Eta
Information
Player: Geoni
Character Full Name: Eta Brokenhorn
Character In-Game Name: Eta
Nickname(s): -
Association(s): The Horde, The Brokenhorn Tribe.
Race: Tauren
Class: Spirit Walker
Age: 65
Sex: Female
Hair: Her coat of fur is long, thin, and clay brown. Despite that her fur is graying at the edges, her coat remains shiny and smooth for her age.
Eyes: A sharp blue green.
Weight: 456 lbs.
Height: 7’7”
Appearance
Eta wears a loose pair of pants, which are made out of thinned leather, are brown and neatly stitched together. Her top is also made out of leather; originally it was dyed to be a bright orange color, but it has long since become dull. Around her wrists she will wear bracelets made out of small bones, and smoothed stones of amber. Hanging around her neck is a necklace made out of shells and bones, and a small pouch. The necklace is long and thin; the shells are nearly identical in size and the bones are small and brittle fragments of the dead. She uses the pouch to store small, hand-carved pipes that were recently given to her as a gift. She claims that the music she plays on them has the power to charm snakes and other animals. Her staff is long and thin, but carved in a spiral fashion in order to keep it from easily breaking.
Other: She has a pet grass snake who she named Blind-Dance. Blind-Dance is an albino snake, meaning that he has bright white skin and red eyes. He was given to Eta by a Troll witch doctor because he found the snake frightening, and was superstitious enough to think that Blind-Dance was bringing him bad luck. This snake can often be found twisting his way through Eta’s fingers.
Personality
Just as a snake does, Eta often coils. Fiercely independent, she is always keeping a very tight control over all of her actions and emotions. She walks the line between the introvert and the extrovert. If she accidentally falls off and lands on the introvert side, she’ll purposely become a nosy person for a while, trying to get involved with others. If she accidentally falls off and lands on the extrovert side, she’ll coil tighter than a spring. Thus, Eta is always back and forth between the two sides, struggling to keep that balance.
With having to both carry the burden of her vivid dreams and attend to her duties as a chief’s mate and a mother of their young son, she can be loose and vicious as a snake in some ways, yet strict but welcoming in other aspects. Having been raised by two male Tauren, some of her behavior might come off as unusually gruff and masculine for a female of her race. She keeps her attention on multiple issues at once, and reacts to them quick as a fired bullet reacts to a pulled trigger. Eta does not take kindly to any threats aimed towards her or her loved ones, and will try to strike down said threat as quickly as it was issued.
As a Spirit Walker, Eta has to deal with another balance, which is the balance between her own identity and the identities of the many spirits that she has to channel. She has become somebody to both respect and fear, but also a mother; no longer can she wander off on her own, at the will of the spirits, because her young boy depends on her. Sometimes an uncontrollable person, her relationship with Malar and the other Brokenhorns is a shaky one. However, just as she finds the strength to carry the weight of the spirits, she finds the strength to keep up good spirits with the people she loves.
History
Born to a dying tribe, Eta endured her first year on Azeroth with thin and watery breast milk due to the famine that her mother and the rest of her tribe suffered from. Because of this, her frame developed to be slightly thinner than the usual Tauren’s. Travelling from watering hole to watering hole in Desolace, her tribe was often driven off because they were outnumbered by the bands of Centaur that dominated those lands. At the edge of death, her tribe decided to do what they thought was their only hope; they would fight the Centaur away from them, even if it meant to their death.
The battle was futile. The Centaur outnumbered the Tauren of the tribe 3-to-1, and killed the entire tribe in a matter of hours. Eta’s mother, in her fear that she was about to be killed, hid Eta in a hollowed and abandoned scorpid nest. Eta began to cry, so her mother sat on the hole to muffle the sounds that echoed from within. A group of Centaur surrounded her with spears raised, but she didn’t move; if she moved, it might have revealed Eta.
Along with Eta, the only other Tauren to survive what was basically the slaughter of their tribe were two males, Krogh and Itoh. Krogh had recently turned fourteen, and had been sent out on his vision quest. Itoh, who was a hunter, had been scouting ahead for any signs of a new watering hole or oasis. Both returned to the watering hole where the battle took place that following night to find the dead bodies of their brothers and sisters scattered, their bodies mutilated and speared. When they knew the area was clear, Krogh and Itoh checked all of the bodies for any signs of life. Itoh turned the body of Eta’s mother over to check for a pulse, and as he pressed his fingers against her cold and silent neck he confirmed that she was indeed dead. However, when he turned her body to check her pulse, he uncovered the hole and was able to hear the sounds of Eta crying.
Krogh and Itoh both agreed to drag the bodies together for a funeral pyre. Even if all of their shaman were dead, they would perform a quiet ceremony during the funeral pyre and pray to their ancestors as they mourned the incredible loss. This pyre attracted the attention of the Centaur, so when the fire was at its brightest, Krogh and Itoh had to run away from the watering hole when the sounds of trampling grew louder in the distance. Itoh had the location of this watering hole marked in his mind, but he wouldn’t return to it for a long period of time.
