Shadiyah Amari
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Shadiyah Amari Desert Rose 
Shadiyah is a strange Keeper woman of many faces, sometimes literally. It's difficult to tell which, if any, is the real one. Despite something being incredibly off-putting about the woman, one can't help but be drawn in, an unnatural allure surrounding her. Those who can read aether will especially sense something amiss with the Voidtouched Miqo'te. About
 Shade stands at 5'5", notably tall for a Miqo'te woman, with a lightly-toned figure that's slender but not lacking in curves with a narrow waist and large breasts. Her face is slender and long for that of a Miqo'te with high cheekbones and two white stripes on each cheek. Her skin is a tanned olive tone and free of any blemishes, and her eyes--large and round with wide pupils due to her Keeper lineage--are a sapphire blue, but tend to fluctuate between that and black. They're lined with thick, winged black eyeliner, dark blue eyeshadow, and long eyelashes. A single, small black mole can be found below the outer corner of her left eye, a beauty mark. Her mouth is slightly wide, lips full and plump, painted a wine red to match her long fingernails, and constantly set into a frown, masking her pointed canines. Her eyebrows are thin, neatly shaped and sharply angled, half-hidden behind her straight-cut bangs. Her nose is small but aquiline, narrow, the faintest of bumps along its bridge to give it a slightly hooked shape. Her hair is chopped into a short, angled bob, shorter in the back and longer in the front to frame her pointed chin and often adorned with beads and small braids. The locks and her fur are a shiny, inky black, fading into midnight blue highlights at the ends. Her tail is long and slender, narrowing at the tip with sleek, short fur. Each feline ear is pierced several times, adorned with golden earrings. She seems to have a preference for gold jewelry, dark colors, and revealing outfits often of an Ul'dahn style. What her outfits lack in cloth and coverage, they make up for in jewelry and flare, a soft jingling sound usually accompanying her motions from all the metal of her adornments clinking together. She wears a black leather choker at all times, curiously adorned with an ornate red heart, outlined in gold with a small diamond set in the middle. Her skin is often painted with metallic, gold ink in henna-like designs. Her movements are graceful and oftentimes suggestive, obviously well-practiced and bordering on unnatural. Something about her visage has an almost hypnotic quality, luring in onlookers male and female alike. The scent of a strong perfume of jasmine, incense, and spices surrounds her. When "in disguise" in public, she typically opts to take the appearance of a servant with a black maid uniform and a pair of thick, round glasses, absent of some of her usual jewelry but still always sporting that heart-shaped locket. When not playing the maidservant role in public, she tends to hide her face behind a turban and veil. In her true, Voidsent glory, black horns like a ram's curl out from behind her temples around her ears. Two black, leathery, bat-like wings sprout from her shoulder blades; too small to grant her flight, but enough to help her glide. Her once well-manicured fingernails overgrow into the form of long, sharp, ebony talons. Speech: She tends to speak in somewhat of a purr, the words leaving her lips in a sultry drawl. Each word is carefully pronounced--one can assume she comes from a noble and well-educated background. Her R's are sometimes rolled in the common Miqo'te fashion and when angered, certain syllables come out in a hiss. Most notably, she does not use contractions when she speaks, making her speech sometimes sound eerily robotic or emotionless. Her voice is low and quiet, velvety, making the most basic conversation sound like sweet nothings.  Shade is notably unstable and unpleasant. A long, tumultuous life, along with her affliction and far too much time spent within the Void has left her a bit out of touch with her humanity, unable to easily connect with others or process her emotions normally. She is quiet and tends to keep herself, giving away very little when she does speak. However, she is truly very lonely and can sometimes be found lurking silently in public places, or harassing someone just as an excuse for some interaction. She is wary of people and very defensive around them, despite a secret desire for friendship. She feels that others have nothing in common with her and could not relate to her, and believes any relationships would only end in despair and betrayal, regardless. For this reason, she resents having any sort of connection with others, and when she realizes that one is forming, she will often try to push the person away and sabotage the friendship. Because of this, the people she likes are typically wholly unaware, and rather than being safe from her ire are more likely to receive it than anyone else. Considering she doesn't like to have anyone's death on her conscience, Shade typically tries not to bring serious physical harm to anyone, and may sometimes seek to protect the defenseless and innocent. One might believe she at least maintains a moral code, but that's only half the truth. She'd just as well inflict emotional turmoil on someone and wreak havoc on their lives rather than hurt them physically or allow them the mercy of death when it comes to anyone she despises. She is petty and vindictive, even to those who have seemingly done her no wrong. She believes the world and everyone in it is vile, so any harm she inflicts upon others will be deserved in the end and is just an inevitable part of life, and is nothing she hasn't suffered herself. She's something of a sadist who likes to see others suffer because it helps her feel better about her own miserable existence. Despite how venomous she seems toward others, it comes from a place of self-loathing. She has little regard for herself. She is softer than it seems, but it's thoroughly hidden behind a cold exterior and vicious outbursts. Her favorite area to bring trouble to people is their love lives, though this has mostly been thwarted now that she is bound to her own significant other and forbidden to fool around elsewhere. However, rather hypocritically despite her own fervent devotion to this man and genuine love for him, she is still a cynic when it comes to love and sickened by romance and affection involving others. Despite her vow of monogamy, she is still often very flirtatious and seductive with others, taking every opportunity to slip innuendos into the conversation. She is not actually looking for sex or romance with this behavior; she either just wants to watch the person squirm or pine after her, or lure them in so that she might steal their aether when the opportunity arises. In fact, if someone actually tries to touch her, she usually shies away and becomes defensive--sometimes violently. She likes to have others be hung up on her--be it due to hatred, lust, or love. She enjoys being praised by others and having them pander to her and try to please her, and yet she can be easily annoyed by the smothering affection and lash out at them for it. Regardless of being truly enamored with Melfice, she enjoys making him jealous, making him uncomfortable, or angering him from time to time either to test the limits of his affection for her or to earn his attention when she feels ignored.
