Beams of cool white moonlight shone through the canopy and curtains of languid mist, illuminating the midnight Pools and their solitary denizen. Centuries into the distant future, when the Disciples of the Mother would spread Her Gospel throughout the lands, this place would become a holy site known as the Pools of Codice - a destination for thousands of pilgrims from all corners of the World. They would know this as the place where Arda, Goddess of Love, wept for a hundred years following the death of her mortal husband Theus. Future pilgrims would immerse themselves in the cleansing waters, filling small vials from the pools of collected tears of Arda's century of mourning.
But for now, there was only Arda, laying at the water's edge of one of the pools beneath a mossy ledge where a forest rivulet discharged through a short waterfall. In her dejected torpor, she ran a finger across the glassy surface of the water, watching the ripples travel across the waters as she traced a figure in the water beside her reflection. As she drew her finger across the water, the ripples coalesced and formed the impression of the reflection of another figure sitting beside her. In the reflection of the pool, Arda had created an apparition of her lost love and husband Theus. In the water's reflection, Theus wrapped his arms around and planted a soft kiss upon Arda's forehead as he did so often in life. At this sight, fresh tears streamed down Arda's face and were added to the millions of previous tears she had shed over the generations, casting a series of ripples that erased Theus' apparition, leaving only Arda in the water's mirrory sheen.
For a century, the Goddess of Love had done naught but weep and reflect upon the time she had spent with Theus. Equal parts longing for those joyous times she had spent with him, and also lamenting how their time together was cut so hatefully short. Even after such time had passed, Arda did not understand the gravity of her supposed crimes against her fellow Gods. What was it exactly that was so wrong about sharing love with mortal man? How was it, Arda wondered countless times before, that making love to a mortal caused any injury to her peers? The Pantheon had attempted during their tribunal to impart great shame upon Arda by exposing her mortal love for all the Gods to see, but the only shame that Arda felt was that she was one of them.
It was then that Arda's thoughts swung like a pendulum, shifting at once from tremendous sorrow to unbridled wrath.
This is not how a Goddess behaves, Arda thought to herself, weeping in the forest like some pathetic wretch.
Arda drew heaving, labored breaths as she came gradually to her feet. Her soft, fair skin practically glowed red with fury.
I am no wretch. I am A GOD
Her thoughts echoed through the grove, scattering flocks of sleeping birds into the moonlit skies and setting the canopy leaves shaking as if buffeted by the winds of a coming storm. The very conviction of this thought sent a shockwave across the Pools, and in its wake, the waters trembled and gave a new reflection of Arda.
In the quivering surface of the waters, Arda saw a new and terrible form. Her silky, golden locks of hair had transformed into a curtain of burning quicksilver. Her nubile body and perfect skin now caked in ash and soot, with glowing fire rippling beneath. A scepter of dragon bones was held in her left hand, and a still-beating divine heart pulsed in her right.
I WILL DESTROY THE PANTHEON.
In the pool's reflection, Arda stood beyond the Threshold of Ahael - the gates of Underworld battered wide open - and slammed the butt of her scepter into the barren, lifeless soil of Neberziel.
I WILL DESTROY MORTALITY.
Within the rippling pool, the countless souls of the underworld teemed around Arda and swarmed through the opened gates back into the realm of the living.
ONLY THEN SHALL REMAIN ARDA, MOTHER OF ALL SOULS, WHOSE CHILDREN SHALL SING LOVE EVERLASTING.
Arda threw herself away from the water's edge, abruptly ending the apparitions in the waters and her delusions of horrible grandeur. The waters of the Pools stilled to a glassy smoothness and calm returned to the grove. Arda took a number of deep, soothing breaths and her anger gradually subsided.
"I am the Goddess of Love," she said to herself at last, "not of Hatred. What I saw in that water was not who I am. I will not allow the wickedness of the Pantheon corrupt me so. If I remain here, this hatred will consume me."
Arda drew herself up onto her feet once more.
"And so I must end my exile, and leave this place."
