0502 Yrthstone and the People of Zarlac

Black-barked firs seem almost aware, quietly glowering at would-be intruders.

• Terrain: Tangled forest (3), Northern Scratch
• Lost/encounters: 2-in-6
• Ley line Hoad (p18): Arcane spell-casters perceive the feeling of having just awoken from a dream.
• ### The People of Zarlac
• In a small glade near the centre of the hex stands a cluster

of mud huts.

Inhabitants: 13 humans (10 men and 3 women), as well as 12 green-skinned children (see Children of Yrthstone), eke out a precarious living here, subsisting on foraged nuts and berries and the yields of paltry vegetable patches. They are an odd mix of folk, but all dress alike, with shaven heads, white cassocks, and a Z-shaped rune branded on their foreheads.

Strangers not welcome: The people wish to be left alone and request that visitors move along. They have no wish to discuss themselves or matters of the wider world.

Z is for Zarlac: If pressed about the meaning of the rune on their foreheads, the inhabitants eventually allow that the Z stands for Zarlac, their master, and that they call themselves the “People of Zarlac.” They cannot resist rhapsodising about Zarlac’s generosity, wisdom, and arcane powers.

History: The people of Zarlac are wanderers who met the Audrune Zarlac by chance in these woods and accepted him as their spiritual master. They are now mind-bound to him through repeated sucklings at his breast. Zarlac himself resides close by, where he serves as guardian to the nodal Yrthstone.

The Audrune Zarlac

A rotund human man with a long, thin nose jutting out from a black cowl. Zarlac welcomes all to sit in Yrthstone’s shadow, if he believes they may be a source of knowledge. He invites visitors to suckle from his ample bosom, promising enlightenment (see Milk).

Demeanour (Neutral): Kindly megalomaniac. Overly cordial for a Drune. Loquacious yet evasive.

Speech: Loud, ebullient. Woldish, Drunic, Sylvan.

Desires: To protect Yrthstone at all costs. To meet interesting, useful people and make thralls of them. To conceal his growing community of followers from the Drune Aegis.

Combat stats: Audrune (DMB).

Milk: Zarlac’s milk is warm and sweet. Those who partake must Save Versus Spell or become charmed for the next 4d6 days (per the arcane spell Ingratiate). Such thralls join “the People of Zarlac,” whom Zarlac tasks to perform various missions to esoteric ends.

Possessions: An Astrolabe of the Aegis (p420) and two dead mice with their tails braided together.

The Nodal Yrthstone

In a grove of fir trees adjacent to the hamlet stands a 13′ high slab of white granite; this is Yrthstone, known as the Teeming Stone.

Guardian: Standing alongside the slab is the Audrune Zarlac, who greets visitors with an affable bellow.

Inscribed spell: Drunic runes describe the arcane spell Cannibalise (p454). See Ley Lines and Standing Stones, p18 for details on learning this spell.

Touching the stone: Anyone who touches Yrthstone must Save Versus Spell or be afflicted with a curse of disintegrating flesh. Each day, a pound of flesh rends away from the victim’s body. Unless removed by magic (e.g. Remove Curse), the curse is fatal within 10 days. Dropped chunks of flesh fester for 1 day before turning green and beginning to crawl. They make their way towards Yrthstone, where they gather and grow a new Child of Yrthstone.

Children of Yrthstone

Chunks of flesh that return to Yrthstone gather and grow into children of broadly human appearance.

Demeanour (Neutral): Quizzical, amoral. Love to wander the wild woods. Regard themselves as children of Dolmenwood itself.

Appearance: Green-tinged skin with a thin layer of bark underneath (+1 AC). Leaves sprout from their joints during the spring.

Annual pilgrimage: On the 1st of Symswald, Yrthstone’s “offspring” are magically summoned to the stone from throughout the region to play, sing, and dance—much to the joy of Zarlac, and the annoyance and jealousy of Zarlac’s people.