Talona (Tah-LOW-nah)

Talona is often depicted as a withered old crone with a scarred, tattooed face in religious texts. Where she walks, misfortune and death follow. She is an odd deity. Sages have described her as having the personality of a petulant, greedy child trapped in the body of a once-beautiful woman now scarred by horrific disease and ravaged by age: She is alternately desirous of attention at any cost like a small child and aloof like a wounded paramour who has been discarded by her love. Talona's power slowly wanes after each great plague. When she feels vulnerable in her position, she unleashes another wave of misery and disease-brought death and receives a torrent of prayers entreating her to spare the inhabitants of Iddoxiar from her withering touch. Her power then waxes again in an endless cycle of indifference, devastation, and appeasement.
Some old texts of Talona refer to her as Kiputytto, but this is actually the name of a rival demipower who challenged Talona's portfolio and lost. Most of those who escaped the battle area died soon after of disease. Shortly afterward, Talona won this devastating deific contest and murdered Kiputytto. Representations of Talona's symbol dated to before her battle with Kiputytto show it depicted as a flesh-colored equilateral triangle with point upward containing three teardrops arranged in a triangle with the uppermost black, the lower left purple, and the lower right green. Why the coloration was changed after her triumph over Kiputytto is one of the inner mysteries of the church not ever revealed to outsiders.

Tenets of Faith

Talona's ethos stresses that life and death are in balance, but that death is the more powerful and should be paid proper homage and respect. Life and death are balanced only because birthing and generation are so plentiful. Death is the true power, and the lesson that waits for all. If it falls to the followers of Talona to drive home the point with the tip of a dagger, so be it. Talona's faithful are taught that if they respect death and the many ways the powers can deal it, that knowledge will allow them to live longer. If people think themselves invincible thanks to wealth or a swift swordarm or strong spells, the great equalizer of disease, Talona's breath, will teach them respect and humility. Initiates to the faith are charged as follows: "Let pain be as pleasure to the faithful of Talona. She works upon you from within, and in weakness and wasting is her strength. She is forever and always with you, whomever you or the rest of the world believes in or serves. Let all living things learn respect from Talona and pay homage to her in goods and in fervent worship, and her dedicated priests will intercede for them so that Talona will not claim them—this time. Go and work in Talona's name and let your doings be subtle or spectacular, but make them known as the will of the Mother of All Plagues."

Worship

Aside from selling poisons, antidotes, and medicines, the Talontar travel across Iddoxiar as quietly as possible, constantly seeking out new diseases and afflictions and spreading rumors so as to augment the reputation of Talona. What seems to motivate Talontar in their day-to-day behavior is a quest for respect: respect that is due Talona for her potentially devastating abilities and due them as her representatives on Iddoxiar. Throughout their careers, Talona's priests work with magic and inoculations to build their personal immunities to various poisons and diseases. Thus protected, they treat the diseased, take employment as food tasters for paranoid rulers, wealthy merchants, and nobles, and bury, those who have died from diseases. Whenever a realm or city-state casts out or punishes any Talontar, for any reason, priests of Talona work to cause a plague in that place to exact "Talona's price" for such insults. Rumors have circulated that certain unscrupulous Talontar have occasionally chosen wealthy folk as targets for disease so that wealth and properties can be seized by the church upon the death of these wealthy owners— with the threat of contracting disease keeping rightful heirs and claimants at bay.

Symbol: Three golden amber teardrops on a purple equilateral triangle with point upward
Divine Classification: Goddess
Portfolio: Disease, Poison, Illness
Domains: Death
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Home Plane: Palace of Poisoned Tears
Worshipers: Assassins, druids, healers, rogues, those who suffer from disease and illness
Cleric Alignments: CE, CN, NE