The Sisters of Anwyn
High Priestess Lusara Elmare
The Sisters of Anwyn are spiritually led by the High Priestess Lusara Elmare, unsurprisingly a female half-Elven cleric. She was raised by the Temple of Ehlonna and has always known and loved the teachings of the Goddess. Lusara spent many years as an adventuring cleric of Ehlonna before finally settling in the Anwyn Woods to care for the Goddess's local followers. As befits a priestess of fertility and new life, Lusara has four children, two of whom were conceived during holy rites and are said to be especially blessed by Ehlonna. She also has several foster children whom she cares for, while acting as a shepherd to the numerous followers of the Goddess in and around the Golden Woods. Lusara and her family live beside the Sacred Grove of Ehlonna, where the high holy days of the Goddess are always enthusiastically celebrated. Lusara tends particularly towards the motherly and fertility aspects of the faith, overseeing births, marriages, blessings, seasonal festivals and the care of children and families.
Lusara is close to Dîmeril Laeghartha, though she does not follow Dîmeril's path of the unicorn and does not entirely approve of it. Lusara regards love, marriage, motherhood and the bearing of children as sacred expressions of Ehlonna's gift of life, and consequently finds the chastity traditionally expected of Unicorn Riders rather strange, perhaps even contrary to the natural order. Despite this disagreement, she respects Dîmeril greatly, and the two women remain close friends and allies. Lusara's husband is Jonas Tetch, a quarter-Elven man with whom she once adventured. He eventually settled with her in the Anwyn Woods and is now a respected bowyer as well as a devoted husband and father. Their children are Elara, the eldest, responsible and already showing signs of becoming a priestess; Caelen, an energetic son more interested in his father's bowcraft than religion; Liriel, a daughter and one of the two children conceived during Ehlonna's holy rites and considered especially blessed; and Tarian, the youngest, who was likewise conceived during the Spring Fires and is regarded as blessed by the Goddess.
Lusara is approaching middle age but remains vigorous and active. She is a comley half-Elven woman with long, thick brown hair, brown-green eyes and the weathered complexion of one who has spent much of her life outdoors. Warm and maternal by nature, she nevertheless retains something of the hardened adventurer she once was. Lusara favours practical woodland clothing rather than priestly robes and is rarely seen without her staff, herbs and the small holy tokens of Ehlonna.
Lusara and Dîmeril embody two quite different interpretations of the same faith. Lusara follows the path of hearth, family, fertility and new life, while Dîmeril follows the path of the unicorn, chastity, guardianship and martial service. Neither path is considered contrary to the teachings of Ehlonna, though the followers of each occasionally disagree over which better reflects the will of the Goddess