The Nightmare Lands
The Nightmare Lands is a unique domain in Ravenloft were the waking world and the world of dreams collide. The landscape is constantly changing and unpredictable. People can travel there while awake or when they are dreaming. The only inhabitants are the Abber Nomads, an aboriginal culture that assumes that anything they aren't observing ceases to exist. The domain is ruled by the Nightmare Court, a cadre of ghoulish creatures that each create a specific type of nightmare.
Abber Nomads are the only living inhabitants of the Nightmare Lands. They are primarily inspired by the Ojibwe people of North America. One of their famous creations is the dreamcatcher, which can protect travelers in the realm from the creations of the Nightmare Court.
Abber Shamans live apart from the rest of their people, and have special insight into the workings of the Nightmare Lands. The most well-known of these shamans is Walks Alone (pictured above).
The Nightmare Court:
The Nightmare Court is comprised of at least six distinct members, though there may be more who have yet to be identified. They dwell in the Nightmare Lands, each controlling a specific location in the domain.
One member of the Court, a being called the Nightmare Man appears to be more powerful than the rest and possibly even the Court’s leader. It is not known if the Nightmare Man is the sole lord of this domain, however, or if he shares this role with the entire Court. Some have even speculated that the Court is simply made up of different aspects of the Nightmare Man’s personality, each given substance by the curse which binds him to the domain.
In any case, the Nightmare Lands’ proximity to the Veil of Sleep gives the Court access to the dreams of people across the multiverse – not just those trapped within the Demiplane of Dread. The members of the Court cannot escape from the domain by crossing the Veil of Sleep, but they can pull dreamers into their mad realm.
The Ghost Dancer:
The Ghost Dancer is perhaps the most tragic member of the Nightmare Court. As her name implies, she is an incorporeal creature who now searches the nightmares of the living in an effort to understand her own death. Dreams inspired by guilt and shame interest her the most, drawing her with the same inescapable pull as a flame exerts over a moth.
The Ghost Dancer appears as an ethereal and strikingly beautiful young woman in her late teens or early 20s. She is translucent, with pale flesh that looks cold and dead. Her short, blond hair is as devoid of color as her alabaster skin. Above pale, full lips, her eyes are hidden beneath perpetual shadow. This grim specter wears a tattered, faded ballerina’s costume. Pale blood stains cover its once-elegant designs; some shapeless splatters, others ominous hand prints that hint at foul violence in the distant past. She is as beautiful as she is insubstantial, with wisps of ghostly mist rising off her transparent form.
The Ghost Dancer never speaks. Dark bruises on her neck could indicate that she lost the capacity in whatever violent act ended her corporeal life, but the details of that event remain a mystery. She does communicate, however, through her expressive and haunting dances. Unfortunately, to view such a dance usually indicates that the Ghost Dancer has marked the audience – and those so marked rarely live long enough to tell others what they saw.
Hypnos:
Hypnos is sleep personified, the one member of the Nightmare Court who never leaves his bed of glass. This villain favors dreams of inadequacy and frustration, seeking to destroy a dreamer’s self-esteem through endless nocturnal episodes. He also has the ability to affect the waking world through a combination of suggestion and mesmerism.
Hypnos appears as a gentleman of high station, a tall man dressed in impeccably tailored suits. His black hair and thick mustache are always perfectly trimmed and neat. A monocle connected to his vest pocket by a gold chain covers his right eye. He is always seen in eternal slumber, resting within a glass coffin, his arms folded peacefully across his chest. Only his right eye, the one behind the monocle, is ever open. Indeed, it never closes, but is instead filled with a maniacal light. Although he appears to be dead, Hypnos is not an undead creature.
Though Hypnos’s mouth never moves, his voice continuously whispers throughout his lonely tower like a chill autumn breeze. It speaks to wanderers and dreamers alike, taunting and ridiculing them while also urging them to commit terrible arts of violence.
Morpheus:
Morpheus is one of the strangest members of the Nightmare Court, a chaotic imp who loves to confuse, confound, and shock the dreamers who provide the energy to sustain him.
Morpheus is a red-skinned, powerfully built male with dark hair and eyes, a thin mustache, and pointed ears. He adorns himself in expensive, formal suits, though only from the waist up. His lower body tapers off into vaporous trails.
Due to his connection to the dream plane, Morpheus can speak any language he has ever come in contact with.
Mullonga:
The aboriginal witch Mullonga is one of the most active members of the Nightmare Court. She may look like an old woman who is so small as to be harmless, but she is evil and malicious. She thrives on the fear and apprehension of others.
Mullonga appears as a hunched, leathery, brown-skinned old woman dressed in animal skins and carrying a gnarled staff. Her flesh looks as if it has been parched in the hottest desert, beneath a blazing, unforgiving sun. As no visible sun shines over the Nightmare Lands, perhaps it is the pure evil that emanates from this witch that withers her flesh so.
Her connection to the dream plane gives Mullonga access to many languages, all of which are spoken with a voice as dry and brittle as a mummy's wrappings.
The Nightmare Man:
The mysterious entity known as the Nightmare Man rules over the Nightmare Court from his lair in the Grieving Cathedral. It is the Nightmare Man’s curse that gives shape to this domain and binds the rest of the Court to the land.
