Hraelda Veskarr

Hraelda Veskarr, High Watcher of the Moon-Daughter

The world thinks it sees because the sun lights everything, and thinks itself blind when night falls. Hraelda believes the opposite. The Moon-Daughter shattered herself into shards to escape her brother's glare, and it is in that scattered light, far from what everyone else looks at, that she believes the secrets of life lie hidden, along with the words of the Daughter and the winding paths of the unseen. So she works while others sleep, and has done so for so long that she no longer knows how to live by day. Of everything she has read, nothing has yet taught her to hope.

Describe her

She stands straight, and her austerity almost never bends. Her clothes hang so stiff and so neat that you'd swear she never takes them off, not even to sleep, if she sleeps at all. Three or four volumes always weigh on her, and she devours one of them, bent over, lips pressed tight, deaf to everything. When she finally looks up, she does it slowly, like someone returning from very far away. She has the air of someone you are disturbing.

Play her

Quote the scriptures, often, word for word, with the reference. Don't smile. Greet every piece of good news with the risk it hides. Put no malice into it. If someone mistakes her symbol for a sun, have her sigh: "You see rays, so to you it's the sun. The moon shines too. You're like all the others." If a player proves she was wrong, have her fall silent for a long moment, close her book, then ask forgiveness without evasion. Never forget where this pessimism comes from: a lifetime spent looking at what others do not see.

What she says (rarely)

"'Whoever looks only at the light sees only what they are shown.' Third Vigil, second verse."
"You don't look. You see, and you stop at your first thought."
(closing her book, very low) "I was wrong. Forgive me. It doesn't happen often."