibilities, from expectations, from her fate inheriting the shop and the trade, from the same town she'd been born in and lived her whole life in.
Location: Yon?
Hither tie in: ?
The Lyeburn family is one of several that had lived on Elanara land and served the family for generations. True to their name, the Lyeburns are master tanners and leather-workers. As rent for the land they lived on, they make and maintain goods for the Elanaras - ranging anywhere from basic tools for the servants to finely crafted belts, pouches, and clothes for the family itself - but they also have a small storefront in town where they sell their goods.
Veridiana is the oldest of thirteen children - eight girls and five boys. She is a year older than Teala, although her position as the oldest and as a frequent extra caretaker of her siblings has led her to generally be more responsible and slightly more reserved than her half-elf friend. Whereas Teala is used to having too much of her parents’ attention focused on her, Veridiana is accustomed to fading from her parents’ minds - not out of any deliberate neglect, but simply because with that many children, a daughter who takes care of herself and doesn’t openly cause trouble was one they don’t actively need to worry about. But behind that quiet facade is a ferocious temper, bottled up until it explodes.
In fact, Teala’s first meeting with Veridiana resulted in a knock-down, drag-out fight. An five-year-old Teala had snuck away from her lessons; a six-year-old Veridiana was longsufferingly playing hide-and-seek with three of her younger siblings. Veridiana hid behind the tree Teala had climbed just as Teala fell out of one of the lowest branches and landed on her. More startled and bruised than truly injured, Veridiana shoved the half-elf off and started to yell at her. Teala, jolted and trying not to cry from the pain of her sprained ankle, screamed back. Neither of the girls remembered who threw the first punch (it was Veridiana), but it quickly devolved into them rolling around in the dirt, clawing at each other, yanking hair and tearing clothes. When they finally both ran out of energy, the sleeve of Teala’s fine dress had been ripped off, revealing blossoming bruises and friction burns on her arm. Veridiana had a nasty set of nail marks near the hinge of her jaw; one of them would leave a small scar. Both girls were dusty, disheveled, and breathing hard when they looked over at each other, and both started laughing at nearly the same time.
That was the start of the sort of adamantine-strong friendship that can only form when two young children immediately recognize a kinship in each other. The girls sloppily patched each other up at the Lyeburns’, only to be found halfway through and properly seen to by Veridiana’s father. Teala returned to the manor and, with a straight face, told her parents her bruises and scratches had come from falling down the stairs on the way to her lessons. This wasn’t a very convincing lie, given both the dirt and the handprint-shaped bruises, but she was committed to her story.
Even at five years old, Teala knew that her parents would never approve of her associating with ‘common rabble’ like Veridiana. The fact that the Lyeburns were tenants and employees of the Elanaras wouldn’t have helped her case, but it was her non-elven heritage that would have put the final nail in any chance of them seeing their friendship as a worthwhile relationship. Oh, the elder Elanaras value other races for their unique talents and gifts, but they are also genteelly convinced of their inherent inferiority compared to the elegance, wisdom, and splendor of the elves. If they ever found out about Teala’s friendship with the daughter of their halfling employees, they would do whatever they could to put a stop to it - up to and including threatening the Lyeburns’ employment or revoking their right to live on the manor grounds.
Knowing this, Teala got creative in continuing the friendship. While she still snuck away from her lessons to play outside, she was rarely playing alone anymore. She frequently bribed Veridiana’s younger siblings with sweets stolen from the manor kitchen and shiny beads or tiny gems taken from the jewelry and clothes she managed to ruin, directing them to keep watch and warn the girls if any adults from the manor were approaching or occasionally run interference. The girls also developed a complex, rhythm-based code and a network of hiding spots to exchange clandestine messages.
Sneaking out to visit the Witchlight Carnival was Teala and Veridiana’s greatest escapade, at least until they started their visits to the taverns. It took a solid month of planning, which was an extraordinary amount of time for a nine-year-old and a ten-year-old. Teala made a rope out of her bedsheets. (Her room was on the first floor.) Veridiana squirreled away a loaf and a half of bread, along with three-quarters of a berry tart, as “supplies”. (One of the more troublesome Lyeburn children unwittingly took the fall for the theft. By the end of the night, the bread had only been nibbled at, but the tart was completely consumed.)
