Dominion Era/Tretallë (Characteristics)

This page discusses a part of the lore of the Dominion Era Tretallë. If you are interested in seeing the Tabletop RPG stats associated with this race, visit: Tretallë (Stats).

Dominion Era Tretallë
Bone Elves
Istfet, The Strangers, Invaders, Deathriders
Imperial Standard of the Tretalleri Dominion
Land of Origin
Continent of Origin	Termalttë
Homeland	Teýrivellë
Capital	Ifatallë Cselvë
Racial Lore
Language	Tretalleri
Characteristics	Tretallë (Characteristics)
Culture	Tretallë (Culture)
History	Dominion Era
Government	Tretallë (Government)
Military	Tretallë (Military)
Stats	Tretallë (Stats)
Racial Relations
Allies	None
Enemies	Elledynnë
Neutrals	None

Though they may be pale, stoic, and unsmiling, there is no question that the Tretallë possess a beauty all their own. Contrary to what the High Elves—who find that the Tretallë are revolting on a primal level—believe, there is a strange appeal to the somber grace of the Tretallë and their Dominion.

It is no mere accident that the Tretalleri God of Death, The Stranger is depicted in religious texts and artworks as just another Tretallë. The Bone Elves are a people that have, over the many years of the expansion of their empire through fire and friendship, recognized the meaning that their appearances carry. As gruesome and morbid as that meaning might be for them, they embrace it and wear it as a badge of honour and of devotion to their patron: The Stranger.

Physiology

The Tretallë are rather unique when it comes to their outwardly appearances. In fact, as far as the people of the Dominion know, they have not met any other people, apart from their despised High Elves, that are even remotely similar to them physically.

Flesh and Blood

The Tretallë are close relatives to the High Elves, sharing a common ancestor whose civilization has long since descended to ruin. While the Elledynnë are in general leaner and shorter, the Tretallë pride themselves of their height and much stronger musculature. In addition, where the High Elves are fair of skin naturally—though those who are well-off in society tend to have bronzed skin due to sunbathing—the Tretallë are a different matter entirely.

The Bone Elves are pale, and their skin-tone can range from alabaster to ivory. More often than not, Tretalleri skin colour is very light grey, much like fresh, undisturbed ashes. Because of their lack of natural melanin, the Tretallë burn rather easily in direct sunlight as children. Most adults are desensitized from sunburn, however, as the result of extensive military training so long as they are determined to have a healthy enough interest and body to participate.

Facial Features

One of the most characteristic features of a Tretallë, apart from the colour of her skin, is the shape of her face. Tretalleri faces are generally long, with prominent cheekbones and angular jaws. The pronouncement of the jaw is far more evident in males than in females, though the females of the race generally have longer and more slender faces.

Tretalleri eyebrows tend to be thin and long, often tapering to a point. The Tretallë do not have very large foreheads, and there is no difference of note in this area between males and females. Regardless of gender, however, the Tretallë often have widows' peaks centred on the middle of their hairlines.

Tretalleri noses are typically hooked, and their lips are often thin. Like most of their Elfin cousins the world over, the Tretallë possess pointed ears. Where male ears are sharper and generally longer than female ones, female ears often curve toward the back of the head and can sometimes even lie flat against the side of the skull.

All in all, the structure of Tretalleri faces contributes to the belief that they are rather cold and always somber, if not angry. It certainly does not help that seeing mirth upon a normally-stoic face is rather eerie as well. For all their quiet beauty, the Tretallë are often said to be possessed of an eerie kind of beauty that is all too often associated with death.

Eye and Hair Colour

There is very little variation in eye coloration among the Tretallë. Generally, Tretalleri eyes come in combinations of an array of different, but specific, hues and shades. Steel grey is the most common eye colour, with gold, green following right after. While there are no true historical accounts of Tretalleri individuals with crimson eyes, such stories have certainly survived as folklore. If these accounts of crimson eyes are corroborated by biological or historical evidence, red would be the rarest eye-colour, just after violet.

