moonshadows

THE WORLD

Darnassus had existed as a sort of Highborne seaside vacation city, but the strip of land it was on wasn’t stable. Looking at a pre-Cataclysm map of Kalimdor, move Teldrassil to the east and connect Shadowglen to Darkshore up slightly north of the ruins of Mathystra. Teldrassil was grown from an acorn of Nordrassil, planted to the north of Darnassus, to stabilize the city. Over the centuries, Darnassus drifted away from the shore it had been connected to, and Teldrassil’s roots formed the bridge to the city. Everything else on a map of Teldrassil was found to the north of the tree and was quite sheltered. Darkshore was so named because Teldrassil’s branches shaded the land even in daylight, making Auberdine a very popular city until the Upheval.

The Second Well had been blessed by the Aspects of Life, Time, and Dream – this, combined with the planting of Nordrassil, transmuted its power to something more representative of Azeroth as a whole. Centuries revealed that night elves, even ones who had no skill at any kind of magic, still drew on the Well’s power and prolonged separation caused them to wilt and become weak and lethargic. Moonwells were constructed as a way to bring the energy of the Well to other population centers, each blessed by a Priestess. All parts of the Well of Eternity are connected to the whole; given time, even a single drop from the Second Well will cause the water it was joined with to be nearly as powerful as that from which it came. A moonwell whose water is heavily drawn upon will need to be periodically replenished from stronger moonwells, or with waters coming straight from Nordrassil, while more isolates moonwells will actually grow stronger over the years. The general populace does not know or think much about the Second Well, something encouraged by Temple and Moonglade alike. While the waters of the average moonwell are too strong to imbibe without being diluted first and tingle when touched with bare skin, the waters of the Second Well are too strong to touch directly.

Nordrassil, Teldrassil, and most trees used in night elf housing are of a breed called Living Tree. It was designed and prized by the Highborne for growing quickly under magical encouragement, and not at all otherwise. Some variants have leaves of bright, non-green, colors. The wood can be easily shaped by a druid or mage, resulting in entire rooms inside of the trunk, roots, or branches, as well as amenities such as closets or cabinets whose doors breathe open and shut on command and do not require hinges or latches. The Living Tree can be imprinted on by a strong mage or druid, and commanded to not respond to anyone except those the imprinter designates. Living Trees with one-room shelters inside them are planted at regular intervals along roads; growing and tending them is a job for druids. The acorns of a Living Tree can be easily enchanted by a druid to absorb life energy and store it – an acorn so enchanted can be settled inside a night elf woman’s vagina and becomes perfect contraception. Every century or so, depending on use, the acorn is swapped out with another and ‘full’ acorns can be swiftly grown into something big enough to serve as a home, due to all the life energy they’ve stored.

Night elves are a much more populous race than in canon, partially due to Ellekayne discovering isolated groups before they died out. During the first thousand years post-Sundering, there was a significant population boom as children reached the end of their first century and wanted children of their own; it took another few thousand years for night elf culture to slow down to the modern view on maturity. As a result, the racial outlook on other races is more like perpetual older siblings than anything else. After all, even a venerable tauren nearing the end of his or her life is still only about a hundred, where night elves consider the first century to be the wild teenage years.

Night elf eyes are silver because they belong to Elune. Most night elves don’t know this. A night elf whose eyes are gold, either from birth or later in life, is recognized as having a great destiny without understanding that the lack of silver is Elune saying ‘you are no longer mine to command, some other hand guides your path’. In the case of druids, that hand is Cenarius. In the case of Azshara, it was her own. In the case of Illidan, it was also his own. Ellekayne has antlers only because she is a priestess of Elune and therefore can’t have golden eyes.

THE TEMPLE

The Temple became the main source of law post-Sundering; all legalities were stripped from marriage, leaving it a binding oath of lifelong love sworn to Elune. Not many couples wedded, even ones who lived together and had children.

The Sentinels of the Moon were originally the temple’s martial sect; after the Sundering, when so many men were killed in the war, they became the sole warriors protecting the night elf people because they were the only ones left who could fight. All girls wishing to become Sentinels or Priestesses may present themselves to the Temple at the age of ten, where a priestess will give them a special blessing. Unbeknownst to most of the populace, this blessing is actually Elune looking into the heart of the prospective novice and giving Her approval. If a girl is rejected, which happens rarely, the priestess will be gently told why. For example, a girl who has run away from home and is only applying to ‘punish’ her family. Novices are given the same training for five years – a combination of physical and mental, the basics for the more advanced studies. During those five years, novices learn basic combat and meditation as well as the lesser blessings. After that, they are separated into Sentinel novices and Priestess novices depending on where their skills lie. At the end of the decade, they are tested and confirmed as Sentinels or Priestesses.

There are a handful of novices who are given special training in stealth, acrobatics, and discreet weaponry. These are the Night Blades, Elune’s assassins. Like a priestess, a Night Blade can communicate directly with Elune and is answerable only to Elune, or to the High Priestess. Illidan’s grandkitten Celyre is a Night Blade. Ellekayne also qualifies as a Night Blade.

