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▍ABOUT
Skaal was born at the end of the Third Age--not among the Lightweaver's first children, but among their immediate descendants. Theirs was a reclusive family that chose to dwell deep within the Southern Icefield, far from the eyes of the outside world. Ice ran strong in Skaal and his sisters, and in the solitude of their hermitage they honed their magical talents until they were peerless in their chosen crafts. Skaal, ever fascinated by the cold's effects on both the body and the illnesses attacking it, became a healer. He developed a technique that would draw illness from a patient's body and trap it within himself. Ice's touch would kill the disease before it could take root, leaving both patient and healer cured.
For many years he remained in seclusion with his family, but time wore on, and Skaal began to show interest in the outside world.
He departed one morning, after heartfelt goodbyes, and embarked on a journey of exploration and discovery that took him across the length and breadth of Sornieth. He had a kind, generous heart that saw him ply his skill as a healer whenever the need arose--he turned no one away--and before long word of his power and deeds travelled ahead of him. Wherever Skaal went, he was recognized, and treated with deference and awe. But though he enjoyed having his ego stroked (and who wouldn't, he reasoned) he worked at keeping in mind that he wasn't healing for praise or reward. He was healing to help people, to make a difference.
He met his mate on a tour through the Starwood Strand, and together they had a son. Skaal's wandering stopped there--he had a family of his own to care for, and wouldn't abandon them--but he wouldn't stop healing. The patients came to him instead, to the Starfall Isles and the city he and his mate had settled in, and after a lot of coaxing he was at last persuaded to accept payment for his services. Life was good; his son sat in on most of Skaal's healing sessions, learning how his father worked and feeding his own growing passion for magical knowledge. He was as steeped in Arcane as his father was in Ice, and though Skaal couldn't pass on his techniques, he was thrilled to foster his son's love of learning all the same.
But children grow up, and children change. In his adolescence, Skaal's son veered away from the common, elemental magic he'd grown up with, and sought to learn all he could of the forces people didn't speak of: necromancy, summoning, forbidden rituals. He kept it well hidden, but tensions flared between father and son. He grew to resent his father--his do-gooder attitude, his glowing reputation, the praise heaped at his feet--and his mother, for always taking his father's side. The resentment opened a rift that would not be bridged, and drove the boy ever deeper into the dark. And it was there he heard the whispers.
He plotted his father's downfall, guided by soft voices in his mind that promised all that praise, all that recognition, would be his, if only he could be rid of his family. He started small, sparking embers of rumours that Skaal was engaged in dark and terrible magicks, and fanning the flames of suspicion as they grew. The flow of people coming to be healed slowed, then stopped altogether, as the rumours took hold and Skaal's reputation was destroyed.
But it wasn't enough, the whispers said. It wasn't enough to destroy him publicly; as long as he stayed true, he would rise above suspicion, and all would be forgotten in time. The son listened, rapt, as he was told what to do--told of the blood price he must pay to be rid of his father once and for all. It would be easy, the whispers--the Shade--said, as long as he meant to follow through. As long as he wasn't a coward.
It was easy, as it turned out. Easy to lure the victims, easy to lure his own mother, easy to spill their blood and his for the power the Shade had promised. Easy to leave clues behind that would lead both his father and an angry mob to the scene of the crime at just the right moment.
Skaal arrived at the grisly scene first, and watched in horror as the Shade drank of the blood it was offered and poured into his son. He tried to stop it; he grabbed at his son and pulled the Shade from him, trapping it in his own veins, where it burned and clawed at his very essence--but he was too late. The ritual had already been completed, there was aught left in his son but the Shade, and by pulling it out he had pulled his son's life out with it. The body in his arms was a husk, nothing more, and when the mob came on his heels they found a man surrounded by corpses, sobbing brokenly over the bodies of his mate and child.
His guilt was clear.
