Vitae

Appearance & Anatomy
Vitaen are always female, there is no special cases or circumstances to get around that. When a Vitaen throws a sapling it is always female. A full grown Vitae can stand anywhere from four foot five inches high to five foot five inches high. They are humanoid in appearance, bipedal with two arms two legs. They have the same outward appearance with a few differences to humans. their skin is similar to their bark, in color and somewhat in texture though they are softer then their tree's bark.

They have eyes of various shades of green or brown, never any blues or hazels are seen. Their hair is not hair, but leaves that are dictated by their tree. If the Vitae tree is an Oak then her hair will consist of three pointed oak leaves, if its a pine tree then her hair would be pine needles.

While a Vitae might look approximately human on the outside -discounting her bark skin and leafy hair- she really is not. She has no lungs no heart. Instead she breathes through her hair, and tiny root like cilia on the bottom of her feet allow her to draw nutrients through the ground and through her body. While she has normal sexual organs on the outside, inside there is no womb. The few times a Vitae has been cut open it is much like looking in their tree, one can see their age in the rings in their bodies. They are solid creatures that 'bleed' sap.

Vitae live for a various lengths of time, they live as long as their tree does. So those whose tree is a long lived tree has the potential to live thousands of years. Those whose trees are shorter term trees such as dogwood have a very shortened life span. One can harm a Vitae, cause her great pain but limbs grow back if chopped off and there is no way to kill her outside of killing her tree. In the past, during times of war the Vitae -mostly a peaceful race- were never entrusted with secrets for it was considered too easy for them to be tortured for information since there was no risk of the torturer going too far and killing her.

Reproduction
Being all female the Vitaen must reach outside of their numbers for what they call Pollinators. When a female Vitae goes into a breeding season then she produces a spore that causes males near her to go into a stupor. She then picks the male that she feels she wants to pollinate her seeds and brings him back to the true Aroboa. There he is kept in the lap of luxury, always near the fertile Vitae so he never leaves the euphoric stupor that he is in. In this state the men are easily managed and any female can order him to do anything and he gains extreme physical pleasure from performing it. It is through this that the Vitae has him pollinate her seed. Once the seed has taken root the Vitae then returns to her normal state and no longer emits the stupor-inducing spores and leads the bewildered man out of the forest.

Once the seed has taken root the mother Vitae nurtures it and cares for it. After several years it will sprout and in about fifty year it will produce what is a sac at its first branches. Over two years this sac will grow and grow until it bursts. Once it bursts a new Vitae is born, so in most cases the 'father' is long dead before his daughter is even born. This is why the Vitaen feel justified in taking the male seed to pollinate and then removing them from Aroboa because with the exception of perhaps a few races most would never know their Vitaen Children.

History
The Vitaen are tree people, their city of Aroboa is a magnificent tree city. It is considered the densest forest in the world but it is also fiercely guarded. For the Vitae are only vulnerable through their trees. Each Vitae is tied to a single tree, that she nurtures and cares for. the only way to kill a Vitae is to kill her tree. This is the reason Vitaen only allow themselves and their Pollinators entrance. Even dignitaries from other cities and races are met in a lavish area of normal trees cultivated to be as close to Aroboa as possible rather then in the home of the Vitae.

Childhood
Since Vitae sprout, and spend a good fifty years in the pod on their tree as their tree grows, Vitae are "born" from the pod with a general knowledge of their surroundings for they still learn from within the Pod. Much like animals, they walk within hours of podding, and it is mere days that they are able to care for themselves. However they are not allowed to leave Aroboa until their first Letitia period.

Clothing
The Vitae are naturalistic, however they are obsessed with trinkets. One of their major flaws are they are incorrigible hoarders. They have no monetary system, but they do barter. They accept outsider coins if they are pretty enough, and often times outsiders can get a great bargain if they bring something pretty enough but worthless. The Vitae love pretty things, so they might trade a handful of diamonds for a nicely cut piece of ground glass if they thought the glass was prettier then the diamonds. So it is not uncommon to see a Vitae with no clothing on but covered in trinkets. They hang baubles from their leaves, arms and fingers. When they are out in the outside world for whatever reason they still prefer to barter but because they do trade for real coin they generally have enough to make it in a monetary driven world, but they frown on it as being illogical.

They also try to respect the customs of outsiders, so to keep from shocking the locals, Vitae do wear clothing if it is required outside of Aroboa. When they are forced to they will wear the least amount as possible because they feel it just as silly to dress themselves in frilly dresses as to dress their trees in such.

They never wear shoes because of their need for soil.

Hierarchy
The Vitaen are ruled by age. The oldest living Vitae is the one who is queen. When her tree passes then the next oldest takes the throne. This is because the Vitae cherish wisdom that comes from living so feel that only those who lived the longest are capable of leading.

