Bahamut
The Platinum Dragon; King of Dragons; Lord of the North Wind
Symbol:
Home Plane: Elyssium
Alignment: Neutral Good
Cleric Alignments: Any Good
Portfolio: Good dragonkind, good leadership, just rulers, heroism, preserving of the good, smiting the wicked
Worshipers: Good-aligned dragonkind, paladins, good leaders and their followers
Domains: Air, Glory (Heroism), Good, Nobility, Preservation, Protection, Scalykind (Dragon)
Favored Weapon: Lance
Physical Description:
In his natural form, Bahamut is a long, sinuous dragon covered in silver-white scales that sparkle and gleam even in the dimmest light. Bahamut’s catlike eyes are deep blue, as azure as a midsummer sky, some say. Others insist that Bahamut’s eyes are a frosty indigo, like the heart of a glacier. Perhaps the colors merely reflect the Platinum Dragon’s shifting mood. His wings are broad and powerful, and Bahamut is astonishingly fast and agile in the air. Bahamut is known to take a number of other forms. Among these forms are those of a tall and handsome male knight, a beautiful and regal female sorcerer, and a somewhat humorous, elderly man with a long beard and magical abilities of unknown and uncertain capacity. While the race of these forms tends to vary (along with the specific details), they all have white or silver-white hair, and their eyes are always those of the Lord of the North Wind.
Description of Nature, Personality, and Dogma:
As one of the two ruling gods of Therafim's dragons, Bahamut understands keenly the weight of his responsibility and power. Because he has such immense power, Bahamut does his best to use it with the greatest of care, since being too heavy-handed with power can be just as bad as not using it at all. Bahamut is a wise and careful ruler, slow to anger, deep of thought, perfect in judgement, and certain in action. He is also a firm believer in the principle that truly great rulers lead best by teaching their followers how to govern themselves, leading by example, and then allowing those followers to do as they have been taught, building their self-reliance as well as their loyalty to their ruler. Of course, Bahamut expects his followers to attempt to do likewise, though he understands the limitations of mortals and the many troubles that complicate matters. Nevertheless, he is a very stern judge of the wicked, and will brook no deliberate acts of evil, and certainly no claims of ends justifying means; to Bahamut, ends are glorified by the means used to obtain them, and any actions that are less than exemplary in gaining one's goals tarnish and despoil whatever good in the desired ends might be obtained. Bahamut's followers are expected to be pillars of their communities, to improve the quality of life wherever they may go, and to help those in need whenever and wherever they can. They are also expected to work against the actions of tyrants and evil dragons whenever possible, so long as doing so does not cause them to violate Bahamut's code of ethics.
Clergy, Places of Worship, Important Rituals, and Servitor Races:
Each cleric of Bahamut is chosen with great care for their charisma, their wisdom, and their devotion to the cause of good. Generally, Bahamut prefers to call his clerics from an early age, so that they can better learn to serve his will without being distracted by other cares of the world. Other clerics of Bahamut are expected to mentor acolytes, so that they are well-acquainted with the requirements of service to their god. Bahamut makes it known when he chooses a cleric by causing his clerics' eyes to turn the silver-white of platinum when they use clerical magic.
Temples devoted to Bahamut are one of the only ostentatious parts of Bahamut's worship. These structures tend to be composed of marble and other beautiful stonework, and adorned with a great many precious, beautiful things. His temples, to Bahamut's way of thinking, are intended as a visual reminder of the glory of goodness, and so their walls and windows frequently display stories of great heroism and the righteous acts of the gods, so that all can see good examples of the way of life that Bahamut encourages and learn from them.
Bahamut's holy day is in the dead of winter, when all around is cold and dead. At this time, when the dying time of nature is upon mortals, Bahamut's worshipers celebrate Gwylain, or "Festival," where they give gifts to each other, and the wealthy go out of their way to provide for the needs of the poor, and everyone does what they can to share with others and have a merry time, counterbalancing the great sorrow that regularly comes at this time of year.
Bahamut is served by seven great wyrm, good-aligned dragons who act as his personal bodyguard and advisers. Membership in this cadre of seven is cycled with some regularity, to allow its members to recuperate from the stress that such shared responsibility with the King of Dragons entails. He also keeps company with a great many good-aligned outsiders, and can call on their assistance in most conflicts should the additional aid be needed.
History and Relations:
Bahamut and Tiamat are the first dragons, born of the clash of primordial energies between the Light and Chaos, a clash which also formed the rest of the multiverse. At first Bahamut and Tiamat were lovers, but their vastly different natures soon turned love to conflict, and they began to fight, a fight that incidentally created the Morrigan. This battle caused them to be cast out of the endless paradise where they had first lived, a place where they had been charged by the Light to create new life and guide it to enlightenment, down into the world of Therafim. While they have both withdrawn themselves from direct intervention in mortal affairs, knowing that doing so would endanger their lives directly, and the very existence of Therafim itself would cease should either of them ever be slain, they both continue to act in extraplanar realms, where they cannot die permanently, and through many proxies in the mortal realm of the Prime Material Plane, each seeking to promote their personal view on what "enlightenment" should entail.
As one of the first gods to be an active part of Therafim's history - indeed, he along with Tiamat caused Therafim's history - Bahamut has had dealings with all of the other draconic deities, and most of the others as well. He has been friends, comrades, and sometimes lovers with every non-evil dragon god, and has either sought to understand or else to oppose all of those of evil alignment. Bahamut is highly active in getting to know other non-evil deities, and his innate charisma as a leader and a diplomat, as well as his likable and calming personality, ensures that he almost always finds favor.
Tiamat and Bahamut have a long and complicated history, and this history continues to this day. They both have wildy differing philosophies, and even more wildly differing methods, and always act to counter the actions of the other, actions that sometimes lead them to direct physical confrontation, leaving both gods spent and in need of recuperation for extended periods. At the same time, however, they are also deeply, even madly, in love, and feel a passion for each other that defies all that either of them believe in. It is not at all uncommon for their physical confrontations to turn amorous, though the passion of their lovemaking is almost as destructive as the savagery of their battles.
Favored Offerings and Justifications for Direct Intervention:
A willing heart and willing hands are perhaps the greatest and most precious offering that Bahamut could hope for from his followers. Going about doing good and performing heroic actions, even the smallest heroic actions, is all that Bahamut asks of his worshipers. Regular, minor offerings of coins to his temples are also appreciated, though the clergy in charge of such money are expected to put it to good use in helping others and improving the lives of Bahamut's followers.
Because of his stance of allowing his followers to learn from their mistakes and to improve themselves without interference, Bahamut is not generally prone to manifesting his powers in the normal activities of his worshipers. He almost never appears in his true form, except in dreams. However, when truly great evils menace, especially evil in the form of corrupted dragons, Bahamut has been known to reach down from the heavens and empower normal but good-hearted people so that they are able to perform truly heroic acts. Many simple peasants in such perilous circumstances have suddenly found that they had the resources available to them to follow the paths of paladinhood, or sorcery, or wizardry, or clerical piety, either because of the spontaneous of these newfound abilities, or, more frequently, an unexpected teacher becoming available, coupled with advanced learning ability on the part of the person in question.
Besides the empowerment of otherwise normal people, often, a strange, silver-haired person will appear in a peaceful community where heroes are known to reside, tell stories of great acts of heroism, and then take a few minor steps that will catapult any nearby heroes onto a path that will reshape the world for the better. This sort of thing is especially common when it is intended to thwart the machinations of Tiamat, who Bahamut always monitors as closely as possible, seeking to keep her and her minions from unbalancing the delicate arrangement of Therafim's power.