The party approach, now a mix of ten people, approach the gates of Vallaki. The ten people are Brume, Bogdan, Tamar, Clementine, Zach, Zach’s three retainers, Ireena, and Ismark.

Before approaching too close, Brume gives a gift to Bogdan; a pair of fingerless gloves with Continual Flame cast upon them. Brume says this is a repayment for using Bogdan’s Scroll of Remove Curse, and hopes that the gloves will be both useful and cool, since they provide light and will likely make enemies think Bogdan’s fists are literally on fire.

The fortified town is surrounded by a 20’ tall wooden palisade, the tops carved into points. Walkways behind the palisade are evident by guards patrolling on the walls. Sturdy iron gates block the dirt road from proceeding further into the town, and planted into the ground around the gates and road are wolves’ heads mounted on pikes.

Two guards, a man and woman, are behind the locked gates. The man demands that everyone who would enter must first lower their hoods and bear their heads; helmets and hoods are not allowed while entering Vallaki. “Won’t any vampires sneak in on our watch”, the guard tells them. He also asks their business while the party lower hoods, remove helmets, and follow the guards instructions.

The party state they’ve traveled from Little Barovia, and are wanting to find a safer place to live. Vallaki seems to be the best place. (NOTE: Not entirely sure what the party said, kind of winging this)

While most of the party is human, some are not. Brume can pass as one if there’s not much scrutiny, but Tamar and Clementine have some obvious half-elven features. Tamar manages to hide her ears behind her hair, but the male guard notices Clementine’s pointed ears. The male guard calls out to her, telling her she should take her friends to the Blue Water Inn past the center of town. There’s already a “slant-ear” hanging out there so she’ll feel at home there, and proceeds to open the large gates.

The female guard, upon notices the symbols of The Morninglord being worn by Brume, tells him that he might wish to visit Saint Andral’s Church on the far side of town. She also tells him that if he needs supplies, he should look to Arasek Stockyard for those.

The party enter Vallaki through the now-open gates and head towards the Arasek Stockyard. There, they meet the owners, Yelena and Gunther Arasek. Yelena tries hard to convince Zach to rent one or more storage units (playing upon his lower intelligence and vanity), and ends up making a deal with him; he gets a discount on his purchase today, but has to agree to rent a storage unit for 25g/month by end of the week. The party guy a few supplies and continue along the main thoroughfare through the town.

They come across the town square. Limp and tattered garlands decorate the homes and shops, and small painted boxes of dead flowers are mounted on the sides of many buildings. There’s are several proclamations posted for “The Wolf’s Head Jamboree” being taken down, while signs for “The Festival of the Blazing Sun” are being put up. The signs all say ‘attendance required, rain or shine’ and ‘all will be well’ upon them; they are being replaced by town guards, who are in turn directed by a very large man, Izek Strazni.

Izek is the right-hand man of Baron Vargas Vallakovich, the burgomaster of Vallaki. Izek has a monstrous right arm, demonic in appearance and clearly not human as it is capped with fingers and claws more appropriate to a monster than a man. Zach, seeing a man clearly larger than him, feels his testosterone rise up and saunts over, intending to show off his own muscles and large greatsword to Izek, who wield a similarly sized axe. Izek, unimpressed, uses his one monstrous arm and traps Zach’s sword in its sheathe, and with barely a grunt shoves Zach backwards with the sole arm. He tells the smaller Zach that he looks like a troublemaker, and the Baron likes to keep tabs on those types. Zach should report to the Baron’s residence int he morning. It didn’t feel like a request so much as an order, to be honest.

Meanwhile, the rest of the party were drawn more to noticing the three men, two women, and two boys locked into three sets of stocks at the North end of the square. Each stock is locked with a heavy iron lock, and each criminal locked up is wearing a plaster donkey head.

Tamar, asking some local children, find out that the people are punished cause they weren’t happy enough. The small child she asks proudly recites “maliciousness unhappiness” as the cause of their arrest, with only a few stutters. Tamar also has some long deep philosophical conversations with other kids. Her DM forgets the conversations. It’s okay, though, cause ALL WILL BE WELL. The party has a few grumbles about the state of the tired, wet people locked in the stocks, but they choose to not cause a scene and leave, headed towards the inn further into the city.

The Blue Water Inn has quite a crowd, several drinking and several listening to the other “slant-ear” in town,
Rictavio. Rictavio is a half-elf bard, and is entertaining people with impossible stories. He tells of a singing, man-eating plant that seems utter ridiculous, but he swears it is true. Before that he told of a previous companion in his circus acts, a female orc who could chew through thick iron chains with nothing but her teeth.

At a table away from Rictavio, three younger men sat and drank. The three, Vaz Vizorach and Nikolai and Karl Wachter) invite some of the party over. Tamar hangs back to listen to Rictavio, but most of the rest of the party go, including Ireena and Ismark, who try to remain mostly silent.

The three young men love to drink, talk, and cause mischief. The sons of nobles, bother powerful and minor, they have little else to do. While talking, Vaz realizes how much adventure and danger the party has seen, and becomes enamored of the stories. Its clear he’s envious of the adventurer’s life, and wants to “kill some bandits” himself. It’s revealed that the Wachter family is extremely rich and powerful, and basically are vying with the Baron’s Vallakovich family for most powerful in the city.

Bogdan is feeling the mischief synergy, because he uses some Ki to make Zach’s sword “talk” with a convincing illusion effect. The Paladin becomes immediately convinced that Buster, his so-large-it’s-compensating-for-something greatsword, is in fact magical.

Karl, having been drinking too much and indulging a bad idea, distracts Zach and tries to steal the “magical sword”. Zach trips him before he gets far and intimidates him, so that Karl runs away in fear. Nikolai apologizes for his brother’s behavior, and leaves to see to him and make sure he doesn’t anything foolish to himself or others.

Brume goes to talk to the innkeeper, Urwin Martikov, and arranges food and loding. He passes over the cheaper fare (boiled root veggie stew and Purple Grapemash No. 3), and opts for the better food (wolf steaks and Red Dragon Crush, a higher quality wine). He noticed that the wine barrels behind the bar were both blazoned with the same brand for “The Wizard of Wines”. He also gets three rooms with a total of ten beds put in them for everyone to sleep for the night. He starts to indicate that Ismark and Ireena were looking for safe homes, but Ismark cuts him off, keeping the Cleric from potentially saying too much to a stranger they don’t know yet.

Brume and Bogdan briefly consider going for a late-night mission to unlock the people in the stocks, but decide it would lead to punishment as they weren’t sure where to hide the people they’d free, nor why anyone wouldn’t automatically suspect the newcomers who just walked through. Instead, the party discusses what to do about Ireena and Ismark. Brume is of the mind that they’ve completed their task; the two are in Vallaki and safe, and have lodging for the night. Tamar suggests that the party (sans the two Little Barovians) scout aroud the city tomorrow and get a better feel for things. This way, they can suggest a more permanent solution. The party agrees, and goes to sleep. The next morning they pay for another day and night’s worth of lodging to be sure, before heading out to explore.

Their first destination is Saint Andral’s Church, on the far West side of town. There, they meet Father Lucian Petrovich, who is cleaning up the church. <<<some>>> After a quick talk, Father Petrovich takes Brume aside. Noticing the Cleric is a devout of The Morninglord, he asks Brume to do him a favor. The church has recently been vandalized, and a holy artifact was stolen — the bones of Saint Andral himself. The Father wants Brume to help track them down and return them.

Father Petrovich says they should start by asking Yeska, a young altar boy. Petrovich had told Yeska about the bones a few days prior, to put the boy at ease when he had nightmares of monsters coming into the church. Investigating, the party found out that Yeska in turn told Milivoj, the groundskeeper and gravedigger.

Milivoj is outside in the ground, a muscular sullen young man who packs his shovel around on his shoulder. He doesn’t agree with the Baron’s “All Will Be Well” mantra. Brume finally intimidates him, with a little bit of deceit, into admitting his act in the theft. Milivoj had told Henrik van der Voort, the local coffin maker, about the bones. A day later, Henrik had paid Milivoj a lot of gold to dig them up and bring them to him. Milivoj accepted, because needed the gold to help feed him and his family, especially his younger sister.

The adventurers go to visit Henrik at his shop. Knocking on the door yields no results, as the man inside yells “I’m closed.”. More knocking, and shouting through the locked door only lead to more and more panicked shouts of “GO AWAY!” from inside. Bogdan tries to pick the lock to the door but doesn’t get it open fast enough, so Zach kicks in the door, bashing it nearly off the hinges in his haste to get inside.

They question Henrik and find out that the coffin maker has the bones upstairs. He claims it’s not really his fault, however, as they made him do it. It turns out they are vampire spawn who’ve been living in his storage area upstairs. Henrik is clearly scared.

Bogdan sneaks up the stairs and uses his Ki powers to cast silence. He sneaks through the kitchen and into Henrik’s bedroom, and looking at the cabinet he was told about finds the hidden compartment that holds a canvas sack of bones. He returns to the party. They talk and decide to kill the vampire spawn up above.

They all go back upstairs, silence still around them. Once in the storage room they see six crates, all very obviously marked “JUNK”. They place themselves strategically, and when first crate is opened … all open at simultaneously in some sort of trap the party must have missed.