Some of these rumors are untrue, speculation, or are greatly exaggerated. Please feel free to add your own rumors under the Player Character category!
Warning! Shade's story involves mention of death, murder, injury, violence, suicide, sex, and abusive relationships. Please read at your own risk if you are sensitive to such themes. Shade was born the oldest child to her parents, members of the Amari clan, a branch of the Amariyo clan who had grown tired of dealing with the dangers of the Black Shroud and migrated to Thanalan instead, making their home at an oasis that served as a wonderful source for water, flora, and fauna. Unfortunately, they found the oasis soon also became a regular hunting ground for a nomadic Seeker of the Sun tribe, the Jackal tribe, who proved to be extremely territorial and just as volatile. The two Miqo'te groups competed for resources, often clashing, but considering the Seekers hunted by day and the Keepers by night, actual altercations were rare, as the groups did not often directly cross paths. Shadiyah's family had long since dabbled in thaumaturgy and were merchants by trade, selling their wares in Ul'dah. More well off than the rest of their clansmen, they had gil to get them by when resources from hunting and gathering were low. Her parents passed their knowledge down to Shade, as well as made sure she had a steady supply of books to continue learning more. By the time she was 18, she was curious of the rest of the world and tired of the constant tension surrounding the oasis as the situation began to border on all out war, so she traveled to Limsa Lominsa for a time to broaden her horizons. Her time abroad, however, was sadly cut short when she received a letter from home written by her younger brother, informing her that relations between the two Miqo'te tribes had turned bloody. There was a direct conflict, when the Jackal tribe sneaked in and attacked the Amari clan midday while they rested. There were multiple casualties on both sides, including the leader of each, leaving both groups in shambles. Shadiyah's family was not spared from this tragedy--Shade's father was dead, and her mother mortally wounded. Shade traveled back to Thanalan as quickly as possible to be present in her mother's last moments. On her way back home, she ran into a Seeker man. The two greeted each other and held a conversation that was friendly enough, until she gave her name. Then, things took a sudden and dramatic turn, as the man suddenly attacked her, proclaiming himself to be a member of the Jackal tribe and blaming her for his father's death. She managed to fend him off and hurry home, but not without him first insisting to her that he would end her and every last member of her clan. Despite his threats, the Amari clan was in a sorry state and the sect of Jackal tribe had nearly been destroyed, so the two groups had formed an uneasy truce of sorts. Shadiyah's aunt was named the new Matron of the Amari clan, and Shade's mother soon passed of her wounds. Shade learned that the man who had attacked her had been the son of the Jackal tribe's now deceased leader. He now served as their leader and only Nunh, prompting many members of his tribe to abandon him, all aside from a few of his mates. Shade had several more run-ins with the hot-headed man, J'zyath Nunh. While the two were far from friendly, the truce forced them to abstain from trying to kill each other, at the very least. In fact, they found themselves often having to work together, since neither group could well stand alone after the damages they'd received. Still, their relationship was tumultuous, no shortage of insults or the occasional violent outburst. At first, anyway. Hatred eventually turned to rivalry. Rivalry eventually turned to understanding. Understanding eventually turned to friendship. And then friendship eventually turned to something... more. It was not a fast process. It took cycles, in fact, before Shade could admit even to herself what she felt for J'zyath. Somehow, a taunting offer to spend a night together became a real one, and a night together became a relationship. She hadn't intended for it to happen--she still had quite a bit of bad blood with the man, and was none too thrilled about being entangled with a man whose very duty was to lay with other women. The Amari clan and Jackal tribe were quite unhappy with the arrangement, as well, adding another stressor to their relationship. However, Shade and Zyath both did their best to make amends for their past wrongs, and Zyath made her many promises. She wouldn't have to worry about his other mates--it would be like they didn't exist. He would acquire no more new ones. He would sleep with no one outside of them. Reluctantly, Shade accepted their relationship and all its challenges, and within a few cycles, the two were married and she had born him a couple children. However, it was not a happy ending. It started with pressures to spend time with his other mates. "They are all close friends," he would say of the women in his tribe, "why don't you just be friendly, too?" Shade, however, had no care for the women. She resented them from the mere fact alone that they stole the time and love of the man she had married. "They might even agree to an orgy one sun. I'd really like for you to be a part of that and not miss out." The mere suggestion made her blood boil. She did not give in to his urging to get cozy with the other