Ellisys
Information
Name	Ellisys
Gender	Cis female, she/her
Age	36
Birthday	30 Desnus
Sexuality	Bisexual
Race	Half-elf
Class	Fighter/ranger
Alignment	Chaotic Neutral
Homeland	Touyes, Taldor
System	Pathfinder 1st edition
Adventure Path	Rise of the Runelords

Personality

Ellisys, also called Elly, is a 36-year-old fighter/ranger who is part of the Order of the Black Arrow. She is a half-elf with a chaotic neutral alignment.

While not a bad person, Ellisys is rather self-centred. She will help others, not because it is the right thing to do, but because seeing people in need makes her feel uncomfortable. She has little control over her emotions and often acts on them without taking a moment to think about her situation.

Although it is unbecoming of someone with her characteristics, Ellisys seems to have accepted that she has been sentenced to serve the Order of the Black Arrow until her death. Dig a little deeper, however, and you will find her scheming to take over the order and become it’s next leader.

Appearance

Ellisys has sharp green eyes which are as hard to read as they are a reminder of the Valley of Broken Trees which she is duty bound to protect. Her long dark brown hair is a blessing, for the blood of her enemies barely shows up on it. She makes sure to have her pointy ears clearly visible as to not be mistaken for a human.

Story

Born from a human noble and his elven mistress, Ellisys was simply referred to as the bastard daughter for most of her childhood years. Lord Jean-Michel Berthelot, her father, was quite taken with Lyra, her mother. Despite the many protests of Jean-Michel’s wife, he allowed Ellisys and her mother to stay in his mansion in Touyes, Taldor.

Ellisys and her mother had to say put in their rooms in one of the wings of the mansion that wasn’t in the best state, “hidden away” as the servants of the Berthelot household would say, but for the most part, they were cared for and didn’t have to worry about their next meal. It was when Ellisys hit her teenage years and began to sneak out to explore Touyes that she realized that she had been living a pampered life.

The people of Touyes were living in poverty, their houses barely standing and many of them dying of hunger and sickness. Being the lord of Touyes, it was the responsibility of Jean-Michel to care for them, but instead, he was always more occupied with whichever event or masquerade ball he would be organizing next.

Once Ellisys spoke up about the abysmal conditions outside the walls of their make-believe paradise and the steadily declining population of Touyes, which her father thanked her for. After all, “dead men can’t work the land nor can they pay their taxes” as he claimed. Jean-Michel followed through on his word to improve the health of the people he had sworn to protect but found other ways to take away what little they had.

It wasn’t unheard of for him to ask for free labour to welcome an esteemed, noble guest to the city or suddenly visit a random citizen (“A great honour!”) and help himself to a family heirloom or what little else the poor soul had left to give. Jean-Michel was a wicked man, but on paper, he had never done something against the law.

The suffering of the people of Touyes was dreadful and although Ellisys couldn’t stand to see them in so much pain, they weren’t the reason she began to carefully craft a plan to kill her father. No, what set her on that path was the story Lyra told her between sobs and shaky breaths about her betrothed whom Jean-Michel had disposed of after he had taken a fancy to her. After hearing that story from her mother, Ellisys decided the real bastard wasn’t her, but her father.

Killing her father turned out to be surprisingly easy in the end. Fleeing Taldor at the age of 17 on the other hand, did not. She had seen many hardships, but surviving nature hadn’t been one of them up until that point. Had she not ran into Melian, an elven ranger living in the woods surrounding Touyes, she wouldn’t have survived. He didn’t ask her too many questions and took her under his wing until she had acquired the skills to survive on her own.

Ellisys never learnt if killing her father had improved the lives of her mother and the people of Touyes. She had spent so much time thinking about if she could kill her father, that she never paused to ask herself if she should. All that she knew was that she hated humans, their endless greed and the suffering they put themselves and other races through.

That hatred is what pushed her forward. After fleeing from Taldor she became somewhat of a mercenary for hire, usually taking on jobs that involved taking care of bandits and the sort. She never stayed in cities with a dominantly human population for too long because it would always become increasingly more difficult for her to hide her disgust in the face of human contractors. It never mattered where she was going as long as she kept moving, but she did purposely avoid the border of Cheliax as she made her way up northwest.

After years of travel, Ellisys finally made it to Magnimar. Despite Magnimar having a dominantly human population, Ellisys found herself staying there for more than just a few days. Magnimar was different from the other cities she had been. It was the first place Ellisys had come across where any individual with good connections and luck on their side could make something of themselves.

Ultimately it was the promise of leaving her past behind and making a future for herself that let to Ellisys’ downfall. She had been working at the docks as another pair of hands to carry cargo back and forth for a few weeks when she had been approached by her boss, a dwarf named Tiorbioc Irondew. He asked her if she would be alright with holding onto something for him. Against her better judgment, she said yes, and she ended up storing a few crates in the room she was paying for at the Old Fang inn.

It was her own fault for not checking the contents of the crates. Ellisys would later learn after she had been brought to the Justice Court that the person who had been assigned to clean her room had out of curiosity opened one of the crates to find contraband inside. From Burglar's torcs to a Songs of Shazathared scroll, the crates had held an impressive and diverse amount of black market items.

It had been clear to Justice Jiska that Ellisys didn’t have the resources or connections to acquire these items and ultimately they had found proof that Tiorbioc Irondew was the man they were looking for. That being said, Justice Jiska ruled that being in the possession of these items was an offence and she offered Ellisys a choice: serve her time in The Hells or join the Order of the Black Arrow. Ellisys didn’t have to be asked twice to make her decision.

Ellysis has been a part of the Order of the Black Arrow for six years now. During her time there her feelings on humans (and dwarfs) have changed to some extent. Although she still thinks that humans are especially receptacle to the influences of greed and power, she has seen herself how even their lowest scum can become a somewhat respectable person with a purpose if they are set on the right path with an iron fist. It is the duty of the Black Arrows to hunt giants and keep the area around Fort Rannick, the Valley of Broken Trees, save.

On paper, Ellisys may not have been sent to the Black Arrows because she killed her father, but she does consider it the reason she has ended up there. While being a part of the Black Arrows may not be the second chance she had expected to get in Magnimar, she is grateful for the opportunity nevertheless.

Rise of the Runelords

Warning! There will be spoilers for the Rise of the Runelords campaign (specifically for book 3) beyond this point.

In the six years Ellisys spent defending Fort Rannick and Turtleback Ferry from ogres and other monsters she could never have imagined the fort could fall, until one day it did. The Black Arrows hadn’t been prepared for the ogre attack at all. A creature smarter than all the ogres combined must have organized the attack, for both Lamatar Bayden, the commander at the time, and a patrol consisting of thirty-three of their men weren’t present at the fort during the attack.

Ellisys fought bravely with her Black Arrow brothers and sisters. It was a brutal one-sided battle which ended with most of the Black Arrows dead and Ellisys was taken prisoner by the ogres. Surely she would have been tortured to death like the other Black Arrows who had been unfortunate enough to survive the attack, but she was saved by a group of adventures.

After taking back the fort those adventures explained they had been sent by the Lord-Mayor of Magnimar to see what was going on at Fort Rannick and to resolve any issues regarding the fort. Ellisys offered them her aid and strength despite being one of the few survivors. She fought by their side as a snake woman revealed herself to be the mastermind behind the attack on the fort, while they tried to find a solution to fix the dam which was about to burst called Skull's Crossing and while searching for the commander.

During Ellisys time with the adventures, she gradually developed a liking for Sir Cumference, their human fighter. Not even her lifetime of disgust for humans could stop her heart from beating faster as she watched Sir Cumference swing his mighty sword down to cut foes. She made sure to enjoy battle side by side with him as much as she could because she knew a future together could never work for them.

Despite this, their parting didn’t end on a sad note. Through a series of events Lamatar, the commander, was reincarnated by his lover Myriana, a nymph and protector of the Shimmerglens. This cost Myriana her life, which Lamatar repaid by becoming the next person to protect the wetlands. Before Lamatar disappeared, however, he told Ellisys that Jakardros Sovark, another Black Arrow, should be the next commander. Ellisys passed along this message and bluffed her way into becoming Jakardros’ right-hand woman by lying that had been Lamatar’s wish as well.

Ellisys celebrated her self-promotion with Sir Cumference and the other adventures before they were off to save the world again. Naturally, she emphasized that she, being the second in command, would always offer them the aid of the Black Arrows if they would ever need it. She was sad to see Sir Cumference go, but she loved watching him leave.

Relationships

Lord Jean-Michel Berthelot

Ellisys’ human father and former lord of Touyes. His feelings for Lyra were obsessive and dangerous, but above all else not mutual. He never tried to build a relationship with Ellisys, seeing her as little more than a part of his household.

Lyra

Ellisys’ elven mother. Although Lyra cared for her, Ellisys could tell since she was a child that there was an unspoken uncomfortableness between them. When she was a little older she was able to understand the situation her mother was in. Had Lyra known what would come of telling Ellisys about her betrothed, she might have chosen to die with the secret instead. To this day, Ellisys doesn’t know what has become of her mother.

Sir Cumference

Ellisys’ human crush. She could never have imagined falling for a human, but his brute strength, beautiful golden locks and silent character charmed her. In her mind she has built him up to be unattainable; a fantasy too good to be true. She is in love with the idea of Sir Cumference, more so than with the man himself. She has been so blinded by her fantasies that she has failed to notice that there might be actually something there, something real that they could work towards.

Trivia

After the adventure, Ellisys wrote the chivalric novel “De Gouden Lokkenridder en de Legendarische Krijgsvrouw” (translation: “The Golden Locks Knight and the Legendary Warrior Woman”). Many of her readers interpret her book as a comedy because the warrior woman fails to win the heart of the knight time and time again. This is much to Ellisys distain because she wrote the novel with the intension of it being a tragedy.

Ellisys ensures that Commander Jakardros Sovark's birthday is always celebrated and every year she asks him if he is thinking of retiring. Every year Jakardros laughs about this and reminds Ellisys that he is still a healthy man with his whole life ahead of him and that only his death can free him from his duty. She laughs this off but knows she will outlive him one day, just by virtue of him being a human and herself being a half-elf. Once day she will be Commander and take what is rightfully hers!