Combat ensues, with the party fighting for their very lives. It quickly becomes apparent that the vampires are taking little damage from most of the party members’ attacks, and that they are healing themselves almost as quick as the heroes damage them. Even the bones of Saint Andral had no effect on them. Things are looking dire…

Treasure:

• Bones of Saint Andral, in a lovely canvas sack

Inspiration:

• Tamar – for having more in common philosophically with human kids than human adults
• Brume – For lying to Milivoj for the greater good (and feeling bad about it after)
• Bogdan – for making Zach’s sword magical.

Brume talks to the vistani about the horses & wagons they’ve been using. They belonged to Stanimir, but the party has been making use of them. Madame Eva says that the Vistani are really protective of their wagons, and they’d rather not part with that; but because the party brought the wagon back along with news of Stanimir, she’l sell them horses at a hefty discount. The adventurers end up paying 50g for five horses. Brume also buys some fingerless gloves off of another Vistani, with plans to use them as a surprise later.

The group leave Tser Pool and head back towards Little Barovia. As they crest a hill and come back to the Ivlis River Crossroads, they see the gallows again. Last time a dead body appeared as they left, but now it is empty again; no one sees either Tamar’s corpse or a Barovian corpse.

Continuing through the Svalich Woods, just before they wold have reached the stone bridge crossing the Ivlis River, they meet a well dressed gentleman alone in the road. It looks as if he was waiting for and expecting them.

The man is Strahd von Zarovich. He asks the party to step down from their horses so they can have a polite discussion, but the party is leary and refuses. Seconds later, he asks again, and they find themselves strangely listening and stepping down from their horses. His request was very reasonable, after all. Strahd wishes to talk with them about a young girl, Ireena Kolyana. According to Strahd, Ireena belongs to him. She pledged herself to him in exchange for Strahd resurrecting her father, who’s been dead these last few days.

Brume and Tamar disagree, saying you can’t own people. Strahd chuckles at this, saying of course you can. She made a vow, willingly; would the party force her to break her own vow? Strahd tells them they need not believe him, of course; he suggests they ask Ireena, and look her deep into the eyes, and know the truth for themselves. She’ll probably deny it vocally, but her actions and demeanor thereafter should reveal the truth.

Suddenly, Strahd asks Brume to come stand next to him. Brume, weirdly out of character, cooperates. Strahd lashes out with his hand and savagely snaps Brume’s neck with one hand. Staring the the jaw-dropped party, Tamar is the first to react and as such Strahd waves a hand in her direction and casts a spell, leaving a very angry and loud chipmonk in the place where the druid was standing.

He solemnly tells the party that this was a simple demonstration. They really ought to make the correct choice about Ireena, and not do anything foolish. With that, his body disperses into mist and he disappears. Suddenly Brume, dead and collapsed onto the ground, is standing and fine, if oddly silent; some illusion had convinced the party that he had been killed when he had not. Tamar was a real-live chipmonk, however, at least for the next hour or so.

Shortly after Tamar returns to her normal form — and continues a tirade of swearing —the adventurers arrive back in Little Barovia. They see what looks to be a smoke cloud in the air, and as they approach it’s clear that it is coming from the neighborhood where the Death House once stood. They decide to investigate before seeing Ismark and Ireena.

The Death House is apparently being rebuilt, as they soon learn. The smoke cloud is actually a thick dust cloud; with no visible reason to explain why, the house is steadily forming back together from nothing. The bottom floor looks more or less intact, but there is no roof or upper stories yet. clemetine says fuck that and goes to burninate it. AGAIN.

As Clementine sets to work, Tamar notices a body collapsed in the street not far from the Death House. The body is not-quite-dead, and it’s soon revealed that it is Zack Justwelm, a paladin who bears an extremely large greatsword and a holy symbol of Lathander. Zach is from Clementine’s old adventuring party! Clementine thought she was the only one who was not eaten, but it turns out Zach was buried in a different cavity in the basement, and once the party defeated Lorgoth the Decayer, the wall of earth holding him as a prisoner slowly started falling apart.

Zach woke up tied in that cavity, and managed to get out of the basement … only to find a cloud of swirling dust. He tried to go through it to get out, but the dust choked him and he passed out. He’s missing his three retainers, younger squire-aged children who help serve him. They were left in a wagon while he explored but there’s no wagon around anymore.

Yenkin, Tamar, Bogdan, and Clementine continue to watch the Death House burn. Meanwhile, down the street, an old woman is pushing a peddler’s cart and selling what appear to be meat pies to the villagers.

- brume and zach see her sell a meat pie to one house, and in the next hand over meat pies in exchange for a small boy
- old woman is Morgy
- zach accosts her, harassing her. wants to know what she’s doing with the kid
- Morgy explains kid will work to help her make pastries
- Zach doesn’t believe her. grabs her by the throat
- Morgy goes all grandma on Zach. mind his manners, what kind of servant of the Morninglord is he. ask the boy, she says!
- boy is Lucian Jarov. says his parents asked him to go with Morgy. he doesn’t seem to mind
- Zach realises he dun fucked up. Tries to back off and aplogize
- Brume is interested in pastry. Wants to know more about it, not so much eat it. Gets charged extra – 5gp – because of Zach
- They leave Morgy alone, go back to Lucian’s house and talk to parents
- parents make a point of not inviting characters in
- explain same situation to Zach
- all this racket causes three kids (ages? names?) to come out from across street, are Zach’s retainers
- they decide to go see burgomaster’s house
- yenkin feels ill, says he’s gonna stay at inn for a while, try to hide from Jenny Greenteeth
- they get to burgomaster’s. Ismark is irate that they took so long, it’s after midday
- see a new person. not willing to invite an unknown person it, so Ismark says to wait. a few seconds later Zach gets splashed in the face with holy water
- all is good, party goes into manse
- inside is all boarded up, holy symbols everywhere. homemade pine coffin lays on floor in a side room
- its Kolyan, previous burgomaster
- Ireena says she can’t leave him there, but no one in village will help them
- villages are they’re scared of her cause of vampire bites.
- Brume (?) asks if she remembers seeing strahd. its fuzzy memories, but barely
- did she agree to go with him if he saved her father? she doesn’t remember that.
- says she does not want to belong to strahd, even if she did say she was his
- party agrees, says they’ll take her to Vallaki
- she doesn’t want to go with her father like he is. will they help bury him? villagers refuse to help because they are scared of her
- party agrees
- zach almost drops coffin on way to Church of the Sun
- they get to church, meet Father Donovich
- he says that they can dig up plot tonight, but ceremony needs to happen at dawn
- warns about ghosts at midnight. Rose shows herself and says she wants to see the ghosts
- party agrees to dig grave. rest help clean up / restore church somewhat, moving debris, boarding up holes, etc.
- takes afternoon, agree to say the night in church. party (minus NPCs) will see what ghosts are about
- eery green light aries, party sees over a hundred ghosts from a small graveyard. clear that ghosts aren’t 1-to-1 with graves
- ghosts are former adventurers. one is Sebastienne, the man who died of the poison dart trap in Death House. Rose knows him, talks to him
- party can’t hear Sebastienne, only Rose
- Rose translates after. ghosts are eternally doomed to fight Strahd. can’t escape Barovia, even after death.
- each night they get a chance to fight him in Castle Ravenloft, each night they fail
- each night they have small hope they can do it, and hope turns to dread. says Strahd loves that hope turning into despair.
- they ride out of town, across ghostly bridge that spans Tser Falls for a quicker route to castle
- party does not want to ride out of town at night, goes back to church
- next morning, have burial. Brume misquote scripture. Donavich is like “no no no, dammit, you’re doing it wrong”
- party rides out for Vallaki
- along the way, see dead body in road
- as Brume approaches, dead body stands up and shoots at Brume, with others in woods doing the same.
- its an ambush
- zach makes all the bandits tired from dodging his sword non-stop, cause he can’t hit them
- Bogdan kills a couple. whacks one into a tree.
- Tamar goes wolf-mode and gives on a killing-nibble
- After bandits are dead, realize all but one are dressed like Vistani.
- they did not attack Ismark or Ireena
- scimitars and crossbows w/ bolts if anyone wants some.
- TODO: come up with numbers and add to loot list
- arrive at gates of Vallaki

The party left the Blood on the Vine Tavern and headed across the street to
Bildrath’s Mercantile. There, the owner Bildrath shows racist trends against halflings, and within seconds of walking in Bildrath is yelling at Yenkin to get out. Suspecting the greedy half-king would be up to no good if left unsupervised, Tamar follows the rogue outside.

Brume soon finds out that Bildrath also has a mercenary outlook, because his prices are beyond exorbitant. The lack of competition and scarcity of goods means he can charge what he wants to the handful of Vistani and extremely rare adventurer who pays for his wares.

Brume wishes to head to the Church of the Sun to pay his respects to any pious villagers who are there. Along the way there, however, the party runs across a surprise. A dilapidated peasant hovel — basically, a random representative of most of the houses in Little Barovia — transforms as they walk past, becoming an open-air bazaar style shop. Inside the shop is a horrid looking creature, who introduces herself as Jenny. She’s been nicknamed Greenteeth, although she professes to have no idea why (while sporting a merry set of moss-green teeth, of course).

Jenny tells the party that she barters and haggles for magical services and sometimes magic items. She chooses to appear as she wishes, and in seemingly unnoticed by those she doesn’t want to be seen by. She’ll sell her services for hard gold coins (at a hefty markup) or also loves to peddle favor for favor.

The hag also clearly has a thing for Yenkin, who is rather vocal about not returning the sentiment. Undeterred, Jenny kept calling him ‘dearie’ and even snatched a bug out of his ear to eat it, proclaiming him to be a ‘delicious little thing’. The rest of the conversation happened with at least on other hero between Yenkin and Jenny, and not nearly enough space for the rogue’s liking.

