Ilnia Vasrith – Paladin of the Moon's Sanctum

Raised within the Sanctum of Glanbeli. Ilnia’s father had perished in an expedition he had never returned from, and her mother died of heartbreak soon after, leaving their sole child behind, to be raised by the Temple, as was the custom for orphaned Glanbelite Drow. From what faint memories she still holds of her mother, she was a great musician, a lover of the harp who filled their home with sweet melodies: melodies that still ring in her ears to this day. Ilnia had no love for the blade or buckler she was handed as a child: instruments of war she would gladly trade for instruments of the soul. Yet, it was her charge, and fighting the tides of fate would spell her doom, expelled to the streets or worse: the tunnels. Holding her head high and soldiering through the trials and tribulations that the Temple placed before her proved difficult, but Ilnia found solace in another soul within the Temple, a young priestess named Lothana who paid tribute to the great moon Glanbeli through song. Ilnia found herself mesmerised by the girl, and the two forged a sisterly bond within the Sanctum, one that would last until death parted them. Though for Lothana, death’s embrace came for her decades early, much to her adoptive sister’s grief, who watched her sibling perish to an incurable ailment; a slow, mortifying death. Lothana was the sole thread that bound Ilnia to the Temple, and gave her any semblance of faith; Ilnia’s faith was bound to Lothana’s. Without her, and watching her die such an agonizing death, Ilnia’s faith in Glanbeli, and any divine, was shattered. Sensing this, the High Priestess of her Sanctum sent Ilnia on a pilgrimage, joining a devout nomadic clan that had recently stopped within the Sanctum for supplies while on their own pilgrimage. It was her hope that among these people, Ilnia’s faith would be rekindled, and seeing the alternative of the Irinaxi Drow would sway her from paths darker than apathy at the least. Among the nomads she has found fellowship, though it feels like a pale imitation of the unbreakable bond she shared with her late sister. Now she and the clan she travels with are caught in a skirmish with a particularly fervent group of Irinaxi zealots. Ilnia has come to learn that the zealots plan on assaulting her home, the Sanctum she was raised in. This will be the crucible to test her faith and will, and whether she would truly give her life to a cause she had only believed in for the love of her sister.