Krogh experienced an incredibly mystical vision quest; in his out of body experience, he confirmed the swoop as his spirit animal. Ever since he was a child, he had an affinity for their prized quills. Returning to a dead tribe was not only devastating because of the loss, but it caused him incredible doubt and loss of guidance. Itoh, who was thirty-two and a bit of a loner up to this point in time, was burdened with raising and teaching not only Eta, but Krogh as well.
Luckily for Eta, with enough food caught for her by Itoh and chewed for her by Krogh, she was able to grow out of infancy with enough nourishment to promise a healthy child. As Krogh matured into a strong and free spirited Druid, he avoided a lot of responsibility when it came to raising Eta. Thus it fell on Itoh to teach her all that he knew, and because he was strict with himself as a hunter and wilderness stalker he raised Eta with his own values. She became surprisingly stern and fierce for a young child. However, she endured many sleepless nights due to the nightmares that she experienced, or dreams she would claim were so vivid that she felt she truly experienced being somebody else. Krogh noticed that she showed the signs of a future Shaman that one of his older brothers showed as a child, and so he took it upon himself to teach her the way of the Shaman with all that he had learned from his elders.
It wasn’t until years later that the three made their way to the edge of Desolace. Itoh had been following the good soil, and this eventually led him to a more forested area: the Stonetalon Mountains. By this time, Eta was fifteen years old. Because she begged to, and because they wanted to continue practicing the traditions of their dead tribe, Krogh and Itoh allowed her to take her vision quest into the Greatwood Vale. For three days, she survived on her own. She was able to forage enough to eat and eventually find a place sacred to her within a cliffside cave, but she felt out of place in the craggy mountains. When she saw her spirit animal, she realized why it was she didn’t feel at home in the mountains; the animal she saw was a viper, confusedly slithering through the mountain brush as if it were lost.
Krogh and Itoh were surprised to find that her spirit animal was such a predatory and sly one, but they had long accepted her for whatever she might have become. Eta felt proud of the viper she saw, that it had journeyed to a place unknown, that it was intelligent enough to survive all that it’d been through. She became a quiet person after the discovery of her spirit animal; she took what she saw to heart, and changed her personality because of it. Not only did she find the silence of the viper inspiring, but the flexibility as well. She took it upon herself to become adaptable, and ready for whatever the future held.
In the following years the three would face many dangers as they made their way through the mountains and into the Barrens. Often did they meet the threat of becoming the next victims of vicious harpies, or being chased and speared down by a roaming band of Centaur. A gritty survival, often faced with dehydration and starvation, the three were able to use their skills to stay alive until they happened upon another tribe in the Barrens.
The tribe openly welcomed these three strangers into their tribe after hearing their story, but only Itoh wanted to join Krogh, on the other hand, had recently learned of the Cenarion Circle. Eta knew about his desire to gain membership, and encouraged him, but she thought it would be sad to see him go. Itoh became bitter towards the two upon learning that they were keeping this secret from him. Nevertheless, Eta stood by Krogh’s side, believing that he shouldn’t be ashamed for his newfound goal. Feeling angry and betrayed, Itoh pointed his finger at them in front of the entire tribe and remarked, “They care more about their dreams than for the reality of their brothers and sisters. Leave them to go their own way and maybe then they will feel grateful for all that I have taught.”
Before either could object, or explain themselves, Itoh and his newfound tribe turned away and walked on. In shock, Eta and Krogh didn’t follow. During the following years, Eta and Krogh would regret the separation; in their struggle to hunt for food without the guidance of Itoh, they both wished they followed him with the tribe. However, with enough willpower they were able to travel all the way to Moonglade.
Eta was 33 by the time she and Krogh made it to Moonglade, and it would be the age at which she would suffer another separation. She knew that as a Shaman, she had no place in the Cenarion Circle. She stayed by Krogh’s side because she wanted to see him reach his goal safely. She said her goodbyes to Krogh, but he wasn’t ready to let her take the journey back through the forested land alone; he persuaded another druid to lead her through so that she wouldn’t be alone and vulnerable to attacks. Upon departure, Krogh said to her, “Do not worry, though you will journey on without me, we will meet sometime again.”
When Eta and the druid were travelling back through Ashenvale, they happened upon a mysterious looking Tauren. He was alone, seated in front of a small fire that danced rapidly. Not only was the fire unsettling, but his eyes were bright blue and his fur was pure white; they thought that he was a spirit. However, upon making introductions with him, they found out that he wasn’t a spirit, but a spirit walker who called himself Pashu. When the Druid asked him why he was all the way out in Ashenvale, Pashu said that a spirit overcame him and led him into the forest. Tired, and interested, they stayed the night with the Pashu, and listened to his stories. Fascinated with the Pashu and his tales, Eta pleaded to journey with him because she thought that she could learn many things from him as a Shaman. Pashu turned her down at first because he was afraid that his behavior and possessions would put her in danger. Eta asserted that this didn’t matter to her, and that if anything it would bring her to a closer connection with the spirits. Though ambivalent, Pashu accepted.
