[A Letter to Hephaestus of Banafsi (DM)]

[Mari]

Hail Hephaestus, Lord-in-Exile! Chairómaste!

I bring my tidings and well-wishes and exhort in your name the smile of my Lady and Her pitiless gaze cast upon the Archonate where even now disorder and misrule foster, making straight your way.

Hail reveler! Hail lord! The Gellemedea opens its doors to you and offers blessings. The Wheel turns and smiles upon those who would stand athwart the efforts of Qa'im to steal the warmth of the beating heart and in its place cold and click-ticking steel. To hew down Bel-Ishun and pave it in copper and bronze and stranger metals. To replace surrender with submission. To turn one and all into mindless cogs in service beneath the withering solar hatred of their factory-god.

Know that She is the fly in the ointment, the sand in the gears, rust and ruin to those who would blaspheme and Her gaze would be turned sharply to your enemies if you would have it. What prayers that would be offered up between the stars, She would hear. The Wheel might turn, and grind your enemies beneath it.

I would invite you to speak on such topics, if you would have it. The Gellemedea is not without great means or generosity to those who would herald the Wheel to return to Banafsi alongside a champion-king restored, garlanded in fortune and revel. If misfortune is to churn as a storm in the coming days, by Her blessing might one stand in the eye of it.

We rejoice with your arrival, for surely this stands as omen of a resplendent immanent to be forged.

Euoi Gellemos!

Mari Blacke,
High Priestess of our Lady Between the Stars