A Bestiary of Enchanted England is not your typical RPG bestiary. It’s based on authentic folk tales and Renaissance writings, filled with lore and plot hooks. Coming to Kickstarter in May 2022.

Centuries ago, the wicked queen Anura fell prey to her own curse, and became a huge, immortal toad. By the Reign she has grown to the size of a horse. Local folklore tells maidens to avoid her seashore, as she spits poison at them, in envy of their beauty. What it carefully does not say is that the network of the queen's servants has also persevered. She commands many of the local criminals, and her lieutenants are witches that she has trained.

Anura's history is well known in Bamburgh and its surrounds. It is repeated in local lore as the ballad of The laidly worm of Spindleston Heugh. "Laidly" is a dialect word meaning "loathsome." Before it was bought into Northumberland, Bamburgh was a small kingdom on the Scottish border. The king was widowed and remarried. On returning home with a new wife, the king introduced his daughter Isobel as "the finest of women" which made her new stepmother so envious she turned Isobel into a dragon. When Isobel's brother, Wynd, returned from the Crusades he turned the spell back upon Anura, cursing her to be a toad until the end of the world.

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Text by Timothy Ferguson. Illustration by Angela Taylor. A Bestiary of Enchanted England coming to Kickstarter in May 2022.