women in his life, but despite the offense she took to it, she stayed with him. One by one, every other promise was broken. He accepted new women into his tribe and slept with them, even had children with them. He argued that he was a Nunh--it was his duty! He began fooling around with women even outside of his tribe. Once more, he was a Nunh--he could not control those urges so integral to the very thing he was! His desires simply could not be sated, and it was foolish of her to think that she, one simple woman, could satisfy them all! Each promise broken felt like a new knife to the heart, and each wound only left her weaker and more caught up on the man who she knew she could never be enough for. She threw away her own values of monogamy and began to entertain herself with others, too--partially out of spite, and partially out of the despair and loneliness she felt while she was left alone as her husband warmed another woman's bed. J'zyath did not take kindly to this, but he could do little to stop Shade. The unfaithfulness on each side became a constant source of argument and turmoil. At one point, Shadiyah even managed to convince him to leave his role of Nunh and with it all the other women, but when he would do nothing in the suns following but sulk and brood, moaning about how he loved the women of his tribe so much he could not go on living without them and how a life of monogamy would never meet his physical needs, she simply bade him to return to it all, which he did all too eagerly. At last, it seemed a line had finally been crossed when Zyath found Shadiyah was involved with a woman of his own tribe. He ended their relationship and exiled Shadiyah from the makeshift position she'd held within the Jackal tribe. Shade was lost into despair, until she eventually learned what happened in the couple moons following the fallout of their relationship. Zyath had abandoned his tribe and his all women there to marry again and lead a life of faithful monogamy--with a man. He was perfectly capable of dedicating himself to one person--just not to her. Shade was furious, all her despair now replaced with rage. She cracked open her family's tomes of thaumaturgy that she hadn't touched in cycles to study, a clear goal in mind. Her former lover and his new marriage must be miserable. Zyath must suffer for how he had wronged her. For moons she studied, until she was certain she knew what to do. She set up the ritual perfectly, fed her aether into the circle to activate the spell. And it worked, so she thought, as a Void portal ripped through the fabric of the air itself in front of her, swirling in a chaotic mass of darkness before her, sucking the very energy out of the room. A being stepped through, and Shade suddenly felt entirely powerless. Still, she spat out her wish to the creature, her desire to make the man who had scorned her suffer. The Void creature scoffed and laughed in her face. "You wish to condemn him for his lust when you fell victim to the very same sin? You are as guilty as he. It's time to become the vile creature you've always been inside," the words echoed through the room, and Shade was suddenly overcome with pain so immense that within seconds, everything was black. When she awoke, she felt... strange. Not herself. The world was more vivid. Suddenly, she could sense the aether around her. She began to notice a strange hunger. Nothing she ate seemed to fill out. It wasn't long before she realized that her hunger was not a craving for food, but something else entirely. She needed to feast on aether--and she found a very particular method to be the most efficient way to extract it, especially if she wanted her victim to perhaps not even fully realize what had happened. However, it was no way to live, and with her attempt at revenge dashed, she had given up the idea entirely and only found an empty sadness instead, and nothing to keep driving her. She stepped out into the water of Costa del Sol, where she'd made her home after her heartbreak. She had never learned to swim; what good was swimming in the desert? She waded deeper and deeper, the waves knocking against her. She walked further until the water was above her head, and she kept going forward as far as she could. Instinct began to set in. Panic began to set in. She tried to breathe, but only found a mouthful of water. Against her own volition, her body tried to swim, but she didn't know how. She fought and struggled to reach the surface for what felt like should have been longer than humanly possible, but she was too disoriented beneath the water to even know which direction she moved. Before long, she was so tired and dizzy and breathless that her body gave out, and everything faded to blackness. Then, she woke up. She didn't know how long she had been out, but she woke up, not on the beach or in some afterlife, but in some plane of darkness and nothingness. She was not entirely alone, she realized, as she found strange and terrible creatures as she began to wander. Many were not exactly friendly, but there seemed to be little sense in the violence. There was no death in this place and nothing to be gained. She realized she was inside of the Void. It was a starving and empty existence, no aether to feed on. Every now and then, there would be a flicker of light. Everything would rush toward it, and those lucky enough to reach the portal in time could be free. Thus became the cycle of