Roggenmuhme

Don't stray from the path.

Written by Francesco Lanza.

General Information

The Roggenmuhme is a Coven Model, and belongs to the Creature type. Creatures are summoned by expending Goetia. This horrible crone is easily called on the battlefield and is certainly not one of the strongest fiends in a fight, yet she balances that relative weakness with some of the most useful tactical powers in the Coven's arsenal. While in the innermost Region, her location can't be crossed by anyone, not even the Austringer, and that means she is impervious to attack, but more importantly she can block roads better than any other Coven Model. That is certainly a good way to protect a Witch! She's also capable of dragging away a Hunter to an Abyss, which can be used to divide them up and break Patrols.
A Coven player would be very foolish indeed to waste such an asset for the mere chance of wounding or killing a Hunter.

The Legend

The Roggenmuhme is just one of a wide spectrum of folk tales about "Feldgeister". These mythical beings are claimed to be remnants of ancient pagan rites appeasing spirits living inside crops. We always say that about fertility and bounty-- they are kind of hot topics for heathen gods, and farming communities are always said to respect quaint superstitions geared toward the well being of each year's harvest. Even in Early Modern Europe such rites and beliefs were mostly thought of as silly, but war, especially religious war, drives even the most rational to their wits' end. And then the folk tales take a darker tone.
In 17th century the Roggenmuhme is no more a goddess, she's a monster used as a very stern warning against deviant behaviour: wandering off, being tardy out in the fields doing God knows what, or just being a misbehaving child would always attract the attention of such an evil spirit. These Feldgeister took the shape of old women like the Roggenmuhme, of stern men not wholly unlike the ancient god Wotan, or of wolves, bears, and even members of reviled ethnicities (yeah, they would go there without qualm) and they would come to harry the wayward.
In three decades of running away from roaming and half-starved armies, the concept of being lost and eaten would take on a new frightening dimension for the poorest inhabitants of the Holy Roman Empire.

Portrait

by Igor Krstic

by Alessandro Depaoli

Gifts

The Devil's boon manifests according to the nature of each minion.

Dark Mother

The Roggenmuhme can draw Orphans from a Sanctuary, or run towards unprotected Orphans, and eat them. Yeah, she's evil, just face the music, ok?

Feldgeist

If this Model is in the Center Region, she is considered as "unconnected" to any other location. Her the fields she roams do not belong to this reality anymore, but she can be summoned at a Cromlech, if a Hunter is lucky enough to find one.

Tactics

A Coven Model is always frightening and useful in a fight.

Snatch

While the Roggenmuhme is famous for waylaying travelers and children, she will do so with a Witch Hunter rather gladly, which is a tremendous tactical advantage for the Coven.

Critical Hit

This monster drains you. When you are wounded, you will bleed more.

The Vanity of the Wise

“Father, we went far abroad, searching until dawn, yet we were thwarted,” said Dieter. “We could not find any sign.”

Azius Schulze covered his mouth with an ink-stained hand. “How so, Dieter? Not even — God forbid! — some sad remains? Not a single blood-drop? Didn’t you find any furrows dug by wagon wheels, or left by the hooves of Tatar horses?”

“Don’t be foolish, Father! No Tatars came here, we already argued that.”

Azius hadn’t it in himself to scold Dieter for his disrespect. He knew well it hadn’t been Tatars. He watched the last entry of his diary, left incomplete: “Item. 12 children lost in the fields in broad daylight. Men from the village, numbering 34, went for a search at Dusk…”

“Would you perchance speak to me, Father?” said Dieter, his voice hard. “Why did you linger at your desk? Did you already know we were bound to fail?”

“Dieter, go back to your family. They are certainly desperate with fright and worry, by now.”

Dieter crashed his fist on the desk. He was a big man, a son to be proud of. “It’s for them that I implore you to be frank with me. I know well that I am far from the studious first-born you desired, but I am smart enough to know you are no coward, and that you are craftier than a Devil. You know about the humours, the numbers, the secrets of Nature.”

“Go home, Dieter.”

“I shan’t move, Father, not one step.”

The old man rose, so as to face his son in the cold light. “You wish for truth, Dieter. It’s a small and simple thing, really, small enough to fit your head. Your father is old, and tired. Accidents happen, and they defy explanation. Our salvation is prayer, and prayer alone. Maybe the Lord will offer succour.”

“Oh,” rumbled Dieter. “I always thought you were a slave to the vanity of the wise, and the very day your knowledge would have been useful for something that is not fostering such vanity—”

“Leave me alone, Dieter. I wish to pray.”

His son stormed off the house. Azius waited for a long time. Then went to the lectern where his Bible rested. With a grimace, he swept it aside, and opened a secret drawer. The Grimoire there awaited. He left in secret, then. The air felt heavy in the fields around the village. He swept about, anxiously, casting his gaze from side to side. The sun cast his rays from dark clouds, and in this light he found what he was searching for. No farmer, thought Azius, seemed resigned to commit the fruitful bounty of his field to the Grace of the Heavens, and therefore it was easy to find a pagan idol hidden in the corn, fashioned from braided stalks. Azius drew out the Grimoire, feeling the irony of the occasion biting. On one hand, he lambasted the peasants for their superstition, on the other, here he was holding a book of spells. He begun the rite, the words fashioned in an unborn language freezing the air into quaint stillness. Yet… How foolish could a man feel, jabbering senseless verbiage to an army of corn stalks? What would his enemies from the University think of him? His spell stammered.

He winced, dismayed by a grasshopper buzzing, and thus he discovered that Roggenmuhme had drawn near. She stood no more than seven steps from him. She was taller than he was, an obscene woman-like monster, her naked skin sallow like a dried-out, deflated pig’s bladder. Her attention felt oily and dire. She held a child in her twig-like hands, a little limp body, clad in yellow broadcloth, like the one he himself gave to Dieter’s wife to dress her family: Roggenmuhme clutched his grandson, Azius realized. He streched his hand towards the boy, a vain attempt to save him, but the vile creature stepped forward, and Azius withdrew. The corn under his feet crackled, and it felt loud like the sharp report of a musket. Roggenmuhme trod without disturbing a single stalk. She was the spirit of the corn, the heathen goddess that demanded sacrifice, the Aunt in the barley, so akin to a ravenous wolf. Azius could make out her flabby breasts, oozing tar in fat droplets.

He felt a gentle touch, and he dropped his gaze to find something unexpected. A warhammer’s head had been politely laid over his forearm. It turned with a snap, hooking his limb and drawing the Grimoire he held to a waiting hand. Dismayed, Azius met the staring eyes and toothy smile of the man wielding the slim hammer, a total stranger to him. The man snatched the book, threw away his long weapon and snapped the Grimoire open. He then marched against Roggenmuhme, chanting the spell Azius had interrupted.

The old man had not discerned a single scrap of pity or worry in the stranger’s eyes. He knew then that the Almighty had sent succour, and it was just the kind this world deserved, no more and no less.