The StorytellerSource Starfinder Core Rulebook pg. 490
LN goddess of community, self-reliance, tradition
Centers of Worship Akiton, Bretheda, Idari, Triaxus, the Veskarium
Symbol An ancient kasathan sigil of community
Alternative Theme Knowledge Reduce the DCs of Culture checks to recall knowledge about a society’s customs, legends, and traditions by 5.
Favored Weapon Spined iceblade
Edicts Preserve history and traditions, share knowledge and wisdom, uphold the bonds of community
Anathema Destroy lore, betray your people or community
Blessings You feel a sense of safety and warmth. There is music in your words, and they carry much further than normal. Your wisdom is respected and heeded.
Curses You lose your voice. Your memories become hazy and indistinct. Your community shuns you.
Kasathas are a people steeped in custom, history, and tradition, and their goddess Talavet is no different. In ages past, kasathan storytellers gathered their clans around the fire and taught them the stories of their past, the traditions of their clan, and the history of their people. Tradition holds that as they did so, these first stories began to take form, breathed into life and awareness by the blending of ideas and the fundamental magic inherent in language and communication. Thus was Talavet born—not just a storyteller, but the story itself, a god embodying all the tales and legends of the kasatha race. She is communal memory, a representation of the bonds that hold the kasathas—and to some extent all races— together and connect them to their ancestral home.
Talavet teaches that tradition is the most important link in the chain of history that binds a community together and that ancient legends, myths, and stories form the solid foundation of an ordered society. Naturally, the Gap was a tremendous blow to her church—with many seeing it as a form of divine punishment— yet in the centuries since, her shattered congregation has reforged itself, stronger for having survived what they now call the Time of Silence. Her followers believe in sharing wisdom for the benefit of all and looking to the past as a guide to the present and the future. But especially in light of the Gap, they also know that there are times when records fail or you cannot rely on the community’s aid, and so you must learn to trust yourself and your own personal traditions, just as a young kasatha must undergo the Tempering to discover himself and become an adult.
Unsurprisingly, kasathas make up the majority of Talavet’s worshipers and priests, but the Storyteller’s faith has also gained a significant number of followers among the shirrens and ysoki, who both have their own tight-knit bonds of family and community, as well as the vesk, who find much to agree with in the goddess’s focus on tradition and self-reliance. These same tenets attract envoys and operatives to Talavet’s church, as well as solarians, the inheritors of the ancient kasatha philosophy of the Cycle. Talavet’s temples generally match the cultural styles of the congregations that worship there, but even a simple hearth can serve as a shrine to the Storyteller. Full churches often include a hearth with a flame that is always kept burning and feature red lighting that evokes memories of the kasathas’ original home star.
While Talavet’s church is generally easygoing and happy to work with members of other religions—for even the cruelest religions help to anchor their people—they have a long-standing feud with the church of Nyarlathotep, resenting the way that god’s faithful twist stories into deadly secrets and conspiracies.
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