Random Adventure Hook for Two of my Homebrew Deities
Specifically, Khitim, the Lady of the Tooth, and Borkh, Lord of a Helpless Death. Because while they’re both from the less moral end of the alignment chart, they have distinctly different opinions on certain issues. Borkh believes that the only true measure of power is having the unchallenged right to mete death openly, and Khitim’s only law is survival at any cost. So I thought it might be fun to set up a circumstance where they, or rather their adherents, had reason to come into conflict.
(And yes, I’m a bit hung up on Khitim lately, but I’m a bit in the mood for feral, and she does tend to bring that in spades)
So. We’re going to picture a city. I’m thinking a smaller, regional city, we’re going to keep this relatively low-scale in impact. And the lord of this city, the governor or burgomaster or duke or whatever his title, is a devotee of Borkh. He strives for his rule to be absolute, and the expression of that absolute power is the execution of those who defy it. He is, in short, rather tyrannical, and he bears his black rod openly. He was given this power by right, and who has the right to challenge him on it? His rule is legal, and his decrees just, by virtue of being his decrees.
And I want to picture an execution. A prisoner on their knees before the headsman’s block. A outsider, an outlander, someone from beyond the city limits. I don’t think a priest of Khitim, no one she would have paid attention to before, just someone from the world beyond this city and the sharply defined edges decreed by its lord. And this outsider does not acknowledge this lord’s, or Borkh’s, right to kill them. They’re a survivor. They’ve seen so much more than this piddling little city could ever dream of. Fuck the God of Executions. They follow Khitim’s law, and under that law no one, ever, has the right to kill them. “Take my life if you’re able, but I’m damn sure never going to lie down and say you have the right to it!”
And Khitim … Khitim hears this. And Khitim is greatly pleased.
There’s a strange silence, a breathless hush across the execution block and the city square around it. And then, abruptly, where a defiant prisoner knelt mere seconds ago, is a werewolf. Possibly even a loup garou. A massive, monstrous, lupine form, erupting upwards, bursting shackles as they emerge. Roaring. Perhaps at least half out of pain and confusion, it’s not every day of someone’s life that a deity transforms them out of the blue and on the spot, but oh. Oh, they catch on quick. Because they’re not bound any longer. Because their smug would-be executioner is right there, and suddenly they have claws. Yes. Yes, they catch on very quickly indeed.
That was a couple of months ago. That one, that first one. They tore themselves violently free. Slew one of the city’s executioners. Only one of many, admittedly. And they’re weren’t close enough to slay the lord himself. But now. Now there is another force, in this city, another faction, another tide. A direct challenge to the lord’s authority. To Borkh’s authority. The city has a lupine revolutionary leader, and a great many people have flocked to them. Despite their ferocity. Despite their bloodthirst. Despite the carnage of their rampages, and the innocents who often perish in them. Because. Because damn it. At least they never claim to have the right to those deaths. Only the means.
Several more werewolves have been made. The city government calls it a plague of lycanthropy, called down by the dark magics of heretics, in the service of a barbaric goddess. But people rally behind them regardless. Martial law has clamped down in response. Tyranny grows day by day. And explosive violence, in response. The city is now a battleground. Two gods, two philosophies, two beliefs. The city divides, one camp or another. And many, many people are left caught between them. Dead either way, maybe. Left only to choose which side they would prefer to be slaughtered by.
And into this powder keg, should they so choose, steps a party. Heh.
I do like Khitim. I think I am, perhaps, kneejerk, just a bit on the chaotic end of the scale? Laws are just too big for me to trust them unequivocally. So yeah. I probably wouldn’t side with Borkh, myself. Though, granted, that doesn’t necessarily make our werewolf anarchist a better choice. Taking a third option is always encouraged. But yeah.
I wanted to show a little bit of a schism, a point of fracture, between two of my homebrew deites. Gods are fun when you involve them in the world. You know?
