Deoch Mass 8-17-2025 - Light, Darkness, and a Mother's Sacrifice

As Aislings we are a product of both the Light and the Darkness. In part created by Deoch, creature of the Darkness. And also by Danaan, the Goddess of the Light. Naturally, we often speak of Deoch in Deoch Temple, but today out here in Undine I wanted to talk to you about Danaan, our race’s mother, and her sacrifice that forever changed Temuair.

We, as Aislings, share a common lineage with the Tuatha de Danaan, those with an innate oneness in Magic. You would know these children of Danaan today as the Fae. It was the Tuatha that brought Magic to Temuair and helped guide those lost from Aosda to the rise of Hy-Brasyl.

We refer to Danaan as the Goddess of Light, but her power is not strictly of the ‘day’, per say. Danaan is the goddess of Life, Fertility, and Abundance. These are the powers that we colloquially refer to as the Light. When the Tuatha brought their power to Temuair, they helped form the great civilization of Hy-Brasyl and ushered in a great age of prosperity, discovery, and peace.

But it is said that every Light casts a Shadow.

Seeing the Tuatha’s natural aptitude with the force called ‘Magic’ drove the inhabitants of Hy-Brasyl to discover how to chain and command the elements, a much different but still very powerful form of magic. Continued desire for power ultimately led to experimenting with Darkness and unleashing it into the world. Foolish court magicians were tempted by the Dark into giving it a corporeal form: the Dubhaimid. They devoured the magicians that called them forth along with thousands of inhabitants of many towns.

Perhaps it could have been contained there, but the foolish reign of kings eager for power continued to use the Darkness in their wars. The power was too tempting to resist.

Those that met their death through an encounter with the unfathomable forms of the Dubhaimid died in abject terror. This was the death of a soul not fit to fade into Grinneal and so the Underworld manifested to harvest these scarred souls. Sealed for eternity in a land of terror, torture, and agony; so loud did the screams in this Underworld become that it birthed Chadul, ruler of the Underworld and the God of Terror.

Remembering the teachings of the Tuatha, many returned to the wise worship of Danaan. Answering these prayers, Danaan appeared to combat the growing threat. Danaan and the combined forces of all mortal races defeated Chadul in three days. The world was ravaged, but Chadul was defeated. Or so a simple man would have thought.

For you see, once the souls of the Underworld birthed Chadul, the fate of Temuair was sealed. Even as battles against the Dubhaimaid continued into the Shadows War and beyond, their numbers were endlessly replenished. Every year the Underworld grew louder with more tortured voices, screaming out as a horrendous choir. Through this ever growing well of suffering, Chadul would only return stronger and more powerful than before.

Danaan understood this implication. Perhaps Chadul could have been defeated a second or a third time, but the next war was always inevitable and there would be no standing against him at the apex of his power.

And so...

Danaan crafted an unthinkable gambit. She resolved to sacrifice herself to the Unknown in exchange for the power to seal away Chadul and end his reign of terror. This power used an ancient magic: the formation of an Octagram that bound the gods of Temuair into a seal of nearly unbreakable power.

But Danaan didn’t sacrifice herself to the unknown without a contingency plan. She needed two things to bring her plan to fruition. 

First, she did not have a suitable eighth god to balance the energies of the Octagram. Second, she intended to create a child race that, unlike the Fae, were native to Temuair and would carry on in her absence.

In Danaan’s most desperate time she needed somewhere to place her faith. It was then that Deoch found Danaan and forsook his servitude to Chadul.... Danaan had found the solution to both of her unsolved issues. She could not fully understand Deoch but she placed her faith in a creature that had until recently been an enemy.

It was then that Danaan left her creation, knowing somehow that Deoch would take up her unfinished project in her sted. She knew that whatever Deoch did to finish her work, part of what was created would be her child. 

And when Deoch did as Danaan had predicted, finishing the Aisling Spark... Deoch was transformed into the God of Inspiration. A God that walked the balance between the Light and the Darkness. A perfect fit for the final spot in her Octagram.

In an instant, Danaan’s plan had been realized. She sacrificed herself and sealed Chadul away with the completion of the Octagram while the age turned with the second coming of the Tuatha de Danaan… that is, we Aislings.

As Aislings we are the children of Danaan and Deoch. We we are unbound by fate; imbued with the gift of endless potential and the power of choice. This is where the real power of our race lies: in choice. Danaan is gone but she has left behind the Light’s final, and perhaps greatest, power... that of Hope. 

Will you choose to carry the Light of Hope forward? 

Together we can assure the continued existence of Temuair and the wellbeing of all who make this dream their home just as Danaan intended.