The third instalment in our series on the Powers of Light concerns Hara, the younger (and twin) brother of Vara.
I’d been putting this one off due to the amount of writing involved, as Hara has three Servants and five Avatars, but to quote Samwise Gamgee, it’s the job that’s never started as takes longest to finish. I’ve decided to tackle the problem by covering Hara and his three Servants in this post, and will cover his Avatars in the next one.
So here, without further whinging on my part, is the portion of the pantheon of Anuru most closely associated with Nature, Magic and the Elves.
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HARA(The Wise, Father of the Elves)
At the birth of the Anari, Hara sprang into being immediately after his elder twin sister, Vara; together they are called the Gemini Sophum, the Wise Twins. Hara was born as tall and as fair as his wave-walking sibling; but where she turned her blue eyes to the Earth and the Seas, Hara turned his to the skies and the stars. While his more warlike brothers battled the Uruqua, their Servants and their Minions during the Age of Battles, Hara remained aloof from the wars of the Powers, seeking ever to decipher the hidden secrets of the Universe. He was the first to learn of the sources of the arcane flux that permeated all of space and time, and the first to learn to wield them to reshape the world that Ana and Uru had made. In this time he encountered Gemmo, one of the Minions of Light, who soared the skies on white wings; and Hara found in her a kindred spirit, and accepted her as one of his Servants.
When Ana forced Bræa to relinquish mastery over her children and cede her light to the Lantern, Hara reluctantly accepted the overlordship of the Kindred who came to be known as the Haradi. Although he resolutely ignored them for long centuries, at length he came to recognize their worth, and at last he chose to live among them. It was they who turned his eyes from the skies and stars to the forests, streams and dells that they called home; and Hara found that he loved these no less than the night skies. Yet because he would not entirely forsake his studies, Hara sought for a second Servant to serve as his viceroy to the Haradi; and so Larannel, called Defensor Sylvanus, was taken into Hara’s service. And later, as the Uruqua and their minions made war upon the Kindred, Hara at long last found Miros, a maiden of the Haradi, who mastered the ars arcanus, and in doing so, gave her life to protect her people. She became the third – some say the greatest – of Hara’s Servants.
While he remains aloof from worldly concerns, and is rarely venerated outside of the ancestral homes of the Elves, Hara continues to watch over his people and their lands; and on behalf of the Anari, keeps also a careful eye on all those who wield arcane powers in service of the Light.
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Sphere(s): Elves, users of magic, woodland dwellers, wanderers
Sigil: A tall oak on a silver (mithral) field, surmounted by a black staff, surrounded by seven white Elven stars
Preferred hues: Silver (mithral) and white
Preferred weapon: Staff (magi) or Spear (warriors)
Worshippers’ alignment: Any Good
Domains: Dream, Good, Knowledge, Magic, Mysticism, Oracle
SERVANTS
LARRANEL SYLVANUS
(Greater Servant)
As overlord and patron of the Haradi, Hara sought far and wide for a guardian of the woodlands to serve as his viceroy. After long years of searching, he found one of the Brahiri, a child of Bræa, a rough warrior of the people who would later come to be called the Elves. This warrior roamed the wood with bow and sword, slaying the beasts and confounding the minions of the Uruqua. This warrior was called Larranel, which name, in the ancient tongue of the Haradi, meant “The Swift Spider”. Because of his ferocity, his skill at arms, his love of the forests and of his kindred, Hara found in him a fell and indomitable spirit, one that would never quail even in the face of the terrifying abominations issuing from the dark wombs of the Uruqua.
Hara thus sought out Larranel, and challenged him to a test of fleetness; and together they ran through the woods, through night and day, and into night again; and Hara marvelled that while the warrior gasped and flagged on the second night, he never ceded, nor begged respite. And when Hara offered a pause, Larranel, despite his bleeding feet and feverish brow, countered that he would prefer to run until a clear victory had been achieved. At this, Hara revealed himself to the Elf, and elevated him to the ranks of the Anari as his second Servant. Since that day, Larranel Sylvanus, the “Swift Spider of the Woodlands”, has served Hara with ferocious devotion, haunting the forests like death avenging; until in the fullness of time his former kinsmen, the Elves, gave him a new name: Corellon Larethian, meaning “Spirit of the Elder Forest”. And in latter days Larranel was much beloved by the Haradi, and hailed as their champion, and revered by all good creatures dwelling beneath bough.
