Shrikes

Introduction
Shrikes are a distinct, pillar-touched elven subspecies created as a result of an eldritch ritual conducted by the iron elf Evdokim Nusakan, later the Prince of Preservation.

Physical description
In appearance, shrikes reside in the uncanny valley for baseline elves, humans, and orcs. Their proportions are subtly different from elven standard and their coloration tends more toward UV and grayscale with occasional splashes of bright color on males. Their eyes have black sclera, with solid color irises devoid of pupils. They do not have visible talons, and their plumage is hair-like down found exclusively on their heads, leaving their overlarge ears bare. They have pronounced lower-jaw fangs that approach orcish tusks in length.

Shrikes are known to assume monstrous forms under great duress or when raised as undead; these "wilding" shapes are larger than a shrike's normal form, covered in feathers that seem to absorb light regardless of color, and sport a large number of insectile eyes on both their feathers and flesh. Viewing a shrike in this shape, especially if the viewer meets the shrike's eyes, can result in immediate madness. Shrikes are far more susceptible to this effect than other species, including other elves, leading to chain reactions of mass psychosis if one shrike in a group goes wilding.

Most non-shrikes are unaware that this transformation is not an alternate form, but the result of a shrike "flattening" her entire four-dimensional body into only three dimensions. Doing so disconnects her mentally from reality, rendering wilding effectively a tactic of last resort.

High-dimensional forms
In addition to being vehicles for low-grade eldritch corruption of the surrounding world, shrikes exist in a fourth dimension of space. They can see "inside" purely three-dimensional objects and maneuver freely in an additional spacial direction, appearing able to walk through walls or manipulate items in closed containers without damaging the containers, among other feats. A significant portion of their bodies actually exists within this space, invisible to species who can only see three dimensions. [discussion of banners goes here]

The more a shrike makes active use of her high-dimensional nature--stepping through walls, manipulating objects in closed containers, reaching inside others' bodies--the higher the risk of her disconnecting from Nephele's reality entirely. [move section in culture up to here on disconnection from reality, wilding, etcetera]

Reproduction
In addition to having radically altered appearances, shrikes are much shorter-lived and vastly more fertile than standard elves. They are also ovoviviparous, giving birth to altricial young. Unlike every other species on Nephele, shrikes are completely cross-fertile with any other sapient. The species of the child, as well as a couple's chances of conceiving, are dependent on the mother's species.

Cultural adaptations to pillar corruption
A major consequence of shrikes' unearthly nature is supernatural mental instability. All shrikes are at some baseline risk of disconnecting from Nephele's reality entirely, becoming unable to recognize the world around them. While this may in some aspects resemble organic psychotic disorders (affected shrikes commonly experience hallucinations, depersonalization, derealization, and paranoia), it is not biological in origin; it is a consequence of being part of two conflicting realities which ordinarily cannot exist together. The sudden frightful violence fully disconnected shrikes fly into--"wilding"--is entirely a product of their connection to the pillar of Salt and Sorrow and its (presumed) hostility toward all of Nephele.

Gender roles
As with other elven societies, shrikes are matrilineal and matriarchal. Both women and men are expected to participate in warfare, hunting, child-rearing, and sundry other civic duties, though the roles they play in these activities are strongly gendered.

Names
shrikes won't give you their names when asked and that's RUDE

(it's a two-fold adaptation to the pillar stuff: 1. pillars come when called strongly enough and THEY might be able to notice their own names being invoked, and be summoned to the unwise speaker... is this really a thing? [almost surely not], 2. a characteristic feature of shrike hallucinations is people they don't know addressing them as if they were friends or family; hiding their given names until they know people extremely well protects them from mistaking someone they haven't met, who is real, for a hallucinatory episode

and it has a nice bonus: it keeps them relatively anonymous and difficult to pin down, as mercenaries!

incl notions of use-name, brother-name, barracks-name, love-name, with examples

also they have generic sigils if they ever need to sign something -- eye (of eye color) over feather (of out-feather color))

Inheritance, lines, and marriages
Inheritance among shrikes is matrilineal and bastardy doesn't exist as a concept with shrike children. Children are born into their mothers' line and inherit her line-name, as well as her relative rank within the line and any duties inhering thereto. The only case where a child's line might not be recognized is if her mother dies prior to naming her or informing any other shrike of her existence.

Half-shrikes--children born to a mother of another species, with a shrike father--are a more complicated case culturally. [...] Some half-shrikes may be adopted into, and live as members of, shrike lines, though the social status of non-elven half-shrikes is somewhat tenuous owing to their very short lives.

Shrikes recognize two forms of marriage: Line-founding marriages and hand-fasting. Hand-fasting is a pledge of sexual and emotional exclusivity between (usually) two shrikes, though larger groups may hand-fast to each other. It is not restricted by the sex of the individuals involved, though opposite-sex pairs (or groups with at least one of each sex) are also expected to only have children with each other; this is less an expectation of reproductive control and more that the parties involved keep their oaths to each other. Hand-fasted shrikes remain in their mothers' lines, and children born to hand-fasted shrikes are part of their mothers' lines.

Line-founding marriages take place between two or more shrikes intending to create a new line, and must include at least one female shrike to be the line's matriarch. Line-founding marriages are not exclusive, and shrikes in one may be hand-fasted to individuals outside it. In this sense, they also serve as an adoption ceremony, forming the core of the new line's extended family from unrelated individuals.

Child-rearing
Marriage is not a pre-requisite to family formation among shrikes, though the widespread (and heavily socially encouraged) use of shrivethorn as a form of subcutaneous birth control among men means even unmarried couples rarely have children they aren't deliberately trying to have. Pairs with children are expected to stay together and parent their children until the age of sub-adult majority, between 16-18. Societal expectations of parents during child-rearing vary with the age of the children. During the first couple of years of life, parents are supported by the surrounding community and expected to devote themselves almost entirely to their children, though they may assume other duties during dire emergencies. As children age and become more independent, their parents gradually resume more of their previous duties.

Shrikes currently raising children adopt different styles of dress that they change progressively as their children grow. New parents go heavily veiled and wear clothing that conceals their out-selves, then gradually reduce the amount of clothing and wear lighter veils as their children age. This "anti-mourning" serves two purposes: First and most practically, it protects children from out-eye contact with their parents and vice versa while they're still learning how to control their gazes. (Shrike children do not develop out-eyes until they fledge; infants are born completely featherless, and don't begin growing feathers until their second week of life.) Second, it gives other members of the community an idea of where couples are in the child-rearing process, and therefore how much assistance they might need and how much work they can reasonably asked to do.

Shrikes elsewhere

 * Isle of Joy


 * Domitianic Empire

Princes

 * Evdokim Nusakan, the Prince of Preservation

Others

 * Esfir Daughter-of-the-Bier, Volkhv
 * Illarion Albireo, Knight-Captain of the Knights Pariah, former Warlord