Dreamweaver

Dreamweavers are spiders no wider than 6 inches that build the settings of dreams out of raw sleeping thought. Dream spinners have pale bodies the color of a dawn sky and weave lovely dreams; dark weavers are glossy black as midnight and spin nightmares. Both have banded legs. They clearly talk among themselves but not with other races, although the Dream Tormentor of the court of nightmares seems able to converse with the dark weavers, by skill or by some gift no one has confirmed.

Dreamweavers bear no malice and avoid contact, caring only for their work. Cornered, one bites for 1 point of damage, but the venom is strong. A wanderer bitten must save vs. poison or sink into a comalike sleep for 1d4 hours, beyond any waking until the poison fades, gripped by sweet dreams or terrors according to the spider's kind. A bitten dreamer saves the same way, but failure deepens the slumber of his real body, keeping him locked in the dream longer. Once a victim drops, the spiders flee.

Sunlight, or equally bright light, makes them fade away like dew or a half-remembered dream.

Each swarm holds one kind only, but many swarms of both kinds can share a dreamscape. From one side their weaving looks like a real place; from the other it shows its true face, a glittering mesh of starlight or a web of skulls and shadow. Visitors rarely glimpse them working behind the scenery.

Like all creatures of the dream realm, dreamweavers feed on dreamers.