The Bride and Groom

The Curse of Two

Death takes many names in Gran Lorien. Some call it the Reaper. The King in Black. Babylon. The Black Pair. The Curse of Two. Those with a sense of humour call it the Bride and Groom. Nevertheless, it comes for all. Death is fickle and asks a lot of those that choose to follow its path. Very few people survive their run-in with the Bride and Groom as they only appear to those on deaths door. As such, stories from those that claim to have seen them are either extremely rare or complete fabrications. From the stories that seem most credible, a common depiction of the Bride and Groom has emerged. Death appears always as a pair: a man in dark robes and a woman in white. The two are always entwined; she is either seated in his lap, held in his embrace, or tangled in his rib cage. The two are one entity and speak as one at all times except when debating the fate of someone that is mortally wounded. The robed man insists they should be put out of their misery while the woman insists they may still survive their wounds. This argument is had many times, in many forms. Sometimes they argue optimistically about ending suffering or enduring life, other times they argue cruelly about prolonging suffering or swift executions. The pair will decay rapidly for as long as they are manifested, eventually crumbling to dust. Some Blood Magicians and Necromancers believe there is a way that the Bride and Groom can be forced to manifest but these rituals all involve horrific sacrifice.

Divine Domains

Death

Divine Symbols & Sigils

The Bride and Groom are often represented with iconography of skulls, black shrouds, harvesting scythes, ravens and in some places vultures as well. In representing the two figures specifically, they are often depicted as a woman in all white and a man in all black.

Holidays

Hallow's End, held to mark the end of harvesting season in autumn. It represents the end of a bountiful harvest of crops, and the subsequent death of vegetation that autumn entails. The purpose of the festival is to celebrate the beauty of the end of autumn, as well as the end of life. As the season ends, we celebrate that it happened and anticipate its return. This is why it is tied to the Bride and Groom, as it goes hand in hand with celebrating someones life after it ends. The festivities are held by having a feast in the town, each partygoer bringing some of the crops that they harvested to be added to the meal. The town is typically decorated with symbols of the harvest: scythes, pumpkins, hay bales, and corn. As the feast ends and the sun begins to set, it is tradition to hold Tests of Courage, in one of the locals barns or nearby woods. These involve some of the townfolk dressing up in costumes and creating a scary experience, usually for the younger members of the town to enjoy. It has become tradition for those attempting the Test of Courage to do so in pairs, representing the Bride and Groom. As such, young partygoers will often invite the subject of their romantic affections to accompany them through the Test of Courage.