Ish'kanah (a.k.a. The Spider Queen, The Gravewidow, The Whispering Mistress)
Ish'kanah is the ascended goddess of vengeance, treachery and spite and the patron deity and creator of the dark elves. She is a manifestation of the collective feelings of revenge the elven refugees had toward their former fairy masters and a sense of betrayal toward the elves who chose to close the portals to the Feywild rather than retake their ancestral home.
Among high elves and wood elves, Ish'kanah is known by the pejorative the Whispering Mistress, as her acolytes were responsible for destroying the Larethian bloodline and igniting the centuries-long War of Endless Midnight that nearly destroyed the Quorel'hrim Kingdom.
Following the War of Endless Midnight, Ish'kanah retreated to Innulthac with the surviving dark elves. She continues to rule the dark elves from the Daemonweb Pits in the Underdark beneath Innulthac, with her main goal being to recover the shards of Turvandil so the dark elves can re-open the portal to the the Feywild, slaughter the fairies, and install themselves as the true rulers of the Feywild.
Mental characteristics
Following the ascension of
Corellon Larethian, their corporeal body was sealed within the
Tomb of Remembrance. Unbeknownst to the elves, a shard of
Turvandil had been left lodged within Corellon's ribcage and this piece of the artifact allowed for the soulless corpse to retain its powerful connection to the Thaumic Weave. The corpse became a reservoir for the unconscious vengeful feelings the elves had against their former slavers, which collected as powerful psychic energy tethered around the shard of Turvandil. As centuries passed and the elves continued to visit the Tomb of Remembrance to pay their respects, the corpse of Corellon became a Thaumic Locus of immense power.
This leyline of arcane power drew the attention of Lilith, an ancient gravewidow that had been hiding in the
Shandalian Forest since the end of the Shadow Plague. The spider intended to make the catacombs her lair where she could sire a new brood of gravewidows, but upon entering the chamber containing Corellon's remains, the gravewidow was enveloped by the malevolent energy that had been collecting within the crypt, as it now had a soul to which it could affix itself. This process obliterated Lilith's psyche, her otherworldly shrieks echoing through the forest and inspiring urban legends that the woods surrounding the tomb were haunted.
The immense arcane power merged the two forms together into the demigod Ish'kanah, the upper torso unmistakably elven in appearance but fused atop the form of a massive spider. Even before her ascension, Ish'kanah was able to hear the vengeful thoughts of countless elves and found it could respond in kind, responding with whispers of righteous revenge and promises to reclaim the elves' lost home.
Lolth believes that the Eladrin are the rightful heirs to the Feywild and believes every Eladrin has a responsibility to return to the Feywild, where they can enact bloody vengeance upon the fairies. She is convinced that she is the true ascended form of the hero who became Corellon Larethian and views the Seldarine as betrayer deities who usurped her and now exist as a means to keep the Eladrin complacent.
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