The 13th Hour; Act I, Chapter 2, "Land of Barovia"

The 13th Hour
Act I; Into Evil’s Den
Chapter 2; Land of Barovia
Sessions 2 & 3 (played 4/28/07 & 6/9/07)

Dramatis Personae:
Cameron D’Agostino (Rob)
Raymond D’Agostino (Mike)
Sir Urik (Jay, a tentative new player who was playing Sir Urik temporarily while designing his character)

In the days following their ordeal in Old Seccolo, the D'Agostino brothers, Raymond and Cameron, tended to their traumatized aunt and sisters as best they could, and tried in vain to delve into the mystery of what really happened on that foggy night. They had both come to the conclusion that the Old Secolo district that remains is just an empty shell, like the shed skin of a snake, and that the real Old Secolo is still trapped in the mists somewhere. The area left in its place just feels wrong, and is avoided by all. The only inhabitant that the two had ever found when they attempted exploring the empty streets was a man in gray robes and a hood concealing his features. In one pale hand he carried an ominous black bag. Cameron had hailed him, but the man turned and darted down an alleyway. They never saw him again. Raymond even explored the section of the sewers beneath those deserted streets, all the while fighting against the primal urge to flee. He found nothing living beneath Old Secolo. Not even the vermin.
Since the quest they had undertaken from the mysterious Alphonse LaMarrs required them to complete their journey to Castle Ravenloft and back before the next sickle moon, they eventually had to make preparations to leave, and now on the morning of April 28th they set out for the village of Barovia, deep within the country of the same name, where they are to seek out a man named Brocken whom they have never met, before venturing into what may be the heart of darkness that is Castle Ravenloft.
Heading out of Curriculo by a coach they had chartered, the brothers travel north and then eastward along the Gundar road, spending several hours traveling with a view of the small range of hills known as the Bleak Sisters off in the distance on their right.

Moving into the lands recently annexed by their country, they spend a couple hours passing through the Crimson Hills of former Gundarak and take note of the rather ominous form of Castle Hunadora straddling a hilltop overlooking the road.
Hunadora had been the seat of power of Duke Nharov Gundar until his assassination, and had lain dormant in the years following. The brothers had heard in recent days that Lord Mallochio has stationed a garrison of Invidian soldiers at Hunadora to combat the Gundarakite rebels that have been causing trouble ever since their country was swallowed up by Invidia and Barovia. It is well known that the Gundarakites detest the iron-fisted occupation by their old enemies the Barovians much more than the comparatively benevolent occupation by the Invidians, and so cause more of a stir in the Barovian held lands, but still cause enough of a bother to Invidians to warrant Mallochio to step up his garrison in the lands of former Gundarak under his control.
When the carriage begins to slow to a halt, Cameron and Raymond look out the windows to see a group of horsemen approaching from the east. Obviously all are of the militia, although not unified by any livery other than the occasional Invidian banner or crest. The brothers imagine mercenaries to make up the bulk of their rank, which would make sense, as there had been much word about Mallochio bolstering the previously humble Invidian army with sell-swords.
As they near the coach, the wear of recent battle on these riders becomes more apparent, and the brothers note the fresh scalps and brightly colored scarves hanging from their belts and saddles. As the carriage now comes to a complete stop and the horsemen make a small ring about it, the brothers shiver when they see that more than one also wears a necklace of freshly severed ears and fingers.
They’re hunting gypsies, thinks Cameron, recalling rumors he had heard recently of Mallochio’s soldiers rounding up those known to be of Vistana blood. He was hoping it was untrue. Apparently not. He had known Queen Gabrielle was reported to have despised the gypsies and encouraged persecution of their kind through slander and innuendo, but her son appears to be taking a more direct route.
As horrible as their grisly trophies appear, however, Raymond and Cameron are even more uneased by the presence of the individual leading this pack of butchers: a sinewy, muscular giant of a man whose general lack of clothing other than a furred loincloth or occasional piece of armor gives him the appearance of some feral barbarian. A great bat-winged helm, black as night, sits atop his massive shoulders, beneath which no features can be seen save for the burning red eyes which glow like hot coals from out of the darkness.

