Longrass Lily
Autumn 4333 - Summer 4411
Lily is cousin to Ro, the Mistress of the Hunt and Eupa, the Goddess of Murder .
Being that, you'd expect a lot more magic out of her than you'd get. Like her mundane cousin, she mastered keeping up with her family and hunting demands and the general danger of living where she did to a degree of excellence that flattened her (stil-fairly-normal-ish-at-the-time) cousins despite being three years their junior.
Lily grew up in the village with her mother Posie, her father Thalia, and her older brother Acorn, who was (.... ten?) years her senior. She idolized her more vicious cousin, seeing the strength and ability for what it was, and she knew early on that she wanted to be nomadic when she got old enough to start on the path.
Of course, these plans were pretty well wrecked when Ro was chosen when Lily was eleven, Tigger lost his shit, and then Eupa killed a third of the village.
The year following was a quiet, nervous one for Lily. The twins stayed gone constantly on the hunt, and Lily being an able hunter was also expected to help, but the mood of the village was one of disquiet and fear, with no one sure what to do anymore. Lily was not privy to much of the discussion, as it was her family often being discussed, but she did understand that no one liked the dependence on the most feared people in the village, even if they weren't an obvious threat right now.
(Lily did have an unfortunate dose of empathy for her cousins from another cousin, Meadow, who pointed out that threatening to kill Ro in front of Eupa was pretty well going to kill anyone doing it, and it was the only thing she could think to do. You can't back a psychotic asshole into a corner and then get upset at them for being a psychotic asshole.)
Unfortunately for the village, no one noticed the overtrapping going on in the hills due to the lack of control coming from the villagers, who had always seen Eupa's hostilities as just that, and between fear of trying to take action against others that were openly hostile and threatening for the sake of others that were also hostile and openly threatening, it just didn't make a lot of sense. They kept the breeding ground clear as long as they could, but as their numbers dwindled it was less safe to try.
When the trappers attacked the village, Lily was asleep. She was only sort of told what happened, being that the trappers with whom Eupa had been at war for a while at that point had decided to come down and try to kill them (with no clear implication of who in the village was being targeted, Lily assumed it was the twins, instead of all of them, because poor Lily didn't know better at the time.)
Ro failed the hunt, of course, but Lily never believed it. She was away when Ro returned and collected Eupa to leave, but she was not long in learning the news. Parts of the village parted immediately, former nomads taking their families to the path, and over the course of time, the remainders parted ways.
Being down to perhaps twenty, the village was still holding some decent ground that could be used for farmlands, and a halfling chief nearby wanted it. In his defense, he wasn't wrong for why, but he would have been too late anyway--he wanted to try and host farmland that would help restore.
Chief Bullrush defended against the invaders and lost his life. Lily helped care for him on his deathbed. He looked like shit and he was sorry.
(That hurt to write. Mrph.) The remaining villagers were down to Lily's Aunt Reed (their second oldest sister) and Reed's husband Zenith; their children and Lily's cousins Meadow and Sage; Lily's parents and brother, and her Aunt Stormy (Bullrush and Thalia's oldest sister). An accident shattered Stormy's kneecap when she was young, and Acorn's foot was mault after he and his friends successfully tracked and unsuccessfully hunted a bear; and thus complicated their migration to nomadic living.
Neither Corin nor Stormy were small people, and only Thalia and Reed had the strength and size to carry either one, and not for very long. (Not hunters. *shrug* They did a lot of people-ing.) It was agreed that Lily and Meadow would stay with Acorn and Stormy to protect them while Thalia, Posie, Sage, and Reed went to track down their nomadic family branch to help get the disabled ones on the road.
Only the food was more and more scarce. The trappers had virtually cleaned out half the prey species in the area, thus messing with plants and bug populations, with predatory species, and Lily had to wander farther and farther to get enough food.