A Tretalleri child will typically have eyes of a middling colour between the eye-colours of her parents. However, it is not unheard of that children are born with eyes that are of an entirely different colour to their parents. Though rarer than the previous situation, there are also officially recorded instances of heterochromia iridum in the Tretallë. As with anything that is inexplicable to them at the moment, the Tretallë hold these deviations from the norm to simply be the will of the Nine.

Similarly, Tretalleri hair is not varied in coloration. A typical Tretallë will have silvery-white hair, though the colour often ranges from light grey all the way to platinum.

The Wisdom Bands

As distinctive as the colour of their skin might be, one of the most prominent features of the Tretalleri face are two bands of slightly discoloured skin. These bands are often darker than the surrounding skin, with a slight, subtle hue that is similar to the individual's eye-colour. These bands typically adorn the sides of Tretalleri faces. Male bands generally originate from behind the ear, sweep up to meet the temple, and then descend to touch the corners of the eyes. Female bands are slightly different in that they extend all the way down to the jaw and lower still to the collarbone.

Because the bands do not manifest until sexual maturity is reached, it is not unheard of that some males manifest female bands and vice-versa. Years of study by the leading scholars of the Dominion strongly suggest that these bands are tied to gender expression. As a result, it is widely thought that these individuals whose bands do not match their biological sex are the Tretalleri equivalent of transgendered humans. Fortunately for these individuals, there is very little in the way of discrimination against them, and society at large welcomes them so long as they are decent people and contribute to the Dominion just as much as everyone else.

Physical Capabilities

They are less adept than their Elfin brethren in sneaking around in the dark, but a High Elf would rather be caught dead than caught doing something so boorish. Their manual dexterity, on the other hand, is quite unmatched in the East.

While generally speaking, their most common features make it more difficult for them to be stealthy in small places, unlike their High Elfin brethren, and the Woodlands and Rogue elves in the West, they are more than capable in larger chambers. They excel at covering large distances on foot and have extraordinary endurance, lending credence to the idea that they were originally from a mountain environment. However, they prefer to use their horses unless absolutely necessary.

The Tretallë are also very capable at navigating many different kinds of terrain. Again, lending credence to the High Elfin story, the Tretallë are amazing at managing mountainous terrain, which the Elledynnë are more or less terrible at.

Musculature

Because most males are trained from birth to run and ride horses into battle, the muscle density of Tretalleri males is generally concentrated around the legs, lower back, and core. It is important to note, however, that the Talfinttë, Hunter Corps, of the Tretalleri army maintain greater upper-body strength in order to hurl spears further, faster, and with more acuity.

Males tend to stand a full head taller than females of their age, but even Tretalleri females are significantly taller than their Elfin brethren. Males have slightly broader shoulders than their hips with a torso that tapers ever so slightly down to their hips.

Females, on the other hand, are generally considered the masters of the siege and thus are not trained as cavalry. They are welcome to join the ranks of riders, of course, but most are content with building the massive machines that the Tretallë are famed and feared for. Because of this, they are generally trained to be capable of lugging around heavy equipment, and thus have greater upper-body strength than males.

Female Tretallë generally have uniform muscle density as lifting often involves the entire body. As a result, they lack the hourglass, effeminate physique of the High Elfin women, nor do they possess petite stature of their Western cousins. They typically have the same shape as the males, albeit, they are slightly more curvaceous.

Psychology

Reproduction and Sexuality

In addition, males of the race are almost never prone to promiscuity. In fact, they have a muted sex drive. It has long been argued that because the Tretallë have the longest natural life expectancy of the Elfin races, they do not see the need to procreate very often. Needless to say, the females often find themselves bereft of any sexual pleasure if they depend on the men, and instead rely on other women to keep them company, save for when the males are, for lack of a better term, "in heat." Counter-intuitively, however, Tretallë males are not possessed of smaller-in-comparison genitalia than the other Elfin races.

Last but not least, like the Elfin races in the East, the Tretallë are blue-blooded. Haemocyanin is the protein that they use in their blood to transport oxygen, because on the Eastern continent, iron is rare, and copper is more abundant in the environment.