Esurien Crones
The Esurien Crones are witches who were once human.1
Origin
According to legend there were at first only three of them, and they formed a coven to practise witchcraft. For many years they worked the dark arts and achieved some success, though of what kind is not known. Craving power and immortality, and realising that the mortal world held no answers for them, they turned their dark pursuits towards the Fey realm. Over decades they made pacts with dark and powerful spirits there, and the change it worked in them stripped away their humanity step by step.1
No one knows what became of the original three hags, but when the crones returned to the mortal realm their numbers were tenfold. Some believe this was a clever deception by the Fey, who wanted to be rid of them; others think it was the result of the crones' own research.1
In time the crones concluded that the secret of immortal life lay not in necromancy but in the manipulation of time. That belief led them south, to the ruined deserts of The Desolation. No one knows exactly what happened to them in the desert, but it is clear that things did not go well.1
Appearance and ways
Esurien Crones have heads like a vulture's. They wield powerful magic, and for all their looks they have supernatural strength, speed and endurance.1 They speak Empirian, the common tongue, as well as Sylvan and Abyssal, and they are counted among the fey.2
Their curse means they can never eat fresh meat. They are condemned to feed on carrion, scraping the flesh off the bones of creatures long dead, and so they carry strange cauldrons on chicken legs in which they keep the bones they collect: the chicken-legged cauldrons. With dark magic they make the meat on the bones grow, which lets them survive longer on fewer bones.1
The crones live in caves buried under the sand and leave their lairs only for good reason. They sometimes gather in covens, which makes them more dangerous still.1
Travellers are warned that anyone who loses their way in the desert can be sure a crone is watching from afar, waiting for them to die.1
Notes
Sources
This article draws on:
- DoTDesolation of Time(Bad Badger Games, 2024), pp. 176-177
Images in this article
Desolation of Time (Bad Badger Games, 2024), p. 176. Art by the Bad Badger Games team.
Related articles
EventThe DesolationThe cataclysm that ended the First Age, when the Dark One attacked Teneris. Gods and whole civilisations died, the two continents were parted and more than half of Caligran became desert.
CreatureChicken-legged CauldronA small living cauldron that walks on chicken legs and follows an Esurien Crone wherever she goes, holding the bones she gathers to feed on.
CreatureDune ChimeraA huge armoured predator of the deserts left by the Desolation, twisted by the sands and feared as the most terrifying living thing there after the legendary Fe’rekh.CreatureKrivarHuman-sized, ant-like beings that walk on two legs, descended from elves who survived the Desolation, fed on corrupted sand ants and fled underground, where their bodies changed and their minds unravelled.CreatureUskanSmall, dragon-like desert hunters descended from the wyverns that elves once tamed as mounts and beasts of burden, before the Desolation scattered them.CreatureHourglass ScorpionA small scorpion that burrows through the ground, senses its surroundings through the earth and carries a venomous sting.CreatureSand MimicA small, shapeless creature that can take the form of an ordinary object and, while it keeps still, cannot be told apart from one.