Alright, let me make something clear before we begin. I don't like elves. I like individual elf characters, sure, but as a race? They're bothersome. They have too much of the "we can do anything better than humans" thing going on. They're faster, smarter, and oh so superior.
Bothersome.
Still, everyone expects elves so let's have some elves.
Since we've got a Roman Empire, obviously we need some barbaric barbarians of barbaria to have them war with. Let's make elves those barbarians, with a Celtic inspiration. After all, the Celts had that animistic druid religion going on.
In fact, let's make the druids, in this setting mages who channel the power of Wood, the driving force behind their society. More than any other race, they worship their element and the holy elves of Wood are the ones pulling the strings. The larger elven settlements may have kings and secular rulers, but the druid advisers are the ones with the real power.
Their faith is a bit of animism, although extending souls mostly only to Wood and other plants. The elves are brilliant woodworkers, but also must perform elaborate rituals of purification before felling and working any tree. Since these elaborate rituals are not observed by their neighbors, that brings... conflict.
Not that there isn't enough tribal warfare among the elves themselves. When not united against the terrible tree-murdering civilizations around them, the elves fight amongst themselves.
Since the Celts had trade routes that spanned Eurasia, the elves are also good traders, able to transverse the woods easily to bring goods and taking advantage of the roads left behind by the Selkie Empire. Just be sure not to offer them a wood-based product. That'd probably be a major faux pas for an elf, since they cannot be sure if the product was made by pure elven hands or through the tree murdering ways of other races.
Since they love trees so much, why not have some elves become them? The most powerful elven druids, to the ends of their lives, opt for nigh-immortality by transforming into great trees. Able to communicate telepathically with those nearby and exercise some of their powerful magics, they become the center of communities and large settlements, a true ruling class. But, their form perhaps special substenance. To parallel the human sacrifice practiced by the Celts, let's have the druid trees require periodically the blood of one of the races. Can someone say "Little Shop of Horrors"?
So, in short, the elves of this world are blood-thirsty, tree worshiping tribalists who wouldn't feel too bad about carting off your mother to be sacrificed to a big tree. Fun fellows, aren't they?
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