Bhayúrnde (/ˈvɑjuːɾnde/)
What is it that makes a god? A divine long forgotten to the abyss of time...
The Black Gods
When the Faeries fell upon the Evergreen, lost and swallowed by anguish. They believed themselves alone, forgotten. Immortal children thrust from their rightful home into the lesser world known as Hríonyr. Though it took time, the Fae would come to claim it as their own, for even the most willful of souls knew not to challenge the Nais Ryyl. Yet with time, the än would cry out once more. And the Fae, once thought forsaken, would no longer be alone. Others fell through the Nais Ryyl. Beings, like them, lost in the lesser realm of Ever. However, these 'creatures' were different...
A God's Greed
Only those who have fallen would know of their torment, the hideous weight of the Nais Ryyl (red Veil). A shroud so thick it presses upon the mind like mud. A horror gnawing at the very depths of your soul! Asåå? (Madness?) Pain? Ruin? You are children, lesser beings so far removed from the origin that the wounds of your ancestors be a phantom. A nightmare unseen and forgotten. Tiis rie! (We knew!) We knew from whence they came, of how far they fell betwixt the horrid veils of Uilbwyán! Yes, we knew. And yet gazed upon them, deaf and hungry. Longing for ashen scales of lias. Ensnared by the än (black) of their divine flesh. We called their name. And the Bhayúrnde answered..." -'Record of Ceir,' page 91 of Naisjun Lijon piit (Red Record of the Faeries)
Basic Information
Anatomy
They bore long mangled horns like great bundling forests of dagger and bone, each wrapping around into ghastly crowns - - - - enormous plated fortresses in the frame of six-legged beasts, their form shadowing even the peaks of Chabhaíonh themselves. And yet it was their leathery wings fairer than the whitest snow, spanning lengths of hundreds of meters that blotted out the very warmth of the sun, as though the light had given way to shadow and fallen in despair.
"- - - - - Shimmering scales of radiant lilac stronger than the greatest dusksilver held a permanence defying even the hands of time, fruitless were made trifling things such as walls of stone and mortar." -pages 16 of Ehyö li Änrii piit (book of the black gods)
Civilization and Culture
History
We know naught more than what the old texts tell us - - - what the Fae left unto us. Everything we have come to know about the Bhayúrnde comes from the book of Andaul yn Tseu and the texts of Llynac dí Chorand reft from the tombs of Aunelius (Yellow Lilies) in Faerus.
"Beautiful were they not? These malignant lords of apathetic hunger and bile. They who provoke even we faeries to kneel in terror. I beseech the, my brethren, look and know well. Look and know that even death holds no fervor for the likes of them. As if the Hreía willed it, with just a faint breath even the spirits would fall to subservience. For we fae who tread the world beholden by our wondrous magicks, I implore you. Who be the most blessed of beings in this realm, we fleeting few who command sraía's flow or the terrible lords above who permit us feeble breath?" -page 25 of Ehyö li Änrii piit (book of the black gods)For all their power, for all the souls that muddied the ocean of fear that once radiated from their enormous forms, it was the words of Ceír that denoted the true terror that the beasts commanded. Those words reverberated through the Fae like an endless hymn of dread and nothingness.
"They be as gods unto us, we who lie in the dirt with our tools and childish magicks as the weight of the world sat within their glistening maw. Each dreaded step resounded throughout the earth, boasting horrid powers that reft naught but fear from the hollowed bones of men..." -pages 94 of Naisjun Lijon piit (Red Record of the Faeries)
Common Myths and Legends
The Bhayúrnde were believed for untold millennia to be merely fictitious beings spoken of only in fables, mindless colossi of boundless malice and power, roaming about the world-devouring the souls of beings they found beneath them. There were no way creatures such as they could exist. Bloodied sovereigns who rode the skies as one would a boat at sea. They whose very presence shattered stones and compelled even the ethereal realm to subservience. It was all just a tale, nightmares the Fae would pass on to their children and them to us. It has to be.....
Interspecies Relations and Assumptions
"- - - - - Those fiery eyes of sanguine tugged at the depths of your soul, clawing at the mind like a rabid dog as they feverishly gnawed down on the heart of your fears. It became no longer the ungodliness of their presence that forced mere resolution and strength into irrelevance, but their command of the ethereal as well." -pages 116 of Naisjun Lijon piit (Red Record of the Faeries)
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