Changeling/Local Gentry

"My son, wherefore seek'st thou thy face thus to hide?" "Look, father, the Erl King is close by our side! Dost see not the Erl King, with crown and with train?" "My son, 'tis the mist rising over the plain."

"Oh, come, thou dear infant! oh come thou with me! For many a game I will play there with thee; On my beach, lovely flowers their blossoms unfold, My mother shall grace thee with garments of gold." ~ Johann Wolfgang Goethe - Der Erlkonig.

"My father, my father, and dost thou not hear The words that the Erl King now breathes in mine ear?" "Be calm, dearest child, thy fancy deceives; the wind is sighing through withering leaves."

Local Gentry
	xxxxxThe local Gentry of Safe Haven are influenced by the native culture of the Passamaquoddy. There are a few in particular that are well-known due to their prolific capture rate. Suggestions for new Local Gentries are not right now being accepted.
The Beast That Walks
	xxxxxThis Keeper tends to take survivalists and people skilled in woodsmanship. Campers, hikers, active folks that wander the forests around Aleswich are Its favored prey. It has never been described as having a particular gender, simply described as a strange amalgamation of random beasts that have been cobbled together like some sort of bizarre Frankenstein monster. Its realm is made up of breath-taking forests and vast mountain ranges. There are two types of Lost that are made in the Beast's Lair: predator and prey. The Beast That Walks will "evolve" those who please Its bizarre whims and "devolve" those who do not. Realm: Common Seemings: Beast, Ogre, Elemental. Uncommon Seemings: Darkling, Wizened Escapees:
The Brackish King
	xxxxxThe Brackish King keeps a realm not unlike an Elizabethan-style garden gone entirely to ruin, flooded and overgrown. Fountains adorned with figures, plant life, fish. He believes himself capable of creating the perfect chaos at the edge of the sea, and at his whim takes everyone from children wandering too far out into the woods to people swimming alone, dragging them into his salty, muddy realm. He keeps a flock of Attendants, schools of aquatic Beasts and many, many Ornaments. Where The Laughing Rictus built his realm in the ocean's deeps, The Brackish King's name tells all – his creations are creatures of shallow water, of estuaries and shore, of the place where the ocean beats itself endlessly against Maine's rocky coast. Estuary mermaids, sirens luring ships into the rocks, lighthouses, warships fighting eternal battles in the shallowest water they can navigate. His creations are also all organic in some way – a lighthouse will be a star suspended in a tree, for example. xxxxxThe Brackish King is known to be constantly at war over territory with The Wailing Worm, and has built himself warships and other implements of destruction to defend against the Worm's incursions. Realm: Common Seemings: Beast, Fairest, Elemental. Uncommon Seemings: Darkling, Wizened. Escapees: Grady, Kermit, Olivia
The Stone Haunter
	xxxxxPossibly the reason that the Baswenaazhi formed, the Stone Haunter was originally seen as a deterrent against permanent settlement when the Passamaquoddy first began to construct semi-permanent structures near where Aleswich is now. The Stone Haunter primarily takes people from the alleys and dark places in Aleswich. He seems to favor two types of people that are completely inimical to one another: the innocent and the criminal. Often prone to taking children, the Baswenaazhi are often set on edge when a sudden emergence of disappearances shoot up around Aleswich and Dunlin's Point. The reason for this is part of a game He plays with His victims: murderers, rapists, violent thugs and others have returned seeing the error in their ways; the reverse is true of the innocent — they tend to come back with an insatiable urge for chaos. People taken by the Stone Haunter have to be of particularly hardy stock in order to survive after escaping from His realm, which is known as the Den of Ten Thousand Urges. This particular Keeper is the only one to have changed with the times, possibly due to influence from European settlement. Realm: Common Seemings: Darkling, Wizened. Uncommon Seemings: Fairest, Ogre. Escapees: Cardinal, Never
The Lurking Rictus
	xxxxxThis Keeper keeps a realm that spans from the deepest and darkest depths of the oceans to the most tumultuous of seas. It occupies Its watery domain with Its vast, fathom-defying shape that to many seems to be made exclusively of long, terrifying teeth and glowing pairs of eyes; though those that truly meet It find that it possesses, in Its favored shape, a long and snake-like body that erupts into an army of pseudopods and tentacles. It tends to take people attracted to the sea; though Its tentacles can reach from any body of water, be it a stream, a lake, or a rapidwater river. xxxxxThe Lurking Rictus loves tales of adventure in the high seas; his Lost tend to fall into one of three categories: 'protagonist', 'antagonist', or 'object'. Protagonists fight the good fight, often taking the roles of heroes against the antagonists, though in time, the Keeper always ends up corrupting them, slowly twisting their ideals and morals until they become the very antagonists they fought against; from dashing buccaneer to slavering pirate; from defiant damsel of the seas to ferocious sea dragon. Those relegated to the role of 'object' often never escape from it, forever treated as such by the others. xxxxxAs befitting a Keeper with such a penchant for long stories, the Lurking Rictus is a patient entity with terrifying foresight and plans that span for eons to come; his tentacles pull strings and shift the tides of stories that others do not even know he participates in. Realm: xxxxxContact Changeling Staff for information regarding this Keeper. Common Seemings: Beast, Darkling, Elementals (Waterborn only), Fairest. Uncommon Seemings: Ogres, Elementals (storm- and algae-based). Absent Seemings: Elementals (everything else), Wizened. Escapees: Esme, Felix, Frank, and Nathan
The Mother of Plenty
