Rhea The Radiant Dawn - Story short

The cool wind blew across the plains, tall blades of grass swaying gently as if the breeze were giving the fields of green a tender caress. Overhead, the sky was a bright blue with a few lazy clouds reaching back toward the horizon and the bright sun shining with a soft warmth that filled Rhea with a sense of contentment. Rhea stood there, her hands crossed on the pommel of her warhammer, Cro’mors. She always took a moment to drink in the beauty of the world before she left the temple. It was almost a necessity, to appreciate it. Briefly, the thought passed her mind, how wonderful it would be to join Relona. That day would come, of course, but not today. Rhea would not hasten that, as much as some Lustrators sought that divine end.

Archmage Tyra had wanted her daughter Lynn to accompany Rhea, but the Temple had declined. Only Rhea, the Radiant Dawn would be necessary to judge correctly. The mages had blustered and argued, but the Temple’s will would not be twisted. Rhea was glad. She did not enjoy company. Rhea would do her duty alone, and the mage Lynn would travel to Whitecrest - in whatever ostentatious manner a mage did - to meet with the aristocracy there.

Some days later, Rhea found herself at the outskirts of the small village in a province controlled by an... Andian, the lord’s name was. She was still at least a day’s travel from Whitecrest by horse, and longer still on foot. Several fields held withered crops or furrowed earth with nothing growing from it. A few of the buildings on the edge of the village center had damage to them, walls tumbled in and burnt rooves. Rhea pursed her lips and continued walking. The glint of steel on the ground caught her eye, and she noted some swords and battle axes. The red tint of blood stained the ground in great gashes, like a painter who had taken his red-tipped brush furiously to the canvas.

Some of the villagers stopped and stared as Rhea entered the threshold of their small town. Items tumbled from hands and clattered against the ground. Others very pointedly looked away, doing their best to avoid the gaze of the indomitable Lustrator. It was no different than usual. Rhea had, over time, come to terms with how Lustrators inspired awe or fear.

A trail of hushed whispers bloomed, trailing behind Rhea as she walked. Most small villages were the same. In the center, a well, a small podium for public addresses, and the temple to Relona and her sisters. Often they had a town hall - sometimes they did not. Rhea had never been able to unravel quite how it was decided. The head of her hammer, Cro’mors, clunked against the temple’s entrance  as she clasped both hands over the pommel, inclining her head and muttering a soft prayer before entering. Creaking, the hinges groaned in protest as Rhea pushed the doors open. Rhea frowned. A temple of Relona should be taken care of… but, in times of war and famine it was sometimes necessary to direct resources elsewhere. Rhea would not hold it against them. 

‘GET HIM BACK!’

The scream came from within the temple. A great thundering crack of wood splintering erupted, and the door slammed back against Rhea. Her golden armor clinked from the impact, and her feet pressed harder against the wall. The orc stumbled as he slammed against her.

Rhea rounded on the orc. She paused - his face was etched with fear and panic. But she paused for only a second. Rhea’s hand darted out, faster than one would expect, and took hold of the orc’s throat.

A few men spilled forth from the temple, and froze in surprise.

‘Why is this orc inside Relona’s temple?’ Rhea asked, gritting her teeth. The orc’s hand pawed at her fingers, trying to pull them away as he choked, sputtering. She tightened her grip for a brief second, before throwing him to the floor. He skidded along a few yards.

‘Thank Relona!’ praised one of the men. The others quickly took up the cry as the golden paramount of Relona and her sisters stood there, armor glimmering in the sun.

Before Rhea could get an answer, a good half of the village rushed over to her.

---

‘They’ve been attacking us for months,’ said one.

‘Yes! And raiding our crops, burning and ripping them up as they please,’ said another.

The small group of villagers - the mayor, and a few of the other prominent members - crowded around Rhea. The initial awe at the Lustrator had given way to their verbal assault. It often did. Rhea on the edge of the well, her hammer resting against her leg. The sound of the trickling water soothed her. 

‘Though it is an awful situation… it is rather simple,’ said the priest. ‘We had no choice - of course, we would have preferred to not attack. But they pushed us against a burning wall.’ He nodded to himself. 

