Ylva of Askr [WoE - Ready]

[Elderflower]

Roleplay Type: World of Equestria

Name: Ylva of Askr

Sex: Female

Age: Younger cow

Species: Caribou

Eye colour: Silver

Coat: Ylva’s fur is thick and short, the perfect coat for keeping her warm in harsh climates. Her face, legs, spine, flank, and front of her belly are all a pale-to-dark brown in colour while her ears, chest, and around her mouth are all a silvery-white. That same white is sprinkled throughout her body’s brown tones.

Like so:

Mane/Tail: Ylva’s mane is little more than overgrowth of fur around her head and neck, as is typical for Whitescar caribou. She keeps her mane braided and beaded.

Physique: Battle-hardened, thick, and muscular (though not without a certain grace and poise). Ylva has the strong body of a warrior with large, many-tined antlers - the ideal sort of beauty in the Whitescar. In the town of Askr, she is most frequently seen sporting a blue-grey dragonscale coat with a large hood (made of dragonscales she collected from a nest) over a white tunic and a gown of chainmail. While traversing outside her clan’s territory she always equips her spear, steel greaves and a helmet which are all inlaid with blue-white Askr wood in runes which tell of the history of her Clan. The greaves she wears upon her forelegs are quite unique, as both have curved blades upon the front for close-combat.

Residence: The town of Askr, which lies in the Eastern forests of the Whitescar.

Askr is something of a remarkable gem buried in the snows of Whitescar. Beneath the ground hot springs bubble and burst forth in jets of steam through cracks in the ground, wide pools of hot and soothing water to be found dotting the snowy landscape. Quite a few are found in the Askr woods as well, instilling a powerful ethereal feel in the atmosphere. The steam, you see, is not the only boon in this land, for the trees here are filled with a magic said to come from one of the Clan’s old gods: Tuktu, the Warrior Bull who rules the stars. The trees pull nourishment not from the sulphurous ground but from the plentiful magical energy that fills air, making them a highly-sought material for inlaying weapons and armour, or anything metal or stonework in general. The aether here is so dense and present that it crystallizes and dances in the branches of the trees like starlight. Askr is famous for its beauty in the harsh sparsity of the north: how could one not stand in awe of blue-white trees full of starlight and wrapped in a soft whisper of steam?

Occupation: Shaman and Spiritual Leader of Askr, Right Hoof of the Jarl of Askr. As a shaman she is the top source of songs, poetry, dance, rituals, and stories of caribou and Askr culture. As the Right Hoof of the Jarl she serves her sister as a consult, a weapon, and spiritual presence.

Cutie Mark: N/A, though she and her sister both carry their Clan’s banner emblazoned upon their flanks. Ylva wears hers on her left flank, a tree with the rune for the A of Askr.

History: Ylva was born one half of a whole to a proud mother and father in the territories of Askr. She and her sister Sigrun were not born identical twins, but there was no doubt in the minds of any Askr caribou that the Silver-Eyed Sisters of the East were anything but one soul in two bodies. From as early as they could stand tall, the two sisters trained together and prepared for the hard life they would face in the Whitescar. Their mother and father both taught them the ways of battle and survival during the day, but at night when the northern lights danced across the sky they taught them the songs and stories of the caribou. Ylva and her sister excelled in both areas, but it was clear where their interests were drawn: Sigrun was born to be a master tactician and warrior while the lighter-hued twin absorbed every word of every story with an eagerness unparalleled by any other in the clan. Her love and pride for Askr and the caribou of Whitescar was nurtured from birth this way, and Ylva and her sister both were infected with an ambition and desire to do more for their kind, to carry them into a better future.

This was why she could not complete her Will Test. As she grew into a hard and tried warrior, Ylva sensed that there was something...wrong in all of Whitescar. Something off. When breeding the Askr trees and what scarce crops they had, all in the Clan knew that it was vital to mix strains and strengthen the product. Bottlenecking any species would cause it to dwindle: that was why the meeting of isolated clans to arrange marriages was vital as well. Left to stagnate without change, anything would falter. The caribou traditions were beautiful, but they needed to evolve and adapt.

When it came time for Ylva’s Will Test she left wordless, the usual cheer in her demeanour replaced with a sombre stillness. She did not return, and she had told none of her plan - not even Sigrun, for she knew her twin would demand to join her...but this was a journey she had to make alone. Instead returning to her Clan successful she elected to travel to new places in the world and learn all she could of those cultures she knew to be flourishing elsewhere. The cow learned much of pony and gryphon culture, committing every detail to memory. She would take this valuable insight home, and tell her Clan of the many advances that ponykind and gryphons had made while the caribou remained the same, always struggling. If they could make peace and ally with these nations, they could open up trade that would bring precious resources to the North. It had to be done!

Taking all she knew back home, no joy could ever be measured to that which soared in Ylva’s heart the moment she first stepped back on the rocky banks of the Whitescar. This was where she belonged, where the cold sting in the air as she inhaled filled her lungs and her heart with music. As she journeyed home, however, something...old beckoned her. She was drawn north, past the Askr territories and into vast, empty wilds. Each day saw her more hungry and tired than she believed possible, and though snow lay all around her to quench her thirst the cold bite of it as she tried to eat it was too painful. When she grew delirious from the strain, however, something happened that she will never forget.