A few times, Lily found adversity in the forms of other locals, most of whom were also hostile and hungry, as the ecology of the hill had been pretty important for most of the hunting-centered cultures around here, many of which were dependent on not just the werekin and beastfolk of the area, but on that village in particular. The ripple effect was pronounced.
It wasn't nice, and she won't let me talk about it, so never mind this bit. It fucking sucked, okay?
This lasted from the end of summer to the beginning of the following spring, when Stormy finally died of starvation. She was sharing half her food with the other two and smoking to hide the pain of it and wrapping into clothes until she just didn't wake up anymore.
A few months later, Acorn and Meadow poisoned themselves while Lily was gone.
Being thirteen and alone and faced with this fucking tragedy and (unjustified) sense of failure, Lily went mad for a while and wandered into the wildlands to let the beast run things. She didn't return to her senses until autumn, and she started trying to build a life for herself. Having been nomadic already for a while now, virtually only returning home to sleep for a night and leave again for a week at a time, Lily found it easy to survive this way. She learned the value of a good backpack and of traveling lightly, mastered hunting monsters in increasingly dangerous areas.
Over time, she relaxed a little and began to explore the less wild areas, considering civilization a curiosity worth sniffing; and she made friends with several Scribe Towers, wandering freely when they needed escorting on the paths between.
A boy from the local village helped Lily a lot with dealing with what happened, which was nice of him. Ro and Eupa were receiving a lot of unjustified hate, and he helped point out Tigger's role in the downfall, and the evil of the trappers was far more well known to him than to her as he lived next door to one.
When she was sixteen, she heard about Ro and Eupa again, and decided to track them down and find out what really happened. Her answers weren't that great, but Ro helped Lily track down their living family.
Her mother had died in an accident, but she had a baby a couple of years before that, and Lily got to meet him and her father and uncle and aunt and cousins again. She traveled with them until she was ready to part for the path again, sick of the family life, and she wandered solo for a while, occasionally picking up travelers to guide and teach so they wouldn't fuck shit up anymore, just generally being a good Ranger.
Lily settled with a mate when she was in her late twenties, and she had two kids, a boy and a girl, five years apart. Her granddaughter was Chosen by the spirits a few years later, and Lily died on the path with her family after a really really shitty fall. She was scattered where she landed by her family, and they visit when they pass through to pay respects.
Lily grew up in the village with her mother Posie, her father Thalia, and her older brother Acorn, who was (.... ten?) years her senior. She idolized her more vicious cousin, seeing the strength and ability for what it was, and she knew early on that she wanted to be nomadic when she got old enough to start on the path.
Of course, these plans were pretty well wrecked when Ro was chosen when Lily was eleven, Tigger lost his shit, and then Eupa killed a third of the village.
The year following was a quiet, nervous one for Lily. The twins stayed gone constantly on the hunt, and Lily being an able hunter was also expected to help, but the mood of the village was one of disquiet and fear, with no one sure what to do anymore. Lily was not privy to much of the discussion, as it was her family often being discussed, but she did understand that no one liked the dependence on the most feared people in the village, even if they weren't an obvious threat right now.
(Lily did have an unfortunate dose of empathy for her cousins from another cousin, Meadow, who pointed out that threatening to kill Ro in front of Eupa was pretty well going to kill anyone doing it, and it was the only thing she could think to do. You can't back a psychotic asshole into a corner and then get upset at them for being a psychotic asshole.)
Unfortunately for the village, no one noticed the overtrapping going on in the hills due to the lack of control coming from the villagers, who had always seen Eupa's hostilities as just that, and between fear of trying to take action against others that were openly hostile and threatening for the sake of others that were also hostile and openly threatening, it just didn't make a lot of sense. They kept the breeding ground clear as long as they could, but as their numbers dwindled it was less safe to try.
When the trappers attacked the village, Lily was asleep. She was only sort of told what happened, being that the trappers with whom Eupa had been at war for a while at that point had decided to come down and try to kill them (with no clear implication of who in the village was being targeted, Lily assumed it was the twins, instead of all of them, because poor Lily didn't know better at the time.)
