Dovid

Dovid
[[File:{{#setmainimage:Elder Cathar.jpg}}|250px]]
Details
Race	Human
Birthplace	Innistrad
Lifetime	Before and after the breaking of the Helvault
Colors
Sources
The Lunarch's Journal

Dovid is an elderly cathar and a veteran of the Pale, now serving the angels of the Lofts of Thraben Cathedral at Avacyn's request.

History

Dovid was once a cathar of the Pale, who specialized in battling geists and ensuring the dead stay at rest. He was grievously wounded at the battle of Child's Wall but was saved by the arrival of Avacyn and her flight. Although he healed over time, his arm would never wield a sword again. After his recovery, Avacyn herself and an angel of the Flight of Herons named Gryta tasked Dovid with cleaning out the long abandoned Lofts of Thraben cathedral, so that the angels of Innistrad may once more use it as a place of rest.

When he entered the Lofts, Dovid found the body of a man dressed in black, half submerged in the basin of a cistern of holy water. The unknown dead man had been strangled long ago but was then preserved by the sacred waters of the Lofts. When Dovid removed the man from the cistern, a journal was dislodged inside his coat. It was the journal of the deceased Lunarch Mikaeus Cecani, detailing the former entrapment of Avacyn with Griselbrand in the Helvault. This, Dovid already knew.

The journal also detailed that Edgar Markov created his foul race of vampires through a pact with the demon Shilgengar and the draining of the blood of the angel Marycz, using her sanguine essence to transform living men into bloodsucking immortal monsters. Dovid was shocked at learning that the terrible vampires feeding on his people were created by none other than the very humans themselves.

Dovid then read that the ravaging vampires had almost caused the extinction of the remaining humans after a few generations of feeding frenzy. And so, Edgar's son Sorin Markov, also a vampire, created Avacyn as a force to rally the plane's remaining angels - a symbol that the humans could unite under. This was done not to save the humans, but rather to preserve them enough that vampires could continue to feed on them for all eternity.

From there, the Church of Avacyn was designed to give the humans the power to protect and grow their numbers, but not enough to ever bring us victory over those that fed on them. Dovid reeled at this truth - that humans are meant to be simply livestock for the vampires, and his church and Avacyn herself, merely unwitting shepherds, caused him to enter a deep crisis of faith.

Later, as a reward for his work cleaning out the lofts, Gryta granted Dovid a sword forged from the shards of the broken Helvault. Dovid named the sword Eost, but knew he would never wield it in battle. Instead, he hung the sword on the wall above his desk and started recording his findings in his journal, to one day share it with the world, even if this act of perceived blasphemy would cost him his position, his title, and his life.

Story appearances

Title	Author	Publishing date	Set	Setting (plane)	Featuring
The Lunarch's Journal	Colin Kawakami	2014-08-13	Magic 2015	Innistrad	Dovid, Avacyn, Gryta

In-game references

Represented in:

• Elder Cathar