Phoenix

In popular legend the phoenix stands for life beyond death and for a universe without end. Tradition calls it unique, though some insist a whole race of them lives in the far reaches of the East. It looks like a huge eagle with a twenty-foot wingspan, and its gold and crimson feathers seem to blaze. It feeds not on fruit or flowers but on frankincense and other fragrant gums. Every five hundred years it burns itself up, and a new phoenix rises by magic from the ashes.

Chiron the Wise claimed in his Natural History to have seen a young phoenix, escorted by lesser birds like a king by courtiers, carrying a nest of leaves, cinnamon, spikenard and myrrh that held its parent's ashes sealed in a myrrh egg; locals called the sight an omen of great good luck. Most authorities doubt him, since a phoenix had been reliably seen only 80 years earlier; some call his story an invention borrowed from that earlier visit, others take it as proof that more than one bird exists.

Alchemists value the plumage, and expeditions go east hoping for a feather or two; the best place to look is wherever myrrh or frankincense is plentiful. Scholars who believe in a race of phoenixes fear it will dwindle away, since each bird must live its full span before producing a single offspring.

A phoenix can burst into flame whenever it wishes, dealing 2-24 damage to everything within 10 feet, and neither fire nor heat can hurt it. It is clever enough to keep away from people, who sometimes hunt it for its plumage: a single feather may fetch up to 200 gold pieces, and one bird can yield 1-6 dozen worth selling.