Welcome to Flavortown - Lyra, Dawnbringer
Lyra Dawnbringer & Serra the Benevolent| Illustrated by Donato Giancola & Magali Villeneuve
"You Never Were"
"Blessed is She, Holy and Kind
Show Us Your Light in the Darkest of Hours
And Your Love in the Most Dour of Days
In Serra's Name, We Pray."
One of the priests recites verse after verse of scripture to the crowd. The bishops estimate there's nearly nine-hundred of them. I watch them unseen. Best not to interrupt, this is the most peace I've seen on their faces in weeks. Most of them lost their homes to the Invasion of Dominaria. Devout children of Serra, ever pious and ever humble. Their parents and their parents before them had prayed for her benevolent blessing. Now, their stomachs were empty, as their crops had been razed.
It's strange to watch them. Holy Mother blessed us with the ability to vanish from sight, a power she herself once held. Her ancient soldiers used this to evade capture during battle against the Phyrexians. But I use it to listen to sermons. My body shimmers slightly, a faint blue aura being the only indication of my presence. Mortals often struggle with the presence of angels. We attract their attention far too easily.
"Lyra Dawnbringer! Here, we come before you and humbly ask for your healing in the face of this sickness!" The priest's voice is amplified by some form of thaumaturgy. Her words ripple over the crowd and they erupt into cheers at the sound of my name. This invocation, due to both her charisma and the holy rites she enacts, compels my obfuscating spell to fade. My body unfolds itself back into existence, mana taking the form of my wings and holy armor. As I fly above them, the congregation reaches out to touch me. Their fingers barely brush against my robes. Yet at this moment, I fear them.
As I descend next to the priest, she bows to me. I've spoken to her before. Lyanii, an ageless human blessed by Serra herself, has tended to many lost civilizations in the past. Yet neither of us have seen anything like this. Entire continents lie smoldering, reduced to rubble by the unstoppable march of Phyrexians. And yet, just as it had in the past, it ended. There was no mass destruction, the Phyrexians simply fell all at once. The soldiers laid down their swords and the battle was done. Simple, they'd thought.
War has a way of leaving lingering scars, however. Once they had buried their dead and sent their souls off to the afterlife, the people of Dominaria were left with tatters of countries and nothing to sustain them. The Phyrexians were dead, whatever that meant for their mechanical bodies, but their war machines litter the landscape like blisters. Further, the people had lost their access to food and, crucially for this group, medicine. Despite their best attempts to isolate them, more and more were falling ill each day. They'd run some exams and ensured it wasn't phyresis, but the people were still scared. Supplies were dwindling alongside hopes.
"Hear me, Dominaria!" I shout to them, raising a silver spear above my head. "You have experienced great hardship, great sacrifice, and great loss. But know this: Serra will provide! She will lift us from these depths and set us on safe grounds." My grip on the spear tightens and I worry it may snap. I can see the exhaustion in their eyes. They cheer for me, but their voices are hoarse. In the wake of past invasions, I've been able to rally the people to action. But here, I have nowhere to guide them to. No plan of salvation, no secret spell that can provide for them. Instead, I do the only thing I can do now. Lie.
Serra is dead. They know this. It is core to the teachings of the church. Yet they, the mortals in a game played by gods, did not understand the meaning of it. Even as her angels take action, as we work to continue to defend the plane, her magic has dwindled. We no longer have her divine providence. Instead, we subsist on our own being to heal and protect as we once did. But when Dominaria fell, nothing we bear could undo that loss.
The people applaud when I speak and I feel vile for it. With a single flap of my wings I take to the skies, vanishing from their sight as soon as possible. Lyanii believes in me, and I do not have the heart to tell her she is foolish for doing so. I've heard stories of the defense of other planes. Tales of true angelic heroes taking flight and staving off the forces of Phyrexia. Yet when my angels looked to me for guidance, my actions failed them. We did not defeat Phyrexia. We endured them. If the true heroes, the ones who were able to live up to Serra's edicts, did not intervene, Dominaria would be lost.
