Tragedy makes up a large portion of Kirdina’s younger life. The memories of her parents are scattered at best and she can only recall random details and events in sudden flashes or confusing nightmares. Some would say that when traumatic events occur the mind will suppress the memory of those events until it is ready to deal with them. That would be the case of Kirdina’s young life, it was mostly spent with suppression.
Her parents, as far as she can remember, were “evil”. In truth they very much were involved in the darker arts, inviting hooded strangers into their home, sacrificing small creatures to strange beings with snarling faces. Her parents would some times speak of the vampire people, who they were quite fond of, and express their desires to become enclosed in that world of darkness. To this day Kirdina hates the vampire race, holding strong beliefs that they were a main influence in what caused her parents to “become evil”,she may even go so far as to entertain the idea that vampire tricked her parents or controlled their very thoughts and turned them to the dark arts. The type of behavior her parents showed did not please the current wild elf community they had been a part of and were asked to leave. At first Kirdina’s parents were furious, but when they found a new home (closer to their new friends they had been making) her parents were overjoyed.
Discovering new things to worship and new powers to desire, Kirdina’s parents were quickly engulfed in a very dark world; yet Kirdina (in mind) did not follow them there. It was the selfish and uncaring nature that her parents often showed her that ultimately spared Kirdina from the same Fate as them. She was never included in what they did and was often left behind alone to find her own things to amuse herself with, but she did not mind. That was what Kirdina liked.
While her parents would be thrusting themselves into yet another dark worship ceremony, Kirdina would leave her home and travel into the forests. There she played. She made friends with the animals and the trees, and would laugh as the sunlight hit her certain ways. She would spin in circles, and sing songs to the ferns, eating berries that squirrels would show her. Then she would fall asleep in piles of leaves, or lay out on the soft moss by a cool bubbling stream. It was this act alone that kept her safe from whatever it was her parents continued to welcome into their home.
Sometimes being too happy can be very dangerous. Kirdina learned what that meant when she met Estel. It had been like any other day, Kirdina venturing out into the forests to escape the pressures of her home, when suddenly while walking through a particular part of the woods she heard a shout. Someone was yelling. Kirdina was interested because it was very rare to find travelers in the parts of the forest where she lived. She climbed a tree and peered down to see a traveler in shambles, trying frantically to retrieve some papers that the wind had caught up while at the same time trying his best to chase after some chipmunks who had snatched one of his bags.
Kirdina laughed and jumped from the tree, grabbing all three papers in one swoop of her arm and handing them to the stranger. Stunned he took them back. Then she turned to the chipmunks and began to chatter with them, asking politely for the man’s bag back. She held up some walnuts from her pouch and bargained with them that in return of the bag they each would receive one. The chipmunks, not really knowing what was in the bag, and knowing full well what a walnut was, readily agreed to give up their curiosity for their appetite. Kirdina picked up the bag and tossed the walnuts in it’s place, then handed that also to the stranger. He smiled and Kirdina gave a giggle and that was how they met.
Estel would come to visit her often and before long they were talking about the ceremony of mated souls. Kirdina had never been happier and, in her innocence, told her parents of the wonderful friendship she had made with Estel. Her parents were not pleased. In a fiery explosion they forbid her to see Estel ever again, “He is not of our kind.” being a repeated slander against him. Kirdina was confused and scared and did not understand why her parents reacted that way.
With tears in her eyes Kirdina ran into the forest to find her beloved, determined to flee with him to his home and never look back. Unfortunately Kirdina, in her emotionally distraught state, did not notice the hooded stranger following her, and continued to her meeting spot with Estel. Once there she told him of her parents actions. Without the slightest hesitation he asked Kirdina to leave her home and come away with him, to meet his people. Estel was positive that his kind would be much more receptive to the love the two shared. He promised her that by the next full moon they would be tol'aedias. Kirdina agreed and they both decided to meet back tomorrow night, giving Kirdina a day to gather what little things she had and to say goodbye to the world she knew.
When Kirdina arrived home she was tackled to the floor and tied up by her parents. They dragged her to a building where some kind of ceremony was already in play, and picked up a branding tool. On the end of the tool was a symbol that Kirdina immediately recognized as a mark both her mother and father wore on their skin. Had Kirdina payed attention at all to what kind of things her parents had been doing or had done she might have been able to guess what that symbol stood for and what it meant to be marked by it, but she did not know and while screaming in pain her parents placed that mark upon her skin. Then they untied her, satisfied with what they had done.
