Characteristics
Physical features
Her decrepit body is hidden behind an macabre dress that doubled as an intricate theatre for mechanically-controlled puppets.
Mental traits
Endelyn is wholly obsessed with all related to tragedy and despair. She believe that each individual has their role to play in the grand, hopeless theater of existence. The best someone can hope for is to fulfill their role with a decent enough performance to offer her some middling interest.
Abilities
Despite their shared enmity, the crones each gained significant powers when all three were within close proximity of one another.
Endelyn is immortal in the sense that she cannot die of old age. She can only be killed during the time of a full solar eclipse, or grand facsimile thereof, a fact she came to understand during a prophecy she received.
Relationship
She has a pet cat named Gloam, who she believes was stolen away by Bavlorna.
She keeps a number of individuals as "guests" at her theater in hte Murkendraw.
Activities
Each day, performances are held in the grand amphitheater at Motherhorn solely for Endelyn's amusement. She judges them according to her liking and allows adept performers to bargain for a glimpse into their future.
Whenever petitioners appear before her to learn an aspect of their fate, Endelyn offers them twisted pageants—she refers to as "auguries"—which involve hideous puppets that steal away part of an individual's free will. These thefts cannot be reversed, even after an individual learns of their untimely fate.
Possessions
She carries with her a pair of magical scissors that can separate any humanoid creature from their shadow, the latter of which then becomes beholden to the hag.
Her preferred means of conveyance is the ornithopter of flying.
Endelyn's most prized possession is the Orrery of Tragedies, an enormous contraption that utilizes both arcana and mathematics to calculate the most likely outcomes out of the infinite possibilities that could ever arise.
History
Crones
Isolated in the Murkendraw swamps, the crones are old creatures, it is believed that the three sisters have existed since the reign of the first Fey Kings. The crones are such creatures. No one knows what breed of monstrosity they, in fact, are. People believe them to be primal hags. Folk say they were four at first. The Mother, the Lady of the Wood, suffered terribly from loneliness, she made daughters out of dirt and water.
They were the first daughters of the Lady of the Wood, a fearsome archfey and the supposed mother of all witches. Each sister became bound to an aspect of time—past, present, and future.
A long, long Time ago the Mother was sole ruler of the spring court. Her daughters brought her the people's requests and served as her voice. Each spring, sacrifices of grain, animals, and men were made to the Lady of the Wood on her special night.
Their mother later adopted a dragon named Tasmiira, raising her as her own. As Tasmiira matured, so did her power, and the Crones grew resentful. Their jealousy only deepened when the Lady of the Wood chose Tasmiira as her successor, granting her the title of Archfey of the Spring Court.
Feigning loyalty, the sisters embraced their new sibling, hiding their envy behind honeyed words and false smiles while secretly plotting her downfall. They waited for the perfect moment to strike.
When Tasmiira returned from her travels, their trap was sprung—the sisters sealed her in temporal stasis, freezing her in time.
With Tasmiira helpless, the Crones began carving out their own domain within the Spring Court. However, their mother refused to stand by idly and attempted to free her chosen heir. Declaring their mother mad, the sisters destroyed her body and imprisoned her soul into a bog, claiming it was the only way to "save" the court. Their mother blood and soul transformed the land forever, spawning the Murkendraw swamps.
The sisters, now rulers of the Spring Court, established their palace deep within the Murkendraw Swamps, guarding it fiercely while keeping Tasmiira locked in temporal stasis. Though they sometimes offer aid to desperate locals, their help always comes at a price.
Their ambition spread over the land—elves took to abandoning their homes and setting out into the bog, where they became food for beasts. Before long, the land was drowning in blood.
Endelyn Moongrave, the eldest, demands payment in the form of severed ears, which she strings across the swamps, using them as listening posts to hear every whispered secret. The people, fearful yet resigned, offer children as sacrifices, sending them into the swamp knowing they will never return—devoured by the Crones.
As their influence stretched beyond the Spring Court’s borders, the Summer Court took notice. Unwilling to let their corruption spread further, the Summer Fey launched an assault on the Murkendraw, igniting a brutal war against the Crones.
The war
The Summer Court, under the rule of King Dasmag, a Satyr Lord, was worried about the ever growing influence of the Murkendraw, a swamp belonging to the Crones, archfey of the spring court.
Driven by his determination to reclaim the Murkendraw from the clutches of the Crone, King Dasmag led an army to the crones. The first army sent to reclaim the Murkendraw consisted mainly of elves. Deceived by the cunning crones, they were banished to the moon Lúg emel (Kurt's Heart), becoming the moon elves.
The goblins offered their aid to King Dasmag after this incident in exchange for newfound powers. However, when they thought themselves unobserved, they callously reneged on their agreement, foolishly believing they could escape the consequences. Fate took a twisted turn when the battle shifted, pitting the goblins against the hags alone. Seizing the opportunity, the cunning hags offered a tantalizing proposition, fully aware that the goblins' betrayal would invoke a curse, effectively severing their ties with the summer court. Tempted by the hags' promises, the goblins succumbed to their deceit. As a result, they find themselves cursed and many were banished from the fey realm, forced to dwell once again in the material plane.
King Dasmag's army was annihilated in their bold endeavor.
Aftermath
The crones divided, and they decided to go their separate ways. With their power weakened, Tismara was able to get free from the temporal stasis, getting back the leadership of the spring court and the archfey title. Edelyn who stayed in the swamp kept rulership over it and neither the spring court nor the summer court tried to contest it.
Hero Krasnar
During a crusade against the crones, an elven hero named Krasnar sought to liberate his kin trapped on the moon. He approached the hag, seeking her cooperation for the elves' liberation. Endelyn Moongrave agreed to three conditions:
- Krasnar would rule the elves
- Krasnar would give up his soul to her
- The liberated elves would remain in the swamps
With Krasnar as their leader, the elves were liberated from their eternal prison, but the experience left them broken and changed, infused with the essence of powerful entities from beyond known dimensions. Slaves to Endelyn under Krasnar leadership, they became the swamp maiden pawns.
Endelyn transformed Krasnar into a Lich knight, making him a powerful and unkillable protector of their swamps. Sacrificing his soul in the process, Krasnar's connection to the moon elves further corrupted him with their newfound powers from contact with abberations, turning him into an unknown entity of immense power, under the influence of the crones.
The lich knight king Krasnar's palace or lair is a colossal living mass of eyes and mouths that gibber mad thoughts, a grotesque reflection of the twisted nature of the Crone's power and Krasnar's transformation.
Family tree
Comments
Author's Notes
Inspired by the hourglass coven from the wild beyond the witchlight (forgotten realms) and by the crones from the witcher.