Religion and Druids

In General
Pantheon
Creation Mythos
Magic
Guildhall
Ranks
Miscellaneous

In General

Defenders of the natural realm and nature in general, a druid can be of water, fire, air, or land. They use purely elemental magic, usually- if not always- of living things. They also have a certain skill with weapons.

A druid is first and foremost loyal to the nature goddess, Irotana, then the druidic order, then to their sphere and the god/ess of their sphere. It usually doesn't matter what sphere a druid was born to- an elf can be a druid of water or a mer can be a druid of air, for instance- but usually they are a druid of the sphere they were born to.

Most druids are gnomes, as gnomes can already speak to animals and do not have to learn the languages of creatures, but there are other species as well in the druidic order. Most are long-lived, such as elves and the aforementioned elves, as learning all a druid needs to know can take centuries. There are very few, if any, humans.

Pantheon

• Irotana: Goddess of nature and all that is. She watches over nature and is usually neutral- unless the natural world is threatened or disrupted. She is the mother of the druidic gods and goddess of the four realms. Druids rarely draw magic from her, unless it is in defense of nature. She is commonly depicted as a silver and white unicorn.
• Aeryon: God of air. He rules over the realm of air and anything winged. Most depict him as a gryfalcon, usually white. Aeryon is swift and decisive in everything he does. His druids are fewer than some of the other deities because he tends to be more selective in choosing which druidic acolytes can advance. He values strength in his followers, but also the knowledge of when to give a little and try a different direction. Winds do not simply push against a tree, they go around it too. Aeryon is more reclusive maybe than his siblings, perhaps because he is one of the more universal of the five. He can whip waves into foam, dust into storms, and fire into roaring blaze. This is a powerful position and he keeps it well checked, unwilling to be challenged as too interfereing in the matters of the other deities. He has a certain love of music, as evidenced by songbirds. The Air God's pendant is a feather, and very rarely, a silver or white falcon.
• Claeryn: God of fire. He rules over the fire realm and anything natural within it. His temper is said to be as hot as his flame, but he is otherwise gentle and warm of heart. Claeryn has a vivid sense of humor. He believes in giving second chances - unless he'd burned up the first chance. He's the closest to Chaos, the only one who hasn't truly disowned her, perhaps due to his realm's destructive power. Even now, on opposing sides, they still play pranks together sometimes. His pendant is that of a burning torch, and he is often depicted as a phoenix.
• Laugar: God of water. He rules over the water realm and any natural thing associated with water, and is commonly depicted as a blue and green sea dragon. He's mellow, laid back, and accepting of everything as it comes. His anger is slow but very powerful when it finally rises up from the swelling depths. He's very protective of his followers and the life beneath his waves. Like Aeryon, he enjoys music, seen in the haunting song of whales and the rhythm of the waves. Laugar is often toasted to as the patron god of alcoholic drinks as well as water. The druids of Laugar wear a pendant shaped as either a water dragon or a droplet of water.
• Tyrea: Goddess of land. She rules over the land realm and any natural being associated with the sphere. She is usually depicted as a gray or silverish wolf, and said to be solid and nurturing. She helps those that helps themselves. Her anger to those that hurt her and hers is quick, but her punishments may take awhile to appear. When they do, however, they are devestating. Tyrea is protective and magic granted by her is powerful, but it has to be well-earned. Druids of Tyrea often take longer to move up in rank, but are powerful and well-diciplined. Tyrea's pendant is a silver wolf or, more commonly, a maple leaf.
• Chaos: The Nameless One, goddess of chaos. She takes the form of a very curvy but willowy woman with extremely long black hair, dead-pale skin, long black nails, slender hands, red eyes with gold irises, and black lips. She wears a great deal of red and black clothing and gold jewelry. She is extremely whimsical; it takes a great deal to please her or gain her favor, and even then it's capricious at best. Only she chooses who gains royalty and more power, or who she wants to protect and teach. Her favor can last, given she's sufficiently pleased. Vicious, malicious, bloodthirsty, sensual, devious and demanding, Chaos truly is the bane of all that is decent in this world.

Creation Mythos

First, there was emptiness, the nothing before time and thought and form. Then there was a light in the nothing, and the light defined the emptiness. The light grew, and in time the light felt that which is emotion. Emotion grew to thought, and with thought came identity, and the light became an all-encompassing entity.

We know this entity as Irotana, the Mother Goddess.

She was and is light, and life, and love and all that is good. Yet also within her was the desire to create, to mold, to bring form to the nothing. Thus did Irotana create the world, its waters and its land, its fiery core and its gusting winds.

Yet the Goddess was alone. She desired to bring form from her very being, to bring forth other entities from her very essence. Thus did she fill her womb with thought and emotion, with fire and water, with breath and blood and form. And thus did the Goddess give birth, and become the Mother of All.

