Talona

Talona:

Symbol: Three golden amber teardrops on a purple equilateral triangle with point upward
Home Plane: Palace of the Poison Tears
Alignment: CE
Portfolio: Disease, Poison
Domains: Chaos, Evil, Suffering
Worshipers: Assassins, druids, healers, rogues, those suffering from disease and illness
Aliases: Kiputytto
Cleric Alignments: CN, NE, CE
Favored Weapon: A scabrous hand (unarmed strike)

History/Relationships: Talona (Tah-LOW-nah), one of the Dark Gods, is often depicted as a withered old crone with a scarred, tattooed face in religious texts. Where she walks, misfortune and death follow. She is an odd deity. Sages have described her as having the personality of a petulant, greedy child trapped in the body of a once-beautiful woman now scarred by horrific disease and ravaged by age: She is alternately desirous of attention at any cost like a small child and aloof like a wounded paramour who has been discarded by her love.

Talona’s power slowly wanes after each great plague in Faerûn. When she feels vulnerable in her position, she unleashes another wave of misery and disease-brought death and receives a torrent of prayers entreating her to spare the inhabitants of Faerûn from her withering touch. Her power then waxes again in an endless cycle of indifference, devastation, and appeasement. In particular, Talona’s power was ascendant during the destruction of Asram (after the erection of the Standing Stone), in the Year of the Clinging Death (75 DR), during the Rotting War (902 DR), in the Year of the Scourge (1150 DR), in the Year of the Empty Goblet and the Year of Beckoning Death (1252-1253 DR), and during the Great Plague of the Inner Sea (1317-1323 DR).

Some old texts of Talona refer to her as Kiputytto, but this is actually the name of a rival demipower who challenged Talona’s portfolio and lost. The battle between the two goddesses destroyed the Netherese survivor state of Asram in its wake. When Kiputytto attacked Talona, Talona plagued the ill-fated Asram in order to obtain the devotional power generated from the worship of its citizens, who hoped to appease Talona and lessen the effects of the disease. Kiputytto responded in kind in the same location, provoking a devastating series of increasingly virulent plagues (perhaps even magical in nature) that overloaded the curative resources of Asram’s various priesthoods and wiped out the entire population in less than a month. Even most of those who escaped the scourged area died soon after of disease. Shortly afterward, Talona won this devastating deific contest and murdered Kiputytto.

Representations of Talona’s symbol dated to before her battle with Kiputytto show it depicted as a flesh-colored equilateral triangle with point upward containing three teardrops arranged in a triangle with the uppermost black, the lower left purple, and the lower right green. Why the coloration was changed after her triumph over Kiputytto is one of the inner mysteries of the church not ever revealed to outsiders.

While he lived, Talona served Bhaal along with Loviatar, though Loviatar and Talona and are fierce rivals. Loviatar loves to torment and tease Talona over her ugly appearance, her scanty number of followers, her cowardly and ineffectual attacks, and her puny portfolio (in Loviatar’s words). Needless to say, Talona openly delights in any setbacks Loviatar experiences, and sometimes even aids good adventurers if she thinks they will damage Loviatar’s reputation. Talona has recently cultivated an alliance with Shar.

Dogma: Talona’s ethos stresses that life and death are in balance, but that death is the more powerful and should be paid proper homage and respect. Life and death are balanced only because birthing and generation are so plentiful. Death is the true power, and the lesson that waits for all. lf it falls to the followers of Talona to drive home the point with the tip of a dagger, so be it. Talona’s faithful are taught that if they respect death and the many ways the powers can deal it, that knowledge will allow them to live longer. If people think themselves invincible thanks to wealth or a swift sword arm or strong spells, the great equalizer of disease, Talona’s breath, will teach them respect and humility. Initiates to the faith are charged as follows: “Let pain be as pleasure to the faithful of Talona. She works upon you from within, and in weakness and wasting is her strength. She is forever and always with you, whomever you or the rest of the world believes in or serves. Let all living things learn respect from Talona and pay homage to her in goods and in fervent worship and her dedicated priests will intercede for them so that Talona will not claim them—this time. Go and work in Talona’s name and let your doings be subtle or spectacular, but make them known as the will of the Mother of All Plagues.”

