Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine is an anthology of creatures of myth and legend drawn from the folklore of Ukraine. Published by Society of Mythic Ukraine, based on an earlier project, Maloviy, which combined descriptions and details of these famous creatures with excellent artwork. This is continued in this Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine. The volume may only be a very slim one at just seventy-four pages and just twenty-seven entries, but it is superbly illustrated. Each is given a detailed write-up that runs to two or three pages which includes an excerpt from the Society’s library, a description, the creature’s characteristics, a full list of its magical powers—and all of them have this list, combat stats, the ritual associated with the creature, and examples of conflicts, plus a secret associated with the creature. The rituals are typically commonly held means of warding against the creature, whilst the conflict examples are actually story hooks that the Game Master can develop into mysteries of her own. There are three such conflicts per entry, giving her a total of eighty-one to play with! However, the creature entries in Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine do differ from those in the core rulebook. This difference is the inclusion of specific examples of Enchantments, Curses, and Trollcraft that a creature might employ. These are not normally listed in Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying, but are included here to make the use of each creature by the Game Master that much easier.
The collection opens with Bezdonnyk, which lives at the bottom of abysses and chasms where there is a bottomless lake or stream. It cannot stray from these locations because it represents the body of a suicide victim never found there and so never buried. When confronted, it might cause blindness or Christian symbols to shatter, or it might bestow the Gaze of the Abyss and magical power as well as knowledge of an enchantment or curse. The conflicts include looking for a missing, often bullied boy, removing the Sight from a boy who believed he has been cursed by a Bezdonnyk, and a village which secretly makes sacrifices to a Bezdonnyk to ensure its nearby springs grant healing. The grim nature of the entries in Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine continues with the Bohynka, an evil spirit born from the deaths of women who died giving birth, committed suicide, or aborted their babies, as well as from the deaths of betrothed girls who died before their weddings. She stalks pregnant women and women with newborns, stealing the babies before they are baptised and leaving behind monsters in their cradles. The stolen child is then twisted into an evil spirit. If that is not enough, Bezdonnyk also strangle people in their sleep, frighten and attack cattle, drive horses away, and devastate pastures. She appears as either an ugly old crone or a pale girl with long black hair. The conflicts include a village where the inhabitants cannot sleep feeling as if they are being strangled and a priest summoned to help was found strangled dead, a village where a new mother is being driven mad because she feels that her child is not hers, and a Bohynka who has returned to enact its revenge on those who drove her to suicide.
Other entries include the Chort, an evil spirit that is the cause of most misfortunes in the world. Cunning, wicked, insidious, and dangerous, it can inflict illness and bad luck to both people and livestock, incite people to commit evil deeds, tempt them to sell their souls to it in return for magical powers, and wilt fields and crops. A Chort is humanoid with animal features—hairy with horns, donkey ears and tails, a pig snout, and hooves—and always dresses in shades of red, typically fancy boots, a hat and a coat. The Nichnytsia is an evil night spirit that appears as a pale woman with long, dishevelled hair, bulging eyes, and a mouth twisted in terror, as well as gnarled, bony hands with long nails, dressed in a white nightdress so long that she looks like she is floating. Either the restless soul of a girl who suffered an unnatural death, a witch, or of someone who died in terrible agony or grief, she lives by day in nearby chasms, but at night sneaks into houses to pick first on children, sending nightmares, pinching and tickling, and feeding them a foul yellow milk which causes a child to be sick. She can also inflict insomnia or a lethargic sleep in which the sleeper has terrible nightmares. The Pesyholov is more typically monstrous, a wolf-headed humanoid with a single eye, believed to be descended from man-eating giants, a practice it keeps today, keeping its victims in pits, fattening them up until they are ready to eat!
Not all of the creatures or spirits in Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine are malevolent. For example, the Brodnytsia, which looks like a pretty girl with thick black braids, builds and protects fords across rivers and swamps so that people can cross them in safety as well protecting children who come too close to the water. This kindly spirit lives with beavers in their dams and will also protect places and people nearby, breaking damns to unleash the held back waters on fires or invaders! She can detect evil doers or those up to no good and lead them into whirlpools where they will drown. Since the Brodnytsia is a kindly spirit, conflicts associated with her involve things that have been done or anger her. The three include looking for the missing wife and brother of a famous hunter and tanner, who unfortunately has annoyed a Brodnytsia by hunting her beaver living companions; searching for a missing troupe of performing artists; and discovering why the dams and fords near a village keep breaking and the area flooding despite the villagers making good repairs.
Khukha are cute and fluffy nature spirits found in fields, forests, steppes, and caves, their forest types often waking with an incredible noise under the canopy that resembles knocking, squeaking, purring, and grunting. They do help those trouble and warn about the dangers in a forest, though some do see them as evil and vengeful. The Krynytsia is the spirit of the well or water spring, who ensures that the weather is good for the harvest and the fertility of the land. When she appears, it is as a young woman of great beauty with long, flowing blond braids. The better maintained her well or spring is, the better the weather and the better the harvests, and the more beautiful she is, but if neglected, the waters will stagnate, and the village and its surrounds will be beset with drought and evil spirits, the latter inflicting misfortune, illness, and disasters.
One of the stranger creatures in the bestiary is the Skarbnyk. Only appearing as a set of floating red eyes, the Skarbnyk guards hidden treasure, but only evil treasure that has been gained through theft, betrayal, or pacts with wicked spirits. The Skarbnyk will do this in return for the owner’s soul when he dies and if anyone does try to steal it, the treasure will turn into potsherds or snakes! However, the Skarbnyk will allow a swap to take place if the thief is willing to give up his soul. The Spryiia is the spirit of a person’s skill or talent which normally dies with the person, but it can be passed on to a child at birth, this being indicated by a birthmark. The Spryiia appreciates hard work and so will leave a person if he becomes too lazy. Mechanically, the increase in the skill is represented by a magical gift that increases a skill by two. The Zharook is either a household spirit or a god of fire that resides in the stove. This many-headed, many-eyed serpent can also be vengeful if it or the stove is shown disrespect and will set fires in the house. It can also make people gossip because it enjoys talking about rumours and news between its various heads!
Physically, Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine is a lovely looking book. The artwork is rich, wonderfully bringing its entries to life. The writing is slightly rough in places and it does need another edit. However, it would be churlish to grumble too much about this, given that the book is for a good cause and how good the book looks otherwise.
There are some common themes running through Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine, such as girls and women having suffered terrible deaths, spirits protecting streams, wells, or swamps, and so on, but this countered by the strangeness of other entries such as the Zharook or Skarbnyk. Yet all of the entries in the bestiary are going to be strange to most of the audience for it, the folklore and stories of creatures and monsters native to Ukraine having rarely travelled beyond its borders. With Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine they have, and in return, Game Masters and players of Vaesen can travel east to cross those borders and investigate mysteries new and different. Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Mythic Ukraine is an excellent introduction to Mythic Ukraine for Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying.
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