The brothers hear one of the horsemen loudly demanding that the passengers disembark from the carriage, and after a pause, they slowly climb out, Raymond having taken a moment to draw his hood up securely over his head in order to hide his grotesque features. Cameron does the talking for the group, much to the relief of his brother, as well as the nervous coachman.
A man with an eyepatch – the same one who ordered them out of the carriage – seems to speak for the mercenary soldiers, and so Cameron addresses this man, while the brutish leader of the group simply glowers down at the proceedings with crimson orbs gleaming from beneath his helm.

“There are no gypsies here,” proclaims Cameron, hoping to throw the one-eyed man off guard.
“Is that so?” the soldier replies.
“Do we look like we would suffer to travel with one?” asks Cameron defiantly, pretending to have been insulted by the man’s need to ask. While his station as a champion of Ezra requires him be morally upstanding, it does permit him to bluff from time to time, and so he does so now.
The one-eyed man scratches his stubbly chin thoughtfully.
“I suppose not,” he says, looking Cameron and his brother over. “Well, have you seen any of their kind abouts then?”
“No, I have not seen any of their filth about recently, but if I did I would be sure to let the militia know. That is, if I did not first kill the scum myself.”
Cameron hopes that he is making a convincing enough blackheart. While he would like nothing better to draw his weapon and have at these murderers, he knows all to well that discretion is the better part of valor, and that these men have them badly outnumbered. Plus there is the safety of the innocent coachman to think about.
The soldier sizes Cameron up once again, as if looking at him for the first time.
“Good with a sword, are you?” he asks now.
“Care to find out?” replies Cameron, turning his mouth up in a slight grin which he hopes is intimidating.
“Ye’d best watch yourself,” says the soldier, gesturing back at the glowering giant atop his horse, whom Cameron does not think has moved at all since this exchange began. “General Warduke doesn’t suffer braggarts or fools.
“Still, you show spirit. When next you visit town, you should enlist in the militia.”
Not very likely, thinks Cameron. What he says is “I shall consider it.”
Thinking that the soldiers have been satisfied, he is about to turn to enter the carriage when the man speaks again.
“Of course we still need to determine your fealty without absence of doubt,” says the one-eyed man, and when Cameron turns back to him he sees that the man is now smiling widely, revealing several rotting teeth.
“And how might this be accomplished,” Cameron inquires.
The man smiles even wider. “I think a donation of five drymarks a head as a show of your loyalty and support of Lord Mallochio would suffice,” says he.
Highway robbers, he thinks as he hands over fifteen gold pieces. Satisfied with their offering, the soldier mounts his horse, and, after waiting for the helmed giant to signal the order, the horsemen all ride off down the road to the west, leaving them to continue their journey.

Shortly after their encounter with the Invidian militia, their coach crosses over into Barovian lands and by nightfall, they arrive in Zeidenburg; a sprawling town of the typical, uninspired brick-and-timber style buildings commonly observed in many countries, with a grim fortress of charcoal colored stone at its center. Lying at the western end of the Crimson Road in Barovian occupied Gundarak, and being the largest settlement in Barovia, Zeidenburg is a prosperous but dangerous town on the brink of revolution. The surrounding countryside has a reputation as a haven for brigands, much to the displeasure of the Count and local boyars. Complicating matters further are the Gundarakite rebels, who have apparently declared Zeidenburg the unofficial launching point for their revolution.
As the coach rolls slowly down the cobblestone streets, the brothers observe their new surroundings and can see that the brick of most of the buildings is plastered over and painted in neutral, earthen tones, with the homes and shops on many streets alternating between deep russet and pale dun exteriors. They also note that it seems like every other shop has a strand of tiny, jingling bells dangling near the doorway.
They find that the town's populace – mostly ethnic Gunderakites – are a swarthy, stocky folk dressed in simple clothes of muted yellows, greens and blues that contrasts the duskyness of their skin.
As they disembark their coach, the brothers can hear sing-songy language of Luktar everywhere about them in the teeming pre-dusk streets, sounding not unlike a hive of angry wasps. Cameron decides to be adventurous – or perhaps just cheap – and stay at the Bloated Leach Inn, which their coachman describes as a lice-ridden flophouse where shady merchandise changes hands each night and nearly every proclivity, no matter how bizarre, can be satisfied. The lecherous wink he gives as he says this tells what type of proclivities the coachman himself intends to satisfy during their stay. As Raymond and Cameron allow their coachman to arrange for the stabling of his horses and make their way to the front of the Leach, they note with some dismay that every local who notices them stops to scowl suspiciously as they pass by. This does not truly surprise either of them, as Gudarakite hospitality is not legendary, yet it still does little to put them at ease.

