The mirari- pronounced meer-AYR-ee, with the Primal name simply meaning "seas"- are strange to many of their surface-dwelling kin as well as other intelligent creatures of the seas. They adapted to the water so long ago that most of them do not even believe that other Elwens exist above the waves. At the same time, some Elwen traits have remained strong and stubborn in them.
Come among them, if you will- the sea Elwens, the Children of the Shark.
PHYSICAL MAKEUP
Mirari are unlike other Elwens in having scales rather than normal skin of some type (though the umbiri and retici, both reptillian shapeshifters, have scales beneath their skin). These scales are usually blue-green, or some shade thereof, usually ranging from deep sapphire to a very pale light green. These scales are scallop-shaped and overlap to provide a kind of rudimentary armor, though the teeth of most sea creatures can still cut through them. They also make a mirari very hard to see when swimming in the open ocean.
Sea Elwens also are adapted for the sea in having webs that they can fold back on their hands and feet (in Elwen form; see below for details on their shapeshifting magic); in possessing systems that let them resist the crushing pressure of the intense sea depths; and in having gill slits on their necks, like those of sharks, as well as lungs. They also still possess body hair on their heads, which is usually kept short so as not to interfere with swimming, and is often some shade of purple or green. Why mirari retain these things is a puzzle, since the magic that adapted them, and the passage of time since, would suggest the loss of both hair and lungs, which they almost never use. But they have remained instead. Some suggest that the initial magic of the seastones (see below) was not powerful enough to change the mirari all the way into sea-dwelling creatures, or perhaps was too powerful to be overcome by later adaptations.
Mirari have large, diamond-shaped eyes in Elwen form, one of twenty shades of a species of fish that shoals near where they live every spring. These colors run in a twenty-year cycle, and a sea Elwen born in the year of a particular shade will always have eyes that hue; thus, for example, a year of blue fish will result in blue eyes for all the children born that year.
Mirari are shorter than most of their land-dwelling kin, about 4'11" to 5'6" usually, though taller is not unknown, and their build is more slender; they weigh about 90 to 120 pounds generally. They have silver blood, which clots very quickly since a wound that continues to bleed in the sea will summon predators. They live about twenty thousand years unless the violence in the sea kills them early; their oldest members are revered as Living Ones, and often govern the mirari communities.
EMOTIONAL MAKEUP
Mirari have a much less complex society than those above the waves, at least superficially. They may appear so occupied with safety that have no time for play. All sea Elwens are expected to join in the patrols that defend the Schools, to serve the Living Ones, and to help care for the children, as well as take additional measures that will defend their people and prevent the attacks of their numerous predators.
They are deeply loyal to each other, but any individual sea Elwen will hold the ideal of service to the community as a whole higher than the idea of service to a family, Living One, or smaller entity. Individual attachments that would preclude the protection and defense of others are not encouraged. As well, the remaining of those who would detract from the community's safety is not encouraged. Those who are troublesome and refuse to stop being unnecessarily selfish or aggressive will be exiled. Those who cannot defend the School, or are a drain on its resources, such as the chronically ill or deformed, are likely to be abandoned or exiled. Children with visible birth defects are usually smothered.
This does not mean that mirari abandon every other mirari who suffers from a wound or disease. On the contrary, since the main purpose of the School is defense against the constant violence of the sea, those who are hurt or sicken in the defense of it are honored and given every evidence of tender and loving care. It is when a wound or sickness cannot be cured that the merciless logic of common defense enters into play. Quite often, someone who knows that others will be drained trying to defend or take care of him or her will volunteer to swim out into the middle of the ocean and die, an action for which he or she will be considered noble, and honored.
In those matters that do not relate to the common defense, the mirari are much as other Elwens. Notable is the idea of bylona, which holds that an individual's mind is his or her absolute personal property. Schools do not (unless aberrant, or far short of the sea Elwen ideal) attempt to regulate what their members may think, only what they may do. Someone can think that the School is an abomination and everyone around her should die, or that he would like to rape children, as long as he or she keeps the beliefs firmly in the context of thoughts and words. Any action taken that harms others will be punished, unless the individual is willing to go into exile, but a sea Elwen's mind and beliefs are that sea Elwen's business and property, and cannot be violated.
As might be expected, the idea of bylona insures that the sea Elwens do not take offensive easily, tend to think for themselves, and are not usually religious.
MAGICAL MAKEUP
The sea Elwens possess powerful, but not particularly varied, magic, one reason that they tend to rely on their communities to defend them, rather than their individual magic as surface Elwens do.
