Quills of Barthemius - Curious Rocky Formation in the Lost Mare River

At the widest point of the Lost Mare river, where the Nightwash River joins it, running deep and fast down out of the Destriel Mountains, there is a most curious formation of stoney structures.  These are very tall (hundreds of feet) stony pillars, in the middle of the Lost Mare, called the Quills of Barthemius.  The Lost Mare is almost a mile wide at this point, and flows much slower than the Nightwash does, when its fast flowing and frigid waters come crashing into the Lost Mare.  At the base of Mount Estelle, where the Lost Mare flows out from under the Iore Glacier, there is a valley with numerous hot water springs, that not only feed into the Lost Mare, but have a warming effect on the waters, so that although it flows out of the icy heights of the Destriels, it is quite warm for a northern river.

Where the Lost Mare is met by the Nightwash, along a two mile long stretch, there are numerous of these tall stone pillars.  They are often about 400-500 feet tall, and 60 or 70 feet across at the base, narrowing little in their towering heights.  The pillars are thick in the river, and are too close together for all but the smallest craft to navigate through them.  There are channels to the west and east of the pillars where somewhat larger craft can navigate, but the river grows shallower there, so only barges and low draft longboats are often found here.  The space between the pillars is sometimes as narrow as 10 or 12 feet, sometimes as wide as 30 or 40 feet.

The tops of the pillars make for an interesting  There is a breed of curious eight legged goats known as Spider Goats that dwell there.  [gamer's note, these are not the monstrous fanged blood drinking Spider Goats that are found in the game, "Mutant Future", but they are interesting enough as they are].  The goats were joined, years and years ago, by a band of Satyrs that came over from the realm of Faery, through one of the many portals in the Harp hills.  These were led by a Satyr druid named Balthemius.  Balthemius and his brethren, taught the spider goats how to use their latent telepathic ability, and awakened an intelligence in them.  The descendents of the Satyrs, as well as a number of Fawns, have taken up permanent residence on the plateau of stony islands, along with the spider goats.  Northguard rangers that have visited the Satyrs report that their reason for remaining on this side of Faery is by order of King Oberon to keep an eye on the Unseely Court creatures that rise up out of the huge sinkholes to the east, along the southern banks of the Nightwash river.  Balthemius himself is still alive, and it is not know just how old he is, or how long he has lived here, but he was not here in the time of the Old Ones.  The Quills are named in his honor, and he performs a great number of good deeds (although, being a Satyr, he is also known to be mischievious, or certainly his brethren and their telepathic Spider goat companions, are).

It is supposed, by a large number of druids and naturalists, that whatever it is that has given the spider goats the ability to use telepathy, as well as their intelligence, is similar to the similar abilities found in the Great Horses of the Darkearth Plains.

The great sinkholes on the southern bank of the Nightwash river is where parts of the Nightwash disappear in vast waterfalls, deep into the earth.  The region is riddled by layers of underground realms, many with permanent portals to the Unseely Courts.  Without the diligence and watchfulness of Barthemius and his satyrs and goat allies, as well as the Great Khan of all the Horses, there would no doubt be more incursions of the darker, evil races into the surface world.

The spider goats are a curious breed, with a number of special abilities, other than their intelligence and telepathy.  They have the ability to climb sheer walls, and although the Satyrs have constructed a number of bridges connecting the wider separated Quills, the goats have an incredible leaping ability, able to jump 20 or 30 feet, as an adult.  The females have an uncharacteristic development, even for a magical creature.  They have spinnerets, and can generate a web (same effects as the spell) that has a range of 40 feet.  This web is used only for capturing prey and enemies, and not used for building webs or nests.  The thick flocks of nesting black geese provide food for the spider goats, and the breeding cycle of the breed has adapted to this cycle, so that when the black geese come north from the south parts of the Lost Mare river in the early spring to nest and lay eggs in the crags on the sides of the Quills, the goats are also ready with their young, and feed on goose while nursing their young.

Other than in their natural habitat of the Quills, there is a group of Spider Goats that can be encountered abroad.  A successful raid by a number of Drow elves (actual Drow, as per the AD&D race, rather than the more typical Dark Elves encountered in the Valley - proper Drow in this setting usually only occur as temporary incursions from the Unseely Realms, but this group has come over permanently, and lives in one of the underground realms in the nearby countryside) captured a number of young spider goats some decades in the past, and have been raising and multiplying them, imprinting their evil alignment and philosophy on them.  These are sometimes encountered, with the members of the Aa'Lega Coven of Drow Elves, and others.

