Wurmling

These huge, clever worms grow all their lives, up to 45 feet long. A mature one of 10 Hit Dice tips the scales at roughly eight tons, plus a ton per further Hit Die. Its leathery brown hide is darker above, and it has two puny arms, a whiplike tail, a prehensile tongue and large yellow eyes that see clearly in anything from full sun to candlelight.

A wurmling avoids melee but has a savage bite and lashing tail for emergencies, and its mass gives its tiny arms an effective Strength 20 for holding and grabbing.

Shockingly quick, given room it can roll onto up to three foes of man size or smaller, each of whom avoids it with a save vs. paralysis. A failure means 1d4 points per Hit Die of the worm, repeated every round it stays on top, and every item the victim carries must save vs. crushing blow or be wrecked.

Each wurmling has curse-born gifts as a member of the curse-gifted orders whose level matches its Hit Dice: five at 10 Hit Dice, six at 12, seven at 15. Gifts after the first need the orders' red elixir to awaken, then stay permanently, sustained by a curse-warding red metal. Typical gifts ward off poison, hurl crimson fire, dig, see afar, shape stone or alter temperature. Wurmlings are immune to the visions caused by the drug scarlet pimpernel and use it to boost their gifts.

It opens locks, finds and removes traps, moves silently, hears noise and reads languages as a thief of equal level, and gains information proficiencies likewise. It knows one language per 2 Hit Dice, plus the equivalent of legend lore and local history. Fast talk, intimidation and a bard's charm fail against it, and it gets +3 on saves against mind-affecting magic such as charm person, suggestion, forget and emotion, and against mind-affecting gifts.

Evil but strictly fair, a wurmling never cheats, though it bargains without mercy. It will not suffer rivals, least of all its own kind; each holds a set territory, and when two collide at least one dies.

At least 1d4 trusted guards, often up to 4d10, always attend it (orcs, gnolls, evil humans or trained trolls), backed by 100-200 servants and underlings. It pays well but cannot trust, so it also uses magical conditioning, addiction and blackmail, knowing 1d4 shameful secrets about each servant. Skyscale guards rarely need such pressure; the two races get along naturally.

Its rackets span nearly every vice, from smuggling, extortion and drug running to gambling, assassination and protection schemes. It rarely harms a debtor, since corpses repay nothing, but hunts down anyone who skips out. Most hold great sway over the local watch, army, guilds and officials.

The best-known one poses as an honest merchant in a northern frontier empire cut off from its neighboring freeholds, smuggling in crimson steel; its gang keeps a code modeled on a local warrior honor code, and officials have never convicted it.

Wurmlings are hermaphrodites but cannot fertilize themselves. Mating follows lengthy talks through go-betweens and elaborate witnessed contracts, once both are sure they will never compete. It happens on neutral ground, and with the partners' tonnage and gifts firing at random, it is perilous to be near. Both partners conceive, each bearing one young after about two years.

Young learn the trade at a parent's side for about a century, until reaching 10 Hit Dice. Wurmlings can pass 1,500 years of age, and their decayed bodies become seedmetal.

Lairs lie beneath trade cities, full of open ground, guards, traps and interrogation cells. The worm writes nothing down, keeping every account in its flawless memory. It burrows slowly, and over centuries carves secret tunnels beneath its home.