Author Megan Feeney
Nyssa
Creation & Life • Gold Dragon
Nyssa, the Golden Dragon of Creation and Life, is the quiet heart around which Aretz turns. As leader of the Committee, Nyssa is less a commander and more a conductor. She does not rule with thunder or spectacle, but with a steady, patient presence that threads through every living thing. She trusts each god to play to their own strengths and weave their powers together in harmony.
Where her gaze falls, seeds remember how to sprout, wounded lands remember how to heal, and even broken lineages find the courage to begin again. Every soul is born innocent, every creature a new chance for the world to get it right. Even when others call for judgment, she looks first for the spark of good that might yet be fanned into something brighter.
Sakinah
Water • Dolphin
Sakinah, the Dolphin of Water, moves through Aretz with an easy, tidal grace. Most days she simply flows around obstacles, trusting the long, patient cycle of rivers, rain, and sea to wear down even the hardest stone. Calm and playful on the surface, she believes that given enough time, water always finds a way through.
​
But when balance is broken beyond her quiet tolerance, Sakinah’s answer comes fast and merciless. Storms rise without warning, tides surge, and once‑gentle currents turn crushing. Her retribution is swift and overwhelming—a reminder that what yields and bends can also drown, and that the patience of water is not the same as its weakness.
The Committee is Aretz's divine pantheon, a hallowed union presiding over the intricate balance of nature and spirit. Once sixteen strong, ancient treachery shattered the harmony. Though the Expelled still wield their formidable power, their voices are forever barred from sculpting Aretz’s fate. Learn about them here.
The Committee
The Sixteen Gods of Aretz
Helaku
Sun Healing • Phoenix
Helaku, the Phoenix God of Sun and Healing, is the radiant protector of Aretz, his gaze piercing every shadow. As the world’s eternal witness at dawn, he watches over the lands with a spirit of pure, vibrant joy. His divine fire acts as a vessel for purification, burning away corruption and mending physical wounds with absolute precision. To be touched by his flame is to experience the raw renewal of the physical body.
His medicari followers serve as his celestial conduits, channeling his brilliance to neutralize venom and eradicate any mortal plague. While he leaves the healing of the soul to other deities, his solar warmth ensures no physical form is beyond repair. Beneath his sweeping golden wings, the broken gain new strength and the wounded find the resilience to rise once more in the light.
Caiome
Moon Peace • Unicorn
Caiome, Goddess of Moon and Peace, is the soft light that asks the world to lower its weapons. She slips through shadows and quiet rooms, easing tempers before they flare and guiding frightened feet away from the edge of conflict. To her, the surest way to win a battle is to make certain it never begins, even if that means retreating rather than standing her ground.
Yet moonlight does more than soothe—it reveals. Caiome’s glow falls gently on hidden motives and buried lies, making truth shimmer where deception once stood. The Peacekeepers, her chosen bards, channel this power when they sing and speak. Through her, they can read the hearts of others, drawing out honesty without a blade drawn or a drop of blood spilled.
Leylani
History • Pegasus
Leylani, the Pegasus of History, Balance, and Scholarship, carries the memory of Aretz on her wings. Every war, whispered promise, quiet act of kindness is written into the pages she keeps—never forgotten. Cool-headed and precise, she studies the past not as a story to be admired, but as a tool to shape the present, nudging events toward the outcomes she deems necessary.
​
Kind but unflinching, she utilizes patterns, ancient prejudices, and long-buried myths to give her a near-perfect sense of who stands before her and what they might become. As one of the few allowed to cross into the Underworld, she walks through its borders with the same strict devotion to balance she brings to the living world. When she intervenes, it is rarely loud and seldom wrong.
Ari
Offense • Tusked Lion
Ari, the Tusked Lion of Offensive and Magical Strength, is the raw, roaring edge of Aretz’s power. He craves victory but not effort, preferring battles he knows he can win and pushing others to the brink so he can strike at the perfect, easiest moment. Ego, anger, and impatience coil around him like a mane of fire, and when he finally moves, his attacks are brutally precise—quick, devastating, and meant to end things in a single blow.