The Nightmare Man wears dark, tattered robes, a hood always drawn over his head. The hood’s shadows hide his face, though long wisps of silver hair spill from the dark opening. Only his hands emerge from the folds of the robes, and these appear as gnarled, pale appendages that are more skeletal than flesh. The robes are spun from the webs of dark dreamweavers, and dozens of these spider creatures crawl across their fraying surface.
The Nightmare Man can speak any language he has ever encountered in the dreams of his multitude of victims. When he speaks, his raspy voice sounds like a faint wind blowing through a dead forest of dry leaves and brittle branches. It carries with it a chill that no fire can eliminate.
The Rainbow Serpent:
The Rainbow Serpent is perhaps the most enigmatic member of the Nightmare Court simply because the creature wears a nonhumanoid form. It is a reclusive entity who sows the seeds of mistrust and suspicion among the dreamscapes it controls.
This winged serpent is only four feet long, with brilliant red scales interrupted by bands of yellow, black, and deep blue. Its eyes are full of malevolent intelligence, and its mouth seems to be curled in a perpetual smile. If dreamers remember anything about this villain, it is this leering, mocking smile.
The Rainbow Serpent can speak any language it has ever encountered in the dreams of others. It does not actually speak, but instead projects the words and ideas it wishes to communicate directly into the minds of its audience. Within these minds, the listeners are never sure what ideas well up from their own subconscious and what comes from the seditious liar with the rainbow-hued scales.
Monsters of the Nightmare Lands:
Morphs:
Gray morphs populate the dreamscapes and roam the Terrain Between (a zone in which waking reality and dreamscapes are mixed and in constant flux). They function as the supporting cast in dreams and nightmares. It is not known if they serve this function in normal dream scenes or just in the dreamscapes of the Nightmare Lands.
A gray morph’s natural form is that of a small, blank, featureless humanoid with long, gangly limbs and pale, gray flesh that is as malleable as water. In dreamscapes, gray morphs assume the form off normal people, common animals and even common objects to fill out the details of the dream. They can change form at will in a dreamscape due to the energy provided by a seed (a dreamer temporarily attached to a particular dreamscape). In the Terrain Between, however, they need to draw on the memories of living, sentient beings through physical contact.
Shadow morphs play major roles in nightmares, assuming the forms of whatever horrors haunt the recessed memories of dream seeds (that is, dreamers). Its natural form looks much like a gray morph, though it’s slightly larger, its flesh darker, and its featureless lines sharper and more frightening.
Ennui:
Ennui are greater dream spawn who serve the members of the Nightmare Court, actively controlling events occurring in dreamscapes while their masters are otherwise occupied. They can move freely across the Veil of Sleep, stepping between the waking world and the dreamscapes without trouble. Ennui are naturally wild and savage. Fear generated in dreamers by nightmares not only sustains ennui, it gives them control over their innate savagery.
An ennui appears as a large creature that can shift its form at will. In its natural form, it stands as tall as a man, has four arms, and batlike wings. Its skin is gray and featureless, able to change with fluidic ease.
Arcane Heads:
Arcane heads are the severed heads of wanderers whose physical bodies died in the Nightmare Lands, specifically the Terrain Between. The heads are then magically animated by Mullonga the aboriginal witch of the Nightmare Court. A flock of 13 arcane heads serve Mullonga, searching for physical wanderers traveling in the Nightmare Lands.
An arcane head looks much as it die in life, except that it has no body. Its eyes are empty and white, and a supernatural glow surrounds it. Its teeth are much sharper than those of a normal human, and its neck has been sewn shut where it was severed from its body. An arcane head moves through the power of magical flight, tracing mystical patterns in the air as it travels. When the mystic patterns of several heads are combined in a specific way, a portal opens through which Mullonga may travel to reach her ghastly servants.
The only sounds made by an arcane head are low, pathetic moans and the grinding of sharp teeth. It appears they can communicate with Mullonga in some way, but they do not speak or otherwise talk to their victims.
Dreamweavers:
Dreamweavers spin the stuff of dreams and nightmares, giving shape and substance to the scenes inside the dreamscapes. These spiderlike creatures come in two varieties: light-colored dream spinners and dark weavers, who create the tapestries of nightmare.
Dreamweavers are spiders no bigger than 6 inches in diameter. The type that weaves beautiful silken dreams has a light-colored body, usually the same color as the morning sky. The type that weaves nightmare webs has a sleek body as dark as the deepest night. Both types have matching striped legs.
Mandalain, the Night Terror:
The night terror called Mandalain has two distinct forms. Both of these forms have ghostly qualities. The first form is that of a beautiful young woman with long brown hair and dressed in a nurse’s uniform. This is how the real Mandalain looked in life. The second form is more terrifying. Her uniform becomes stained and tattered. Her hair turns wild and white streaks appear within it. Her eyes, once big and expressive, become empty pools of shadow. Her long, slender fingers take on the most dramatic change; they become surgical scalpels.
This Mandalain isn’t the ghost of the real nurse. This is a night terror constructed by the Nightmare Man from the images in Dr. Illhousen’s nightmares. The creature’s sole purpose is to enter the waking world and torment Illhousen as it haunts his clinic.
The night terror never speaks, but it sometimes screams with such pain and agony that it sounds like Mandalain is being killed again.
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