As they were about to leave, Jenny finally took her eyes off of Yenkin – for a few seconds, anyways – and noticed the artificer Tobin with them. They chatted amongst themselves, and Tobin decided to stay to see what magics and alchemy he could learn from Jenny, and the hag herself interested in the thunder cannon carried by the dark-skinned man.

Saying their farewells and watching as the shop faded back into a decrepit house, the adventurers continued along the street to the church. Arriving, it was clear that the church — like most everything seen in Barovia so far — had seen better days. Large cracks in the wall between wooden planks left candlelight fleeing into the dim afternoon air. Inside, they could hear a man chanting through some prayers, until a high pitched scream pierced the near-silence.

The praying man was Father Grigori Donavich, the priest of the church. Gaunt and haunted with large dark bags under his eyes, Donovich was malnourished, sleep-deprived, and still zealous in his belief of the Morninglord. He was praying for his son Doru, who’d been turned into a vampire spawn a year ago. Doru was the source of the inhuman screaming coming from the basement under the church.

Father Donavich explained his son’s fate. A year ago, the Mad Mage had been rallying locals, saying that together they could defeat the devil Strahd. The mage led a group up to Castle Ravenloft and fought a battle against Strahd’s minions, prevailing and storming into the castle itself. However, eventually Strahd himself entered the fray, and the army was shattered. Few escaped with their lives, with even the Mad Mage falling off of a cliff and dying. Doru returned to Father Donavich not long after, changed into undead, and has been locked in the basement since while Donavich prays for his son’s salvation.

Brume unleashes his Radiant Soul, become more angelic in appearance, and attempts to soothe Donavich. Seeing that Brume is clearly a high ranking cleric of the Morninglord, the priest begs Brume to help his son, and has the Aasimar swear an oath to not harm his son before telling them about the trapdoor in another room that leads to the basement. The trapdoor is chained and padlocked shut.

Yenkin is wary of the basement, so he has Tamar and Bogdan stand on the trapdoor while he unlocks it, so that it can only be opened about 1 foot’s worth. The talk to Doru through the gap, who begs for food and says his evil father has imprisoned him below. He says that the reason the church is abandoned is that the town knows what his father has done. The party is unsure, so tries to see if he will eat regular food and drink, thinking a vampire would have no desire for them. Doru takes both, danged from a rope and lowered to him.

Finally Brume has the trapdoor opened. He goes down the stairs and uses Bogdan’s Scroll of Remove Curse to attempt to cure Doru, but the spell fizzles with no apparent effect. Immediately after, Brume is set upon by Doru. The prisoner — clearly a vampire spawn, despite his earlier lies — grabs Brume and bites into his neck, feeding upon the blood he so clearly desires. Brume, in a panic and fearing his own life, casts Thunderwave and knocks the spawn back before retreating. He knows he broke his oath not to harm Doru, but also feels he had no choice. As Brume stands on the trapdoor, Doru launches himself up at it, but can’t dislodge the heavily armed (and weighted) cleric. Yenkin locks it back up as the party goes back to talk with Donavich once again.

Donavich refuses to believe his son is beyond salvation, and says that Brume must not give up yet either. The Morninglord, despite not answering Donavich’s prayers, is still the only hope for Doru. The priest then begs that if the party is every near Krezk that the search for the abbot of the Abbey of Saint Markovia. Agreeing that if they get to Krezk they would try to do so, the party then left back towards the town’s center, hoping to carry on past that to Mad Mary’s home. They found her home without too much effort (since the crying inside was their clue from earlier), but no matter how much they knocked on the door they could get no response. Debating if breaking and entering was warranted, they left the boarded up house alone and sought out the burgomaster’s house instead.

The house of the burgomaster, Kolyan Indirovich, was once a small mansion, but is weary and torn down like the rest of Little Barovia. Iron gates have been forcibly twisted, with one gate fully wrenched off of its post and tossed aside. The outside of the house looks like a small battlefield, liberally scored with claw markings and blackened soot stains. The weeds around the house are overgrown, except nearer the walls of the abode; there, paw prints and human footprints mar the turf, and are littered with the broken glass of the windows. The windows are all shattered, boarded up.

Calling out at the door, a woman answers. It is Ireena Kolyana. The party tries to talk to her, but she becomes convinced they are agents of Strahd and refuses to open the door. After some failed diplomacy (and as Ireena’s yelling becomes more fearful and forceful), the party decides they need to return with Ismark Kolyanavich, so they return to the Blood on the Vine tavern.

There, Ismark is visibly annoyed that the party tried to visit his house without him. He questions the party’s motives after Bogdan answers questions out of order, starting to suspect there is something more to the group than they present. Distrustful but not yet dismissing them, he asked for the heroes to come to his house in the morning — after he’s had time to explain and calm Ireena down. They’ve caused enough damage for one day, he snarks to the group as he leaves.

Sleeping for free at the tavern (curtesy of returning Stanimir’s belongings to Alenka, Mirabel, and Sorvia), the party returns downstairs the next morning. There the three Vistani sisters ask if the group is ready to travel and see Madame Eva. It’ll be about two hours worth of travel to get to the Vistani camp. The heroes agree, their plan being to go and see Madame Eva and return by midday in order to meet Ismark at the burgomaster’s house.

They set out in two wagons, with the three sisters riding in their own and the party riding behind on Stanimir’s old wagon. Leaving Little Barovia they enter a broad meadow, and after thirty or so minutes cross the Ivlis River, over an arching stone bridge. An hour later after that they reach a crossroads with an empty gallows swinging in the wind, and a about a dozen graves nearby.

All is well, until after they pass. Suddenly, the once-empty gallows now holds a decaying body of some Barovian peasant. For some unknown reason, however, Tamar does not see the Barovian but sees her own lifeless corpse hanging in the cage. She begs to know what the other adventurers see, but when everyone but her clearly sees something different, she starts to freak out even more. This is twice that she’s seen signs of her already being dead – while very much alive, thank you.

Not long after, they round a corner and arrive at the Vistani camp, nestled against the the waters of the Tser Pool. Five tents and four more of the barrel-topped wagons loosely circle an open area in the middle, where several Vistani lounge. Horses are docked nearer the Pool’s waters. The three sisters explain that Madame Eva hates surprises, so they wish to go talk to her before the party sees her, but that the rest of the camp is open to them.

Despite being mid-morning, some Vistani are already drunk. They give the heroes wine and and sing songs. Soon, a Vistani man with an impeccably groomed goatee starts to tell stories. He introduces himself as Oleg Drazkoi, and it doesn’t take long to realize just how incredibly drunk — and yet functional — Oleg really is.

The first story story went something like this (paraphrased):

A mighty wizard came to this land over a year ago, and stood where you’re standing now. He wanted to rally the I people of Barovia against the devil Strahd. He stirred their passions, stoked their fires with the flames of revolt, and bore them up to the castle en masse. The peasant army fought the minions of strand and held their own for a time, but then the dread lord himself appeared and those who had not fallen fled. The wizard and the vampire fought each other, spells flying from the courtyards of Castle Ravenloft to the precipice a thousand feet above us. Thunder shook the mountains and rocks fell upon the great wizard, but he was not moved. Lightning split the heavens and struck the wizard, but he stood fast. But when the devil moved against him directly, the wizard’s magic met its match, and he was thrown to his death. I climbed down to find his body — hoping to find something of value, you see — but the Ivlis had already washed him away.

The second story went more like this:

There was a noble prince, many thousands of moons ago. This prince was beloved by his family and feared by his enemies. He brought peace at the edge of a sword to this valley, but found himself injured and separated from his army. We, the Vistani, found this prince and nursed him back to life. We brought him back to his army, and his family. There, the prince’s beloved brother was set to marry. It was then that the curse struck, and the prince wanted blood above all else. The curse — whatever caused it — made the noble prince become a terrible master. …. I can’t remember the rest …

As Oleg finishes his second story, Madame Eva approaches and beckons the adventurers to enter with her into her tent, a much larger affair than the other tents. Madame Eva announces that she must first uncover the heroes pasts in order to learn their futures. She holds each of their hands and turn, and as she stares at they her eyes glaze over, the pupils and irises disappearing until solid white orbs stare deep into them.

This is what she says about each:

• Bogdan
  • Child of a monastery, you have wandered far from your path. But do not fret, there are forks in the road ahead, and your curiosity will lead you back to the Sun before your days are done.
• Yenkin
  • Half a king, half a man, son of him called Short, I see you. I see your fingers itching, twitching, but know that if you so much as pocket a handful of sand in my tent, I shall curse you such that you will wish to be back in the halls of your uncle.
• Clementine
  • Daughter of Dragons, you have not yet unlocked your full power. Awaken the ghost of Argynvost and ask him to tell you more.
• Brume
  • You may not know your own past, Brume, but I do. I know of you indeed, Nelchael, “Sword of Thunder”. The Lord of Morning is not your holy father, he is more of an indulgent uncle.
• Tamar
  • Your soul smells of kobold, wild Moonthing. You do, however, wish to desire a trait known to many Vistani, though you know it not. Speak with Oleg outside after and ask about ‘his famous list’.

She then proceeds to do a reading of the Tarokka Cards.

The adventurer’s asked Madame Eva questions, especially about her intent. (other questions?!?!?) She says that she wishes the noble prince of legend restored, and not killed. She wants him to be free of his curse and back like the stories say he used to be, so that he can help all of Barovia recover. It is this desire that fuels her own actions to give aid to adventurer’s in the form of Tarokka readings.

