Session 24 - "She turned me into a newt!" - The Witches of Whitewater

Sat 26th Sep 14:30 - 19:30

In-game timeline: Marpenoth 15 - Marpenoth 16 DR1489

We rejoin our 'Heroes' after a considerable out-of-game break with them having levelled up to L5. They are currently in Neverwinter, having returned from the Shadow Isle, base of the pirate and slavery ring known as the Radiant Sisters. 

Drogan is torn between feeling good about finally getting revenge on the Drow Pirate Captain Bree for killing or enslaving many of his past shipmates, and about causing a large dent in the side of the Radiant Sisters by helping to kill two of the hag sisters who were running the organisation. And feeling bad for not being able to save his past crewmate, Bryn, who may still be on the Shadow Isle, or may have been killed in the battle, and also for learning that his uncle may have been responsible for the pirate raid on his ship in the first place. Drogan paid a visit to his uncle in Neverwinter, but has not told any of the others about what happened at that visit.

In between his training, Drogan has also been helping set up the new freight business with Hawkeye, who is arranging for a new crew, organising repairs to the single ship that they have, and registering the business and touting for freight contracts. Hawkeye is getting slightly concerned that both the business itself, and the ship, are still unnamed - something she feels is very bad luck.

Alwaith does his own things about town. No surprises there, then.

Devon seems to be getting more and more sneaky in his movements. In fact, the rest of the group often don't see him until he suddenly appears at their table with a mug of fine ale in his hand. What he gets up to between these times is anybody's guess.

Dwarrow pays many visits to the temple of Berronar in the Merchant's quarter, partly to further his training, and to pray to his deity, and partly to prepare for the upcoming journey to the Isle of the Abbey. Having used his previous Blessing of Berronar (Strength) to enable the group to escape from the Isle, and to get the jump on Bree, Dwarrow selects a new Blessing - the Hierophant.

After all their training is complete, Dwarrow suggests that they pay a visit to Father Greatshaw, who is based in a town only a few hour's ride away, named Whitewater. He has heard that Father Greatshaw knows a fair bit about the Isle of the Abbey, and about the Clerics of Shar who reside there now, and it is probably worth getting as much information as possible before they set off to sea.

The group hire some horses, after some discussion about the pros and cons of ownership vs rental in today's economy, and head to Whitewater. Dwarrow mentions that Whitewater is a very puritanical town, so perhaps discretion is the better part of valour here, and maybe hiding their abilities in the arcane arts would be a good idea.

This turns out to be good advice since, upon arrival, the party find themselves in the middle of a crowd, many of whom are calling out for the lynching of one or more of three women who are bound and gagged on a platform. It seems that they are accused of being witches, though there is significant debate as to which of the women are guilty, and which are innocent. As the group look on, the mayor - Bagshott Crawford - is handing off the difficult decision to the elderly Father Greatshaw standing next to him, who in turn insists that he be given more time to make the decision, The decision is delayed until dusk that day. As they leave the platform the party approach to talk to Father Greatshaw. Some discussion later and the party has agreed to make the decision for Father Greatshaw, as they are the most independent, having no knowledge of who anyone is in this town. In return, Father Greatshaw will dig out what information he can regarding the Abbey Isle and the clerics.

And so our group of 'heroes' set about performing an investigation as to which, if any, of the three women are witches. Alwaith heads to the town jail to interrogate them - a tough thing to do, given that the leader of the guards refuses to ungag them for fear of witchcraft. Still, Alwaith does manage to ascertain some information from the women.

Dwarrow talks to Father Greatshaw, though learns very little. Devon chats with the mayor to get his take on things. Drogan meanwhile heads to Matilda's house (one of the accused) to nose around. He finds a lot of information about how the town is getting more and more corrupt and less and less puritan - something for which she overtly blames Mayor Crawford, though she may be a little biased, what with being the widow of the previous Mayor! She also makes it obvious that she believes Mayor Crawford is having an affair with Isabel - another of the accused.

Armed with this information, Drogan heads back towards town, though stops off at Isabel's house to check things out there. Finding very little  in the sparse house, other than some nicely painted artwork and some well-crafted carvings, he looks harder at the mirror hanging on the wall. Using his stone cunning he determines that in fact there is a gap behind the mirror, heading into the hillside that the house backs on to. There is obviously some cunning mechanism that allows the mirror to be moved to gain access to the area behind. After spending all of 30 seconds looking for such a mechanism, Drogan turns full "Drogan" and just smashes the mirror. Whether this brings him 7 years bad luck is something that remains to be seen - there may actually be something in these folk-tales you know!

