Human Gods of Vasloria

Like all the Innumerable Younger Gods, the gods of Vasloria embody the attitudes of the people who live in that region. This includes the humans, polder, and draconians of Vasloria.

Vasloria is a polytheistic, preindustrial, pre-Enlightenment, feudal culture. Its people have many superstitions and prejudices, some of which are reflected in the teachings of their gods. Adûn, for instance, teaches that hard physical labor is a moral good and people who work hard every day are honest. Most people in Vasloria, especially Aendrim where Adûn's faith is most popular, believe this to one extent or another.

Some of them take it more seriously than others though. People in the most distant villages tend to believe it more literally, while people in the cities are perfectly aware than one may work and work and be a villain. And this is true of most of the beliefs presented in this chapter. Some people take it very seriously; some not so much.

Like all peoples of Orden, the people of Vasloria are well aware there are other gods. They do not particularly think their gods are better, just, "These are the local ones who matter to us." A priest of Cavall who journeyed far from Corwell and found themselves in the distant desert land Khemhara could still act as a conduit of Saint Llewellyn the Valiant, but they would look around the Heliopolis and see the animal-headed gods of the Khemharans and the astonishing feats of masonry and astronomy the Khemharans achieved and think: "Well. Obviously the gods of Vasloria aren't that big a deal here, but these gods certainly are!" The peoples of each region of Orden prefer their own gods because they understand them best, not because they think they are "more powerful."

Adûn

Domains: Creation, Life, Love, Protection

Adûn believes that truth and hard work are virtues. He embodies the Vaslorian belief that hard work is honesty. Someone who works hard—real physical labor—is an honest person. Anyone who does no obvious work for a living is someone not to be trusted. Adûn is more worshiped in the field than in the city. Farmers distrust city folk because many of them make a living writing, or counting money, and never break a sweat.

Vaslorians in remote villages still use the ancient test of strength to determine truth. Two individuals in a legal dispute may find the reeve asking them to fell a tree or build a wall. Whoever finishes first is in the right, because they worked harder and are therefore more honest. Many walls and fields owe their existence to this ancient legal tradition.

A priest following Adûn expresses their faith through labor. They build things. Many priests are also masons or carpenters. Joining the church for them did not mean abandoning their former trade. It intensified it.

A knight following Adûn spends their time aiding others through hard work, inspiring people to honest speech and hard labor, as opposed to Adûn's brother Cavall who seeks to right wrongs.

Adûn and Cavall are brothers and the line between them is not a sharply defined one. Truth and justice are close companions.

Gaed the Confessor

Domains: Love, Protection

Gaed the Confessor, son of Malgen, son of Germoc, was the abbot of a small monastery dedicated to Saint Anthony—Shield of the North—in eastern Aendrim during the rule of the tyrant Baron Kaveran. Kaveran was a secret censor of the church of Saint Pallad, winning the baronial throne though a combination of treachery and good strategic battle principles. Once on the throne, he threw off the black cloth covering the device on his shield, revealing himself to be a servant of Pallad, Saint of Nikros.

Kaveran sought to consolidate his rule by extinguishing the church of Saint Anthony, Shield of the North specifically, and worship of Adûn generally. In this, he almost succeeded. Gaed's monastery was small, his province obscure. But as he refused to renounce his faith, his monastery attracted more and more refugees, making it harder and harder for Kaveran to deal with him without causing a revolt.

Kaveran abducted Gaed, his knights dragging the abbot out of his monastery in the middle of the night, and tortured him for seven days, hoping to break his faith and force him to convert to Saint Pallad. Gaed neither renounced his faith nor called out for aid.

Kaveran was no fool, and knew killing Gaed would make a martyr of him, and so attacked the abbot's flock. Hoping—by putting their homes to the fire—to pressure Gaed into recanting his faith. Kaveran barred several families in a tavern, set fire to it, and brought Gaed to witness the horror.

But Kaveran had not thought to shackle Gaed, and the abbot countered by lifting the bar on the burning building and walking into the tavern in full view of hundreds of his followers. He spoke Saint Anthony's words as he did so, but it was Adûn who clothed him in a shimmering blue light.

