The Aggrieved

"A tear for the Firstborn who gave us her breath
A tear for the Secondborn who troubled the sea
A tear for the Thirdborn who claimed the broken
A tear for the Fourthborn, consumed in the flame
A tear for the Fifthborn who held firm at the Gate
A tear for the Sixthborn and her child, the Curse
A tear for the Seventhborn, Devourer of Steel
A tear for the Father Warg, whose Daughters lay dead, whose domain is defiled, The Wolf in the Void."

-The Prayer of Eight Tears

Culture

Due to the high percentage of gnole adherents, the theology of the Aggrieved borrows heavily from gnole ancestor worship.  Reverence for the deceased and rituals to appease lost souls are shared between the two faiths, and some erroneously conflate the two as being different aspects of the same religion.  However, while the Aggrieved share many things with some traditional gnole practices, there do exist some important differences.  Primarily, many gnole traditionalists see no distinction between living and dead members of family or even their clan.  The dead are honored, but also expected to lend their strength and wisdom to their people even beyond the grave.  The Aggrieved view death as a resolution of all of life's hardships, and their mission is not just to bring comfort to the living but also to the restless dead.  For this reason, many traditionalist gnoles are wary of the Aggrieved's habit of quieting the dead.  Conversely, many shumaivik of the Dawnpath find this philosophy very similar to their own, and thus relations between the two are mostly friendly.

History

The God-Wargs have been worshipped by the mortals of Vaadstrael since before the rise and fall of the Ancients. For millenia the wolves have been regarded as guardians of the natural balance of the world and progenitors of many its mortal races. The only race with no history of wolf worship is humanity.
When the humans of old invaded Vaadstrael's moons, slaughtered the wolves, and murdered the Wargs, the Wolf-Cult suffered. Many lost hope and abandoned their ancestral faith. Those that remained dedicated their lives to mourning the loss of their gods and keeping their memory alive. The newly-named Aggrieved faced more than a crisis of faith, as the Ancients became obsessed with wiping out any trace of devotion to the Wargs. Luckily, the violent collapse of the humans' empire came soon after, and the Wolf-Cult outlasted their persecutors.
With the Ancients gone, the Aggrieved were free to practice their faith openly, which in turn led to a period of growth for the religion.

Tenets of Faith

The Aggrieved exist primarily to ease the grief and suffering of others, both living and dead. For the living, this is through generous application of material alms and aid, and is a spiritual sense through the lessons offered by their long-deceased gods as well as through the philosophy that none are truly gone as long as there are those left to remeber them. For the spirits of the dead they employ rituals of appeasement and guidance to their proper place of eternal rest. In extreme cases, where a ghost's pain can cause them is beyond usual rites to honor them, specialized preists called Deadlighters are employed to put the wayward soul to rest. The use of magic in this way too force souls to play dormant is distasteful, even to the Aggrieved, and as such they would much rather ensure hauntings of that nature are prevented altogether. To this end, many clerics of the Aggrieved maintain jobs as caretakers for tombs, crypts, and graveyards, tending to the mortal dead as their fellows tend to the sacred corpses of the Wargs and their progeny in the Mausoleum of the Warg's Repose. Though they accept those wishing to be a part of their order, they do not seek out converts.

Type

Religious, Other

Alternative Names

the Wolf-Cult

Demonym

Aggrieved

Leader

The Tattered One

Location

Mausoleum of the Warg's Repose

Controlled Territories

• Mausoleum of the Warg's Repose

Notable Members

• The Tattered One