Aymara
Sweet, Lovely, Fairest, the Golden, the Singer, Sister of Song, Jewel of Heaven, Lady of Love
Aymara (ai-MAR-uh) is the chaotic good goddess of love, music, passion, romance, marriage, lovers, musicians, artists, and bards. She is associated with all aesthetic delights, and her name is spoken first by those who see the arts as the greatest achievement of the mortal races. Curiously, Aymara did not bring music and dance to the world. Her mother did, but none surpass Aymara’s skill in the arts, and Zheenkeef has never been too interested watching over artists.
Aymara’s worship is extremely popular among the elves and, in olden days, she was thought to be their mother and father. The elves still sometimes refer to her as mother, and show her in the comely shape of a female elf. The other races revere her, especially at weddings, but she is not particularly popular among dwarves, whose artists are usually adherents of Korak, and make clever and beautiful works with their artisans’ hands. Among all the gods, Aymara is the only one regularly associated with the Shee, the last of the div races remaining on earth. Some believe she tarries in their forests, which are now fairy woods, and many dryads, naiads, pixies, and sprites have reveled under the moon with the Lady of Love.
Divine Domains
Love and the Arts
Divine Symbols & Sigils
Aymara is usually shown as the most beautiful woman the artist can imagine, and therefore is whatever race the artist prefers. She is usually shown with golden hair, for she is remembered as Aymara the Golden, but occasionally her hair is dark, and her skin maintains the golden burnish. She is very tall and always dressed in the finest courtly attire. Many depict her with a lyre under her arm or in her lap, as she plays and sings for the delight of others. Other images show her singing so sweetly that even the rocks weep.
Musical instruments of gold or silver represent the goddess, but a silver lyre like the one she plays in so many legends has become the most common one. Members of her clergy wear small versions of the instruments they play, so a flautist might wear a small silver flute, or a harpist, a golden harp. If one simply needs a symbol, though, one always uses the lyre, the most universally recognized instrument of Aymara. Songbirds (particularly the nightingale) are associated with the goddess. She is also closely tied to the pegasi, and rides a silver pegasus herself, for the only appropriate steed for the most beautiful of the gods is the most beautiful of beasts.
Musical instruments of gold or silver represent the goddess, but a silver lyre like the one she plays in so many legends has become the most common one. Members of her clergy wear small versions of the instruments they play, so a flautist might wear a small silver flute, or a harpist, a golden harp. If one simply needs a symbol, though, one always uses the lyre, the most universally recognized instrument of Aymara. Songbirds (particularly the nightingale) are associated with the goddess. She is also closely tied to the pegasi, and rides a silver pegasus herself, for the only appropriate steed for the most beautiful of the gods is the most beautiful of beasts.
Tenets of Faith
Arts and Desires
Aymara is a true patron of the arts and desire. As Love’s Conquest reveals, she cannot abide a place where music is not heard or where love is shunned. She works to make a world safe for love, delight, and art, but she knows the world is not so happy a place that people can spend all their days in revelry. She is realistic about her wish.Aymara reminds mortals that in beauty they can find hope, and in love and music they can be reminded of why they persevere through difficulties. Any seeking to ease pain through beauty are especially blessed by Aymara, and she often makes her blessing manifest by filling their lives with love and delight. However, she also sees deep into the artist’s temperament, and knows the best among them might require sorrow to make their greatest works. She has been known to oblige, providing the tragedies and afflictions for some of the mortal races’ greatest artists, resulting in the saying, “as unhappy as a singer.” She believes the great art that arises from these sorrowful lives do such long-term good that one lifetime of pain is a worthy trade. Besides, these artists end up rewarded in death, abiding with her in Heaven, or in the Fourth Hall of Maal’s kingdom. Aymara is certainly mercurial. Her favor falls upon and departs from mortals with equal alacrity. She is very emotional, longing for true and immortal love. From time to time, she believes she finds a mortal couple with such a love, and heaps blessings on them, only to see them quarrel over nonsense, and then strips them of her blessings. Tales of such star-crossed lovers fill countless comedies and tragedies. If there are two emotions in which she is constant, it is her love of her family and her hatred for Kador. She believes, rightly, that Kador, who is now Asmodeus, plots to destroy the kingdom of Heaven. Because of this, she remains forever vigilant, and even directs an order of mortals to watch over matters diabolical, prepared for a war against Hell.
Holidays
Holy Days
Lords and nobles with a sense of the artistic, or who wish to present themselves as artistically savvy, often work with the faith to promote the Aymaran Festivities. These usually take place in the spring and summer. Their size and importance depend on the wealth and prominence of sponsoring nobles. The festivals are often given peculiar, grandiose names which nearly always mention the sponsors, such as, “The Worthy Festival of the Five Perfect Blossoms in Spring, by Lord Pembroke Callington’s Charity.” Local celebrants sanctify the Aymaran Festivities in opening and closing ceremonies. Once every fifteen years, a great council of celebrants convenes to organize a Bardic Championship. At such times, the celebrants spread word to the four corners of the civilized world to tell bards that the Championship is coming, though in times of peace, artists anticipate the event, and travel to where it will likely be held in any event. It takes two years to move from announcement to commencement. At the Championship, bards compete in contests of composition, playing, singing, drama, and comedy. The winners are proclaimed the greatest bards of the civilized world, blessed by Aymara, and are given beautiful silver medallions to mark their victories. A Bardic Championship is considered a profoundly holy time for Aymarans, and they come from all around to witness such grandeur.
Servants of Aymara
Aymara has many servants, all of whom love her perfectly, or she inspires awe and love in all who behold her.The Chorus of the Birds
In a great aviary of pearl and silver, high in the kingdom of Heaven, there live ten thousand birds. Each bird was, in mortal life, a great singer—usually one who led a miserable life, and was thereby inspired to create magnificent art. Now the birds sing all day in such glorious harmonies even the angelic choirs wonder at them. Aymara sometimes sends a member of the Chorus to earth to visit a singer and inspire him—though this is not as common as claimed by the bards, who often say they learned their latest song from a bird of the Chorus.
Arathelle
A silver pegasus, Arathelle is Aymara’s steed in the vaults of Heaven as well as on the rare occasions she descends to the mortal world. Arathelle is a wise and lovely beast, able to call other pegasi to her side and to communicate with all manner of steeds, including the unicorns. Her coat and mane are silver, as though spun from the very metal of the earth, but her eyes are deep as wells, containing the insight and wisdom of the ages. Legends tell of heroes favored by Aymara who were saved from the brink of death by Arathelle, swooping down from Heaven and carrying them to safety.
The Seven
Aymara’s seven children by Aragos are patrons of musicians: Aragoth, Barawyn, Celedynne, Dariun, Erylwyn, Fionali, and Geromul. They correspond to the notes of the musical scale, the seven rhythms and the seven types of instrument: reeds, drums, horns, flutes and whistles, cymbals and gongs, plucked and struck strings, and bowed strings, in that order. They visit composers and players, aiding their songwriting.
Just as the Chorus of the Birds does not visit half so many singers as claim to have seen them, the Seven do not aid nearly as many musicians as claim to have been aided.
Divine Classification
God
Religions
Alignment
Chaotic Good
Church/Cult
Spouses
Siblings
Darmon
(Brother)
Children
Related Myths
