The Four Evil Gods of the Gaetani

The Great Dragon, parthenogenic daughter of the Earth, created many children in imitation of the Celestial children of the Sun and the Sea. Most of these were merely monsters, some of which still haunt the Gaetani countryside. However, four of the Great Dragon's children were powerful enough to be considered gods.

These are: the wolf, god of the wilderness and of rape and murder; the monkey, god of sorcery, treachery and betrayal; the crow, god of slaughter and of death in battle; and the cow, god of famine and disease.

While priests of the Crow and the Cow are very rare, usually arising as lone individuals inspired by horrible events to spread the malice of their god, Monkey priests and Wolf priests are common, and exist as parallel priesthoods to those of the respectable gods.

Wolf priests are particularly numerous among the hunters of the coast hills, but they can be found all along the edges of the civilized world, wherever people are forced to depend on the wilderness. Wolf priests are usually men, but women can also be wolf priests. Rude and brutal, Wolf priests possess extensive magic relating to wilderness and to wild animals. Those who have sworn allegiance to the Wolf God live outside the constraints of normal Gaetani morality, have little fear of the monsters of the wilderness, and have no fear of priests of the Judge.

Monkey priests are common throughout Gaetan, but are not concentrated in any particular region. They are usually older, childless women (occasionally men), living on the edge of established communities. Their practice is usually an open secret (known but not acknowledged), and they will often belong to legitimate priesthoods as well. Monkey priests are the people to go to for curses, poisons, and weapons of treachery (e.g. the magical dagger known as the Monkey's claw leaves wounds that never heal). They are feared and hated, but are both too useful and too powerful for most villages to do anything against them. While they are said to have dealings with monsters, they do not exist outside Gaetani society, and they fear both monsters and Judges.