Afterwards, Tamar goes outside to see what ‘special list’ Oleg has, and it’s a list of every swear word he’s ever heard in every language. The druid’s eyes light up.

Treasure

• I don’t think there was any.

Inspiration

• For going angel and trying to save Doru, Brume is inspired.
• For resisting Jenny Greenteeth’s adoration, Yenkin is depressed but also inspired.
• For seeing her death everywhere and starting to adapt to deal with it, Tamar is inspired

The party stands in front of the remains of Lorgoth the Decayer, a massive pile of human remains and refused once held together by dark magics. Atop the pile is the tiny bones of baby Walter, the youngest still-born bother to Rose and Thorn. The party decides that Walter’s corpse needs to be interred as well along with the rest of the family, so Brume claws his way to the top of the pile. It was nauseating work, but the cleric managed to cope and finally retrieve the small skeleton and bring it down to the others. Yenkin (controlled by the DM) has to be told not to try and dig through all of the bones to look for loot.

While heading towards the family crypts, several of the heroes notice that the constant dust and footprints over the entire basement/dungeon are missing along one corridor. They decide to return the remains before exploring further. After this, finally having a moment to breathe and relax, Clementine introduces herself to the party. She is a half-elf sorcerer, and had been part of an adventuring party that had chased werewolves to Barovia before being caught up in the Death House. Her party, except for her, had been eaten by the ghasts (Gustav and Elizabeth Durst).

While discussing the corridor emptied of dust, Bogdan decides to return up the spiral staircase to the attic, lighting his way with a torch. Once there, he notices some extremely startling changes:

• all of the windows were gone, replaced by solid walls of bricks.
• all of the doors were gone, replaced by vertically spinning scythes within the door frames, spinning fast enough to make whirring sounds
• the fireplace was pouring out thick black smoke
• the interior walls were newly cracked, with rivulets of blood pouring out from all of the cracks, making the walls damp

Choking from the smoke and frightened, Bogdan quickly dashed back into the staircase, running into Tamar leading the rest of the party upwards, having noticed Bogdan ran off without them. After explaining the changes around fits of coughing and stutters of fright, the group retreats back down to the dungeon level. After talking it over, they decide to explore the dust-free corridor before daring the even more dangerous house above.

Bogdan cleverly suggests that they should approach it from the eastward direction, so the party heads back towards the room with the table and chandelier instead of a straight-forward approach. Of course, the “door” is back in place and Bogdan moves foward to combat the mimic.

The battle was intense. Bogdan’s staff and fist both got stuck, magically adhered to the surface of the mimic within his first two strikes. While Tamar stares in disbelief — who fights with a door?!?! — Brume and Clementine unleash their spells at the mimic, showering sacred flames and magic missiles upon it. Bogdan is able to yank his hand free and retreats, abandoning his staff, while the “door” chases him with clunky movements. Clementine gets caught too close and is grabbled by the door’s tongue, pulling her closer, and survives from some fast heals by Tamar as Brume distracts it with his longsword. A few dangerous attacks
more and the mimic is defeated, nearly falling on Clementine in the process. Yenkin (again via DM) has to be yelled at by Tamar to avoid trying to drag the entire door behind him, claiming it was loot.

Resting for a short while, the party then moves into the room free of dust, where Brume finds a hidden door. The door is behind a false wall of clay, nearly rotted, and Brume has no difficulty in bashing it down. Inside is a short staircase ending at the foot of a ladder leading upwards. Brume heads up the ladder, almost falling as one rung breaks away, before reaching the underside of a barred trapdoor. Opening the door, Brume finds himself in the den in the first floor of the house, with all of the same dangers (sickle doors, blood walls, black smoke, bricked up windows) as in the attic.

Misquoting some scripture, he blesses himself and lets bold action dictate his future, charging headlong at the eastward wall separating him and his allies from the exist. Smashing through the blood-sodden wall, he lands in the foyer area with the front door in sight, only to be set upon by rats swarming from the broken wall. Unleashing a mighty wave of thunder, he scatters most of the rats before killing the rest with his sword. He yells for his party, and together they escape the Death House, all choking from the poisonous black smoke that was filling the den.

Now back in Little Barovia , the mists had retreated. They were still present, but now much more like normal fog, only thick enough to be noticed at a distance. The party welcomed the respite from the indoor gloom, even if only to return to the outdoor gloom and the land of the mists. A little over 24 hours had passed by the party’s reckoning, so they guessed it was roughly the same time of day as when they had entered. Strangely, though, the horses were still warm and did not appear to be any more hungry than normal.

Decided this house was a blight, and to save any future adventurers from it, Clementine set about lighting it on fire. Walking around the outsides of the house, she used Produce Flame over and over until the house was well and truly turning into a bonfire. (“It was totally an accident, officer, I swear.”)

All of the nearby houses look much the same. Most are boarded up. It’s gloomy enough that even though it is daytime (or whatever passes for daytime in a land this choked with mists), candles or other lights are needed indoors, yet no lights shine from within these dwellings. A few have some small sounds coming from them, but it could be a stray animal or just the boards of the houses settling, so the party keep going forward until they reach the center of town. They they find a tavern and a storefront.

They choose to go into the tavern. it has a sign in front that reads Blood on the Vine, but careful examination reveals it’s been changed from Blood of the Vine. The tavern looks like it was once a nice place … long, long ago. It’s run down and shabby now, and has very little in the way of occupants. A short, pudgy man named Arik is the barkeep, a blond man drinks alone in the corner, and three Vistani woman chat quietly among themselves.

Brume approaches Arik to buy a drink, and the man is pretty dull. He stands there, cleaning already-clean glasses, until he answers Brume’s questions with as few as words as he can. A good description for him is “plain”; he wears drab clothes, his eyes have a dull look to them, and even his voice is bland when he speaks. While ordering his drink, Brume overhears the three Vistani talking, and catches a snipper about ‘… think Madame Eva would know?’

Brume, realizing they likely of the same people as Stanimir, approaches them and asks if they knew the old man. They admit they do, and inquire as to why Brume asks. As the cleric relays the tale of their fall to wolves, the Vistani make a point of asking if it was wolves or werewolves. Tamar confirms that at least some of the wolves were werewolves. At the end of the tale, the three women introduce themselves as sisters named Alenka, Mirabel, and Sorvia.

Brume indicates that he has the spellbook of Stanimir. Sorvia, the one who had asked about the werewolves, asks if he will return it to the Vistani so that they can give it to Stanimir’s apprentice. Brume hesitates, unsure if the spellbook should really be returned to them. Alenka then says that she can prove that they knew Stanimir — his wagon has an “open secret” to his friends. Underneath the seat of the driver’s position, in a cleverly hidden false drawer, is a stash of exceptionally good Tabac. She asks the party to go with her and her sister’s outside so she can prove it.

After they all go outside, she does indeed prove that what she said was true. Upon seeing that the party was also truthful, that this is indeed Stanimir’s wagon, she offers a reward for them burying the old man and bringing the truth of the matter to his people. She hands Brume a bag of 75 gold and a spell case containing a scroll of Calm Emotions. Brume in turn hands over Stanimir’s spellbook.

After conferring with her sisters, Mirabel then asks the party to travel with them in the morning to meet Madame Eva at a camp about a few hours journey away. They offer the party free logding and drinks for as long as they wish as a further plea to come with them, as well as gratitude for honoring their dead friend Stanimir.

While this was happening, Tamar notices that a raven perched on the eaves of the tavern, watching them. Watching them intently, in a very un-raven-like behavior, now that she noticed. Casting Speak With Animals upon herself, she tried to ask the raven what it saw. The raven answered clearly, without the usual intelligence barrier most animals would have in this situation. It mocked her, refusing to answer any questions clearly. It did give a warning, however — that many animals (although not ravens) served as spies for Strahd. Shortly after, the raven flew away. As it took to the wing, it circled the druid, and a single feather fell from it that Tamar.

They all head back into the tarern, the party to their table and the Vistani to a back room. Clementine approaches the blond man drinking by himself in the corner, who introduces himself as Ismark Kolyanovich.. Asked if he knew much about the town (and specifically where they could find the burgomaster, Kolyan Indirovich), Ismark replies in the affirmative. He says that Kolyan is his father, but has passed away. Clementine then asked if he knew anything about his father sending out a letter.

Showing him both letters, Ismark says that the one they were given by Arrigal at the Waystone Inn back in Daggerford must be a fake, because Ireena is his father’s adopted daughter, not his lover. Also that the handwriting was not the same as his father’s. The other letter he said looks like the real thing, but was unaware it was sent. He asks about the body they found it on, and claims it was his father’s manservant Dalvan Olensky. That letter’s date (in the Barovian calendar) was a little over a week ago. He speculates that his father found out about the fake letter somehow and wanted to warn the party away from Barovia.

Guessing that their prowess exceeds his own, Ismark then begs a boon of the party. He wants them to take his sister Ireena to the fortified town Vallaki, in the heart of the main valley of Barovia. The journey would be to the west, far enough away to be a full hard day’s worth of travel. Tamar asks why he wants to move his sister, and Ismark starts to explain.