Even more adventurous than his brother, Raymond decides to spend the night mapping and exploring the sewers beneath the sprawling town. Using his crowbar to pry open the bars of a grate, he enters the sewer system and is instantly aware of the definite sense of age in the stonework of these sewers, though they are still appear architecturally sound and wear their years well He looks forward to the challenge of mapping and exploring the entire system, much like a child adventuring for the first time out in the woods surrounding his village.

Beginning his expedition and plotting out the series of narrow tunnels and large catch-basin chambers, he observes that the sprawling complex is much more vast and labyrinthine than what was under the much smaller town of Curriculo.
Early on in his expedition, he comes across two young men speaking to one another in Luktar. Hiding in the shadows and keeping his distance, Raymond observes them for a time. He notes that the youths are dirty from spending time in the sewers, but not nearly scabrous enough to have been living down here. Similarly, while the jerkins they wear are patched together from various materials and crudely dyed black – possibly with sewer sludge – their boots and leggings give them away as above-grounders. He guesses them to be boys from the city above that get their jollys skulking around in the sewers. Remembering the air of oppression up there and the constant presence of the Barovian army, he imagines the dark underworld of the sewers to be the only place where the average Gundarakite can truly feel free.
He also notes that both wear some sort of crude wooden disk about their neck. Both disks are painted with the same design, but he is not able to get close enough to make out the details, without himself being seen. Listening to their conversation provides him with little real information, for while he and most other Invidians speak the language of Balok spoken in Barovia, he does not know many words in Luktar. The only thing he is able to judge is that some derogatory things are being said about the people of Barovia, specifically, the soldiers occupying their city above. After a minute or two, he sneaks away unnoticed in the shadows, continuing his expedition in the opposite direction.
Soon after his encounter with the two young Gundarakites, he comes across metal rungs leading up to a grate on the surface. The rungs are stained with blood, with more spatters of dried blood on the stone sewer floor beneath it, along with strange footprints of a type he has never seen before. Vaguely humanoid in appearance, these prints are easily three times the size of the largest man's foot, twisted and deformed with clawed nails that actually left gouges in the stone. Inspecting the grate above, Raymond finds the bars had been twisted and bent out of the way, leaving a larger opening that an average sized man could perhaps squeeze through..
..or be pulled through. Raymond shudders at the thought and continues his mapping, being ever more cautious now and mindful of his surroundings.
About fifty feet down the tunnel he kicks something with his foot and moments later a mangled torso bobs up to the surface with only one arm still attached. Prodding it with his blade, Raymond notes the general lack of bloating and decomposition indicates that it is fairly fresh, and that the body has been literally ripped apart, rather than picked apart by scavengers or fallen apart through breakdown of the organic materials. The face of the corpse is frozen in a look of pure terror, which does little to ease his mind, and wondering what could have possibly ripped a man apart like that does little help either. Raymond also notices that what was left of the corpse was wearing a dark patchwork jerkin similar to the two Gundarakites he had just encountered, and that there was a painted wooden disk still worn about its neck on a leather cord. Removing it from the ravaged body, he inspects it more closely and sees now that the painted symbol is that of a sickle and a hog slaughtering knife crossed and dripping blood against a bluish black orb of the night sky dotted with stars. This was not the banner of any nation that he knew of, nor a symbol of one of the major religions of the Core. A family crest, possibly, or the symbol of some of some cult or guild, perhaps. Pocketing the wooden medallion, he continues on, soon after coming to a crude makeshift fire pit constructed on a platform in the middle of one of the large catch-basin chambers. The pit has spits for cooking, and looks like it has seen frequent use, though not in the last several hours. His panicked first thought is that perhaps it was built by the owner of the giant misshapen footprint, but after a moment he realizes that this was built to a scale not fitting something of that size. The boot prints around the pit are the clincher that this was the work of men, and also indicated that it was constructed and used by those from above, rather than a beggar or vagabond who would most likely be barefoot. He imagines these youths in their black jerkins and painted medallions cooking the occasional meal down here in their hideaway. Indeed, in a dead end tunnel a short distance away he sees that a large version of the symbol on their wooden medallions has been painted on the stonework.
Raymond discovers the creature's lair, on his on his third or fourth hour in the sewers, finding it in another catch-basin chamber, this one heaped with the bones and remains of humans and smaller vermin. The thing's droppings litter the floor – he had found some before earlier in another section of the sewers – and some garbage and muck is gathered and clumped together into a crude bed or nest. There are also coins strewn about the stonework and glittering up from the murky waters, and some other odds and ends lying about – things the monster must have taken off of victims and brought back to its den. Bloody misshapen handprints and scrawlings on the walls indicate to Raymond some level of rudimentary intelligence in the beast. It ventures that it probably possesses the thinking process of a very small child. Ever mindful of the creature's return, Raymond collects some of the silver and gold coins – mostly Barovian currency. While gathering the coinage he notices a strange oblong package wrapped in burlap and tied with a cord. The wrapping has become grimy and stained from its time in the sewers. Cutting the cord with a knife and slowly unwrapping it, he finds inside the most beautiful sword he has ever laid eyes on. The hilt is magnificently crafted, and features a number of embedded emeralds in the design. The sheath is equally beautiful, covered with aquamarine velvet and golden trim, with more of the jade gems fitted into the precious metal. It will later occur to Raymond how both blade and sheath were in pristine condition with not a single stain or discoloration in the fabric of the sheath, despite the soggy and slimy condition of the burlap wrapping. Slowly drawing the blade after first wiping his grimy hands on his cloak so as not to dirty such a fine instrument, he notes that the saber is perfectly balanced, and feels right in his hands. He is also impressed by the fine etching in the blade, and looking closer, he sees that several words have been engraved in Luktar just above the hilt. He swooshes the blade through the air before sheathing it again, suddenly feeling ashamed to be holding such a beautiful weapon, hideous wretch that he is. Laying it back in the burlap wrapping, he stares at it for a time, and if the monster had happened to return to its lair now, Raymond may very well have been dead. But the creature, whatever it is, is currently elsewhere in the sewers, and Raymond continues to stare at the blade, until he finally notices a piece of stained and grimy paper in the burlap wrapping. He takes the letter out and read the following which has been written in Balok:

