Aradhel, the warforged Paladin, Fist of Raziel, with his holy avenger Aethaexen locked in battle with Tiamat’s Black Head Ythousja. Am epic stalwart of true virtue, Aradhel was not swayed by Ythousja’s beguiling abilities or her frightful majesty. Although he watched his wooden and metal limbs dissolve under the rain of corrosive acid that exploded from her viscous maw, round after round, Aradhel would not be undone.
From the beginning, Jorogumo established a relationship with the Blue head of Tiamat. The supreme assassin felt the mind of the dragon goddess in her own – she knew it as a lover and a target. She had trained her whole life for it. She learned her true name – IsthGart. She would not die. The goddess would fall and she would return to the web, a queen in the glory of Llolth.
![IMG_9353[1]](https://daotyr.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/img_93531.jpg)
By five she rules. White Green Red Blue & Black. The Chromatic spectrum of evil. The alpha and the omega. The nightmare from which only death can awaken those who suffer her presence.
The clockwork ballistics were launched from Theriol to Hurthyric two nights before the Summer Solstice, 1164, VII. There were six, such missiles – harboring the greatest heroes of this, or any, age. There mission: simple. Tiamat was there – in body. Anchor the dragon goddess with the Lore gem embedded in the arch druid’s chest and proceed to destroy the target in hand to hand/arcane combat. It would be over in six combat rounds. A game of souls for the heart of Innien.
1. Oromo, Warlord of the Ancient Dawn, played by Minoo, level 25 Brute
2. Safein, The Archdruid, played by Danny, level 26 Controller
3. Jorogumo, The perfect slayer, played by Marty, level 25 Lurker
4. Aradhel Draz-Galad, The warforged fist of Raziel, played by Robert, level 26 Skirmisher
5. Tim Tigeon, The Sheriff of the Dreamwater, played by Matt, level 27 Artillery
6. Aela the Fallen, played by Jason, level 26 soldier
versus Tiamat, level 32 solo-brute, DM’d by Obi
“We know she is here, in Dao Tyr. I have called you, warriors from across the world, to strike against the most evil thing to have ever existed. With every Illmata Moon she must come and uphold the covenant with her prince, Hurthyric, the Dragon King. The ritual takes place in a different place every month – in three days time, we know where it will happen. Make no doubt: this is a conspiracy to do away with a goddess, and certainly your life, but perhaps your very soul hangs in the balance. With this one chance we may end this war-without-end. Theriol have never been offered an end game possibility such as this. We implore you, vanquish this bitch and free my people.” King Brogan VIII.
Playlist:
The warforged paladin, Aradhel entered the newly rebuilt throne room of King Brogan VIII, King of the Theriol, for the first time on the Summer Solstice of the year 1164 in the seventh aepoch of Dao Tyr. He was summoned by his lord, the archangel Firestar, Raziel – patron angel of Theriol. An astromantic alignment was about to occur and thus the Firestar called on his ancient knight. Aradhel would then return, to the world, from beneath the earth mound where the machine-man had spent the past four hundred years, under two hundred fathoms of water in a lake that was once Purdjion – the land of angels and devils that he him self had surrendered to the purifying water.
“Welcome Lord Aradhel.” King Brogan greeted him at the door and shook his hand with earnest. Aradhel did not speak. He did however, turn and recognize the power emanating from another in the room – a women, dressed in black, with a raven on her shoulder and a brass crown on her brow. She was standing in the window archway, the fading sun bathing her black robes in gold. Brogan noticed the knight staring at her, smiled and said rather nonchalantly, “Yes my lord, goddesses seem to be common of late.” Stepping across the room toward the women “Sir Aradhel, may I present the Avatar Uthia, Lady of the Raven queen, voice-mother of the Firestar.”
Aradhel bowed, as did the Raven Queen.
Gliding over to the knight who had met her halfway into the throne room, the Raven Queen touched Aradhel’s metal face. “Brave immortal Aradhel. I’ve been dreaming with you under that lake, all this while. Waiting for this day. This day that will challenge your perfect faith and test the nature of your soul.” A tear formed in her eye and fell down her cheek. “I ask you today, the most terrible thing a mother could ever ask. I ask you today to perform an act that may just condemn me to an eternity of sorrow, an eternity of remorse.” Pausing, Aradhel could see her take a deep breath as she took both of his massive, guantleted hands in hers. “It has taken me a thousand years, but I now know that my youngest daughter, born Tiama, now called Tiamat, is beyond redemption. I need you to end her. I need to ask the left fist of my son to kill my youngest daughter.”
