Yellow Bride

A witch who bears the child of Diaboli.

The Infernal Cycle

The flow of infernum follows a long, ancient cycle that is in conflict with celestial essences. Its rise and fall is like a very slow heartbeat, the pulse of perdition and pain. Communing with it requires demonological rites.

Diaboli's Vessel

To become a yellow bride, one must perform a rite of blood sacrifice to Diaboli, calling upon him, using brutal violence and the invocation of one's own damnation, offering oneself or another up to his power. Once they have summoned him, he sends an image of himself to terrify and torment them. This image will remain in their minds until they are ovulating, at which time, he will come to them at night and plant his seed within them.

Maiden, Mother, Crone

A yellow bride follows the same stages as a common witch, but it is changes based on events in her life:

• Yellow virgin: all yellow brides must never have had another's seed within them before they are impregnated by Diaboli. If they have, intercourse with him will kill them. Yellow virgins are those who have performed the rite but not yet been impregnated. At this time, they are in their maiden phase and very weak, but they do have certain powers, such as sensing good and evil.
• Yellow bride: once impregnated, a yellow bride has a gestation period during which they carry the child of Diaboli himself, bearing a cambion of significant power. During this time, they are extremely powerful as mothers. They have their full might during this phase.
• Queen of Hell: most yellow brides die during childbirth, but about one in a thousand survive. If they suckle their child after this, they become a Queen of Hell and gain immense infernal powers, eventually becoming a demon. If they do not suckle their child, they wither away and die anyway.

Diaboli's Ascension

Counter to other witches, yellow brides take power not from their matriarchal ancestors but from the rise of Diaboli, which coincided with the Fall.

Witchcraft

The practice of witchcraft is a series of rituals, dedications, and traditions that allow yellow brides to access the flow and cycles of infernum. The practices include sacrifices to Diaboli or other demons. These rituals vary by culture, but usually involve a set of symbolic materials, a giving of blood, and either incantations or readings from ancient texts.

Breeding Pits

Yellow brides do not gather in covens of threes, but in mass breeding pits where other yellow brides dwell and fight for sustenance. Those who band together do so by following the strongest among them for survival.

Willing and Unwilling

Most yellow brides are innocent women captured and sacrificed to Diaboli. The followers of Diaboli do not care about them and assume they will die after the cambion is born. They take the cambions and use them as puppets in political games, raise them as powerful nobles or capitalists, or bind them into demonic objects. The rare person who willingly becomes a yellow bride is usually an extremely ambitious, ruthless, powerful woman or womb-bearing person who believes they can become a Queen of Hell.

Powers

Yellow brides draw infernum from the sacrificial rite they endure and then the demonic child within them. This gives them direct access to infernum, costing them their souls.

Infernal Powers

Common infernal spells include

• Control minor demons: a simple blood ritual will give them power over weak demons, essentially a major PRS bonus to commanding them.
• Acidic blood: if they drink soured milk, their blood will become acid and any who cut them will burn.
• Grow fangs/claws: they can do this at will if they believe their child is in danger.
• Terrifying visage: if they mark a talisman with their blood, they will have a visage that intimidates targets.
• Soulbreaking shriek: if they rip their voice box open, it will bleed but not be damaged such that they cannot use it, allowing them to shriek so horribly the souls of those who hear it will break.
• Hellfire aura: they can summon an aura of burning infernum by complex incantation.

Protections

Yellow brides can invoke protection from celestial, aetherial, or poioumenonic energies by drawing circles of blood or using potent sigils or simple formulas for spells. The rites vary depending on the energy they seek to block.

Evil Eye

The evil eye of a yellow bride feels like a slap when they wield it. Those afflicted by it are cursed with terrible traumas that follow them, horrific acts of murder and brutality happening to those they love.

Healing

Yellow brides can use their breath to give temporary health to someone in exchange for eroding their soul, which feeds the unborn child.

Emotion Spells

Yellow brides can draw emotional resonance from others through talismans marked with demonic sigils, twisting their emotions and driving them to commit atrocious acts.

Devouring

Yellow brides feed their babies through acts of cannibalism, which is enabled and empowerd by dedicating each kill to Diaboli, who allows them to eat the souls along with the bodies.

Binding and Unbinding

Yellow brides can bind a person, place, or thing to a cycle. This is done via ritual involving something belonging to the target. When the target is bound to something, it will be affected by the cycle of it. They can only bind to an infernal cycle, though it can be any infernal essence. Unbinding is done by using infernum's ability to sever and break. It always involves blood.

Familiars

A yellow bride may be bound in their initial rite to an infernal beast that will serve as Diaboli's spy and agent, but also as a protector of the pregnant bride. It will betray her as soon as the child is born.

Soulsending

Yellow brides can repulse the souls of others, forcing them out of living bodies, by invoking a powerful infernal ritual known as the Rite of Soulsending. This involves burning something owned by the person in hellfire and invoking the True Names of six powerful demon lords.

Transformations

A Queen of Hell gains the power to transform into infernal animals after she survives birthing her child.

Spells

Yellow brides favor incantations and rituals for their spells, usually involving blood sacrifices.

Inventory

Yellow brides can use any object associated with witchcraft if it is compatible with infernum, but they have three special objects:

• Yellow dresses: all yellow brides wear yellow dresses while they are pregnant in order to show Diaboli their devotion. These dresses are stained with blood and infernal seed, which makes them powerful protection from celestial energies.
• Simulcra poppets: they often use poppets shaped like their targets and pinned with something owned by their target in order to cause horrible things to happen to them.
• Infernal mirror: yellow brides keep a mirror that shows the child within them growing when they look into it. It absorbs the souls of others who look into it if they are caught in their own gaze.

Variations

Variations of yellow brides are purely cultural. Some have different names for Diaboli or involve different powerful demons or infernal beings, but never one that does not primarily wield infernum rather than other infernal essences.

Societal Role

Yellow brides are common throughout Ansulym, where they are kept as slaves by powerful lords who serve Diaboli or by other rich figures. They are seen as little more than vessels for the Infernal God's might. Those few who willingly become yellow brides are seen as threats to be eliminated. In other societies, they are the template for persecution of witches. They are seen as power-hungry women, godless monsters, and all witches are painted the same.

Skills

Common skills include

• Survival
• Murder

Stats

Modifiers to base of nation/species:

PRO +2
ATH +2
STR +2
AWA +3
WIL +3
STH +2
PRS -1