Druids

This entry will here focus on the Coven Tabjishreg specifically, a druidic coven of Taresani.

=Alignment= True Neutral

=Members= Druids of the Tabjishreg Covenant, binding them to the code and school of thought associated with the half-elven druid Jishreg (non-druidic name: Qvela).

=Founding Year= c. MY 150 (?)

=Territory= The Coven Tabjishreg is the dominant coven in Taresani, holding sway everywhere south of the Veesat River. As with all druids, the coven-members are nomads, keeping well clear of any areas of significant habitation. Individuals may dwell in a particular forest or hillside for many years, but they are easily ready to drop it if they must. The coven also has a few dozen members in the Cronvtani Isles and north-eastern Drecitou.

=Purpose= As with all covens, the Tabjishreg is secretive and enigmatic, sometimes going out of its way to ensure that outsiders searching for it do not find any members. Tabjishreg druids follow the teachings of a great master from what is now southern Utempe, Jishreg, who felt the Kraij to the Greater Covenant around Marnic Year 110. From what outsiders have been able to glean concerning this master, he was an ascetic who encouraged that other druids take vows of silence and chastity, the better to reflect upon that which they serve. Rejected by the hedonist coven dominant in Taresani at that time, the Lisbarniz, he wandered alone through the wilderness for a decade, reflecting upon the thousandfold incarnations of the Great Covenant he had sworn to follow. He had a startling insight into the nature of purity, and began preaching a new lesser covenant. He said, “All that I have done, I have done in the name of purity.” His teachings fiercely challenged the Lisbarniz, nearly precipitating an internal war among the druids of Taresani. Eventually, however, he won extensive support, and by 150 had driven the Lisbarniz from the island. He swore his lesser covenant around that time, with the simple purpose of utter purity “in body, speech, and mind.” As with other covens, the Tabjishreg is also devoted to the protection of nature against the undead and other aberrations.

=Hierarchy= Owing to their balance between law and chaos, druids have neither an enthusiasm nor a distaste for hierarchy. That said, there is a certain order of the ranks in any coven, and Tabjishreg is no exception. The internal politics seem to be gerontocratic, with a strong emphasis on wisdom and the training of lower-ranking druids. While the elders (tardmur) are unquestionably in power, they are not closed to influence from the lower ranks. If a novice is wiser in a given situation than an elder is, the other druids will listen to the novice. It should be noted that, astonishingly, all druids subscribe to a belief in sexual equality. Even humans born and raised in civilised areas who become druids accept this extraordinary idea in the covens. Unlike the elvish practice of a “double society” where the sexes are separate but equal, the druids have always maintained both integration and equality.

Novice (Samyag)
Novice is the rank of training, when the druid is still learning the secret language of the Great Covenant and studying the secret texts of their chosen coven. In the Tabjishreg, novices train with a single teacher, separated from the rest of the coven for the first year. Meditation is central to the Tabjishreg practice, and most of the training revolves around it. Many partake in ascetic practices such as taking very little food, sleeping in the rain, or receiving extensive tattoos without any pain-dulling medicine. Due to druidic attitudes towards “life force”, any sexual expression by a novice is forbidden, and those that break the rule must do extensive penances. The exact experience varies from student to student, but all eventually feel the Call (Kraij) of the Great Covenant, a shatteringly powerful moment when their soul is bound with the Great Covenant. The Kraij apparently only occurs if the Druidic language is taught to the student by a master who can already speak it. The Kraij gives the novice true fluency in Druidic (otherwise impossible for any mortal) and the ability to work magic through the Great Covenant. Despite the immense power of the Kraij, it is not considered sufficient for ascendance from the novitiate: the samyag must solve a ritual riddle, instead.

