Swanmay

Swanmays are human women who can become swans. As humans they look ordinary, usually in light armor with a ranger's kit, sword, dagger and bow, none of which transforms, so it must be hidden. Their token (a signet ring, a feathered garment or a feather token) becomes plumage or a leg band, and can betray a swanmay to a knowing eye.

In human form a swanmay is a ranger; roll 2d6 for her level and Hit Dice. As a swan she can be wounded only by +1 or better weapons and attacks with a flying leap, buffeting wings and a bite.

Swanmays are a sorority of lycanthrope rangers who chose their gift. It comes from the token, which radiates magic to detect magic, works only for a swanmay, and without which she is stuck in her current shape.

The sisterhood is deeply secretive. Only human women join, perhaps invited after unknowingly doing a swanmay some great service; other requirements are unknown. A player character invited in is 50% likely to retire from casual adventuring for her new duties.

Swan-natured, they dislike brash, noisy folk, savage beasts and evil, befriend sylvan elves, dryads and other forest folk, and avoid most humanoids. Only nature priests are regular allies, usually recruited against a shared evil. Sisters share lightly fortified lodges by forest lakes with a roof hatch and a secret tunnel to the water for escape; flocks of waterfowl, and sometimes the bodies of poachers left as a warning, give them away.

Swanmays defend forests and wildlife against evil races and monsters, and protect swans out of sympathy, not kinship.

Swans haunt rivers, lakes and marshes. Any encounter has a 10% chance of including swanmays in bird form. A quarter of encounters are with a lone bird, always a male cob if it is an ordinary swan; otherwise expect mated pairs of cobs and pens, each pair tending 1-3 eggs or 1-2 cygnets. Intruders in their territory are attacked by both adults with a flying leap, a bite and two wing blows, and the onslaught has a 50% chance of blinding or confusing the target, costing it its next round's attack. With 90% odds of noticing intruders, swans raise a loud alarm chorus and, if no eggs need guarding, swim or fly off.

Bird maidens, relatives of the swanmays, dwell high in the cool valleys and mountains of the desert lands. A bright feathered shawl or veil lets them take many bird forms, including falcons, swallows, parrots and, at 8th level, giant eagles. Only that garment changes with them. They can peck and claw as birds but rarely do.

They have no sorority but share a faith: all are idol priestesses who believe everything is divine. As wandering teachers they shield the land from despoilers, favor those who respect it (desert riders, mystics, fisherfolk), and keep the fields and herds of the river valleys fertile. Some tribesmen take them for helpful spirits of the dead; they deny it, sometimes cutting themselves to prove they bleed.

A bird maiden's Hit Dice equal her priest level, 2-8. Her major spheres are Weather, Plant, Healing, Elemental, Divination, Animal and All; her minor spheres are Sun, Protection and Creation. She uses spears, darts and slings, loses her spells if she dons a shield or armor, magical or not, heavier than hide, and cannot turn undead.

Men sometimes steal a bird maiden's shawl to force her into marriage. Should she ever get it back she abandons him, slaying her sons and bringing her daughters away to join her kind. If the garment is destroyed, she dies. Rumor places a vast timber stronghold up in the clouds above the high hills, where aarakocra instruct young bird maidens in their sacred duties.