Esnarril Softart

Esnarril Softart is a high elf mage in the Mürekkep ve Çelik ("Ink and Steel") campaign who keeps the Starsong shop in Akşelale. He wears the white and blue robe of his school, whose embroidery at wrist and collar marks him as a master, and he speaks for the Starsong academy, whose teachers make the goods he sells. When Castor introduced himself, Esnarril said he had heard the name and nothing bad of it.^{1 2 3}

The shop

The shop is a large building of dark wood bearing the symbol of Melas. It is clean and quiet; a small bell rings at the door. Ordinary books stand in locked glass cases, and rare spellbooks lie behind a metal grille on the counter. The goods belong to the school, not to Esnarril.^{1 4 5}

Esnarril's companion is Ruby, a small red pseudodragon that rests on a stand and climbs onto his shoulder; it shares its curiosity and delight with those nearby without words. Esnarril calls Ruby his best friend in the world.^{4 6}

The shop also sells the books of the Starsong teachers: one that trades places with a decoy copy on a word of command, one that can change into another object to hide, one that cannot be destroyed, and one that only its owner can see.^{7 8}

Dealings with Castor

Castor brought a set of volumes to show him. Esnarril studied them through enchanted spectacles and wished to buy them, saying they treated a dark and rare subject, but Castor would not sell. When Castor showed him a second dark book, a gift from the witch hunter Gregor of the Blue Fortress, Esnarril refused to have it in or near his shop: eyes that studied it for centuries, he feared, might find hidden rituals in it and bring danger to his people. Castor thought of leaving it one day to the Starsong library, which Esnarril agreed would be safer.^{9 10 11 12}

Instead of a loan, Esnarril offered Castor two books from the shop and the unhatched sibling of Ruby, in return for Castor's personal belongings passing to Starsong at his death. The bargain, an elven custom called Trade Among Friends, was signed that evening and is described in Castor's estate contract. The egg later hatched as Vaden.^{13 14}

He also showed Castor two works on Aquaron and the sea, among them a rare manuscript called the Eye of Aquaron, and gave him directions to the house of Oladin Silvertide, a Starsong teacher of sea and storm magic.^{15 16 17}

The search for Glamrin

When Castor told him that Starseeker Glamrin was missing, Esnarril, who counted Glamrin a close friend, offered to come and search himself. He locked the shop with his staff, sheltered Glanfall and Bobo inside it, and rode out behind Castor.^{5 18}

His first spells of finding near the cave showed nothing within range. After the party moved on a little, he cast again and found Glamrin alive nearby, wounded by an arrow. Esnarril carried him back on horseback and advised the temple of Amarath, where the priest Marcus could help, as the nearest place of healing.^{19 20 21 22}

Witness in Akşelale

Esnarril corrected the party on the cannon fire on the townsfolk: it had happened about three months earlier, not weeks. He said that Captain Wilhelm had led the first inquiry and withdrawn shortly before the party arrived, and that the Justicar Alcarin Nova had come about a week after that.^{23 24}

He knew the Black Stain, a thieves' guild of the province, because its men had come to demand protection money. He had never paid; he warded his windows with magic and relied on the shop being the academy's property. He could not prove that the guild had killed a debt-ridden drunkard three years earlier, and he warned that the Silver River inn was not beyond its reach. He offered to introduce the party to Lene, a butcher who had been at the protest.^{25 26 27 28}

On Castor's last visit, Esnarril sold him a spellbook once scorched by a dragon for Luke. He said he was sorry he would receive Castor's books at his death, since he did not wish him to die, and told him to beware of storms.^{29 30}