My Lord Strahd,
Please accept this gift from your most loyal servant. I appropriated it from the home of one of your new subjects in the annexed lands. As you can see, this is an exquisite piece – and I know how fond you are of exquisite pieces. The blade was obviously crafted by an expert sword maker. The saber's hilt in particular is marvelously sculpted with several fine emeralds inlaid into the gold. The inscription on the blade – "All my love – Ada" – is what gives the weapon its name, "Ada's Love", and is part of an intriguing legend surrounding the blade that I'm sure you will find interesting. As the story goes, the sword was to be a gift from a Gundarakite woman – obviously one with some amount of wealth – to her groom to be, who was a captain of the local guard. She spared no expense at having the blade specially made for her lover, complete with the inscription of her love, so that it could protect him in battle. Perhaps if it had been given sooner, he might have benefited some, but alas their wedding day was never to pass, as the fortnight before, Gundarak's "Second Unwise Rebellion" began and her lover was decapitated in the early hours of the fighting. Heartbroken, the woman is said to have plunged the blade into her own heart on her wedding day, after having dressed in her nuptial gown for the occasion. Rumors have it that the blade carries some enchantment, either through design or the powerful emotions that surrounded it. This has yet to be tested, although I'm sure you have the means at your disposal to do so once it is in your possession.
Your humble servant,
Ionache von Tassel

Raymond realizes that a courier must have been walking through the streets of Zeidenburg when the creature grabbed his legs and dragged him down into the sewers. He marvels at what an improbable series of events had delivered a treasure such as this into his hands.
Digesting this, he sits for a few more minutes before wrapping Ada's Love and the accompanying letter in his cloak and moving on. He does not go far when he turns a corner and runs straight into a group of over half a dozen of the young men in their dark patchwork jerkins and painted wooden medallions, all brandishing weapons. A search party, he thinks. Cursing himself for being so wrapped up in his new acquisition that he became careless enough to stumble into this mob, he realizes that they have all already seen him and he will now be forced to deal with them.
He notices several of them pointing at him and hissing at one another in Luktar, apparently taken aback by his features. My usual welcome, the caliban thinks.
"You. Barovian spy-dog", speaks the leader of the group in Balok with a thick Gundarakite accent. "What have you done to our friends?"
"I have done nothing to any of you" replies Raymond, holding his hands up, palms forward in a gesture of peace, yet ready to assume a combat stance and draw a weapon at a moment's notice. "I have seen the recent remains of one of yours, though, I believe. “There would seem to be a terrible monster stalking these tunnels, for I have just visited its lair and seen what is left of several of its victims."
"You lie, freakish one!", the leader of the group spits back with a sneer. "There is no monster in these sewers. Wheeb."
We will not be taken in by such a fanciful tale is what the he was actually about to say, however when the huge hairy arms grab hold of him and yank him backward into the darkness, the young man's last discernable word spoken in this world would ultimately be something sounding like "Wheeb" followed by a series of screams and gurgles. Only the youth's torso reappears, moments later, landing on the slimy stone floor and flopping about like a dying fish as the dead man's arms spasm for a bit and then go limp. The thunderstruck silence is broken by an obscenity uttered in Luktar by one of the young man's associates.

