Villain who started studying healing magics for nefarious purposes.
"Do you know why the call me Astellia the Undying, young paladin?" The Lord of the Twisting Wastes sat on a chair that had scuttled into the room with her atop it, draped in silver and white silks that were more like bedsheets she hadn't chosen to remove than clothing. Even her captive had to admit that the effect was distracting, as she tried not to pay attention to the dark magician's curves. "Most of your brethren come armed with poisons, bottled plagues, implements of death and ruin to the living form."
(Content warning: body horror, self-mutilation)
She smiled, and her captive could have sworn her perfect teeth sparkled in the light of the enchanted lanterns. "Useless, of course, as they all learned. Oh, they ruined my body for a time - ravaged my flesh, ruined all the hard work I do to stay fresh and dewy. But I, my sweet dear, am not deathless. I am undying, and the difference is key." She picked up a carving knife, and the paladin steeled herself for the torture to come - but then the blade came down, shearing Astellia's left hand completely off.
She watched, equally fascinated and horrified, as the bones in the severed hand wriggled free, bit by bit, and clattered across the floor and up the chair, reassembling into a skeletal hand as the stump began to visibly regrow across them. "You all come prepared to try to kill a living immortal, and not a lich queen wearing a disguise of her own once-discarded flesh. No one thinks that one of the undead could wield the magic of life, growth, and renewal, even if I was - and still am - one of the greatest healers the world has ever known."
The chair scuttled forward, and she laid the bloody, half-regrown hand along the paladin's cheek, her lips quirked at the horrified comprehension dawning in those pure blue eyes. "That's right, sweet girl. I discarded my life centuries ago, and wrapped myself in living flesh as armor against the holy. Spent years learning to sculpt it from the horrible mass I made at first. And now you, like all the others before you, are going to come amuse me in my chambers while I fix that sad brain of yours and rescue you from all that misguided devotion to a god who can't even warn you what you truly face."
She withdrew the hand as tears began to leak from the paladin's eyes, cutting a track through the bloody handprint on her cheek. "Now, be a good girl and come along." A crook of Astellia's finger and the paladin found herself jerking upright, her bones and muscles obedient to a will other than her own. "Don't fret, you'll come to enjoy it before we're done."
The chair scuttled away, silk fluttering along behind it, and the paladin stumbled after, leaving bloody teardrops in her wake.
she sounds awful aaaand i love her