Rites of Passage: Letitia
When a Vitae goes into Letitia for the first time she is then considered an adult. Letitia is the state that vitaen go into when they become fertile. It is marked by a changing of the color of the leaves that make up her hair. Instead of being greens and mossy coloring they become bright reds, yellows, and oranges. Any males who come within a few feet of a Vitae in Letitia becomes a thrall to her.

Since Vitaen so rarely go into Letitia, any Letitia period is a period of celebration, however the first is particularly special and often is preceded with a celebration that all of Aroboa participates in. Until the first Letitia the Vitae are not allowed to leave the borders of true Aroboa. The first Letitia demands that the Vitae feast for a week before leaving Aroboa forest and returning with her own male enthralled to be her pollinator by herself.

After the first Letitia all subsequent Letitia are treated just as respectfully but can be done in groups. All Pollinators are brought to Aroboa where pollination occurs. There has never been a Vitae who pollinated a tree outside of Aroboa.

Food and Cuisine
Vitae don't eat like humans do. They eat like plants. They have cilia that line the bottoms of their feet that sucks nutrients from the soil just like their trees. They also use photosynthesis to process the light into food for themselves. They can ingest small amounts of food but it harms them. Small amounts will make them perhaps feel a little sluggish. Large amounts will make them near comatose, and excessive amounts will put them -and their tree in Aroboa- into a state where they could die. This is because they do not have a digestive system, and the food sits and rots inside of them. In small amounts their body can secrete the toxins but in large doses it is much like poison. They are able to drink things however, though again they prefer to do so through the roots on their feet but if they are in 'mixed' company they can drink through their mouths as to keep the discomfort level down.

They do understand that their male thralls need to eat so the Pollination hut is supplied with a stove, icebox and is stocked whenever there is a Pollinator present. However the Pollinator is generally the one who cooks for himself, but the Vitae pamper and take care of their Pollinators so as long as it is vegetarian they will do what they can to make sure they have all the fixings that they want for their favorite dishes.

Education
Once they have reached one hundred years of age after podding, the Vitae are then inducted into one of two guilds. The god Gaug is the head of the guild Decadier, and his lover the goddess Auta is the head of the guild Durata. Every Vitae is tested in her hundredth year to see where her talents lie. Those who have a talent toward mastery of growth and renewal join the Durata Guild. Those who have a talent for the Mastery of decay and recycling join the Decadier.

Unlike other places these two guilds do not war, compete or in any way rival each other. In fact they do the opposite. They are in true balance for the Vitaen and their god and goddess knows that one can not have life without death, or death without life.

The Durata learn to master the innate talents to encourage things to grow. This is not magic in the truest sense since no one can learn how to do this. You either have the ability or not. There have only been four non-Vitae Durata members and all four of those have been legendary heros in ages past. It has been well over a thousand years since the last non-vitae graced the ranks of Durata. Those who have been accepted within the halls of Durata are given a special crystal that is goddess-touched. This crystal does nothing but gives the wearer the feeling of the presence of Auta. Many outsiders welcome the crystal-bearers for they are seen as life givers, though they really do not create life. they only encourage the seeds within the ground to take root.

The Decadier are the balance of the Durata and their head is the god Gaug. The Decadier learn to master the innate talent of decay and recycling. They encourage organic matter to decompose and can often times ensure that the decomposed material retains the maximum amount of nutrients. People do not understand that when a Durata visits, the plants she encourages to grow can only grow so big without the nutrients within the soil. It is the Decadier that ensure those nutrients are within the soil. The decadier can be identified by the lump of obsidian that each wears. Unlike the Durata the Obsidian-bearers are not always welcomed for they are seen as the carriers of death by the uneducated.

Other
The Vitae take the long view approach. Since the vast majority of them will outlive most living things they tend to not worry so much about the present. Instead they make decisions based on future impacts rather then the now. they are also notoriously slow to come to a decision. It is not unusual for a council to come to the queen with a petition and ten years later still be waiting patiently. They are extremely hard to agitate because of this. There is very little that one can do that the Vitaen wouldn't find a way to unravel it in the future. The one and only time the Vitae has gone to war was when a human settlement relentlessly logged the outer forests of their mock Aroboa.

The Vitae consider Humans to be very rash and unpredictable race. They make decisions based on emotions rather then logic, and because of their very short lifespans must make very rapid decisions. the Vitae on the other hand take years, decades even to decide even such things as what color roses to plant at the base of the Royal tree. It takes them centuries to make decisions that might make a large change. It is for this reason that the Vitae has ended up being seated on the sidelines during the major conflicts of the world because they take the long view.

Magic
The Vitaen are only adept in one branch of magics. The magics of the forest. They are entrusted in the care of plants and trees. They can induce growth, they can also induce decay for decay feeds the plants of the forest.