Nethygi

(Note: Insufficient information is available at this point to guess at the place of the Nethygi in the natural ecology in the Black Steel world, although a handful of educated guesses can of course be made.)

Though some can be seen walking the streets of Night Harbor or purchasing wares in its famed slave market, and though - during the quiet war between certain Shalasian powers and an enclave of shadow elves and their allies - Thaqz has actually killed one, the Nethygi (this is the plural form; the singular is Nethygian) are largely an unknown quantity to Black Steel and to human beings in general. In appearance, they are a mass of powerful tentacles (probably five or six; no one in Black Steel has ever had both the opportunity and desire to actually count them) emerging from a head some half a meter in diameter, much more nearly round than that of an octopus. Their tentacles also lack octopus-like suckers, but are lined with bony ridges, perhaps in the nature of nails or horns, at least along the ends of their inner surfaces. All the Nethygi ever encountered by or described to Black Steel personnel have had extremely pale white skin.

In their dealings with human beings, perhaps aware of the revulsion with which most humans see them, Nethygi typically stand "upright" on their tentacles, and wrap themselves in long cloaks, often cowled, that completely conceal their tentacular "bodies" except when they part the cloak to reach for something. It may be that interacting with Nethygi is at least slightly more palatable to the average human when a Nethygian can be imagined as at least a vaguely human-like or humanoid being. Even so, the illusion of near-humanity must be consensual; no matter how carefully cloaked and cowled, no Nethygian in motion or in speech would ever be mistaken for a human.

The Nethygian vocal apparatus is capable of roughly reproducing human language, but not apparently without effort, and never perfectly. Nethygians speaking human words sound something like someone trying to talk while choking, hissing, and gargling alternately or simultaneously. No member of Black Steel has ever heard Nethygi speaking in their own language, though they may speak in voices too low or high to hear, or communicate by nonverbal means -- some informants in Night Harbor claim to have seen Nethygi silently twine their tentacles with one another's when presented with the sort of business deal that should require consultation.

The ease or regularity with which Nethygi can attain sorcerous power is unclear, but it is apparent that some, at least, have magical ability. The Nethygian that Thaqz slew, for instance, managed to induce a seizure in him before the wizards whom Thaqz had led to its hiding place came to his assistance, allowing Thaqz to break free and strike the killling blow.

Dragons

(Note: The origins and nature of dragons are so deeply shrouded in mystery that attempting to classify them in any meaningful way is essentially hopeless. Certainly they are deeply bound up with the sorcerous world, but the sheer range of draconic descriptions, together with their rarity -- most places in the Black Steel world tell stories about dragons, but many have been passed down for generations since the last sighting -- make it nearly impossible to make any definite statement about dragons as a whole, or indeed to consistently separate myth from the world's reality. Their size and rarity are such however that their origins are uncertain in the extreme; the continuation of a species with such an apparently tiny population spread over such widely distant regions would likely be as impossible by strictly non-magical biological means as would their flight and very living existence given their enormous size. As such, whether dragons constitute a single species, or whether the notion of species or any other taxonomical classification applies to such beings, is by no means a certainty.)

Dragons are so rarely seen by human beings, and legends of their appearance are so diverse, that describing even their physical appearance is an uncertain business at best. It is entirely possible that many reported "dragon" sightings were actually of other types of creatures altogether, from transformed sorcerors to non-sentient beasts. This article will restrict itself to dragons that share the most common characteristics associated with their wide-ranging descriptions: Thinking beings, enormous in size, with at least vaguely reptillian features and functional wings.

Most reasonably-contemporary reports of dragons come from areas rarely frequented by humans, which could well simply mean that travelers to distant places like to embellish or invent the events of their journeys, or that unusual creatures seen in previously-unexplored places may be called "dragons" by default. Some believe that for reasons of their own, dragons actively avoid human habitations however -- while others hold that the wilderness areas frequented by dragons remain untamed wilds simply because humans who attempt to claim them do not survive the attempt.

Black Steel personnel, in their far-flung and disparate travels, with the penchant of certain of their important members for exploration of the unknown, and their interest in unusual and magically-charged places, have themselves encountered an exceptional number of dragons for a group of their size: A total of two dragons, or possibly three. (The first, seen briefly and at a distance, might have been some other especially large flying creature, mistaken for a dragon by those who saw it.) Obviously, this is not a sample from which a great deal of information can be inferred, but dragons are obviously capable of wielding sorcerous power -- the dragon best known to Dargon and Quix in fact agreed to act as their tutor in its use -- and of communicating in language comprehensible to human beings. Any description of draconic nature overall however must wait for more information to be gathered, if enough of it ever can be.

Dwarves

(Note: I use the name "dwarf" -- and the plurarl "dwarves," borrowing from Tolkien again to avoid the lame "dwarfs" -- with some reluctance; shortness is by no means the primary characteristic of these people, and they do not resemble the one-dimensional comic-relief "dwarves" of modern fantasy stories any more closely than real roman legions resembled the caricatures in "Asterix the Gaul." Nevertheless, this short, stocky, commonly bearded people will be called "dwarves" inevitably, so I may as well accept the name and move on.)