There have been two Priestesses in the first century after the Sundering of note for being unusual: both were born male. One was discovered when puberty revealed her, and mocked horribly. She was in tears when Tyrande swept in and was told indignantly that the novice was a boy. Tyrande calmly stated that Elune had accepted the novice, and if she was female in her heart, then it wasn’t her fault that her body didn’t match. She then performed a miracle, asking Elune to make the novice’s body match her heart, and Elune changed the novice’s body to a female one. The second notable priestess also identified as female despite being born male, but declined to have her body changed to female. She remained in a pre-pubescent male body as a living symbol that gender wasn’t always an easy answer.

THE DRUIDS

Originally, there were few enough students of nature magic that anyone with the affinity for it was called a druid. After a few centuries, there were enough to warrant formal testing and acceptance into a newly-formed organization – the Canarion Circle – to keep things from getting messy. A nature-gifted night elf starts training at the age of ten, like a Temple novice, and for five years learns the basics. At the end of five years, he or she is taken under the wing of an older druid, and this Shan’do teaches the more advanced techniques. Animal forms are usually taught in the second half of the decade, and lessons go at a more individual pace. By the age of twenty, young druids are usually ready to complete their qualification testing and go for their first shift in the Emerald Dream.

Druids in the Emerald Dream are cared for by other druids, mostly, and in the same way a coma patient would be. They are gently bathed and changed, and fed diluted moonwell water to directly sustain their bodies. Of course, after a long shift, a druid will still need to eat heartily and work out to regain lost muscle mass. A druid’s first shift might be as little as a month; by the end of a druid’s first century, a ‘short’ shift is five or ten years, while a ‘long’ shift might be a full century. There is a strict ratio of time spent in the Dream to time spent in the waking world, and shift length may be altered depending on the druid’s family life. One with a partner might take five on/five off to make it easier for the partner to endure the separation, while a druid wanting to have a child might take a five-decade shift and earn fifty years off to plan, have, and raise the child. A druid without a family is more likely to take long shifts and then relax for a while and see what’s new when they come out.

Druid animal forms are made possible by borrowing tiny crumbs of power from the Ancient they’re connected to. The negotiations to allow the Darkspear tribe to join the night elf (for lack of a better word) empire also involved the tribe’s loa, and the Darkspear were not allowed to join until their loa had agreed to accept Elune as their higher authority, just as the original night elf loa did. Bear and Nightsaber (who can still be found in-game in Moonglade) were two of the loa worshipped by the original tribe of trolls who found the Well of Eternity and became night elves. Deer, the preferred form for swift and sustained travel, comes from Malone via Cenarius. In order to be accepted into the Cenarion Circle and become a full druid, these three forms must be mastered. In the first centuries post-Sundering, other forms were experimented with, but results varied widely. In some cases, like Owl and Seal, success depends entirely on the individual night elf winning the approval of the Ancient. In other cases, the form is not safe to take long enough to master, and is forbidden.

A druid taking an animal form is typically at low risk for losing his or her mind and becoming feral. Meditation tricks are among the first things young druids are taught, and each druid is also conditioned to return to his or her mind upon hearing a certain tone. The risk of losing one’s mind to animal form only becomes an issue if the druid is in a form long enough that he or she stops thinking night elf thoughts and only thinks animal thoughts. Forms are first taught in the Emerald Dream for this reason; a new form is often overwhelming, and a teacher can ring the ‘come back to yourself’ bell in the student’s ear easily.

Paradoxically, the more a druid takes a form, the less likely they are to become lost to it. This is because that form becomes part of the druid’s self-identity. The more a druid takes a form, the more unique to that druid the form becomes as it reflects that self-identity. A druid just learning nightsaber will typically have a solid coat matching their hair color, with the dot-and-crescent symbol on one or both shoulders. Later, that form will reflect the druid’s personality in color, pattern, even build. For example: Illidan’s nightsaber form is built like a Siberian tiger, with broad paws, thick fur, and a heavy tail. This is because he spends a lot of time in the snow in Winterspring. His flanks have a half-faded dapple on them much like a nightsaber cub growing out of its kitten spots, reflecting his perpetual and cheerful immaturity. His paws and belly, reaching to the underside of his chin, are white while the rest of his coat is the same midnight blue as his hair. His eyes are gold because those were an integral part of his self-identity.

Golden eyes are rare; they indicate that a druid belongs wholly to Cenarius and not to Elune. Druids with golden eyes tend to be older and very powerful, and can pull rank on just about any other druid. Druids with antlers are very rare. The presence of antlers indicates that a druid has the personal approval of Cenarius, and can pull rank on any other druid regardless of eye color. The two living male druids with antlers, Malfurion and Broll, have animal forms that reflect this status. Their bear forms have antlers, albeit small ones, and their owl forms have tiny little antlers. Their nightsaber forms, however, have manes. Ellekayne’s antlers only show up in her deer form. She was given antlers around the age of five or six thousand after a brash, golden-eyed druid refused to accept any help from her previous to a flood she’d come to deliver a warning about.