:: Random NPC—Devadas, Draconian Shaman ::

Devadas (“Servant of God”)

by Wm Jay Carter III, 6/23/15

Race: Draconian

Species: Chameleon

Age: Old

Gender: Female

Stature: Average

Physical: Hunchback

Outwardly: Languid

Inwardly: Ashamed

Profession: Potter

Magic: Shaman—Spirit Guide

Catchphrase: “About time you got around to breaking open the door.”

You reach forward to open the entrance to the steppe pyramid, but instead of swinging inward, the whole slab falls backward, slamming with a heavy crunch, splitting into several uneven pieces. Wincing, you gingerly step over the rubble and enter a small antechamber where stands, shelves, and hooks are burdened with an overabundance of simple red-clay ceramics, a ghostly mist swirling inside of each.

You press further, into a slightly larger chamber—what appears to be a ceramist’s workshop—complete with a potter’s wheel, piles and piles of red clay, and an empty bed. “About time you got around to breaking open the door,” says a voice from the bed. Only after you look more closely do you see that the bed was never actually empty; it’s occupant had simply been so well hidden by natural camouflage that you had not noticed her before. The old hunched draconian sighs wearily as she rolls into a stooped sitting position. “Go on, then,” she says as if you’ve been well acquainted for years, “let’s hear what you have to say.”

Abandoned by her parents when their nomadic tribe left and she could not keep up, Devadas was taken in by a potter and taught his trade. Always ashamed that her parents had left her behind, she was convinced that her hunched stature made her unfit to hunt with the rest of her tribe. Her foster father did much to help her move past these feelings, but still the thought has haunted her ever since. After he died, she was well and truly alone.

She first caught a glimpse of the Æther while she was only a little girl. She had fabulous nightmares which seized her with dread—actually visions of the horrible atrocities members of her tribe committed across Athanasia. The spirits of those who perished came to Devadas for reconciliation after death, convinced that she was the incarnation of the draconian god of vengeance. She denied these claims at first, but when legends of her began to spread, she succumbed to the stories at last and endured the title.

Inundated with the spirits of the wronged, she at least wished to offer the troubled souls a place to rest until they moved on. And so, with a little help from her foster father’s spirit, she fashioned Pots of the Damned—ceramic vessels where the spirits could brood, and froth, and eventually calm and fade. She looks forward to the day when she can die and move on herself. Until then, her life is full of spirits, and clay, and nightmares, and loneliness.