Common to all sea Elwens are:
Shark kinship. Most mirari instinctively find sharks- and their relatives, the skates, rays, and barracudas- admirable and understandable. They can feel vibrations and smell blood in the same way that sharks can, even when not in that form, and sharks will not usually attack them unless in the middle of a blood frenzy.
Shapeshifting. All mirari can transform into great white sharks, larger or smaller depending on their larger or smaller Elwen form. In such forms, they are susceptible to feeding frenzy if they smell blood, but they retain their intelligence most of the time and are able to cooperate with each other. It is in shark form that most Patrols are run.
Shocking. All mirari are able to cause an electric shock, similar to that of an electric eel, in those they touch. This does not usually kill opponents above a certain size, and mirari are not able to repeat it for nearly a full day after they do it, meaning that this usually functions to allow a sea Elwen to flee (and come back with help).
Congealing the water. This can be used, with intense concentration, to solidify water like ice around a large attacker, such as an orcan whale, and keep it from moving. Many Children of the Shark have at least one member in each Patrol who can do this with great efficiency, and who holds the dangerous predator captive while the others, in shark form, come from every side.
Divided by gender are:
Ella illusions. Female sea Elwens can use starlight on water to create illusions, silvery in color but otherwise very realistic. These can be used to bedazzle and confuse predators, and also to cover an escape.
Fences. Male mirari create static fences of an energy similar to electricity in the water surrounding a School. These are permanent, and so are rarely used for individual defense.
Young sea Elwens of both sexes come into their gender-specific gifts shortly after their twentieth birthday.
ORIGINS AND MODERN SETTLEMENTS
Sea Elwens retain few legends of their creation and existence above the waves, though they still at times sing to the stars when surfacing at night. The wise among them, however, know that they were at one time suenluvitai or holly Elwens, perhaps the earliest of all the races of Arcadia to take to the sea. They were fascinated with the waves, and found seastones, magical gems that transformed them into sea Elwens using their own love of the ocean. The new mirari made a short attempt to continue living above the waves with their kin, but their new need for the water was too strong. Now, few sea Elwens save those who dwell very near to shore remember their ancient kinship with the suenluvitai.
Mirari Schools are scattered throughout the seas around Arcadia and other Shadeemiran continents. However, these are the most powerful (and most generally known to surface-dwellers):
Aerielillo. This sea Elwen "city" (rather, a permanent School who has found a natural coral enclosure and so does not need to migrate within a wide territory as most Schools do) is located in the waters of Silverbright Bay, to the south of the province of Lillomar. Since they were not hurt (as were the Elwens of the land) by the humans, they have been willing to help the round-eyes learn the crafts of boat-building and fishing. There is little contact that is not formal between the communities, though, since the humans distrust the mirari magic and the sea Elwens do not understand the humans' distrust.
Holdon. Another "city" in the Silverbright. This is further from shore than Aerielillo, and thus they often pass pearls and rare fish as trade goods through their cousins rather than coming to shore themselves. They are sometimes said to be researching seastones and trying to understand their magic so as to turn more surface-dwellers into mirari, but few believe these rumors.
Alembic. Another "city" in the Bay of Horallis, actually a mirari dwelling around a sunken city there. These sea Elwens are more open about believing that the destiny of every land-dweller is to come to the waves, and they have little to do with those Cytherians who do not agree with them.
There are, of course, countless Children of the Shark dwelling in the open seas.
LANGUAGES
The languages of the mirari can be said to be Varmian in descent, coming as they do from the language of the suenluvita country of Varmiable still called that, but they have changed enormously. They still consist of sounds, but these are often accompanied by gestures and sometimes emphatic opening and closing of the gill slits. Primal and some other surface-dweller tongues have influence the tongue of those sea Elwens who dwell near shore.
The two main tongues known today are:
Beleini. This is the tongue of Silverbright Bay, and is considerably harsher than the Varmia that birthed it. It has strong Primal influence (as can be seen from the naming of one city "Aerielillo") and has abandoned word ordering in favor of inflection, at least when spoken at long distances. When speaking face to face, some sea Elwens adopt positions and gestures to convey meaning, some others use word order, and still others use a system of inflections that refer to positions in the ocean.
Miran. This is the name of the mirari language of the open seas- or, at least, the name that the sea Elwens of Alembic give it. Whether all Schools speak the same language, whether there are many different dialects, or whether "Miran" covers a wide divergence of languages is not known, since few surface-dwelling Linguists have studied it, and the Alembic mirari will not tell what they know. Their language is extremely conservative, very word-ordered like Varmia, though even softer in the matter of phonemes.
More to come.
