Luster

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Luster

"Yeah, I guess I could have just talked to him but my axe just so happened to get lodged between his eyes. Whoops. What can I say? I'm a clutz."

Relatives	Mother: Madame Lunari (deceased)
Languages	Common, Elvish, Sylvan
Affiliations	None
Aliases	The Axebreaker
Marital Status	Single
Place of Birth	Cressida Weald
Date of Death	None
Place of Death	None
Species	Fairy (currently), Eladrin Elf (formerly)
Gender	Female
Height	3’2 ft
Weight	40 lbs
Eye Color	Blue

Oath of Conquest Paladin. Pronouns: She/Her.

Physical Appearance

Luster is a fairy with blue luminescent skin that almost looks like porcelain when it catches the light. Her hair is similar, but it's a deeper shade of blue. She has white eyes that seem to glow with moonlight, a feature shared by most Moon Court Fey. Her ears are fairly large and slope downward to a point. There are winglike horns on top of her head that fade from the same deep blue as her hair to a much paler color at the tips. Her actual wings are insectile but follow the same coloration as her horns. Luster has stitches fashioned from pure moonlight keeping her arms and legs attached to her body and the light they emit is uncomfortably bright to anyone not born of the Moon Court. She typically dons black and silver armor with chain mesh.

Personality

Luster has a good deal of bravado, being willing to take on quests that the more cautious would turn down. She can be serious when the moment calls for it but tends to be very jovial in her day-to-day life. Luster doesn't like it when people bring the mood down and will often resort to mischief to get people to lighten up. In reality, she is deeply bitter about her situation, and uses combat to take out her frustrations so that they don't bleed into her everyday personality. If she goes a good deal of time without fighting, Luster will become more closed off and agitated until she gets to beat something up.

History

Luster’s earliest memory is fading in and out of consciousness while a Naga removed and reattached her limbs, sloppily attempting to infuse her soul with mystical energies—she had been unlucky enough to end up under the knife of someone inexperienced. Pain came and lapsed in waves, but she was always acutely aware of the feeling of being taken apart and pieced back together. Luster was far from the only fairy of the Moon Court to undergo such horrific experimentation. Fairies were considered the lowest on the totem pole among the Moon Court: as such they were often utilized as either servants or fodder for experimentation—the latter, of course, was their preferred role. When Lady Luanach, the resident archfey, had the court turn their attention towards animals from the Material Plane, all fairies became servants.

Luster became the assistant to a satyr paladin named Calypso—someone tasked with the defense of the Moon Court from everything and everything that dared to trespass in the demiplane. Calypso usually had Luster run errands and entertain, but occasionally, when the satyr was drunk, he would teach Luster the ways of magic and weaponry. Over time, Luster learned that Calypso longed to have an apprentice to replace the one they “lost” ages ago, hence why he was teaching her. Luster made sure to act as nothing more than a simple, foolhardy fairy when Calypso was sober, but she secretly took his lessons to heart and would hone her abilities whenever she had free time.

Eventually, the Moon Court went to war with the Cult of the Under Rabbit: animals raised to higher intelligence by a rabbit who escaped experimentation and ascended to become an Archfey. Calypso, of course, had to leave to join the fighting. While he was gone, Luster was tasked with managing his abode. She used this time to snoop through Calypso’s belongings without the fear of being caught and eventually stumbled upon a letter for his former apprentice. The letter vaguely implied that he was remorseful for… something. Soon enough, the war ended with a Moon Court victory and Calypso returned home.

For weeks, Luster attempted to trick Calypso into giving information about his relationship with his past student away. She wanted something to hold over his head, figuring that blackmail might help her improve her station; she also plainly had nothing better to do. Luster waited until Calypso got drunk again and took on the role of her instructor. After impressing him with her skill, she pressed him again. Unfortunately, he caught on to her game and was at first enraged. Instead of killing her, however, Calypso calmed down and confided in her about Lady Luanach having stolen leadership of the Moon Court from an eladrin named Madame Lunari. Luanach apparently killed Lunari, but instead of killing her daughter, transformed her into a fairy so she would live in humiliation. Unfortunately, this daughter lost all memory of her former life and mother in the transformation process.

Luster broke into a cold sweat while listening to Calypso’s story, as though something was terribly wrong. Calypso seemed to grow sicker and sicker as he told Luster the truth, eventually no longer being able to stand. He told Luster that he had mentored Madame Lunari’s daughter before Luanach led overthrew her and that his punishment for choosing to remain loyal to the court’s former ruler was a geas that would kill him if he ever revealed the truth. He had planned to eventually deliver the vague letter Luster had read before going to challenge Lady Luanach so he could die in honor, but drunkenly decided that he needed to ensure that his apprentice knew who she was. With his dying breaths, he urged Luster to escape from the court. Luster immediately ran, stumbling through the demiplane until she literally fell through a portal that transported her to Amusa.