The trial was short, and the execution only a few days after. Skaal didn't bother to defend himself; he may not have committed the crime himself, but was the fault not his for letting things reach this point? Was it not his fault that his son had reached for that dark power? Were the lives taken not on his hands? The Shade inside him had grown silent, but he knew it was there. All he wanted now was for his death to kill the evil within him as well, and ensure that it couldn't hurt anyone else.
Death came swiftly after the headsman's axe connected with his neck, and for a few seconds the blackness was comforting and peaceful. But it was wrong. His mind was still conscious, still thinking, and no matter how long he waited the blackness didn't fade. it seemed to grow thicker, hotter, squeezing from all sides and attempting to drown him. Ice's touch saved him. The cold held the black at bay, until with a shuddering gasp, Skaal's eyes snapped open.
It was pitch black, wherever he was, and cramped. His hands found rough, wooden walls, and a wooden ceiling less than two inches from his nose. He pounded against it, and felt dirt rain down through the cracks, and panic gripped him as he realised just what had happened: he'd been buried alive.
Reason tried to tell him that was impossible, that he couldn't be alive after having his head lopped off by an axe, but Skaal wasn't listening to reason anymore. He was listening to fear and animal instinct, and the desperate need to escape. He punched and kicked at the lid of his coffin, choking on earth that streamed into his nose and mouth. There were more moments of blackness that interrupted his struggles, but eventually his hand broke through to cool night air, and Skaal dragged himself to the surface, retching dirt and bile onto the grass around the edges of his grave. Hours passed where he just breathed, curled on his side and staring blankly at the stars above, until the panic that had freed him ran out, and reason was allowed to creep back in.
He had died, multiple times, of that he was certain. He had felt the axe blade at his neck, and he had lost count of how many times he'd choked on loose earth. Why then, if he had died, was he still alive?
His answer came when, for curiosity's sake, Skaal drew a claw over his wrist, and watched black ooze bubble forth to cover the wound and seal it up. He laughed at that, a broken laugh that bordered on a sob, and dropped his head back onto the grass. That settled it: he couldn't die. The Shade he'd pulled from his son lived inside him now, and though his mind was still his own, the evil he'd failed to save his family from had taken root inside his body, and it wouldn't let him die.
Forty centuries hence, and Skaal has tried everything to end his miserable, lonely existence. Physical wounds are erased, poison is forcibly expelled moments after consumption, and it doesn't matter to the Shade whether or not he eats. The strength in Ice he was born with keeps the Shade from overtaking his mind completely, but all that means is that Skaal is aware of what he is, and what he's done.
He still heals, sometimes, if he sees someone in need of help. It isn't as though the Shade will let him get sick any more than Ice would, and to be able to help people remains a faint bright spot in his life. To that end, he's come to Waypoint to offer his services and occupy his time, because they don't ask questions. And who knows? Maybe someday, someone passing through will know how to reverse his condition, and finally let him die.
▍MISC
NAMESAKE/ETYM.— Ramble all you want about the name here.
RELATIONS— EVENTIDE (daughter - adoptive), ABALATHIA (sister), LINK (relation)
TRIVIA—
• The house he chose for his own plays host to at least eight visible bird feeders, and he likes to watch and listen to them in the mornings. When he ventures outside, they fly away.
• Animals can innately sense the Shade that taints his very soul, and either avoid Skaal or become aggressive to ward him off.
• Proin malesuada, diam vel scelerisque sodales, nisi mi consequat nulla, at dignissim arcu magna a magna.
• Maecenas tristique felis non diam eleifend mollis. Donec in mauris et ipsum hendrerit consectetur ornare at turpis.
ART— [ X ] by Grovey • [ X ] by Auries • [ X ] by Riserae • [ X ] by W
SONGS— [ Arms Outstretched ] by Griffin McElroy • [ Dust ] by Griffin McElroy • [ The Legend of Ashitaka - Ending ] by Joe Hisaishi • [ X ] by W
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