Avatar/Manifestations: Other Manifestations Talona may manifest as a flickering brown-and-yellow radiance above a place of disease or death (such as a battlefield). Her shape and movements resemble a dancing flame able to teleport itself for short distances. She is unable to speak in this form, but may write by burning letters in wood or other organic substances or scribing them in sand, ashes, dust, or other loose material. In this form, she can by touch bestow spells, enact her Touch (see above), and communicate mind-to-mind employing mental visions with any creature. (In practice, only Talontar are favored by such communications). Her presence is sometimes indicated by the sudden appearance and rapid growth of a black lily or a poisonous herb or fungus. The talontar believe the discovery of a solitary piece of amber or jasper indicates the Lady of Poison’s favor, but if such a gem shatters when touched, the victim will soon die of disease (if amber is found) or poison (if jasper is happened upon).

Agents/Petitioners: She sends chasme (tanar’ri), gulguthras (otyughs, neo-otyughs, and gulguthydras), imps and quasits, ironmaws, rats (pack of giant and normal-sized rodents), sewerms, shadowdrakes, spiders (gargantuan, hairy, and watch), terlens, and vorrs to inflict her wrath, show her approval, or aid her faithful.

The Church of Talona: Talona, like most chaotic evil gods, is more feared than worshiped and is propitiated to avoid her attentions, not to draw them. The church of Talona operates underground, as can be expected of a faith that promotes death and disease. It IS strongest in those regions where plagues are rampant, and the faithful of Talona are often accused of creating such situations. Many wererats pray to the Lady of Disease for additional weapons of disease to use against the hated humans.

Those who actively worship Talona tend to gather in secret in the catacombs beneath cities or in wilderness ruins. Underground temples are often built above reeking, overflowing sewers or in humid grottoes overgrown with fungi and mold. Wilderness shrines are typically located in stagnant swamps and marshes rife with disease-laden mosquitoes and rich with the sickly sweet scent of decay. Twisted gargoyles carved to resemble mortals wracked with various diseases or poisons are positioned prominently throughout such structures. The Lady of Poisons attracts the cruel to her service; her priests tend to be self-sufficient, capable—and sadistic. Priests of Talona are known as Talontar, and members of the faith as a whole (laity and clergy) are called Talonites. Talontar are partial to ritual facial tattoos and scarification over their whole bodies. Talonite priests of 2nd level or less are considered probationary initiates. Only upon reaching 3rd level are they formally inducted into the priesthood. Specialty priests of Talona, known as malagents, wield poisoned daggers and serve as the adventuring and internal policing arm of the faith.

Day-to-Day Activities: Aside from selling poisons, antidotes, and medicines, the Talontar travel Faerûn as quietly as possible, constantly seeking out new diseases and afflictions and spreading rumors so as to augment the reputation of Talona. What seems to motivate Talontar in their day-to-day behavior is a quest for respect: respect that is due Talona for her potentially devastating abilities and due them as her representatives in Faerûn. Throughout their careers, Talona’s priests work with magic and inoculations to build their personal immunities to various poisons and diseases. Thus protected, they treat the diseased, take employment as food tasters for paranoid rulers, wealthy merchants, and nobles, and bun those who have died from diseases. Whenever a realm or city-state casts out or punishes any Talontar, for any reason, priests of Talona work to cause a plague in that place to exact “Talona’s price” for such insults. Rumors have circulated that certain unscrupulous Talontar have occasionally chosen wealthy folk as targets for disease so that wealth and properties can be seized by the church upon the death of these wealthy owners— with the threat of contracting disease keeping rightful heirs and claimants at bay.