When the shadowy outline of the nearly 10 foot tall slavering thing now appears in the tunnel before them a moment later, hungry yellow eyes gleaming, most of the remaining men in the room, Raymond included, turn and dash headlong down the tunnel in the other direction.

The screams of those who moved to slow or froze in terror can be heard echoing through the sewers as the panic-stricken men all race for their lives through the labyrinthine tunnels, a few slipping and falling in the muck and then scrambling to keep up. Being the sewer rat that he is, Raymond is able to instinctively find his way back to the place where he entered without breaking stride, three of the other Gundarakite men hard at his heels. When they all emerge to the surface, Raymond stops to catch his breath while the three young men continue to run, screaming, into the city proper. Attracted by the commotion, a pair of Barovian soldiers on horseback now ride out into the street in front of the fleeing men. Recognizing them on site as Gundarakites out after curfew, or perhaps just undesirables in general, the two soldiers draw their swords and immediately cut down two of them without a word or a warning. Raymond watches in horror and disbelief as the horsemen attempt to run down the last surviving youth who flees into an alleyway. Wary of suffering the same fate, he quietly slinks outside of the city limits to spend the rest of the night up in a tree somewhere, far from the nearest sewer entrance or Barovian soldier, cradling his new treasure in his arms.

On the morning of April 30th, the brothers board their coach once more and leave Zeidenburg by way of the Crimson Road. Cameron had heard that the Crimson Road was named such because in the aftermath the several “Unwise Rebellions” against Duke Gundar, his troops would round up many of the dissidents and line them up along this road, and Gundar himself or one of his lieutenants going down the line and one by one cleaving them nearly in half with a great blade, thus dousing the road in blood. Some even say that the ghosts of those executed wander the roadside on certain nights, their spectral bodies split nearly in twain. Following it north for a few hours, they see and feel the road the road becoming more difficult as it begins to climb up into the foot of the looming Balinoks, just as the great oak trees and other hardwoods dotting the countryside begin changing over to thick evergreens.
After coming to a crossroads mid-morning, they continue west along the Dreadpass, a rather ominously named highway that looks to have started life as little more than a trail and had recently been expanded into a crude road, probably in the time since the Barovian invasion.
Soon the road is winding through the formidable Balinoks, truly earning its name. Twisting through these mountains, which used to essentially form a natural buffer between the constantly feuding nations of Barovia and Gundarak, Raymond and Cameron feel uneasy, almost as if these massive and towering chunks of earth could close in and crush them all at any moment. This growing unease worsens still as the coach passes by an abandoned old keep, literally hugging the side of the mountain, and the two are unable to unclench their muscles until the keep is well behind them and hidden by a bend in the pass.
As the sun is beginning to set, the brothers start to fear they will be forced to spend the night in the middle of this forlorn mountain range with nothing to keep them company but the wolves who they hear constantly howling. Both are relieved when the carriage rounds a bend and they see Lake Zarovich glittering in the light of the retreating sun, with the fishing village of Vallaki nestled against it.
Located at the western end of the Svalich Pass, the lakeshore village is a pivotal crossroads for the entire southern Core, and has modest, bustling streets of clanging blacksmith shops and riotous fish markets. Vallaki is divided into the prosperous upper town and the somewhat squalid Lower Town. The former surrounds an ancient citadel constructed in a distinctive style with domes and spires, circular arches, and narrow arcades of slender columns. Other than that of the citadel, Raymond and Cameron see that the architecture here is similar to that in Zeidenburg, although the adornments are much different. Barovians, it seems, are fond of decorating the facades of their buildings with colorful stones, especially those that glitter with bright mineral flecks of a strange luster. These lively decorations adorn even the humblest home. Doorways tinkle with silver wind chimes, and windowboxes overflow with bright and delicate mountain flowers. Although quaintly charming, this domestic primping seems to highlight to Cameron just how trivial the joys of these people are.
Indeed, from what the brothers can tell, these people seem dour just by their dress; all somber colors of black, gray, and dark brown. The women in particular seem to wear nothing but black in this town, with very few exceptions. The reason for this, which the visiting D’Agostinos are unaware of, is that it is customary for Barovians to wear black for an entire year following the death of a relation. Consequently, given the size of the old Barovian families, and the harshness of Barovian life, it is not uncommon for many to perpetually wear black year after year.
Other than the colors of the fabrics, the fashions are very similar to the simple dress of the Gundarakites, and physically, an outsider would be hard pressed to tell these two feuding peoples apart, as they share the same features. They are apparently similar in temperament as well, and soon the icy stares of the citizens of Vallaki make Raymond and Cameron nostalgic for the scowling Gundarakites.
Raymond is disheartened to find that the small fishing village has no sewer system to skulk about, and is forced to spend the night exploring the above ground sections of Vallaki. It gets off to a bad start when he attempts to buy supplies from a general store with Invidian coin. After spitting on the silver piece, the shop keep screams at him in his guttural Balok to "Get out of here with yeh! Yeh stink of cat piss and arse!"
Having gotten some Barovian currency from their coachman at a modest exchange rate, Cameron meanwhile checks into the Blue Water Inn, known to be the finest establishment in Barovia and a considerable improvement from the paltry amenities of the Bloated Leach. In a common room with a spectacular view of Lake Zarovich and Mount Baratok in the distance, he sups on a fine meal of tocana, which is a Barovian pork stew with onions and garlic.

