A brief history of Beedel’s pact with Dunstrand, by Eric Swanson
In the first adventure by this group – another iteration of the Dunstrand Faire – Beedel stumbled upon a young woman at night in the noble hunting forest. (There was a search on – I can’t find my notes and don’t remember who/what was missing – and a random roll determined it was Beedel who met her.) She had long gold hair and piercing blue eyes, and was dressed in some kind of green, leaf patterned, elf-ish shift. From the module:
“there is legend of a female spirit in the noble hunting forest near the keep. She hasn’t appeared in recent memory (no one living can recall an incident, but Fernius the scribe knows the details of the legend). It is said she will appear to a lone person who might be wandering near the woods – she has never appeared to a group. She also only appears the day before, of, and after a full moon. It is said that a few strands of her hair harbor powerful magic. The hair can not be taken, only given. If anyone manages to contact her and ask for a lock of hair, she will offer it in trade: “you must give your love to me”. This seems like a good deal, but any character that takes her up on the deal will find afterwards that they did, in fact, give her their love: all of it, and they aren’t romantically desirous of anyone else after that.”
Beedel followed her to a grotto (that no one has found before or since) and did in fact “give his love to her”. He essentially “married” the land. When word got out that he’d met the spirit of the woods he became something of a local legend among the people of Dunstrand city.
This started Beedel’s initial bond to Dunstrand and its resident spirit. He gained the following benefits: +1 all Survival and Athletics checks in Dunstrand/on Dunstrand lands; each day in Dunstrand can gain 1 use of Wonderment (apply proficiency bonus to any single check); +2 Lore for any flora and fauna of Dunstrand; +2 recognize any druidic sign while in Dunstrand.
Later, when he multiclassed into druid his bond deepened – his druid power is something akin to a warlock pact. Here’s the description of how it went down in the ‘Afon Ddu’ module:
“The party needs to camp one night on the trip to Athlapoole and finds a good spot (‘prospect and refuge’) near a copse of mixed trees – oak, holly, beech, etc. Beedel is unable to relax or settle down for the evening, and shortly “You feel that something in the nearby copse is amiss, and is calling to you. It’s like a burr in your boot that keeps digging into your skin.” Upon entering the copse he finds a small oak tree (about eight feet tall) that’s being strangled by vines. Oak being a sacred tree, and particularly sacred to the Vale and Nandhe, he knows this must be healed. “Beedel, you feel something different about this moment – you feel energy in the earth beneath your feet and know instinctively that you can harness the magic of the land itself to draw off the choking vines and heal the oak. Looking around you spot mistletoe growing – in fact in your vision it’s glowing in the dusk.” (If Tazia is here she can see the draw of the land, and the tree, working on Beedel.) Taking a sprig of the mistletoe, you kneel before the stricken oak, close your eyes, and let your mind sink into the earth – letting go of control. You begin quietly chanting in a tongue no one understands; and as you do, the vines unwind themselves from the oak and crawl across the ground to climb old deadwood.” Beedel has used a spell (cantrip) for the first time – Druidcraft.
The oak leaves ‘unwither’ and the tree straightens itself; from somewhere you hear a sound of relief from pain (‘ahhhhhh’) and words spoken in sylvan, for those who understand it, “Thank you”. Beedel falls to the ground moaning, then screaming and writhing in pain. “You feel a prickling and burning all over your torso and legs, pain around the crown of your head and ears, and a terrible pain in your groin (like being kicked repeatedly). You writhe, claw and grasp at your body.” A green light is visible coming out of the ground and moving over his body. The grass and plants within the light wiggle about and grow before your eyes.
After about half a minute Beedel begins to calm, then by the end of another very long minute the pain is over. Passive perception (15): His body is somewhat transformed, though not obviously; he has much more hair on his torso and legs (not like animal fur, but like an extremely hirsute man); along the sides of his head, under his hair at the crown, small ridges of horn – reminiscent of a rams’ horns – have come out; he ears have developed a minor pointedness; and other ‘satyr-like reproductive traits’. None of this is obvious to anyone, though particularly aware observers will only notice that his beard or stubble (or however he wears it) is quite a bit thicker and darker than it was.
Beedel is exhausted by this, and feels the lingering effects of physical shock and trauma, including aches in all the places transformations took place. (He’s at ½ of full hit points. DC15 wisdom check to immediately recover 5 HP.) He can feel that some of his prowess as a warrior has left him, but he’s also imbued with new abilities, able to draw on the magic of the land itself. (Fighter level reduced by one, druid level one replaces it.)“
So to be clear, there’s nothing obviously ‘faunlike’ about Beedel. If you look closely you might notice his ears are a little more pointed than a typical human, and you can feel the ridges of vestigial horns under his hair, but in general he just looks like a hairy fella. The magic at work here is primal and very ancient, and his pact with that magic has slightly transformed his body to reflect a more ancient world.
The upshot of all this is that Nandhe uses him as a physical conduit to the people of Dunstrand; one facet is that Beedel is a powerful “fertility aspect” figure for her. Children fathered by him are literally bonded to the land itself, and Nandhe makes sure fathering them is a regular option. To clarify, while he no longer has any romantic inclination to marry or have an emotional bond, child bearing age women of Dunstrand are drawn – powerfully – to him and (at the player’s option) he’s happy to oblige.
If you think about all this in the context of 1st millennium BC celtic druids, earth mother, sex magick, fertility ritual, etc – you’re getting the picture.
For the original motivation for all this, listen to ‘Forest of Blue’ from the Paperboys first album:
https://thepaperboys.bandcamp.com/track/forest-of-blue