Maebha is a young member of the Lodge Eldritch and its mysterious seventh circle. She is an unsettling figure, with dark robes, pale skin, black hair, and gaunt features. She wears a skull mask which also serves as her bone talisman, helping her to summon and focus the magical energies she can weave. Strange arcane-looking tattoos crawl up her neck. She is often accompanied by an entourage of skeletons that serve her, as well as a black feathered owl. She seems to be arrogant and haughty with her position as a mage of the Lodge Eldritch, which is not unusual for one of her order.
She was made a member of the Storm Eaters when Wrothgar decreed (according to the Lodge Eldritch) that she would be the only mage of the Lodge allowed to join the Barak Tor (Blood Tower) quest to obtain the God Trap. The Lodge claimed to not understand why Wrothgar named her by name, but nontheless insisted she join the quest as their sole representative.
Maebha experienced a strange burst of arcane energy when she was trying to maintain control over a necromantic spell while under the duress of combat. Strange power and searing pain flared from her hand as the skin was peeled back to reveal a functional skeletal hand. Two of her hand bones were discovered to be jet black and not the same size as her other bones, as if they were not hers. After this event Maebha can now occasionally use her magic in unexpected and strange ways, such as animating sentient skeletons and draining dead souls to give her health and vitality. She doesn't seem to know or understand what happened, and doesn't seem to know how to consistently channel the strange power of the black bones in her skeletal hand.
The strange power of the black bones seems to be spreading within Maebha, as spidery veins of black now sprawl across the other bones of her exposed skeletal hand. Her magical powers are evolving as the black veins spread, and she has demonstrated necromancy powers unknown to the Lodge Eldritch (some in the Lodge might even say they seem like the magical powers of a heretic, rather than a Lodge mage...). Along with the evolution of her powers, Maebha experienced a vivid dream where she heard a woman's voice and saw a beautiful ancient city nestled in snowy mountains. She currently does not know what the dream means or how it is tied to the black bones in her hand.
Maebha revealed that she was the leader of a cabal of mages within the Lodge Eldritch known as the Bone Faithful, who secretly planned to replace the current leadership of the Lodge when the time was right.
When the Storm Eaters completed the Barak Tor and met the legendary dwarven smith Wrothgar, Maehba discovered why she had been singled out for this quest. Wrothgar explained that in exchange for his Godtrap, one of his demands of the Lodge Eldritch were the bones of Ravel (the only known remains of the former apprentice of Svain and the mother of weird magic). The black bones in Maebha's hands were the bones of Ravel, apparently put there as part of some experiment by the Lodge Eldritch when she was a baby. Whatever power the Lodge expected Maebha to manifest with the bones of Ravel didn't happen in her training, so when Wrothgar demanded the bones in exchange for the Godtrap, the Lodge willingly sent Maebha on the Barak Tor thinking it would be no loss to the organization. The Lodge did not tell Maebha that she would have to sacrifice her hand to Wrothgar at the end, perhaps afraid that she would complete the quest, or perhaps they knew about her machinations with the Bone Faithful, or both. Along the Barak Tor the bones of Ravel began to manifest power within Maebha, probably due to the extreme stress and threat of the quest, but by that time it was too late for the Lodge to study or harness whatever was happening to Maebha.
When faced with the decision to either lose her hand or stay with Wrothgar as payment for the Godtrap, Maebha refused to do either. The Storm Eaters turned on the conniving and often caustic Lodge mage, as no real companionship or bonds had formed between them during their time together. Maebha was slain by Ottar when he severed the hand that held the bones of Ravel. Despite their tumultous relationship, after Maebha's death Svagnir made a funeral drum from her bone mask talisman and sang her soul along its path to Valdryssil. May the complicated and ambitious young mage find what peace she can in the boughs of the tree that made the world.
Comments