It was Gaed, son of Malgen, son of Germoc, who entered the tavern—it was Saint Gaed the Confessor who emerged, unscathed, leading the people inside to safety. In that moment the people and many of Kaveran's own followers turned on the cruel Baron, dragging him off his horse and spitting his body with kitchen knives and pitchforks.

Gaed teaches the virtue of being true to one's principles even—especially—when doing so is the most difficult thing in the world. The title "confessor" is granted to those who persisted in their faith in public, even when doing so was dangerous or deadly.

Gryffyn the Stout

Domains: Creation, Life

Gryffyn the Stout was an infant dwarf when his parents' cart was waylaid by bandits who killed his mother and father, stole all their wares, and set fire to the cart. They were unaware of the child nestled within.

A nearby farmer saw the flames and rode out to investigate. When she arrived, she could hear the bawling of the dwarf babe. Though wreathed in flame, the infant's skin was too hardy to feel the heat. In the horse's pack were a pair of tongs the farmer used to extract the child without harming herself, and she took the baby dwarf home to her husband.

Naming the child Gryffyn, the farmers raised him as one of their own. The boy grew up wanting to be a farmer like his adoptive mother and father, but they encouraged him to take up masonry, believing stonework to be a natural part of his ancestry.

Gryffyn had no particular aptitude for stonework, but desirous to please his parents he worked hard until eventually he was apprenticed to a mason and, after many years effort (more years than most, it was noted) he produced his master work and became a master mason.

One day, years later after his parents had passed, hundreds of people from other nearby towns and villages arrived at the quarry where Gryffyn worked. Cinis the necromancer had discovered an ancient tome of lore and summoned a horde of ghouls. She used her new army to conquer the surrounding barony, causing a flood of refugees. Gryffyn's quarry could not shelter a tenth this number of refugees, so he proposed the people cross the White Ravine to the north and seek asylum among the elves of the Orchid Court.

The people were appalled, the White Ravine was impossible to cross for any but the most experienced ranger. "There is no choice" Gryffyn said. "Cinis's army will be here in a matter of days, and there is nowhere else to run."

The people cried and prepared for death. Gryffyn saw this, and his heart felt like it would burst. "There are stones enough in the quarry," he said enigmatically. "Yoke the oxen and bring the stones to the ravine and do not stop, even in darkness, even in rain, until the ghouls come or the quarry is empty."

When the army of Cinis the Pale arrived, the people fled to the ravine, the path being easy as their carts and oxen had worn a clear road. Thinking they would throw themselves into the ravine rather than be eaten by the ghouls, they were astonished to discover... the miracle. A great stone bridge crossing the ravine. It had not existed three days prior, and all agreed it could not have taken less than a year to build.

Fleeing across the bridge, the refugees found the body of Gryffyn, author of this marvel, his fingers bleeding, hammer in his hand, his heart having finally failed. He knew his labors would cost his life. But Gryffyn's Arch still stands, almost a thousand years later.

Saint Gryffyn the Stout teaches that despair is the enemy of action. That unyielding endurance is the cure for impossible odds. That more than sword and spell, hard work is the savior of the people.

Cavall

Domains: Life, Love, Protection, War

Cavall believes that mortals cannot live where injustice thrives. To followers of Cavall, the unjust society is the Wasted Land, where people live false lives. The concepts of civil law and just punishment are his.

A watchhouse chaplain is almost certainly a priest of Cavall. A rector serving a small town may be welcome on the town council, but would consider passing judgment on a fellow citizen a breach of duty. The maxim of the church of Saint Gwiddon the Vigilant translates as: "To watch, report, but not to judge." The law, Cavall says, belongs to mortals.

Censors of Cavall, on the other hand, have no such motto. The nobility often sponsor knights of Cavall to roam the countryside and dispense justice in remote wilderness areas where the noble's influence cannot reach.

Brother to Adûn and patron of the country of Corwell, Cavall also believes that people, no matter how vile, can be bettered. "Let the law judge," said Saint Llewellyn, "Let us forgive."

Llewellyn the Valiant

Domains: Life, Protection

Llewellyn the Valiant was a knight in service to Duke Melianus of Gant known as Melianus the Bright. His mother the duchess died from a withering illness none could cure, and Melianus, her only son, assumed the throne.

