------------- Syvasgaard – General Baeltanis

“Yes, Sub-Commander?”

“General. The officers are ready for your address.”

“Very well, Sub-Commander. I’ll be right out.”

She stood before the mirror, silently going over the speech one more time. It was no call to rally the troops, no war to be fought. It was a farewell address. She was leaving her homeland and going far away. It was her duty. And she’d always held her duty first.

Ravadiana Baeltanis was born to the summit of Delsian society. She was great grand daughter to the Del-Mage himself. Her father was a soldier, a ranking military man in the days before the War of Tryskellias on the far away continent of Callona. The elves,… stayed out of it. Yet, barely out of diapers, she learned of the stories of what was happening on the battlefronts of that war. The elves of Delsia might not have cared what the humans did to themselves, but they certainly cared if their self destructive idiocy spilled over onto the Elven homeland.

Then came the many years between. Ravadiana grew up strong and bright. She caught the thrill of combat at a young age. And centuries later, when the humans finally realized what had happened in that long ago war and rose up against the Off-World invaders that had occupied their planet for over two centuries, she was there with the great warrior, Callandra Everwhite, to heed the call to war. Her mother was shattered. Her father offered his sword, but nothing else. And when she returned from those radioactive battlefields to repel the Republic,… she was hailed as a hero,… by everyone but her own family. The Little Raven, as her Great-Grandfather had called her, had defied millennia of royal family tradition and followed the path of the sword over the art of the sorcerer.

Another century and more passed. The prophesied end of days finally came. It was not what anyone expected. Shannara Seke, the Del-Mage of Meldinosa, the Avatar of Labelas, God of knowledge and magic, fell. He was slain by the Avatar of Kirinasalee, the Revenancer. The powers of His clerics faltered and faded. And in the aftermath, three factions once again warred for control of the High Elven homeland. The Mages, the last of the noble lines and the intelligencia of the kingdom; the Military, the soldiers and rangers who had fought to defend Delsia for thousands of years; and the Dark Druids, arisen once again under the worship of Mordai. In the end, it was General Everwhite and her elite warriors who won the day and saved Delsia from descending farther into chaos and ruin. And at her side, Commander Ravadiana Baeltanis, last of the blood line of the Del-Mage.

Some would call her betrayer of her family and their creed, ever the supporters of the Mages, of racial purity and protection of the Delsian way of life. But there were others who knew it from the day she was born. For what Delsian was ever born with raven black hair? In the years after the Civil War, she was sent to Syvasgaard, to establish ties with the Western Alliance of Callona. Who better to fit in with the dark haired Carellonians than a black haired High Elf? And who better to represent Delsia than the blood of Shannara, a Paladin of the Seldarine, an Elven Spellsinger, and the most popular battlefield general since the Supreme Commander herself?

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