Strahd von Zarovich is apparently attacted, or perhaps even infatuated with, Ireena. He has already bitten her twice, as they are two sets of bite marks on her neck. The weird part is that it’s commonly known that vampires cannot enter a private home without an invitation by a resident, and no one has invited Strahd in. Regardless, as the story unfolds, it turns out that Barovia as a whole was cursed by some feel deeds that the ancestors of the Barovians did. No one remembers what the bad deed was, but the effect of the curse was that the devil himself, Strahd, became their dread master. It was then that the deadly mists surrounded the area, and no one can leave. Anyone trying to enter the mists starts to choke or dies from exhaustion, and the few who manage to survive more than that end up back where they started no matter how long and hard they try.

Previously, the land had two gods, the Morninglord and Mother Night. One watched over them during the day, and the other at night. But since the curse, Mother Night has unanswered their prayers and there has been no sun to pray to during the day. Some even say it was Mother Night herself who cursed the land, such was the betrayal by the Barovians’ ancestors.

When asked if any had tried to fight back, Ismark mentioned a powerful mage who had fought against Strahd a year ago, but he lost and went crazy after. He was simply referred to as the “Mad Mage” since.

Ismark distrusts most Vistani, and says they are usually servants of Strahd. The three sisters who own the Blood on the Vine are exceptions.

When asked about animals spying for Strahd, he said he didn’t know anything about it. Noting the raven’s feather on Tamar, he said that it was widely accepted that ravens were an omen on all luck, both good and ill.

Treasure

• bag of 75 gold
• spell scroll of Calm Emotions

Inspiration

• Tamar, for being baffled at why a human would fight a door, is curiously inspired.
• For burninating the Death House, Clementine is inspired.

Yenkin and Brume had retreated back to safety to get some rest. Meanwhile, Bogdan and Tamar, feeling more adventurous, decided to tie up loose ends. Shifting into an arachnid, Tamar went scouting deeper into the unknown corners of The Death House. She stealthily crawled along the basement ceiling, entering room after unoccupied room.

She found rooms full of statues and odd relics, empty areas that looked like bedrooms and dens, and an abandoned-looking prison, but not a single living soul. All the while the chanting grew louder and even more eery, “He is Ancient. He is the Land.”. The louder it grew, the more cold chills and shivers it produced. At last, Tamar discoverer the source — a room with chains hanging from the ceiling directly above a blood-stained dais. Murky water surrounded the platform around the dais, with a narrow ledge surrounding the room the only means of egress outside of wading through the water. Unless you’re a spider on the ceiling, of course. Tamar could easily pinpoint this room as the source of the chanting, yet there was nothing here, no people or artifacts or even other animals, that was doing the chanting. The spider was running out of time and had seen enough, so she returned to the attic to rest with her fellow party members.

Bogdan, meanwhile, had planned a quick retrieval of the sack he had dropped outside the house earlier. That sack held the remains of the children, and now that he had located their tombs in the basement he figured they should be laid to rest there. While mistrusting of the fog, the monk was quick enough that he wasn’t too worried about whatever it might do to him. Heading to the first floor of the house, Bogdan existed the house through the front doors (which had shut of their own accord, but thankfully were no locked) and with his left hand resting on the building quickly circled around back. The longer he remained in the mist, however, the more he felt it sapping his strength, and he quickly tired until a deep exhaustion was wearying him. He snapped up the bag and dove into a nearby window, fearing he had no more moments to lose before he lay down and died, so exhausted had he became. Back inside the cursed house again, Bogdan used every bit of strength to climb the stairs back to his friends.

During Bogdan and Tamar’s scouting, Brume tried to diagnose his good friend Yenkin’s bug infestation. After giving Yenkin a close inspection, the “healer” could find no logical explanation, magical or otherwise. Yenkin’s skull would have to be filled with insects at the rate they emerged. Dark forces were definitely at play. Brume suggested using a valuable scroll (remove curse) that Bogdan had been caring around, but the miniature Half-King refused his offer. Hubris, Brume assumed, but just the same he would honor his friend’s wishes. Bogdan returned looking as if he had fought a war single handed, and Brume could find no way to help restore the monk’s state of exhaustion. Rest, and lots of it, seemed to be the only course of action, and that couldn’t happen as long as they were trapped in this house. Tamar finally returned, and with that the heroes slept. Brume had another horrifying vision — a faceless man was chained to a post, surrounded by shadowy figures wearing hooded robes. The figures were all calling for the man to die, that he had to die to appease the great devil. Just as the man was stabbed in the chest, his face was no longer devoid of features, but was Brume’s face instead. Brume awoke with a scream, feeling the pain in his chest as if it had really found its mark.

Brume and Yenkin set out to complete Bogdan’s idea of saving the children by placing their remains in their corresponding crypts. Brume felt Thorn’s spirit leave his body as the boy’s remains were laid in his coffin, but Rose did not do the same for Yenking. The rogue felt like she – like he – had unfinished business. Yenkin was still possessed and cursed with brain mites, and yet he seemed almost stoic. Tamar, still scared fro having seen her own named carved into the empty tomb, asked the others to look at it for her. None saw her name, however, and all proclaimed it was left empty and uncarved.

Brume’s shield, the focus of his light spell, illuminated the dungeon-like corridors and soon they found the room with the large statue, as described by Tamar. The statue held a sphere, some sort of mottled smoke-gray crystal orb, in one hand. Yenkin couldn’t resist and immediately began searching it for traps. Brume warned him greed would be his undoing while Tamar swore at him in Draconic, a language known to have over two thousand curse words. As soon as Yenkin picked up the globe, five shadowy figures materialized. Yenkin quickly realized his folly and replaced the glass ball. The hafling’s blade sliced through one of the figures as he darted away. Brume acted simultaneously, summoning a mighty thunder wave, one that would shake the very earth. A single “shadow” was instantly vaporized and the rest simply retreated back into the statue.

Yenkin decided to press on and came to a door. The Half-King leapt at the challenge of picking it’s lock. Noticing Yenkin’s absence Brume followed after him and was met coming the other direction. Yenkin yelped something about a mimic that looked like a door as he bravely advanced in the opposite direction. Bogdan decided flanking the creature was the key to success and circled around behind it. They could hear it bumping along behind them and then it stopped. As they turned the next corner the anthropomorphic door had relocated into an empty doorframe that they had just previously been through. Discretion is the better part of valor, Tamar said, and everybody agreed, leaving the mimic alone.

The mimic had been guarding a bedroom with dirt walls and floor, a four poster bed, and an open chest filled with torches. Yenkin scrambled over to the chest and as his hands met the wood, two ghasts leapt out of the soft earth and attacked. Tamar, Bogdan and Yenkin were face to face with the cannibalistic monsters. Tamar had taken point in dire wolf form and was ready for a fight. What took place in the next few seconds was over in a flurry of claws, teeth, fists, and steel. In the ruckus, Bogdan had been seriously injured and had fallen. A half-elf sorceress, Clementine, had been held captive by the ghouls. Upon being free she joined the fight. Brume chanted a prayer in celestial and Bogdan’s wounds knitted themselves back together, returning him to the fight. The ghasts were defeated, but victory was not without its price.

The loot in the footlocker was the items kept by the Dursts after killing Clementine’s former adventuring group. She was the last one alive, with her next on the menu to be eaten by the pair of ghasts. The party patched up their wounds, looted the room, and identified the dead monsters as Gustav and Elizabeth Durst. Rose abandoned possessing Yenkin and floated nearby, shocked and terrified at the fate of her parents., Their actions in life had doomed them to transform into these flesh eating fiends instead of dying a normal death. Their grotesque corpses, still wearing the robes they wore in life, were laid in their crypts. The Durst family would finally rest in peace.

The didn’t want to spend anymore time here than necessary. The chanting continued below and the adventurers knew it must be why they were still trapped in this horrid building. Moving on, they entered the flooded room and were careful not to walk through the water.

Bogdan leapt over the water to the dais, and as he landed on the dais a group of shadowy figures manifested along the walls. “One must die! One must die!”, they chanted as they pointed at Bogdan. Brume waded through the water and climbed the stairs of the dais.

The shadowy figured held torches, but these seemed to absorb the light instead of granting any, and Brume’s shield dimmed. As Brume reached the top of the dais, they shifted to point at him, continuing the same chant: “One must die! One must die!”. Brume challenged their demands, saying “There will be no sacrifice, not by our hands!”

As their chanted demand was denied, the chant changed. “Lorghoth the Decayer, we awaken thee!” they screamed in unison. A large pile of refused and bones stirred to life. It was massive, over teen feet tall and as wide around as two of the Vistani wagons. The pile started glided across the water, moving smoothly and quickly. It became clearer that this pile was some sort of undead creature, a massive undertaking involving the bones of hundreds of people, glued together by dark energies and human refuse. At the top, where a head might be on a normal creature, was the intact skeleton of a baby human. The party found out what had happened to the stillborn corpse of Walter Durst.

Suddenly, the chant again changes and the shadowy cultists speak faster and faster, “The end comes! Death, be praised!” The mound was within reach and attacked Brume, dropping the stalwart cleric with a single deadly blow. The adventurers sprang into action. Bogdan blasted the creature while Yenkin poured a healing potion down the throat of his buddy Brume. Tamar, still in the form of a large dire wolf, pulled Brume to safety and then aided Bogdan in fighting the “shambler”. Blow after blow was exchanged, and the monster had hardly flinched. Most of the party assumed this was an un-winnable fight and retreated to the hallway assisting from safety. However, Bogdan and Tamar would not be denied, and pressed the attack. Their resolve payed off with Bogdan landing the final blow, causing the pile of bones to fall apart.