‘Thank Relona you have come!’ said the mayor. ‘After the rest of the orcs hear, they will not think about attacking the village again! But, we must execute the captured orcs we have at once. They deserve nothing more. Brutal beasts that attack and pillage and rape! You have seen it for yourself - one of them had broken free to defile our temple!’

‘Anestra.’

‘I… sorry?’ the mayor asked.

‘Thank Relona and Anestra that I have come. Anestra has graced me with being her Radiant Dawn, a position within the Lustrators that I am honored to serve as.’

The mayor licked his lips with a nervous glance to the priest. ‘Forgive me, I did not-’

‘I would expect a man of your position to know that Anestra is the sister of justice. Perhaps your priest has been too lax.’ Rhea stood. ‘I will speak to these captured orcs.’

‘Uhm, Radiant Dawn… but, why?’ asked the mayor. ‘They deserve no sympathy, they would give none to us - in fact, have shown that, time and time again.’

The day’s light seemed to shine a little brighter behind Rhea. ‘All deserve a trial. It is wrong for the sentence of death to be meted out without due process. Anestra will judge them, and I serve as Anestra’s tool.’

---

Rhea was led to another small building. She had told - in a voice that brooked no argument - the priest and mayor to leave her, and she would seek them out when necessary. 

Within, the smell of copper was strong. The orcs still had blood caked on them, their wounds untended. There were three of them. Rhea frowned.

‘You. Orc,’ she commanded, a finger pointing at the one that she recognised from the temple. ‘How many of you were there that came to this village?’ Her voice was solid and strong, and most often caused people to tremble in fear.

The orc did not look up.. 

She waited.

And waited.

‘Speak!’ she commanded once more, after a few minutes had passed.

‘Only… only a few,’ spoke a trembling voice. It was one of the other orcs. Rhea could see that he was the youngest. Barely into what an orc would consider an adult.

Only a few? She knew orcs made a great deal of their honor and courage… but... that was almost suicidal. Was suicidal.

And yet… the fields were destroyed and fresh blood had been plentiful.

Rhea set her weapon against the wall, and she crouched down, resting her wrists just above her knees. ‘It is likely that Anestra will demand death from you. But Anestra is not cruel. She will not demand me to cause more pain than is necessary. To judge correctly though, Anestra demands of me that I learn all that I can, so that I might better understand her will and her thoughts. Speak. Why did you attack this place with so few warriors?’

Silence. The orc that had spoken had lowered his head once more. It seemed that he had offered all he had to say. Rhea sighed. She turned to the third orc. ‘Will you speak?’

A moment of silence stretched longer and longer, and Rhea thought that they might not answer her.

But, then: ‘Had to… no choice. Tribe in danger…’

‘War and battle is always dangerous. This should be known by orcs.’

‘This… different. Not want to fight. Tribe not want to fight. Not want to attack… but humans coming during night… me mother...’

Rhea frowned. This was not something that she had expected. This was not something that was common. ‘This village - they have been attacking you? This is what you are saying?’

The young orc nodded weakly.

‘Explain. What would this village have to gain by attacking orcs? It is small, and almost indefensible.’

The young warrior looked up at Rhea, and his eyes were a mixture of dread and despair. ‘Please… please don’t make me say… me scared… me not want to… not want to have that done to me!’ he pleaded, scrabbling back against the wall, keeping his eyes downcast. ‘Me be good… me be good!’

He was broken. Rhea had enough experience to know she would not get a straight answer out of these orcs. Not without breaking them even further. But she suspected that perhaps the orcs were not at the heart of this problem. She would pray tonight to Relona for guidance, and Anestra for justice, and revisit the issue tomorrow. Rhea expected the priest to cleanse the temple for the morning.

---

Rhea rose just before the dawn’s early light, the first rays readying to break over the horizon. She never did anything but. The smells of morning wafted up from below. A rich brothy scent of onions and carrots and celery, mixing with bread baking in their oven.

Though the smells of cooking awoke a hunger in her, Relona had answered her in the night. Rhea readjusted her braid and left her room. Down the flight of stairs, and past the busy kitchen. The innkeeper saw her, and moved to welcome her over for breakfast. No time for that. She ignored him.