First came Tyrea, the nurturing eldest, solid of spirit, long of patience, the first daughter of Irotana. Then came Aeryon, swift and decisive, with music in his heart and wisdom in his fierce gaze. Laugar was next, with a laugh as deep as the seas, easy of temper and slow to anger. Then Claeryn, ever quick to rage yet otherwise gentle and warm of heart, ever loving of a good trick and a good laugh. And at the last came Chaos, she whose name is lost to time, mischievous and whimsical, capricious and temperamental, ever indulged by her older siblings.

In the age that followed the birth of Irotana's children, all joined with her in populating the world we now call Calacia. Irotana herself created the elves, pure of spirit, one with her world, companions of the gods. They spread throughout the world, tending to nature, living among it peacably. Aeryon took a tribe of elves and gave them feathered wings, and they became the servants of the gods. Claeryn, in a fit of creative whimsy, selected a tribe of elves and granted them wings, scaled and sailed like the wyvern's wings, and they became the dragoons. Tyrea selected a third tribe of elves and melded their form with rock and tree and earth, and they became the gnomes. Laugar granted a fourth tribe the power to grow fins when they entered the water, and they became merfolk.*

But it was a different tribe of elves that drew Chaos' attention, a tribe of mischief that occasionally grew malicious, a tribe curious and inventive and restless. She fused them with the essence of the void and of her own chaotic blood. They became soulless things, hungry things, thirsting for the lifeblood of other creatures. Vampires.

The other gods were horrified and shocked at this twisted creation. They forbid her from touching their creations, lest she pervert them accidentally. And they tried to destroy her creation. Chaos protested, but they would not hear, and so she hid away as many of the vampires as she could, believing them beautiful in their cold predatory ways, while the rest of the vampire tribe was destroyed by her siblings.

She grew bored, merely watching mortals play out their lives. She grew bitter, watching her siblings continue to create while she was forbidden to. And so, against her siblings' commands, Chaos created creatures of her own, ogres and their ilk. In vengeance for her slain vampires, she sent her creations rampaging across the world, slaying everything they came across. Some of the angels, servants of the gods, followed her in her rebellion, and she granted them the power of shapeshifting, and they became the demons.

Irotana's children battled Chaos and her mortals as their youngest sister's rebellion grew to outright war. Thus did the four older gods chose realms to direct in the battle against their sister's perversions of Irotana's world. Tyrea had long been drawn to the earth, and she directed those of that realm to fight. Aeryon took charge of air, Laugar of water, and Claeryn found his realm in fire.

War continued, and the four gods realized they needed strong weapons against Chaos. Each called sentients to them and granted them powers to protect the realms. These Protectors of the Realms became druids, priests of the gods, weilders of divine magics.

Yet the druids were not enough protection still. The gods pondered on this, and finally realized a solution - they would make creatures to bond with sentients and fight Chaos together. Thus were the bonds created, phoenixi and maricorns, kraenon and gryphons and all the rest. But Chaos would not be outdone, and thus did she create bonds for her own forces, twisted forms of her siblings' creatures.

Thus passed the sixth age, and Calacia revolved into the seventh age, that of fiercest war. In this age, the gods battled most ferociously, and destroyed much. Where their blood spilled sprang forth new life, the elementals of fire, earth, wind, water, and chaos, who contented themselves with keeping the element balance of the world in place. Many people fled to a large island, and to other parts of the world, yet it was the island that most fled to. They called that island Shadow Star. It was so named because although it was a refuge, a lone star of hope, it was under the shadow of war and chaos.

The rest of the legend we weave yet, as the present spins to the past and events of today become history's tales.

(*The mortal angels of current-day Shadow Star are actually descendents of those near-immortal angels who are servants of the gods. Those angels interbred with humans (which aren't native to Shadow Star, but are actually from our Terra), and the current angels are little more than attractive humans with feathered wings. The same goes for merfolk. Due to the fierce rivalry between elves and dragoons, or perhaps causing it, the elves perpetuated the legend that dragoons were the result of a disgusting mating between dragons and elves. Some dragoons agree, though they take pride in the idea that they have dragon blood. The truth, that they're Claeryn's creation, has been mostly lost.)

Magic

Druidic magic is clerical, but not in the usual sense. Certaintly, druids have to be loyal to their god/ess, but they do not have to spend time in prayer. The druidic gods and goddesses respect devotion to, communion with, and protection of nature above all else. Thus, druids are most often in solitude- practically hermitlike- in their realm. For instance, a druid of land will usually keep to him/herself in the forest or some other life-rich area of land. To the druidic gods and goddesses, devotion to nature is a better cause for reward than any amount of prayer- devotion to nature is a type of prayer, in this case.

