Church of Mielikki

The church of Mielikki, officially known as the Walkers of the Forest Way, was the primary religious organization dedicated to the worship and service of the goddess Mielikki.

Organization
The clergy of Mielikki included clerics, druids (called 'forestarms'), and rangers ('needles'). Generally, druids of Mielikki took on the abilities of rangers, including the ability to wear all kinds of armor usable by rangers, even metal armor (unlike other druids who were not allowed to wear metal armor).

Orders

 * Order of the Unicorn's Horn: The Order of the Unicorn's Horn was a small society of itinerant healers who brought solace to injured people, animals, and plants.
 * Shadoweirs: The Shadoweirs served as a type of religious knighthood of the woods. Members were activists who proselytized with zeal and were willing to go on the offensive on behalf of their sacred forests. They sought to advance the regrowth of ancient forests reduced by civilization, and to halt the endless assault of civilization on their ancient homeland.

Rituals
Divine spellcasters following Mielikki prayed for spells in either the morning or evening, but were required to observe both events. Once a month, clerics and druids were required to perform the Song of Trees, calling forth a dryad or treant and performing odd jobs for it for a day. Mielikkians also held the equinoxes and solstices as holy days, called the Four Feasts.

Symbol
The traditional holy symbol of the faith was a white unicorn's head, golden horned and blue eyed, facing sinister, that is, to the left. An alternative symbol showed a white unicorn over a green field. An older symbol was a white star on a green leaf, specifically a tiny and dazzlingly bright white star balanced on a green leaf of oak or ash that was open and verdant.

Possessions
The raiment of the Walkers of the Forest Way was governed by the seasons, with each article of clothing having a specific base color and an accent depending on the season. In autumn, it was red with white accents, representing fallen leaves becoming covered with snow. In winter, it was white with green accents, for the evergreen trees under the snow and how the forest remained in full life. In spring, it was green with yellow accents, symbolizing the forest slowly returning to lushness. And finally, in summer, it was yellow with red accents, for the beauty and bounty of flowers, fruits, and grains. Otherwise, the trappings of the faith were often in forest green.

Their vestments comprised a plain tunic or tabard, which was typically sleeveless in summer and long-sleeved in winter, together with boots, trousers, and a short cape. All articles of clothing were in the seasonal colors, except the boots, which were always brown. They had no headwear. While working in the woods, most priests wore whatever befitted the weather and the task at hand, but they made an effort to display the seasonal colors, even if in hot weather this might be only a sash and baldric. Needed items were carried in pouches or packs or even strapped to their boots. During times of conflict and adventuring, priests and rangers wore regular armor (often chainmail) with only their capes.

They wore their holy symbols of Mielikki always over their hearts,  either stitched into the fronts of their tabards with silvery thread or as a pendant carved from bone or ivory.

Magic
A number of spells and prayers were unique to Mielikkian priests or were closely associated with them:
 * Banish blight
 * Stalk
 * Wood sword
 * Tree healing
 * Create treant

While within a forest environment, any cleric, druid, or ranger of Mielikki might use a form of the spell analyze balance whenever required. When cast on a type of creature, a specific individual, or an item, it functioned as normal, yielding an estimate of its deviation from true neutrality. But if cast on the forest itself, they could detect if the local ecology was significantly threatened.

Clerics and druids initiated into the higher secrets of the church in the 1370s DR could cast the following unique spells: These they shared with the churches of Silvanus and Eldath. Moreover, they could rebuke or command animals or plant creatures.
 * Mold touch
 * Briar tangle
 * Thorn spray
 * Fireward
 * Tree healing

Circa 1479 DR, a priest of Mielikki could channel divinity and use the divine spell fleetness of Mielikki, becoming blessed with the speed and surefootedness of her sacred white hart.

History
In the fall of Myth Drannor in the, many worshipers of Shaundakul were slain and his faith declined sharply. The church of Mielikki absorbed those Shaundakun rangers who survived, while the church of Waukeen claimed the traders.

In the 11 century DR, a priestess of Mielikki that lived in Amphail, Asaudrae Daerantree, was killed by hunters while in the form of a stag, giving rise to the Rite of the Stag Lass. Many of the faith and some in Amphail would come to believe Asaudrae to be Mielikki herself.

In the Dalelands around the 1340s DR, Arms of Mielikki lived, worked, and fought alongside the elves there. As the elven population was so small and slow to replenish, they relied on the human Mielikkians to protect them, calling them as "our shields". This established a deep and long-lasting trusting between the church of Mielikki and the Dales elves.

In the latter half of the 1360s DR, a few Arms of the church started buying up land around Secomber in the Western Heartlands and in upcountry Sembia, using riches retrieved from hidden caches and ruins in some forests. On these lands, they established orderly tree plantations that would serve as "forest shields" to supply local peoples with lumber before they looked to natural woodlands. The Arms would even cut the wood themselves and sell it cheap. They later extended this scheme to parts of Amn and Tethyr. To aid this practice, the Arms hired foreign adventuring companies, nicknamed "armies of the trees", to combat any woodcutters who still targeted the natural woodlands.

By the 1360s DR, the church of Mielikki and the goddess herself were in decline. Mielikki came to recognize that, with her service to Silvanus, as his power was growing, her own was dwindling, as were her faithful, which was threatening to reduce her to a demigoddess or less. Finally, in the, Mielikki ordered a complete restructuring of her clergy, creating the branches of the Heartwoods, Forestarms, and Needles and reintroducing the druids. The action not only arrested the decline of her power, but bolstered it and gave her enough to establish her first divine realm in the Outer Planes.

Members

 * Drizzt Do'Urden, an ex-worshiper of Mielikki
 * Catti-brie
 * Montolio Debrouchee
 * Lander
 * Pikel Bouldershoulder
 * Florin Falconhand