Harpy

A harpy has a vulture's body topped by the torso and head of a woman, youthful in shape but repulsive in detail: matted, straggling hair, rotting teeth, and a stench that clings to the creature and anything it handles, since harpies never wash. What little they wear is rags hung with glittering trinkets stripped from earlier victims. Their own speech is nothing but shrieks and cackles, a hideous contrast with their singing; a rare few have learned other races' tongues.

The song charms every human and demihuman who hears it, though elves resist. Anyone who fails a save vs. spell hurries toward the singer as fast as he can, then stands spellbound while she kills him at her leisure. The charm lasts as long as she keeps singing, and she can sing in the middle of melee. Covering the ears once the song starts is useless, because the first note does the work, but characters who plug their ears in advance (wax and the like) are unaffected. A character who makes the save is immune to that flock from then on, though a different group of harpies gets a fresh chance.

A harpy's touch on a charmed victim lays a weaker but longer enchantment: failing another save vs. spell leaves the target mesmerized for 20+1d10 hours. Killing the harpy ends either charm.

Forced into a fight, a harpy bites and rakes with its talons together, and about half of them carry weapons, typically a bone club (1-8) swung with surprising skill.

Harpies roost along coasts near shipping lanes and beside busy roads, where their singing can pull travelers in. Home is usually a shallow cave fouled so badly that no animal will approach; they stay there except to hunt, often carrying prey back to eat in comfort. Beyond the shiny baubles pinned to their rags, treasure means little to them, so coins and weapons lie mixed with bones and filth that can be several feet deep in the oldest lairs.

A lair typically holds about six. No male has ever been seen; harpies apparently reproduce at will, each laying one egg every two years. The young get no care and live on carrion and cave vermin until they can sing and hunt. There is no social order, only endless squabbling over shares of a victim and over when the torture should stop and the feast begin. These spats sometimes turn deadly, and the loser becomes an extra course. Now and then harpies will join other humanoids in some evil scheme.

Harpies hunt any beast, staying put until the food runs out, and every creature weaker than they are fears and loathes them. Their hunger is enormous, they love torture, and they often kill for fun, leaving uneaten bodies to rot. They seem to live about 50 years.