Treasure

• in room with ghast:
  • cloak of protection (Bogdan?)
  • 4 potions of healing (1 used already – rest carried by Yenkin, Clementine, and Bogdan?)
  • chain shirt
  • mess kit
  • flask of alchemists fire (used by Clementine)
  • bullseye lantern
  • set of thieves tools
  • spellbook covered in yellow leather, with 9 spells in it
  • up to 30 torches
  • up to 6 large black voluminous robes
  • leather sack with 15 candles
  • pair of iron candlesticks
• gold ring worth 25g (on skeleton’s finger, Bogdan has?)

Inspiration

• For letting curiosity dictate “what the hell, these mists can’t hurt THAT bad” … Bogdan is inspired
• For doing what he was told not to – probably because he was told not to – and trying to grab the orb from the statue, Yenkin is inspired.
• For yelling at Yenkin to not do it – please, no really, ah c’mon wait stop GODDAMMIT DON’T DO IT ARGH – and inventing new swear words in draconic, Tamar is inspired.
• For refusing to even consider sacrificing anything on the dais, Brume is inspired.

The party had just reached the attic of the home of Rose and Thorn Durst, and in that attic had found a children’s room. The room was locked by a padlock from the outside, and on the inside were the dead bodies of Rose and Thorn.

The party decided that the house itself must be a trap, and they were tricked by the children’s ghosts outside. Clearly something was amiss. Despite this, the goodness in Brume dictated that he see the remains of the two kids buried, and he started to put the bones into a sack.

After disturbing the remains, ghostly apparitions of the Durst siblings rose from the floor. Rose questioned what Brume was doing with her remains. After explaining himself and questioning the children, the party realized that these two ghosts were not the same as … whatever the other Rose and Thorn they had seen outside of the house were. The children admitted to not having left their room – their death site – for “hundreds, many hundreds of moons”. They’d been by themselves that entire time, aside from a few adventurers they’d seen who always abandoned them. One of these adventurers, whom Rose named Sebastienne, had told her this house was now called ‘The Death House’.

Their story was teased out of them slowly. Their parents – still admitted as Gustav and Elizabeth – would lock them in their room in the attic to protect them from the monster that lived in the basement. One time this happened and their parents never came back to unlock the room, so the children died from hunger and starvation, simply dying where they lay from weakness. They had never seen the monster (as they were always locked in their rooms), but their parents had occasionally had others over to help fight the monster. The monster’s screams were terrifying. High pitched and sounding as if it came from many throats, yet always at the same time. It’s roar would make them shiver in fear under their blankets in their rooms.

Asking where they could find the monster, Rose pointed at the dollhouse and said to look at it – it would show the way. Paying more attention, it was revealed that the dollhouse was very exact – it showed secret rooms and hallways that the party has missed, including a spiral staircase from the attic, through the walls of the house, down into some sort of basement.

While the children were talking, Brume wanted to lower their remains (still in the sack from earlier) to the ground outside via the balcony window around the corner. While attempting to do so, however, Rose noticed him and started screaming at him. “She didn’t want to leave, and she didn’t want him to leave either!” Flying ethereally through the air, both Rose & Thorn flew right into Brume’s body. Rose came right out the other side, but Thorn stuck in, possessing the cleric and making his desires of wanting to get rid of the bodies vanish.

More talking happened before Bogdan pulled the same trick, except he managed to get out of the room with the children’s remains unnoticed. He climbed down to the balcony’s roof and lowered the sack to the ground, dropping the rope after it before heading back inside.

Knowing which way the basement was, Yenkin decided that the best thing for the party to do would be to stock up with items in the house and try to learn as much as possible before going into the basement. Of course, hearing that they were leaving Rose again flew into a panice and possessed the first person she could — Yenkin.

As such the party went back downstairs and Brume donned the splint armor they’d found previously in the upper hall on the second floor. After this they went to the Library, where Rose had mentioned Gustav always being angry with a book and muttering gibberish while trying to read it. That book was not in the Library (although Bogdan did find a book about werewolves that he kept). Tamar found a fake book that opened into a secret room.

Inside the secret room they found the corpse of Sebastienne, the adventurer Rose had mentioned. He was slumped over a half-open chest, the victim of a dart-trap that had been set to go off when the chest was opened. There they found treasure (listed below) and a letter from Strahd, still sealed with a motif of a stylized raven in front of a castle tower. The letter read:

My most pathetic servant,

I am not a messiah sent to you by the Dark Powers of this land. I have not come to lead you on a path to immortality. However many souls you have bled on your hidden altar, however many visitors you have tortured in your dungeon, know that you are not the ones who brought me to this beautiful land. You are but worms writhing in my earth.

You say that you are cursed, your fortunes spent. You abandoned love for madness, took solace in the bosom of another woman, and sired a stillborn son. Cursed by darkness? Of that, I have no doubt. Save you from your wretchedness? I think not. I much prefer you as you are.

Your dread lord and master,

Strahd von Zarovich

After studying a giant red book by the Priests of Osybus, Tamar realized that the rituals in it were bogus. It was a good thing, too, as they claimed to have the power to summon a demon to grant the caster everlasting life.

After leaving the library, the party searched the rest of the house. They found some crossbows and bolts in the den. They also noticed lots of details in the house that seemed wrong, at least when asking Rose via Yenkin (carvings now had skeletons in place of masked dancers, wolves hidden among deers in the trees, etc).

Back in the attic, Yenkin found some bones in a storage room in a unlocked chest that had been covered by a dusty sheet. He wanted to throw the bones aside, but as he did so the specter of the long-dead nursemaid attacked him. During the fight the specter managed to kill Yenkin. Weirdly, mere seconds after the fight was over Yenkin stood back up, coming back from death. He raved about having some vision and having “seen it all”, all the while now having insects continuously crawl in and out of his ears. Looking at the bones of the nursemaid in more detail, it was clear she had been stabbed to death by dozens of knife wounds.

Finally the adventurers were ready to explore the basement. Heading to the secret spiral staircase they had uncovered while looking at the dollhouse in the children’s room, they entered behind the fake wall and descended through a veritable warren of cobwebs. Brume cast light on his shield, and the party lit one torch; both for light and to burn the webs in the starewell, which were so thick that the group was barely able to see a few feet in front of them.

At the bottom of the staircase, perhaps 50’ straight down, the basement was revealed to be more of a cavern. Tunnels carved directly into earth, clay, and stone and supported by timber braces, the floors were covered in centuries-old footprints. Eery chanting echoed off the walls, their source of direction unable to be determined.

The party found two sets of living quarters, one complete with a well that led to a cistern of some sort below. As they walked around, the direction of the chanting changed and seemed to come from the south.

Finding a dining room strewn about with bones, the party inspected the area a little more closely. It soon became apparent that the bones were literally the remains of multiple meals, and that they were human; someone had been eating human flesh with knife and fork. The party shuddered upon learning the truth.

The nearby larder had a grick hiding in it, who lashed out at Tamar when the druid came too close. Shifting into a dire wolf, the druid traded blow for blow before winning the combat and continuing onwards. From hear, the chanting seemed to come from the west.

Heading east, back towards where they had first come down, the party found six crypts — 5 of them sealed with stone slaps carved with names (one each for Gustav, Elizabeth, Rosavald, Thornboldt, and Walter Durst) and the last one with the slab open and with no name carved upon it. Bodgan tried to open one but the stone weighed too much and he was unable to move it.

Going back to the westward direction below the dining room, the party was ambushed by 3 ghouls at a point where two tunnels bisected each other in a crossroads of sorts. The fight was vicious but over quick, with Yenkin and Brume (courtesy of Thorn) both hiding out of fear while the rest of the party defended them.

Tamar’s wolf-ears picked up that the chanting was coming from the northern leading tunnel, but had not yet told the party since she was still a wofl. The party decided they needed to rest and recover before exploring further, and headed back up to the attic and were going to barricade themselves in the children’s rooms.

Treasure:

• splint mail from standing armor in upper hall (Brume)
• from library
  • book about werewolves (Bogdan)
  • iron key to unlock padlock on children’s room upstairs (Yenkin)
• from chest in secret room behind library
  • 75gp
  • spell scroll – bless
  • spell scroll – protection from poison
  • spell scroll – spiritual weapon
  • deed to the house
  • deed to a windmill
  • signed will from Gustav & Elizabeth Durst, bequeathing house & will to Rose and Thorn
  • letter from Strahd to the Durst’ parents
• from the den
  • 1 light crossbow + 20 bolts
  • 1 heavy crossbow + 20 bolts
  • 1 hand crossbow + 20 bolts
• from living quarters in basement
  • 11gp, 60sp in a pouch made of human skin
  • 3 moss agates worth 10gp each
  • black leather eyepatch w/ carnelian (worth 25gp) sewn into it
  • ivory hairbrush with silver bristles (worth 25gp)
  • silvered shortsword (worth 110gp)

Inspiration

• For letting his insatiable curiosity lead him to trying to open a family crypt even when everyone else was saying no, Bogdan is inspired.

Leaving the dead body behind, the adventurer’s continued along the Old Svalich Road heading what they presumed to still be westward. It was hard to tell what direction was which, or even what time of day it was, with the mists so dense and thick, obscuring all traces of natural sunlight.

The road wavers between an unkempt but still obvious road and chaos. Parts of it have gravel layered in the dirt and others are nothing but the thick ooze of mud dotted with small bushes and entangling grasses. Spots off the road are sometimes almost a bog, despite the steady and unrelenting persistence of the pine trees standing ominously nearby, as if guarding the road.

A half mile of journeying later and the Tamar notices something shining just off the road ahead of the Vistani wagons being driven by Brume. This was in a spot where the road was barely present, a rough and haggard stretch of thick grasses. She had found a small mirror, reflecting more light than what was really there to reflect.

