The Quarrels of Gods

Being an account of the pantheon’s own politics — for the gods watch each other as surely as they watch us, and mortal hands tip their scales.

The seven gods share one sky, and they do not share it gladly. Between every two of them runs a standing — an old accord or an old wound, measured by the scribes from −100 (open war) to +100 (sworn alliance). These standings are not scripture. They move.

See the whole web at any time:

/cov pantheon

Every pairing hangs there as a banner — grey for indifference, warming green toward friendship, souring through gold and orange to red as two gods turn on one another. The most strained pair flies first.

The Old Accords

Left alone, every relationship settles back toward what the lore says it should be. Some of those resting places are not peaceful:

• Kharoven and Varkul rest amicable — iron sworn to iron; the forge arms the war.
• Mosswyn and Neritha rest amicable — the rains feed the fields.
• Kharoven and Oryndel rest tense — the rune would write power into steel, and the anvil unwrote it. The oldest quarrel in the sky.
• Mosswyn and Ulfrayne rest tense — the hunt thins the herds she keeps.
• Mosswyn and Nythrava rest tense — the deathless night is no friend to living things.
• Nythrava and Ulfrayne rest tense — two crowns of the night, and one night to rule.

The rest of the pantheon keeps a cooler peace — leanings and grudges too mild to name, until something feeds them.

What Moves the Sky

Three hands turn the scales:

1. Yours. When a follower of one god kills a follower of another, the standing between those two gods sours — each kill by about 1, though heaven weighs any single mortal’s rampage only so far: one slayer can move a given pair by at most 2 in a day. The gods answer to the pattern of their congregations’ wars, not to one zealot’s evening.
2. The old accords. Each day, every standing drifts a small step back toward its resting place. Grudges cool. Alliances left untended fade. Nothing mortal is permanent — a truth the gods enjoy more than we do.
3. The gods themselves. They are fickle. Each day the sky shifts a little on its own, in no direction a scribe can predict.

The Names of the Bands

A standing wears one of six names. Crossing into a new band is news — the whole Reach hears it proclaimed, in dark words or fair ones:

Band	It begins when…	It holds until…
Allied	the standing climbs past +80	it falls back below +60
Amicable	past +40	below +25
Neutral	—	—
Tense	the standing sinks past −40	it recovers above −25
Rival	past −65	above −50
At War	past −85	above −70

Mark the gap between those columns: a grudge crossed is not quickly uncrossed. Two gods driven to rivalry stay rivals until the wound has more than half-healed. If your congregation’s wars push two gods toward the red, do not expect a quiet week to undo it.

Note

For now, the quarrels of gods are watched and spoken — the banners shift, and the Reach is told. What their wars will finally cost mortals — feuds, tributes, festival days despoiled — is still being written, and this page will say so plainly when it becomes law.

Reading the Banners

Each banner in /cov pantheon shows the pair, the band they stand in, the exact standing, and where the accord naturally rests — so you can see at a glance not just where two gods stand, but which way the wind is pulling them.

Tip

Before you make a habit of hunting another god’s faithful, look at the sky between your gods first. Every kill is a coin dropped on a scale that all of us live under.