Arah - Lady of the darkest night, Tribemother of the Orcs

When the world of Andúnë was still young, in the West, the forefathers of the Gnomes and the Halflings built their homes and rose as a powerful nation.
In the East, the Elven Houses spread their influence far and wide under the shadow of the mighty trees.
The highest peaks were dominated by the Dragonborn who did battle with powerful ancient creatures.

Before all this came to pass however, before the trees, the grass, before animals roamed the earth, the world of Andúnë lived in darkness.
A darkness mitigated by the pale light of distant stars, pierced occasionally by the shrieks of ancient primordial beasts.
When life began to appear and flourish, in the beginning of time, the darkness subsided and retreated to remote corners of the world, vast underground caverns, and took the name of Arah. Spying on the surface, Arah saw the different races develop and desire grew in her heart to do something similar, to gain the devotion and love of a people of her own.
Creeping around in the depths of night, she brought many species of plants and animals to her reign, finding that only a select few, the oldest ones, born before the time of the Sun and Day, would thrive in her harsh domain. From these, she gave shape to a new race of hardy creatures, who worshiped her and adored her, and would fight for her affection, the Orcs.
These creatures, hulking and strong, would live with Arah herself, embodied in an Orcish matron. Together they would, at night, hunt the great beasts of the planes, when the world was young. In time, the Orcs came upon the other races, who thought of them as demons of the night and fought them for the right of pasture and to retain the fragile balance of the infant world.
In time, when it became clear to the other races that the Orcs were not mere animals but sentient creatures capable of speach, the other races beseeched their patron deities to determine what to do about this growing menace. Arah revealed herself to the other gods, who had, until then, been mostly unaware of her existence. A balance was struck, that saw the birth of an orc nation, divided into tribes that roamed the central plains of Andúnë.
Arah herself joined her peers in their dealings of otherworldly concerns and became known for her strength and wisdom. To this day, those who travel under the cover of night pray for her blessing, as do those who live a nomadic life and spend their nights away from shelter.
The early Orc tribes, over many millennia, dwindled in numbers, and what little numbers of them remain today are still roaming the plains or seek refuge in more inaccessible valleys, deep in the mountain ranges.
Over time however, many instances of crossbreeding between Orcs and Humans occurred, and this has resulted in small tribes of Half-Orcs that by and large also worship Arah as their ancestral Tribemother.