Aliases: Larranel, Larranel Sylvanus, The Wood-Spider, Corellon Larethian, Corellon the Cleanser, Defensor Sylvanus, Spirit of the Elder Forest
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Sphere(s): Elves, wanderers
Sigil: A bent oak on a silver (mithral) field, over two pine cones, surmounted by a white bow, flanked by two white Elven stars
Preferred hues: Silver (mithral) and forest hues
Preferred weapon: Longbow
Worshippers’ alignment: Any Good
Domains: Animal, Community, Magic, Plant, Trickery
MIROS, Mistress of Stars and Skies
(Greater Servant)
The tale of Miros has been told elsewhere, and is legend among Elves and Dragons alike. Before the Age of Wisdom, when the Brahiri were besieged by the monsters and Minions of the Uruqua, Miros, daughter of a King of the Haradi, sought out Scîarratekkan, wiliest and most ancient of the Great Red Wyrms, and offered him her flesh in exchange for his mastery of the arcane arts. She spent seven years as the consort of the Wyrm, learning his deepest lore and secrets, and beguiling him with her charms. When at last she had learned all that he had to teach, she gathered the knowledge into a single scroll, and despatched it to her people to enable them to better repel the forces of the Dark. But for her there was no escape; for she had spent to long in dragon’s form, and in her womb she bore Scîarratekkan’s child. Rather than loose such an abomination upon the world, she slew herself; and in his rage at her betrayal, and the madness of his grief, the Great Wyrm unleashed the might that was in him, and brought down his lair upon them both.
But it was not the end for Miros; for Hara had seen, in her unrelenting quest for wisdom and the selflessness with which she had obtained it for the benefit of her people, a spirit like unto his own; and so at his behest she returned from the Long Halls of Tvalt, and agreed to serve him as his viceroy of magic. And in the form of a slender, scarlet-haired maiden of the Haradi, and that of a Great Golden Wyrm, she does so unto this day.
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral (Good)
Sphere(s): Magi, stars, the skies, metallic dragons
Sigil: A golden dragon, wreathed in scarlet flame
Preferred hues: Gold and scarlet
Preferred weapon: Claws or Dagger
Worshippers’ alignment: Any (Good)
Domains: Dream, Knowledge, Magic, Mind, Mysticism
GEMMO, Lady of Winds
(Lesser Servant)
Before the Brahiri were made, and only the Beasts of the Earth bestrode its unmarked surface, the great raptors ruled the skies. One who delighted in flying with them was Gemmo, one of the Minions of Light, who soared aloft on great hawk-like wings, glorying in the mastery of the clouds. Here she often encountered Hara, wingless, but nonetheless walking the night skies, the better to observe the motions of the stars. After many such meetings, and many words, they fell into companionable silences. Observing Gemmo’s flight, and the ferocious ecstasy of the great wind-riders, learned much about the lust for freedom and exploration that lies in the hearts of all winged things; and while Hara did his best to emulate her gleefully erratic behaviour, her heart seemed always beyond him. And so, one night (for in those days before the lighting of Bræadan, all was night, and fair), he asked her to serve him as his viceroy for all things that flew. Laughing, she accepted, but told him that her duties would be light; for how could he expect her to govern that which was eternally changing and ungovernable?
To this, Hara had no answer.
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Sphere(s): Winds, birds, raptors, rangers, druids
Sigil: Winged longsword
Preferred hues: Black, white and sky-blue
Preferred weapon: Longsword
Worshippers’ alignment: Any (Good)
Domains: Air, Celerity, Chaos, Weather
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