Skull of Secrets (Priest Spell)

This spell creates the intangible image of a floating skull trailing black flames. The skull appears to have eyes of flame, but neither its eyes nor its tail of flames are real, and they cannot burn or harm anything. It floats within a 20-foot-diameter sphere, drifting about at MV 18 (A). Dispel magic destroys it, but it cannot otherwise be touched or harmed.
The skull delivers a verbal message of 22 words or fewer (which cannot be an incantation that launches a spell) and spits a tongue of real flame. The message to be spoken is spoken by the caster when the spell is cast. The flame is a cone of magical fire 1-foot in diameter at its wide end and 10 feet in length, whose touch deals 3d4 points of damage to exposed flesh and readily ignites all flammables.
Both the message-speaking and the fiery "breath" occur when complex and specific conditions set during the casting are fulfilled; these trigger conditions are similar to those set up by wizards in the casting of magic mouth spells. The message and the flame can have the same or a quite different set of fulfillment conditions. When both actions are performed, the image of the skull slowly fades away.
This spell is usually employed to ignite funerary pyres and to set afire foes of the faith; its visible form serves to dupe the faithful into thinking that Cyric is personally manifest at an event.
Notes: Granted by the evil god Cyric of the Forgotten Realms setting.
Category:Priest Spells
Category:Spells from Faiths & Avatars
Category:Spells