Lupta

A goddess first introduced in the article Little Horrors in Quoth the Raven Issue 31. Lupta is almost exclusively worshipped in the domain of Madego. She is a goddess of fertility and the earth, as well as magic and healing.

Dogma

Lupta's faith is short on dogma. Her faithful believe that her motivations are essentially unknowable, but she brings life to the earth, turning barren wasteland into verdant acres. She nourishes the living without distinction, and likewise accepts the deceased into the earth's embrace without distinction.

Alignment

Chaotic Neutral

Cleric alignments

Chaotic Evil, Chaotic Good, Chaotic Neutral

Portfolio

Fertility, the earth, dance, healing, farming, magic, the afterlife, the spirits.

Symbol

A stylized woman, brown, asleep on her side within an angel-shaped outline, green.

Spell domains

Goddess version

Earth, Healing, Magic, Plant, Repose

Spirit version

Earth, Healing, Plant

Favoured weapon

Scythe

Background

Lupta was - or possibly still is - a female human table-dancer from Souragne. During the Grand Conjunction of 740 BC, Lupta sought solace in hooch whiskey and a pipe of opium, only to fall through a tear in the Demiplane's planar fabric - right into Madego's G'Henna province.

While still under the influence, Lupta started to dance when a Chi-Folken named Vurik tried to exorcize her using a set of spirit-drums - and came under the influence of the Chi-Folken's guardian spirits. As a channel for their power and the focus of the Night of Music, Lupta was key in the great ritual that stabilized the domain of Madego and turned G'Henna province into the new breadbox of the Core provinces. In the wake of the Night of Music, Lupta seemed to meld into the earth, leaving a woman-shaped hill within an angelic outline, the dealul zeiței.

While Lupta's true fate is uncertain - she might still be mortal and present in Souragne, G'Henna or the Shadow Rift; she might have been transformed into a being like the Maiden of the Swamp; or she might be an actual deity trapped in the Mists - the Chi-Folken wholeheartedly believe she is a goddess who came to them in their hour of greatest need and worked with the spirits to save them. The Chi-Folken of G'Henna province believe her to be Zhakata the Provider; the Four Tower Nations see her as the fifth manifestation of Ezra; in Nova Vaasa she is a concubine of the Lawgiver with special dispensation to perform acts of kindness; she is considered to be a spirit of fertility, farming and plantlife rather than a goddess in Souragne, Valachan and Verbrek. Regardless, she is nigh-universally adored in Madego.

Although Lupta's fate may be in doubt, the fact that her faithful are granted spells when they pray to her is not. Nor has she ever been denounced as a false goddess by the spirits also worshipped by the Chi-Folken.

Worship

While the church of Lupta is light on dogma, it is rich in celebrations. Lupta gives birth to the spirits, brings forth the good things of the earth and grants her protection against the greatest ills. Her faithful celebrate all the good things of life as her blessings. Even burial ceremonies are events less of mourning than of celebration of lives well-lived, the bonds created during that life, and the expectation of eternal peace and joy. Only earthquakes and volcanic eruptions are cause for - marginally - more serious rituals, as these events are seen as signs that the goddess has been angered for some reason, and she must be appeased. Sacrifices to Lupta include sheaves of ripe wheat and bundles of sugarcane, as well as libations of whiskey and rum.

Clerics of Lupta can generally be recognized by their green-and-yellow robes. These symbolize the wheat that grows out of her earth, growing from youth to ripeness, whereupon it is partially consumed and partially returns to the earth, continuing the cycle of life and death. Only Ewigkinder Clerics wear variant brown-and-green robes, claiming that this shows greater kinship with the goddess's holy symbol, but actually to avoid triggering their own chromatic aversion.

In her spirit version, Lupta is honoured by farmers, herbalists, gardeners, Druids, Rangers, Voodan, and all others whose lives revolve around plants. Her effigies and holy symbols are found at acres, greenhouses and gardens, and anywhere else plants grow. Sacrifices to the spirit Lupta are composed of flower wreaths and libations of spring water.