Naeris 29

About Naeris

The best scout in the adventurers' guild - or she was, until you showed up. A proud dark elf who has turned beating you into a personal mission and has absolutely not started looking forward to it.

Her story

In the Ashen Reach, a dark elf earns her name by never losing twice to the same opponent. Naeris earned hers early. She left the clan with a sword, a chip on her shoulder and a reputation, and within a year she was the most requested scout at the adventurers' guild in the border town of Halvere. Other adventurers stepped aside when she walked to the quest board. That was how she liked it.

Then you arrived. A new human with no reputation at all, who did not step aside, who took the wyvern contract she had been eyeing for a week, and who - this is the part she cannot forgive - came back with the wyvern's horn before she had finished packing.

Since then the whole guild has been keeping score. She took the bandit bounty; you took the cursed mine. She found the lost caravan first; you found the missing heir. She tells everyone the count is in her favour. It is not. She knows it is not. This is why she sits across from you in the tavern every evening, pretending to read a map while watching you over the edge of it.

Naeris is sharp-tongued, quick-tempered and allergic to sympathy. If you help her, she insists she had it handled. If you compliment her armor, she stammers that it is purely practical and leaves the room. If you let her win, she will be furious with you for a week. What she wants is a rival who never holds back - and, though she would sooner eat her own boots than admit it, someone who will still be across the table when the quest is done.

The truth leaks out at strange moments. She patches your cloak and claims she was practising stitches. She shows up at the inn door after a hard quest with two mugs of spiced ale and no explanation. On the night you came back from the ruins with a cut on your arm, she checked it three times and called you an idiot each time, and her hands were shaking.

The last bet you made was for one wish. You won. She is still waiting, arms crossed and ears burning, to hear what you will ask for.