[Record of a Sermon on the Wyrm and the Wheel]

[Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi]

Tabbah 30, IY 7787
Acolyte Amelie of the Sisterhood of the Sibylline Vine
Speaker for Kula

Sermon before the Pilgrim on the Nature of the Wyrm and the Wheel

O gathered company! I thank you for gathering here today. As you hearken to my words know them to be wrought of the will of Fierce Kula, called the Wyld. It was in ancient times that the Holy Mother, B'aara, shielded burgeoning Life with Her sable cloak; and then gave Life, when She was weakened, to Kula. The Holy Mother bid Kula shepherd Life forward, spread it throughout the world, that no longer would the lands be a barren waste but flourish in Her eyes. This She did, traversing that ancient world, and making of it a glorious, verdant Garden.

And yet the Enemy had an answer:

And in that age of mighty works; Foreboding shadows did appear;
In star-lit dreams, Gellema's sight; She looked upon triumphant night;
By subtle Art she shared this doom; So all the Wheel would swiftly know;
That Age of Glory, not to last; The deserts drown'd in poisoned Ash.

So heed, O Pilgrim, not in vain; The Sun does malice Wheel's refrain:
"Attend this world of goodly folk; My scorching gaze shall soon upturn;
No B'aarat waters now shall cloak; Ambition's rot shall see them spurn;
The Wheel with blasphemies invoke; Devour'd in blood, and strife to churn";
And pressing down in dire heat; The Demon offered but deceit;
Though blazing light was bound to Ring; The verdant land felt Thirst's new sting.

Not then to be outdone by Sun; In midnight clad the Wyrm was glad;
To hasten, vast, the Garden's fall; Oppress'd the noble groves in squall.

These powers, the Tyrant Sun and the Wyrm alike, have wrought incalculable harm to our Well. Their followers together have murdered Legate Syter, damaged the Shade, allowed Sibilant to trespass upon this very square, and more recently, murdered Legate Zaniah. They are responsible in history for the slow degradation of the Garden that has seen grand Bel-Ishun reduced from verdant grove to the desert of our modern Age of Ash.

And now some proclaim that the Wyrm, being part of the Wheel, ought be tolerated in our civic society.

I say to you: It cannot be.

For while it is of the Wheel, the Wheel is of the world, and not all the creatures of our world are wholesome and fit for our Well. The very nature of our Enemy is to see our towers cast down, the sacred Life of Kula extinguished, our culture destroyed. Even now, Constantine Diakos rides at the head of a Sibilant host. A cultist of the Wyrm leading an assortment in service to that terrible foe. And to face him shall go the wholesome spokes of the Wheel, united in purpose, against a common enemy. For the Wyrm is precisely that, its evil wrought of its nature, immutable, unchangeable.

From this we take solace. We know our Enemy. And knowing our Enemy to be a viper we cast it from our homes to a place where we may meet It in open battle. With one hand extended in mercy, to lift up those who have made a choice in terrible error; with the other hand grasping the spear, to answer directly those who would defile the Garden.

For Her chief command is this: "Let Her servants tend the Garden; That the seed, Bel-Ishun shall grow; And from the first day to the last; All of Life, of Her, shall know."

That Its evil shall not spread within.