Goblins of the Moon (2020)

From Introduction:

In the Sakhab Wastes that surround the dead city of Ardoussarlis, numerous factions vie for power. The orcs are strongest, militarily. They have numbers, arms, and tactics, but they are belligerent and prone to power struggles and in-fighting. The goblins are the most numerous, but irrevocably split into competing factions. And yet, it is from among their numbers that comes the one individual who holds the most power in these scarred lands: the Goblin Prince of Birds.

There are goblins who revel in the mutagenic pollution of the wastes, and others who abandon the land altogether to be pirates on the open seas, but the Prince of Birds rules neither of those factions. He is chief among the lunar hierophants who rule the smaller cult of Purestrain Moon Goblins, who worship the old goblinoid gods and stay true to the original blueprint of their race (or so they claim).

Their cult doctrines say that goblins came to Earth from the moon, which they abandoned when its cities were destroyed by meteors. Their migrant ancestors travelled the distance between worlds in the form of giant birds, though this was partially their undoing. Some goblins became addicted to the polymorphing experience, and this penchant for mutability has continued through the ages to this day. The Purestrain Goblins hold their mutant brethren in contempt, for they believe that only two bodies reach the pinnacle of all Creation: the original form of goblins and the giant birds that saved them from destruction. And even then, only the lunar hierophants are permitted to take the shape of birds.

The Goblin Prince of Birds appears before their flock arrayed in a cloak of feathers and a mask of living flesh. Their head resembles that of a baby bird but takes the crescent shape of the moon, to better reflect the nature of the ancient gods. Masks are a common feature of goblinoid culture. Not only are they a sign of office, they can also be a way of reflecting or projecting the power of one’s god, one’s true self, or even one’s ambitions. A mask is to the face what a sword is to the hand, what a book is to the mind, or even what a spell is to its caster.

But the Prince of Birds wears a mask of office. It may have been created for some other purpose, but now the identity of the one who wears it means nothing. The mask is everything. Every lunar hierophant has their own mask, passed down through the generations, and when they put it on, their old
identity is ignored by all others, and they are expected to embody the position the mask signifies.