Over the seas of Dominaria, I wonder what Serra would say. When I was first formed in the depths of her Holy Plane, she told me I would go on to lead her church one day. My purpose was to lead, my form sculpted for the sole task of this. Did my failure to protect Dominaria mean she had faltered? Were her designs capable of fault? If she were to see me now, I know she would be disappointed. The last relics of her grace have been lost and her people have resorted to scrambling for nourishment. Serra's last hope, a failure in her final mission.
Over the seas of Dominaria, I can only hope she will forgive me.
It was late in the afternoon when Phyrexia began to breach the plane. I remember the clamor of the leylines as my archangels emerged from the fabric of the plane to arm their stations. Within minutes, we had assembled forces across every plane and nation on the plane. We stood strong, united as the Invasion Tree's tendrils burst through space and took root in our soil. In our hubris, we shouted our battlecry. Our weapons had tasted Phyrexian flesh before and we thought this would be no different.
The first to fall was Archangel Evra. Somewhere over the skies of Tolaria, a tendril of the Invasion Tree shot out from the skies and pierced through her chest, sending the angel plummeting to the ground in a whirl of feathers and robes. Next was Seraph Vojar while defending the Vec. In that moment I saw what he saw. The faces of the people watching an angel die. They'd never seen it, nor did they think it was possible. The church was ever so emphatic about the idea that they would defend everyone. Until our last breath, in Serra's name. Yet here, we couldn't keep that promise.
Atop the ramparts of Benalia City, I watched the forces of Phyrexia pour from the skies. It wasn't like a march of an army, instead looking more like the pouring of bodies. As though they had truly been made one, a liquid mass of flesh and sinew falling on us like rain. We would banish one only to have three more take its place. Something about these Phyrexians told us they were more advanced. Their predecessors had fought Dominaria before. Though they had lost to our might, these ones had learned.
I had, in my weakness, accepted that I was to die on that battlefield. Likely it was to be a death by one of the massive Obliterators whose talons raked against our shields. I would see Serra again. It would be, for the first time in eons, peaceful. True peace, free of the multiverse's conflict.
But that did not come. Instead, I watched as our salvation did not come from Serra's angels, but from beyond. A woman, clad in glowing armor with wings that stretched from each horizon, emerged from the nothingness with a blazing sword. Knight-Errant, Champion of the Sun, the Resplendent One. She who was called Elspeth led the final assault against Phyrexia. The enemies that we could barely hold off simply fell before her blade. I've heard stories of her, empowered by the angels of a far-off civilization. In the swinging of her blade I saw something more. Like a ghost around her, a presence that resided between her body and her soul.
She was Serra, and she was Elspeth. Not in the sense that she had learned from the Mother of Angels, nor that she was fully possessed by her spirit. Instead, the angel that saved Dominaria that day was something new. A unified being, born of a planeswalker's spark and a champion's spirit. It was as beautiful as it was terrifying. The flap of her wings sounded like cannons, her face stoic as she slaughtered the hordes of Phyrexia. Once she had finished, she simply turned to me. As if she was waiting for instructions. Her eyes were not human. They were something far greater and far more distant. I simply knelt before her, compelled by the presence of my creator.
In that moment, I knew. She was Serra's warrior. I was not.
Then she vanished. Quickly, as if fading into the aether between worlds. The entire affair was nothing more than a sojourn for her. This war, which had claimed the lives of some of my greatest soldiers, was a minor step in her mission to save the multiverse. As my people were rallied to attention, we heard of those who truly made Phyrexia fall. The ones who caused all of these beasts to fall dormant where they stood. It was because of Elspeth that this happened. She was truly chosen by Serra, a champion of her message for us to follow.
There, I felt sick to my stomach, for I realized I wished it could have been me.
