Bloodline: All in the Family

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for the overall layout of the family tree.)

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Darrovan + Winimere / Ulana, Jozen, Thornton)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Librarian.png The Librarian: "To understand the totality of the family curse, I believe it is best to begin our scrutinies with the one who lies at the heart of the curse, and with him, his nearest and dearest."



http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/DarrovanAinsleyPog.png "Darrovan Ainsley. I find it suspicious that he ruled Bardosylvania for precisely one year and one day before disaster struck his noble house, a length of time often prescribed for traditional curses and other arcane maladies. And a year and a day later, he was allowed to return from his death, and others born of his blood--or indentured to it--came with him. I wonder what ignoble deed could have brought the House of Ainsley low, for surely Darrovan is responsible in some manner.

Darrovan is mystically bound to the lands of Bardosylvania. His will over his dominion is absolute, and the very trees and mists will move to halt those who seek to leave his domain against his wishes. The irony here is that he is as much a prisoner of Bardosylvania as he is its master; As the Mists refuse escape to those he wishes to keep within his realm, so too shall the Mists warp and twist his path until he finds himself returning to the heart of Bardosylvania should he ever try to cross the borders from his dark land. He therefore needs his family and his servants to deliver his will from afar, just as they need him in so many ways.

In life, Darrovan was a power-hungry manipulator and a schemer whose ambitions knew no bounds; Such ambitions may have provided the final nail in the coffin when Duke Eowuld of Konegheim withdrew all support from his province. But whatever his misdeeds in life or after death, his bond with his family is as strong as his need for their support. The grave rejects him and Death shall not have him again; Strike Darrovan down one night and he shall rise from his ashes the next. Fortunately for all that is good in this world, his family seems to enjoy no such immortality. And were his entire family reduced to ashes one and all, only then would Darrovan's curse truly be complete."

Undead type: Unique -- Unknown.


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/WinimereOshar.png "Winimere Oshar-Ainsley, Darrovan's wife and cousin in one. Even as a young girl she was sickly and afflicted with anemia; That she survived long enough to come of age, bear several children and perish at the hands of brigands rather than succumbing to her illness is a seeming miracle. She did find great favor with her father-in-law Heward Ainsley, a dark scholar who seemed to adopt her as a liaison with--or a substitute for--his antagonistic son Darrovan; Perhaps Heward's hand was somehow instrumental in her survival.

Winimere soon determined that her disease, as with certain other bloodborne diseases, was eased of its pains as she ingested fresh blood. Deeming male blood unfit and incompatible with her body, she spared Jozen and Thornton from her pursuit of a remedy and took to drawing small amounts of blood from her daughter Ulana, a practice which she kept hidden from the rest of the family for years. And when Ulana ran away from home to escape her mother's knives and razors, Winimere was forced to drug and abduct young girls from the peasantry to slake her perceived need, abandoning the girls in the woodlands once she was finished with them. Not all of the girls left the forests alive.

When Ulana returned to the family years later, her doting father was the first one--and, as fate saw fit, the only one--to learn of Winimere's misdeeds. However appalled he was, Darrovan was slow to bring judgement against his wife; He had his own skeletons in his closet, some of which were known to Winimere as well. But Ulana's tempestual homecoming was soon overshadowed by Heward's sudden death and Darrovan's ascension to the throne, and one year later a horde of monstrous brigands would forever silence the threat which Ulana posed to Winimere's reputation.

Or would this be untrue?"

Undead type: Vampire. And a most fitting fate at that.


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/UlanaAinsley.png "Ulana Ainsley, beloved by mother and father...moreso by her father, who doted on Ulana even to the expense of his two sons. How deep would Darrovan's ire run were anything bad to happen to her?

But we've already heard the tale of her mother's bloodletting. After an angry and bitter Ulana fled from her home to escape such torments, she fell in with the commoners and, for a time, lived as a bon vivant and libertine among them. In time, one among her bawdy companions would leave her with two illegitimate daughters, and once her money dwindled to nothing she would be forced to return home and confront her parents and her brothers.

