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Not part of Riordanverse
The following article/section is from the Sikander Aziz series continuity under Rick Riordan Presents and not the Riordanverse canon. |
The Tablet of Destines is a tablet created by Tiamat to allow her son Lugal to change fate.
History[]
The Tablet of Destines was created by Tiamat for her son Lugal before he went to war with the younger gods who had killed her husband Apsu. By giving him the power to change fate, Tiamat sought to ensure Lugal's victory over the other gods. However, Lugal was defeated, and Tiamat was slain by Marduk.
After Lugal's defeat, the tablet falls into human hands. At first, the tablet merely allows those who can read the language to read their fates. However, the tablet becomes damaged over time which allows the holder to alter their destiny.
Over the millennia, the tablet changes hands a number of times, being used by people like Alexander the Great, Cleopatra, Saladin and Mehemet to change fate. Aware of the tablet's power, it is sought by Ishtar before her death at the hands of Nergal. The tablet ends up in the Baghdad Museum eventually, but it's stolen in 2003 during the Iraq War and it ends up in the collection of Lady Fitzroy.
Sikander Aziz series[]
Fury of the Dragon Goddess[]
Belet Amari seeks Sikander Aziz's help to get the tablet from an auction at Fitzroy Castle. However, Lugal also locates it and causes chaos as he attempts to get at the tablet. Belet and Sik manage to get the tablet and escape with Rabisu and Daoud. Shortly thereafter, while reminiscing about his dead brother with Daoud while holding the tablet, Sik inadvertently triggers its powers, altering destiny to bring Mo back, but with the consequences that their parents died when Sik was young, and they were raised by Ishtar instead. Sik later has a dream where he witnesses Tiamat giving the tablet to Lugal and he realizes what it actually is as a result.
Sik and his friends come up against Lugal who seeks to use the tablet to resurrect his mother Tiamat, using the tablet's power to remove from existence everything that Lugal sees as a threat to his plans after its stolen for him by Anzud. Although Lugal eventually succeeds, Sik gets him to hand over the tablet by showing him the better side of humanity. Mo sacrifices himself to the dragon goddess holding the tablet as she consumes all of existence, but Sik follows his brother inside of Tiamat. Tiamat's power begins wiping the tablet which Sik realizes is the key to them winning: if they can get the tablet out of the goddess before its completely wiped from existence, everyone will be left with a clean slate for their destiny. Sik and Mo manage to kill Tiamat and Sik escapes with the tablet.
After Tiamat's death, Sik quickly inscribes "my brother lives" on the tablet before it settles, properly resurrecting Mo. The tablet being wiped clean reverses all of the destruction that Tiamat had caused and restores everyone's original destinies. Sik holds onto it afterwards, showing it to Belet days later.
Abilities[]
Due to its ability to change fate, the Tablet of Destinies has enormous power. However, when it's wiped clean, everyone gets a clean slate, and those that have been erased by its power are restored and the impact of it being used to change destiny reversed, although some lingering effects remain.
- Reality Warping: The tablet can allow the user to warp reality on a cosmic scale in order to change fate. Sikander Aziz simply wishing for his brother to come back while holding the tablet triggered its powers, even if it was inadvertent on his part. However, Mo briefly remembered his original destiny after coming back before quickly losing those memories. The alterations to his destiny cause Sik to struggle with his two separate identities and to subconsciously access the skills that his altered destiny self gained, although Sik didn't have full access to them until he touched the Huluppu Tree that Dumuzi transformed into and met with Ishtar. After his original destiny was restored, Sik still retained some lingering memories of his life as Ishtar's adopted son, including at least some knowledge of Latin, a language that Sik had no knowledge of before.
- Chronokinesis: In order to fulfil Sik's wish that his brother Mo is still alive, the tablet alters time so that Mo is only severely injured in the accident that killed him and left with amnesia. However, the ripples through time cause Sik and Mo's parents to never get out of the refugee camp that they were living in and die of tuberculosis, altering Sik and Mo's destiny to be raised by Ishtar instead while Belet Amari is raised by Lugal. When Lugal uses the tablet to resurrect his mother, it has consequences echoing back through time as creation starts to unravel, having been created out of Tiamat's corpse. Lugal used the tablet's power to go back in time to the night that Mo left for Iraq and attended dinner with the Aziz family and Daoud at the deli. Even after the tablet was wiped clean and the consequences of the tablet's powers were reversed, a picture taken at that dinner remains on the deli wall.
- Existence Erasure: Lugal was able to purposefully use it to erase the other Mesopotamian Gods from existence as well as anyone else that he saw as a threat
- Resurrection: Lugal was able to resurrect his mother Tiamat, causing all of creation, which had been built out of her body, to begin unraveling as she was brought back. After the tablet is wiped clean, Sik is able to use it to properly resurrect his brother by writing "my brother lives" on it which resurrected Mo without any consequences or time and destiny alterations.
- Power Removal: Lugal was able to use the tablet's power to strip Sik of his immortality and briefly turn himself mortal.