Leaving Vallaki in the early morn of May 1st, the brothers continue their journey by coach eastward along the Old Svalich Road, soon coming to the Svalich Pass and the massive Gates of Barovia. Spanning the opening to the narrow mountain pass, these huge iron gates hang from great stone pillars built into the sides of the mountains themselves, and standing before them are two towering stone guardians wielding pole arms and bearing the Von Zarovich crest. Both are decapitated; their carved heads lying among the weeds at their feet, neatly broken from the stone shoulders.
The gates are inexplicably closed, which the brothers find rather odd for such a heavily traveled route. Just as they disembark and investigate, however, the rusted gates emit a great screeching sound as they slowly swing open of their own volition, a chilly mist billowing forth from the Svalich Pass and washing over them like the breath of some great and terrible beast.
Gathering their courage and ignoring the desire to turn back, the two return to the carriage and continue on into the pass, fully expecting to hear the massive gates clanging shut behind them. The only thing that greets their ears however as they ascend even higher into the Balinoks are the howls of dozens of wolves.
Their travel slows considerably due to the incline and the many dead-man's curves and precipices that caution one against moving to rapidly along this treacherous twisting mountain road and after a few hours of winding through the craggy peaks of the Balinoks, the coach passes through a crossroads. From the window of the carriage, Cameron notes the sign that designates a smaller road as leading off towards Castle Ravenloft. Continuing along the main road, they approach the natural stone bridge that spans the massive Tser Falls. The two brothers look out the window at the thick white curtain of water that plunges to the valley a thousand feet below, which is almost completely obscured by the spray of the falls.
As the coach gains opposite end of the bridge, the brothers get a remarkable view from their window of the valley and notice immediately the perpetual ring of fog that surrounds the village and its environs. The D'Agostino brothers had always thought the infamous 'ring of choking fog' a legend or exaggeration, but here it was, wrapping around the Tser pool and snaking through the Svalitch pass, cutting across the road in two places to completely seal off the settlement from the outside world.
After crossing the falls, the road begins to wind its way downward into the valley, where the village of Barovia sits, completely surrounded by the ring of thick mist that almost seems to hold the town prisoner. Known locally as the Devil's Descent, the road twists back and forth as it drops precipitously in its approach to the village.
As they descend futher, the village once again becomes hidden by the mountainous terrain and the Svalich woods, and when the coach soon after comes face to face with the wall of billowing fog, the passengers both take deep breaths and steady their nerves, as their vehicle pushes through the dense, clammy mist and emerges on the other side agonizing moments later. A couple hundred feet beyond the mist the coach begins to slow. Sticking his head out the window, Raymond can see that they are approaching a crossroads where an old wooden gallows creaks in a chill wind blowing down from the high ground to the west, from which they came. A frayed length of rope dances from its beam. Across from the gallows, a low wall - crumbling in places - partially encloses a small plot of graves which presumably house those who died at the end of that rope.
As the coach now comes to a stop, the brothers climb out to see what is causing the delay and find to their dumbstruck horror that a shimmering apparition has materialized in the graveyard area.

