This is the story of the disappearance and return of Dazrada
Soros, High Priest of Taath.
This age is does not yet have a name, for it is yet early,
though some have suggested it be called the Age of False Gods. But I shall call it
This Age of Ours. The age before this is called the Age of Revelation. The end
of the Age of Revelation was marked by many cataclysms, one of which was the Great
Conflagaration.
The details of what happened in the Great Conflagaration are
lost. But this much is known: In the office of the Priesthood Guild, the High
Priests of all the gods had gathered to discuss something, no doubt of great import.
Then there was a great roar, a great explosion. Fires roared through the city.
When the faithful arrived at the Priesthood Guild, they found it, to all appearances,
untouched. But the door to the office where the High Priests had been meeting was
welded shut, as though by high heat. And when the people of the Spur were finally
able to pry open the door, there was no sign of the High Priests. It was as though
they had never been there at all.
What made the High Priests disappear, where they were taken,
none can say for certain. It was presumed that all had died.
But they did not die.
The first to return was Aremaia Starling, High Priestess of
Rinanni. She returned nearly a hundred years after she had disappeared, and it was
said that she had not aged at all. If Aremaia ever spoke of where she had been and
what had happened to her, it has not been recorded, or the records are still lost.
Now, among the citizens of the Spur at that time was a
Muatana-al named Esteban Lovecraft-Dubois. He was an assassin, in fact the master of
the Guild. He was also a devout follower of Taath. As a Muatana-al, he was old
enough to remember the Great Conflagaration, and to have had dealings with the High Priest
of Taath. A Psycian named -- and I believe this name will be familiar to you --
Dazrada Soros.
It galled Esteban that Aremaia, a servant of Rinanni --
goddess of love and peace and knowledge and all things hateful to Taath -- should be the
first to return to the Spur. So he invested all of his time, and all of his
considerable resources, in researching ways to bring his High Priest back to the Spur.
Now, also dwelling in the Spur at this time was a San Elf
named Hex ChunChan. I say he was a San Elf, for so he appeared, but in fact he was
something rather more. He was a... a dhuvghal -- I hope I pronounced that right --
sometimes known as a recursive. The dhuvghal serve a mysterious lord, and work
toward mysterious purposes. All that is known for certain is that they are
evil. And no matter how many times a dhuvghal is killed and his body destroyed, he
will return to the world. It may take years, decades, even centuries, but they will
return.
The full purpose of the dhuvghal Hex's presence in Spur will
probably never be known. But one of the purposes was to effect the assassination of
one of his enemies, a Usilin named Strangeangel Sondemiroir. It seems Strangeangel
had gathered a collection of artifacts, a group of amulets, which Hex needed for his own
purposes.
To destroy Strangeangel, Hex hired the services of another
Muatana-al -- this was during the Time Before the Bane, when Muatana-al traveled freely in
the Spur -- one named Witold. To Witold Hex gave that most dreaded of weapons, that
abomination that causes the permanent death of any who feel its touch.
A red glass dagger.
A Fang of Rhangkhorre.
Witold found Strangeangel praying at the altar of Rinanni,
and plunged the Fang of Rhangkhorre into his heart. Hex captured Strangeangel's soul
in an obsidian mirror, and disappeared without a trace. But before Witold could
flee, he was set upon by a group of brave Leuian warriors, who killed the Muatana-al and
wrested the spent Fang from his hand. One of these Leuians, a Lord Kyle Ferdain,
kept this Fang in safekeeping, away from Hex.
Esteban learned of these goings on from a small group of --
what, more Muatana-al? -- who had their own reasons to seek the death of Hex, and had come
to Esteban to ask his aid. Upon hearing that Hex had dared to bring a Fang of
Rhangkhorre into the Spur, he struck a deal with the young Muatana-al. He agreed to
waive his usual fee -- five hundred thousand gold, which might have bought the entire Spur
at that time -- if they would bring him the spent Fang.
The Muatana-al approached Lord Ferdain, and the noble Leuian
handed over the remnants of the Fang despite his misgivings, for he himself had reasons to
desire Hex dead.
Esteban lived up to his end of the bargain, for within a week
the head of Hex ChunChan adorned the altar room of the Temple of Taath. Of course,
Hex has since returned to the world, probably many times by now, but but to anybody's
knowledge he has never since come back to the Spur.
Some thought Esteban a hero, a savior of Spur, but certainly that he would not prove to
be. For there at the altar of Taath, under the watchful gaze of the dhuvghal's head,
he brought back that creature who would eventually prove to be a mortal threat not only to
the Spur, but to the entire world and to the Gods himself.
The High Priest of the god that Esteban so loyally served.
Dazrada Soros.
Revised: September 02, 1998.
Copyright © 1995 by Mythic Entertainment.
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