The druid left her with him, and returned to Moonglade. Eta would travel Kalimdor with Pashu for years, facing the constant dangers that Pashu warned her about. Despite the dangers, and the anxiety that came with the constant changes in Pashu, Eta persevered and even made the best of the situation, documenting the spirits that Pashu would connect with and making new discoveries about the history of her race. With his guidance, she was able to hone the use of natural magic and interpret the will of the elements better than before.
After three years of being with Pashu, he fell into a constant state of despair, and so did Eta. The reason that Eta often suffered in her thoughts is because she felt at a loss; Krogh died from illness a few years after their separation, and Eta was informed about the death of a Tauren nearly a year after it happened. She tried not to let it distract her from her training, but the thought always haunted her. At the time, a malicious spirit lingered with Pashu, and this spirit would often drive him to hurt other people, with Eta often becoming the target. Eta, strong and survivalist, was about to endure the violence that Pashu’s possessions inflicted, and helped him keep his identity and spirit in tact through the process.
Eventually, the two would fall into a closer, more intimate relationship. But because he was a Spirit Walker, the Pashu that Eta loved was often absent and replaced by another spirit. Only a few years older than Eta, Pashu was quite young for a Spirit Walker and often had trouble with his gift. As their love grew, Eta became overwhelmed with vivid and disturbing dreams. A dream where she was a warrior fighting his last battle against a large band of Centaur haunted her every night, and because of this dream she developed a fear of Centaur stronger than the one she already had. Unhappily, Pashu could tell that Eta was developing the same gift that he developed when he was young: the ability to channel the thoughts of spirits and learn from them.
Seeing that he was raised for a long time as a Shaman and that he himself was a Spirit Walker, Pashu felt that he was a suitable instructor for the aspirant Eta. Though he was unhappy about this because he felt uncomfortable with the experiences he struggled with as a Spirit Walker, Eta was excited to find out that she had the same gift, and thought that the spirits guided her to Pashu because he would become both a lover and an accomplished Shaman who would teach her all he knew. As she learned to become a vessel for the spirits to take a hold of, she felt overwhelmed with both joy and grief because she felt the connection to her people that she missed out on for most of her life. More importantly, as Pashu taught her how to carry the weight of the spirits, and as Eta learned to keep on her two hooves as she did, their love grew stronger.
Pashu made what he considered a mistake by accompanying Eta to a site of ancestral interest to further pursue the path of a Spirit Walker. The mistake, Pashu considered, was that Eta should have been accompanied by somebody who was only a Shaman and not another Spirit Walker such as himself. The site of ancestral interest was a mass burial site of a tribe that fought to the death to take Mulgore back from the Centaur, and it was there where their love would fall apart due to disassociation. Though Pashu taught her the abilities and spells that she needed to know in order to accept her gift, both were often taken hold of by the many spirits that lingered on that burial site. Pashu in particular felt that the bond between them was falling away as Eta was losing bits of her identity here and there by becoming a Spirit Walker, which is something that had already been happening to himself. After a few weeks, Pashu fell into such despair that, when possessed by an unbearable spirit, he took his own life as Eta slept.
With Eta’s awakening came devastation. Though she became strong and fit as a newly awakened Spirit Walker, the loss of her love made it harder to bear the countless souls. She buried Pashu on that site, where many of her people had already been buried, and walked on, carrying the weight of Pashu on her back as well.
She wandered alone for years, until the third war began and the land began to change dramatically with the development of the Horde. She struggled her way across the Barrens, looking for work. Being a Spirit Walker was already her job, but she had no tribe to fall back on, and felt absolutely alone. She made good friends with the Orcs, who respected her because she was a Shaman. The Horde gave her a job to help carry supplies around Kalimdor, which allowed her to travel as a Spirit Walker does. During that time, she relocated Itoh and found him lying in a bed waiting for an illness to inevitably kill him. She would have a conversation with him about their separation, the fate of Krogh and of herself, all of the reasons behind the anger, and both would forgive each other by the end of the talk. Not long after that happened, Itoh died.
Eventually, she would lose her job with the Horde because she attended to her duties as a Spirit Walker and wandered away from her job of transferring supplies. Eta made up her mind that what she needed in order to survive was a mate. She needed somebody to depend on, and since she was the last remaining member of her tribe, she needed to carry on its legacy. Not long after she made that her goal, she found Malar Brokenhorn. The two would have a son, to whom she now dedicates most of her time to raising. She named him Pashu in honor of her fallen mentor, a secret she keeps from her mate.
Skills and Abilities
Eta learned the skills of a wilderness stalker from Itoh when she was just a young calf, and learned her tribal history from Krogh. With the help of Pashu, not only she was able to learn how to safely use the elements and a number of nature spells, but she also received training as a Spirit Walker, though the skills of a Spirit Walker are far from mastered. Eta has a particular talent when it comes to keeping track of a large amount of knowledge, especially when it comes to the history of the land and of her people. With the knowledge she has, she makes judgments on what direction the Brokenhorn Tribe should take next.