At first all that their eyes notice is what appears to be a disembodied head wearing a frayed and soiled hood worm by condemned men, with a noose and length of rope dangling in the breeze, but after a moment they can see the transparent outline of the rest of the spectral body. A yell startles them and they both look away from this supernatural presence to see an armored man charging toward the graveyard, drawing not his sword, but a dagger with an ornate hilt and a blade that almost seems to be made of glass.

Steeling his courage, Raymond charges into the graveyard as well, drawing his weapon. Reaching the monster first, he swings at the spectre in a diagonal slash that carries the blade through its transparent form. Had he been wielding Ada’s Love, the ensorcelled properties of that weapon may have allowed him to damage his foe, but feeling as he was of being unworthy of using such a blade, his treasure remained in his backpack, and so his weapon passes through the phantom with no effect.

In response, the creature wraps its shimmering fingers about the caliban's neck and Raymond feels an intense cold go through him which freezes him in a state of shock and panic. Rushing in to his brother's aid, Cameron swings for the ghost but finds that his weapon is also useless against it. Out of the corner of his eye, he also notices with concern that a sinister quartet of pale and cadaverous humanoids – most likely ghouls scavenging on the carrion within the graveyard – have emerged from hiding and are now approaching. Turning to face them, he clutches the silver medallion about his neck and thrusts it in their undead faces, calling upon his faith in Ezra to vanquish them. Two of the attackers hiss and shield their faces before turning and scampering off. The remaining two close in for the attack, and the paladin steadies himself for their charge. The armored stranger, meanwhile, has joined the combat, sinking his almost transparent blade into the back of the phantasm, actually causing a visible wound in the creature to appear, which soon wells up with spectral blood. The ghost turns on him, releasing Raymond and clutching at the man’s throat, as the knight repeatedly plunges his enchanted weapon into the phantom's chest. Weakened from the ghosts touch, Raymond slices for the hood covering its head, but while the blade cuts through the hood, creating a large rent in the rough fabric, it does not meet anything within, and the monster begins to choke their newfound ally, causing his face to turn deathly pale and his eyes to bulge with terror.
Cameron meanwhile manages to wound one of the hungry creatures assaulting him before the other scrapes his exposed flesh with its dirty nails, causing an intense cold to spread through his limbs and body, paralyzing him and making him collapse to the ground before his enemies. Having slashed again at the ghosts hood with no effect, Raymond now sees his brother's predicament and comes to his defense, running through one of the ghouls with his blade as Cameron's body fights off the effects of the creature's touch and the paladin sluggishly gets to his feet to rejoin the battle.
With a last show of strength, the strangled knight plunges his ghostly dagger into the spectre’s chest once more, and the phantom convict finally succumbs to the multiple stab wounds and fades away with a wail. As the empty hood and frayed rope drop to the ground, the knight, horribly weakened from the struggle, soon follows them.
The two brothers finish off the last undead assailant and see to the fallen knight.
“Thank you, noble warriors, for your timely assistance” he says with a sputter as they help him to his feet. “I am Sir Urik.”
“I had made camp here the past several nights waiting for this apparition to appear so that I might put it to rest,” says the knight.
“You are a brave man for camping out in these lands,” observes Raymond with admiration.
“Or a foolish one,” chuckles the knight. “We would not have survived the Barovian nights had we not come prepared with a healthy supply of wolfsbane to keep the local predators at a distance. Even so, we were forced to kill several whose hunger overcame their revulsion. It is fortunate that the restless spirit finally appeared, for our supplies have dwindled. My brother at arms, Sir Tyrus, had gone down to the village this morning for more, but has not yet returned.”
As he relays his tale, Sir Urik gathers the remains of the tattered and grimy hood left behind by the spectre. Sprinkling holy water over it, he retrieves a spade from his camp and begins to dig a hole in the small cemetery for the ghost’s final earthly remains.
“According to the tale I was told by a local innkeep,” says the knight, “on the night following this man’s execution many years ago, his body was ripped down from the gallows by a few very strong and determined wolves, leaving only the hood and noose, which were simply discarded and never properly buried. I believe it was this lack of a decent burial that has kept the man's spirit from being at rest.”
After digging the small grave, Sir Urik and the D'Agostino brothers hold a small service and inter the remains, with Cameron giving prayer to Ezra to see this spirit into the next life. Sir Urik’s quest completed, the knight now packs up his small camp and returns to the coach where Raymond and Cameron wait.
With the knight and the brothers now sharing the same destination, all board the carriage to continue on to the village of Barovia. Dusk is rapidly approaching as the coach nears the small settlement, and a thick damp ground mist has settled in, threatening to envelope the area. As they approach, the passengers find the layout and architecture to be very similar to Vallaki, but as the muddy ground underfoot gives way to slick, wet, cobblestones, they begin to see that many of the windows of the tenements are boarded, broken, and lightless. A dilapidated sign hanging off to the right reads, in Balok, "Welcome to the Village of Barovia". Nothing seems to move in the village, although the mist is hampering visibility. Faint sounds, as of something groaning, echo hollowly from somewhere deeper in the settlement.
The carriage continues on, the coachman slowing its speed, as the streets become further choked with mist, limiting vision to only a few dozen feet. The passengers can see that the buildings here at the edge of town look to be all either abandoned, burned out, or barricaded. Garbage litters the ground, and Raymond detects a carrion stench in the air. Once more, the coach comes to a stop, and as the passengers lean out the windows, they see that ahead, in the middle of an intersection, is another carriage that is overturned and blocking their way, the haft and yoke broken and lying in the street, as well as most of the wheels. The horses are nowhere in sight. Sir Urik spots some movement coming from within the wreckage of the broken carriage and gets out to investigate, the brothers disembarking behind him and taking in their surroundings.
As Urik approaches the wreckage, he sees a pale man with terrible wounds hunched over the still twitching body of one of the coach's passengers, ripping and tearing at the flesh with gory mouth. As the knight recoils in horror and takes a step back, he sees that several more of these obviously dead people have silently emerged from around the wreckage and from the alleys and doorways surrounding the group.