Their ploy for actually getting Teala into the carnival was similarly a mixture of overcomplexity and childish straightforwardness. For three weeks leading up to the carnival, Teala hoarded her pocket money, the silvers given by her parents to teach her responsibility and by their indulgent business associates. Two days before the Witchlight Carnival arrived, her pleading eyes and wistful smile convinced one of the servants who lived in town to buy her a bag of candy using the money. (The servant secretly paid for part of the bag himself, hiding the rest of Teala’s coins back in the candy bag so she would have some money left over.) In the bustle of trying to get all nine of the Lyeburn children (at the time) crammed into the wagon that would take them to the carnival, Teala blended into the crowd, despite being a full foot taller than the tallest halfling child. The entire way, she and Veridiana fed the stockpiled candy to the other children, so they were nearly vibrating with the sugar running through their systems. Standing in the ticket line, just before they got to the gate, Veridiana surreptitiously untied the ribbons keeping her siblings attached to her parents while Teala hid behind a nearby goliath family. Suddenly faced with eight shrieking, sprinting halfling children on a sugar high (plus one who was pretending to be), both the Lyeburns and the ticket taker were too distracted to notice Teala sneaking in the gate.
Teala’s first visit to the Witchlight Carnival remains a blurred impression of colors and music and laughter and magic. She knows that she and Veridiana ran off to explore the carnival together. She knows that, for the first time, she felt free and wild and fey. Everything else is a rose-tinted haze, but deep in her heart, the emotions still linger.
She isn’t even sure when or how she lost her song. She only knows that the next night, when Veridiana started to play the rhythm that should have been as familiar as her heartbeat, it was gone. Not only was Teala unable to remember either the words or the melody, but she also found that as Veridiana sang and played, the song itself seemed to flow right by her ears without sinking in. Afterwards, she could barely even recall that Veridiana had sung at all, let alone remember anything about it. The realization was particularly devastating because that was a song the girls had crafted together, with Veridiana penning the words, Teala figuring out the rhythm, and both of them together building the melody. Although the girls wrote other music together, the loss of that particular song left a small, echoing silence in the core of Teala’s heart.
But even that silence was drowned out when Veridiana vanished. It happened two years ago, just after her sixteenth birthday. Her parents and siblings were devastated when they awoke to find her missing without a trace. Some of the town gossips learned that some of Veridiana’s clothes and personal belongings were also gone, and the theory that she had run away to seek her own fortune rapidly became the accepted explanation. As reluctant as they were to admit it, that explanation sounded logical even to Mrs. and Mr. Lyeburn. They had long been aware that behind their eldest daughter’s reserved and caring exterior lurked a growing bitterness for the responsibility placed on her shoulders by virtue of being the oldest. The next oldest Lyeburn, a girl named Marelle, muttered not-quite under her breath that she was only surprised it had taken Veridiana so long to leave.
Teala knows they are all wrong. Oh, she doesn’t doubt that her friend was chafing for something better than taking over a leather-goods shop and being a third parent to her twelve younger siblings. After all, the two of them had wistfully talked for years about leaving both the town and their parents’ expectations for them behind. At sixteen, it wouldn’t be surprising if Veridiana had decided to do more than just talk about it. But there is one glaring flaw in that way of thinking - she would have never left town without saying goodbye to Teala.
Perhaps this was foul play and merely staged to look like she had left willingly. Perhaps she had even started off on her journey, but something happened to her between her house and the manor. Perhaps there is some sort of missing message that never made its way to Teala. Either way, there are answers to be found, and Teala means to find them.
She has spent the last two years training her skills with sword and shield. Her parents think of it as a noble sport, all grace and elegance and no actual combat; it’s why her weapons are so ornate. The leather armor she wears was acquired from the Lyeburns’ store at a time when the fourth-oldest child, Zenyas, was watching the business. Teala looked him in the eye and told him, “You and I both know she didn’t just run away. I’m going to find her, but I need supplies to do it, and I need my parents not to know what I’m planning. Will you keep a secret?”
And, for the three months since Teala finally saved up enough money to buy the armor, Zenyas has. Those three months have been filled with Teala preparing to set out - even as she hesitates to actually leave. As desperately as she longs to find Veridiana, the strings tying her to her parents and the manor, keeping her entangled, are hard to break. And with the trail long cold, she is at a loss for how to begin.
Deep down Veridiana yearned for freedom; freedom from responsibilities, from expectations, from her fate inheriting the shop and the trade, from the same town she'd been born in and lived her whole life in.
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