Name: Spider Goats (Drow variant)
No. Encountered: 2-12 (with a Drow hunting party, or as part of a Drow lair)
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Movement: 90' (can jump 30'; can scale sheer surfaces)
Armor Class: 4
Hit Dice: 2
Attacks: 2 Kicks, 1Bite; or 1 charge
Damage: 1d4+1 (kick); 1-4 (bite); 1d6 (charge)
Save: MU2
Morale: 9
Hoard Class:VI (remains on dead victims)
Special: Half of all spider goats encountered can shoot out a web 30', acts as the spell was cast by a 4th level magic user (lasts for 8 turns).  On a successful charge attack, victims Man sized or smaller have to make a saving throw vs. paralyzation or be knocked down.  Against a knocked down opponent, a spider goat that makes a successful Bite attack, will remain attached to their victim, doing 1d6 damage automatically every round, until the spider goat is slain.  The Drow version of the Spider Goat has also been trained to use a psychic shriek attack, based on their telepathy.  This causes all characters below 3rd level (or creatures below 3HD) that are within 80' of a spider goat to make a save vs. magic each round that they want to act.  Spell casters within 80' of a spider goat are particularly vulnerable to the psychic shriek.  They may not employ any spells that requires a Verbal component.

Sky Snails

Sky snails are key to the mining operation of Amberstone described here.  In addition to the role they play in transporting the large multi-ton blocks of Amberstone out of the mountains, and down to the city of Khomaes, and beyond, the snails are fascinating creature in their own right.

Num Appearing: either 2 (mated pair), or 2d12 (colony)
Alignment: neutral good
Movement: 30' (unless enraged, then it becomes 120')/ fly 30'
Armor Class: 2
Hit Dice: 12 (fully grown)
Num Attacks: 1 (unless enraged, then 3) - this is always 1 acid shot (range 30', and when enraged will also get feeler flails
Damage: acid shot 2d6 (save v. poison or take an additional 1d6 for 1d4 rounds); feeler flails are 2d8
Save: F12 (matching hd)
Morale: 9
Special: Extra attacks (feeler flails) and extra speed only are available when the Sky Snail is enraged, conditions for being enraged described below.
Description: Sky snails are a peculiar breed of giant snail that dwell in and around the crevices and caves of the Cliffs of Cloud.  Their most peculiar visible features are (1) their size (they can get up to 10' across the shell, and perhaps another 4' of extended head, and 4' of extended tail), and (2) their amazing bright color.  It is an intense, and brilliant cobalt blue (in the shell) when fully grown, and a slightly lighter shade for the flesh of the body.  As newly hatched younglings, they are actually white, with shells of only the slightest tint of blue.

In addition to their size and appearance, however, there is another feature of the sky snails that is remarkable.  Their shells have a natural ability to not only levitate, but also to support a vast amount of weight.  These shells retain this ability once the snails are dead, for a period of time (1d6+6 months).  If it were not levitating, the empty shell of a fully grown sky snail would weigh nearly 1000 pounds, but have a weight of nothing because of the magical levitation characteristic.  A fully grown snail shell can also lift a further weight of 2 tons (4000 pounds).

The snails are fairly sedate and lethargic.  They will only attack, unless attacked, in two different circumstances (both of these "enrage" the snails, which raises their movement value to 120').  First, if the young (1hd, AC 6) of a mated pair of sky snails (they mate for life, sharing what wizards describe as a "mild telepathic bond") are threatened in any way, both parents will attack with a fury.  Second, whenever the metals Electrum or Platinum are brought within 100' of a snail, they will attack the source, and seek to voraciously consume the metal.  They do this with their corrosive, acidic body juices.

In addition to being able to move by their normal snail foot motion, the snails can release and from their surface, and fly.  They have an organ that allows them to direct their levitation, allowing them to fly at a 30' rate.  There is not a known limit to how high they can levitate above the surface.  It has been surmised that they could possible reach the moons.

Sky Snail, feeding and protecting its nest near the Nightwash River.