Shade's existence--escape to the realm of Hydaelyn whenever she could only to be returned to the Void whenever death befell her immortal body. Life in Hydaelyn was hardly preferable to the Void. She would feast on her fill of aether and stir up whatever trouble she could, but she found little joy in it. Still, it beat the vast nothingness and hunger of the Void, where the only benefit (if one could call it that) was never having to interact with anyone else. It wasn't until a particular portal of light appeared that something happened to make the cycle any less monotonous. She found herself in some sort of basement lab, face to face with a Midlander man who seemed to have intentionally set out to summon something. Fueled by blind hunger, she lunged at the man and attacked him, talons tearing across his face. However, she was caught off guard when he managed, for a moment, to subdue her and then bind her to him. It was the beginning of a resentful partnership, the two constantly battling for dominance. In truth, she could have easily slain the man at any point, but he proved to provide entertainment and human interaction that she'd been long since deprived. The mage, Melfice Vainchelon, supplied her with aether and a home, and she in turn did his bidding and allowed him to tap into her power, as well as study her and the curse with which she was afflicted. But just as the last time, a reluctant partnership slowly began to change into something more. Not about to be spurned by love again, Shade vehemently fought against it and any of the man's advances, but she had met her match in someone just as cruel and stubborn as her who was not about to accept rejection. She gave in, and the two formed a relationship that at first incredibly toxic in time mellowed out into something more tame. Where once she rebelled, she began to obediently comply with her "Master's" wishes--most of the time, anyway. If she were too tamed, he might grow bored of her or grant her less attention! They caused some mayhem for others, though mostly the Harbingers of Dawn, usually in the form of acquiring aether that Shade needed to feast on or that Melfice had use of in his experiments and his own spellcasting. These experiments, Shade eventually learned, were originally to try to revive his deceased fiancee, Chandra. However, she soon became the new focus of his work, in the form of trying to a solution for her need of aether. Shadiyah was soon unexpectedly to introduced to X'unmei Noh, who Melfice described as his adoptive daughter who he had rescued and taken in. Despite their relationship being familial, Shade was automatically suspicious and resentful of anyone who might take any of Melfice's time or affection away from her. Melfice and Shade's crimes began to catch up with them, when a ritual that was meant to transfer Shadiyah's curse to one who desired it was interrupted by Harbingers who immediately went on the offensive. Shade jumped into the line of fire to protect Melfice, sustaining fatal injuries in the process. She was returned to the Void once more, where she was uncertain if she would ever see Melfice again. Even if he had survived the ordeal, she had no idea if she could make it back to Hydaelyn within his lifetime. She scrambled and fought to make it back, and mercifully, before long she found a portal before her as if it was made for her and hurried through. She found Melfice there, having opened a rift to summon her and call her back to him, and they were happily reunited. However, the consequences of their actions still followed them. They realized that if they wanted to live a long, peaceful life together, they would need to stop making so many enemies. The two began slowly but surely to try to make amends and clean up their acts, and along with this they each began to let go of their pasts and treat each other a little better. Melfice eventually admitted that he still had Chandra's preserved body, and wished to let her go and have Shadiyah present. Upset Melfice had kept this from her, she refused, and he had Unmei accompany him instead. However, things did not go as planned. When they released her body, the residual aether clinging to it manifested into her angry spirit. She specter plagued their home, and Shade narrowly saved Unmei from certain death at its hands before the three were able to defeat the ghost. The past was laid to rest, and Shade and Unmei found more friendly terms. Though Melfice and Shade are still dealing with the consequences of their past crimes against others, both want nothing more than to cure Shadiyah of her affliction so that she might stop robbing him of his aether or be forced to take it from elsewhere, as well as so that they might not be hunted by those who want to slay anything related to the Void. Stories are in chronological order. Stories contain mature/sensitive/nsfw themes. Please read at your own risk.
Context: Melfice is displeased after Shade takes aether from their associate. How to Train Your Voidsent Context: Shade gets in trouble once again after consuming Val's aether. No Solace in Death Context: Shade is banished and forced to wander the Void after being "killed."
Context: Melfice and Shade pay a visit to some ruins in search of information. Breakfast Context: Shade and Unmei bond over an awkward breakfast following banishing Chandra's ghost. [Link Here Title] Context: ---
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