Scalliwing

Scalliwing

Couatls are large, brightly colored serpents with feathered wings. Good-natured, these creatures aid mortals and oppose evildoers, but sighting one presents a momentous occasion—these magnificent, albeit reclusive creatures rarely appear.

The smallest members of the couatl family, Scalliwings resemble their larger kin but are roughly the size of a house cat, and a irascible mischievous streak tempers their kindly nature. While most couatls seek to right the world's wrongs or guide mortal civilization toward societal advancement, scalliwings work on a more individual level. They claim their role is to teach goodhearted spellcasters the ways of magic, and indeed they sometimes serve—or "assist," as they're swift to correct—such spellcasters as familiars.

With iridescent scales and bright feathers, scalliwings are remarkably pretty creatures. They seem well aware of this fact and use their appearance to ingratiate themselves with others. This beauty makes some of them slightly self-aggrandizing, but other scalliwings find that their small size and relatively weak defenses put them at the mercy of cruel, larger creatures who seek to imprison them as beautiful pets and trophies. While scalliwings might cheerfully reside in a single residence indefinitely of their own volition, captive scalliwings have orchestrated devious escapes, coordinating their efforts with other creatures to cause spectacular property damage in the process.

Scalliwings measure about 2 feet long from nose to tail with wingspans of about the same length. They have life spans nearly as long as a human's. While a scalliwing appears slightly more common than their larger, reclusive kin, many mortals live entire lifetimes without ever encountering a scalliwing.