Almost from the beginning of his rule, there were rumors that a sorcerer in the marsh was behind Melanius's power, poisoning his mother to hasten his ascent, but as the marsh was nigh impassable this could not be proven and was taken for little more than a spiteful rumor.

Duke Melianus's reign was cruel almost from the outset. He accused all those loyal to his mother of treachery, and found occasion to have them each imprisoned and executed without trial. Sir Llewellyn had served the duchess loyally and strove to acquit himself of his duty under the new duke. But he struggled to reconcile his sense of duty with the new duke's capricious malice.

The new duke yearned to imprison his mother's favored knight, but all the guards, the reeves, the people of city and village, looked up to Llewellyn. Melianus instead contrived to send Sir Llewellyn on a series of quests, each more deadly than the last.

The Trials of Llewellyn, as they came to be known, passed into legend and their tale is still told in Corwell. Llewellyn and the Dragon With Seven Eyes, Llewellyn and the Witch of the Fen, Llewellyn and the Onyx Tower.

When Llewellyn slew Ghruk the Trollhag, she cried out, "Follow Melianus!" as she died. These words echoed in Llewellyn's ears and his heart. He assumed she meant, "Obey him—be loyal to him." But as he rode his great destrier Silverheart back to Castle Gant, Llewellyn began to suspect what Ghruk meant.

That night, Llewellyn waited in the stables and, at midnight, Melianus appeared. He mounted his great black warhorse Coalfire and rode. To where, Llewellyn could not guess. But the knight followed the duke as he rode east toward the marsh, he remembered the rumors.

At the edge of the marsh, Coalfire's eyes began to glow with a baleful flame and his mane burst into crimson fire. Llewellyn's breath caught in his throat. "A nightmare!" he realized. The rumors were true! The sorcerer had given Melianus a devil steed.

On flaming nightmare hooves was Melianus able to cross the impassable swamp. Llewellyn balked, no one could cross the cursed bog. But Silverheart champed at her bit, pulled on the reins. She would not yield. Placing his trust in his steed, Llewellyn let the reins lie slack, and Silverheart took the lead.

Llewellyn and Silverheart plunged into the bog and though it was night and the mud sucked at her hooves, Silverheart pushed on. In the hour before dawn, they arrived at an island with an ancient tower. "The tower of the sorcerer," Llewellyn thought. Thunder rolled, and rain began to fall.

Looking to the upper window of the tower, Llewellyn saw someone performing a dark ritual. A flash of lightning illuminated the figure. It was Melianus! Melianus was the sorcerer! Llewellyn called out, and the duke descended the tower and mounted his hellsteed. On his shield now—the screaming-skull symbol of Cyrvis, the Lich, god of malice.

Cyrvis had rewarded his loyal servant for years of cruelty, and the figure astride the nightmare was Saint Melianus the Bright. The Dark Saint charged Llewellyn, his lance gleaming with balefire. Llewellyn and Silverheart returned the charge and the two clashed together, Melianus's blow strong enough to unseat a giant. But Llewellyn was not thrown. His strength was the strength of ten, for his heart was pure.

Coalfire struck with flaming hooves at Silverheart but the destrier struck back, blow for bite and bite for blow. Then the hellsteed, roared and a rotting green flame burned Silverheart's flesh and stole her breath until, choking, she fell to the ground, dead.

Llewellyn's heart burst. He threw his body over the corpse of his loyal steed, and Melianus's lance pierced his armor, his back, and his heart. Knight and horse, dead. Melianus crowed as the lightning flashed again. But, in that moment, the miracle.

Cavall stood between the Dark Saint and loyal knight. Cavall pulled the lance from Llewellyn's back. "Rise my son, and rise thy steed. Thy work shalt never be done."

Saint Llewellyn the Valiant and Silverheart his Eversteed rose, immortal, and the battle against evil renewed itself, the two armored saints clashing on barded steeds.

Weeks later, neither having returned, the people of Gant laboriously forded the swamp and found the tower of the sorcerer. The ground

around the tower turned black from the baleful energies unleashed. Though no bodies were found, the armor of both knights lay on the ground—Melianus's breastplate having been pierced.

Llewellyn and Silverheart had rid the people of their cursed, hateful duke.

