Icanus Deepmelder

Icanus Deepmelder is known far and wide among arcane circles. Thought by many to be one of the oldest living sun elves in the Sword Coast, he is known as much for his cruelty and wickedness as for his great age. Because he is often seen involved with activities associated with Asmodeus, many assume that he is a dread cleric of that demon god, but avowed Asmodean clerics do not claim him. Those who study dark and arcane lore have much more sinister theories about his association with Old Hoof and Horn.

No one knows how old Icanus is, but some stories place him even before the founding of Waterdeep. Even accounting for the exaggerations that follow such a person, Icanus is by all accounts a powerful agent for a dark evil. One well-sourced account places him at the heart of the destruction of a now destroyed village in the northernSword Coast where, more than a hundred years ago, he ensnared the villagers in such debauchery that they ultimately went mad and razed their entire village. Many similar stories have gathered around this dark character.

For a while, the stories of his exploits seem to grow in frequency. He seems to delight in using his dark powers to twist good people to his ends for no other purpose than his own enjoyment (and perhaps, if the stories are true, his master Asmodeus). Significantly, however, around the time of the Second Sundering, Icanus seems to have disappeared. Many arcane scholars believe that upon Asmodeus' ascension to godhood, he consumed the soul of his erstwhile servant.

Icanus is famous among those who study these things for the tattoos on his face, written in a bastardized pidgin of what seems to be infernal and elven. Since no scholar has been able to study the symbols closely, no clear analysis of their meaning is extant, but the prevailing theory is that they are the words of whatever pact he has with the dark power he serves.