Mavdes Yuvari

Hal'atir / Sorcerer

Submitted character story

Mavdes is a Hal'atir. Some call her a changeling, tiefling, or a demon, but she's none of those. A sailor,  a lover of change, she's just beginning to discover her power and is destined for many things - adventure, tragedy, and coming into her own as a sorceress of the seas of Invalan.

Mavdes began as a Tiefling character for an updated 5e campaign of the classic D&D Saltmarsh adventures, but the backstory I wrote for her for her life *before* she became a 1st level sorceress took on a life of its own. Though the Saltmarsh D&D character is now 7th level and proceeding, *this* Mavdes Yuvari has an entire, different life of her own. Mavdes also inspired me to attempt actually writing the stories brewing in my head for years - hers included. 

   Mavdes is a Hal’atir.  In the world of Invalan there is no precise “demonic” (or “angelic”) heritage, rather Hal’atir are a product of imbalances between the two polarities of magic in the universe. A baby conceived during a polaric disturbance is usually stillborn, but infants that survive end up with strange hybridizations and unusual traits. Mavdes’s parents were human, she thinks, but she... isn't.

   Raised in an orphanage, presumably abandoned, Mavdes is now 18. She’s been a crew member on an independent merchant ship, the Hereward, for over a year. Her role is lookout and deck crew, and she is apprentice to Crorhan, the ship’s Wizard, though her magical affinity/talent seems to be more internal than external - powers driven by the force of the mind rather than the channeling of external energies. 

   Mavdes (Mister Yuvari to her Captain and ship's Mate, Mav to her fellow crew) is young, but not naive. She was raised in a world suspicious of her kind and spent a year living on her own before signing on to her sailing ship, where she has found a home.

   Mavdes is curious and adventurous. She sees Change and New everywhere. There’s always something just over the horizon – or under the surface in front of her. Every port, every ship, every uncharted rock will change your course, as will every person. Even standing still, the storms come to you. Best be ready for them. At the time I hope to capture, she has a new physical exuberance borne of a ’healing’ of a life-long fragility.

   Mavdes is loyal and open. Kindness and respect are her default towards others. 
If Mav can’t fly or feel she has reasonable access to open air, she’s uncomfortable. If she can’t even spread her wings, she gets agitated and short-tempered, even claustrophobic. Aboard ship, she doesn’t like being below decks for long periods of time, especially when the hold and crew quarters are full. Unless the weather is particularly bad, she usually sleeps in a hammock on deck, or in the crow’s nest.

   Mavdes is not strong, but she is quick. Her bones are hollow, which is what keeps her weight low enough to support flight. The was born frail, and endured a number of broken bones as she grew up. During the voyage that truly began her story, she performed an act of diving heroism and sacrifice that saved the lives of two crew members at the cost of what would have been irreparable damage to her wings and exposed a danger that imperiled not just her ship and crew, but an entire nation. 

  For these acts, she received a substantial reward, and spent the lion's share of it for the Osseous Aegis; a set of magical runic tattoos that now cover her body and make her much hardier. That added robustness has improved her physical confidence and made her much less circumspect about taking action or putting herself at risk. 

   Mavdes has an inhuman charisma that works one of two ways - those she not attract, she intimidates. This can make it difficult for a young woman learning to navigate the world, but her Captain knows how to it to advantage, and Mav is learning.

  Mav's defining moment, for the moment, is a pirate attack on the Hereward. In the sudden, pitched boarding action, the pirates gain the upper hand and the opposing ship's wizard kills Crorhan. Mavdes, firing crosbow bolts from the crow's nest to limited effect, witnesses the death. The shock of grief, terror, and rage break the barriers in her to her magical power and she lashes out psionically, paralyzing and asphyxiating the opposing wizard, and then stunning, or outright killing several other of the boarding pirates, including the opposing ship's Mate with stabs of her mind before she blacks out from both grief and the real pain of her poorly controlled magical strikes.

  The Hereward prevails. The tide would not have turned without Mavdes' rapid, decisive actions, but it is hard for her to appreciate that. The loss of Crorhan, the realization she has killed, that she has broken through to her power but does not know how to use or control it, are all too much for Mavdes and she retreats within herself.

   She continues to perform her duties as crew, but whenever she is not on duty, she retreats to Crorhan's cabin/workshop and studies. Eventually she discovers a treatise on the mind and its powers and recklessly follows its guidance on meditation and projection of the mind inward and outward. On her fourth day with the tome, she casts her mind out, seeking, and becomes lost, her body entering a state of effective catatonia. 

   With the ships healer unable to revive her, the Captain decides to bring her to shore and put her in the care of a local temple while the ship continues on its route, planning to return and pick her up in a few months as their route brings them back. 

   Mavdes awakens six months later, unaware of how much time she spent wandering the nether astral space between. She is the same person she used to be, mostly, but her time..."away" has also changed her. She sees the world differently. She can feel the flow of magic within her. She knows that there are things she needs to do.

   The Hereward should have returned months ago, but never did.  First order of business: find her ship and crew and Captain.