Sgrios Mass: The Succubus & Sgrios
An area that has always been of great interest to me is
local folklore. Whenever I have spare time during my travels I make it a
point to seek out some locals whom might pass along some stories and
lore. Oral histories are the only accounts of many of the events that
have shaped Temuair, and, as the elder generation die off, we are
finding that they are lost forever -- leaving vacant holes in our
understanding for eternity.
I have stacks and stacks of papers with various folk
tales cataloged on them in my study here, but just recently while I was
nervously pacing the streets of my home town, Oren, I overheard a
conversation between an old mundane and a child that sparked a buried
memory of a tale I was told during my childhood; funnily it ties into a
question I get asked often and, in my literary pursuits, have never
found a scholarly answer to.
In front of the palace in Oren sits a sinister statue
carved of black stone. It exudes an unpleasant aura, and basking too
long under its imposing gaze is reported to cause horrifying visions and
lapses in consciousness and sanity. The horned and twisted visage,
leaning eagerly from his massive throne is supposedly the nightmarish
form of Chadul; carved long ago in the days when the battle between
darkness and light tore our lands apart. The identity of the sculptor,
or even the culture of origin of this representation have been lost to
the ages, as has the identity of the wealthy eccentric that brought the
terrible idol to the center of town.
However, much as the beautiful vision of Danaan graces
the sacred altar of Mileth, it is said that, in this world, other altars
exist as a mouthpiece to the gods, though not all are imbued with such
an enlightened energy. It is said among many, including the old man who
sat on that park bench with his young grandson, that generations past
had witnessed, first hand, the dark altars to Chadul and that, after his
sealing away, most were destroyed. The only remaining altar in active
use by Aisling and Mundane is that of Danaan's altar in Mileth.
Just about anything can be placed on the sacrificial
altar as an offering to the Gods. Occasionally They will speak out to
you, bestow upon you a gift, or, if you walk the path of the priest,
might earn you recognition for your faith. There is one item, though,
that, when placed in the altar, causes a strange reaction from the Gods.
"You are no longer protected by King Bruce", it warns. "You feel the
inner abyss for one Temuairan day". Yes, casting into this sacred altar
the bound hair of a succubus seems to cause both Gods and man to turn
their back on you; marking you for a sure death at the hands of your
fellow Aisling.
We know this as the rite of ascension; by putting
ourselves in such a despised and vulnerable position, we are thus able
to escape from Sgrios' realm unscathed and meet with the Gods themselves
in our spirit form. But why? What is the importance of the hair and why
is it that Sgrios should give us such favorable treatment for
sacrificing such a common and seemingly purposeless material into the
altar? While no book in the Loures library can explain the link, the
oral histories passed down from generation to generation have an origin
for the strange pact.
Says the old man to his boy, "In the wartimes of Danaan
and Chadul, it was a common form of worship to leave offerings to the
Gods at the altars. Nearly every town had one, and not each was erected
to the Goddess of Light. Nay, many o' cities were wont to give praise to
the dark lord for his protection and in doing so erect altars under the
statues of Chadul himself. Now, in those days it weren't just the
mundanes who sought to strengthen the resolve of the Gods, all manners
o' creatures participated, too. The Mukul o' the swamp, the Kobold of
Astrid an' the mountain folk of the Grimlock all praised the holy
goddess by their own names, but some manners of creature made offerings
to the darkness. Each would approach the altar o' their choice and leave
what they could gather; precious stones, weapons, nourishing food.
Typically one'o the octave would come an' collect the items an' deliver
them to whichever front would make best use of them. The Succubus, a
dread fae of the Isle of Man, made a pilgrimage to one such altar and,
having nothing of practical use to show her dedication with, used a
sharpened stone to cleave off her hair. Upon casting it into the altar
-- nothing. No message of thanks, no inner growth or renewed
understanding. Each God looked down from on high and scoffed 'Of what
use is this to us? We are at war and this beast brings us hair?' they
said, cackling at their petty mockings. The Succubus bent beside the
altar, she did, weeping at the loss of her beautiful hair which she
offered to the Gods only to be teased and ignored. There she remained,
until a shallow voice speaking an incomprehensible language startled her
awake. For there, above the altar was Sgrios, and in his clawed hand he
held the lengths of hair that the beast had discarded. He chattered out
his blessings in that dark tongue and there she offered up her hand in a
pact with the only God willing to accept her sacrifice. For, see,
Sgrios then made it known to her that, should she seek the favor of the
Gods she would only need to drop her hairs into the altar and he would
grant her safe passage through the underworld."
A grim note to end on, that Sgrios should be opening
his passages through the underworld to those who have slaughtered his
chosen beast, but should she return to cast her hair willingly to the
altar and he not be there to open the passages for her, He would break
his pact.
Whether or not this story bears roots in any form of
truth or is a warped fiction from generations of verbal retellings we
shall never know -- however, this is the glory of the oral traditions.
They exist in a realm where truth is not the objective; a realm where a
story between a grandfather and grandson then becomes a story between
the grandson and the generations that follow him.
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