Want to help? Consider becoming a Patreon.

• Arhian Vos – Human Monk
  • Pet: Pabu (Young Red Panda)
• Hartmut Helmsworth – Elf Monk
  • Pet: Kalistia (Young Blink Dog)
• Sindri Waggletop – (Forest) Gnome Wizard
• Rettniss Kulvith – Water Genasi Druid – Absent
  • Pet (?): Vindri (Sindri Voodoo Doll)
• Avacyn “Jolyne” Uloth the Merciless – Half-Orc Paladin
• Twilight Skybane – Tiefling Bard
  • Pet: Gem (Sailor Parrot With A Mouth)
  • Pet: C.C. (Copy Cat, Mimic Bag Of Holding)

• The party returns to the Inn and meets with Severin Goldenharp, who knows Twilight (see Session 35), once again after helping Nikalos (see Session 36) and defeating the Cultists of Belaros, whom he’d warned Twilight about (see Session 37) at the Nightshade Inn and Tavern
• He asks the party what it was that drew them here
• And Sindri mentions that according to what they’d found out – there was supposedly a red dragon that lives in the area that was freed from a circus
• Sindri asks how a circus is tied to a red dragon
• Severin explains, from what he’s gathered, there was supernatural things happening with the circus and a party of adventurers freed the dragon; but he’s not clear what was “super natural” about the entire circus, but that’s what everyone says
• Severin inquires about the interest in the red dragon; and Sindri explains that a mage in Ridgecrest by the name of Heima Kipa, a lore master, had sent them to investigate various dragon sightings (it’s true – all the way back in Session 30!) – but Sindri notes they’re not to fight the dragon – just confirm the sightings – and confirm if there’s a cult forming in the name of Tyhamat.
• Severin adds that the Innkeeper, Bradbury, “knew” the people who freed the dragon (they’d stayed at the Nightshade and seemed quite friendly!) – and that what he’s heard is the dragon has been cited, it’s been seen flying from a mountain top very close to Redstone; but has never attacked Redstone, and there’s no reports of a red dragon attacking nearby towns. (Farm animals tend to disappear from time to time, however)
• Rettniss explains that she’s exhausted after the ordeal with the cultists and goes up to her room to rest (DM Note – Rettniss missed this session so it was an easy way to take the character out of this session). Arhian agrees and heads up the stairs to check on the animals… however, in the meantime, Sindri, hungry for knowledge seeks out Bradbury and finds the jovial human more than willing to talk
• “So glad to see you! The old woman you sent to take care of your pets has done a fabulous job! The blink dog was in the kitchen again! The bird was cursing people! Since she’s gone up there, the animals haven’t been heard from,” Bradbury explains
• “Old woman?” Sindri asks. “We didn’t send any old woman to take care of the pets.”
• “She said she knew you,” Bradbury replies, “seemed to especially know the one lady – the skinny one – Arzan? Arfan?”
• “Arhian?” Sindri asks.
• “That’s the one,” Bradbury nods. “Knew all about her. Seemed to know her for years, with how she spoke about Arhian.”
• “You didn’t let her into our rooms did you?” Sindri asked, alarmed
• “No, she said she’d let herself in. I assume you gave her the keys. I didn’t even tell her what room you all were in, which is why I assumed she was sent by all of you,” Bradbury explains
• Bradbury shrugs after a moment, “I will admit… she was, and I am sorry if you know her well, but she was, not pleasant on the eyes.”
• Sindri turns to Twilight, “Do we know an old woman?”
• “The hag,” Twilight whispers, realizing that’s who it could be. (See Session 36)
• “I mean, it’s a bit rude to say,” Bradbury admits, “but that’s what she reminded me of.”
• Twilight grabs Hartmut and Avacyn and explains, “We’ve got a potential problem. We need to get up to our room now.” Hartmut and Avacyn see Sindri trying to quickly scramble up the flight of stairs and quickly follow.
• Meanwhile, Rettniss collapses on her bed and slips into the slumbers of sleep almost instantly. Arhian looks around and sees Kalista, the blink dog, curled up on Hartmut’s bed, near the pillow, sleeping peacefully. Gem is perched on the dresser, eyes closed, peacefully sleeping as well; both of which are unusual for either animal – but she quickly realizes, Pabu is nowhere to be seen
• As soon as Arhian enters, Gem awakens and begins cursing (now she seems normal!) – about how they’d been gone for so long – and some old woman came into the room – Arhian is stunned at the idea of an old woman had come in?
• It’s when Gem explains that the old woman did finger thing – and then took the red dog (Pabu)
• Sindri uses his racial trait of Speak with Small Beasts to try and get more information from Gem – and via squawking at one another back and forth for about a minute, Sindri is able to surmise that an old woman opened the door; upon doing so, cast a spell that paralyzed the animals, but they were all conscious – simply could not move. She then placed them, and took Pabu and disappeared into air (teleported away)
• Sindri conveys this to the rest and adds, “It’s definitely the hag we just dealt with.”
• “But how did she even know we were in this Inn and in this room?” Arhian asks, when suddenly her arm burns – and she looks down at the scar she had gotten after smashing the hag’s window in the strange cabin (See the very end of Session 36). She clasps her arm, “Damn it. We need to find out if there’s a way this can be removed.”

