Tayling

Every tayling birth produces twins: one a demihuman, the tayling, and one a beast, the taylang. The tayling is slight and fine-boned, with alabaster skin and elegant, elflike features. The taylang is always roughly human in shape but can look like any forest creature, from a great bear to a sinuous reptile, and usually stands around seven feet tall with a heavy build.

The pair share every thought, feeling and sensation telepathically, out to a range of one mile, and in battle they work as one: the powerful, swift taylang is a born warrior, while the clever tayling is a tactician and spellcaster. Thanks to their bond they are surprised only on a 1 and get -1 on initiative each round, have a 75% chance to spot enemy casters before battle, and gain +1 on saving throws.

Always aware of its twin's state, a tayling with healing magic or potions can spend its next action on a taylang fallen below 0 hit points; if that lifts it above 0, the death never happened, and no system shock or resurrection roll applies.

Usually the taylang holds foes back while the tayling casts, then closes to finish them under its twin's spells. Taylings cast as wizards or priests of levels 1-10; wizards choose only Alteration spells, and priests have major access only to the Elemental sphere.

If one twin falls, the survivor loses those bonuses and goes berserk: a tayling unloads its deadliest spells, then brawls. A taylang enters a killing frenzy with +3 to hit, keeps fighting until -20 hit points, and ignores all magical effects; a color spray cast on it the round after its twin dies simply fails.

Neither twin will flee unless both do. A survivor never forgives its twin's killers and will hunt down everyone responsible, even if they run.

Taylings live on a remote jungle island far out in a vast ocean, unaware of the wider world's turmoil. They call it Home. A huge active volcano, the Sky-Bearer, crowns it, its endless smoke making the island resemble a cloud and perhaps keeping it uncharted; glaciers on its flanks water the jungle.

Lowlanders enjoy easy food and mild weather, fear only jungle predators, and treat life as a party. Highlanders work cold terraces and hunt harder, scorn lowlanders as idle, and are laughed at in return. Taylings live in village huts while taylangs prowl the edges at night, so villages are hard to surprise. They have never known war and would likely fight a jungle guerrilla campaign rather than form an army.

All revere the volcano as supreme god, maker of land, food and air, and jointly supply a summit monastery whose priests give endless thanks. Each village gets one of its priests, who rules as chief in the highlands but mostly plans festivals in the lowlands.

Twin pairs choose mates jointly from another pair, a tricky search since pairs come in any mix of sexes. The taylang, limited by body type, picks first, then the tayling vets its counterpart; each twin mates with the matching member of the other pair. No lasting bond forms. A year later mothers bear twins and raise them nearly without the fathers, so all-male pairs never rear young.

Separation beyond a mile drives the tayling to frantic worry and the taylang to attack anything near. Afterward the tayling often turns paranoid and the taylang erratically violent. After two weeks apart, a tayling stops eating and wastes away, and a taylang usually throws itself at some mighty creature and dies.

Taylangs eat only fresh meat they hunt. Taylings are vegetarian, gathering wild fruit and nuts in the lowlands and farming grain in the highlands, where reluctant taylangs are drafted for plowing.