Nel

Nel
Fan art of Nel (cropped from a larger image), by Taylor Weltzer.
Type	NPC
Actor	Matthew Mercer
Character Information
Creature type	Humanoid
Race	Half-elf
Age	At least 95 (in 843 PD)
Languages	Common; Elvish[presumed]
Place	Zephrah
Family	Derrig (late husband) Baernie (daughter) Leeta (daughter) Maeve (daughter) Will (son) Orym (son-in-law)
Connections	Ashari Herbalist Union (member)
Profession	Herbalist
Status
Status	Alive (as of 843 PD)
Appearances
First seen	"For The Tempest" (3x68)
Last seen	"Nice" (3x69)
Stream	Campaign Three (2 episodes)

Nel is a half-elf herbalist of the Air Ashari in Zephrah. As an NPC, Nel is played by Matthew Mercer.

Description

Appearance

Nel is a half-elven woman who wears her long blonde hair in a braid past her lower back. When Orym caught up with her after the Apogee Solstice, she hadn't slept well recently and had some bags under her eyes.

Personality

Nel is a professional but family-focused woman, taking time to interact with Orym and her daughter Baernie even while working under pressure.

Biography

She got married to a half-elven warrior named Derrig around 766 PD. Together they had Baernie, Leeta and Maeve (triplets), and eventually one son, Will. Nel worked as a herbalist, and two of her daughters, Baernie, took an interest in the job as well, although the former would be the one becoming an herbalist, while the other focused on becoming a druid; Nel and Maeve taught Orym (a local halfling child and a friend of Will) about magical plant-based healing, although he wasn't very talented in that particular area. Some time later the fighter would end up becoming part of their family when he married Will, thus becoming Nel's son-in-law, and staying close to her husband and children.

Circa 837 PD Nel lost her husband and her son during an attack on Keyleth in Zephrah, since both were part of her defense team as the Master of Defense and a member of the Tempest Blades respectively.

As of 843 PD her daughter Leeta had become Derrig's successor as a Tempest Blade and the right hand of the Voice of the Tempest. Orym, on the other hand, had left Zephrah to investigate the deaths of his loved ones, becoming an adventurer. He returned during the prolonged apogee solstice of 843 PD, and although he was offered to visit Nel, he refused, since he wanted to do so after his mission in the Grey Valley, where he hoped to find one of the herbalist's daughters, Baernie, who had been sent there days before with a team and hadn't come back.

The following day, as he had expected, Orym Teleported back to his hometown with his team and some rescued warriors, including Baernie. Nel found them when she joined the other members of the Ashari Herbalist Union in the process of preparing the antidote to heal Keyleth, although she took a moment to greet her daughter and son-in-law. Later that same day, while the Air Ashari were celebrating, Nel was visited by Orym, Fearne and FCG, being kind to them (and particularly to Orym, who cried a little while talking to her), accompanying them to pay their respects to Derrig and Will in their memorial platform, and later offering them biscuits and sharing the recipe with Fresh Cut Grass.

Relationships

Fan art of Orym's family, by Taylor Weltzer.

Derrig

Nel was happily married to Derrig for 47 years, and has four children with him: triplet girls named Baernie, Leeta, and Maeve, and a son named Will. One of the reasons she fell in love with him was because of his willingness to admit when he was wrong, and to make a choice when it was necessary even if he wasn't sure of the correct one.

Orym

Nel took her future son-in-law as a student and shared her knowledge with him. Despite not being as talented as she was, he still recalled those lessons years later. They both shared the trauma of losing a husband and a family member in the same attack. Orym, despite not calling her "Mom" as often as he called Derrig "Dad", considers Nel his second mother. She is very proud of the halfling, and when meeting him after a long time she stopped what she was doing to speak with him and express how happy she was to see him. She also showed interest in knowing about his great deeds during his adventures.

Character information

Abilities

Orym knows how to do magical healing using Druidcraft thanks to Nel's lessons, so she probably knows at least that cantrip.

Appearances and mentions

• Specials
  • "Dalen's Closet" (Sx47), mentioned only (first mentioned)
• Campaign Three
  • "The Hellcatch Valley" (3x24), mentioned only
  • "Aid of the Tempest" (3x66), mentioned only
  • "For The Tempest" (3x68) (first appearance)
  • "Nice" (3x69)
  • "In the Shadow of War" (3x110), mentioned only (unnamed)

Quotations

• (about her late husband) "The wonderful thing about Derrig, and one of the reasons I fell in love with him, was he didn't always get it right, but he was always willing to admit when he was wrong and learn from it. He didn't always know the right thing to do, he didn't always know the right choice to make, but he still made a choice."

Trivia

• Her name could be a diminutive of several other names, but as an independent word, it could come from the Old Irish néal, meaning "cloud".
  • Although it is just a theory, this etymology could connect with Derrig's tattoo sleeve of clouds and a sun.
• She isn't religious, believing instead in the natural world, and in her own wisdom and experience (or the advice of sensible people such as Keyleth).
• She met Taryon Darrington and Doty.
• Her home is a modest but quaint abode surrounded by nature, with trees that have been growing for generations shaped around it.

References

Art: