Steam & Water Mephits

Mephits!  Been a while since we had these guys.  The Bestiary tells us that steam mephits are “overconfident and brash”…which makes sense, really.  Being half composed of water, steam mephits are likely given a wide berth by true fire creatures; even if the Fire Folk aren’t directly hurt by the mephits’ scalding breath and boiling rain, they still probably don’t enjoy it.  Their reluctance likely inflates steam mephit egos to quite unreasonable sizes. 

Meanwhile it likewise makes sense that water mephits are the Plane of Water’s pranksters—acid breath, acid arrow, and stinking cloud are pretty much the Water equivalent of a joy buzzer and a stink bomb…

Water mephits find work as servants, pages, and court jesters in most Plane of Water cities, running errands for marids, undines, and tritons.  However, their natural inclination to pull pranks always bubbles to the surface.  Since they’re not that clever (Int 6) such acts usually involve simply delivering the right message into the wrong hands.  More than one marid house has gone to war (or found itself inexplicably drawn together via a hasty marriage) thanks to the meddling of a water mephit. 

Gillmen settlements are tough places—take the usual rough-and-tumble nature of any port, put it under the surface of the water (where visibility and law enforcement are both limited), and add a bunch of gill-necked mutants into the mix.  The water mephits in these quarters are just as bad—they tend to try to drown (or at least smash the water breathing potions of) any obvious air-breathers they come across.

The baths at Kitara are said to be blessed by the spirits.  That’s...technically true…if by spirits you mean a handful of shikigami, an exceedingly drunk tanuki who refuses to leave the bar on the third floor, and a gang of steam mephits.  The mephits mostly lurk in the boiler, but they’ve been known to scald anyone who complains the water isn’t hot enough.  Notable individuals include Bog, a thief—he especially likes rings—and Merwinda, who tends to get crushes on the bath’s larger patrons.  Many a fat merchant, fighter, or sumo wrestler has found the amorous steam mephit in his bath…and she refuses to take a polite “No” for an answer.

—Pathfinder Bestiary 202–203

The music was great this week!  Me…meh?  Anyway, if you like new/good music, download it.

(Music starts about three minutes into the file, so feel free to fast-forward slightly.  If the feed skips, Save As an mp3 and try listening in iTunes.  Link good till Friday, October 4, at midnight.)