Coming up to help her inspect (the cries of “something shiny” acting as catnip to the curious pair), Tobin and Yenkin approached Tamar to see what she had found. Tobin unknowingly stepped right into a wolf trap buried in the thick grass! Luckily for him, it was so rusted that it didn’t quite shut around his leg.

While examining the mirror, everything it’s light touched appeared to age right in front of their eyes, with it having the grasses go brown and Tobin’s hand become that of a gaunt old man. The visual changed seemed to have no real affect, as the grasses were still alive after being reflected, and Tobin’s hand went back to normal after a few seconds as well.

Tobin also found a long, fancy pipe made out of some dark stone, perhaps a black marble or something similar.

Yenkin wanted to make sure there were no more wolf traps in the area, so he went looking for them — and completely missed the one just a few feet away from the first. Knowing that the wolves in this area were sure to be mistreated — he’d seen his own party members slaughter some, after all — he wanted to disarm the trap and set out to do so with his thieves tools. Tamar shook her head and grabbed his arm before he ruined his tools, and handed him a stick to simply press down on the plate. Thanking her, Yenkin used his newfound ‘tool’ and set off the trap – which again failed to fully snap back in place due to rust.

Leaving this small bit of excitement behind, the party continued for another mile and a half before reaching a gate blocking the road, in the middle of the Svalich Forest with nothing around. High stone buttresses loomed gray in the fog, with huge iron gates hanging off of the stonework. Two headless statues flanked the gate, their heads lying among the weeds at their feet, greeted the players with silence.

Bogdan approached the gates and they opened automatically. Curious, the party drove through, and the gates clanged shut behind them.

Now slightly freaked out, the heroes continued for another two miles before reaching the edge of the forest and entering a clearing, with another half mile between there and the first signs of town. They had reached the village of Barovia. Boarded up houses, abandoned shops, and the cries of a young child were all that greeted them.

Following the sounds of cries, the party encountered Rose and Thorn, a pair of young children. Ten-year-old Rosavalda and her seven year old brother Thornboldt were standing in the middle of an forlornly empty street, with Thorn crying and Rose trying to hush him. As the party approached they could see that Thorn gripped a stuffed doll close to him as he cried.

Rose cried out, begging the heroes to help remove a monster from their house. Their parents, Gustav and Elisabeth, had kept the monster locked up in the basement. But when they went down to the basement to finally kill it, they never came back. The children also though their younger brother Walter, just a baby, was in the nursery area of the third floor.

They’d never seen the monster, having only heard it and been told about it by their parents. Its howl was the worst noise they’d ever hear, saying it sounded like some part of it must die each time it howled.

While trying to do a cheap parlor trick with a coin behind Thorn’s ear, Yenkin was surprised when the boy snatched the coin away from him and pocketed it. Tobin tried the mirror out on the kids, and the boy happily played with it for a moment. Neither of the kids reflections seemed to change any, despite everything else having done so. When he asked for it back Thorn became sad and started to cry again, so Tobin gave him a gold piece in exchange for the mirror (and that gold piece vanished just as quickly into the boy’s clothing).

Placing the children in the wagon and admonishing them not to drink the wine and to stay out of trouble, the party approached the house. Bogdan climbed up the side of the house to the third floor balcony and nimbly clambered up top. The doors were locked, but by breaking a single pane of glass in the door he was able to peak inside before opening the doors. The insides were covered in dust, thick enough to clearly have been a long time since this area was livable. The room was a bedroom of sorts, but it was too dark for Bogdan to make out more.

Tobin wanted to climb up as well, and managed to make it easily up to the underside of the balcony. But when it became time to work his way around the balustrade he fell and landed hard on his back.

Seeing his companions difficulty, Bogdan climbed back down and the party entered together into the front door of the house.

The lower levels of the house were spotlessly clean. Entering from a gated portico into a foyer and then an entrance hall, the house was very well decorated and clearly well-cared for. Motifs of windmills and wolves were here and there, on shields mounted on walls to suits of armor placed near stairwells and empty doors. Before leaving the foyer area Tobin notices that the mists outside have gotten even closer to the house.

Oil lamps and stocked fireplaces are in many rooms, allowing for lots of light once the characters light them. Going up the stairs from the main hall, the party arrives to the second floor. There hangs a large wood-framed portrait of the Durst family, with presumably Gustav and Elisabeth standing behind Rose and Thorn, while Gustav holds a baby that is presumably Walter. Oddly, Elisabeth’s figure is seen regarding the baby with a slight hint of scorn.

Continuing up the stairs to the third floor, a cold draft is felt, and suddenly the rooms they are in are no longer clean, but caked with years – if not decades or more – of dust. Here there’s a dusty balcony, a landing overlooking the floors below.

A black suit of full-plate armor stands near the fall wall, covered in cobwebs. Yenkin lights the oil lanterns and Brume moves to open the northward lying doors towards the back of the house, but Bogdan gets to close to the armor and it animates to life.

Delivering a mighty haymaker to him, the monk decides its time to back away and get to safety. Tobin fires a shot and misses, but Tamar snags it with a spell and wraps it with vines of thorns, yanking it towards the stairs – and back towards Bogdan. Yenkin slips into a corner and shoots at it but misses, while Brume moves to stand in front of the halfling and calls upon Lathander to blast the armor with radiant fire.

Deliver several head-rattling blows to the party before Bogdan finally bashes the wolf-shaped visor right off, the armor finally collapses into a pile of clanging regular (if dented) armor.

Exploring the third floor more, they find a master bedroom. Tobin grabs some jewelry; Brume looks for Walter, the missing baby; Bogdan decides to try out the dumbwaiter and sends the wolf head visor of the armor downwards. Yenkin meanwhile explores a linen closet before decided there’s nothing worth anything in there.

Standing at alert in the balcony area, Tamar finally gets a bit bored before going to see something described to her by Yenkin in the closer, something weirdly shaped covered in a sheet. It turns out to be an Broom of Animated Attack, and it proceeds to batter Tamar about hard, dropping her to the floor after a few, ahem, clean sweeps to the head.

Rushing to her defense, Brume charges in, yelling “Two Brumes enter but only one leaves!” It’s clear Brume does not know how to spell broom. It’s also clear he and his sword don’t care as he chops into the animated object. Tobin manages to get behind Brume and fire off the finishing shot, breaking the broom into pieces.

Worried about Tamar, Brume uses his healing kit to stabilize her before carrying her on his shoulder back to the entrance of the house. They now notice that the gate to the portico is shut and locked, and that the mists are thick and ever-present all the way up to the edge of the house. Yelling for Rose and Thorn, Brume gets no answer.They take a short rest while figuring out what to do, and decide they cannot stay here, so they go back to the master bedroom in the third floor area. Barricading the door with pitons, the party rests to recover from their wounds, Yenkin snug in his new tigerskin cape/blanket.

Brume has a dream that night. The rising sun of the Morninglord is bright and clear, and suddenly gets occluded by darkness. It’s as if the sun started casting shadows instead of light. Eventually the whole sun is dark, and from the darkness a pale, pallid white face appears. The face blots out the darkness and then starts a mocking laughter, causing Brume to awake in a panic, also waking everyone else.

Continuing to explore the third floor area, the party find the nursery area, which were the rooms originally seen by Bogdan when he scaled the walls to the front balcony. A side room holds a crib, but there’s no cries of a baby in it. Pulling back the black shroud over it, Tamar sees a tightly wrapped, baby shaped bundle in the crib. When she touches it, however, the blankets collapse in on themselves, revealing that nothing is there.

Leaving the room, however, she does notice an odd strip of wall that has less dust along its floorboard. They discover a slight draft that blows the dust away, and soon have a secret door open that leads up more stairs to the attic.

Once in the attic, they find a door locked with an thick iron padlock. Sensing this is where they must store treasure, Yenkin runs to it and unlocks it. On the inside, however, there is no treasure.

There’s a room with child-sized beds, a toy chest with windmill motifs, and a dollhouse that’s an exact replica of the house they’re in. And there’s two small skeletons on the floor, dressed in the same clothes that Rose and Thorn were dressed in, and Thorn is holding the same stuffed doll they saw with him before. Clearly, the children the party saw outside were not alive…

Loot Found:

• tigerskin rug/blanket/cape for Yenkin
• silver jewelry box with gold filigree (75gp). inside are three gold rings (25gp each) and a thin platinum necklace with a topaz pendant (750gp)

Inspiration:

• For declaring a Broom on Brume action, Brume (not Broom) is inspired. (Broom is ded)
• For being inquisitive and thinking of how to best use devices (like the mirror on a child), Tobin is inspired.
• For nearly dying because of a broom, Tamar is not inspired and in fact is rather ashamed and can we please not talk about it?

Our heroes went to the party & dinner hosted by Duchess Morwen for them, celebrating their return to Daggerford after the long wolf-filled winter at Secomber. Of course, Morwen was never one to settle for less, and used the situation to also ask the party to journey a few hours south to deal with some vagabonds who were harassing people.

Her reports said that a camp of miscreants were begging for wine and demanding money, swearing they’d hex anyone who didn’t comply. But the guards Morwen had sent after them came back swearing that the campers were friendly people and weren’t doing any harm. Morwen was convinced they’d been magically charmed and wanted the adventurers to go investigate.