	xxxxxWhen the Powells first came to America from Wales and established their apple farm during the late eighteen hundreds, they came across this curious being that haunted the land upon which their trees were planted. The Mother of Plenty, a member of the Gentry with a penchant for striking deals with mortals, presented herself as a fertility goddess and made an offer to the original patriarch of the Powell family, giving him the chance to have the best apple crop in the colony at the price of one of his children. He accepted after a particularly terrible winter. Since then, the Powells have often given their own to the Mother of Plenty in exchange for an increased yield. This has recently stopped with the return of several of the Powells from Arcadia, in 2005. With the deal severed, the Mother of Plenty seeks vengeance against the oath-breakers, continuing to stalk their orchard as well as the orchards of other families nearby, while the main (American) branch of the Powell family still sacrifice to her from Oregon. She is known to be a temptress and a trickster. The Passamaquoddy called her Benwazishika, which meant "sorrow-oak" in their language. She has taken to capturing others, since her deal with the Powells is no longer in effect, going so far as to tricking mortals into her realm outside of her usual hunting grounds to the north of Aleswich. It is speculated that she is unable to re-capture the escaped Powells due to the bargain originally made with the family, and having to do with their ownership of the land. Realm: The realm of the Mother of Plenty, on the surface, looks like a large, sprawling farm, with meadows and orchards, clusters of outbuildings, and industrious workers. But there's always something not quite right about Her realm. The trees move and shake with fear. The workers pretend they don't notice what's going on. The packs of animals hunt at Her direction, and some of the buildings seem alive. Common Seemings: Beast, Elemental, Wizened. Uncommon Seemings: Darkling. Escapees:
The Girl
	xxxxxThere is a story of a Passamaquoddy girl that traveled to the white community of Aleswich. She grew up in one of the first reservations created by the new United States. She was treated harshly and unfairly by the whites. She remained proud, even when she was pushed to the point of breaking. This girl became one of the newest legends of the Passamaquoddy tribe. She was not a violent woman in the story, but sometimes stories can be altered based on what point one is trying to prove. The Girl is a Keeper who represents the harsh realities of warfare that the Passamaquoddy and the Algonquin natives were subjected to when the whites began to occupy North America. There was never a need for her before the whites arrived; she is the only legend of the Passamaquoddy that will avoid taking the native population. She ignores anyone who shares Passamaquoddy blood, therefore is treated with a great deal of suspicion (surprise, surprise) by the Wawaazisii. There are few stories about her and fewer escapees. She specifically takes people of northern European heritage. Her realm is a dreamscape of what the Reach once looked like in the past. While altogether beautiful, she organizes her captives into tribes and forces them to subjugation and invasion almost constantly. The lives of her escapees are punctuated with near nightly deaths. The Lost who have escaped the Girl's realm are usually broken, scarred things even by Lost standards. While the Wawaazisii believes her to be a very ancient, nearly immortal Loyalist, the stories of her are quite the opposite. She is often referred to as the Bleeding Woman, the Passamaquoddy or the Revolting Queen. Realm: The Girl's realm is a place of suffering. The nights seem impossibly long and impossibly dark. The world grows icy cold at these times. During the day, the sun blazes in the sky, cooking everything below it. Captives are forced to constantly build and rebuild their ramshackle villages, which are constantly razed as war flares up between the different tribes. Disease and starvation is a near constant. Life is a constant struggle. Common Seemings: Darkling, Wizened. Uncommon Seemings: Elemental, Fairest. Escapees: Claudio, Sam
The August Lord Eternal
	xxxxxThere once was a Changeling that settled the lands around the Marshes. He went down the wrong path though. He was involved with the slaughter of some of the Passamaquoddy and eventually he was run out of the town. He traveled and eventually became a Keeper. He then set his sights on a particular local Gentry and has done his best to quietly build enough resources to eventually get her back. If this will ever happen still remains to be seen. For now, he keeps an eye out for any 'talent' that will be good for his 'collection' until then. Realm: Eternal Night. No sunlight. If one wanders off in search of escape the hounds are usually set out for a blood hunt. If they managed to not escape and survive the hounds then they are punished severely for try to escape the life they've been given. If one is lucky enough to escape there's little telling what will lie outside of the realm Note: For more information on this Keeper please contact Artis Common Seemings: Beast (Bats, Spiders and Wolves), Darkling, Fairest and Wizened Uncommon Seemings: Elemental and Ogre Escapees: Artis, Annie, Robbie
The Wailing Worm
	xxxxxThe Passamaquoddy believed that the Memegwesi people who lived along the riverbanks and would steal away children did so for a massive worm that counteracted the efforts of Mishikinebik, the horned serpent that lived in the great salt waters off the coast of Aleswich who dispensed wisdom and healing. The Wailing Worm is interesting in that it actively sends its Lost and hobs back into the real world to appear to those who it believes are "pure of heart," to bring them to their master so that It might figure out what made these beings so considerably different than Itself. The Wailing Worm appears as a large earthworm with a bisected section at the front of its body which is lined with a collection of spines and spikes. According to the Lost that return from its subterranean realm, It speaks to them constantly in a telepathic fashion, reading their minds and listening to their thoughts. Only when the Worm turns Its attention to hunting is when the Lost have any semblance of peace — which often leads to escape. The Worm is at constant war with The Brackish King. Realm: Common Seemings: Darkling, Ogre. Uncommon Seemings: Beast, Elemental. Escapees: