The Eye

The Eye was once a human; now it stands seven feet tall with a huge eyeball in place of a head, on a slim body that moves with swift, light grace. It favors long green robes trimmed in red and hemmed with embroidered golden eyes, and in public it hides them under a gray cloak with a deep hood. Only one has ever been seen, but because it is the work of the cult's god, nobody can rule out others.

Gathering information is its purpose, but it can fight. It wields a two-handed sword and hides a dirk strapped hilt-down along each forearm; when the sword is impractical, it crosses its arms and draws both blades to fight two-handed. It has a 19 Dexterity and remarkable grace. While awake it cannot be surprised, and a constant limited precognition gives it -1 on initiative.

Its gaze is the real terror. Each round it may focus on one creature, which, unless it was already declared to be averting its eyes, must save vs. death magic. Failure means a ghostly shape is visibly sucked out of the victim into the Eye, and the body drops lifeless. The Eye cannot feed on the trapped life force until the body is destroyed; once it is, the soul is eaten and only divine power can restore it. Slaying the Eye sends every undevoured soul back to its body, and the Eye can also release them by choice. Meanwhile it learns all the memories of anyone it holds.

The cult's wizard-priests made the Eye, possibly with their god's own help. Only the highest-ranked members know the dangerous, slow process, which uses wish and other powerful magic, so it is thought that only one Eye exists at a time.

The change burned away its humanity: it has no emotional ties or virtues. It finishes other people's sentences before they speak, surrounds itself with mirrors and stares at reflections, and works off its own pain on helpless victims.

The cult calls it their god's senses in the world. Besides constant precognition, it can use clairvoyance, find traps and detect magic whenever it likes, sees through every illusion, and speaks telepathically with anyone it likes. Above all it is a psychic tracker. Once it has seen an intelligent being, directly or by scrying, it can sense that being's aura from afar: within one mile for creatures with no spells, or a number of miles equal to the highest spell level the target can cast (a 12th-level wizard with 6th-level spells is trackable at six miles). Heavy concentrations of magic, such as artifacts, hoards of magical items, or a wizards' guild hall, mask the aura; in doubtful cases the Eye must save vs. spell to keep the trail.

The Eye is a tool of the priesthood, not a priest, and ordinary cultists regard it with awe. Its loyalty to the cult's high priests is absolute, and no one else may command it.