The northern lights descended from the sky and she drank them deep, knowing that the Goddess Cow of the River of Light, Qalipu (pronounced hollipu), had found her. The light fell down and touched the snow-covered earth, leading Ylva forward. She followed that path, energized, for three full days where it ended at a vast mound of snow. There, she knew what to do, for Qalipu’s name means “the one who paws.” So Ylva pawed at the snow, and it collapsed to reveal the mouth of a cave. In the cow went, finding a hot, humid space heated by hotsprings as her Clan’s territories are. There, the cow slept, and had an unforgettable dream. When she awoke in the dreamspace she saw a pond, still and stagnant and full of twisted fish. In the distance, she and Sigrun began to paw at the earth until fresh water sprung forth and fed into the pond before leading to the ocean. The fish came back to life and began to live as salmon do - in the ocean and the rivers, thriving and plentiful.

It was a sign, and when she woke Ylva knew Qalipu had guided her to this vision, for all around her tired body were tall growths of Qalipu’s Mane, a weed her kind had not seen in over a century. Indeed, they had believed it to have disappeared from the Whitescar for good. She collected this weed and finally returned home, with her knowledge, her vision, and (most importantly) the mane weed her offering of worth to her Jarl in place of refusing to do her Will Test.

Except her Jarl was gone. In fact, the day of her return was to be the day her sister Sigrun was to be named Jarl. There was no time to waste, then. The beauty of Qalipu’s Mane would prove Ylva’s sister to be a true leader of caribou. So Ylva boiled some of the bushels of weeds down and mashed them into a paste to create a pigment, one that shone with the many colours of the northern lights. With that, she branded her sister’s forehead with the mark of the Jarl and performed one of the old rituals, calling upon the favour of the old gods. On this night, Sigrun was named Jarl and the sister who had returned to her named her Right Hoof and Shaman.

Character Summary: Ylva, much like her sister Sigrun, is the embodiment of a Whitescar cow. She is harsh and fierce - a taciturn and solid sculpture carved from coldest ice. She is resilient, resourceful, and an able fighter thanks to being reared in one of the world’s most unforgiving environments. Ylva is a daughter of the North, a child of snow and fire, of ice and of ash, and many say that breathing deep the cold air in the White Scar is what gave she and her sister Sigrun their famous arctic silver eyes.

If the bitter cold has taught the caribou anything, however, it is the value of warmth. In the pantheon of the old Askr gods there is even a God of the Hearth, a deity completely separate from those of fire and magma. The warmth of home is so valued in the territories far from the the volcanoes and running lava of the Whitescar that it is said to be a divine intervention of the cold, something deeply spiritual and vital to Askr culture. So despite the fact that the territory of Askr is resting atop steamy hot springs that create a bizarrely humid climate in the frigid north, the true warmth in Ylva’s Clan rests within the caribou themselves. Her kind face hardships unfathomable to those who dwell in lands of plenty such as Equestria, and her kind have carried each other forward literally and figuratively for many years. When the wind howls, the caribou boom with love and laughter, and Ylva is one of the loudest of them all. Outside of battle and duty to the Jarl, she makes it her mission to make her sister laugh, to sing loudly with the warriors of the clan, and to bring warmth to all she can.

Cold nights spent sheltered from the cold lead to a culture proficient with song and story. These traditions were passed to Ylva and Sigrun from their parents, and the lighter-hued calf took to these traditions more readily than her sister, learning every note and every myth and legend of the caribou and of the old gods. She learned the value of symbols and tales, and the more she learned from her mother the more deeply spiritual she became. Tails of the Caribou Goddess Qalipu and her brother Tuktu filled her dreams and waking thoughts, and the wonder she felt from the very first tale her mother told her remains alive within Ylva to this day.

Her calfhood, though full of struggle thanks to being reared in the Whitescar, was full of beautiful memories. She is fiercely proud of what her kind have accomplished and loves their traditions, their culture, and their history dearly...but she senses a dissonance as well. The world around them all has been changing, thriving - though their old ways and rejection of the new prevented them from growing into a future that would help them flourish. Why struggle for survival and resources when abandoning some of the old ways to accept peace, trade, and allies could help the caribou with the immense struggle for survival in their brutal homeland? The cow learned much of ponies in her travels, and she holds an immense sense of respect towards them. They have advanced far beyond the caribou in their lands of plenty, and though seemingly weak they possess a valiant and noble spirit that is likely impossible to break. They laugh at the greatest dangers and join together the moment they are threatened, with more ease than the Clans of Whitescar could ever dream. Ylva wished to see the caribou ally with these admirable folk, and though her thoughts were radical they were thoughts shared by the High King and more importantly: her sister Sigrun. Together they aim to make Whitescar a changed placed, more willing to embrace peace and become one with the modern world.

But of all these things, the most beloved and precious thing in Ylva’s life is her sister, Sigrun, the Jarl of Askr. The shaman’s loyalty and love go first to Sigrun, and she dedicates her life to both the gods and her Jarl. As right hoof she is an advisor, a warrior, a confidant, and a comfort. Any who dare utter threats to the controversial leader will see the fury in the silver eyes of the shaman: a fearful sight indeed. To Ylva, her sister must always come first. Her own joy and comfort must always be secondary to Sigrun’s. Even the greatest pain and heartache was easily forgotten knowing that she was doing so in service of her dear friend, her only sister. She ever saw herself as Sigrun’s watchful shadow, and would proudly and happily serve and protect the Jarl until she drew her final breath.

[Bellosh]