Night Man

When it comes to the Pale Men, they place a lot of stock in prophecy, as is the wont of their god, the White Raven.
  But the Raven is not the only beast of prophecy the tribes of the Mourning Plateau pay their respects to. There is a creature that the tribes believe is responsible for the very existence of the night and the human need for sleep. This figure of myth is known simply as the Night Man, and is the subject of fearful reverence among the Pale Men and investigative curiosity among others.
 

Appearance & Origins

As long as historians and the shamans of the Pale Men can remember, the Night Man has been a part of the mythos of the humans of old. It is believed that it was the personification of evil before the events of the Godfall introduced a very real representation of evil to the world in the form of the Adversary.
  The way it is described by the indigenous peoples of the Mourning Plateau, the Night Man is a tall, gaunt figure clad in robes of purest darkness and on its featureless head it wears a crown of stolen stars. It is said to harbor the night itself inside its robes, and that nightfall each day is a result of the Night Man releasing that darkness to spite the day.
  It is not unusual for there to be a carved idol or fetish depicting the Night Man in the yurts of the Pale Men, as they believe that acknowledgment of it might double as appeasement.  

Myth

The tales tell that, once the Night Man has released the darkness within its robes, it can move freely around the world and find those who are about to fall asleep. From them, the Night Man plucks their soul and attaches it on silken threads it tucks inside its robe. Once taken in such a manner, the soul of the sleeping individual must be on its best behavior until dawn or the Night Man might choose to torment them with nightmares, or in the worst case it might choose to keep them, never returning the soul to the slumbering body.
  It is probable that the Night Man is a deification of mortal fear and anxiety in the face of the dark and the vulnerability that one is exposed to while sleeping. There are, however, those who believe there is more to the myth than that.
  Of particular note to folklorists is the parallels one could draw to Xi'pthara, the supposed first Arachnitha who rose from a primordial darkness and spun threads upon which they laid the foundations of their people. It is also notable because the Arachnitha have shared the Mourning Plateau with the Pale Men for generations. Admittedly, these are very strenuous connections, but some are convinced by them.
  It is also a widely held notion that the Night Man is simply another, earlier permutation of Gloamwing, the darker side of the White Raven.   Another interpretation that is especially favored by the mages and researchers of the Enlightened Few, is that the Night Man is a particularly persistent Possible which seeks entry into Nascindor through becoming a curiosity that people think and talk about. Due to this, it has been deemed a memetic threat by the mages of Pluthem and is a banned topic of discussion in the House of Learning.
 

A Picture of Me

Those who are convinced that the Night Man is a Possible, and who are not afraid of the potential repercussions of discussing the matter, believe that it might have been the Night Man who inspired the ill-fated creation of Larion Voskar's final piece, A Picture of Me, in an effort to create itself a passage into Nascindor.
  However, if this was the case, it seems likely that something went awry as the painting remains immured within the backroom of the Vintage Vault.