A Castrovel Adventure: Part 3, Chapter 5

In which Lady Vaeol recounts their warfare's ending, including her thoughts on the Qoaronae.

From the Daylog of Vaeol-Zheieveil u-Zhasaele Zolaemaue be’Son

(continued from 10. Soelae, 24,541: 2nd Day Northbound from Qoaronaea)
We spent the next three months simmering within Ofu Vou’s tightness, whereof some grumbled we did so as punishment for my bargain with the Formian Myrmarch, though the reeves bethought more likely that the High Staff had merely forgotten us. Then we were shipped to Komena on the Southern Shore overlooking the Sea of Teeth’s western reach. Here the High Staff set us to shore-watch, mild duty with much chance to hunt. The land and weather interested, for the wind brought coolness I had not felt since Sovyrian. Likewise, some trees seemed like those I had seen amid the Elve’s Homeland. I reckoned we had come so far south.
After another year of such watchfare and other tasks, our firdtide in Valmaeana ended with our comeback to Qoaronaea. We marched up the Street of Heroes in full weaponshow, under the High Staff and Captains’ oversight. We were then led into the Temple of the Qoaronae - the War-Goddesses, at the city’s heart, a building so great that its main hall easily holds five thousand folk, which tallied, including us, the Qabarata, our other allies, and so many Valmaeans as the room let, as Honor Ward. There we stood sharp under the gaze of the Goddess’s mighty stonelikenesses, each fifty armspans tall, carven in startling, awful whitsomeness: hair of snapping snakes, mouths afang, blood-dark wings, harness gleaming darkly, and weapons clutched in clawed hands. The Qoaronae, whom the Valmaeans have besworn as their matron-goddesses, and this city’s namesake. By all tales, this stead is a world-wonder.
I heard a yoretale that the Qoaronae are the triplet-daughters of Burning-Mother and Father-Night. When they reached maidenhood, they went to their father and asked to help in warding their home, their siblings, and all the Sun-Worlds. When Father-Night yaysaid, they beseeched him to show them the Outer Darkness, for they claimed they must understand the dreads they would ward against. Begrudginlgy, Father-Night listened and led them into the darkness between stars. When the three maiden-goddesses came home, they were fearsomely shifted: no longer fair, and looking even as their stone-likenesses shown before me. 
When I behold their snaky locks, sharp mouths as carven in their stones, and bloodily clawed fingers, I recall bewritnesses I have read of the elder Moqeva. I wonder how we have undertaken gods who even seem like these erstwhile foes.
The Valmaean High Captain spoke before the fane. She bade us remind our tide here and the warfare we had witnessed, the foe’s dread we had undergone, and the friends fallen we had lost. She bade us bear this yestermind back homeward and never forget, and never forgive. Then she bade us pray to the Qoaronae for victory.
My throat choked on the prayer, and I could not spit the words. Of all the gods I have seen, the Qoaronae I love least. Unlike Burning-Mother, from what I saw at war, they do not ward, and do not cleanse. They reap souls and blood, and whether they be Lashunta or Formians, I wonder that it may reck not. Instead of light, they belong to darkness and thrive thereon. Yet that is the least reason. For the coldheartedness and bloodymindedness I witnessed in Valmaeyana, I forsake the Qoaronae.
In school, I read the ‘Woe for Lost Valmaea’, and even foolishly tried it in the original Old Valmaean. I had loved the poetry, the fights and love-bouts, and overall the sheer wrath, a City meeting its own death. I remind how the hero Lady Beareal’s speech shouted right off the bookleaf into my mind: “Keep your warm gods smiling through heavenly skies. My gods behold a fiercer spirit. I, like them, was born under the South’s low, heavy sky. Heaven smiles not here. My heaven is the battlefield.” Lady Beareal and the Valmaeans may keep their southern gods. I choose Heaven.
A month later found us back aboard ship, when even now we are sailing northward, back to Qabarat. What I underwent in Valmaeyana haunts me. I think on my Myrmarch and wonder whether she lives, and moreso what she thinks of our meeting, and what outcame for her ilk. Much as I love my city and kind, I pray I never again see the Formian War.
I have been writing this for well more than a day, and each day I have worked has marked another bringing us nearer to Qabarat and home. Now Semuane and Vosaeth call, and I think in their love I may forget these ills. I miss Remaue awfully. I pray I am let to come home.