Ravenvault Keep. Ancestral home of the Dark Elf royalfamily. A foreboding wall surrounds a masterful palace, botha work of art and a defensive masterpiece. The fortress hasnever fallen. High above the palace grounds, the Queen, Shelan, beloved both for her remarkable beauty and unmatched mastery of death magic, watched over the realm of her family. The lands that had so suddenly become her's alone to govern. Her husband, King Leafblight Lightbane, had been discovered early that morning, murdered. The heir to the throne, Darkleaf, and his brother, Treekiller, dissappeared a bare hour before the murder had been discovered. The investigation had fallen to the youngest Lightbane, Dallium. He summoned the spirit of his father with the intention of tracking down the killer and avenging his father. The late king boldy told his youngest son that Treekiller, Dallium's own brother, commited the assassination. Something in Dallium's gentle mind snapped, and he wandered of into the wilderness in search of answers.
  Shelan turned to the seer in the middle of the room, hugging her body to ward off the chill air that caressed her bare skin. The blind elf held knarled fingers over a ironwood totem, carved in dark symbols. "My Queen, the spirts are ready." the mystic intoned.
  "Well," she asked impatiently. "Where is Darkleaf? Where is he destined to become king?"
  The seer bent over his totem, muttering in a demonic tongue. The queen signaled for her maids to choose out garments suitable for a new widow. The young women rushed to work as the seer cackled in triumph, and quickly cut short in a grunt of confusion. "My Queen...It would apear the
Darkleaf is not to become king. The king is leaving the realm of our people rapidly, while Darkleaf is far distant. He will find a great human house... it would appear that great peril lies within..." Suddenly, the old elf screamed in pain and confusion. Ingnoring her maid's valiant attempts
to dress the agitated queen, Shelan stepped forward, curious.
  The seer's eyes opened, narrowed against the light. Whatever bargain he had made with the underworld had been broken, and his sight had returned. Unfourtunately for him, his first sight in nearly seven hundred years was the naked body of a very powerful woman. Shelan flicked her wrist, channeling pure darkness into the poor man's body.
  "NO! Please, STOP!" The Dark Elf felt a slight itch in the small of his back. He reached for it desperatley, but his knarled arms couldn't reach. The itch built to a sharp pressure that spread with agonizing slowness to his entire torso. All at once, the pressure was replaced with the
sensation of millions of red-hot needles piercing his body. He gibbered madly and thrashed about on the floor. One of the young maid's made to go to him, but was held back by an elder, shaking her head. The queen glanced at them expectantly, and they rushed to dress her.
  The man's screams of torment tore at the morning air. Blood dripped slowly to the ground from the stump that used to be his tounge. The needles spread throughout his entire body. Black flame erupted from his body, consuming him alive. Soon, naught but ashes remained. A maid was quickly dispatched to fetch an air mage to remove the mess. The queen so hated to dirty her shoes in the dust of the weak.
  "Now, how to best break the bad news to the commoners? Send for the political consultant at once." Her servants rushed to obey.