[Weird Wayfarers] The Puppetress

You find yourself in a bright busy bazaar. The crowds quickly pass you by as you scan the stalls and shops for that which you seek. You see a myriad of wondrous wares but none of them are what you truly desire. With hesitation, you go deeper into the bazaar—into its winding alleyways and tight squares.

As you penetrate further the wares become even more foreign and odd. But still none are what you seek. As you delve deeper, the brightness of the bazaar gives way to seedy shadows and the cackling of the crowd slowly fades away. Soon you are engulfed in silence and twilight.

After what felt like an eternity of searching, something familiar catches your eye. You stride over to a small wooden house bathed in a small beam of sunlight. It's half demolished like every other structure in this alleyway maze, but that's not what caught your eye. It was the blue and gold noren hanging from the doorway—the ones with the dancing demons on them.

From the other side of the noren you can hear the sound of wood being carved. It causes your heart to skip a beat. You've traveled all this way but you haven't prepared yourself for what you've been told lies beyond the noren. It's too late to turn back now. You charge through the doorway and that is when you see her.

The Puppetress is a reuniter of lost souls. She uses her skill to craft human puppets and her magic to imbue them with the soul of a deceased. This makes her popular with widows, next of kin, and all of us left behind.

The process of crafting a puppet takes d4+2 weeks for the puppetress. (The visage must be exact for the magic to work!). She charges 4d6x100sp for this process and to cast Imbue Soul.

The Puppetress is a 9th level magic-user. She knows 1d8, 1d6, 1d6, and 1d4 spells of first, second, third, and fourth levels respectively. Her only fifth level spell is Imbue Soul.

Imbue Soul
Magic-User Level 5
Duration: Instantaneous
Range: 0
This spell snatches a fragment of the soul from beyond and places it in a mortal vessel, be a puppet, statue, or bowl of soup. However, the spell rends the soul, leaving the vessel...not quite right.

The vessel will talk, feel, and act as its soul did when it was inside its living vessel. But it will be marred by bouts of seizures, demonic intrusions, etc. As a result the vessel will have one half of the HD, abilities, and skills that it had in life.

The caster of this spell must possess an article that belonged to the soul in life. This spell must be cast daily on that article for no less than d4 weeks. This allows the caster to meditate and locate the soul in the afterlife. Afterwards the soul may be retrieved and placed in its new vessel.