Dalari Ssinsrig and Jane

[Ruethgar]

Dalari looked over their camp in the dimming light of the fire. His eyes lingered on Ssin and his face wrinkled in worry as he saw him writhing and silently screaming in one of his night terrors. Tears ran down Ssin's face as his shadow came to life and started comforting him, stroking his hair and singing softly. Dalari was quite disturbed at the demon, Zaurin, bound to Ssin's soul when they had first met. Zaurin was terse, cruel to his enemies and pragmatic to a fault, never wanting to risk he and Ssin's life for anyone else. But over the weeks, Dalari saw this other side of him, gentle, nurturing, but only ever at night. Zaurin tried to hide it and denied it, but he obviously had come to care for his host. His seeping darkness would muffle Ssin's screams as he would cradle his head or hug him tight, trying to see him through another one of his terrible dreams of his youth. Neither of them talked about what happened, trying to bring it up would make Ssin more melancholy than usual and Zaurin overly defensive so Dalari had learn to stop asking. Ssin stopped screaming into the silent shadows, but he was still sobbing softly.

Every time Ssin had a terror made Dalari wish Aurora were still alive. She was such a great healer. She had helped him realize the terrible scarring the high priestess had done to him, suppressing his true nature and making him more obedient and she unraveled it. She always insisted she had just removed the magic and that it was his own strength that helped him heal his own mental scars, but surely she could have done something for Ssin if they had met? Dalari looked down at his hands as tears came to his eyes, he fidgeted with his holy symbol. He should probably get rid of it, but it always helped remind him of his convictions, even if the faith it represented was a sham.

He looked up to the other member of their motley crew, Jane. Everything she said seemed to be a lie, but she said it with such cheer and conviction that you would almost believe her. She was sitting upright, asleep but with her sword gripped tightly in hand. She was such a light sleeper they really didn't need to take turns keeping watch, she could attack even before she woke up. She would say it was from years of training, but she looked so young and her reactions from sleep were almost panicked not calm and collected training. Every other day she would make up a new story about where she came from and being trained by some legendary hero and somehow pull the skills out of nowhere to back it up. Dalari and Ssin had found her running from people she said were bandits, but now that they know her, they suspect she probably swindled them and they were coming after her. Dalari keeps telling her she doesn't have to lie to them, and a bit of her true self seems to poke through every now and then. He silently hopes to himself that he's getting through and they can be true comrades. She always seems to make thinly veiled excuses to stay with them, he hopes it's because she is actually warming up to them. But whenever there's any sort of conflict among them it feels like she's just going to drift away and never be seen again.

He pulled out his ceremonial armor and the polish and oil. It was such a point of pride when he had made it into the paladin order, he loved this armor despite the bittersweet memories. Aurora had insisted they get rid of it or at least have it reforged to take out the kingdom's crest and colors. It was a mash between plate, chain, and mostly leather, largely decorative, but that was all hammered away to make it more functional, more drab and less assuming. It still wore the same as always, but he lamented not looking like the paladin in shinning white armor he'd always dreamed of. Instead he was in drab brown and black leather reinforced with chain at the joints with a dulled steel full shoulder pauldron and armguard that never seemed to polish back to a proper shine.

He managed to keep his hands and his mind occupied with equipment care until his shift was up. He woke Jane with a loud whisper and nodded that it was her watch. She acknowledged that she heard and brushed her wavy brown hair out of her eyes as she stretched. Dalari settled down with his cloak as his blanket on the hard ground and his pack as his lumpy pillow. He wished they had a tent, or bedrolls, but they always needed to be ready to move at a moments notice, the less they had to pack, the better. He quickly drifted into dreams of feather beds and grand feasts.

Spoiler: Crunch

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So this is a sort of party I was wanting to get together that fell apart for the game, but still wanted to write into one another a bit. Dalari is a holy warrior, can smite people with holy light and is able to defend and heal his allies. Ssin is a half drow arcane archer who uses shadow magic courtesy of Zaurin. Jane is a chameleon, not entire sure what direction I want to take her story-wise though. As a party I think they would work well enough, have a face, a tank, and a sneaky DPS, heals are low, but Dalari can cover them if needed.

[hema kumar]

your article is little bit confusing