• Investing the room, it’s Gem who alerts Twilight (Natural 20!) that the old woman left a note under Arhian’s pillow. Twilight moves the pillow and indeed discovers a note – written in crimson ink, which she assumes is blood – and undoubtedly Pabu’s blood.
• It reads:

Get rid of that which sits on the mountain; it’s a threat to me.
Get rid of it, and the beast shall be yours.

• Sindri shakes his head, “We can’t take a red dragon.”
• Arhian shakes her head, “We could convince it to relocate. We don’t need to fight it.”
• Sindri shakes his head. “We need to find out more about this circus that captured the red dragon. Maybe there’s someway that can help.”
• Returning back down to the inn, the party greets Bradbury. Sindri asks about this circus that used to come to Redstone.
• Bradbury calls one of his assistants to watch the counter while he speaks with Sindri and the others. He goes into detail about how these “adventurers” claimed that one of their old companions was literally torn to pieces, with only their fingers remaining, and placed in a bag addressed to the Paladin of the group – a fellow named Arhian. Arhian corrects Bradbury and says that’s her name. And Bradbury says it’s something like that. (DM Note – It’s Adrian and that event did indeed happen in The Adventurers Session 47). He adds that the party went to go examine the circus/carnival – and believed a hag was behind it (see The Adventurers Session 48). He goes on to explain that the carnival owner, an odd man named Datura Stramonium came into the inn seeking them out specifically and gave them free passes as well as giving the Paladin a magical ring (see The Adventurers Session 49). He concludes, “I am not sure what happened next. I know they went to the Carnival. But then all Hell – and I mean that literally – seemed to have broken loose. There was a demon. Demon-children. Well, they were kidnapped children – but they were no longer children. Their souls were long gone – these demons just wore their skin. The red dragon. And some beast that was killing the red dragon – and might have succeeded, had it not been for the aid of the adventurers saving the red dragon!” (see The Adventurers Session 50, for the conclusion of the Carnival story!) Bradbury shrugs, “According to them – they stopped some major demonic summoning. The carnival workers were all demons – siphoning souls. And the behir – bred to kill the dragon-kin was killed because these adventurers struck a deal with the red dragon and maintained the deal.”
• Avacyn hears a woman’s voice in his head that he immediately recognizes as Zenafel, the angel (see Session 37 for more details about Zenafel) say, “The innkeep is not lying – high above Redstone’s peak – I sense a great power – a dragon. He slumbers in an ancient temple, forged by dwarves… these dwarves once honored me… but they are gone… long gone… departed long before Searscale‘s arrival.” Avacyn shares with the others what she’s learned
• Bradbury takes a long pause, looking over everyone around him, gathered at the table. He finally clears his throat and says, “Listen, this may or may not have anything to do with whatever the lot of you are getting into – but despite the rumors, I do not live in this in. I have a small farm just outside of Redstone. And just last night, I was at the farm, tending to some of the animals, when I saw some travelers on the road and they were – seemingly – headed for Redstone. So I went out onto the path to greet them – and almost immediately regretted it. They were all covered in grey cloaks; they were tall, but seemed to be walking hunched, as if to hide their height. They reminded me of… Dragonborn. Their voices… were… deep… dark… gravely sounding. I told them about the Inn, and they said they would not be going there. I wasn’t sure where they were headed because there isn’t much else between where I live and Redstone, to be honest. They genuinely made me feel very uneasy – and rest assured, I’ve been running this inn for a very long time – and I have seen some wicked things in my life. Nothing made me feel as … unsettled… as this group did.” He also notes, “There were nine of them in total.”
• The party asks about Bradbury’s home – and realize the point between his home and Redstone would allow these ‘strangers’ to scale up the mountain before reaching Redstone
• Arhian looks to the her party, “All paths seem to be all pointed in the same direction – the top of the mountain.”
• The party gathers back in their rooms to gather their supplies, and Arhian asks Sindri if he’s ever heard of this magic that allows hags to “watch” people; Sindri confirms he has for sure heard stories in which hags will come through the veil of the Feywild, and find a child (usually a poor family – less likely to have mages employed to prevent them from doing what they need to do or detecting their magic!) – and will use their razor sharp fingernails to claw across a sleeping child’s forehead – which creates a scar – but the blood collected, allows the hag to always look through the child’s eyes – and even command them. Hags often observe families in this way; then find the most wretched ways to ruin a family from within; such as commanding the child to murder their parents while their parents slept – then release the child who now sees themselves covered in blood and their deceased parents before them; or murder their favorite pets and eat them; so it stands to reason that when Arhian had punched a hole in the window and it sealed itself around her wrist – it drew her blood which the hag now collected – and would have allowed the hag to watch and even tap into Arhian’s most recent memories – granting her the knowledge to know where they were staying and how Pabu was valuable to Arhian’s heart.
• The party decides, once they realize Rettniss is not only tired, but apparently ill and will not be able to scale the mountain that they had best go to the local healer in Redstone, so they vist Locked Potions, which is run by Trema Lockheart and purchase a number of regular potions as well as greater healing potion.
• The party then makes their way to Dwarven Steal (the first dwarf, with perhaps a sense of humor) – that shop being run by a male dwarf named Grosh Forgeheart. The party sells some of their miscellaneous weapons and armor they’ve collected over time and no longer need.
• The party makes it to where Bradbury mentioned he last saw those “Dragonborn-like” folk; and they immediately see where it looks as if something with claws, very recently, scaled the mountain here. The party quickly prepares to begin scaling, with Sindri rapidly climbing up (Arhian commenting that she’s sure that Sindri may have lied and that he’s a Rock Gnome rather than a Forest Gnome)…