Darrovan was elated to see his daughter but was less than pleased with the arrival of his granddaughters. He still regards Jana and Josia less than favorably, and the oddity of the twins can only contribute to this discord. But in light of what he, his wife, his daughter and the rest of his family have become, such past failings as predatory bloodletting and children birthed out of wedlock now seem petty by comparison."

Undead type: Ghoul


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/JozenAinsley.png "Jozen Ainsley. Jozen was always the deeply troubled sort, always keeping to himself and never speaking, not even when spoken to. His childhood was spend inflicting various horrid tortures onto whatever insects and small animals he could catch; Happily, he seemed to grow out of these habits as he came of age.

In their adolescent years, Darrovan sent Jozen and Thornton away to receive their higher educations at the feet of Wee Jas' more refined priests and scholars. During his time with the cloister, Jozen met and fell in love with Enawilde Stang, the only daughter of Lord Hendroth Stang of Karkovia, the infamous warlord who proved himself in the Imperial Civil War.

As the years passed, Enawilde grew more and more frustrated with Jozen's peculiarities and lack of emotion. She separated from Jozen and his House and returned home to live with her father, and there she remained even as House Ainsley fell to marauders. For whatever her reasons, Enawilde has never returned to Bardosylvania to pay her respects or to determine the welfare of her husband. As one might expect, Jozen's normally lax emotions have grown quite incensed over this."

Undead type: Vampire


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/ThorntonAinsleyPog.png "Thornton Ainsley, or 'Thorn' to those most familiar with him. Thornton took the cloister's lessons to heart, attending the priests with great interest and becoming a priest of Wee Jas in turn. The goddess may not favor the twinge of wickedness which has ensnared Thorn's lifeless heart, but his devotion to the studies of death, spiritual passages and the properties of the soul could not be any more sincere. Equally sincere was Thorn's devotion to his brother Jozen, as was Jozen's devotion to him. As they returned home from Abbot Weirvan's temple, the two brothers swore to each other a pact: If death should ever take one, the other would join him. And if one were to return from death, so would the other follow him.

Suffice it to say that Jozen and Thornton have honored their pact thus far. But Jozen returned from death as a vampire, while Thorn returned from death as a ghoul. This disparity has caused some degree of discord, as Jozen has attained what in Thorn's eyes is a higher station of existence. Perhaps in time Thorn will learn that ghouls are not without their advantages, regardless of how wretched the ghoul's diet is by comparison.

More than this I cannot say; It seems that the hand of destiny weighs heavily on this one, and I cannot perceive the weave of his future. But whether that destiny leads to a shining resolution or a grim fate, only the gods themselves could say."

Undead type: Ghoul


(Reserved for generation: Ulana / Jana, Josia)


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Jana-JosiaAinsley.png "Ah, Jana and Josia Ainsley, the twin daughters of Ulana. Unfortunate girls they are, for it seems that Dame Fortune has not smiled on them. Born out of wedlock in a childbirth which was so traumatic that it left their mother's womb torn and barren, and scorned by a grandfather who could only find repugnance with their bastard heritage from a nameless, lowborn father. And then, taken from this world at six years of age. Mercifully, they succumbed to the malignant defects of their birth years before the brigands would have slaughtered them anyway.

Just as their births shared the same year and day, so did their deaths share the same year. But they did not share the same deathday; Jana died first, and Josia finally joined her three days later. And for those three longest days of her life she lingered, weakening, stricken, waiting to die, with a horrific burden bound to her very flesh and bone.

Did I mention that Jana and Josia are conjoined twins?

They were and still are joined at the ribs and the belly, sharing some of the same innards and entrails. For the clerics and sages to separate one of them would have killed the other, perhaps even both. And so Ulana elected to leave the girls as they were. Alas, it was their conjoined state which, in the end, led to their shared demise anyway.

They used to be quite chatty and friendly, but they don't say very much anymore. Physically, Jana appears worse for wear, yet she seems to be faring well enough through the ordeal of undeath. But there is something behind Josia's cherubic eyes, something traumatized and scarred, cold and menacing, perhaps even inhuman.

