The 14 Days of Blessing Day 9: The Goddess Shrines

Welcome to day 9 of the 14 days of Blessing! What's this, you ask? Well, for two weeks I will be running daily blog posts introducing you to the world of Azaria- the characters, the setting, the locations, and more, in the run up to the release of the third book in the series, The Blessing! And for each day you participate, you can win a prize!

The prizes up for grabs include:

A free ebook of The Binding (one to give away each day), the first book

A free paperback of Binding (one to give away)- international shipping available

One of seven original art prints (seven to give away, choice of any major character, the fox Nahbet or the dove Rusephine)

You can choose one of the above character cards, or one of the two prints below- these will not be watermarked

A free ebook of The Parting (five to give away)

And, if you participate in at least 10 of the 14 days, you could win one of five ebook box sets of The Binding, the Parting and the Blessing!

Sounds great, right? But what do you have to do to be eligible? All you need to do is:

-make sure you like my Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/maddoctorartist/)
-follow me on twitter @maddoctorartist (https://twitter.com/MadDoctorArtist)
-share my Facebook page
-leave a gold 💛 and purple 💜 heart emoji comment on each daily post (either here on the blog itself or the facebook post)

And that's it! Winners will be picked by random number generation and must be contactable via email. Each daily winner will get a free ebook of The Binding, plus one of whichever of the other prizes above catch your fancy (except for the box-set).

Please share with anyone who loves reading young adult fantasy fiction, and best of luck!

So, without further ado...

The Goddess Shrines

The next few posts are going to be able some cultural and lore aspects of Azaria. The Goddess Shrines are important landmarks in Azaria. Now little more than old ruins, they still hold cultural significance. But rather than try to explain it all myself, I thought it would be better if you heard from an expert...

So allow Eliza, the protagonist of the Goddess Saga, to reveal all! Along with her friends Adam and a special guest...

[transcript of animation]

Eliza: Hello again, it's time for another episode of my Encyclopaedia Azaria! Today's topic looks at the Goddess Shrines, the oldest known ruins in the kingdom, and Adam's here to help me out.

Adam: Yup!

Navinka: Do not forget about me.

Eliza: *cringe* And Lady Navinka, too.

Navinka: Indeed. So, let us begin. There are six known Goddess Shrines spread throughout the kingdom. Many are sited within modern cities, so that is how we name them.

Adam: *ahem* The shrine closest to us is Lanaran, and the others can found in Dhjerba, Ornixa, Dragonvale, Estovan and Viens.

Navinka: Each one was built by the noble Gladier family around a thousand years ago, and most people think they did this to honour the Goddess for Azaria's victory over Esturia and the end of the Age of Darkness, where the pagan animal deities were no longer worshipped.

Adam: I think we covered this last time...

Navinka: There's no harm in repetition, it might help the facts stick!

Adam: Sure...

Eliza: Anyway, we can give you a quick run down of the shrines and a little about their history. They're all built using a similar sturcture, but with some variation depending on where they are.

Eliza: Lanaran's shrine is situated just between Bane and Laranan itself, and it's the closest to its original design. It consists of a inner sanctum with an altar and two ring passages. It was the first to be excavated, but it's also one of the smallest shrines.

Adam: The next one is Dhjerba's shrine. Unfortunately the original ruin was destroyed around four hundred years ago in an uprising where the Esturians, now under Azarian rule, tried to rebel. Given the extensive damage, the shrine was remodelled into a cathedral, whose walls use the original stone and carvings.

Navinka: Probably the most famous shrine is Ornixa's. As the mines were under ownership of the Gladiers, it is not too surpring that this shrine is the most extensive and well built. Nobody truly knows how large it really is, and parts are still being discovered even today. It doesn't help though that it's hard to tell where the shrine ends and the mines begin.

Eliza: The biggest shrine is Estovan's. Unlike the other ruins, it's built high above ground on the foundations of an ancient fortress. Originally it had eight towers connected by a suspended ring passage, although now only four towers remain. It overlooks Lake Estor, but while it's on the private land of the noble estates, public access is still possible.

Navinka: Dragonvale's shrine is perhaps the most interesting. The original shrine was decimated by a terrible flood, and so almost nothing of it remains. However, my ancestors, the founders of the city, considered the site to be fortuitous, and so they constructed a cathedral around it, similar to what later happened in Dhjerba. Remnants of the ring passages still exist deep underground, although no relics or original stonework have ever been found.

Adam: Last is the Viens shrine. It's by far the smallest, as the ring passages were deliberately destroyed as the capital city expanded, despite the protests of the local scholars. Pretty much all of its relics have been sold off to various institutions, including the Vault of Knowledge in Begara, so other than being a historical site, it's not very interesting.

Eliza: And there you have it.

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