Tesni Ferlyn

Backstory

Centaurs, from a young age, are told to never, ever leave the herd. If you leave the herd, you may never find the Path again. You will be left behind, lost and alone, until maybe another herd passes your way and takes pity on you. Foals are told horror stories about wanderers who starve, or break their legs, or fall... but of course, those stories only take hold with the shadows. They're not quite enough to deter a curious filly in the light of day.

Tesni Ferlyn is possibly one of the few hapless centaurs to leave her herd not once, but twice. As a young child following the migratory path set out in every centaur's memory, she often trailed a bit to the side, or a slight way behind the rest of her family. There had always been murmurs about her, but after that fateful day, they increased tenfold.

There was, as she later recalled, a butterfly. It had the most striking colors of any she'd ever seen, and with the places Tess had traveled, she'd seen a good deal of butterflies. This one, however, she just had to follow. A butterfly like that must be magical! So, after whispering to her half-asleep mother that she would be back in just a minute, she trotted off after it, keeping just enough distance to avoid startling it into flight as it flitted into the forest. (Forests, by the way, do not make for excellent centaur terrain.) It was very slow going, but she kept up with the butterfly for a long time — a very long time, she realized suddenly as the sun caught her eye. She turned in a circle, hoping to find a sign of her path, but she'd never been the best tracker...

She sniffled, on the edge of crying, as the stories she'd been told became all too real. No home, no herd, no food, no way back. She didn't know how to hunt or fish, and she hadn't been in the region long enough yet to learn which berries were which. A sob worked its way up her throat before she could stop it, and she collapsed, crying her heart out, until she felt... a presence. It was vague, almost indiscernible, and to this day she can't quite explain how it happened, but Perdita took pity on the child. She warmed Tesni's heart and took her hand, leading her out of the forest and staying gently, almost imperceptibly by her side until she crested a hill and discovered her herd on the plain ahead. It would be the first night in her life that Tess ever prayed to another god before Diona.

After that experience, herd life felt... restrictive. They were devout Diona worshippers, so her sudden interest in a minor god (and not even a well-known one at that) was considered foolish, even heretical, and her story was frowned upon by the herd leaders as nothing more than luck. She ground her teeth and argued when she could, but by the time she came of age, she was more than ready to take a breath, grip her green Perdita medallion, and explain to her parents that she would be leaving the herd on a quest to not only find but thank the God of the Lost for her help... in person. Two years later, she's found herself in Nema, Soliencia, no closer to her goal...