I can only wonder what fevered horrors raced through Josia's mind during those three long days."

Undead type: Unique -- Something similar to a ghoul / zombie hybrid.


(Reserved for generation: Jozen + Enawilde)


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/EnawildeStang.png "Enawilde Stang. A fascinating woman she is, but I find it difficult to trust anyone descended from that murdering and despotic devil, Lord Stang. From what I've read, the colors of her eyes were never constant; Jozen was attracted to her when her eyes were a peculiar shade of magenta, if accounts of his romantic poetry are to be believed.

Perhaps this should not be surprising. Her father is never seen in public without the concealment of his intimidating black skull helm, but tales speak of the skirmish of Ürsenburg, where an axe warrior under the banner of Konegheim struck Lord Stang's head with such ferocity that the helm was torn from its gorget and cast skyward, leaving Lord Stang's head bare for all to see. Tufts of his hair--blacker than night--across his human scalp came together as growths not unlike ridges of tiny horns. Perhaps they were horns, for the enraged Lord Stang slew the axe warrior with redoubled savagery, then turned his wrath on the Konegheim soldiers, the gawking peasants, even his own band of warriors. And he slew everyone near him until he was satisfied that all who may have seen his unconcealed visage were dead.

But someone escaped with this tale, it would seem. The tale has it that Lord Stang then marched on Penn's Hamlet alone--his small army felled by his own hands--and he struck down the loyalist mayor, sheriff and guardsmen there.

And to think that Enawilde is never seen in public without a shawl or a cowl bound tightly over her head, concealing her hair as well as she can. It would seem that the Stangs have their own family secrets, just as the Ainsleys do."

Status: Alive

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Lyria + Barrovik / Verwitt, Parsa)
http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/LyriaAinsley.png "Lyria Ainsley, youngest of Lord Heward Ainsley's children.

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/BarrovikStern.png "Barrovik Stern, Karkovan warlord turned refugee when the kingdom fell.

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Male.png "Verwitt Stern

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Female.png "Parsa Stern


(Reserved for generation: Barrovik + Elsa / Vallin)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Female.png "Elsa Dunnovik

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Pogs/VallinSternL.png "Vallin Stern

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Heward + Perinia / Yavana, Darrovan, Lyria)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/HewardAinsley.png "Heward Ainsley, father of Darrovan and Lyria. For generations had the cruelties and tyranny of the House of Ainsley become known. But Heward rose up to cast this dark mantle aside and restore a sense of justice and virtue to his family, his people and his land. Hurtful or needless laws were repealed, political prisoners were released from the manor's dungeons upon his ascension to the throne and trade between Bardosylvania and the neighboring lands flourished beneath his fair and unbiased hand. An honorable leader and a devout servant of Wee Jas, he felt gratitude towards the goddess for Bardosylvania's resurgent prosperity and rewarded her by building a number of temples and many roadside shrines in her name. Well into the sixth decade of his life he was still as hale as a man half his age, and the townsfolk who knew him from his youth began to speculate that Heward Ainsley had somehow attained immortality.

Alas, he proved them wrong. In the winter of 1375 TA he suddenly took ill and fell into a coma from which he never awoke, dying two days later. His eldest son Darrovan quickly took the throne and voiced his fears during Heward's funeral that Heward had finally unleashed something dark and dangerous, bringing a curse down upon all of Bardosylvania. When Heward's body was interred in the Great Ainsley Crypt, Darrovan ordered that the entrance to Heward's vault be sealed with a barrier of flagstone and mortar, with sheets of lead laid to block the passage halfway through and glyphs of warding etched and empowered on the flagstone of the sealed archway. And all in the land were expressly warned by Darrovan's newest law that none were to ever disturb Heward's final resting place. Ever.

So much mystery surrounds Heward's death. What is the truth? How did Heward die? And did Darrovan seal the vault as he did to keep people out?

Or was it done to keep something inside?"