A vacuous silence filled the room. Brogan, standing behind Aradhel, scratching his chin spoke first. “We have a chance we will never have again Sir Aradhel. We have learned that Tiamat will be, in body, at the Red Tower of Hurthiric in one week’s time. We have devices. We have a plan. Our strategy is set. The party that is going to perform that act, well, that is another question…”
The Raven Queen continued “The good king of men, here, speaks as all good kings do – conspiring for the good of his people. My plans are not so selfless, and indeed, I can not share them with you. I can only ask that you maintain your faith with me, with my family, in this duty, this final, mortal duty.” Aradhel nodded slowly and then got on one knee. The Raven Queen put her hands on his shoulders and continued. “You are so brave, although I doubt that you can feel fear. You will be teamed up with those who are seemingly diametric in alignment to your noble cause. You will be tested further. Your faith in me, in my eyes, Aradhel, is all you must trust.”
Aradhel raised his head and looked into the infinite eyes of the Raven Queen and spoke for the first time in half a century. His voice sounded like the strong wind resonating through the hollow of an ancient oak. “My comrades are my weapons, and I am their shield. I pledge this, that if I can prevent it, They shall not parish. So long as they live, our enemies will fall. I am the righteous, left fist of Raziel, the Firestar. Though tainted I may be…I am the toppled pillar newly erected; called forth to purify in holy flame all that which is vile, corrupted and debased. To burn the wicked and tyrannical who oppress and subjugate the innocent. And to imbue the righteous light to those that find themselves in dark places.”
The Raven Queen wrapped her arms around his large helmet of a head. “Oh my dear. I am too close to you see your fate.” She kissed his brow. “Good luck to you.” She kissed him again, another tear ran down her cheek. She the turned and glided to the shadow where she was gone in a breath. The vacuous silence returned to the throne room as Brogan, nodding to the ancient knight, turned and left him there to sit and ponder.
“You have let your hair and beard grow, lover, over the year that you have been king of Theriol. I don’t like the way it feels against my cheek.” The dark elf slid off the white sheet and wrapped her thin scarf around her shoulder. King Brogan, already standing by the hearth, poured two glass of red wine. From the corner of his eye, he admired the contrast of her sleek, ink black skin against the soft folds of his linens.
“I don’t much care how you feel about the length of humanly birthright.” He swallowed the cup of wine in one large gulp.
The svelte, elven queen slid across the shadow filled space between the two with a whisper and placed her fingertip on his lips. “Such a beast”,” she whispered with a casual smile and kissed him lightly. Brogan let him self go, as he did so often of late, for just a moment, to the swoon of her charms. Then the darkness fell again across his heart and he face betrayed his will to keep it in. “I’ve known you for years Brogan, watched you for longer. You can’t hide anything from me, why do you try? Open up to me now, so soon after we have coupled. Let me in to the great leader’s mind.”
“I can never tell if you are mocking me.” Brogan pushed the drow away and filled his wine again. “There are those in my small council who would barely hesitate, for love of my father, that I was with you, night after night, time and time again. Damn it women, were I not beguiled by your love.” Brogan turned away and again, finished his wine.
Taking an exasperated deep breath, the drow took a step up to him and wrapped her thin arms around his waist, feeling the taught, mid-section muscles above his belt of a human man in the prime of his young life. She wondered to herself for a moment if it was not her that was beguiled by him – although for the drow, she was at least as attracted to the power that Brogan held, more so than any measure of genuine affection. She traced the length of his arms, and as she did her finger tips left trails of glowing ruins that quickly burned away when Brogan turned to look.
“My love, we have just begun our journey down this road together.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, talking into his shoulder blades as he stared into the black. “I am ready to tell you a secret…My lord Brogan, I’ve never told you my name, and now, I am ready. By me giving you this, my name, shall a new chapter of our relationship be open. By me sharing this with you…By me giving this dark gift to you, shall your power grow.”
Brogan turned and looked into the dark pools of her eyes, lost and found, searching for answers and finding further confusion. “But, as you’ve said, I’ve known you my whole life. I see you in my dreams. You are the dark, clear, spring water under the earth. You are the curtain of the seducing night, cold and fierce. You are the moon, full of magic and brilliant calling. You name is the wind. You are a priestess queen of the fay.”
“My lord,” she whispered, her eyes alive with intense power, she turned he man toward her and spoke with a resonance that belied her tiny frame. “My people, my children, call me by title, a name older than all the cities of men. A priestess? No, Lord Brogan. I am the target of their prayers.” He gasped as he realized the next words that were going to fall from her mouth. “Llolth. My name is Llolth.”
