The Wood Aelves

"They look at us, my brother. They see our lips, sewn together by our oppressors. They see the tubes thrust into our backs, allowing us to live, at the cost of constant misery. They do not look with scorn, but with fear, and pity. I do not blame them. We are mockeries of the elven race, hideous beasts compared to what we once were. Hated by our families, and scorned by our protectors. Hah! I would not wish this fate on anyone in the world. But tell me. Tell me brother. Why did they have to make our children like us? The tubes, the lips, the pain? What did they do to deserve the fate of our race? What they do to be like us?"-Arius Arveln, in his famous letter to his brother Lashius that is now known as, "The Epistle of Elven Sorrow".
The Wood Aelves are made up of those who questioned the High Aelves in their effort to purge all they deemed inhuman and tainted. The High Aelve Empire's most wicked crime is treason, and so those who commit treason are given the harshest punishment. First, their lips are sewn shut so they can never speak another word against the Aelves. Next, magical implants are placed in their fingers so they can never write in any tongue other than Aelven. Lastly, massive feeding tubes are placed into their backs so they can still eat and drink. However, every time they must eat or drink it causes them incredibly excruciating pain. After these procedures are finished, the Aelf is forced out of the forest, where they must fend for themselves. The last influx of Wood Aelves happened before the Great Elf War, when many pacifists were subjected to this brutal punishment. Many humans fear the Wood Aelves for their strange appearances and customs, and such they are frequently marginalized and forced to live in shacks. The greatest curse of the Wood Aelves, however, is the fact that all of their torture is passed onto their children, who are born with the tubes and the sewn lips. The Wood Aelves are a people of suffering, cursed with the knowledge of the High Aelfs and their wickedness, but never being able to share it. The humans and other assorted races aren't aware that they aren't able to share it, and so after the Great Elf War many Wood Aelves were slain in brutal pogroms across Wirtelkag. Currently, the vast majority of Wood Aelves live in the Forests of Yanagon, as the Great High Priest of the Yanagonya decreed them friends of the forest and therefore allowed them to live there as equals in their society.

Naming Traditions

Feminine names

Eagalia, Beataeis, Norana, Vestaulasya, Caia

Masculine names

Arius, Lashius, Tellarius, Ahenobarbus, Skipariti

Unisex names

Most Wood Aelves are not actually known by their birth names. Due to their lips being sewn shut and the fact that they are cursed to only write in Aelven, they generally go by human-given nicknames, simply because they can't share their own names. These names are very diverse due to the diversity in qualities that every ethnicity has, but they are commonly racial slurs such as Tuber, Slipmouth, and Loosetongue.

Family names

Arveln, Scorius, Tretarius, Indelnam, Maratio, Tobenus

Culture

Major language groups and dialects

Only Aelven

Shared customary codes and values

They are a highly anti-authoritarian people, due to their oppression at the hands of many races. They commonly side with the humans, but due to the pogroms many of them distrust humanity as a whole. The Wood Aelves mostly agree, however, that their cousins the High Aelves are the true threat to the world, and seek to protect the Isle from their influence.

Birth & Baptismal Rites

At birth, Wood Aelves attempt to cut the tubes on their children's back, in the hopes that they may come off and their people's suffering may end. They have never succeeded.