Status: Dead


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/PeriniaMorrow.png "Perinia Morrow was a devoted acolyte of Wee Jas serving the temple of Dark Grove Hollow, and that is where she met Heward. She was the first to welcome Heward to her temple when he came to assess how it could be restored from the ravages its structure had suffered as it had stood over the past century. She was taken with his strength and his noble bearing; He was taken with her empathic spirit and her long, golden tresses. One could credit her with molding Heward into the great leader he would become; His own upbringing under Wardner Ainsley had turned Heward into an angry and bitter man prone to terrible and even violent mood swings. During their courtship, Perinia faithfully counseled and comforted him so that he might separate himself from his past and move forward into a brighter future. The two were wed young, and two children were born of their union.

But then she disappeared without a trace one night as a great storm descended on Ainsley Manor, and she was never found since. Until the day that he died, Heward claimed to know nothing of Perinia's vanishing. Is she dead? Did she take flight into obscurity after a terrible argument broke out between her and her husband? No one can say. All that is known is that Heward redoubled his strides towards virtue and justice after Perinia vanished, as if he were doing both her work and his to restore Bardosylvania to a state of order and benevolence."

Status: Unknown


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/YavanaAinsley.png "Yavana Ainsley. "

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/DarrovanAinsleyPog.png "Darrovan Ainsley. You have read his story here (http://www.cohguru.com/forum/showpost.php?p=244432&postcount=2)."

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/LyriaAinsley.png "Lyria Ainsley. You have read her story here (http://www.cohguru.com/forum/showpost.php?p=244455&postcount=3)."

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Garrett + Prudence / Banney, Braddock, Winimere)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/PrudenceAinsley.png "Prudence Ainsley

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Wardner + Fenne / Heward)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/WardnerAinsley.png "Wardner Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Female.png "Fenne Oshar

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Borogon + Shia / Turner, Prudence)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/BorogonAinsley.png "Borogon Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/ShiaFoddener.png "Shia Foddener

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Male.png "Turner Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/PrudenceAinsley.png "Prudence Ainsley

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Iridia + Kaelern / Silaire, Lewena)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/IridiaAinsley.png "Iridia Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Male.png "Kaelern MacRoss

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Male.png "Silaire MacRoss

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Female.png "Lewena MacRoss

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Raskett + Miravana / Gwenlyn, Borogon, Wardner, Iridia).

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/GwenlynAinsley.png "Gwenlyn Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/BorogonAinsley.png "Borogon Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/WardnerAinsley.png "Wardner Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/IridiaAinsley.png "Iridia Ainsley


(Reserved for generation: Gwenlyn / Corwin)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/CorwinAinsleyL.png "Corwin Ainsley

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Dorren + Briny Addie / Gwendolyn)

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/DorrenAinsley.png "Dorren Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Pogs/Hag-GreenHag.png "Briny Addie was likely not the hag's true name, but it was how the regional townsfolk knew her.

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/GwendolynAinsley.png "Gwendolyn Ainsley, the half-hag daughter of Dorren and a reminder of his shame.


(Reserved for generation: Dorren + Orosha / Dorren II, Raskett)


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Female.png "Orosha Maire. Dorren finally found a wife in his twenty-ninth winter, the better to push his memories of the hag from his mind.

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Male.png "Dorren Ainsley II

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/Cameo_Male.png "Raskett Ainsley

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Winna + Gyorn / Hekalena, Miravana, Cliath)


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/GyornFoaler.png "Gyorn Foaler was a knight loyal to Bardosylvania and the House of Ainsley. For years Gyorn served Dorren Ainsley and enforced the lord's will throughout the province, and for equally long did the knight fancy Dorren's younger sister, Winna Ainsley. After bearing Winna's garland and her favor through three tournaments did Winna--grown jaded with so many suitors--come to fancy Gyorn in return, but Dorren refused to honor any union between the two. Only when Gyorn came before Dorren bearing the heads of three giants who had threatened the province did Dorren finally relent and grant his blessing to the union between Gyorn and Winna. The two were wed, and Gyorn rose within the nobility to the approval of many.

