Given life with fire by
Flame-in-Shadow, the Kindled pride themselves on their passion and, indeed, on their pride, but they do not consider themselves to be flames. Rather, they are shadow and ash, the products of fire, cool and measured, and at home in the dark as no other
Elves are, hence their common name of 'ash elves.'
In the structure of the
Regime, the ash elves were responsible for military matters. They departed the Regime in search of their own path when they determined that the
High Elves valued their social structures more than they did their own kin. Seeking to avoid further conflict with both the
Orcs of the
Legions and their adamant kin, they entered the
Underhollows. There, they found a calling to defend the
Pillars of Aiaos from the influence of
The Abyss, but their true legacy lies and has always lain in family, subordinating individual needs to the greater cause of dynastic continuity and advancement. They take a broad view of family, however, absorbing and adopting others to increase the size, strength and glory of the cornerstone of ash elf society, the extended family unit known as the sept. Individual status in ashen society is determined through a mix of birth, sept status and achievement.
As is common with those living in the treacherous deeps of the
Underhollows, the ash elves are an insular race, and they are slow to trust those outside their sept. Despite this, they are always open to adopting those who prove themselves both skilled and trustworthy, and will bring even non-elves into their ranks. They almost always suspect strangers of serving the fiends and
Outerfolk that they strive to contain beneath the
World, but those who manage to become a part of their family are held as sacred, regardless of blood relation.
The Sept
While a sept is at its heart a family, membership is somewhat fluid and a sept's outward image is dominated by its sziszeri. Sziszeri is a word specific to the ashen dialect of elvish, a portmanteau of zeri (broadly meaning family, more specifically describing the sept to which one owes fealty) and sziszi (art, or expertise,) describing the pursuit by members of the sept of a particular area of skill or study. The sziszeri emerges from the interests of the sept's original members. As the members of the sept cultivate the development and adoption of specialists in their chosen field, this focus becomes more pronounced. Those whose personal talents lean away from the sziszeri will often seek teaching elsewhere and it is not unusual for such individuals to end up fostered or adopted by their patron sept. It is this process, as much as any form of dynastic marriage, that is used to forge bonds between septs.
There are specific terms for the septs which play different roles in a drow's life, with implications of the various levels of fealty owed to the different bodies. The sept of which an ash elf is currently an active member is their zeri. Loyalty to one's current zeri is paramount, but a duty is still owed to the sept of one's birth - their aszki, a word which also means parents or ancestors (sing. aszk) - and to any other sept with which an individual has trained in their life - their kzori (sing. kzor), or schools - and through these links, conflict can be mediated and mitigated.
Within each sept, most property is held in common, for the good of the family as a whole. Individuals own very little - only clothing, personal items and the tools of their trade - for while ashen society is supportive of individuality, ultimately all individuals are part of a larger whole. The sept undertakes commercial, political and - in extremis - armed endeavours as a body, meaning that not only the benefits, but also the liability for those endeavours fall on no one individual.
Each sept has four main components, known as chambers: The polia, the sziszana, the axila and the mantia. The polia is the part of the house that attends to day to day business, and includes the bulk of the house's children and those adults who do not belong to one of the other parts. The sziszana is the part of the house that is actively involved in the maintenance and development of the sziszeri, and may overlap with one of the other chambers, depending on the sziszeri in question. The axia is the house's martial arm - the ash elves retain much of their original martial culture; ashen weapon specialists and their characteristic, curved
ashmetal blades are both noted for their excellence - providing combat training and protection to all members, as well as levies for the benefice military. Finally, the mantia is made up of the sept's specialist spellcasters and scholars.
Each chamber has its own internal hierarchy. The polity is led by the custodians, the axia by the monitors, the mantia by the adepts and the sziszana by the prodigies. While the exact form varies between septs, based on custom as well as scale, the future leaders of each chamber are identified by examination and apprenticed to the existing leadership. Those who exceed the high expectations placed on them and truly excel become the Favoured Children of the sept, who form the ruling council of the sept as a whole. The council is organised by seniority, with the older favoured children also acting as mentors for the younger. The overall leader of the sept is known as its First Scion.
Sept Status and the Benefice
It is through ties of adoption and fealty, and occasionally marriage, that the septs of an extended territory are organised into a wider community known as a benefice, which can range in size from a single city to a vast federation. Within a benefice, septs are ranked according to the extent of their territory, the number of their vassals, their level of excellence in their sziszeri, and also the sziszeri's breadth and importance in the eyes of ash elf culture as a whole. The most powerful are known as high and civic septs. Both of these control large swathes of territory, command the fealty of several vassal septs, and have a broad-reaching sziszeri, encompassing many aspects drawn from the expertise of those vassals. They are distinguished from each other in that a civic sept controls a city - despite their break from the Regime, the ash elves retain the old focus on cities as the centre of civilisation – and its dependent territories through direct governance or the fealty of lesser septs. A high sept may be equal in wealth and excellence, but lacks this singular point of control.
Below the high and civic septs are the small, minor and orphaned septs. Small septs control limited territory, and are much more specialised in their sziszeri. Most are direct clients to a patron high or civic sept, trading their achievements and loyalty for status and protection, but retaining a fierce sense of their own independent identity. Minor septs are typically small families setting out on their own, with a single estate to their name. Their sziszeri is typically a limited, but often innovative, derivative of the sziszeri of the sept they have broken from. A minor sept will typically develop to small sept status, or else be reabsorbed into a larger sept, within twenty years of incorporation.
Very rarely, a sept will suffer a significant, almost total loss of property, leaving them with no territorial holdings, but still enough people and unique expertise to hold to their sept status. These septs are usually absorbed into the larger sept to which they owe fealty, but some maintain an independent existence as an orphaned sept.
The First Scions of the septs of a benefice form a ruling council which acts to govern the allocation of the Underhollows' sparse resources, mediate disputes between unrelated houses, and determine overarching policy. The council also oversees the organisation of several levels of competitive examination in areas such as administration, mathematics, martial and arcane skill, geology and micology, which are used to establish the potential and status of young drow between the ages of twenty and sixty.
Religion and Identity
The ash elves have adopted the worship of a collection of
cthonic deities, whose cults help to bind the different houses of a benefice together in a common culture. Unfortunately, a number of ashen septs and even entire benefices have become corrupted from their avowed purpose by the influence of the Abyss or the outerfolk. Many of these ‘fallen ashes’ now worship the demon prince known as
Lilloth the Netweaver, and strive to overthrow the cities of the ash elves from beneath. Those who retain enough loyal allies to resist still hold their cities, but other benefices have fallen, and the survivors of such coups, like the septs of
Benefice Zeranzeri, have travelled closer to the surface.
The ash elves are physically distinct from the other kindreds, typically smaller and slighter even than other elves. They are marked by a characteristic tint to their skin, ranging from blue to purple, over an even greater range of skin colours than most kindreds, running from pale lilac to a deep blue black. Their hair is almost invariably either pure white or entirely black, and their eyes are always uncannily pale, almost luminous. Like all elves, ash elves mark their passage into adulthood by taking on an adult identity, setting aside their child's name and embracing a gender identity. While they recognise the same three genders, however, they rarely acknowledge these through outward presentation. Even adult ash elves favour they/their pronouns, at least within exclusively drow society.
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