It is roughly 600 BDP in Eldre'thalas, 300 years after Prince Tortheldrin and his loyalists murdered their vassals in cold blood in order to hoard the volatile power of immol'thar,ensuring their continued immortality. Tortheldrin had imposed the edict to curb the population in the wake of the culling, and every child born in this age of tyranny was either left to the elements, carried through the dangers of the wilds with their fleeing parents, or murdered outright by the Prince's brutal enforcers. It is in this corrupted and decaying political environ that High Magister Celestra Brightwell is rudely shaken from her suicidal stupor, for someone has abandoned an infant at her doorstep.

Chapter One- Bestowal

The stones of the city were beginning to corrode in an unnatural way, buffeted as they were by the waves of corruption emanating from the demon trapped within. The steady seepage of arcane-muted fel and void were getting harder to contain. Once a sprawling city at the western reaches of The Kaldoreian Empire, Eldre'thalas now stood in partial ruin, the tropical damp and seasonal monsoons of the surrounding rainforest wearing away at stone. Roots and vine threatened to engulf the outer walls and domes as the city sank into a fitful slumber. Within these halls Azshara's most revered Arcanists had spent millennia pouring over ancient writings, translating the words of cultures once lost to time, gleaning meaning from the whispering arcane vapors wafting from the well of eternity, it's geometry and visions transcribed by the well-speakers far east at the eternal pool's shores. The halls had once echoed with voices and laughter, Azshara's chosen Magi engaged in spirited debate with their colleagues while strolling through the verdant gardens, or a master Lorekeeper launching into a lecture, students and citizens alike would gather in front of one of the many marble statues lining the western garden's pathways to listen to these daily orations.

This era of prosperity had long since passed. The city now stood, partially abandoned, much of it's grounds entombed in stillness with the occasional wail of a tortured ghost splitting the silence. It had been thousands of years since the arcanists and their apprentices had been united in the common goal of bringing glory to their beloved queen and her vast empire. The life's work of these brilliant minds now sat in ruin, their tomes accumulating dust and mildew while the once-glorious empire of their queen sat shattered and decaying, the whirling rage of the maelstrom marking the death-throes of their collapsed well. Paranoia, shame and madness now reigned in Eldre'Thelas, clinging like cobwebs to the minds of those that remained. And there were the rules, the restrictions. The tomes were still there, stacked and organized amongst the vast shelves of the ancient Library. There were less of them, and more and more were locked under the mark of the Athenaeum by the day.

It was in this crumbling city that High Arcanist Celestra Brightwell opened her back door at dawn's break to the shocking sight of an infant, asleep on her doorstep, blissfully unaware of the danger a single cry would attract. As she stood there gazing down, the myriad possibilities tore through her mind. First and foremost was to wonder what blundering fool could have let this happen. And to leave it at her back stoop of all places, to thrust this danger, this responsibility upon her. Why not flee like others had done? Was this a trap of some kind? She certainly had enough enemies for this to be counted among the possibilities. She reached out tentatively with her senses and felt no illusory magics bending the space around her doorstep. So it was real. How they'd hidden a pregnancy she could only guess at. One of the magisters must have been involved. She'd have to draw it out of Nylora, there was not a doubt in her mind that her Spellsword would know something of this mess. The multitude possibilities running through her thoughts disturbed her greatly. If she were to protect this forbidden child it would mark her end for certain...and yet.

She had grown so hopeless these past few months. So weary of what Prince Tortheldrin had attempted to justify in his twisted state. She was beginning to lose hope entirely that any remnants of the man she had once loved and respected remained in that warped mind. She'd grown disgusted by what she'd seen her compatriots slowly become, she had no one to rely on but herself among the High Magisters now. Celestra herself was not blameless, this she knew well. She had been instrumental in constructing the pylons. She had not challenged Tortheldrin's grand plan despite the misgivings nagging at her mind. And she had not stopped the massacre, the "culling" as the prince had so ghoulishly called it. She'd hidden away then, cloistered herself in her chambers like a coward as the prince's closest lackeys meted out their vile betrayal upon the lower caste. She understood how they'd gotten to that point, intellectually at least. Guilt, grief, she had tread those dismal halls often in the years succeeding the sundering. She couldn't linger long on the memories, the cities, the people, the immensity of all that was lost. And every last one of them had played a crucial part in it's destruction. She was well acquainted with the weight of that guilt, and with the madness that clawed at her thoughts when she drank too deeply of the pylons tainted energy. She was no stranger to those unnatural, destructive musings that manifested if she failed to reign in those urges, if she failed to take a step back from the jagged precipice of her grief.

The merciful release of slumber rarely came to her at dawn, and she'd reduced her draw upon vile Imol'thar's essence to a slow trickle. She was weaker now, and the ravages of age hastened their assault upon her body. The mad fevers weren't as incessant, no longer scraping at the edges of her thoughts, sending them careening into those perverse meanderings. But the hunger, the vast hunger, just as it had been in that great lethargy that had followed the loss of the well. Lately she had considered cutting her ties to those failing pillars entirely, had considered letting herself wither away quietly. But this? This had complicated things. She gazed down at the swaddled child, sleeping peacefully on her back doorstep leading into the city. The sun's first rays had begun to shine upon the mossy cobblestone, evaporating the dew that had settled into their worn surfaces in night's emeraldine mist. If she were to protect this child she'd have to resume her draw upon the pylons once more. The temptation she felt as she mulled over that detail was not lost on her. She considered the many experiments she had abandoned when she'd begun her fast, many of them bent on one single goal. A noble goal for certain, perhaps that simple fact could ground her. Perhaps she could pull this off. For the first time in many years she felt the stirrings of something- excitement? no that wasn't quite it. The baby let loose a soft yawn and her hand reached out from within the blankets, the tiny digits grabbing hold of the soft folds.

The Magister gently lifted the infant and cradled her in her arms, careful not to wake her. She was smaller than most Kaldorei babies, her ears shorter and malformed in places. her development must have been stunted by the energies permeating the halls, radiating into their bodies night and day. The effects of this environment on the child's biology concerned her and awakened a bit of the natural curiosity that had been slumbering inside her for the last few hundred years. She made her mind up in that moment as she peered at the innocent's sleeping face. she would not allow another soul to be ripped from this world.