• Elemental Magic: This is the first type of magic learned. Those of Laugar will learn to use magic involving water; those of Tyrea will learn to use magic involving plants; etc.
• Healing Magic: Druids learn how to heal the creatures of their sphere with magic. They can only heal creatures and only the ones of their sphere, however- not sentients.
• Shapeshifting: This is harder than it might seem. First, the druid must know almost everything about the creature they are shapeshifting into. They choose one species and learn everything about it- its physical features, both inner and outer; reproduction; behavior; digestion... everything. Then they must have a very strong sense of self- they must know who they are, and must know about themselves. If they do not, they may lose themselves in the animal they 'shift into. Finally, the druid will actually perform First Change (the name given to the act in which a druid first shapeshifts into his/her chosen creature) with the supervision of two druids who already have gone through shapeshifting. Some druids HAVE died in the process, and some have lost their sense of self and become fully animal. The two supervisors can sometimes help bring those who lose themselves back, but not always. The whole process of research and gaining a strong sense of self takes many years- sometimes two or more decades.

Druid Hall

The druid hall in Cascadia Falls is laid out much like a Roman villa. Its grounds are almost like a city park in some respects, situated on the edge of the city, a beautiful segment of nature amidst the bustle of city life. It's a good place to study, relax, picnic, or meditate; for this reason, members of other guilds sometimes have outdoor lessons in the druid hall. There are meadows and clearings interspersed with trees, flowering grasses, vines and many kinds of flowers. The air is clean and pure. Marbled fountains, some in ruins and only a shadow of their original form, stand in several clearings, proudly spouting water. Unlit iron torches line the path and sit around several clearings for those who entered the villa at night.

The top of the shallow hill near the actual entrance provides an excellent view of the hall itself. White pillars stand tall at the portico, intricately carved with vines to look as if greenry had embedded itself in stone, and marbled steps leading to double doors, usually open to let as much light in as possible. There are carvings about the doorway telling the story of creation. The druid hall is flanked by a large pond (though not large enough to be called a lake), and there are five ourdoor temples for Irotana and her four children, all in marble.

Entering the druid hall doesn't normally change the level of light much at all. In the center of the main room is a tall tree with strange, long, supple, nearly vine-like branches, which stretch across the hall in every direction. Birds fly freely in and out of the hall, coming to perch on smaller trees in the main room, or picking ripe berries from bushes, only to fly outside again. Any druid of Tyrea can move the leaves and branches to seal the roof from rain or other things.

Along the back wall, opposite from the entrance, are four solid doors, each emblazoned with a different symbol. One with a phoenix, one with a sea dragon, one with a white falcon, and one with a silver wolf. Claeryn, Laugar, Aeryon, and Tyrea. There is a fifth, much larger door to the right of the entrance, with the symbol of a silver and white unicorn, Irotana. It's in the order of creation, when an observer faces the druid hall from those temples.

Ranks

There are three ranks in the druidic order: Acolyte, Cleri, and Changer. Druid ranks are not named as other religious orders are, as they are not a typical religion, and are more of guardians of nature than priests and priestesses or clerics. Acolyte is the only rank so named after typical religious orders.

• Acolyte: At this level, the druid learns to speak the language of the creatures of their sphere, and learns the basics of the interaction and behaviors of the different species. Once this is done, they learn elemental magic and the harnessing of it, as well as healing magicks. They will then pass a test to become Cleri.
• Cleri: In the Cleri level, the druid will improve on their magic. They will also choose an animal to study and eventually change into. Once they perform First Change, they are Changers.
• Changers: Changers have performed First Change, and will often begin to study another animal to change into.
• Guildmaster: OPEN (Irotana's Chosen, Shujaat Khayri, is acting as guildmaster as there is currently none).

Miscellaneous

• Weapons: The primary weapons of a druid are the bow and arrows, and the staff.
• Diet: Contrary to what some people might think, druids are perfectly fine with eating meat. After all, the gods and goddess of the four realms are predators, though Irotana is not. However, they do not kill unneccessarily, and do not interfere with people hunting for food or predators hunting meat.
• Clothing: Most druids wear colors that go with the sphere they serve. Those of Laugar wear deep blue and sea green trimmed with white. Druids of Tyrea wear forest shades- dark green and brown, namely. Servents of Aeryon are clothed in sky blue and white, although black and silver, symbolizing the night sky, is also acceptable. Those of Claeryn wear red and orange trimmed with the blue and white of a flame's center. Clothing is usually loose-fitting, comfortable attire for easy movement, although for ceremonies and gatherings, robes in their sphere's colors are worn. All druids also wear their god or goddess' pendant about their necks. The Guildmaster wears Irotana's colors- silver and white.