Upon her escape, Luster wandered for some time, contemplating what to do with what had been revealed to her. She knew that attempting to kill Lady Luanach would be a death wish, but the thought of essentially living her life in exile irked her. Luster eventually began taking odd jobs in order to provide for herself. She was a natural when it came to minor mercenary jobs and she eventually decided to swear an oath of conquest: Luster promised herself that she would vanquish foe after foe until she garnered enough strength to retake the Moon Court by force. She was also determined to find a way to return to her eladrin form.

Languages

Luster has known Common, Elvish, and Sylvan for as long as she remembers and has no memory of going through the process of learning any of them. Her mother likely taught her all three. Her favorite language is Elvish because of what it represents to her--speaking it makes her feel connected to her true heritage and makes her wonder what her mother might have been like.

Powers and Abilities

If there's one thing Luster loves, it's being on the front lines. She's very fond of charging her enemies and mowing them down before they know what's hit them. As a conquest paladin, smiting her foes with the power of her oath--her sworn promise to leave no battlefield unvanquished--is one of her favorite techniques. Despite having wings, she prefers wearing hefty armor so she can take a beating. While this means she's often unable to fly, Luster makes up for this by standing her ground. She earned the nickname "Axebreaker" because she often hits so hard that her weapons are in pieces by the end of the battle. This never stops her from fighting, however. Luster once used the handle of a greataxe to bludgeon an opponent into submission. Her favorite spells all have smiting capabilities and she's particularly fond of using Thunderous Smite to blow out someone's ears while she wrecks the rest of them. On a few occasions, she's made use of Command and a surprising amount of charisma to convince thieves that fighting isn't worth it. On others, she has simply relished in making people fall prone before taking their heads off.

Attacks and Weapons 

Typical Weapon: Greataxe

1st Level Spells: Armor of Agathys, Command, Cure Wounds, Searing Smite, Thunderous Smite, Wrathful Smite

The Adventures of a Small, Strong Fairy/Former Elf

Was it Jack or Mack? Also, Amaris.

Who would have thought a simple mission could end up going so off the walls? Look, I totally wasn’t planning on killing the guy when I got told to go retrieve something stolen. One second, I was wandering through a city and the next thing I knew I had walked into a tavern and was comforting a crying old human. From what I could tell, poor old John didn’t have much to his name except for a silver necklace that had been passed down through his family for at least four generations. And when something that rightfully belongs to someone gets taken away, I can’t help getting a little ticked off. So I took down a description of the thief and went to find them. Would you believe my luck? I found them trying to pawn the necklace off in an alleyway. Obviously, I chased after the guy—Jack? Mack? I can’t remember the guy’s name—and ended up following them into a forest. Maybe it’s just because the Cressida Weald was basically one big forest, but I always feel like I’m going home when I’m going through the woods. I can’t decide whether or not I hate it.

While I was running, I heard the very distinctive sound of hoofbeats behind me. So, I turned around and came face to face—or face to knee I guess—with… She was tall, but most people are tall compared to me, and she had this pretty purple cloak with star patterns all over it. I knew she was from the Moon Court because her fur and hair was so white it was like moonlight. Again, don’t know whether or not I hated it. At the very least, she had the decency to introduce herself: Amaris. I should have tried to take her name. That would have been funny. Apparently, Amaris was one of the people assigned by Her Lady Bastardship Luanach to track me down. How quaint. I have to say, for being a bounty hunter, she seemed very unenthused. We just kind of stared at each other for a while. Then I tried to smite her. She managed to get out of the way, but just barely. Amaris attempted to put me to sleep, and I would have had an axe to her throat, but then I remembered why I was in the forest to begin with: Jack! Or Mack! A bunch of other satyrs also showed up, and being dragged back to court was the last thing I wanted. I don’t like retreating, but even I know that sometimes it’s strategic.

They chased me while I chased Jack-Mack and let me just say that running from satyrs should be some kind of sport. Seriously! It was so fun! Eventually I lost them and ran right into the necklace thief. He started cowering, so I thought I could talk him down, but then he drew a dagger and charged at me. It was basically just a reflex to kill him at that point. But hey, when I looked at the dagger he drew after he was dead, it was totally poisoned, so I’d say it was just an eye for an eye. I took his corpse with me back to the tavern, but John wasn’t there anymore, so I started looking for him and wandered into an inn full of a bunch of super cool people! I think they were kind of put off by the corpse thing, though.