Her boots left heavy footprints behind her as she made her way to the temple. Most of the town was still asleep. It only took her a few moments to reach the temple, and she swung the doors open.

A foul smell roiled outward. One only Rhea would be able to smell. Her eyes scanned the small building, and took everything in. No detail was lost. Columns rose from the ground to the ceiling. The great stained glass images of Relona and her sisters that decorated the walls were discolored. They had not been maintained. Relona’s statue at the end of the room was dull, the spheres that represented her three sisters equally as devoid of their lustre. A small door to the right side of the building led to the back of the temple.

Rhea let her hand run across the columns as she walked down the aisle, small clouds of dust billowing upward from the disturbance. Even through the gauntlets, she felt the foulness lingering in this place, tainting it. The smell grew stronger, more there as she passed through the door. A sense of decaying rot was in this place. A small table sat in the room, surrounded by a few chairs - ostensibly it was a room to discuss Temple business. But the vile odour continued to grow stronger, more physical, and Rhea descended the stairs that led to the temple’s store room. Blood coated the walls, and the stone stairs were slick with blood that had turned a hard brown from age.

Every sense of Rhea’s was offended, assaulted by the room. She wrinkled her nose in disgust. Pieces of orc and human were strewn about in various stages of decay. Arms, feet, hands and legs. Maggots writhed over the dead flesh in eager hunger, and several flies had made their home on the many blood and flesh-coated daggers littering the small area. 

‘Disgusting.’ The sight repelled Rhea down to her very essence. With every second longer that Rhea spent staring at the profane scene, her revulsion and anger doubled. ‘...and here they come,’ she whispered to herself, as she closed her eyes,let her head roll back and inhaled deeply. The abhorrent smells filled her mind. Scurrying feet hurried down the stairs. Filth. They were filth to Rhea. Rhea’s lips curled back behind the metal helm. 

She let them edge into the room - the priest and mayor - and when she opened her eyes once more, the mayor stood in front of her, and the priest behind. Both held small daggers in their hands with fingers as white as snow.

The mayor was the first to speak, his words quivering as he could practically feel Rhea’s anger emanating off her.. ‘Radiant Dawn, please-’

‘You. Will. NOT. Speak!’ Rhea’s voice was like a crack of thunder. A bolt of lightning. A strength and power to it that was hers alone, earned from a history of fighting and combat.

‘I can-’

Whatever it was that the mayor could have done was a fleeting thought. Rhea’s face contorted behind her visor. Cro’mors thrummed in a growing golden light, and the heavy weight of it swung through the air, an arc of brightness illuminating the dim area. It crashed into the mayor’s head and caved it in like it was nothing more than a pile of leaves. Blood and brains hit the wall behind him, a great flourish from floor to ceiling. Hair and bone clung to the macabre painting, sizzling slowly and blood bubbling as it boiled. His body crumpled to the ground. Fire burned through Rhea, and she let out a roar that bounced off the walls, raising her hammer high above her. She swung it down in a vicious blow that destroyed the dead mayor’s torso and cracked the stone foundations. An acrid smell of burning flesh and boiling blood filled the small area as the holy power within Cro’mors burned what parts of the mayor it had touched. 

‘...you must understand, Radiant Dawn! There was… no choice! The rain - you see! The rain, there was none, and sacrifice was required… it was required! It was REQUIRED! Or else… everyone - everyone dies! There was no choice, Radiant Dawn! Relona will understand, there is no choice, there was no choice, you must - you must, must understand!’ 

The priest pleaded, shuffling back as he spoke, half bent over with his hands together in front of him. With every step he took in retreat, Rhea took one closer to him.

‘They are just orcs! Their worth was nothing! And those of our village that were sacrificed - thieves… please! Radiant Dawn… you must… Relona willed it!’

Rhea did not speak. Cro’mors’ pulsing brilliance spoke for her.

‘We offered praise to Relona as required… much of it, Radiant Dawn! And- nnchhh!’

Rhea’s fingers closed about his throat, and her hammer dropped to the ground. With one arm, she pushed him up against the wall until his feet dangled in the air and his own hands pawed in vain at Rhea’s grip.

‘Anestra judges you tainted.’