Guardian (Kawlush)
Guardian is the main rank for all druids, referring to their status as unflinching wardens of nature, as well as the esoteric role of the “Keepers of the Undying Seal.” Just what this seal is, is an utter mystery, and it was only mentioned once in a written version of an Elven myth concerning the origin of the druids, now kept in the Vatheot Library by the Guild. At this rank, druids are fully independent servants of coven and Covenant. The few druids that come into contact with outsiders are almost always guardians: novices are forbidden contact with outsiders, stewards are too concerned with internal governance and vigilance against abominations, and seers are deeply uninterested in the affairs of the outside world. Roles within the ranks vary greatly depending on natural skills. Some serve as scribes, others as hunters and gatherers. Guardians have a strange command of their magic, and many prefer to spend their time hunting and exploring in the shape of a beast. The guardians often take solitary residence at a hut, carefully studying local natural occurrences and reporting to the stewards. The rise in the rank of steward typically occurs around the late middle years.

Steward (Cepdalg)
Steward is the “autumn rank.” Stewards are so titled because they are the ruling rank in the coven, and responsible for educating the novices, directing the guardians, and heeding the seers. Since covens are nomadic over great distances, different stewards maintain correspondence usually by writing letters and requesting that birds carry the message over distance. Stewards may call a gathering if they think it necessary: such a gathering is called a circle, and is an assembly of all the coven’s stewards in one location. The last such circle called by the Coven Tabjishreg was in Marnic Year 483, when the first illithids appeared in western Taresani and the coven debate a course of action. Stewards have great power in druidic magic and serve as teachers because the have not begun to fade into the Great Covenant. Some stewards do not take on a leader’s role, however, and become mighty lone wanderers, hunting and destroying any who violate the natural order. As they approach elder years, stewards begin to feel what is known as the Fade (Jeryap), when their individual personality begins to lose cohesion and unite with the Great Covenant. They become seers when the Jeryap proceeds to such an extent that lost memories are replaced by those of other animals.

Seer (Tagned)
Seer is the winter of the druidic state. The body and mind are weakening, as they must, though druidic power continues to grow stronger. Jeryap now affects the druid extensively: their mannerisms become strangely bestial, while fading memories are replaced more and more. The seers know more of the Great Covenant than other druids, and some even claim to have visions of the First Tree in all its glory. They are able to detect permutations and shifts in the Great Covenant to a highly subtle degree, hence their name, and many have the ability to see fates with the same accuracy as a Guild waker of the divination school. Some seers even have the enigmatic power of doom-saying, which is unique to the druids. The seers of a coven often live in extremely isolated locations, even for druids: those of Tabjishreg keep to the hills and deep forests exclusively, avoiding all non-druids entirely. When death approaches for the seers, their memory rapidly dissolves into “primal memories” and their ability to speak a non-Druidic language deserts them. The druids respect the dead, stripping away the meat to feed wild animals and drying the bones, which are then buried under small cairns. These cairns cannot be found by non-druids unless a druid shows the way, and vegetation grows upon them when it should not, even in the chill of winter. The bodies of archdruids are buried similarly, but the presence of their body tends to distort the surrounding area: the trees grow impossibly tall, the water is crystal clear, and the animals seem even to comprehend mortal speech. These places of purity, the Glades (Jrangele) are regarded as the locus of the archdruid’s lesser covenant, where the covenant’s power is bound and originates from. No scholars have had the immense privilege of visiting the Glade of Jishreg, but it is guessed to lie in the forests of Utempe. Furthermore, it seems that the power of a lesser covenant must be renewed at the Glade: once every few years, the druids of a coven must return there and honour their archdruid, or they risk a fading of their power within the lesser coven.