Holy Days/Important Ceremonies: The church of Talona observes thrice-daily prayers to the goddess (morning, highsun, and evening, though the timing of such rituals need not be precise), and daernuth (holy festivals) every 12 days. Festivals are events open to non devotees, where such visitors are encouraged to pray and give offerings to Talona to spare themselves or loved ones from death, disease, wasting diseases, and the like. At such day-long celebrations, priests of Talona are always careful to show lepers and other victims of disfiguring diseases being cured by priestly magic before everyone and also to demonstrate their immunity to contracting disease by touching disease-carrying or filthy objects to the still bloody ritual wounds of a Talontar (inflicted as during a private circumcision ceremony). A long symphony of rolling drums, deep-voiced chanting, and glaur, shawm, and zulkoon music proclaims the power and veneration of Talona throughout the day, and minor priests busily sell poisons (for eliminating vermin, of course), antidotes, and medicines throughout the day, assisted by senior clergy who diagnose conditions (usually with great accuracy) and prescribe treatments in return for stiff fees.

Annually at the daernuth falling closet to Higharvestide, initiates of the faith are formally inducted into the priesthood. This ascension is marked by horrifying private ceremonies involving ritual scarring and sacred tattoos.

Major Centers of Worship: The House of Night’s Embrace, a fortified temple-palace in Tashluta ruled by Lady Doom Thalaera Indlerith, is the most prominent site of Talona’s worship. The House is defended by an army of black-masked guards assisted by gargoyles and golems. In its secretive depths the battle-tested Priestesses of the Lady’s Night make poisons, potions that spread disease by touch or introduction into beverages, and antidotes to both (which they sell at very high prices). Agents of the Night’s Embrace maintain a busy touring schedule of wealthy houses, noble country seats, and royal courts throughout Faerûn posing as purveyors of fine wines and perfumes, but their true calling is an open secret Many of the priestesses employed in this duty dabble in local politics (and love lives) for their own entertainment, secure in the knowledge that fear of poisoning will keep them safe from the daggers that claim most intruders into such affairs.

Affiliated Orders: Talona is not served by any military or knightly orders, but she is served by several secret cabals of rogues and other vermin The Plague Rats are an elite organization of thieves, assassins, and wererats active throughout the Western Heartlands and the North. Their secret base is believed to be located in the depths of the Rat Hills and to have connections to Undermountain. It was apparently unaffected by the great Conflagration in the Year of the Shield (1367 DR).

The Plague-mother’s Children is a guild of thugs active throughout Chondath and the Vilhon Reach. Formerly composed of crusaders dedicated to the extension of the Rotting War as the ultimate test of Talona’s favor, it has degenerated in recent years into an informal brotherhood of warriors and thieves who run extortion rackets throughout the region and threaten Talona’s wrath if they are not given their monetary due. (Crusaders are no longer included among the faithful of the Mistress of Disease.)

During the Tune of Troubles, Talona appeared to an evil human wizard named Aballister and bade him to found a trifold order of wizards, priests, and warriors. Castle Trinity, a castle-in-mountain’s clothing, was built into a rocky spur on the northeastern edge of the Snowflake Mountains. Talona gave the wizard an unholy recipe, the Chaos Curse (named Tuanta Quiro Miancy — the Most Fatal Horror), with which he could destroy the agents of good in the region. Accessed by a dozen rocky tunnels, the stronghold was eventually collapsed and ruined through the work of Cadderly, a priest of Deneir based in the nearby Edificant Library, and his friends. They succeeded after countless battles in the Library, the Snowflake Mountains, the nearby Shilmista Forest, and in the town of Carradoon. Remnants of the triumvirate of Talona may yet survive in secretive fellowship.

Priestly Vestments: All priests of Talona wear gray and green robes with ragged sleeves. These are washed but never repaired and in time become faded rags. Out of pride, most priests continue to wear their old, worn-out vestments until they are nearly naked. Old and high-ranking priests tend to have ritual scars and tattoos all over their bodies, and some even sport many body-piercings so that their torsos are studded with small rings linked with fine chains. Female clergy and laity alike often wear earrings and elbow-dangles of black metal wrought in the shape of talons.

Adventuring Garb: If embarking on a possibly dangerous adventure or preparing to go into battle, Talontar favor black-and-purple armor adorned with spurs, horns, and spikes. They wear any armor in a pinch and prefer to wear as much armor as possible. Only specialty priests of Talona carry the special ceremonial poison daggers of the faith. They have no compunction against using them in combat. A nonbeliever caught with such an item attracts the unwanted attentions of Talona to his or her health as well as her church’s wrath.