Dryads have a close connection to all living creatures.
Dryads are the elementals of Life, beings born from the combination of Earth and Light. Wild and untamed, they are healers and protectors of the forest, often living alone in luxuriant clearings full of various animals and plants. These places are called an Arbor, and they are the homes of the Dryad. If a Dryad's Arbor dies away, and the beings she cares for are lost, she too will fade to nothing.
Dryads are often helpful to respectful sorcerers that stumble into their homes, healing and feeding them gladly. However, if the wild is harmed, Dryads become vicious, hunting relentlessly until the offending victim has been destroyed, killing them with hordes of wild animals or grasping roots and vines. Some dryads, influenced by the dark presence of Germany's Black Forest, are warped and twisted into even more violent beings, the Black Forest Dryads.
The God of Earth, Atlar, has several Dryad lovers. The children born from Atlar and a Dryad are demi-gods of nature, the females known as Nymphs and the males as Satyrs.