A Year and A Day: Annis Hags

Changeling: the Dreaming

Homebrew Rules

Character Creation Guide Download: Annis-Hags.pdf

Quoth the Annis Hag:

“I swear on the dreaming, that cold iron will eat your flesh, and that salt tears will stain your freehold, and winter’s chill will brittle your bones, and you will never sing again. Call me, a witch again, and see what happens.”

Kith Excerpt:

Not evil by any stretch, nor even Unseelie really, the Annis are a harshly stark reality in contrast to the rest of the World’s Changelings. The other Fae Creatures of the Dreaming realms either conveniently overlook the Annis or actively despise them. This is enough so that the Annis are relegated to hag status, despite youth or beauty that accompanies their childers. Yet this relegation does ring with a certain amount of truth. Neither Kithain or Thallain, nor Gallain or Adhene, the Annis are something else entirely.

An all-female Wicht (Kith) which is the reason for their epithet of hagges, the Annis bear their derision with a weary stoicism. While not ugly as most hagges are regarded, the Annis are severe in both appearance and nature. Yet this severe nature is due to the cold truth of their existence, and this severe appearance a reflection of their reality. In their Àrd years, they can become every bit the hagges of legend.

They are the reverse of the jovial springtime Dreaming paradigm. A raw manifestation of the coming winter and all the bitter heartache and emptiness left in the wake. They are cold iron and bone-numbing sadness: a constant reminder that the realms of the changeling are dualistic, and all good things must come to an end.

Flavor

“How now, you secret, black, and midnight hagges! What is’t you do? A deed without a name.”
The Gentleman’s Magazine – The Tale of Telerophon