Pyreen

A pyreen's true body mixes traits of every humanoid people: dwarven bulk, elven ears, a halfling's youthful face, and eyes like those of a giant or human. Few ever see it. Druidic shapechanging lets a pyreen become any animal, and each keeps a disguise for every race, so most pass as nameless travelers on the roads. Peace-bringers, as they are also called, know each other on sight in any form. They speak all human and demihuman languages and have a 65% chance to know any other tongue of the world's thinking creatures.

Pyreens avoid violence, but few beings are more dangerous. Every one is a druid of 16th level or higher with major access to the Cosmos sphere and every elemental sphere; four are 17th, four 18th, two 19th, and their leader, Varun Ashkael, is 20th level. Their guarded lands are enormous, a whole forested ridge or a nearby mountain range. Their bond with the land's spirits brings them spells each dawn with no prayer needed, and the initiative penalty caused by life-draining wizard magic never touches them.

Psionically they command, among other powers, psionic blast, ego whip, mind link, contact, ejection and tower of iron will; defenses such as mind blank, thought shield, mental barrier and intellect fortress; complete healing, energy containment, mind over body, absorb disease, chameleon power and chemical simulation; aura sight, spirit sense and danger sense; psychic surgery, gird, enhancement and psionic sense; plus empathy, truthear, identity penetration, conceal thoughts and psychic messenger.

Each carries several magic items, nearly always a small metal blade, usually a dagger or knife, enchanted to at least +3 and sometimes with extra powers. Favorite extras are rings, bracers of defense and cloaks of protection.

A pyreen rarely risks itself for others, not from fear but because a life measured in millennia seems too costly to spend on mortals. Harm to the land changes that. If one sees a druid protecting guarded lands, or a party fighting a life-draining wizard, it may help unseen: a sand elemental joins the fray, or a sudden wind knocks the wizard flat and spoils his casting. Folk merely fending off a hungry beast get nothing. There is a 75% chance a pyreen has heard of any well-known, powerful party, and their past deeds decide whether it helps or hinders; slayers of a life-draining wizard might be helped even against a petty monster.

Each pyreen lives alone, even among crowds, pursuing its own mission to heal the land or destroy a life-draining wizard, the sorcerer tyrants being the greatest of these. They seldom cooperate, disagreeing on how the world should be mended. None keeps a lasting home, though one might stay in a place for a century or half that.

For nearly a millennium Varun Ashkael has worked toward the great dragon's death. Aware he could never beat it alone, he helps good heroes live long enough to outgrow him, while undoing the dragon's ravages and freeing slaves of every race.

A common trick is to meet a party disguised as a human or half-elf and pose as a humble druid, even holding spells back; a create water that could produce eight to ten gallons might yield only two or three. Stories of a desert wanderer saved by a cold flask appearing from nowhere are true, and a pyreen did it. It helps only when it can stay hidden and the land gains, and never twice: heroes who need saving more than once are not the champions it seeks.

Pyreens remember the world before its ecology fell, possibly even the dragon's origin, since they may be older than it. They will not speak of the past even under threat of death, though they may tell worthy folk about the land as it is now. Few others have explored the humid jungle borderlands as they have.

A throwback with no real niche, a pyreen still changes the land around it. It needs no food or water anywhere on the world, as a high-level druid needs none at home, but enjoys good meals and wine. None is known to have died of age, and whether that is racial or druidic is unknown; there were once many more.

Battlefields scarred by a life-draining wizard may turn green months later. Each pyreen can cast rejuvenate only once a month, a crippling limit that may be why it nurtures strong adventurers, and any priest or mage seen casting that spell may be trailed for a long time by an animal that is not what it seems.