• As they continue to scale up the mountain, the height, and thinning air, get to a number of them, as they begin to slip and slide more; but eventually each of them clear past the clouds and their astonished at the sight that greets them… a massive fort at the top of the mountain, just as Avacyn had said the angel, Zenafel, had commented on…

• Scaling to the top – they see what appears to be a dwarven-statue guardian at the front massive gate; and in front of it – a liquid pool of some kind

• Hartmut, who is able to speak dwarven, is able to communicate with the guardian – it says, “Speak her name and enter.”
• Twilight suggests speaking the name of Zenafel, because they’d learned that earlier in the day that dwarven clerics created a temple in her honor at the top of Redstone. Hartmut nods and turns to the dwarven guardian, speaking her name – and the dwarven guardian stands to the side. The others notice it appears, that something scaled the side of the wall – and Sindri is able to determine the pool in front of the dwarf appears to have been acid.
• Stepping inside the massive temple, it is eerily quiet; there are no lanterns or lights, the halls are covered in dust, long abandoned webbing lines all of the walls and floors; no one has been here in a very, very, very long time – just as Zenafel had indicated – the dwarven clerics who once honored her, seemingly vanished without a trace long ago
• Sindri finds an interesting book – the Book of Zenafel.

• Sindri also locates a magical weapon called The Arm of Zenafel which he gives to Avacyn.
• Moving silently they come to a large dining area; where a disgusting sound of crunching and chewing can be heard; examining the area – they spot what appears to be a troll in one corner eating a large, rotund creature; they quietly move across the room to an area that has stairs leading upwards; after some problems – the party finally ascends – and are met by nine towering figures and a massive red dragon…!

TO BE CONTINUED.