Cult of the Lady

In the earliest times, the land was green, a garden for the sustenance of man, and in that time, man was lord over all he surveyed. The birds of the air and the beasts of the field bowed to man's command. "You will be caretakers of this place" the Lady told the first onces, "You will have guardianship over all you survey, for I have created this for you, my most beloved of children," And for generations it was so. But in time, her children forgot their Lady, and turned away from the land, and in that breach of trust came the Dragons and wraiths, factions of the dark lored's armies, eternally struggling for domination one over the other. When they won their way to the world, the dragons saw in humans, the spark of divinity in them and knew that buy using these humans, they could fight their adversaries, and win. So it came to pass the first rider joined with the first dragon.

From that day, the humans who followed the ways of the dragon have been damned to all true believers, for they have seen the face of evil and embraced it. They are a plague to be contained, controlled, and exterminated.

(Excerpt from 'The Book', Remembrance, Chapter 16, verses 5-11)

Like any true believers, the followers of The Lady are not necessarily evil. Each person believes in his or her own fashion. The Church of the Lady is a relatively recent development in the dragonlands, the first whispers of it just 40 years ago, or so.

They've learned from their prior mistakes and re-organized their church to eliminate the potential that they will be silenced before their aims are met. Organised into cells of six members, each cell has a single contact in another cell, and churches, or groups of six cells have a way of contacting the other churches.

Each cell typically consists of:

A lay priest, or one who delivers the word to the cell
A runner, the messenger by which messages are carried
(The messenger is often ignorant of the purpose of his mission)
An inquisitor, or one who exacts sentence upon those who've fallen aside
A scholar, or one who can research and gather written information
A scout, or one who is familiar with survival, hunting and tracking
A soldier, the main battle fighter type.

This is the general cell makeup, other cells may vary slightly according to their purpose.

In general, the message of The Lady most quickly appeals to the disenfranchised, the homeless, but it is gaining a following in the merchant camps and even among some of the nobles. This is for the simple fact that the focus of The Lady's message is to restore humans as the dominant species. The indigent and homeless like it because that would raise their station, and with the dragonriders gone, that means more to go around for all. The nobles like it because it reinforces their power, without the dragon riders to answer to, they would have carte blanche to do as they saw fit.

This is not to say that this is the primary reason, some follow because they believe, others for personal of financial reasons. The field cells are utterly, and totally fanatic believers, carefully chosen for their skills.