Editing Isandre (section)

=Notes=
Dolwyn Isandre Halysii

'''Halys''' is one of the Sapthetian city states, the smallest and Southernmost in the alliance. Famed for it’s rushing mountain fed rivers, metals and woods, Halys has a predominantly old Sirdahaar population in the Highlands, the great forests that stretch through the foothills and valleys of the inland producing small concentrations of well populated valleys or rivers and great stretches of thinly settled woodlands. The old tribes refer to themselves as the '''Forest Towns''' and have clan and cultural allegiances that stretch across the borders of all four states, leaving the ‘watersiders’ to their politics. Religious practices go on alongside ‘the old ways’, an animistic faith that predates the church, but is steeped in old geomantic and gematric traditions.  

Dolwyn grew up in '''Ithilom''', a trade centre on the '''Illfit river'''. Her father was a whitesmith, an assayer for the miners that plied the valley streams. She was third born  of three girls and was a difficult birth, small and her mother was unable to bear children afterward. Her family life was a good one, however and she grew up happy and quick of mind. She made friends of all the local girls and was their ringleader, as there was always a touch of magic about her ideas and adventures. 

When she was twelve, she was trampled by a panicked carthorse. Dolwyn survived it and the fever that came after, but her body was never right again. Her spine healed twisted and she lost partial use of her left arm and leg. Ashamed and broken, she retreated from the world to her room, rarely leaving the house.

But news travels in the forest towns, and the next spring a man came who claimed he could help, as the others had all claimed. This one however, asked nothing but to speak with Dolwyn alone for a time. She agreed, stirred to interest by something about the wizened old Sird.

Dolwyn’s life changed again that day. The man was '''Kreis the Felden''', a follower of the '''Old Way''' and Healer-mage of some small power. He took her to apprentice and taught her the ways of the inner spirit and outer form along with his mundane healing skills. Slowly, over time, Dolwyn learned to heal herself from within, awakening a slow end to her condition and a call to the power of magic. Now, at 23 years of age and a known wandering healer, Dolwyn is welcome at most doors for her abilities and
Powers. She lives a seemingly carefree existence

'''The Old Way''' teaches that the world was and is filled with the spirits of all things in an endless cycle of transformation and rebirth and is the best teacher as it contains all. Spirits also have degrees and forms and these are captured by the Order in glyphs and shapes, mandala like patterns that are reflected in the forms of things. Old magic relies on the finding or crafting of things that reflect the spirit-shape of a spells effect. Words are seen merely as another form of capturing the spiritshape of a magic. The Order is illiterate but its members have highly trained memories, especially for visual or imagined forms. Crystals, geometric forms, gematria and sacred shapes are important as foci for spells and methods of passing them on.