Kirdina was even more confused to say the least and began to wish that she had stayed home studying things her parents now did, at least then she would know what was going on. She ran to the forests where Estel had been, hoping to catch his trail and track him until she caught up to him, but what she found instead was blood. Under the starlight she could easily spot the crimson covered grass, and the continued splatters of blood that made a trail. Her heart sank and her lips trembled as she used her tracking abilities to follow the path of blood deeper into the forest. Eventually she found what she had feared, spying a silhouetted body lying crumpled and broken in a heap of gore. Her legs began to give out from under her and she stumbled to the body, ultimately collapsing from heartbreak at his feet. It was Estel, it was as she had feared. Suddenly she heard a gurgle coming from his throat, and she staggered over to him, gently cradling him in her arms, knowing that he was dying and there was nothing she could do to save him. “I will hold you in my arms until your last breath, Aedia.” she whispered and she sang him songs of the forest and it’s beauty until he breathed his last words: “I am sorry I could not protect you.” And then he was dead.
Such events like that can take a toll on one’s mind, and even make them do things that normally they would never consider doing. Kirdina had that happen to her. She stormed home covered in the blood of her cherished one and quietly snuck into the room of her parents. She took a blade not even 9 inches long and cut their throats while they slept, watching them struggle for air only long enough to know that they would not make it to see the morning’s light. She grabbed her bag, threw the dagger to the floor and left them there for dead, just as they had done to Estel. That was the last time she spent with her family.
Kirdina ventured forth into the forests, perhaps hoping that it would spiritually cleanse her from the horrible things she had seen and done. She continued to tell herself that her parents had to die, that they were evil, but the guilt ate away at her and made her mind unsound. The forests became her new home and all she desired was to keep moving, to get away from the home she had come to know. The forest was kind to Kirdina and always gave her comfort, reaching out a friendly branch when the rain would pour or when the sun would beam too brightly. In return she fought for it’s safety, keeping a keen eye on those who would bring harm to it, and swiftly punishing them if they did. So she did this for many long years, alone save the trees to keep her company. Many a night would she long for a friend, and often her thoughts would drift back to Estel, and her home. Perhaps the forest took pity on Kirdina, or maybe it was simply chance, but one day when she fell asleep under a tree, she awoke to find herself in a different place altogether.
This was the setting where she met her travel companion now known as Maki. Whether Kirdina has truly become so lost in her mind that she created this persona, or if Maki truly is an entity of some form trapped inside a wooden flute it has yet to be determined, but Kirdina will argue that Maki is a person all his own. She found him when she awoke one day standing over a pile of stones, how she had come to be there she does not know. What she does know is that on top of the pile of stones there laid a small wooden flute. Nothing too special about him save a face, a grim, wise old face staring back at her. Once she touched him she began to hear his voice, and still does to this day. She calls him Maki, though he tells her that his true name is far too old to pronounce in any of the common tongues. He is annoying, rude, easily offended and completely self absorbed, but he has a soft spot for Kirdina and will sometimes offer her advice and council when she is troubled or upset. They have formed a loose friendship over the years and now are almost never seen without the other.
Kirdina has been traveling for a long time, keeping far distance between herself and where her home once was. Her travels began to lead her into lands populated by more than just plants and animals and after a day of thinking,(and some discussions with Maki) she decided to create a mask. Not knowing what her symbol meant nor what it could provoke if the wrong eyes did spy it, she felt the need to keep it covered and hidden, away from the eyes of strangers...at least until she learned what it truly represented or found a way to rid herself of it.
Kirdina, in general, enjoys the occasional adventure, and looks forward to meeting new people. She can also at the same time be a solitary figure keeping only to the company of Maki and the forests. She is always willing to help when innocent lives are being threatened, and will jump on any opportunity to help keep the forests safe. She holds a strong feeling of hatred to vampires or any beings who practice the “dark arts” and wishes to abolish them from the world. She is sometimes troubled by her past, and may even in fact be insane with a strange voice in her head named Maki, but she is ultimately a good and kind being.
When she is not fighting for the forests, she will be meditating in them, giving thanks to the goddess for the beauty and love the trees have to offer. It is likely to stumble across Kirdina playing her flute to the plants and animals, or to see her pleasantly enjoying the view of the leaves dancing with the wind. Despite her lack of religious knowledge her views make her a worshiper of Ehlonna and one may even find her praying to a goddess she has no name for.