Fiend-touched

Not all mortal races hail from the various Material planes. Deep in the bowels of the Hells and the Abyss, deities of evil have created their own forms of sentience, races who are born into a life of predetermined damnation. Most labor for entire lifetimes, suffering at the whim of demons and devils, but a select few escape to other worlds, or obtain sufficient power and skill to make themselves a force to be reckoned with even amidst such primal evil. Some sages believe that these beings have true souls, as much as any human or halfling born on the Material plane. Others maintain that no soul can journey to the Lower Planes (or any of the Outer Planes, for that matter) until death, and that these beings have no more of a true soul than any outsider. That they are as alive as any human or elf on any other world, however, cannot be in doubt. They are the fiend-touched, and they are perhaps the most racially unlucky people in all creation.

© Wayne Barlowe

The fiend-touched are actually several races that are similar in most respects, but differ based on which Lower Plane they hail from.

The two most common fiend-touched races are the baaun (by-oon), who come from the lawful Hells, and the ta’inar (tie-nar), spawned in the chaotic Abyss. Most of the material presented here applies equally to both, but where differences exist, they are specifically pointed out.

Personality: The vast majority of fiend-touched are irredeemably evil. Even if they were not born with the taint of wickedness already in them, due to their creator and the plane of their birth, a life of slavery and torment at the hands of the fiends extinguishes whatever brief spark of goodness might have flourished. The baaun are ordered in their thinking, planners and schemers; the ta’inar are more temperamental, more prone to anger and random violence. Both, however, are vicious, cruel, and given to harming others in pursuit of their own ambitions.

Even those few who manage to break away from the norm, who allow some bit of compassion to grow within, never seem able to fully crawl out from under the shadow of their births. They do not love as fully as others, do not sacrifice so much for their friends, and even in pursuit of the most pure goals, often seem willing to employ questionable means.

Physical Description: Both races of fiend-touched are very humanoid in general appearance. The baaun are shorter and lithe, resembling elves in overall build, while the ta’inar are taller and broader, standing somewhere in height between a large human and a small ogre. Both races tend to have unusually tinted skin, ranging from blood crimson to jet black to sickly gray to ice white. Their features are sharp and striking, though the cast of the baaun’s faces make them appear handsome or beautiful to mortal eyes, while the more dramatic angles of the ta’inar are more frightening. Both races have eyes that gleam a faint gold, red, or green in the dark. Fiend-touched reach adulthood at around 16 years of age. Those few who live to old age can be as old as 300.

Relations: The majority of fiend-touched, who dwell in the depths of the lower planes, hate and despise all other beings. Because devils, demons, and other creatures often torment or enslave the fiend-touched—or, at best, treat them as lower-class citizens in the various hellish communities—their options and relations are limited. They must keep their fiendish overlords happy, or they die.

Those few who travel to the Material plane fare only somewhat better. Most other humanoids fear and distrust the fiend-touched, due to their evil ancestry and racial proclivities. Most of the fiend-touched feel the same, as members of the race are overwhelmingly evil. Only substantial experience to the contrary—such as battling alongside a non-evil fiend-touched against a greater threat, or many years of peaceful and honest trade—can usually convince others to accept one of the fiend-touched as a neighbor or ally.

Alignment: Most fiend-touched are innately evil, a combination of inborn cruelty and a hatred instilled by years of suffering. The baaun are primarily lawful evil, like their diabolic forebears, while the ta’inar are normally chaotic evil, like the races of demons. A rare few, however, manage to throw off the cloak of malice and adopt other worldviews. These few tend to be of a neutral alignment, though the baaun still lean toward law and the ta’inar toward chaos. Rarely will a fiend-touched become good, and next to none have been known to adopt a completely diametrically opposed alignment. (That is, even the few good baaun likely won’t be chaotic good, nor is a ta’inar likely to become lawful good.)

Fiend-touched Lands: The fiend-touched have few lands to call their own. In the lower planes, most of them dwell in large cities, occupying the lower rungs of society, treated no better than the souls of the damned who traveled there after death. A few live in isolated villages in the barren and dangerous wastes of Hell or the Abyss, eking out an existence. These communities spring up wherever the fiend-touched believe they can avoid fiendish attention, with no other rhyme or reason to their location.

The fiend-touched are very few on the Material plane. If they have ever gathered together in sufficient numbers to form their own community, it remains hidden from outsiders.

Religion: Most fiend-touched worship out of fear, rather than any true love or veneration. They usually worship whatever dark god created them, or whatever fiendish lord rules over the area in which they dwell. Those who escape their birthright, either traveling to the Material plane or finding freedom in the lower planes, worship whatever deity is appropriate to their goals and alignments.

Language: Baaun speak Infernal; Ta’inar speak Abyssal. Most also speak Common, the better to interact with the souls of the damned—perhaps the only “beings” in the lower planes who do not hold a higher social status.

Names: Fiend-touched tend to have names that sound fiendish, both as a means of honoring and appeasing those creatures with whom they must live, and as a means of making themselves sound powerful. A few who depart the lower planes assume human names, in hopes of better fitting in.

Male Names: Antherus, Cthon, Dvarlus, Kanach-Kell, Nalloch, Oorzan, Ra’endavak, Syschiel, Ythun, Zirig.

Female Names: Baraska, Elerem, Genevra, Irikel, Lilliar-Asthal, Meeracha, Quolesse, Sybanat, Tirivgenya, Volaterras.

Adventurers: Fiend-touched adventurers normally pursue one of two simple goals: survival or power. Those who seek merely to escape their fiendish overlords and horrific lives travel far and wide seeking a place of relative safety, and perhaps someone they might call a friend and ally. Others seek to destroy those who lord over them, either to free their people, to take the fiend’s place as overlord, or for simple vengeance. Fiend-touched legends tell of these individuals returning after many years to vanquish powerful demon lords.

15. COPYRIGHT NOTICE
Lions Den Press — Secrets of the Planes: Planar Races Copyright 2007, Lions Den Press; Author Ari Marmell and C.A. Suleiman