Gyorn was an avid hunter and trophy collector, and it was this pastime which eventually lead to his death. With his spear he had greatly wounded a grizzly bear near Bereghel's Green, and the beast had fled deeper into the woods. He ordered his hunting party to separate and spread around the forest in hopes of trapping the bear between their ranks. He himself found a trail of blood heading through a thicket towards a stream, and so he dismounted and pursued on foot, spear in hand. Unfortunately he had not accounted for the recent heavy rains; Venturing too near the stream, he sank up to his knees in a soupy morass of mud, and it was there that the enraged bear descended on him. The others in the hunting party found Gyorn's mauled remains two hours later, crushed into the mud beneath the cooling body of the bear. So desperate was Gyorn's spear-thrusting that he had bent the spearhead within the bear's heart, and three hunters were needed to pull the spear free. Hunter and hunted, joined in death.

Winna was terribly bereft with Gyorn's demise, of course. And her relations with her family would soon take a turn for the worse."

Status: Dead

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/WinnaAinsley.png "Winna Ainsley

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/HekalenaFoaler.png "Hekalena Foaler. It was once said that none in the land was as great a musician as her. Aspiring bards and mistrels came from leagues away to learn the art of music at Hekalena's feet

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/MiravanaFoaler.png "Miravana Foaler was always a dependable and well-spoken child. She learned heraldry and diplomacy quite capably during her youthful tutelage, and she came of age to find her uncle, Lord Dorren Ainsley, demanding her service to Bardosylvania as a diplomat, soothing relations with other nations of the empire and negotiating treaties, pacts and proposals with the lands outside the empire's borders.

http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/CliathFoaler.png "Cliath Foaler was a very demanding child, born sickly and overly emotional. As the years began to take their toll on Winna's troubled mind, she turned snappish and bitter. In her eyes, Cliath--her youngest daughter--was an unwanted burden who could do no right and who had fallen so short of the standards set by her older sisters. Winna's aggressions took an abusive turn; First came the hurtful and belittling words, which--after Gyorn's death--became torn hair, burned hands and enraged blows. In her thirteenth year Cliath took a very nasty tumble down one of the manor's staircases; With her right leg broken she crawled four miles to the village of Wolvenhelm (presently the town of Rasketton), where a temple's physician and a cleric tended to her injuries. They could mend her body but not her mind, and so Cliath decided to run away from home for good. Invoking her noble heritage, she pledged her service as a page to Sir Ansel Vormond--a paladin of St. Cuthbert--and the two wandered the land together for years. Never once in all those years did Cliath reveal that her mother had been the one who slung her down the stairs and broke her leg in the first place.

Upon growing to become a young adult, Cliath returned home to be reunited with her sisters and to be reconciled with her mother. But Cliath was deeply dismayed to find that Hekalena had birthed a daughter who was obviously tainted with monstrosity. Cliath had learned zeal against demonic forces from Sir Vormond, she had learned venomous hatred from her mother and the two combined into something dark and dangerous. Helakena's corpse was found floating facedown in the bottom of a well and the woodsman who owned the well was accused of the murder. But a youth known only as Aelred of the Lyre--a prominent bard who had learned his songcraft as one of Hekalena's most devoted pupils--came before the court of the law to bring justice to Hekalena's true murderer: Cliath, who had bound Hekalena hand and foot and dropped her into the well to drown. Little Lisbette lived only because Hekalena had left her at the manor when she ventured into the forest for the last time. Lord Dorren Ainsley himself, angered with the thought of blood betraying blood, took the magistrate's place before judgement could be cast and denounced his niece as a "bloody and poison-hearted betrayer, naught more than a harlot to all the Hells" as he delivered her sentence. And so Cliath went to the gallows the next morning, all of twenty years of age.

Thus, Hekalena's death was avenged. But what about Cliath's life?"

Status: Dead


(Reserved for generation: Hekalena + ? / Lisbette)


http://mypetdungeon.tritonius.com/LisbetteFoaler.png "Lisbette Foaler

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Bardos III + Riata Lyrr / Kya, Dorren, Winna, Yorseld, Turallio)

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Bardos II + Gerevalda / Bardos III, Velda, Dana, Weiren)

[The Widowed]

(Reserved for generation: Bardos + Lebetta / Bardos II, Orinn, Eyrea)