Though he sits on the side of the Committee, Ari is a dangerous ally to lean on for too long. The rulers of his kingdom are granted a single, terrible gift: the Wish, a unique power that can tilt the scales of war or history in an instant. In Ari’s eyes, strength is its own justification, and mercy is something best left to gentler gods.
Adalia
Defense • Dire Bear
Adali, the Dire Bear of Defense, Compassion, and Protection, is the open door and the unyielding wall in one. She welcomes others with warmth and patience, gathering the lost, the frightened, and the weary beneath her sheltering presence. Once she has offered her care or sworn an oath, her loyalty is absolute, even when that devotion becomes heavy or overbearing.
Adali never strikes first. She warns, and warns again, giving enemies every chance to turn away before she plants her feet and refuses to move. When the fight finally comes, she is in it for the long haul—enduring, absorbing, and outlasting every blow so others can survive behind her. For those she loves, she will fight to the death, not out of rage, but out of a fierce, steady love that simply will not back down.
Mitexi
Mitexi, Goddess of Family, Hearth, and Empathy, measures strength not in single heroes but in the bonds that hold a pack together. To her, a shared meal, a worn doorway, or a familiar laugh around the fire is worth more than any crown. She feels the emotions of those around her like shifting weather, using that awareness to soothe tempers, mend rifts, and keep her chosen families from splintering.
​
When conflict comes, Mitexi’s loyalties are never in doubt. She thinks of others first, and blood or chosen kin will always stand at the center of her protection. For the sake of a united home or a tight-knit community, she will endure slights, swallow pride, and bend until she cannot bend any further. But if someone threatens the heart of her pack, Mitexi’s gentle warmth hardens into something unshakable, and she will stand between her family and the world without hesitation
Family & Empathy • Dire Wolf
Pythia
Foresight • Owl
Pythia, the Owl of Foresight, watches Aretz from a quiet distance, her eyes fixed on futures that have not yet learned they exist. She speaks rarely, not from shyness but from caution; she knows how fragile the path ahead can be, and how a single careless word might shatter one destiny and birth another. In council she is subdued and withdrawn, weighing every silence as carefully as any prophecy.
True Seers are rare, and those few who awaken to the full breadth of their sight inevitably find their way to Pythia. Under her guidance, they learn to thread their minds through the chaotic web of possibilities without losing themselves, tracing the branching lines of what might be and what must never come to pass. To follow Pythia is to accept that knowledge is both a gift and a burden—and that sometimes, the wisest choice is to say nothing at all.
Neutral Committee
These four deities have been cast out from the sacred golden arc, wandering the shadowed fringes of Aretz. Though fractured, their power over the primals remains absolute.
Pakuna
Forest • Peryton
Pakuna, the Peryton of Forest, Neutrality, and Natural Law, walks the wild places as hunter and prey, shadow and sunlight both. To her, nothing in Aretz is purely good or purely evil—life and death chase each other in an endless circle, and one cannot exist without the other. She can wear the shape of any forest beast, from the smallest forager to the fiercest predator, and in every form she is the same unblinking witness to the world’s harsh balance.
All who can survive the wilds are welcome in Pakuna’s domain: hunters, gatherers, misfits, and wanderers alike. She offers no special mercy and no special cruelty, only the simple rule that if you can endure, you have earned your place. Pakuna does not bend toward light or shadow, crown or cause. She is strict, steady, and unyielding—Neutral and Natural, always
Nykira
Ingenuity • cat
Nykira, Goddess of Ingenuity and Shapeshifting, slips through the cracks of every rule Aretz has ever written. In one moment she is a sleek alley cat, in another a wild hunter in the brush, always watching for the cleverest, least expected path to get things done. Sneaky and delightfully manipulative, she delights in solutions no one else would dare try, treating obstacles as puzzles rather than walls.
