AKA Lady of the Ice Garden, Witch of the Northern Waste, High Wizard of Glacks Island, Lady of the Fire, the Enchantress, etc. Her original given name seems to have been Shei-la ti Tarl n'Tarlanai (Shei-la, daughter of Tarl of the clan Tarlanai. This is conjecture based on research into archaic forms of pre-Empire Adantri nomenclature.)

Sheila is a powerful enchantress and can appear just about any way she chooses; however, her original appearance is that of a tall (5'11" or thereabouts) statuesque woman with long, straight, raven black hair. She has black eyes and an olive complexion. She has a strong-boned face with wide cheekbones, a strong jaw, and a long, straight nose; at one time she had the typical orckish fang-like canine teeth, but at some point she got rid of them and now appears more "human." She is striking rather than beautiful.

Sheila seems to enjoy changing her appearance for the hell of it, so feel free to describe her in any way that fits the mood of the story you're writing. Prefers long, flowing gowns, but will dress to fit the occasion. Not overly formal; she may be found in simple peasant skirts on many occasions.

Sheila maintains an (outward, at least) appearance of extremely high morals, because it is good for her image. She is extremely sure of herself, and believes that her ends justify any means. She can be quite ruthless, but does not indulge in wanton cruelty. She is devoted to the protection of Alastari and may consider anyone or anything (including the Alastarians) which gets in the way of her mission an enemy. In a fight, she favors nasty, morale-destroying battle spells, such as the one where your eyeballs explode. She carries no conventional weapons. She may have any number of magical ones on hand, but her own powers are generally sufficient.

Sheila was born in the city of Ni Kuoto in what would later become the Empire of Lirith Kai. The city has long since fallen to ruins, but the Adantri government maintains a small shrine as a tourist attraction, and tours of the ruins are conducted weekly for interested parties.

Always a bold, charismatic, and decisive woman, long life and hard knocks have taught her how to achieve her ends by subtlety as well as force. Sheila can appear mysterious, manipulative, and unfathomable. She often acts in ways that can only be described as flaky, but whether this is due to whim, senility, or some deep dark plot is impossible to determine. Most of the time one can assume that she is very intelligent, very devious, and very much in command of the situation, whatever it may be. Sheila seems to get a positive kick out of being mysterious and confusing. She will often let people believe that they have gotten the best of her, knowing very well that in five years...or five hundred...she'll still get exactly what she wants. She knows when to stop intriguing and bring out the big stick, as well.

Sheila can be quite personable, charming and informal; on the other hand, she can be as chilly and remote as a Vithicaran glacier when crossed. People who cross Sheila Greywand tend to meet untimely, messy ends, though she would never be so crude as to order anyone killed outright. Fame, fortune and flattery do not sway her ultimate decisions, though she is perfectly willing to enjoy all of them as incidental rewards of her position. She has a deep and sincere commitment to her vow to protect the lands of Alastari, and almost everything she does is towards that end. Pledged to protect Alastari as a whole, she does not favor any of the current kingdoms or governments over another.

Her strengths include a net of well-placed informers, spies, people who owe her favors, being filthy rich, indirect control of all the arenas and the warriors thereof, and being the most powerful sorceress in Alastari and possibly all of Ghea. Weaknesses include occasional impulsiveness, a hot temper and a tendency to hold grudges. She can sometimes be swayed by a lingering fondness for an old lover or friend.

Sheila was born almost fifty-five hundred years ago to Elsa of Glacks Island and Tarl Itu-Iama Chenra of Golden Lotus Hill, a minor prince of the soon-to-be-great Empire of Lirith Kai, whom Elsa "bought" with a favor owed to her own mother, Elna, by Tarl's father. Elsa herself was the daughter of the elf-warrior Egin Greenhill and his one-time arch-rival and later lover Elna No-Clan, the orc woman who was Hrufra the Butcher's greatest general and assassin. Tarl and Elsa's match was an unhappy one; their first child, Tarl the Younger, showed his orkish ancestry in his appearance and was rejected by his father, who referred to him as "the Monster." Upon learning that his wife was pregnant again, he insisted that the child was not his, and when Elsa went into labor Tarl went mad, slaying his wife, several of her servants and midwives and gravely injuring his son, who attempted to stop him.