Ro failed the hunt, of course, but Lily never believed it. She was away when Ro returned and collected Eupa to leave, but she was not long in learning the news. Parts of the village parted immediately, former nomads taking their families to the path, and over the course of time, the remainders parted ways.
Being down to perhaps twenty, the village was still holding some decent ground that could be used for farmlands, and a halfling chief nearby wanted it. In his defense, he wasn't wrong for why, but he would have been too late anyway--he wanted to try and host farmland that would help restore.
Chief Bullrush defended against the invaders and lost his life. Lily helped care for him on his deathbed. He looked like shit and he was sorry.
(That hurt to write. Mrph.) The remaining villagers were down to Lily's Aunt Reed (their second oldest sister) and Reed's husband Zenith; their children and Lily's cousins Meadow and Sage; Lily's parents and brother, and her Aunt Stormy (Bullrush and Thalia's oldest sister). An accident shattered Stormy's kneecap when she was young, and Acorn's foot was mault after he and his friends successfully tracked and unsuccessfully hunted a bear; and thus complicated their migration to nomadic living.
Neither Corin nor Stormy were small people, and only Thalia and Reed had the strength and size to carry either one, and not for very long. (Not hunters. *shrug* They did a lot of people-ing.) It was agreed that Lily and Meadow would stay with Acorn and Stormy to protect them while Thalia, Posie, Sage, and Reed went to track down their nomadic family branch to help get the disabled ones on the road.
Only the food was more and more scarce. The trappers had virtually cleaned out half the prey species in the area, thus messing with plants and bug populations, with predatory species, and Lily had to wander farther and farther to get enough food.
A few times, Lily found adversity in the forms of other locals, most of whom were also hostile and hungry, as the ecology of the hill had been pretty important for most of the hunting-centered cultures around here, many of which were dependent on not just the werekin and beastfolk of the area, but on that village in particular. The ripple effect was pronounced.
It wasn't nice, and she won't let me talk about it, so never mind this bit. It fucking sucked, okay?
This lasted from the end of summer to the beginning of the following spring, when Stormy finally died of starvation. She was sharing half her food with the other two and smoking to hide the pain of it and wrapping into clothes until she just didn't wake up anymore.
A few months later, Acorn and Meadow poisoned themselves while Lily was gone.
Being thirteen and alone and faced with this fucking tragedy and (unjustified) sense of failure, Lily went mad for a while and wandered into the wildlands to let the beast run things. She didn't return to her senses until autumn, and she started trying to build a life for herself. Having been nomadic already for a while now, virtually only returning home to sleep for a night and leave again for a week at a time, Lily found it easy to survive this way. She learned the value of a good backpack and of traveling lightly, mastered hunting monsters in increasingly dangerous areas.
Over time, she relaxed a little and began to explore the less wild areas, considering civilization a curiosity worth sniffing; and she made friends with several Scribe Towers, wandering freely when they needed escorting on the paths between.
A boy from the local village helped Lily a lot with dealing with what happened, which was nice of him. Ro and Eupa were receiving a lot of unjustified hate, and he helped point out Tigger's role in the downfall, and the evil of the trappers was far more well known to him than to her as he lived next door to one.
When she was sixteen, she heard about Ro and Eupa again, and decided to track them down and find out what really happened. Her answers weren't that great, but Ro helped Lily track down their living family.
Her mother had died in an accident, but she had a baby a couple of years before that, and Lily got to meet him and her father and uncle and aunt and cousins again. She traveled with them until she was ready to part for the path again, sick of the family life, and she wandered solo for a while, occasionally picking up travelers to guide and teach so they wouldn't fuck shit up anymore, just generally being a good Ranger.
Lily settled with a mate when she was in her late twenties, and she had two kids, a boy and a girl, five years apart. Her granddaughter was Chosen by the spirits a few years later, and Lily died on the path with her family after a really really shitty fall. She was scattered where she landed by her family, and they visit when they pass through to pay respects.
Children
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