Her loyalty to her sister Vulpira is fierce, and she walks beside her often, yet even for Vulpira she will not shatter the laws that bind the worlds. Instead, Nykira dances along their edges, finding loopholes, side doors, and strange in‑between spaces that let her go where others cannot—even into the Underworld and beyond. She rarely punishes, because what others call “wrong” she often sees as simple creativity. To Nykira, true innovation demands strange methods, and the world is better for every rule she manages to bend without quite breaking.
Runako
Chaos • Corvid
Runako, the Corvid of Chaos, Fun, and Entertainment, perches comfortably between the heights of the Committee and the depths of the fallen. Both sides tolerate him with a kind of weary resignation, which he finds endlessly amusing. Loud, social, and impossible to pin down, he laughs his way through schemes that leave everyone wondering whether he’s helping, hindering, or just enjoying the show.
Runako never moves without a scapegoat, a backup plan, and three different exits no one else noticed. His followers are spies, double agents, mischief makers, and chaos coordinators who treat rules as loose suggestions at best. In his creed, you’re only truly in trouble if you get caught—and if you do, well, you clearly didn’t plan as well as Runako taught you.
Karayan
Death • Winged Snake
Karayan, the Winged Serpent of Death, moves through Aretz with a calm that never wavers. Cool, collected, and constant, he guards the sanctity of the soul with a precision that leaves no room for carelessness. To those who honor the dead and keep their oaths, his touch is a quiet mercy and his rewards are gentle; to those who profane the boundary between life and death, his retribution is swift and exacting.
His exile from the Committee began with a single, unforgivable choice. Karayan wove his will into the bloodline of the Soulkeeper family, binding them as his rulers within the Kalindi Swamp and granting them dominion over the creatures of the Underworld. Now the Soulkeepers stand as the Keepers of the Dead, walking the line he drew—both a gift and a curse that forever ties their fate to his fallen grace.
The Broken Circle
These four deities have been cast out from the sacred golden arc, wandering the shadowed fringes of Aretz. Though fractured, their power over the primals remains absolute.
Akako
Magic • Red Dragon
Akako, the Red Dragon of Magic, wears his power like a perfectly tailored mantle—dignified, controlled, and unmistakably dangerous. Determined and unrelenting, he will do whatever is required to claim what he desires, carving his path with raw arcane force and razor‑sharp intent. His hunger is not wild, but focused, the kind of ambition that reshapes the world around it.
His fall from the Committee came when Ari pushed him one step too far. In a moment of defiance, Akako chose a mortal follower far too young, binding them to a power they were never meant to bear. For that, he was cast out—but exile stripped neither his nobility nor his strength. Akako still moves through Aretz with his head high, a fallen lord of magic who refuses to bow, even to the gods who judged him.
Vulpira
Loyalty • Fox
Vulpira, Goddess of Loyalty and the Fox, is a tangle of charm, mischief, and fierce devotion. Part trickster, part seductress, she slips easily into new circles and, once accepted, wastes no time claiming them as her own. Those who prove disloyal or false find themselves quietly edged out, while the faithful are wrapped in her playful warmth and sharp, watchful care.
It was loyalty, not malice, that led to her fall. To stand beside her sister Nykira, Vulpira broke the laws of the gods and chose a follower too young, mirroring the crime that cast others out before her. She does not regret it. Her retribution can be brutal, but her laughter is bright, and her love for her sister is unshakable. For Nykira’s sake, Vulpira would break any rule, bear any exile, and still grin as she walks away from the wreckage.
Kelsul
Tides • Shark
Kelsul, the Shark of Tides and Water, shares Sakinah’s belief that water always finds a way—but he refuses to wait for time to do the work. Vigorous and relentless, he hunts for every opening, every weakness, driving forward until he has forced a path through. Once Kelsul sets his mind on something, stopping him is like stopping the tide itself: possible in theory, disastrous in practice.
His retribution, like a sudden riptide, is swift and devastating, dragging the unprepared under before they realize they’re in danger. Kelsul’s fall from grace came when his hunger outgrew his share of the sea. Instead of ruling beside Sakinah, he reached for all of it, trying to claim the oceans as his alone. For that, he was cast out—but the tides still answer when he calls, and the deep places of Aretz remember his name.