Session 12 — Sophie Ate the Evidence

Session 12 — Sophie Ate the Evidence

Sable woke up at midnight with a crossbow in her face and a polite request to go murder someone. She had just gone to sleep. Under suggestion. After being sent to bed by her own party. This was, in retrospect, a reasonable thing to be upset about.

What Happened

The session opened mid-consequence: Isaac had just been sent galloping toward the village of Barovia by Merich's Persuasion roll, leaving everyone in the Blue Water Inn to reflect on the series of events that had produced this outcome. Sable extracted a promise — no mind-altering spells, no effects, nothing — before agreeing to help fix it. She amended this to "effects" before being interrupted, which will certainly not come up again.

The party rode out in pursuit: Merich and Sable on Sophie the direwolf, Brother Moro and Celeste on horses from the inn stable. Celeste sent her sphinx familiar ahead to track Isaac's trajectory. They had a thirty-minute head start and horses; the party had a direwolf and motivation, and somehow caught up roughly halfway to the village — near the Black Gate, which is coincidentally on the road to Castle Ravenloft, which is something nobody commented on.

Isaac had stopped because his horse threw a shoe. He was crouching in the road examining it when the party arrived out of the darkness and attempted to negotiate. Merich opened with intimidation. Isaac has a plus eight to intimidation. Merich rolled a nat one. The horse shat directly in his path and Merich fell in it. Isaac found this very funny. "You are funny, little man," he said, which is not the response intimidation is meant to generate.

Merich pivoted to fabrication, informing Isaac that Ireena had last been seen in the village of Barovia after speaking with "the Vistagna in the camp" — whom she had definitely definitely been reported near — before realizing mid-lie that this was where he had already sent Isaac. Merich recovered by confirming yes, the party was protecting Ireena from Isaac specifically. Isaac announced his intention to get on his horse. Sable stepped out of the dark, said "you realize we have to kill him now," and cast Zephyr Strike. The transition from diplomacy to murder was approximately four seconds.

Merich cast Hold Person. Isaac, not known for his Wisdom saves, failed. The party executed the most organized violence of the campaign so far: Sable opened from point blank for 81 damage in a single turn, Merich followed with an Eldritch Blast and a Divine Smite totaling roughly 47, and Isaac was killed before he had taken a single action. The entire exchange took fewer rounds than it took to ride out there.

The search of the body revealed: studded leather armor, a battle axe, a thick fur cloak, a wine skin, 20 gold pieces, and several small dolls of Ireena Kolyana. Both saddlebags on Isaac's horse were full of dolls. Every single bag. Nothing but dolls.

There was a brief discussion about Isaac's demon arm — whether to keep it, attach it to Merich, attach it to Sable ("absolutely not"), feed it to Sophie, or burn the body before the arm could Evil Dead anyone. The arm's stats were determined to include a 3D6 fire-damage ranged cantrip and a +8 to Intimidation, which is possibly the single most fitting trait ever identified by a dead man. Ultimately, Sophie ate Isaac. She rolled a 10 to start and a 19 to finish. No complaints. A small flame escaped when she burped. Merich suggested this might be permanent. The DM said the poop would be spectacular.

The party camped in a field off the road — not directly in Strahd's driveway, but close to it — took a long rest, and rode back into Vallaki at dawn. The gate guard was suspicious of a group that had ridden out at 2am and returned six hours later with fewer horses. Merich explained they had been hunting halfling camel mercenaries on orders from God. The guard had never heard of a camel. This somehow worked (Deception 24, guidance assisted).

At St. Andrew's Church, Merich quietly informed Ismark Kolyana that Isaac was "no longer a concern." Ismark winks with both eyes. Sable materialized from the shadows to confirm the man was dead, described it as working hard to achieve that outcome, and dematerialized. Ismark made a mental note about the rabbit.

The party recounted their current open tasks: find Milovaj and the stolen bones, find Arabelle (the mist-passage potions are on the line), deal with the coffin-maker, and possibly worry about the boy last seen walking toward Castle Ravenloft. They chose to tackle Henrik the coffin-maker immediately, on the theory that finishing one thing might be advisable.

Henrik's Coffin Shop is a two-story box-shaped building with all the shutters closed. The sign is coffin-shaped. It looks closed. The shopkeeper inside was shouting from somewhere in the building that he was closed and they should go away, with increasing urgency. Brother Moro and Sable responded by going around back, silently removing a window shutter and the glass behind it (Sleight of Hand nat 20; the glass fell in silence), and climbing inside. A large L-shaped room containing thirteen coffins. Sable investigated a crate upstairs marked "junk" (with quotation marks), found junk, and was investigating a second crate when six vampire spawn burst out of six separate crates simultaneously.

The ensuing fight was four rounds long, involved the entire floor plan, and introduced several noteworthy tactics: Merich's Aasimar radiant aura dealing 3 damage per turn to everything in range; sunlight rectangles created by blasting out the boarded windows; a vampire dragged off the ceiling by Brother Moro using the grapple rules and Tavern Brawler; Celeste's Burning Hands dealing 5D6 fire damage (Warlock level scaling) to a cluster of three; and Sophie's absence (she was outside and missed the whole thing, which is probably for the best given the structural capacity of the room). Sable spent most of the fight invisible, appearing just long enough to shoot something and vanish before anything could swing back.

Two vampires died to direct damage. Two more died to combined damage from Sable's crossbows, sneak attack, and Hunter's Mark. One was killed by Merich's sword. One was finished by Sable with a critical hit in the final round. The last surviving spawn (Vampire Five, personality profile: "coward") spent the final two rounds hiding in a pile of boards and throwing planks at people with no particular success.

Merich took 18 points of hit point maximum reduction from vampire bite (necrotic + the "bite reduces your maximum" mechanic). The DM confirmed this resets on a long rest. The party's response to this news was "so like normal then."

Henrik van der Voort himself spent the entire fight in the downstairs room, curled into a small ball and weeping. He is fine.

The session ended with the vampires destroyed, everyone alive, everyone leveling up, and Milovaj presumably still somewhere in the building. Henrik has some explaining to do.

Key Decisions

NPCs Met

Locations Visited

Items Found

Loose Threads