Sky mining for Amberstone

As mentioned, briefly, in the posting on the Darkearth Plains, the Nightwash River comes out of the Destriel Mountains, and flows over a great cliff wall at the edge of the mountains (the Nightwash Falls).  That cliff wall is part of a curious formation called the Cliffs of Cloud.  Soaring over 3000 feet in the air, above the plains below, this formidable edge of the Destriel Mountains extends some miles in either direction of the Nightwash Falls, and does not get noticeably easier to navigate anywhere in the region.  And still - there have been numerous attempts at carving trails and walkways criss-crossing their way up to the heights to get at interesting features in the cliff wall.

One of the features that exists, and has a precarious donkey path carved into the rock wall, crossing it's way back and forth some 1600 feet into the air, is the famous Amberstone mine.  Once the 3 feet wide trail is climbed up to the cliff face, it opens up into a rift in the cliff wall, with a large shelf, approximately a mile from west to east.  This is just east of the falls, so the western edge of the rift is quite close to the falls, and the rift is constantly wet with spray from the mighty waterfall.  The shelf cuts back several hundred yards into the cliff face, and most of the open rift has a ceiling some 50-60 feet high.  It is as if a gigantic finger scooped a mile long blister out of the rocky cliff wall.

Overhead view of Amber Cave (top), image of Blue Sky Snail (lower left), outside of
Amberstone mine (lower center), and looking out from Amberstone mine,
even seeing the green valley down below (lower right).

Within this rift, known simply as the Amber Cave, there is a curious rocky tower built, from bottom to top of the rift, near where the small trail rises up to the rift opening.  That tower is the monastery home for a group of hermetic dwarves that protect and guide the miners working in the mines.  The whole western end of the cave (shown above, in an overhead sketch, along with images of a blue Sky Snail, and the outside and inside of an Amberstone mine) is home to the Sky Snails.

The shells of the Snails retain their ability to float.  One thing that the snails can do, when they detach from something and start floating on air, is to use some internal organ or magical ability to steer and direct themselves up and down and left and right.  Although the shells can give a person this ability (a single shell from an expired adult snail, if worn as a backpack, extending from a human sized wearer's knees, to up above his head, and extending far to the rear) to float quite readily - but directional movement has to be accomplished some other way.

The sky miners use the snails by luring them onto the great blocks of Amberstone with a food/potion mixture that the Dwarfs make (theirs is called the "Order of a Reflective Sky" - a curious theme and name for a Dwarven mystic order).  A block rider will then climb onto the top of the floating block, and use the Sky Snail potion to lure the snails from one side of the block to the other, giving a crude sort of steering mechanism.

The temple monastery is old - much older than the Dwarfs, or even than Westroner culture in the valley.  It was probably built by servants of the Old Ones.  The Amberstone that is mined today comes out of thinner veins than what evidently originally existed.  Vast blocks of the stuff were used to build the great canal of the Lost Mare river as it runs under the King's Highway.

Today, most of the mined blocks of Amberstone "float" their way down to Khomaes.  There is a great market there, not only among the great public works of the City Proctor, but also among the many noble houses, and their decadent villa.  None, however, has as hungry an appetite for Amberstone as the faculty and staff of the wizardry school of enchantment and charm in Khomaes - the Glamor Hall for Bewitchment and Entrancement.  The Queen of Enchantment (Queen Mellisonde) is a great customer of the guild of miners working Amber Cave.  Because of this, she (and the enchanters and enchantresses of her school) is very supportive of and protective of the Reflective Sky order.

The miners, other than raids by bandits, have to contend with possibly opening up the wrong tunnel or cave trail, to the many hived pockets of evil humanoids from the Unseely Court that dwell within the Destriel mountains in general, and within the Cliffs of Cloud specifically.  When herding and harvesting sky snails, however, two other menaces present themselves.  The first are the Blood Stars, radial parasites that have a limited flight (actually, sort of a jetted propulsion through the air, as part of a surprise attack to attach to a victim), but whom begin viciously sucking blood out of mammals.  There is a strange feature of Sky Snail blood that keeps the Stars from draining it quite so quickly, but not so Humans and Dwarves (death could come within minutes of a full sized star striking an unprepared victim).  The second are the Cliff Monsters.  These are hard shelled worms, capable of burrowing through hard rock, that are attracted to vibrations caused by movement, and also heat caused by fires or too many people in one area.  Once they emerge from the rock walls, they tend to go after the closest warm body.

Writeups (with specifics, and stat blocks) on the Sky Snails, Blood Stars and Cliff Monsters are available as their own articles.