Saint Llewellyn is Cavall's greatest saint. He teaches that the greatest loyalty is to the well-being of the people, and that it is the responsibility of the strong to protect the weak. That the only proper use of power is in pursuit of justice.

Gwenllian the Fell-Handed

Domains: Protection, War

"Work your ritual, loremaster. And I will make your life worthy of a god's memory."

The Red Sun hobgoblins seemed unstoppable. The baron began to think he might need to evacuate the entire barony, else allow his people to be slaughtered. His greatest knights perished against the Red Sun, who wielded some magic that granted them invulnerability.

Then the loremaster came. Zür the wizard, dwarf and master of the Tower of Enchantment arrived. Seeing the need, he opened his tomes and researched what might the hobgoblins might wield. He presented himself to the baron's court with a solution. The Red Sun had found an ancient spring dedicated to a Gol demon-god. The Red Sun hobgoblins had bathed in the spring and awoken the blessing of the demon within and, having bathed in the river, they were now invulnerable.

Zür believed he could remove the enchantment and rob the Red Sun of their power. But the way to the spring was dangerous and he had no guard. The baron was at a loss, his greatest knights were almost all dead, thanks to the Red Sun.

"I will attend," Lady Gwenllian volunteered. The baron objected. Lady Gwenllian was his personal knight and bodyguard, just as her mother had been to his father. "If we succeed," Gwenllian said, "you will have no need of bodyguards. If we fail, it will be the same."

The baron could not say no to his closest and most loyal knight, and so Lady Gwenllian, daughter of Morwetha, rode out with Zür the Enchanter. "It will take time to perform the ritual," Zür said. "Once I start, the demon will send creatures to stop me. They will be terrible."

Gwenllian swore to defend the dwarf against all who might come for as long as it might take. In later years, Zür professed he felt the weight of her vow and knew the gods were watching. "How long to work your ritual?" she asked, and she could tell the answer would be dire.

"Ten days," Zür said. "Ten days must I work this weaving without pause or rest or food or water." Dour Gwenllian merely nodded. "So be it."

Arriving at the spring which ran red, Zür prepared his weaving. "You understand," he said coating his hands in a rare powder, "that once we begin, we cannot stop, no matter how horrible the fiends the demon sends at us."

Well-versed in the faith of Ord and the dwarves, Gwenllian responded. "Work your ritual, loremaster. And I will make your life worthy of a god's memory."

For ten days and nine nights, Zür spoke his weaving and lighting sprang from his fingertips as he grappled with the demon of the spring. And horrors came as he did so.

Creatures unseen in Orden, assemblages of organs, teeth, and claws. Animals with too many legs or too few heads. The dead came, trees that walked whose branches dripped blood came. The tale of all

detailed in the Lay of Lady Gwenllian. And while the endurance of the dwarves is well documented, Lady Gwenllian did not falter, did not rest.

On the seventh day did a group from the Barony come to tell the dwarf the Red Sun had been defeated. Zür hesitated, but Lady Gwenllian did not. Exhausted, spent, she could not be fooled. She saw through the demon's guise and the men who were not men erupted in tentacles and spines.

Lady Gwenllian dispatched them all.

Twelve days after they rode out, Zür returned with Lady Gwenllian's body on her horse. The spring had been consecrated by the green. The Red Sun had lost their invulnerable skin and were beaten. Lady Gwenllian protected Zür as she swore, but she died upon dispatching the last demon spawn.

"I bring you her body," Zür said to the baron. "And one thing more will I do for you. I shall build you a church here. A cathedral worthy of the life of Saint Gwenllian."

Gwenllian is the saint of those who stand watch, of all those who must carry a burden ceaselessly. Gwenllian teaches that vigilance is its own reward.

Salorna

Domains: Life, Nature, Storm, Sun

Salorna believes that nature is a moral good. That to behave in a manner not in accord with the natural balance (she would never use the word "order") is to commit offense against the gods.

Salorna teaches that humans are a product of nature, so then a tilled farm is as much a natural phenomenon as a forest. Indeed, tilling the land is a form of caring for it. But she also teaches balance in all things. A land of farms and no trees would be just as unnatural to her as a land of all trees and no people.

