Moon Maidens (A to Z Challenge)

When the gods fell before the talons of the dragon during the Gods War, the Sun was captured and spared but the Moon flew high above, higher than even the dragons could follow.  The Empress called off pursuit knowing that should the Moon return to the world. she could be captured then.

Her worshippers, the Moon Cult survived, though driven underground after their failed attempt to kill the Empress.  Where once there had been hundreds, if not thousands, of temples and shires to the Moon, now she was only worshipped in secret.

But not only her worshippers survived but in many cases, her children did as well.  While perceived by many of her worshippers as a virgin goddess, she was able to create life from the essence of moonlight, making elementals of awakened moonlight.  Some of these daughters of the Moon, for they inevitably manifested in female guises, were assigned to aid and assist the priestess of the temples before the Gods War and being elementals, they were more likely to survive that destruction or abandonment of the holy sites.  While many were bound to their temples and haunted them until destroyed (or very rarely freed), a handful could roam and did so.

The Moon Maidens, as they are usually called, are adaptable, their forms mutable and they are natural mimics.  While they all love the Moon and seek to aid her as they can, they have no unified plan, some explore and learn, others try to inspire new worshippers, some just live stolen lives pretending to be human and performing rites to their mother in secret.

While they can take other forms, most of them have some aspect they cannot change only conceal such as silver eyes or pale hair, but universally, when cut, their blood appears as liquid silver.  As elemental beings, they are effectively immortal unless destroyed by violence or magic.

Game uses:  A sage who possesses knowledge needed might secretly be a Moon Maiden and they wish artifacts from before the Gods War, relics of the Moon‘s worshipers, in exchange.

A Moon Maiden evangelist has come into the city and is inspired the downtrodden and the dispossessed to organize and unify, perhaps even to overthrow the rulers of the city.  Do you help her?  Oppose her?  Or just take advantage of the chaos that will be caused?

In a ruined temple, they may encounter a Moon Maiden, still bound to the place.  Will they help free her?  Try to trick her into revealing where the temple’s treasure is hidden (if any of it survives)?  Or something else?

Notes: Moonlight elementals are, of course, inspired by the Lunes of Glorantha and Runequest.  An idea I found enchanting when I first encountered it and one I am happy to find a place for in the Sea of Stars.

Image from PublicDomainPictures.net and is in the Public Domain.