Holy Orders of Urian
Holy Orders
The eyries have four holy orders, two of which are nearly extinct, and one of which was last active so long ago it is now but a dim memory. Each order is named after a beast of the feather. The Skylarks of Urian are clergy, and the dominant order. They have two levels of status: the wings and songs. The Eagles of Urian are holy warriors with two ranks: the talons and the eagles sworn. The hawks are an order of protectors who recognize no ranks among themselves. The now-extinct griffins once mastered the mystical elements of Urian’s manifestations. In addition, a member of any sect might be named eyrie lord, to manage one of the faith’s strongholds, but must abandon prior affiliations to oversee the other sects fairly. Not all eyries select a lord, and some simply grant authority to the highest-ranking resident, though in all cases the senior skylark will be the authority on spiritual matters. The average eyrie has five or six skylark wings, two skylark songs, a couple of eagles’ talons, and a presiding eyrie lord. Four Hawks of Urian might be resident, but rarely participate in eyrie business, as they simply use the place as a base of operations. However, some eyries have no eagles whatsoever, and are instead protected by the hawks.The Eyries of Urian
The church of Urian has weakened in the civilized world, though worship of the god remains strong in wild places. As people move into cities and have ready shelter and warmth, the need to fear the winds and revere the sun is sublimated to reverence for more earthly forces like commerce, craft, war, and medicine. For this reason, the eyries of Urian (as his Churches are called) and the Urianath (YUR-ee-uhn-ath) who worship there have become rare in cities. The eyries are not secularly strong, and one of their holy orders has vanished from the world. Indeed, the greatest eyries stand high in the mountains, ancient and magnificent structures that offer a commanding view out across hundreds of miles of valleys. These eyries are remote and hard to reach, and it is rare for the skylarks— priests—to journey down from them. This does not make for a popular religion. And yet, for those who seek freedom from enslavement—of the body, the mind, or the spirit—there are few greater places than the eyries. Homes of contemplation, beauty, and austere wisdom, the eyries are a boon to many in their deepest need. The eyries are roused to action when asked to aid the enslaved and the downtrodden. Just as Urian’s wind reaches every corner of the world, the Urianath believe Urian’s care should be available to all people and therefore abhor slavery. However, the Urianath are now so marginalized that, should they seek to topple a major power, they would need aid from another church to carry out the task. The stance against slavery is universal in the faith. There are other points on which the Urianath vary. There are some devoted most to the sun and light of the Sky King. These Urianath strive against the undead and other forces of unlife. Others among the Urianath revere the Sky Father’s cold light of the moon and stars above all, and seek individual strength and glory, as the stars are individual points of beauty and light. Urian has a peculiar view of the world: He either focuses on the highly specific details of peoples’ lives, or pays attention to trends across hundreds of years. This is best understood as the sun and the stars. The sun rises every single day; its cycle is one of the daily repetitions. Stars hang in the heavens, unchanging, for thousands of years, their fire never dimming. Their cycle is either so slow as to be immeasurable, or they are not on a cycle at all. Urian sees the world through these eyes: the day-to-day and the very, very long term. Nowhere is this clearer than in his attitude toward the Urianath faith. He can become intensely involved with the mission of one skylark in a very specific predicament while ignoring everyone else in her eyrie, or he can go for hundreds of years without sending guidance or aid to any of the Urianath—even the most powerful. Most of them accept this as the reason the order of the griffins have been gone from the world for so long; they imagine the Sky Father hasn’t even noticed yet. Urian certainly has no reason to mistrust or dislike his church, but he also has the very practical details of being the heavens to attend to. And if he is capricious and uninvolved in his dealings with the Urianath eyries, he is even more so with the various nomads and barbarians who worship him on the fringes of the world.Saints