Elsa's child survived; the young Sheila was sent north to Glacks Island and raised by her grandparents. Tarl was taken in by Hurfra and the karragit general, Elna's mentor and former almost-conqueror of Alastari; he settled down on Glacks, grew up, married a nice orkish woman, had a passel of kids and lived happily ever after. Sheila's life was not destined to be so simple. When she came of age, Sheila was sent to her grandfather's elven community to study magic. She quickly showed astonishing aptitude, and in the next few hundred years her adventures formed the basis for many a bard's tale. Arrogant in her power, she did something (modern-day scribes are not certain what, for few records survive from those days) which angered the gods themselves. For some time the name of Sheila drops from history altogether. It is rumored that her current devotion to the protection of Alastari is some sort of penance for her long-ago transgression. Be that as it may, around thirty-five hundred years ago her name begins showing up again in the historical record (an admittedly spotty historical record. There is some debate on whether or not Sheila Greywand is the same Sheila as the one born to Tarl and Elsa; Sheila herself is no help on the matter, confirming or denying the connection depending on how she feels that day.) In any case, Sheila is recorded as having lived in the Mossmist Forest during the time of the Folstrom Wars, and of having some connection with the highelven wizards whose research eventually broke the Folstrom's control over the dragons.

Her history between then and now is the subject of legend, debate, rumor and very little hard fact. All that is known for certain is that over the centuries she mastered every form of magic known in Alastari, traveled to other worlds and dimensions, and eventually raised a fortress and a school of wizardry on the Isle of the Eye.

Sheila has few true friends. She has picked up more incidental enemies than a dog has fleas. Her problems are the usual ones suffered by anyone trying to control several dozen unruly city-states from behind the scenes, and she rarely has time for hobbies.

She has no close relatives, but has numerous very distant ones, descendants of her brother Tarl, her father's and mother's siblings, etc.--assorted extremely distant nephews, nieces and cousins many, many times removed. Timmy the Spy is an example. She has outlived almost all of even her highelven relations of her own generation and the several after it.

Sheila has no known children, and there has never been a record of her marrying, though she has had numerous lovers. Some say that Sheila has been romantically linked to this or that of the few more accessible gods (Mantor the Bright, according to one source.) Other known ex-lovers are Keel Woodhaven, one of the Primus spyreporters; Taliesin, a manager; and the Puppetmaster, one of the teachers at the Academy of the Eye who also manages. She is not involved with anyone currently and seems to be going through a "love stinks" celibate phase.

Contrary to common belief, Sheila's major arcane might is not in the Grey Wand. In fact she would be stronger without the wand than with it. The wand is a chaos artifact. (That is, it was brought to Alastari through a Chaos Gate from some alien dimension.) With the wand she can enhance her control of the various dimensional gates which dot Alastari, and she can cast simple, flashy magics. The wand must be fairly constantly discharged or it becomes more difficult to control. Currently she uses it to power the resurrection spells for the advanced arenas as well as maintaining the seals on the Gates. Sheila spends a fair amount of her time and magic and energy maintaining control of the wand, which tends to warp people to its will. Exactly what it would do to someone it had warped is not known, as Sheila is not fond of lending it out. It was stolen at one point by some Dark Lords (which of the several groups of Dark Lords infesting Alastari was never discovered) but they were apparently unable to divine its secrets. However, the wand, as useful as it is in helping her to control the various gates which lead to Ghea, is more bother than it is worth, and as soon as Sheila is certain that one of her warriors can match the mind-bending will within the wand, and fight well enough to defend it from those who would try to take it, she intends to send that warrior to a non-magical world where they will be able to destroy the wand.

In the past few years, Sheila has begun to put her ultimate plan for the arenas into action, removing the seals on various Chaos Gates and sending Lord Protectors into the Gates to be guards and scouts. Besides the most publicized of these expeditions, the Gateway Arena, numerous Lord Protectors have been sent alone into smaller, less dangerous gates. Many of the Lord Protectors no longer active in the arena are actually off on "Gate duty."

Encyclopedia Alastaria

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