They call them Omenpaths. Snaking pathways between worlds. On Llanowar, one of these emerges in the thicket. It pulses with light much like the angel from afar did. A twisting thicket of aether.
I have seen them before. Ages ago, far before the universe was torn apart by constant invasions and power-grabs. There were once artificers capable of forging these portals to wage their petty wars. In the last centuries, it seemed as though the greed and cruelty of mortals was growing. Something compelled them to do these things. Whether it was malice or their own hubris, I cannot say.
The thing they call an Omenpath buzzes, an electric current pulsing through the air. Near it, the edges of trees seem to have fallen into it, as if consumed by an ever-flowing current of the space between worlds. Their branches simply stop at its perimeter. One bit of the plant existing here, the other shunted into a place none of us could comprehend. Teferi described them as scars on the skin of the multiverse. I thought of them more so as signatures of those who attempted to conquer the world in the past.
From the light, I see a figure emerge. It--No,--She is clad in shimmering stardust, a substance obfuscating her face like when a moon falls into place for an eclipse. I've seen her before. This must be the one they call Elspeth. The woman who slew that tyrant. Here. Perhaps she would send me to whatever place my creator had been banished to.
She speaks with words and walks without form. I am invited through the twisting liminal space of this gateway. The figure guides me for what feels like miles, each step feels like crossing continents. The edges of the pathway beg me to step into them, fall deeper into the ever-shifting nebula of the aether. But I resist. The one guiding me is silent. Soon, we emerge onto the scorched fields of Trokair.
But that can't be right. Trokair was lost years ago. What stood in its place was a new civilization. Certainly they wouldn't waste resources scrambling for control of smoldering ashes of Old Trokair. But wait. Smoldering. I place my hand on the ground and feel the heat. Any fires would have died out before we had arrived here. My mind begins to fall back into place. The smoke tastes different. We are not on Trokair. Not the one that I know of.
Ages ago, these lands were lost to the first Phyrexian invasion. The Church's Angels stood against the forces of Yawgmoth. We called it a triumph. It catalyzed hope in the masses, yet it was at the cost of many lives. For the first time since Serra's death, we had done something that inspired the people of Dominaria.
For the first time since that invasion, we mourn. I remember the loss of those soldiers, human and angel, from this battle. Sarpadia and Trokair were the greatest losses of the war. My guide watches me, still and stoic, and I wish that she would just speak. I want to know why she was chosen by Serra and I was allowed to fail. Instead of answering me, she waves her hand and we watch as time flashes forward.
First, tents arrive. A few dozen families sailing in from distant nations. They carry with them livestock, heirlooms, and memories of the lives they lost. Then, structures begin to rise up. Towers made of sleek cobblestone begin to be constructed over the ruins. More people join the refugees. Knights, wizards, scholars, anyone who can lend a hand arrives.
And us. The angels. Yes, I remember this. We arrived early in the restoration process, tending to the wounded and assisting in constructing new housing for the people. Seeing myself is an odd thing. I watch my own body act as I once did, dragging lumber from nearby forests to be built into a farmhouse. My guide gestures to my past self. My past hands hold the tools to rebuild this world. I could not name the feeling that day. The idea of instilled purpose and vitality. But now, I know.
Angels are constructed of white mana. We are bonded to the very concept of healing that runs through every plane. My guide's face peers through the shining light and I see her. Blonde hair blazing in the rising sun of Dominaria. This is not Elspeth. This is her. Emerging through the twisting paths of time to return here.
And finally, she speaks. Multi-octave and fantastic.
"You are not alone," spoke Serra. "You never were."
I remembered when I first emerged from the void of Dominaria. In the face of an invasion I was handed a spear. For so long I lived with that spear bonded to my hands. It was the only way I knew how to live. But in the wake of this devastation, the world has changed. And I must change with it.
Serra's word can no longer be a never-ending defense. It must become healing.
Lyra Dawnbringer
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