Ulantarr
Ulantarr, alongside Triodar and Hevren, was amongst the most powerful of the Gods of Torthe, child of Aesa and the being that became The Blight, whose name has been burned away even within history or memory. From the children of Aesa and the Blight, those before the Titans came, there were hundreds, yet now there remain only three, Triodar, Hevren and Ulantarr. And after so many of their siblings and their nieces and nephews were lost, all three were loathe to bring more children into existence.
Ulantarr, in particular, as a lonely and quiet prince of gods, was more than the others keen to avoid this path. He fled his mother and father when they broached the subject, and preferred to dance amongst the eaves of Arden on his own. He took to wearing strips of red ribbon and wrapping cloth about himself, and when he was ever caught, he would simply run, letting the ribbons tangle his pursuers before he was ever caught. He had fought for years in the Outland War, and he had no wish to see any conflict or hear any talk of it. His favoured people were the gnomes, and the halflings, the little people who had few gods to speak for them. He taught the halflings the mechanical arts that set them apart from the others, and the gnomes he taught the secret ways of the forests, the speech of animals and birds, and gave them what protection he could.
But Aesa needed children. The Titans were growing in power, and although there was peace, she needed the Old Gods to propagate, to have a show of strength. And so she worked to betray her own son. He would not take a wife, nor would he give of his strength to create children by other means. So Aesa reached out into the unknown planes, tearing aside the veil between worlds for but a moment, before unleashing a maddened, crazed thing, that tried to seize her for its own the moment it saw her. Her intake of breath, her rushed curse, became its name: “Khraxxara!” or in common, “Begone!”
She pointed the alien, tentacled monster of lightning and storms, towards her son, and sent the force of lust towards him. Ulantarr felt the crackling energy and the sense of unbridled desire – not physical desire, but the desire to exist, to create more of itself – and he began to run. His great mischief, his trickery and shadows, he used all he would. Each time he felt he was getting away, only to see the great thing that was Khraxxara waiting for him following the spoors of its need.
Finally, exhausted and weak, Ulantarr paused, and in that moment, the Khraxxara seized him. It’s tendrils locked Ulantarr into place, and siphoned off his energy, his god light, and the roots of the storm-thing began to take hold. Only then did Aesa see her true mistake, because the tendrils spread, and spread, through the forest of Arden, and each one was in the likeness of Khraxxara, desperate and needing to exist, to create more of itself.
Aesa struck, fast and without hesitation.
She slew the tendril creatures that grew, and she sent the power of her decay to turn Khraxxara’s tendrils and form to ash, leaving only a mewling, sobbing and mindless creature that would be forever alone and mindless, without its children. It was its tears, unknowing and uncomprehending, that saved just three of its tendril shoots. These became three new children of Ulantarr, three new gods of Torthe to balance the newcomer Titans.
From the thousands of fallen tendrils, the darkness of final death, one shoot became Cutalazz, the Laughing God of Death.
From the clashing tendrils that in their moments of destruction lashed out with rage at Aesa, rose Sybinyll, Goddess of War.
And from the tendrils that sought not to attack, but protected other tendrils from the wrath of the Queen, rose Gardaran, noble hunter.
Khraxxara fled into the night, and its story, what little there is, is told elsewhere.
Ulantarr, drained and tired, gazed upon his three children, and he wept. He had prophecies from Hevren that his children would be his doom, and he was never one to fear that, but he had also heard from his brother that he would see each of them die painfully before he met that doom, and it was that he had tried hard to escape.
He gazed upon his mother, his ultimate betrayer, and he began to laugh. He has, since then, never spoken to Aesa, and continues to turn away from the great power he could have if he but stretched out his hand. His three children are hugely powerful gods, of War, Death and Hunting, but he is content to play mischief games with his little people. Though his games and mischief are amusing to many, particularly his son Cutalazz, who takes most after Ulantarr, many consider them a pale shadow to the great deceits and treacheries Ulantarr once played upon the armies of the Titans millennia ago, before war and suffering broke him. Now, other gods mock him, and consider him a waste upon the world.
Yet to this day, those races, the halflings and the gnomes, thrive, when so many others similar have fallen and faded. The mystical forests of the gnomes, and the hidden refuges of the halflings, are protected more than they have ever had a right to be on their own, and most say this is Ulantarr’s work. Those few times these races have been threatened, the ancient god has risen, and even the darkest of gods have quailed before his rage.
Tenets of Faith
- Family is sacred, and any betrayal of that trust must be guarded against;
- Laughter is the best medicine for the young, for the innocent.
- Mischief and treachery is permitted against the powerful and abusive.
- It is better to humiliate utterly and defeat completely, than to fight and win temporarily.
- Keep a warm hearth and an open heart for those who flee oppression.
- The greatest tyrant falls to naught, when his captive people find him a fool.
- Hates Aesa and Khraxxara.
- Opposes the Blight and the Calculix.
- Adores his three children, especially Cutalazz.
- He withdraws from all over interaction with the gods.
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