Pyryrakas

Pyryrakas (peer-REE-rah-kahs) was the Proto-Elemental goddess of Water, crafter of Elves, spirit of winter, and the patron goddess of sailors. Her worship has spread throughout the world and beyond the bounds of race. Outside of Elven worship, her name is often shortened to Pyry.

Table of Contents Description Personality Powers Aspects Realm Activities Relationships Worshipers Clergy Orders Temples Dogma Rites Scripture Holy Days Relics History Myths and Legends

Description

Pyryrakas is portrayed as a noble Elven woman with long navy blue hair and pale skin, that both sparkle in the light, like a sheet of fresh snow. Context often influences her attire. As a goddess of elves, she is depicted in light flowing blue outfits reminiscent of pouring water. As a patron of sailors, she is often dressed in more practical sailing attire. When depicted as a symbol of winter, Pyryrakas takes on a more feral appearance with furs and armor.
During Starfall, Pyry fell to a mortal form yet to be recorded.

Personality

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Powers

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Aspects

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Realm

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Activities

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Relationships

Pyryrakas has a relationship with both the Proto-Elementals and the seasonals, serving as both.
Pyry, and by extension her followers, hold a neutral if not positive regard for Arun, the god of air and Humans, recognizing his sacrifice and loss. However, this cannot be said for the other elementals. While blame is disputed between the two’s followers, The Queen of Elves is often said to contest Erdah, god of Dwarves and earth, at every turn without being outwardly in conflict. This has led to ongoing tensions between the patrons’ races. However, this conflict is minor and passive, especially compared to Pyryrakas’ abhorrent regard for Affirhet, the god of fire and would-be assailant.
Pyry’s distaste for Affirhet extends into her role as Grandmother Winter, where it is directed to his sons Donaru and Dregnu, the gods of summer, whose constant conflict creates a mess that she must clear at the end of the year. Her relation to the other two seasonals is reflected in the Elven Pantheon, wherein she takes on a more matronly role to both Larenquin and Setahlenthal, The Spring Maiden and Mother Harvest respectively.

Worshipers

Prior to Starfall, Pyryrakas was worshiped across various cultures, each interpreting her divinity uniquely. She was predominantly revered as the patron of sailors, with the ocean considered, “her domain.” This role made her particularly influential in port towns, especially within the Lallieric Islands. Pyry also had a wide following of respect and honor as the personification of the harshness of winter, where she gained the title of ”The Snow Queen,” a derivative of her more broad title of Queen of Elves. Within Elven societies, Pyryrakas, if not referred to by name, was held in high regard as ”Grandmother Winter,” an honorific drawn from the Elven respect for their elders. The most notorious of Pyryrakas’ worship was as the patron goddess of the Empire of Oichegairdin, though many outside Oichegairdin debate its interpretation of Pyrian tenants. In contrast, Dwarven communities often view Pyry in a more malevolent light, denoting her as, Rángeld, The Luring Pool, a siren-like trickster who portends death and suffering. Despite these varied interpretations, communities frequently offered her respect, particularly in hopes of surviving the winters she governs.

Clergy

Pyryrakas’s clergy are broadly known as The Cove. Each Cove works independently to best serve their community. Coastal communities often have a sect that provides training to shipwrights and sailors. Coves found more inland often task themselves with preparing their community for winter or guiding others through harsh, cold, environments. Regardless of their location, each Cove serves a hierarchy akin to a fleet of ships, with dedicated members as their crew and led by high priests, known as Frost Captains. While individual sects may only know each other through having served on the same ship or at port, they are more often recognized by the silver snowflakes that adorn their aqua and turquoise clothing, use of Pyry’s favored weapon, the Cutlass, and a silver or platinum earring with a turquoise band and snowflake engraving that is donated to the temple upon their passing to pay for funerary rites.

Orders

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Temples

Temples to Pyryrakas appear wherever her touch seems constant, be it near mountain tops, arctic tundras, or coastal cities. While they all utilize aquamarine in their floors, walls, columns, and statuaries, coastal temples also strengthen their walls by utilizing tabee concrete: clay, sand, and oyster shells.

Dogma

Pyryrakas’s dogma is shaped around her role as a goddess of water. As such, water, especially fresh water, is held with reverence within The Cove. They believe:

• Be transparent in your beliefs, for faith will wash away the soot of hardship in life.
• Be calm and serene, like a pond.
• Forgive stormy sea-like outbursts as a natural part of life.
• Persevere. Even the great mountain is cut, in time, by the brook.

Faith in Pyryrakas often brings an appreciation of all things, as she signifies the end of the year, freezing it in time for remembrance before one starts again.

Rites

The Cove often encourages daily devotion be it by donating material, money, or property to the temple or through private recitation of sacred texts. Different Coves may have stronger preferences towards either practice or a type of donation.
Two notable outliers include followers of Pyry donating their time and experience on ships in her name and Elven followers of Pyryrakas utilizing spell scrolls and books as among sacred texts.
Coastal followers are also known to perform rituals to officiate naval officers and new ship captains, as well as bless new ships or sailors departing on their maiden voyage.
Finally, members of The Cove, with the ability to do so, will not resurrect those who have been lost at sea or by sea creatures. However, they will provide funerary rites which often includes creating a pyre for the victim on a vessel that is then launched to sea. Members of The Cove often pre-pay for these rites in the form of an engraved earring that is donated upon their death.

Scripture

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Holy Days

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Relics

• The Cloak of Elven Prosperity is an expertly crafted cloak that, in worthy hands, protects the wearer from all disease, both natural and supernatural.
• The Sailor’s Necklace appears as a simple hemp necklace. The wearer is protected from the elements while sailing: both the cold of the wind and water and the burning of the sun. It is said, one wearing this necklace will not be claimed by drowning.
• A Tear of Pyry is a brilliant teardrop-shaped, blue diamond the size of a fist, said to have been shed after Pyryrakas’ assault. It is believed that if one thinks of someone and speaks their name while holding the tear in their hand, the diamond will summon the person to you and return them to life. It is said to have been lost or sealed beyond the Stormwrack.

History

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Myths and Legends

The Assault of Pyryrakas This myth details how the Elementals, Affirhet, Arun, and Erdah, fell for Pyryrakas, Elemental of water, and competed for her affections. Affirhet, seeing a match in his opponents, attempted the most direct route and forced himself upon Pyryrakas. She, with the help of Arun and Erdah, fought him off. The conflict decimated the landscape, creating the ring of deserts. From then on, Water has sworn off any coexistence with Fire and the two have been separate ever since.

Pyryrakas

Symbol of Auril by Wizards of the Coast

A Snowflake

Aliases: Rángeld, The Luring Pool (Dwarven)‌; Grandmother Winter or The Snow Queen (Elven)‌; Pyry or Queen of Elves (Human)‌
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Divine Rank: Elementals
Portfolio/Domains: Air; Cold; Good; Healing; Magic; Oceans; Snow Storms; Travel; Water; Weather; Winter
Worshipers: Bards; Elves; and Sailors
Favored Weapon: Cutlass (Short Sword)

Pyry, the Goddess of Sailors

Liria by Astri Lohne