The Otherworld
(artwork by Sharon Delaportas)
Creatures of Light:
For centuries, King Arrane has led the creatures of light with a steel but fair fist. Since wedding the human, Lady Geraldine, over thirty years ago, more kindness and compassion has been added to his list of amazing qualities.
He rules the light of the Otherworld from with the alabaster palace that sits atop the Isle of Arran, a floating isle whose location moves from moment to moment to keep it better guarded against those who wish to see it destroyed. From his throne, he watches the sea, the earth, the sky, and all things nature-born.
The origin of nightmares, the
maras spend their evenings seeking humans while they sleep. They sit their
tiny bodies upon the chests of men and ride them through nightmares,
sometimes trapping the humans inside the hellish dreams, killing them while
they sleep. If a human dies in sleep due to a mara, a mara can capture the
human soul at the moment of escape, and carry it into the Otherworld, where
it will be reborn into a creature of dark. This is how Queine Elphina's army
has been made. This is how she's found her soldiers....
While ogres by nature are cruel and conscience-less, Dulcee is the rare exception. His fierce loyalty to the throne of Arran makes up for the fact that he's a bit dim-witted. Dulcee is the surprising savior of Prince Gavin upon Gavin's entrance to the Otherworld, and that act makes him the sole ogre allowed on Arran land.
With
bodies as small as 6 to 8 inches, the grotesquely long arms and legs of the
peches are slightly frightening at first sight. Feet as large as lilypads,
teeth as sharp as rose thorns, the peches make for an excellent ally of
darkness as they lurk in the depths of the darkest caves. Unseen in the
darkness, their strange laughter and sing-song voices are enough to bring a
shiver to even the bravest of men.
The peches serve Queine Elphina not out of loyalty but out of fear, for she has killed many of their kind and has no reservations about making the lot of them extinct.
The child borne of the succubus, Lucette's, seduction of King Arrane, Queine Elphina is a unique creature borne of both darkness and light. The beauty of Arrane runs in her veins, making her stunning to look upon, though her succubus lineage has tinted her with a bluish aura that taints her kingdom and everything else she owns.
She fights her father for the throne that rightfully belongs to her, but in truth, it is no more than a father's love that she so desperately wants, for while King Arrane might lead his people with a compassionate hand, he has had little of such compassion for his own daughter. She'll get what she wants, however, even if it means killing her half-brother to get it. Even if it means killing her very own father.
Succubi
are often thought of as beautiful creatures who enchant innocent men with
their sexual wiles. The fact is, they are horribly disfigured beings whose
beauty only surfaces under the power of their magic. They never truly
transform into beauties ~it's merely the spell under which the humans are
put under that makes them believe the grotesque, green-tinted creatures are
exactly what they long for.
Pictured here, Lucette is a succubus whose love for King Arrane led her to seduce him with magic in hopes of begetting him a child that might win her a place at his side. But even birthing Elphina, Lucette and Arrane's child, could not give her the future she wanted, for Arrane would never allow creatures of darkness to rule in his kingdom. Therefore, Lucette and Elphina were cast from Arrane's life, leaving them both bitter...and hungry for revenge.