Felling a tree for lumber is natural. People need lumber to make homes for shelter. This is proper and good. Felling a tree because it's in the way of a road is mere convenience and therefore a moral wrong. Salorna curses a straight road.

Killing for food is likewise natural. People need to eat and the pig knows this as well as the person. Killing for sport is a moral wrong, however. It is unnatural, Salorna says.

A wheel that harnesses the power of the river is a beautiful thing. Humans and river physically connected. A dam that blocks the river is a desecration.

Some of Salorna's priests are conduits; some are mages of the green. Both seek to preserve the balance and respect for nature. Because much of Vasloria is covered in elven forest, Salorna's druids are also often diplomats to the elves.

Salorna has few censors, but not none! Favoring light armor and ranged weapons, her censors are often mistaken for rangers. They seek to punish those who hunt for sport, or those who would defile the natural order.

Draighen the Warden

Domains: Nature, Sun

Saint Draighen the Warden, the Ranger, Draighen of the Wood was known in her life for her mastery of the elf haunted wodes which she could cross without incident. Draighen it was who first treated with the derwic, whom even the wode elves had not seen in many ages of the world.

The awakened trees were happy to hear news of the world and while it was impossible for her to satiate their endless curiosity ("How fare the steel dwarves?"), Draighen provided many services for them. Chief among those—locating the Stone of Hyllc a large flagstone infused with magic, which the derwic used as a kind of altar for communing with their creator. Many traditions had the derwic forsworn after the loss of their symbolic meeting-stone, and they were sore grateful to the human who took their problems as her own.

Years later, a fire threatened to engulf the local wode, and the elves within refused all aid. Their stoic refusal to prevent their own extinction infuriated Draighen, whom they already resented because of her special relationship with the walking trees.

Draighen proposed a trick the humans-"the men of farm and field" used when fire threaten to burn their crops after a drought. "Starve the fire," she proposed. The elves, initially curious, rejected her idea as soon as they understood it. "Cut down the trees?!" they exclaimed, and exiled the human.

Refusing to give up on the elves, even after they chose to die with their forest, Draighen went to the derwic, who immediately praised her plan and were eager to help. The elves of the wode were astonished when Draighen returned with a dozen derwic who immediately began uprooting a line of trees ten miles long and a thousand feet wide. What would have taken the elves or humans many days even working together, the derwic did in an hour. The fire reached the edge of the break the walking trees had made... and died out.

When the elves remarked upon this, taking the derwic to task for their actions, Hurolathornindrascyl, derwic's chief, looked at Draighen in confusion and then pointed to the sea of uprooted trees. "They would have moved on their own if they could! We just helped them along."

The elves were properly chastised and realized their shame. Though the derwic disappeared back into the wode, the elves celebrated Draighen, naming her Elf-Friend and Wode Warden. In the ceremony, Draighen was surrounded by a golden light and her brown eyes turned green. The elves knew she was Saint Draighen now.

Draighen teaches solutions can always be found if people are willing to talk. That even the darkest forest is not a thing to be threatened by if you carry wisdom and an open heart with you. That the proper reaction to unknown territory is curiosity.

Eriarwen the Wroth

Domains: Nature, Storm

Eriarwen the Wroth apprenticed to her mother as a witch just as her mother had apprenticed under her mother. Her family were witches in service to Halcyon the Moonmaiden, saint of Viras, the Lady of Spring. They had tended to the souls and health of the people of five villages for two centuries. Eriarwen was not yet of age, and so not yet a full mistress of the craft when the blight came.

At first it was a newborn foal born with seven eyes and a writhing grasping tentacle where it tongue should have been. It took three farmers to kill the infant beast and though they dismissed it as an accident of birth, the three were harrowed.

Soon, it was a cat, then a herd of cows. Then every kind of beast and bird in the wood emerged with hideous mutations, defects, and deformities. The creatures had not just been driven mad, they were filled with hate for the people of the farms and villages. Though they could not know it, it was the Red Blight of Caswyn the Plaguemaster.

In a matter of a week, the people were forced to all gather together in one town for protection, and they feared they were doomed. All attempts to stop the blight had already failed.

Her mother and grandmother, the other witches of their coven, spent their time trying to protect the people and heal the afflicted animals, but this was not possible. There could be no cure, for these creatures were not sick. Caswyn had changed their nature making new things out of the wildlife.

