Artoš

Denmother of All

Artoš [Ar-tosh] is variously depicted as a red-headed goliath clad in furs or as a mighty, runescribed bear. Artoš was among the earliest mortals to ascend to godhood, alongside her sister Beryllian during the Second Era. Artoš is the goddess of the moon, kinship and serves as matron deity of the natural world among the Wildergods (below).

As a goddess of the natural order, Artoš embraces the changing of seasons and the circle of life. Among her clerics are held three key tenets of virtue:

• Nature. No constructs of civilization hold greater importance than rivers, forests and mountains.
• Natural Cycle. There can be no spring without winter, no dawn without night, and no hunter without prey. The many cycles of life must continue.
• Kinship. The bond of kin, by blood or by choice, is a binding unbreakable. Let none stand between you and your own.

When the Humans began razing forests and soiling lakes, Artoš created the first Orcs to protect the wilderness. Orcish legends tell of the first orcs being grown from the earth by Artoš herself. She tended to them in her grove and charged the first four orcish ancestors with protecting the year and its changing of the seasons. Thus created were Juno, daughter of summer & sands; Septimus son of marshlands, forests and the harvest season; Janus, lady of snow and winter; and Mars, lord of the river and coming spring.

The Wildergods

Artoš' four divine offspring charged with stewardship of the natural world in its many forms, to whom many pay tribute. These beings were the first of many Paragons.

Mars, Lord of the River

Juno, Lady of Wildfire

The Archon of Summer and Lady of the everburning sands. Juno's favoured form is her original one--that of a warrior caste thri-kreen, insectoid-like and four-limbed, Juno is as adept a warrior as she is a druid.
Juno teaches her druids to win by any means available and emphasizes an utter lack of dangerous pride. If Juno's foe has better weapons or tactics, a Druid of Juno will adopt those tactics themselves. If the foe has greater numbers, the druid will ambush or poison them. It is this adaptability that led Juno's druids to adopt artifice and forged weapons, a tactic unheard of in other druid circles, although Juno remains averse to forged metal as a rule and taught her warriors instead to work with glassteel.
Worship of Juno specifically is relatively uncommon outside of Bharazad except in thri-kreen colonies. Within Bharazad, Juno once had an abundant following of fire-wielding druids, the Druids of Scorched Earth. These druids have long since been eradicated, however.
The most famous of Juno's halls of worship is the Palace of the Blazing Dawn, a sprawling complex of sandstone buildings and lush courtyards that has long since been overrun by rampant, wandering monsters. The Palace dwells in the Plane of Fire, but once a year its door opens to the material plane for one day only, during the summer solstice.
Juno's most well-known relic is her Sunstone Ring, which she used to call down the sun's own fires to scorch her enemies in a torrent of flame.

Septimus, Lord of the Forest

Archon of forests, marshlands and the harvest.

Janus, Lady of Winter

Archon of snow and winter.

The Huntresses of Artoš

The beasts of the material plane revere Artoš as well as any priest, and like any priesthood there are those among the beasts who have earned Artoš deepest respect, gratitude and favour. These beasts are Artoš' revered huntresses and are spread throughout the realms. Neither gods nor true archons, these beasts nevertheless retain a supernatural magic far beyond that of their kin.

History

The Death of Mount Pelithyr

From the elvish word for Wanderer, the Pelithyr was a massive, wandering mountain that roamed the continent during the First Age and Artoš' first answer to the humans' destructive growth. This wandering mountain would rove about, sometimes only a scant few miles per year, drawn to the noise and disruption of human cities. The Pelithyr was to humans what fire is to forests; the old growth was razed to yield room for new life.
At the dawn of the second age, the Pelithyr was at long last slain by a collective, bloody effort of the humans' Imperial army. Within its corpse the humans discovered its bones could be forged into a great new metal: adamantine.

Creation of the Orcs

At the dawn of the Second Age the humans' sprawling Empire controlled most of the continent's land. The humans razed forests, soiled lakes and blasted mountains. Artoš was bound by the First Rule and prohibited from harming the humans directly. With the Pelithyr's death, she was stirred to new action. Artoš delved into the Pelithyr's mountainous corpse and from the Pelithyr's flesh and bone she drew forth Tygus, the first of the orcs, his skin of gleaming adamantine. Artoš gave to Tygus and his new people a single divine purpose: prevent humankind from sacking and burning the untamed wilderness.

The Horn of Tygus

Myths and legends among Artošian clerics, orcs and elfkind alike tell of Tygus, a powerful cleric who wielded a mystical battle-horn laced with powerful druidcraft and blessed by Artoš herself. The tales of Tygus have become a web of rumour, exaggeration and falsehood, though great reward awaits those who unravel it...

~~Details for Player Characters ~~

Symbol: A Silver Crescent Moon
Domain(s): Nature
Ideals: Nature, Community, Change
Typical Alignments: Any non-lawful alignment.
Typical Worshipers: Druids, lycanthropes, wood elves, orcs.