Chapter Text
Duty and Honour
By Gwyphyn
Prologue.
`...the Sentinels were considered to be many things by many different people. To those they protected they were considered saviors, powerful guardians who were to be aided and helped whenever needed, no matter how slight or great their need. To the upper echelons of power, they were Guardians of the people and lands who served their want, and were often feared. More then one greedy or cruel lord met their fate at the end of a Sentinel's sword. To Priests and other religious workers, they where Resa's priests. Their lives spent in servitude to the Goddess who stood opposite Hera on the left hand of Zeus, second to none but the powerful King and Queen of the gods. They answered to no-one but their Goddess, the King or Queen they recognized as rightful ruler and to their own harsh conscious, and woe behold the ruler who sought to use these faithful guardian's for their own foul gains. For the justice of the Sentinels was swift and the executing of that justice even swifter.
They were all of these things, but to the Guide's they bonded to, they were so much more. The Guides were partners to these fierce guardians of justice and peace and protected them as much as the Sentinel's protected their Guide's. They were their Blessed Protectors' conscious as well as their anchor. It was their Guide's that allowed the Sentinels to function, drawing them back to reality with the power of their voices, whenever the Sentinels awesome abilities proved to much for them. It was their Guide's which acted like the buffer between the Sentinel's heightened senses of, sound, smell, touch, taste and sight, and the overwhelming desire to zone out on one particular sense. A Guide's heartbeat was a focus for their Sentinel's exceptional hearing, their uncomplicated smell a focus for their keen noses. The comforting touch of a Guide's hand enough to pull them from the deepest sensory overload, and the familiar sight of a Guide's face a tranquil mooring for their eyes.
Without their Guide's the Sentinels were lost and most did not survive a parting with them well, and in the case of death rare, if at all, was the Sentinel which lived longer then the time needed to put their lost Guide to rest. Most them choosing to zone out on one particular sense and join their Guide's in death.
They were thought to be the human embodiment of the animal spirits which served Resa so faithfully, and it was believed that with their passing they, and their Guide's, returned to their true spiritual form and flew once more to their Goddess's side. Until that being decided that they were once more needed on the surface of her sister Gaia, and returned to our world. This could perhaps be why, in the whole history of their guild, the combined numbers of the Sentinel's and their Guides never surpassed one hundred and two.'
Extract from `THE LEGENDS OF RESA' an ancient text written by an unknown author. Discovered in the underground vaults of an uncovered library not far from the ruins of a Greek temple dedicated to Gaia, and thought to date somewhere around 800BC.
end prologue