Yenkin led the party to question the guards, who swore that they travelers in question were friendly people. One in particular was a grandfatherly old man who offered them some of the best wine they’d ever had and great stories to boot. Tobin paid a lot of attention to the guards, looking for signs that they’d been charmed, but found nothing.

After going back and talking to the Duchess, she explained she wanted the travelers gone by dawn. She handed the party an ultimatum to deliver to the travelers and sent the party on their way, even as evening was turning into dusk. Clearly she was in a hurry to remove any perceived stain upon the honor of Daggerford.

The party left and headed south to the crossroads where the travelers were encamped, thirty or so yards from the Waystone Inn. There they found the travelers, a group of Vistani led by an old man named Stanimir. Stanimir told them that they were travelers who enjoyed the freedom of travel and good drink, and he told you stories while his fellows danced around the fire. Stanimir used his spells as a mage (unknown to the party at the time) to make the fire part of the story, telling of a noble prince who fought in a long ago war. The prince was hurt and saved by the Vistani, and to reward them he blessed them with the ability to travel safely far and wide.Years passed, however, and the noble prince was cursed and turned into a tyrant. They were looking for brave adventurers to help break their dread lord’s curse.

The party agreed to help the Vistani after some discussion, but decided to sleep in the Waystone Inn instead of around a campfire, enjoying one last night in a bed before traveling.

At the inn, most of the part chose not to eat the sad food offered, but Tamar decided to bravely venture forth and try the potato and lentil soup. The rest of the party felt they had enough to endure, simply listening to the bad entertainment of an obviously drunken minstrel. A short while after, the doors of the inn slammed open and another colorfully dressed man (much like the Vistani that the party had just met) came inside. From the foggy night outside strode in Arrigal, with a missive from his master Koylan Indirovich, Burgomaster of the village of Barovia (not to be confused with the land of Barovia). He begs/tells the party to head 5 hours east and ride for five hours along the Old Svalich Road through the Svalich Woods to arrive at the village of Barovia. The party is confused, because they know for certain there are no woods named Svalich nor a village named Barovia within the area nearby. Before voicing their confusion, Arrigal dropped a heavy purse of coins to buy drinks for everyone in the tavern and left abruptly.

The party decides it seems like they really should head to Barovia before dawn. Morwen wants the Vistani gone, the Vistani want the heroes to help them, and Arrigal wants them to help his master.

While discussing the events of the night, they hear an irritable old man arguing with a much younger man about how wolf attacks had been increasing out towards the Misty Woods. The characters knew full well how many wolves were in that area, having just come back from Secomber after having dealt with them for a winter. But to hear the young man tell it, not only were the wolves back, but there were werewolves as well. At the the old man started yelling, because everyone knew there weren’t no damn werewolves around here.

Tobin tried to ask questions of the old man, but the irritable elder simply started complaining about how adventure’s were milking the Duchess, promising to take care of wolves but doing no such thing and yet still claiming a reward. That was the real problem. Tobin nodded blandly and went along with it, until finally the younger man took Tobin aside and whispered to him that the they thought werewolves were involved because of some missing people, and how the wolves seem to be having much more cunning that normal.

They call it a night, except for Yenkin had other ideas and stayed up later, drinking the strong wines of the Vistani before finally heading to the inn himself.

In the middle of the night a long ominous howl shatters the silence, waking everyone except Yenkin, who’d passed out from drinking the night before. Shortly after, screams can be heard coming from the Vistani encampment. Bogdan is the first to be alert and jumps out his window, running quickly to the Vistani. Brume, Tamar, and Tobin soon follow.

When the three arrive, Bogdan is already fighting a single wolf while several others are tearing through the Vistani camp. Several of the Vistani are already dead, but there is a stiffer pocket of resistance around Stanimir and his children. Stanimir is using his magic openly now, throwing fire at the wolves.

The party and Vistani managed to kill all the wolves, but just as they did Tamar heard some foreboding sounds. Werewolves had waited until everyone thought they were in the clear before charging in, slaughtering the Vistani. The characters quickly found that many of their attacks had no effect on the shapeshifter. Stanimir cast hold monster on one to keep it at bay while Brume and Tamar threw spell after spell of Thunderwave, keeping the monsters at bay. Eventually, the werewolves killed all of the Vistani, and the two not being held immobile ran off, laughing at the party as they did so.

Bogdan noticed that Stanimir’s daughter was still barely alive. Approaching, she whispered to “beware … factions of Vistani” before dying in his arms, moments before Tamar could reach her and heal here. Tobin and the other party members used the nearby fire to finally kill the werewolf after learning that they were simply doing their lord and master’s bidding.

Burying the dead Vistani and taking one of their wagons and some horses, the party set out eastward, hoping to find this Svalich Wood. As they trekked, the warm spring day became colder and foggier, gradually thickening, until soon they were surrounded by fog. Even worse, they were in a dense pine forest, in an area that should have been devoid of pine trees.

Stopping to explore, they noticed that the mists did not get to close to the road. It wasn’t just that they could see better nearer, it was simply that the road was clear of mists. Tamar at this point got a whiff of something putrid, and with a little looking found a dead corpse holding a crumbled envelope.

This letter contradicted the one they had received earlier. One stated that Ireena Koylana was the Burgomaster’s adopted daughter, the other that she was his lover. One said she’d been bitten by a ‘vampyr’, the other that she was afflicted with an unnamed deadly evil. The handwriting was clearly different, although they both had the same seal.

While reading this, the party was attacked by four wolves. Two ran snapping and snarling after Tamar and Bogdan while the others went after the horses pulling the carriage.

Suddenly a strong wind gusted out of nowhere, blowing Yenkin and Tobin over a dozen feet to the side. Bogdan broke a wolves back while Tobin ran backwards to clamber up on top of the wagon, while one wolf got stuck in a large puddle of mud. Yenkin hid and managed pot shots from cover.

A dire wolf approached, and sat and watched the party instead of attacking. Tamar studied it, realizing that it’s body language was off. This wasn’t some regular wolf, this creature had intelligence and cunning.

Tobin showed off the power of Brunhilda, his thunder cannon, and quickly dispatched two more wolves. Meanwhile, Brume tried to spear one and managed to somehow miss and pole-vault from the wagon’s yoke over the wolf, a sight funny enough that Tamar managed to miss herself.

As the last wolf died, the dire wolf charged the party, jumping in the air and heading straight towards Yenkin. Just before the imminent collision, the dire wolf seemingly turned into mist and flew through and around Yenkin, disappearing with the sound of mocking laughter on the wind.

For no reason and out of nowhere Yenkin started feeling sad about the wolves. The party was trespassing and killed these wolves for no reason. It just wasn’t fair. The other adventure’s though this was an absurd way of looking at things, but Yenkin knew they were wrong.

Loot found:
9 daggers
2 hand crossbows and 14 bolts
Stanimir’s spellboook
17 gold
4 horses and a barrel-topped wagon filled with wine & travel supplies

Per Character:
50g from Duchess Morwen (or a single item in PHB up to 50g)

Inspiration

• For a werewolf dying while she was nearby (as part of her Emerald Conclave faction), Tamar is inspired
• For the best/worst accent ever and “caring” about the wolves so much as the end, Yenkin is inspired
• For having the decency to bury the Vistani and wanting to return their posessions, Brume is inspired.

Bogdan and Tobin ran into each other during their times in Waterdeep. Bogdan was a monk who wasn’t quite sure where the line between curiosity and nosiness ended, and he had a insatiable desire for learning secrets. Tobin was an artificer – a new type of mage who learned spells like a wizard, but loved to tinker with alchemy and crafting just as much. Artificery was looked down upon by Khelben of Waterdeep, and when the Blackstaff looked down upon something, you stopped doing it. Or you left town, such as what our two heroes did.

Deciding to stick together, they left the metropolis in search of a friendlier home – or at least, a less judgemental one. They traveled southeast for a few days until they came to Daggerford. Morwen, the local Duchess, was known to pay well for adventurer’s and risk-takers who could solve problems that her local guard couldn’t (or wouldn’t), and it wasn’t long before Bogdan and Tobin made a decent name for themselves in doing just that.

Tasked with dealing with some troublesome tribe of kobolds who’d turned to banditry, the pair teamed up with two other adventurous folk, Brume and Yenkin. Brume was a weird one, a large pale man who always wore his helm or hood, afraid of the sun. Until you noticed that he wasn’t just pale, he was every so slightly blueish, and his eyes almost glinted like gold. Yenkin was easier to notice, despite – or maybe because – he was half the size of Brume. The halfling had nimble feet and sticky fingers, and was a great boon for a larger, less agile man like Brume.

The four of them set off and finally found the kobold bandits, killing many and chasing the rest. Several days of chase happened, with the kobolds always just minutes ahead, until the party arrived at the edge of the High Forest and followed them in. Soon they found themselves in the middle of a skirmish, with kobold fighting kobold, and all the kobolds fighting them. Confusion reigned until a half-elf druid dropped out of the trees, explaining that there was a small faction of kobolds who’d left the main group because they didn’t want to be bandits. After some fierce combat, the bandit faction of kobolds was fully defeated, and the party – now with the Tamar, the druid – went back to Daggerford for their reward.

The group had a few more adventures after that: taking out a handful of imps who’d escape a summoning circle by an apprentice wizard who’d reached above her station, convincing a marauding centaur that he’d have better luck in the Misty Woods (away from the humans he like to attack), and defending the hamlet of Secomber from a large pack of wolves who’d been decimating their villagers all winter long.

It was after this last mission, now that the warm days of spring were finally back, that the heroes were welcomed back to Daggerford. And here’s where our story begins.