The elves of the Big Rubble are among the most human-oriented elves I know of. There’s only about 200 elves in the Garden, the other 800 Aldryami consist of a few non-combatant dryads, unreliable pixies, and a swarm of enthusiastic but diminutive runners.
The elves in Pavis are conventionally organized. Their Shanasse tree is the focal point of a Council of Elders composed of High King Elf, Elder Sister High Priestess, Gardener High Priestess, the Chosen One, Light Son Friend (an Elven chief priest of Yelmalio), and Half-Elf Friend (a chief priest of Aldrya and initiate of Pavis). Any actions taken by the elves are voted upon by this ruling council. Light Son Friend and Half-Elf Friend have no vote, but their opinion is valued. There has not been a Chosen One present on the council since the time of Pavis himself (who sat there for a time), but the seat is kept vacant.
There are claimed to be exactly 20 Runemaster elves and dryads living in the Garden. The Pavis elves form a complete community, and are not subservient to any other group of elves in the world, but have ties to the elves of the Redwood Forest to the north. Not uncommonly, elves travel from the redwoods to Pavis and are adopted by the Garden.
In times of battle, the Yelmalio worshiping elves lead the mobile defense, and are likeliest to actually leave the Garden in a counterattack.
The runners and elves worshiping solely Aldrya remain in the Garden as militia, usually. When the elves raid outside, even the regular militia will take part.
There are many different types of runners in the Garden (such as poison ivy runners), fostered by the peculiar environment there. These runners rarely leave the Garden. The Shanasse tree of the Garden is but a small plant, with leaves of all the different types of herbs in the Garden. From season to season, the exact leaves will change, and so will the blooms, but there is always a flower blooming somewhere on this plant. No being except for initiate elves of Aldrya have beheld this plant.
See also
With 200 elves, that likely means about 140 are initiates of Aldrya alone, 8 are initiates of Babeester Gor, 10 are initiates of Flamal, and 10 are initiates of Yelmalio. Maybe 5-10 are initiates of Pavis. There a dozen or so dryads (members of the Elder Sister subcult), and about 800 Children of the Forest.
This small community is able to protect, maintain, and sometimes even expand the Garden.
The Garden is surprisingly magical and punches above its weight.
Now remember that New Pavis was founded within the lifetime of most living elves of the Garden. Their relationship with Dorasar was wary, their relationship with Sor-eel was generally positive, that of Halcyon generally negative, but in general they consider the Pavis priests and the Yelmalio cult their allies.
Now we know there have been “half-elves”. Pavis is the most famous, but I’ve run across a few others in Greg’s notes. So what are those?
Well, the easiest is likely the union of human and dryad. This is no different than the union of human and other nymph or nature spirit, and although uncommon is not rare.
But I expect that human-elf unions happen occasionally, perhaps aided by fertility magic like Pregnancy.
Now as for Pavis – his precise ancestry is a mystery. And likely going to stay that way. The Big Rubble is a Third Age setting, and so many things have been severed, lost, and destroyed. And that is good for the setting, IMO.
Note there are also half-dwarf. One of Pavis’s daughters married Flintnail. If they had children it would have been half-dwarf, quarter-human, and quarter-elf! If that happened, I am sure there was magic involved!
Kind of reminds me of Gilgamesh being two-thirds god and one-third human.
It is unrecorded who the mother of Pavis’ children was. Or if it was only one mother.
Something we forget about a LOT are the Runners. They are the most common of the Aldryami – the spirits of shrubs, ivy, scrub, you name it. I’ve seen groups of Runners all team up on a single person with their whipsticks. With an average resistance of 13, enough Runners can even take down a strong human. They are like little wood woses or moss people!
The elves of the Garden are of course associated with the cults of Ernalda, Eiritha, Yelmalio AND Pavis. Which gives you an idea which humans they are friendly towards.