Thraele: Exit the Dragon

During the security check, the party comes across a horde of treasure guarded by a young silver dragon. She convinces the dragon to spar with her and if he loses, to give up the one thing the party was tasked to retrieve. She unloaded on the dragon (and got a few lucky dice rolls!) and won the spar. This victory, one-on-one, over a dragon both underscored her awe of dragons as well as made her incredibly prideful and even more full of self-assured hubris.

It is with this attitude that she went into the train job. She ended up meeting a Warforged named Barrel, part of an additional security contingent of Warforged on the train. The lack of humanity of this Warforged seemed to resonate with her – even though he is decidedly more ‘human’ and thoughtful than the others in the troop – to the point where he is slightly mocked for it. She also meets an old dragon who sacrifices himself to Tiamat to save humanity, to her great dismay as she does not feel life is worth saving that way. Certainly not at the expense of something as noble as an ancient dragon. She also met Githyanki dragon riders and some of their mounts, and was enthralled by them as well.

Note: When the DM created this campaign adventure, i don’t think he realized how Thraele-interest-heavy this ended up being but it was a super fun adventure with an immense number of character development hooks for her that I greedily latched on to.

This next tale is one where Thraele is returning to the train after having had to escort the dragon to sacrifice himself – a decision she did not agree with, and resents humans even more now (previously, she has been disdainful of them – not ‘humans’ necessarily but he concept of ‘humanity’ and all it entails – namely, community, laws, ‘civility’, etc.) This was also about the midpoint of the adventure, with regards to playtime. So we were in the thick of it.

—

Thraele sits with her head in her hands, feeling an unfamiliar lump in her chest. She wants to… cry? No that’s not it. Scream, perhaps. Yes, that felt closer. Still not quite it though. She feels an itching in her fingers, a slow rising heat at her fingertips….

She needed to talk to someone who would understand.

Barrell.

She pulls out a small piece of copper wire from her pocket, holds it to her lips and mutters a few words under her breath, and casts a telepathic voice in Barrell’s head: “I’m back. Have lunch with me. I’ll come there.”

There is a startled grunt from the Warforged, but nothing else.

She pulls her helm on before exiting her quarters to see Grey walk, scowling, towards the back of the train with a bowl of custard. 

She marches purposefully in the opposite direction to the lounge car, ignoring the stares and whispers of the people she passes. Her helm – beautiful carved bone with large, curling ram’s horns on each side – is always a topic of conversation. The lunch rush seems to be picking up. Thraele grabs a larger cup of Andulian red wine, bread, cheese, and fruit – enough for two – wrapping them in a napkin. As the people – various merchants, lesser nobles, soldiers, children – mill around, laughing and talking to each other, embracing the strange familiarity of having no shared experience except being on this train together, Thraele feels a seething, bilious hatred creep from her stomach up her throat and coming to rest at the base of her brain. The scowl on her face deepens and it takes every ounce of willpower she has to not set the car ablaze. 

She clenches her jaw, and tries to tune out the grating, irritating laughter as she exits the car, hands full of food and drink and the same heated itching at her fingertips from a few minutes ago.

This disgusting levity of insignificant creatures that do not know, and could not appreciate, the greatness that was being done for them. As they never seem to. Sacrifices were made for humanity all the time, and at best, they squandered them. 

She marches straight to the Warforged car and upon entering it, a few of the Warforged look up from various conversations to note her entrance, but say nothing. She scans the room and, finding Barrell, sitting alone at a table and reading the book she had given him, makes a beeline toward him. 

“Barrell,” she says, walking up to him.

“Thraele,” he replies, closing the book and looking up. “I heard your voice before but I could not see you.”

Thraele is confused for a moment, before realizing what he meant, “OH. Yes. I forget that you are not familiar with certain magicks. I can send brief messages to people through a minor arcane effort.”

There is a soft grinding noise of wood on stone – the Warforged chuckle – “Perhaps next time you can let me know it is you.”

“Who else is sending you messages in your mind?”

“Fair enough.”

“Anyway, let us eat.” She sits down at one of the empty chairs beside him. “I brought enough food for a light lunch. Only one cup of wine, but we can share that. I’m not a big drinker anyway.” 

She starts to unwrap the napkin and lay out a makeshift picnic on the table.

The warforged looks at the food and wine and then her – “I thank you… but my people don’t eat or drink.”

She stops and looks at him quizzically. “Interesting. Because you don’t need to, or you can’t?”

“Both.”

“That is fascinating. I wish I could do away with the binds of needing sustenance or rest. You know, some of the greatest magic users have transcended mortality itself and no longer need to abide by life’s trappings.”

“I feel there must be some joy in food and drink though. Otherwise, these soft ones would not be so much stock in it.”

Thraele scowls, “What they put stock in and what they do not… it is useless to try to understand. Futile to try to correct them. Infuriating to watch them squander gifts given so freely to them.”

Barrell pauses for a moment. “I feel like this is not about the food.”

Thraele looks up at him and taps the table restlessly. “I… just had to watch an ancient silver dragon give up his life for ….” She gestures to the train around them. “And I failed to stop him.”

Barrell says nothing, watching her. 

Thraele shares the story of what happened with Adalon, her jaw clenching and unclenching visibly as she recounts the tale.

“… and humanity will never even know of the sacrifice that has been made for them. And even if they did know, they would not appreciate it. They are beyond worthless. Their lives are meaningless. What good does it do for them to live while an ancient one dies?”

When Barrell speaks, it is slow and quiet. “The choice was not yours to make, Thraele. It was his, and he made it. He chose to have humanity progress – he would die so thousands, tens of thousands, might live. Perhaps you do not see that as a fair trade, but he did.”

“He. Was. Wrong.” Thraele speaks through gritted teeth. “His life is easily worth millions of theirs. His death, billions.”

The Warforged puts a three-fingered hand on Thraele’s on the table – the sensation is cold and much heavier that she expected, but it is comforting in a way. ”You are right. One life is not the same value as another. He saw value of humanity where you do not. And his parting request was that you start assigning that value as well. Surely, your reverence for this being will make you acquiesce to his wishes, despite how unnatural it might feel for you at the beginning.”

“I revere … revered… him, yes. But that does not mean he was right in all things. He was not right in this thing, and I cannot and will not accept that his sacrifice was the right choice to have made. I had little respect for the ways of humanity before – the arbitrary morays of right and wrong – the importance of seeming just without actually being just – but now… now I am starting to understand that their biggest problem is that everyone expects better from them. If you believe they are exactly as base as they seem, with no ability to do or be better, everything becomes much easier.”

The Warforged cocks his head a little, “What becomes easier?”

“Dismissing their ridiculous sentiments in the interest of getting things done.”

Barrell strokes his chin, with what would be a pensive expression on anyone else, “Yes, our people are almost always brought in to complete tasks that require a certain…. Dispassion.”

“I am unsurprised.”

An hour or so passes as they continue to discuss the value of one life versus another. Thraele can feel a few Warforged looking at them, but she ignores them and stays focused talking to Barrell.

—

At the end of the adventure, Thraele buys out Barrell’s contract from the company and the two of them leave together. I like to imagine Barrell, the Warforged, imparted some humanity and softness in Thraele, but more than likely, she is just too stubborn and he doesn’t feel compelled to .