Very little is known about the dwarven peoples or their society, except as it bears on their interaction with humankind. Even in Korv, where dwarves are regular and numerous visitors to human cities and play an important role in both government and trade, the dwarves appear to simply participate in human society and do not offer demonstrations of their own. Even Dargon and Quix, who visited a dwarven outpost in the far north, shared meals with them, and slept under their vaulted subterranean roof on two nights, never saw a single dwarven woman or child. The extent of dwarven caves beneath the earth is unknown; the number and types of languages they speak among themselves is unknown -- among humans, they usually speak the local human language by courtesy, or a few words in some language of their own mostly in case of emergency. Their religious bents, if any, are unknown; their numbers worldwide are unknown; their relationship with shadow elves is largely unknown, though they seem not on the whole to be friends; since both dwell in darkness beneath the earth, it might be imagined that they would interact closely, in war or peace -- more closely at least than either interacts with surface dwellers -- but no evidence of their relationship or its nature has been found to date, and the few dwarves who say anything about it typically deny any contact with the shadow elves -- as one dwarf reportedly put it, "We keep to ourselves in my home, and they do not trouble us there." While dwarven lifespans are known to be significantly longer than humans', their full extent is likewise unknown.

The relationship between dwarven people and the world's sorcerous forces is steeped in uncertainty. These forces seem to bend in upon or around dwarves in such a way as to thwart both spells and sorcerous vision, more so than with any other known species. Some wizards theorize that dwarves use a powerful form of sorcery unique to themselves, either intentionally or biologically (like the elves, who rely on sorcery for their long lifespans, and the giants who do so to maintain their massive size) to support their long lives and typically tremendous strength for their size, bending the fabric of the magical forces around them so completely as to prevent other sorcerous power from interfering. Others argue that the dwarves have actually developed resistance or immunity to magical forces, and are completely incapable of using sorceries of ther own. Whatever the truth of the matter, rumors persist that dwarves are capable of imparting their unique relationship with sorcerous forces upon objects they fashion by hand -- such as weapons, armor, and shields with unique properties including resistance to magical spells. Whether it resembles human magic or not however, Dwarves do appear to possess supernatural powers of some kind: They are known in Korv, for instance, to fashion books in large numbers, with letters and pictures exactly identical from copy to copy, faster and more precisely than any team of copyists could be imagined to work; and to build weapons that launch metal balls at incredible speeds by igniting an obviously magical -- but to a wizard's eyes, not apparently sorcerous -- powder.

Like woodland elves, dwarves have had enough commerce with humankind to develop a reputation based more on actual interactions than mythological archetypes. They are known for mainly honest dealings, but also for stubbornness about their terms, and suspicion of human promises. In Thorm Casati's assessment, a reputation as misers was likely established around dwarves because of their /lack/ of greed; he has found that dwarves on the whole seem to be difficult to trick or entrap simply because there seems to be little or nothing with which to lure them into a position of jeopardy -- especially since their patience, perhaps arising from their long-lived nature, allows for careful investigation of claims before agreeing to anything; a typical Dwarven response to "hard sell" tactics is to take his business elsewhere. And of course all these notes represent the average, typical, or reputed ways of dwarves; as with woodland elves, the idea of "mavericks" or "renegades" who defy typical dwarven stereotypes is well understood among humankind, though of course by definition, the nature of such mavericks or renegades can hardly be guessed in advance.

The Undead

Many of the creatures called "Undead" by human beings are nothing more than inert corpses, animated with the appearance of life by a form of sorcerous power. Others are effectively bestial creatures: Corpses of once-sentient beings acting as hosts to animating parasites with nothing resembling human sentience or intelligence at all. These types of creatures are normally known as Walking Dead and Ghouls, respectively, when the precise nature of the spell or parasite is not known. There do exist some sentient beings however who by the work of extraordinary sorcerous power -- sometimes but not always their own -- extend their existence in the world beyond the natural lives of their bodies, sometimes preserving their corpses to serve as the vessels for their sentient spirits, sometimes generating artificial bodies for themselves, and sometimes existing as entirely non-corporeal beings. In theory there is no reason to suppose that undead beings would be any more "good" or "evil" than living ones, but in practice the choice to become undead (when it is voluntary) is unlikely to be compatible with -- nor is the fact of existing in an Undead form for any length of time conducive to -- what most human beings would regard as sanity.

The sorcerous power necessary for the transition from living to undead being is such that nearly every case is unique; nevertheless, some commonalities have been inferred, such as the difficulty of maintaining undead existence in direct sunlight or the presence of large numbers of people. Just how universal these are however, and the possible nature of others, remains unknown.

Several broad categories of undead existence have been used to distinguish between them on the basis of their ties to their once-living bodies (or to any body at all). The best-known names for the best-known categories are:

Liches: Undead spirits still bound to their once-living bodies. This broad category includes beings cursed to live beyond death in decaying bodies (sometimes preserved by artificial means, as in the case of Mummies) and those whose bodies are preserved, renewed, or both by sorcerous means.

