Madfather

Madfather, as it is known, has been seen stalking the waterways of Thuyhof and the shores of nearby Lake Guhlubs, usually on clear nights with at least a half-moon, and usually around the witching hour of 2am-3am. He–if it is a he–has never been seen in the rare company of the Lunar Presence, but neither has the Lunar Presence ever whispered of Madfather. Those brave or foolhardy enough to inquire have been met with only silence and the sounds of distant screams.

Terrifying in shape and visage, Madfather is 9-10 feet tall even in the hunched state in which it is usually encountered, but can rear to heights of fifteen feet or more when provoked. Its flesh is charnel-grey and sinewy, like a bog body, stretched over misshapen bones too human to be animal and too animal to be human. Its true extent is concealed beneath a tattered cloak, seemingly made from a discarded mainsail, and all that can be seen poking from its hood are the bare long bones of a cervine and the crowned horns of an elder deer.

The “Father” part of the name, occasionally “Père” in the more ornate High Church style, comes from the being’s observed behavior: it makes ablutions at the water’s edge that are similar to many Church rituals, including purification, atonement, and even baptism–although what, if anything, is being baptized is unclear as its immense seven-fingered hands conceal all, bony though they be.

If one approaches or calls out to Madfather, they will soon learn the origin of the first part of its name as the being lopes over to them with a few powerful leaps and proceeds to rend and tear at their living flesh with tooth and claw. For whatever reason, it attacks the eyes first, as if afraid of being seen, and those few survivors clawed back from its grasp are almost always blinded.

High Inquisitor’s Note:
My guess is that Madfather was, or wanted to be, a priest of the church, and turns to the mindless, soulless repetition of ritual as a way to assuage the nightmarish fall from grace it has endured. This is perhaps why it cannot stand to be seen, and why it alone is willing to baptize in running water those horrors from which an ordinary priest would recoil.

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