A Harpy is a bygone creature.
Overview[]
- Life is a jest, and all things show it; I thought so once, but
- now I know it.
- — John Gay, “My Own Epitaph”
Half bird, half woman, these creatures were sent by Zeus to punish those who had dishonored him and to eat and befoul the victim's food so that he would starve to death. Initial myths paint them as a trio of sisters (common in Greek myth) born to a giant and a nymph, but later tales indicate that there may have been more. Jason and the Argonauts freed Phineas from starvation by the harpies, but the harpies themselves may have survived the encounter.
Since the harpies are relegated to myth in the modern world, a mage is most likely to encounter them in the Umbra after offending the Greek gods. Harpies might even manifest during certain Paradox backlashes. Typically, the harpies do not attack; rather, they simply steal or ruin their victim's food before he can eat more than a scrap, so that the victim starves to death. Freed from the shackles of their mythical role, though, harpies might well attack unwary intruders in their domains.
Legendry[]
The three harpies swooped down from the sky to terrorize the unsuspecting revelers. Their piercing cries chilled the men's hearts and made the women shudder in fear. Peolos stood at the center of the group, his eyes lifted toward the evil creatures. He alone showed no fear, though he alone was the one who should have.
The harpies descended on him, their target, the one the gods had sent them to retrieve. He waited, sword in hand. Perhaps he knew it would do no good to run, though the others shouted at him to do so. Perhaps he knew his time had come. The harpies howled through the air, trailing a foul stench. Covering their faces in disgust, the revelers fled in all directions. With ragged vulture claws, one harpy took Peolos by the arm, another by the face and the third by the leg. Together they lifted him into the air and carried him away. By the time his feet had left the ground, Peolos had joined the grim ranks at the mouth of Hades' realm.
Some days hence, two travelers found his body. Even maggots had not been hungry enough to touch it. Choking, the two men covered the corpse then retreated to the shrines of their respective gods - and to the bath houses. Both souls and skin were cleansed raw before either man went to bed. Even then, neither one could rest easily. The harpies befouled the travelers' dreams as they had befouled Peolos' body. Trembling at the edge of morning, each man swore he'd never anger his gods again. No sin, no matter how glorious, could be worth the harpies' touch.
Description[]
Originally documented in Greek lore, harpies were the harbingers of death and the punishers of pride. If they appeared - and they always came in flocks - someone near was sure to die. Originally, chroniclers believed that harpies themselves caused deaths, but priests and philosophers demurred, insisting that harpies follow death, rather than bring it.
Living deep in sordid wildlands or barren mountain caves, harpies display more instinct than intelligence. Food and shelter appear to be their only true motivations, although it is said that the Old Gods still use them on occasional errands. Filthy creatures, harpies allow dirt and excrement to coat their feathers and skin, unlike most animals. The resulting stench is enough to nauseate most mortals and drive away all but the most pestilential beasts. Harpy nests are noxious places strewn with fecal matter, urine and leftover carrion. Flies and beetles are the only things that can tolerate a harpy's presence for long.
Old tales claim that these wretched creatures were once women whose pride, sloth or slovenliness marked them beyond salvation. Rumor claims that each harpy was a secret murderess whose crime was hidden to men but not to God. Rather than dying and descending into the Underworld, these debased wenches attained a sort of foul longevity. Midwives to death itself, harpies now wallow in misery, their minds long since gone. Such madness is preferable, it is said, to truly comprehending what they have become. In its own way, this insanity is a form of God's mercy.
Harpies can sense when a death is imminent, and they often follow armies or perch near places of violence. People who look up once too often spot them circling crossroads as crows do. On more than one occasion, the sighting of a harpy has caused a death. At other times, the sighting had actually averted one. A wise person is one who understand the warning inherent to the harpies' presence and knows to take extreme care.
Like vultures, harpies eat dead meat. A single body can feed three corpse-viragos for a week. They carry it to their nest, leave it there and feed on it for the next few days. Once they have consumed the body, they foul it with droppings, then strike out in search of another. According to common lore, the wretched things are nearly immortal; they die only if starved to death, burned or hacked to pieces. Desperate harpies can survive on the remains of other animals as well, though they prefer succulent human flesh.
Although they lack even rudimentary social graces, these odd creatures tend to travel in threes. Teamwork, after all, makes it easier to lift heavy bodies. These "weird sisters" share their dinner evenly and never seem to fight amongst themselves. Furthermore, they never attack or kill their own for food, even when they haven't eaten for some time. Harpies are scavengers as opposed to hunters, and death always provides for them.
Future Fate[]
Although the occasional "triptych" of harpies can be found near rural wastelands and battlegrounds in the technological age, most of their kind haunt Umbral Hellholes, war-Realms and the Underworld. Every so often a huge mystical conflict draws flocks of the sickening things. The 1998 war in Concordia draws so many harpies that many residents abandon the place for good.
Image[]
From a distance, flying harpies look just like regular vultures. Once they descend to the ground, the differences become apparent. Larger than most vultures but smaller than most humans, harpies live a birdlike existence. No bird, however, carries the stomach-roiling stench that a harpy does. Even the most shot-bedraggled drunkard is a rose beside a corpse-virago.
Savage and crude, a harpy has the chubby body and long wings of a black and ragged vulture. Sharp, curved claws extend from her feet. All harpies are female, with flaccid breasts and hawkish human faces (usually dirtied and stained with whatever they've been eating). These ties to humanity are the beast's most disconcerting features. It's quite disturbing to see a carrion-bird madwoman with her face in a corpse, tugging out its innards with her craggy yellow teeth.
Roleplaying Hints[]
Where there’s death, there’s food. And where there’s food, there’s life — your life. Eat to live. Live to eat. Dead things don’t know any better. They’re dead. They taste better that way. Death. Food. Life. Nothing else matters.
Charater Sheets[]
References[]
- WOD: The Bygone Bestiary, p. 37-39
- MTAs: Dead Magic, p. 116