His handiwork revealed a tunnel behind the mirror, heading down some steps and into the hillside. Without waiting for the others, or even telling them where he was, Drogan headed down, and approached what looked like a small, dingy cave, full of stalagmites, stalactites, bones and cauldrons, as well as a convincing statue of a gargoyle. Pretty ominous stuff! But not enough to deter Drogan, who decided to head in on his own….

… and was promptly attacked by some tentacles flying out from one of the stagmites! Luckily the tentacles missed, and Drogan, sensibly for a change, ran out and back to town to get the others.

Meeting up back in town, the whole party went back to Isabel's to tackle the monsters in the cellar. And it proved a tough battle - the roper managing to drag Drogan, then Dwarrow towards its gaping maw, only to then have piercers drop from the ceiling onto them - piercers which the roper proceeded to place back on the ceiling ready to drop again. Things were looking tough for the group - tentacles flailing, a large mouth biting and a number of piercers dropping, all doing considerable damage. Eventually however the party was triumphant - Drogan managing to round off the battle with a critical hit on the roper to take it down, after Alwaith blinked into another dimension to watch proceedings from afar.

Nothing particularly interesting to steal in the cave, but lots of evidence condemning Isabel - especially the box of children's toys that seemed to be emanating necrotic magic pretty strongly!

The party were running out of time before a decision was needed, but they checked out Elizabeth's house (the last of the accused) and met her mum, Ada, who thought that Drogan and Devon - despite being different races from each other, and from Ada herself - were her sons, and were there to make her a cup of tea. They found plenty of herbs and fungi, as well as some alchemical supplies and recipes (later copied by Dwarrowsteel), but they decided this was just a useful hobby, rather than witchcraft from Elizabeth. Meanwhile Alwaith and Dwarrowsteel visited the warehouse at the docks and discovered that Isabel had been receiving some shipments recently, including one that arrived only the other day. Upon opening it, they found various jars and vials of obscure liquid as well as animal parts. This sealed the deal - Isabel was definitely the witch!

It came to dusk. The town was gathered, baying once again for justice. In an act of showmanship, rather than announcing who the witch was, Drogan decided to walk up to the three accused, and, as Dwarrow told the crowd of their findings, place the noose around Isabel's neck. Unfortunately, upon touching her, his mind became affected, and instead of hanging her, he proceeded to free her! At the same time a number of children in the crowd began to rise from the ground and hang in the air, entranced. Isabel lifted her hand and a golden orb of light rose to the air, and crackles of energy seemed to flow from the children into the orb.

A mighty battle was about to commence!

Or maybe not. As the guards tried to keep control of the panicking townsfolk, and usher them out of the square, Isabel suddenly vanished, only to reappear directly behind Dwarrowsteel, where she tried, and failed, to shock him with a touch. Devon stepped forward and performed not one, but two critical hits upon her, causing her considerable damage, and shoving her off of the platform to fall prone on the floor, a Booming Blade invocation still affecting her body. Her control over Drogan was broken before he'd had a chance to attack his friends, and Alwaith followed up with an Eldritch Blast, and Dwarrow with a hammer blow. Close to death, Isabel managed to absorb some energy from her floating orb, but only to have it removed by Drogan who hit her with an attack while she was still down. Shocked by the onslaught, and with very little health remaining, Isabel launched another globe into the air and disappeared, to reappear at the edge of the town square, hoping to escape. The Booming Blade was still in effect, however, and as soon as she moved, the damage she took caused her to fall, dead, upon the ground.

The townsfolk were in awe. They were also quite frightened, especially of Alwaith, who was the only one who overtly showed magical powers in front of them. The Mayor thanked them for their help (Drogan was distinctly unimpressed and almost publicly accused the Mayor of his affair with Isabel, but was persuaded to hold off by Devon, who didn't want to get involved in the local politics), and Father Greatshaw shared a lot of information about the abbey and about the clerics of Shar with them, before the party headed back to Neverwinter.

And so we leave our 'Heroes', witch-hunters all, as they prepare for their trip to the Isle, armed with knowledge of the history of the Isle and the clerics. Aboard an unnamed ship. After smashing a mirror. No good will come of this…..