The Gods of Heaven (Aedra Lords) |
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Kammoloth (King of the Gods) |
Akkala (Healing, Purity) |
Samekkh (Wisdom, Light, Knowledge) |
Dokorath (Honor, War, Valor) |
Velena (Love, Beauty, Truth) |
Artela (Nature, Mercy) |
Dvalin (Weather, Agriculture, Wine) |
Wvelkim (The Sea, Marine Life, Sailing) |
Yajiit (Fire, The Sun) |
Velena (və-LĀ-nä) is the goddess of love and beauty. Because true love is honest and forthright and despises deception, Velena is also the goddess of truth.
Appearance & Personality
Velena appears as a gorgeous young woman, though the specifics of her appearance vary depending on who is observing her. She is warm, kind, and vibrant, and wears her emotions on her sleeve. She dislikes the formal, restrained air that most of the gods adopt in their dealings with mortals, preferring a more relaxed approach. Of all the gods, she is the one most likely to draw close to a supplicant, put her arm around them, and speak to them as a friend.
Because her emotions are so close to the surface, however, Velena can also be one of the more temperamental gods in the Pantheon. If someone offends her, she may make trouble for him among the celestial court until he offers an apology — or she may simply refuse to answer any requests for help offered up by the offender (or anyone close to him) until he sees the error of his ways. Still, it is not in Velena's nature to hold a grudge for long, and a simple, sincere apology is usually enough to earn her forgiveness.
Divine Intervention
Boons: Velena believes that it is a terrible injustice when a person's inner beauty is not reflected in outer beauty, as well. Those who live their lives in accordance with her ethos of kindness, compassion, and romantic faithfulness will often find themselves the recipients of her blessings, even if they did not specifically ask for them. Velena can permanently improve someone's appearance, or nudge prospective mates in his or her direction. In this work she depends greatly on her kerubs, who help her to keep watch over those who faithfully serve the cause of love and reward them accordingly.
Velena can also reveal the truth of one person's heart to another, exposing the subject's thoughts, memories and emotions to the recipient with absolute clarity. This experience, called the Communion, makes it impossible for the subject to lie or hide her feelings on any matter. If the subject's heart is noble and her motives are pure, the experience of so thoroughly knowing her will often cause the recipient to respond with love toward the subject. On the other hand, if the subject's heart is stained by obsession, greed, lust, or other forms of darkness, then these feelings will be projected to the recipient so clearly that it will often drive them apart forever. Velena only performs the Communion relatively rarely, and she often places requirements or conditions upon it in order to keep people from destroying themselves (or their loved ones) with more truth than they can bear.
Finally, one aspect of Velena's sphere of influence that is often overlooked is her power to break many types of magical curses. "Love conquers all" is more than a feel-good sentiment; Velena's divine power is able to overcome enchantments that cloud the mind, cripple the spirit, or imprison the body beneath layers of magical deception. The one notable exception to Velena's skill in curse-breaking is the area of forced physical transformations, such as the Curse of Metamor; since this type of magic actually alter's a being's fundamental nature at the physical level, it is far more difficult for her to reverse than other types of curses. While Velena has examined the Curse of Metamor, the parts of it that might be within her power to change (such as the psychological effects of the gender-changing Curse) are too intertwined with those parts that are beyond her power, and to date she has not succeeded in unraveling the Curse to any measurable extent.
Cost: Velena prefers to offer her gifts after a person has already paid the cost, in the form of faithful devotion to the cause of love. Her blessings are most likely to come when they are unexpected and unasked for, for a person who acts kindly and compassionately merely to get something for herself is missing the whole point of Velena's ethos. Still, Velena is not above granting an "unearned" boon from time to time, if she believes that the gift will enable that person to better serve her cause in the long run.
Discipleship
Becoming a disciple of Velena is a noble but challenging road. Such an individual must be extraordinarily selfless and compassionate, expressing love freely and without hesitation or expectation of reward. Such love is rarely expressed sexually; Velena knows that humans (and other mortals) are jealous and possessive by nature, and that very few people can engage in a loving sexual relationship without feeling entitled to that person's love above all others. For this reason Velena strongly recommends monogamous relationships among her disciples, and suggests that couples should work together in her service. If a single disciple should fall in love with someone who does not feel the same calling to discipleship, Velena will release that disciple from her service and allow her to marry her intended.
Most of Velena's disciples are either single women or monogamous couples; few single men feel called into her service.
Offspring and Servants
Velena's descendants include the kerubs, the first of whom were sired by Kammoloth; the eladrins, sired by Dokorath; and the Nine Muses, who are products of her short-lived relationship with Samekkh. She has no known children by Dvalin, Wvelkim or any of the daedra lords.
Velena seldom uses servants other than her own kerubs, but she has occasionally been known to send messengers in the form of celestial cats or swans.
Symbology
Aura: Deep red glow.
Holy Symbol: A stylized looking-glass, consisting of a circle (representing the mirror) with a cross attached to the bottom (representing the handle).1
Symbolic Creatures: Cat (for femininity), swan (for beauty) and hummingbird (for joy and love).
Holy Day: Vele'kema, February 19th. Women hoping to be blessed by Velena's favor make donations of flowers or jewelry to the local temple, or engage in acts of charity toward the poor and needy. Girls who have had their first period in the last year are brought before the altar at the Lothanasi temple, where they are anointed with perfumed oil and blessed by the priest in Velena's name. This is the traditional rite of passage for girls in western Galendor, and after this ceremony the girl is considered a woman and eligible for marriage.
d20 Notes
Intermediate Deity
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Domains: Joy, Pleasure, Truth
Weapon of the Deity: Flaming Longbow