When her grandmother's horse changed underneath her, turning into a merging of horse and crab, Eriarwen saw her mother summon a killing spell, but her grandmother forbade it and turned to try and calm and reason with the steed who had carried her for twenty-seven years.

Then Eriarwen saw the beast rip her grandmother apart with a single bite.

Her mother raced to her mother's corpse. And Eriarwen called out.

Eriarwen did not scream or cry, nor call out for aid or even mercy. She did not call to Viras, nor any of her saints. She called out to Salorna the Summer Storm and demanded the Woodland Mistress act.

Eriarwen felt a growing heat and joy in her heart, and, feeling like she could fly, she suddenly saw the world through a million eyes all at once, and where she had stood, a humanoid figure composed entirely of bees filled the space. Eriarwen the Swarm exploded in a cloud of bees and each bee was Eriarwen. She sped across the countryside from one village to the next, stinging every animal affected by the Red Blight, and the villagers watched as the woodland creatures, their own pets and livestock, returned to normal. Good as new! None knew then that it was Eriarwen who saved them, but all knew it must be a member of her family. Who else?

But Eriarwen was just getting started. Returning to her grandmother's corpse, the swarm coalesced and Eriarwen emerged, a young woman again. But her hair was flame and lightning crackled where she walked.

"CASWYN!" she thundered. "I SUMMON THEE! COME! YOU CANNOT RESIST! I COMPEL THEE!"

Caswyn, furious at the death of his blight, furious at the girl who dared oppose him, could not resist. He revealed himself and in that moment, it was Caswyn the Pestilent, saint of Cyrvis who appeared.

Saint Caswyn and Saint Eriarwen battled and grappled with each other, each growing to great size infused with the power of their gods. But their figures were unrecognizable. Caswyn was a rotting giant, a mutated dragon, a griffon oozing blood.

Eriarwen was a wolf made of fire, a crow made of lightning, a bear made of stone.

Caswyn the Chimera hurled Eriarwen the Lion to the ground and it was Caswyn the Cobra who struck. But it was Eriarwen the Elk who spit Caswyn upon her antlers, banishing the saint from the mundane world.

Eriarwen returned to herself, and though she was now an immortal saint, she sensed that Salorna had given her yet more power. She saw her mother weeping over her grandmother's body. The old woman's horse, restored by Eriarwen's sting, nuzzled at her mistress's curled gray hair.

Eriarwen smiled, and knew the task before her. She conjured lightning from her fingertip, and her grandmother was renewed. Mothers and daughters reunited.

Eriarwen teaches that nature holds the power to destroy—that Mother Nature is also the fury of a hurricane. She preaches revenge against those who would pervert the natural world. And that those who seek to preserve the balance between humans and nature must be willing to take violent action if necessary.

Evil Gods

Most heroes are hero-heroes, but some heroes are anti-heroes, and some are anti-villains! This section presents one archetypal saint from each of Vasloria's evil gods; the brothers Nikros and Cyrvis for those players who wish to play such heroes.

Nikros the Tyrant

Domains: Death, Fate, Storm, War

Nikros is strength. He is dominance. His is the right of the strong to rule over the weak. He is the Tyrant.

Nikros believes that strength is the only virtue, and those who are born strong were born to rule. Because of this, followers of Nikros are often mistaken for followers of Adûn—a mask they are happy to wear. Both teach that strength is good. But for Adûn strength is a tool for helping others. For Nikros, strength is power to enact your will heedless of the consequences. Might is right.

Many is the baron or duke who attained power through sheer strength and ruthlessness, seeing their people as mere resources to be spent. Many of these rulers only come to Nikros after achieving power, their ears poisoned by a priest of the Tyrant.

Though he and Cyrvis are brothers, Nikros hates Cyrvis because Cyrvis is feeble and weak. Both teach that strength is the only virtue. But Cyrvis teaches that the weak can exploit treachery and sorcery to become strong. Nikros spits upon these feeble wastes and preaches to the strong to take what is theirs by right.

Like Cyrvis, his priests worship in secret. Like Cyrvis, folk hate followers of Nikros, while sometimes secretly admiring them. Bullies always have their sycophants.