=Punishment= Unlike the Guild or the lineages, the very structure of druidic covens is deeply intertwined with the magic they work. While a sorcerer who betrays his lineage will feel his draconic blood run wild, and a murdering wizard may feel the sickening retaliation of an abjuration spell meant to prevent such behaviour, the very power of the druids is bound to coven and Covenant. While the vast majority of druidic power is drawn from the Great Covenant, the oaths of a lesser covenant give them certain limited benefits. They can intuitively sense if a druid is a coven-mate or not; they can “summon” inferiors in the coven with a gentle drawing compulsion; and they can draw vastly larger amounts of magic if they stand in the Glade of their coven’s archdruid. For those who betray coven, the loss of these powers, as well as the hostility of the coven, is its own punishment. For those that stray from service of Great Covenant, however, all druidic powers are stripped away, and terrible misfortune follows until they atone. Atonement is a severe physical tribulation, often involving the heavy shedding of one’s blood. Death is only a punishment for the “irredeemable,” those who steadfastly refuse to atone for their blasphemy against the Great Covenant. “Straying” while remaining within the coven is punished with ascetic penances, such as absolute solitude for a cycle of Aduämsol. For outsiders who cross a coven, there is usually a proportional retaliation. A wizard who steals a druidic talisman, for example, may return to find that an artefact in his library has tracelessly disappeared. Crossing the Great Covenant is very rare for any non-druid, but the punishment is terrifying: a shattered fate. For having interfered in the basic laws of reality, the non-druid’s destiny is robbed of all significance. What was once a meaningful passage in the book of fate becomes a pathetic scribble of banality and nonsense. Everything they do from then on is empty, chokingly mundane, and meaningless.

=Relations=

The druids do not actively seek out contact with the outside world. Theirs is a deeper realm of wilderness and primordial energy, unbound by the trappings of civilisation. The outside peoples that the druids have the most contact with are the elves, who have a very long history with the druids. The elves have, of all the speaking peoples, the most cultural congruence with the druids, and respect them immensely. Humans, on the other hand, know the druids little. Those humans that come in any extended contact with the druids are extremely rural peoples too ignorant to understand the mysterious wanderers of the forest. Often, the druids are mistakenly identified as forest spirits, and left offerings of food and cloth. For their part, the druids often reciprocate by encouraging the healthy growth of the villagers’ crops and bolstering the health of their livestock. More urban-dwelling people are almost entirely unaware of the existence of the druids, and those that hear of them tend to dismiss them as a woodland fable. Any scholar of moderate learning, however, can learn that the druids do exist, without even leaving the city. The saighe-dwellers, too, know of the druids from their records, and a few exceptional examples of dwarves and gnomes have even experienced the Kraij. Politically, the covens are non-entities. Among the magical societies, the covens remain the most secretive, and many a hopeful wizard has been unable to ever track the druids down. The only time the druids have cooperated as a collective with the Guild was during the Grey Revolt. Aware that the necromancers were no longer protected, the druids offered to help exterminate the creators of the abnormal undead, and the help was accepted. Remarkably, the druids seem unbothered by the orcs and accept them into the covens (though they almost overwhelmingly comprise one coven, the Dyarisvesh), and the orcs return this with a sort of baffled respect. The half-humans are often drawn to druidic life, seeking the stability and balance which are central to druidic practice. The druids regard the Unburnt with deep suspicion, recalling the damage done to Kerlonna’s wildlife during the Ahrese Crisis by the invading demons. Most warlocks are uninterested in the druids and simply avoid them. Halflings are sometimes drawn to druidic life, but not in remarkable numbers: it is difficult for them to consider breaking the bonds of their close-knit families.