Vampires: Undead spirits bound to a version of their once-living bodies that are capable of sustaining themselves by various physical means (most commonly involving the drinking of blood to restore lost fluids, tissues, and energy).

Revenant Spirits: Undead spirits no longer tied to their actual once-living bodies that nevertheless interact with the world by embodying themselves (usually repeatedly, temporarily, and by sorcerous means).

Ghosts: Undead spirits no longer bound to their once-living bodies in any way, retaining their undead existence completely independent of any corporeal form they may seem to assume -- if any.

Seashore Sirens

(Note: Like other types of beastmen, the sirens of the Grat'han coasts are presumed to owe their origins to sorcerous activity, or to the realization of human myth through pantheonic intervention.)

With the obvious exceptions of their enormous wings, taloned feet, birdlike tails, and feathers, the seashore sirens of Grat'ha are very nearly human in appearance -- it might be even more apt to say elven -- both in the features of their faces and the basic bone structures of their bodies, with the important exception that all their bones, birdlike, are hollow, and typically more slender than a human's. Seashore sirens have no hair anywhere on their bodies -- even their eyebrow ridges are bare, and their eyelids have no lashes -- but typically have thick, hair-like crests of long feathers growing back and downward from the tops and backs of their heads and necks. Their wings too are covered with feathers, as are portions of their backs, typically spreading from their wings (protruding from the same areas as human shoulder-blades) down toward their waist, by which point the feathered area normally extends all the way around so that their entire bodies from the waist down are usually covered in feathers, until the base of their talon-feet. Like those of elves and giants, their bodies rely upon sorcerous energy for the ability to function and to fly, and their bodies are therefore more fragile in death than in life. Black Steel personnel have to date encountered only female sirens, and nothing is presently known about males -- not even whether they exist at all, or how sirens might reproduce.

The sirens of the Grat'han coast are primarily but not exclusively nocturnal, and seem to prefer to make their homes -- or perhaps merely hunting camps -- in high, forbidding, inaccessible coastal locations; the most successful choose craggy peaks that are difficult to reach by land or sea. Detritus in these homes suggests that their diet consists primarily of fish, complimented with a smattering of land animals, occasionally including human beings. Sirens are of course best known for their singing -- songs that were once believed to be wordless as birdsong, but that have been discovered, in at least some cases, to comprise a complex language of emotion. The sirens' songs are famous for their supernatural allure, and in fact Theril has observed them and found the songs themselves interwoven with enchantment -- a "spell" whose weaving appears to be built into siren heredity as much as are their wings and feathers. It has been speculated that individual sirens sing slightly different enchantments, each unique in the fashion of human voices, but Theril has not as yet made enough observations to support or undermine this theory. Certainly the core spellweave is identical in all known cases, with an effect meant to overwhelm the senses of any living animal within its range and draw them toward the source of the singing. The audible song itself of course varies from siren to siren and from moment to moment; as far as Theril can tell, the nature of the verbal song has little or no bearing on that of the spell that is woven through it.

The most successful sirens probably survive primarily on such fish as fall under the enchantment (whether the enchantment penetrates the water or whether only leaping fish are affected has not yet been closely studied) and throw themselves ashore, and animals that stumble over precipices in their attempt to move closer. Lone creatures are always in greatest danger from seashore sirens' songs; living beings naturally resist sorcerous effects, so there is usually safety in numbers among social animals (and especially thinking beings) as creatures that have not fallen under the spell can shepherd, stop, or protect those who have. While seashore sirens can be vicious fighters if cornered, they normally prefer to flee through the air when confronted with forceful resistance, though some will attempt to gather stones and hurl them from the air at animals or people who try to fight them without effective ranged weapons or the means of flight. Sea birds are not believed to be specially immune to the sirens' songs, but of course are not subject to the hazards of grounded or sea-going creatures moving blindly toward the source of the songs, and apparently are not eaten by seashore sirens. Avian behavior in response to siren songs has not yet however been observed in detail.

Long assumed to be of simian intelligence at best, sirens were exterminated or driven out when they made homes in the regions of human settlements, but the Rat Pack (who else?) recently had an opportunity of dealing peacefully with a highly successful group of seashore sirens living on a particularly inhospitable crag just off the Grat'han coast in a little-traveled corner of Thornton Bay. They reported that the sirens used thrown rocks to deliberately start an avalanche to block the Rat Pack's path of advance, displaying a level of tool use and planning far beyond animal means. They also showed signs of mourning and possibly funereal rites for their dead, and further efforts resulted in communication and even negotiation through emotive song. Some still believe this enclave is unique in this respect, perhaps in effect representing a new species, but whether for this enclave alone or for some or all of the rest, the seashore sirens of Grat'ha must be counted among the thinking beings of the world. Whether they can wield magic beyond or apart from the spell intrinsic to their song is as yet unknown.