“And since I got back, I’ve barely slept a night all the way through.” The old elf wizard sat on the small stool, staring at the swirling tea leaves in his steaming mug.
“Well, from the sound of it, it is lucky you got back at all.” The human ranger took a deep breath and poured a bit of whiskey from his flask into his own cup of tea. “How many did you say there were? Six?” Tim looked up from his mug at Thaylinn, who was staring out the cabin window at the setting sun beyond the lake. The elf nodded. “Well, as you know, old friend, I was trapped in the Abyss for many years. It is all kind of fading from memory. I did not do much battle there. I mean, yeah, I was tortured and stuff, but I was hooded most of the time and pain fades from memory.”
“I know Tim, and I am glad your soul is intact. We all are. The Dreamwater needs its Sherriff. Technically, I was never actually in the Abyss. Those six succubi were the last enemy to face us in a final battle at the Dawn of Time. And although I was the only one in my party to survive the trip back here to the Dreamwater, my soul is broken. Rhoen, Lagozed, and dear sweet Aelar, all dead…Lost in time.” Thaylinn reached into a fold of his gray robe and pulled out a fist-sized bundle wrapped in leather. “I grabbed this, the meaning of our ill-fated quest, before I saw the time portal and my friends, collapse into the void.” Thaylinn took the whiskey flask from Tim and spiked his own drink, took a slow sip and then began to unwrap the object on the table.
The object glowed from within, a deep opalescent radiance that transcended anything from nature. Tim could recognize this as an object of deep, ancient magic, possibly druidic, possibly even proto-druid. “50,000 years” Thaylinn whispered. “Across many oceans of time. Behold. The Gherivon.”
Tim raised an eyebrow. “Mighty name. I’ve heard of it before. Penelius told me once of a world-ruining device by that name. We were talking at one point about going to get it ourselves. That is what you were doing? How long have you had this thing?”
“Nearly twenty years Tim. I’ve kept it here, in Maiah, safe. But that time is done Tim. I can’t keep it anymore. I am departing to the West and where I am going, this can not come.”
“Oh lord, you’re giving it to me, ain’tcha?” Tim’s drawl always brought a smile to Thaylinn’s face. Tim sighed again and pulled an herbal cigarette from his belt, lit it and continued. “I’ve had many experiences with old, powerful weapons. Hell, I threw on of the Swords of Doom into that lake right there. (see Ethilistyr) Shall we do that with this?”
“No, afraid not old friend. That won’t keep it safe. Tim, listen to me. I need you to take this thing far away. You are the only one who can do this. The Gherivon needs to be taken to my younger sister, Safein, to the land I am from: Theriol.”
“Wait. Hold up. You want me to walk, because I don’t know how else to get there, across the whole of Dao Tyr to give this little rock to your kid sister?”
“Well that is the long and the short of it, I suppose.”
“Thaylinn, that is going to take me twenty years to walk that distance.” The elf had nothing to say at that. Tim sat with his mouth agape. “This will be the last thing I do with my life. You know that I am an old man too, right?”
“I wouldn’t ask unless I was certain there was no other way. I believe that there is great fate left in this object Tim and I believe you, and my sister, have some great roll to play still. I can discern the stars aligning in a particular way. Please Tim, do this.”
“Okay, I guess. I’ll grab my boots.” Tim stood, extinguished his cigarette and finished the whiskey.
“Just like that? you are leaving now? Humans are astonishing”
“Yeah, just like that. There is only one way to start a long journey, and that’s to start it. Tell me though, Thaylinn…” Tim paused, lacing up his boots. “What can this thing do?”
“Well, for one, I can tell you that the power in this thing can ground any dragon.”
“Any dragon?”
“Any dragon.”
“Well hell, okay then. It just might come in handy. I think I’ll wear it as a belt buckle.”
Aradhel was the first warforged – constructed in old Puriol over one thousand years ago. A paladin by calling, not by design, Aradhel is the servant fist of the Archangel Raziel, a patron spirit of Theriol. He returns from beyond the mist to join the effort to smite the dragon goddess Tiamat.
The statue of Raziel in the main square of the City of Theriol.
Safein the Archdruid – imbued with the ancient, trusted magic of both the humans and the elves of Theriol, Safein carries with her the hope and the doom of her people should she fail against the Dragon Goddess Tiamat.
Chronicles of the World of DaoTyr 