Lamashtu (la-MASH-tu) is the mother of monsters, devourer of infants, and source of all that is corrupted and bestial. A monstrous and terrifying deity born from the depths of madness, she is both fiendish queen and revered mother to the horrors that stalk the night. Legends say that from her womb sprang many of Golarion’s monstrous races. Although goblins and gnolls are her best-known progeny, ultimately her foul spawn number too many to count. Her dominion over beasts makes the wilderness a fearsome place, while her nightmares invade the peace of sleep. In her thoughts scream the endless dreams of the insane, and in her will lies the destruction of all things.

Lamashtu tore out her own womb and feasted upon it to gain power over the unborn, then regenerated her own flesh by consuming a thousand stolen infants. Her milk can sustain, poison, or even transform those who drink it. Lamashtu steals seed from men while they sleep and uses it to create half-breed monsters that she later sends to shame and wound their fathers. Her touch and breath cause stillbirths and infant deformities, and those who suffer it are usually plagued by nightmares.

Lamashtu’s goal is to create evil and chaos by twisting the flesh and spirit of all creatures into misshapen things that cannot stand the sight of the untainted. She is not an empire-builder or a warlord; she only wishes to corrupt mortals until the entire world is her altered brood, an enormous monstrous family devoted to her. If her world is full of warring tribes, so much the better, for it means there will always be a need for many births to replenish the ranks of the fallen. Lamashtu revels in destroying the most innocent, whether defiling their flesh or tainting their minds; to her, a nursery is a banquet. She is a fertility goddess, but while those who pray to her are more likely to survive childbirth, their offspring are inevitably tainted. Offering someone else’s newborn as a sacrifice to protect your own is a viable practice for the desperate, and many stories of “changelings” (infants stolen and replaced with wicked faeriekind) are actually Lamashtu-altered infants who appear normal and then transform overnight into monsters.]

The Mother of Monsters has dominion over all unintelligent monsters. She murdered the god Curchanus and stole his portfolio of beasts, which is why the untamed creatures of the wild consider mankind an enemy. Many strange and unique monsters stem from her whim, as she enjoys molding the flesh of radically different beasts to create new terrors. Those plagued by monsters can pray to her for assistance, and in exchange for loyalty and offerings of newborns or infants (or sometimes merely breast milk or placentas, if she is in a good mood), Lamashtu sends her minions away to prey upon unbelievers. Her name can be invoked as a charm or prayer against nightmares, but using it might draw her attention and lead to monstrous births if the invoker is not a member of her cult or doesn’t make the appropriate grisly sacrifices.

Lamashtu’s worshipers believe that purity and perfection are temporary or illusory, while corruption and flaws are the natural and final state of things. While high-minded artists and philosophers might argue that change is a dynamic agent that prevents the stagnation of civilization, the followers of the Mother of Monsters don’t care about such things and only want to bend and tear and break the blasphemous beauty they see in the world. Lamashtu’s true form is a pregnant woman with a three-eyed jackal head, taloned bird legs, and black hawk wings. The state of her pregnancy varies, but she is always visibly pregnant, and often hugely so, though this never affects her mobility. She carries two blades: one shrouded in fire, called Redlust; and the other in frost, called Chillheart. The length of each blade varies from that of a standard kukri to that of a falchion. Her voice is deep and rich, but rises to a howl when enraged, and when she screams it sounds like a lion’s roar and can be heard for miles.

When the Mother of Beasts is angry, her victims suffer painful joints, infections, or nightmares. For her worshipers, giving birth to an untainted child or one of a “prettier” race (such as a gnoll giving birth to a human or elf) is a sign of great disfavor and shame, requiring many prayers and sacrifices to atone (starting with the unwanted newborn).

Lamashtu is chaotic evil and her portfolio is madness, monsters (including wild beasts), and nightmares. Her domains are Chaos, Evil, Madness, Strength, and Trickery, and her favored weapon is the falchion—though the kukri, with its murderous implications, is also used by and is important to her faith. Her holy symbol is a three-eyed jackal’s head. Most of her clergy are clerics, many lesser humanoid clergy are adepts, a small number are rangers, and a handful are corrupted druids. She is called the Demon Queen, the Mother of Beasts, and the Demon Mother. Despite her titles, she is not the creator of the demon race as a whole, though she is served by many such fiends and herself sprung from the depths of the Abyss. Along with numerous well-known demons, she is served by seven powerful demonic sorceresses called the Seven Witches, who, in some tales, are actually her most powerful daughters.

A Lamashtan Prayer

Great is the daughter of Heaven

who tortures infants.

Her hand is a net, her embrace is death.

She is cruel, raging, angry, predatory.

A runner, a thief is the daughter of Heaven.

She touches the bellies of women in labor.

She pulls out the pregnant woman’s child.

The daughter of Heaven is one of the Gods,

her brothers,

with no child of her own.

Her head is a jackal’s head.

Her body is a mother’s body.

She roars like a lion.

She constantly howls like a demon-dog.