The Urianath recall the names of saints as those who have made significant contributions to freeing all people. If someone deterred an empire from conquering the world or stopped an infernal plan to subjugate the mortal races, she would find herself revered as a saint by the Urianath, regardless of her faith. Usually for the Urianath, sainthood requires martyrdom, as it is not likely for one to achieve such ends without the loss of one’s own life. The most notable of the saints revered by the Urianath is Griffin Saint Mathilde, who was the last of the sect of griffins. Her entire order was wiped out by a demonic cult working to bring forth one of their most powerful dark princes. The cult did not realize Mathilde had survived, however, and in the last moments of its vile rite to call the demon, she sacrificed herself to close the gate. Her act wiped out the cultists and barred the prince from entering the material plane for one hundred years and a day. Since that time, there have been no griffins, for there is no one to train them, but their sacrifice is remembered, for they saved the world from certain doom.Tenets of Faith
Doctrine
“The sky is light and dark. The wind is hot and cold. The sun gives life and death. But the sky is dark when the world needs dark, and death comes of necessity. Can we question and rail against the cold while we praise and hallow the warmth? Can we hate the sun in the desert when we love it in the winter? All are part of the Sky Father, and all have a purpose in his plan. We must be grateful, even for darkness and death.” —Skylark’s Song Abu Goldfeather’s “I Have Tasted the Stars”The Urianath practice a good-aligned faith, even though they sometimes praise and glorify things others find evil, like bitter cold, the blood moon, or darkest midnight—and it is precisely because others find them evil that they praise them. The core premise of the Urianath faith is that Urian loves the world and its peoples. After all, he guarded the tree, he opposed Kador bitterly, and he pulled the winds from his own body and enslaved them—he who loves freedom most! He gave light to the dark parts of the world, and gave evening to the light parts. It is therefore unquestionable that he loves the world and the mortals who inhabit it. So why, then, does he sometimes let the wind rage and destroy ships? Why does his cold winter wind come down and kill unprotected children? Why does his sun burn the skin and suck the water from a man’s body, leaving him to the vultures in the desert? Why does the night serve as a haven to thieves and evil beasts? The contemplation of these questions, and their reflection in every mortal spirit, is the heart of Urianath practice. For these great and difficult questions are reflected in the hearts of men: Why does a good and happy woman consider hurling herself to the rocks below whenever she stands at the edge of a cliff? Why does a loving father consider casting his own child into an open fire? Why do good people do terrible things? The contemplation of these questions is of central importance to the Urianath, and their understanding is that it is the freedom to do evil that makes people good. Just as the Great Sky must sometimes let awful things happen so that the mortal races fully appreciate the good of the world, so too must all people contemplate the darkness in their own souls to fully appreciate the good. One can see, therefore, why the Urianath so oppose tyranny and slavery. A slave is not free to walk the good path, to explore the depths of her spirit. Tyrants seek to control the thoughts and hearts of their subjects, though thoughts and hearts must be free to soar or sink. But just as the Urianath oppose the extremes of law, they oppose the extremes of chaos. They believe that discipline and rule are necessary for a person to fully appreciate his goodness. The path of the Urianath lies between law and chaos. It embraces contemplation and balance on the road to good. The eyries are most often visited by those wrestling with the darkness of their own spirits, just as the sun and moon wrestle, and just as the North and East Winds battle with the South and West. Those who strive to conquer what they see as their worse natures, those who feel imprisoned by past deeds or wicked desires, find succor in the faraway and hidden eyries, high in the mountains. Whenever they are apart from their eyries, the Urianath seek to bring spiritual guidance and support to people across the land. They bring freedom of the mind, the heart, and the body to all they encounter, so that all people can explore the dual sides of their nature—the light and the dark—and understand that both are necessary for goodness.
Worship
Urianath Prayers
The Urianath have many sayings they utter repeatedly, as they contemplate the world and their own spirits. One of the most common is a meditation on light:“Father Sky, the Sun and Moon,
Giver of the golden boon,
Silver twilight, radiant dawn,
The cycle ceaseless carries on.
“Hallowed heavens, pitch and star,
Thou kindle even near and far.
Thy light shines out when all is dim,
Thy darkness forms the nightly hymn.”
Type
Religious, Holy Order
Demonym
Urianath
Subsidiary Organizations
Deities
Divines
Related Myths