=Religion=

To many proselytists of Sahullam, the covens are a dangerous heathenry that worships the Realm of Flesh and scorns true knowledge. The druids themselves are unconcerned with this: to them, Sahullam is but another of the hundreds of cults that civilisation has spawned. Some scholars have mistaken the power of druidism, too, for miracles, and judge druidic practice to be a primeval religion. Druidism, however, is not merely a religion. With its own language, spiritual beliefs, hierarchy, and places of residence, druidism is better described as a separate culture, hidden in the wilds. From the member races, the covens have drawn a belief in gods and animistic spirits, but not worship. Reverence is solely given to the Great Covenant, the law written in the blood of every living being that binds them to Maelris. The druids do not hold that the Great Covenant was created by a deity, but that “it created itself in the birth of life” and that “it follows its own ways.” The druidic magic is drawn from the energy of life itself, channelled through the Great Covenant. As druidic belief goes, they hold that upon the Kraij, the druid’s soul is burnt into the Great Covenant, and the “scripture of blood” awakens within. The Druidic language is a manifestation of the language of wild life itself, only sensible to those who have awoken to the reality of the Covenant. Upon death, rather than travelling to another plane, the druid’s soul joins with the Great Covenant and dissipates into blissful union with all life. There are no specific religious ceremonies, as the druids instead undertake to reflect upon the Covenant at all waking moments. In moral terms, the druids seek to maintain balance, not attending to extremes of behaviour without reasonable cause. Specific practices to reflect upon the Covenant vary between covens tremendously, but in the Coven Tabjishreg, they seek understanding through non-craving for body. Tabjishreg is one of the most ascetic covens, requiring that members limit the amount of food they consume to avoid indolence.

=History=

'“The Fall of Qatsurvahê and the Waking of the Keepers,” ELVEN MYTH, Folklore & Mythology, the Primary Hall, Vatheot Library'

Yea, then our glory and majesty was without compare. We spoke and the sea settled; we roared and the rain fell. We had beheld the lands beyond the sky, our numbers were so many. The gods were our shackled servants, the spirits our weeping slaves. No chieftains or tribes fought for might then, for we were one people at peace. Our name-of-many was, in those days of thunder, Qatsurvahê, and we no longer remember why. Spires of crystal and metal reared up across the world’s face, brushing even the moons in their vastness. The other bloods were but savages kept in the wilds, while our mages climbed the trunk of the Unshaking and stared out from her branches, into the unfathomable sea beyond. And they sought yet greater glory.

Blood and bone they needed, and this was taken easily enough from the other bloods, so meek and ignorant were they. Gold to seal, iron to pierce, stone to support. The mages circled, looking beyond the sea to their goal, the Farthest Shore. They knew not what it held, only that they could reach it. When the moons veiled the sun and the blood of a thousand slaves fed the sea, they triumphantly created the last edifice of their dominion, gaping into nightmare.

Somewhere in the screaming misery that followed, there rose a new voice. While our cities collapsed into ruins of twisted flesh, the wild raised a new cry of supplication. The wild bloods called for deliverance, not by their gods but by the earth itself. Once they called, and dozen-eyed wolves gnawed on their unborn young. Twice they called, and reshaped wizards bayed, wading through rivers of bloody milk. Thrice they called, and the Keepers came forth.

To horror the Keepers brought fury, to despair they brought hope, to madness they brought peace. The cities they tore down and blasted to sand. Those of our people, the greater number they burned to excise the disease we had brought. They held fast the vile gate and beseeched the Unshaking, and she veiled herself in ice against the sea beyond. The gate they stripped apart and burned with sunlight and pure waters. The corruption they uprooted, to wither and be no longer. The Undying Seal was their master, painted in blood.

And a remnant of a remnant stood by the crumbling ruins, before the Keepers, and they were all that was left of our fathers. They said in hollow voices, “Are we Qatsurvahê still?” To which the Keepers answered, “That was the name of your conceit. Ye were less then than ye are now, for we have cleansed your blood.” Our nameless fathers asked, “And who are ye, that speak thus?” Answered, “We are the Keepers of the Undying Seal, who tend the Unshaking and guard Maelris against your folly. We lay our doom upon ye, that ye may not wound the world again. From here until the death of the last of your blood, ye shall be able to work naught but stone and wood, and all that ye work otherwise will shatter in your hands.” But cried our fathers, “How then shall the cities be raised again?” And the Keepers answered, “They shall not be so.” And, weeping, our fathers departed, taken by the winds.

And time turned onwards. Some may murmur that some of the old cities were not shattered, but lay hid beneath the earth. Even if they were, what would we do then? No, better not to defy our fate. For we are the blood of Qatsurvahê and conceit, and we must bear our doom even to the winter of the Unshaking.