Morai-Heg

What Morai-Heg would look like before forcing Khaine to be part of her 'cutting my hand off and drinking my blood' fetish. Much to the latter's eternal shame.

Hmmmm...I wonder what happens if I nag Khaine again? - Morai-Heg trying to tempt her fate once again

Morai-Heg, the Crone was or is a High Elf and Eldar goddess. She's old. VERY fucking old and insanely confusing. Yes, High Elves/Eldar do grow old. She's THE goddess of fate, whereas Lileath just deals with prophesy. She might be dead or just transformed into she who thirsts or that other one who likes so slurp down Eldar soul smoothies who knows. Better to steer away from this one.

Warhammer Fantasy

Morai-Heg looks older than any Elf-dar will likely ever look however. She's essentially the Fates of the pantheon in one body. She grants prophesy to the elves when other gods ask it, she gets to re-arrange the stars at her will (which is why astrological signs aren't bullshit in Warhammer. Quite the contrary, you really can predict when shit hits the fan if you stargaze and it's all thanks to Morai-Heg).

Unlike the other gods, Morai-Heg doesn't have a duality to her. Despite being a goddess of the underworld, she is not evil. She's full True Neutral. She only does things that benefit her, and every event will benefit her. All beings, both those born and divine, will end up owing her more than they can ever pay by the time they die, probably because she manipulated it to be that way and no doubt causing a chain of divines undoing each other's requested changes in a clusterfuck of manipulation. She has an army of banshees that she uses as hunting dogs, sniffing out where great deaths will occur and either seeking to prevent them or hasten them as she sees fit (so yeah, that 6 you were hoping to roll or that 1 that lost you the game might be her fault).

Ravens are her mortal worshipers more than other mortals, as her only shrine is at the Gaen Vale where all female elf gods have representation. As a result, being cruel to a raven really is unlucky especially if you are an archer or gunner. Non-archers call this superstition, but elven archers (so 90% of Elves. Militia armies, remember?) impart the wisdom of befriending ravens to even the races of the Old World when they can.

She died alongside all the other elven gods in the End Times and is super dead by the time of Age of Sigmar.

40k Version

It's interesting that while Lileath managed to predict (although without knowing the details) Slaanesh's birth, Morai-Heg apparently (see below) didn't know a single fucking thing about what was going to happen, but also did nothing to prevent it. Out of all the gods of the Eldar it's most likely that Tzeentch would have saved her (probably from trying to pay back one of the half a fucking million+ favors he'd have owed her from Fantasy since the two Warhammers share a multiverse with one Warp) but since we have the blanket statement that "no gods other than Khaine and Cegorach survived" then we have to assume that Morai-Heg wound up in Slaanesh's gut after a thorough multi-cock reaming. Then again Isha turned out alive so who knows. Perhaps a loop-hole. If they survived but are no longer gods then technically it wouldn’t be contradicting any lore. Simply as Warp entities below “god” level. Or that the Four are the bar for godhood and only Khaine and Clown-boi are powerful enough to count.

Morai-Heg had a whole bunch of daughters, collectively known as the Howling Banshees, originally thought to have been begotten by Khaine, though recent fluff points to them having been fathered by the as-yet-to-be-born Ynnead (named Kaelis Vara'Lanthian), so just like Slaanesh there is a little bit of chronological fuckery going on, where both gods have a definite "birth" point, but have always been around and capable of doing things. Times always a bit loopy when it comes to the warp but this is perhaps an even clear example of most of just how much cause and effect get screwed with when it comes to the warp.

In any case, Morai-Heg sent her daughters to go pester Khaine and drive him mad enough that he would agree to cut off her hand so she could drink her own blood to gain the knowledge contained within. Guess that means that despite building the webway, the Old Ones never discovered the hypodermic needle? Or just ask Vaul for an exsanguination tool. The Howling Banshees then were fostered off to the care of Khaine, where they became his next aspect of War.

The story continues, whereby the fingers of the severed hand were taken and forged into five uber-powerful swords capable of wielding the power of her soon-to-be-born husband Ynnead in the material realm and they were scattered throughout the Eldar empire until they needed it most. Marrying a God that should be the equivalent of a fetus? Huh...Guess Morai-Heg really does have an abundance in weird fetish fuel.

These new revelations allow us to draw some interesting conclusions regarding the "inevitable" fate of the Eldar:

1. that Eldrad did not actually misappropriate the collective destiny of the species by awakening Ynnead early, since the croneswords were intended to be used by the Eldar to save themselves, but also required Ynnead to be "stirring" at the very least in order to power them. If everyone needed to die for Ynnead to be born, then how is a sword that uses his power going to save them?
2. That if Morai-Heg seemingly could not foresee the birth of Slaanesh from the collective psyche of the Eldar, leading them to their inevitable doom, but foresaw the inevitable birth of Ynnead from the collective psyche of the Eldar, and that he was necessary for saving the Eldar from their "doom". One might assume that both gods are either one and the same from different perspectives, or are actually aspects of something greater still.
3. She already knew what was going to happen, regarding the Dark Prince, but let it happen regardless, because it needed to happen. She's playing the long con, in which what ever plans she has cooking, required the Fall to happen; she had already set the foundations for what was to come next, in the form of Ynnead, and may be setting up something big for much further down the road.

Trivia

Morai-Heg is mostly based on a supernatural creature of the Irish mythology, the Morrígan. A goddess (or trio of goddesses) of fate, war and sovereignty, she had the abitlity to shapeshift into a crow and could bring courage or sow terror in the heart of warriors. The Morrígan survived Ireland's Christianisation through the banshee of the folklore, hence the association in 40k.

Gallery

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  Ranni Morai-Heg in a more...Fromsoftware flavour.

The Gods of the Eldar
Asuryan - Cegorach - Isha - Kurnous - Khaine - Lileath - Morai-Heg - Vaul - Ynnead