The priest choked, sputtering. Tears ran down his face as he struggled to breathe

‘Anestra bars your ascension.’

Rhea’s fingers tightened, the metal digging into his flesh and drawing blood.

‘I demand your death.’

The last sparks of life drained from the priest as Rhea squeezed them out, bones snapping. She dropped the lifeless body with pure disdain. She let the head of her hammer point downward, and hefted it up. Cro’mors crunched through the priest’s body, and Rhea closed her eyes. Power rolled through her and her weapon, and bright gold flames enveloped the priest, burning his body away. 

Moving with a resolved determination, Rhea ascended the stairs. The sounds of the town had slowly come alive, and she could hear muffled whispers from outside the temple. She flexed her grip on her hammer before striding through the top level of the temple and bursting through the door, flames already creeping up the stairs to the main room of the temple with eager hunger.

Dark blood drank in the sun’s light while the rest of her armor glimmered, and the few people milling about temple’s entrance froze. Rhea moved to one of them, a man past his prime and holding a cane for support. She could smell it on him.

‘Anestra judges those that are tainted, and their ascension is barred!’ Rhea’s voice rumbled over the town. 

Several of the milling villages trembled at those words, their faces turning white as fear washed over them. They had heard stories of what happened after those words were uttered… A man past his prime whimpered, shrinking back several steps and tripping over himself, urine running down his legs. Rhea’s hammer crashed down, and the sound of bones snapping and splintering cracked like a whip, new flames erupting and consuming his flesh.

In one fluid motion, Rhea turned about, the force of her hammer carrying her to the next person she could smell it on, sending the body of the young woman flying several yards away. Rapacious tendrils of holy fire jumped from her body to the building, and the wood went up in flames. For a few seconds, the villagers looked on, stunned.

And then, ‘RUN!’ 

Screams of unrestrained fear erupted, and people tripped over themselves in a frantic, desperate haste to escape Rhea’s hammer. Those that had still been sleeping had wakened, and made their way outside to see what was happening.

Some of them met their fate at the end of Rhea’s hammer, and some were spared Anestra’s wrath. All of them pleaded and begged but Rhea heard none of them. Some of them tried to fight, to defend themselves. But Rhea’s conviction was far beyond them, and to her, it were as if they had kneeled down and offered their heads to the executioner.

Rhea moved through the village like a whirlwind, leaving cleansing flames in her wake, a trail of blood and bone and brain behind her. Those that deserved death met their ends at the end of Cro’mors, and those that still smelled pure were spared. There were not many. Rhea would not tolerate sacrilege. 

---

The young orc looked back down the hill. Smoke billowed up into the air, and the flames greedily devoured the temple and half the town could be seen even from this distance. He had never seen a Lustrator before, but he had heard the screams and the pleading and the begging in their prison. Death has come for us, he had thought.

But Rhea had stared them down, and judged him clean. But his two companions had not been so lucky.

His bonds had been smashed, and the Lustrator had allowed him to leave. 

‘Herak not want to go back near any humans again…’ he muttered. The scene he had walked through to exit the village had been overwhelming even for an orc. Men, women and even children had not been spared; death and fire filled the village. Herak would not sleep well tonight.

---

Anestra’s task completed, Rhea had left the small village, and continued on. A few hours out, she spotted a small earthen shrine to Relona and her sisters moulded from soil and covered in grass. At one point, it had had four pillars surrounding the small spherical mound in the center and someone had destroyed one of them. Now there were only three. 

‘...vile.’

Rhea heaved Cro’mors high into the air, and brought it down with all her strength. Soil and roots gave way to the strike, leaving nothing of the false shrine behind except a mess of dirt that would be covered by grass in a few weeks. 

As Rhea rose her gaze again, she looked toward the mountains in the distance. Where some of the ascetic monks made their home, offered their own praise and worship to Relona and her sisters. Rhea frowned, rubbing her thumb over the pommel of Cro’mors. Though the monks were odd in the eyes of most of the Order of Relona, she hoped that whatever vile corruption had managed to seep in here had not made it to them.


End.

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Hope you liked the Rhea short story, she wont be appearing in game quite yet, but we were inspired to give you a bit of information on the Relona religion and also a character that you will hear about in the coming updates.