A Harpy Soldier from Harps-Îzil, serving the Dark Legion of Demons, from the army of the Succubus Pukunta during the demon-Car'Had War
H A R P Y, harpeia
Race: Harpy
Class: Car'Harid
Species: Beast People
Other names: Harpía, Arpía, ἅρπυια, harpyia, hárpuja, harpeia, harpazein, Snatchers, Siren, Wind Elf, Flying goblin, Virgin Eagle, Wind demon.
Allegiance: Dark Legion of Demons
A harpy was a winged beast-people from the family of the Car'Harid (same family as the Great Eagles, gryphs, hipogryphs and Car'Haad)
Description[]
Harpies resemble a cross between a elf, goblinoid or human and a hunting bird, with long talons for feet and large graceful wings for arms. They have a range of tan to brown or black skin, with skin that sometimes has a violet or reddish tone. They have feathers with a similar wide range. They were oviparous and carnivorous, and they could be found in Aels, Zarhuy, Ushaenor and western Hieyoks. Vicious and predatory by nature, harpies are the bane of all other life in the areas where they take root, attacking and eating the travelers in the mountains or shores near the cliffs where they build their nests.
Normally, for every fifty female harpies or so, there was only one male, that they procured to keep safe in their nests, from where originated the rumors that said that there existed only female harpies -explaining names as "virgin eagles"-.
The Harpies were very territorial, and they lived normally in flocks of about 50 to 60 members, and most of them used just some very rustic stone and bone tools: However other harpy flocks, in contact with other peoples, like the ones who served the Dark Legion of Demons, learned to work the copper, bronze and iron, and even the ability to build in stone, and these more organized flocks quickly became small kingdoms, like Härps-Izil in the corridors of Wind.
Enemies, Ecology and Types of Harpies[]
The mortal enemies of the harpies were other flocks of Harpies, the Gryphon-kin, the Car’Hads, and the Gargoyles in the air, but on land they needed to defend themselves from the ones who wanted to eat their eggs:
The Ur Dur Goblins, created by the demons, and who later escaped, left the harpies of Aels on the brink of extinction as they spread in the continent for eating their eggs, so the harpies needed to live on cliffs and mountains impossible to climb.
Some kinds of harpies were the Miriannar from the islands of Ushaenor and Aels, the blue Kiariatenn of the cliffs of Kuzuardh in the seas of Hieyoks, the Feuerhäaran from the high mountains of Ushaenor, and the Iziellen, from the Corridors of Wind in Aels.
Harpy Lore[]
Elven Legends about harpies claim that they descend from a group of elves, who were cursed as punishment by their gods. The reason of the curse vary, from sins as bestiality with birds, to try to learn to fly by challenging the gods, to be virgins who, upon their city being attacked by enemies, asked the gods to help them to escape from the fate of falling into enemy hands and be raped and enslaved, and so, were given wings to fly.
To the Car'Had -Gryphon/Eagle people- legends, harpies where harmful birds, possessed by bad spirits who turned them into monsters, that they had the divine command to hunt down.
Harpy legends in their own accord, make them descendants of the Great Eagle--the Sun and the Great Owl--the Moon, conceived in the wind as the firstborn children, before the sky, sea and earth were separated from their loving embrace by gods jealous of their love.
Hesiod calls them two "lovely-haired" creatures, and pottery art depicting the harpies featured beautiful women with wings. Harpies as ugly winged bird-women, e.g. in Aeschylus' The Eumenides (line 50) are a late development, due to a confusion with the Sirens. Dumian and Unlic writers detailed their ugliness. They were usually seen as the personifications of the destructive nature of wind.
The Harpies in the Dark Legion[]
Since before historic times, due their predatory nature, harpies had been at odds with several other races, and while sometimes some harpy flocks did alliances with other beast-folk, they were constantly an enemy of peoples like the elves.
Their animosity towards elves, and later their attacks on humans and kanovs -and their ability to fly- interested the demons after they appeared, and they tried to gain such an ally for their own purposes.
The Harpies in the dark legion sometimes served as agents of punishment who abducted people and tortured them on their way to Demon fortresses, and they were vicious, cruel and violent. They lived on the islands of the seas of Tok, Caritz and Hieyokscream.
However, the incorporation of larger flocks of Harpies to the Dark Legion of Demons, aside of reporting a very useful edge to the legions of the black banner, added a new dimension to combat -the sky-... and as well, predisposed the traditional enemies of the Harpy bird-people, the Car'Haad grypho-people, against the Dark Legion of Demons.
That's why there was fought the Car'Haad-Demon war (2183-2188 a.a.H)
During this war, Succubus General Pukunta was in charge to siege and conquer the Skyhalls, the capitol and fortress of the gryphon people, the Car’Had, after their failed assault on the dark tower of Dol-Nur, in their war against the demons.
The army of Pukunta was composed of harpies, gargoyles, flying demons and dragons, around the number of 50.000 of them against 6.000 Car’Had defending their fortress, but with the death of their commander during an assault, her army disbanded.
Normally, the harpies in flight, couldn't use most of the available armors and equipment. However, the Harpies of the Dark Legion were equipped with spider-silk Drow-made armors, very light to not bother and weigh down the harpies when fighting, and the demons sometimes provided them with weapons, but the harpies preferred to fight using their legs and natural talons instead.