Kina

Kina by Didier Graffet

Kina – also called the Dark Mother and the Destroyer – was a vastly powerful entity imprisoned beneath the fortress with no name for millennia. Despite being trapped, her influence and the activities of her fanatical worshipers the Stranglers were the driving forces for many of the events of the Books of the South and the Books of Glittering Stone. Kina and her adherents – including Narayan Singh, the Daughter of Night, and the Khadidas – were some of the most dangerous enemies of the Black Company in the later Annals.

Introduction

A wide variety of myths from many cultures attempt to explain Kina's origins. Regardless of the myths, it is certain that she was a powerful, immortal entity who waged war on the glittering plain. She was eventually overcome at great cost, and trapped by her enemies in a tomb-like state far beneath a nameless fortress. Slowly but constantly planning her return since her prehistoric imprisonment, she mentally reached out to countless individuals across many (or perhaps all) of the 16 worlds linked by the plain. She had the ability to orchestrate and subtly manipulate mortals by appealing to their inner weaknesses, for example: Mogaba's ambition to be Captain of the Black Company.

Recognition and worship in the homeworld

In the homeworld, her worshipers were called Stranglers or Deceivers. Membership in this tiny minority cult was forbidden there, punishable by execution, as it centered around human sacrifice. In various aspects and avatars like "Khadi" (which were decidedly less grim than the Stranglers' goddess), she was also worshiped by the Gunni as the goddess of death in Taglios and elsewhere in the southern continent.

Appearance

Very few people saw Kina in her physical form. Of those who did, depending upon who looked at her directly, Kina appeared alternatively as a beautiful woman with perfect proportions, sleeping naked but covered in scars; or in other circumstances, a hideous demon. In the dreams that Murgen and Lady had about her, she looked like a colossus with four arms and a demonic face.

Before the Annals

The Free Companies of Khatovar (of which the Black Company was one of the last) were actually created by Kina's worshipers from Khatovar, an ancient city in an entirely different world. They were sent out to choose the location of her return during the prophesied Year of the Skulls. But Khatovar was not the only place which created such movements. Throughout the millennia, her cultists in some or all of the other 15 worlds also sent groups like the Company out across the Plain.

Events of the modern Annals

Kina's "Foretold" messiah was the Daughter of Night, who was protected by Narayan Singh, the "living saint" of her cult. They both worked tirelessly to transcribe the Books of the Dead to bring about the Year of the Skulls. Kina was able to project her power in physical form outside her subterranean tomb only rarely, and apparently at great expense. In She Is the Darkness, she manifested physically in Longshadow's uppermost tower in Overlook. There, she encased the Daughter in a protective "eggplant black" magic bubble; she also effortlessly swatted Soulcatcher and the Howler aside, wounding the powerful sorcerers seriously.

Water Sleeps

Kina, in her genuine physical form, was wounded gravely by Goblin, who pierced her with the Lance of Passion at the end of Water Sleeps. She used this event as an opportunity, however, and sent out a loyal demon, the Khadidas, from her nostril to take possession of Goblin's body.

Soldiers Live

In Soldiers Live, Kina's servant the Khadidas (still disguised inside Goblin's body) escaped with the Daughter and attempted to transcribe the Books of the Dead in the homeworld. They failed, and were eventually recaptured by the Black Company inside the Palace of Taglios. The Khadidas was suppressed with the aid of the complex of spells inside One-Eye's hat. Kina was soon attacked in her chamber again by Goblin, who this time pierced her skull with One-Eye's spear. An instant later, she was disintegrated by Croaker when he detonated Goblin's rheitgeistiden. Her evil influence was finally wiped out from all 16 worlds. Even in the Grove of Doom, the goddess's overhanging sense of psychic menace, which had hung in the air of that place for centuries, was gone at last.