LAKHI
Mistress of blood magic, dragons, the sea, and self-rule
Alignment: Lawful neutral
Suggested Domains: Blood, Water
Symbols: Blue dragons, fish, moss, seaweed, silver
Enemies: Baturach, Maruma’e, Rinshari
Allies: Jukai, Senfaer
MOTHER OF THE SEAS
When the soul of Atiakha was rent in two, the daughter of the moon became two separate beings, the sister goddesses of the sea Lakhi and Maruma’e. Lakhi remained below and took the form of a titanic blue leviathan. Nesting in the heart of Mount Fayrlin, she rules the deepest waters and their inhabitants. The secrets of blood magic were always her domain, though this birthright was stolen by mortals long ago.
Like the ocean-depths that are her domain, Lakhi is a wellspring of life, eternally laying eggs in her wake. She is credited as the mother of all fish, serpents, and dragonkind. By virgin birth, she hatched the Three: colossal monstrosities whose might and intellect nearly rivaled her own. The Three remain nameless within the legendarium, but are often depicted as the whale, the crocodile, and the kraken, or else as three great sea-dragons. The Ten were born to Lakhi by Imbakhao, father of serpents. These mythic dragons of varying colors and codes would become the forefathers of metallic and chromatic dragons.
Lakhi is said to be locked in continual war with her sister Maruma’e, whose connection to the Darkplane brought the first aberrations to Vinramar. To her ardent followers, and the dragonborn most of all, Lakhi is a symbol of clarity and freedom from the slavers and tyrants that rule the land.
The traditional draconic gods are Lakhi, Imbakhao, and Maruma’e, all ancient primordials that may take the form of dragons. The Kaiervol worship Imbakhao, the black dragon, while the Medeghar worship Lakhi. Rivalry between the two groups has ended in bloodshed on more than one occasion. The dragonborn who worship Maruma’e, the mad concubine of Daemoth, often find themselves developing aberrant features such as tentacles and extra eyes. Many dragonborn cults have preserved knowledge of certain powerful runes that were shown them by the maahiset, and these might Figure prominently in their different forms of worship.
While it has never been clear just what the dragonborn of the eastern jungles worship, legends hint at colossal beasts that rule the deepest parts of the jungle. Whatever these beings might be, they are the object of the eastern dragonborn’s zealous and secret devotion.
A Dragon’s Young
Heirs to a forgotten bloodline, the dragonborn have withdrawn from the outside world. Their appearance causes other races to fear and despise them, especially those whose history remembers a time when the dragon-children marched a terrifying onslaught across the West. But that was ages ago, when the world was young.
Like many descendants of Lakhi, the dragonborn have dwindled to a size comparable to the other humanoid races of Vinramar. To some extent their physiology must be amphibious or reptilian (depending on subrace), but they seem to be predominantly mammalian, as opposed to their distant cousins the lizardfolk, who are reptiles. Whatever their characteristics might be, the dragonborn are feared and hated more than any other common race.
Most dragonborn feel kinship with sea creatures and reptiles, and they look to the dragons as their ancestors and gods. Their mythology, however, is largely based on oral tradition, and very few have any real knowledge of their people’s long-past golden age. They tend to reject the worship of humanoid gods, considering it the height of narcissism to assume that the gods bear resemblance to mere mortals.