Nikros's censors take what they want, ignore the law heedless of consequence, and teach that all folk should live thus. To subjugate one's will to the law, or the community, or the family, is to be weak! Weakness is a disease and it must be eradicated!

Pentalion the Paladin

Domains: Death, War

Pentalion the Paladin, the Usurper, served at the right hand of Uther the Callous, aiding him in his ascent to the throne. Uther mastered fell sorceries under the tutelage of a priest of Cyrvis. In public, Uther's illusions kept him hale seeming, but in reality his addiction to sorcery had withered him.

Pentalion was Uther's greatest knight, general, and chief of his secret police. He ferreted out conspiracies and rebellious coalitions. His tactic: infiltrate the rebels with his own agents—give them a taste of success but at the cost of relying on his power. Then, in their moment of triumph, Pentalion's agents revealed themselves and the insurgents found themselves surrounded by enemies without and within.

Eventually serving at the right hand of the conqueror was not enough. Pentalion loathed Uther for his physical weakness and growing dependence on sorcery. After Pentalion helped Uther depose a nearby duke, the paladin helped the dead duke's daughter plot revenge.

He used all his usual tactics. His agents aided the duke's daughter and helped her build her insurgency, but in a critical moment when she confronted Uther with only Lord Pentalion as witness, the evil paladin killed first Uther, then the duke's daughter assuming leadership of both the kingdom and the rebellion.

Savior to all, Pentalion was made a saint of Nikros for this act. He ruled well into old age, always finding new enemies within and without to be cruel to. And the more cruel he was to his invented enemies, the more the people loved him.

Saint Pentalion teaches that one should bide their time and build their power before striking. That treachery in service to growing your own power is no vice.

Cyrvis

Domains: Death, Fate, Knowledge, Trickery

Cyrvis is the enemy of fate. He is the god of those who believe they have been wronged by life, and seek revenge. Cyrvis is a god of magic, because through magic one can gain power to exert their will over others. He is brother to Nikros but because he is frail and Nikros values only strength, Nikros hates Cyrvis, and Cyrvis is happy to return the sentiment.

A person bullied, a criminal arrested, a servant dismissed—all who harbor secret hate whisper Cyrvis' name, and that whisper is a prayer. A suitor rejected by a consort who loves another finds themself walking in Cyrvis' shadow. He is the god of assassins, conspirators, and the bitterly frail.

It is dangerous to worship Cyrvis in public, but those who gain power through his worship often parade this fact gladly and teach Cyrvis' hatred as virtue. Many is the knight who rides with Cyrvis's screaming-skull talisman on their shield, teaching folk to take what they want, the law be damned. The law is a coward! The law is a system designed by cowards to keep us from seeking real power!

His churches are often underground—in dungeons, cellars. His priests worship in secret, plotting against those with power, or those who are merely popular. To be liked and loved is reason enough for a follower of Cyrvis to hate you.

Eseld of the Eye

Domains: Knowledge, Trickery

Eseld of the Eye, the Eye of Hate, sought mastery of the Tower of Summoning. But though she studied hard, there were always other mages more fortunate.

Cursing those who succeeded where she failed, Eseld sought the Tome of Boiling Hate, written by Cyrvis himself during his life. Acquiring the tome required years of research and treachery. Eseld left a trail of poisoned librarians and tortured loremasters behind her before finally unearthing the tome from its resting place at the bottom of the inverted Tower of Blood.

But though the tome was written in an ancient dialect Eseld knew, the words moved under her gaze and she could not extract meaning from them. Many oracles were consulted and tortured before she learned the prophesy.

"Only one with singular vision will see the secrets in the Lich's writing."

With a flash of certain insight, Eseld understood the riddle. She took a dagger and carved out her own eye. With only one good eye remaining, blood from her eyesocket pouring onto the page, she could read the lore within.

In that moment was Eseld made a saint of Cyrvis.

Filled with sorcerous power, Eseld no long sought mastery of the Tower of Enchantment, returning instead to the hidden Tower of Blood, restoring it to its former glory—there to start her own cult. Eventually Eseld was overthrown by the Darkling Shades, her own cadre of elite sorceresses who pass on her lore to this day.

Eseld teaches that spite is a virtue. Only fools follow rules, and sorcery is a route to ultimate power.