Before he can draw his sword, the living corpse in the broken carriage lunges at him and Urik grabs hold of the grasping arms and hip tosses his opponent back into the wreckage, where the ravenous thing is impaled upon the broken haft. Raymond and Cameron draw their blades as Urik tosses another lunging cadaver over his back and into a pile of refuse before drawing his own weapon.
Raymond charges into the fray, quickly felling one of the rotting things and moving on to another, while his brother lops the arm off of one but then slips on the wet cobblestones and loses his grip on his weapon, scowling in dismay as it clatters into the gutter while two of the hungry dead bear down on him. Urik decapitates one shambler then turns to face the corpse that had been impaled earlier, the broken piece of haft still protruding from its gory chest. Cameron meanwhile tumbles between the grasping claws of his attackers and recovers his blade, turning to face his rotting foes once again. Finishing off another of the walking dead, Raymond moves in to assist his brother, while Urik cleaves the skewered monster in two. Cameron finally puts down the one armed zombie, and all three hack down the remaining undead combatant. Turning to look back, the trio realizes that the coachman must have panicked and abandoned them during the melee, as neither he nor his carriage are in sight. With a moan that echoes throughout the streets, dozens more of the living dead begin to emerge from doors and alleyways, hungry for their next meal.
As the trio grimly prepares to face the onslaught of the horrible things shambling forth from the foggy gloom and stumbling out of abandoned buildings, a morbid lullaby drifts down from above, sung in a haunting baritone.

Little one, O little one..
Come to me, your time is done..
Forget the future, Forget the past..
Your life is over – Breathe your last..

Quickly scanning the windows and rooftops above and about them, while keeping an eye on the oncoming undead, Cameron finds the source of the disturbingly hollow voice; a creature perched on a roof right above them, dressed in old and faded dinner attire and cape, with a giant gourd for a head, carved in a sinister Jack O'Lantern's face. Eerie yellow deadlight glows from within the thing's head, and greenish wisps of smoke issue from the mouth.

Fear gnaws at Cameron's stomach as he knows from experience that mindless undead become even more formidable opponents when under the direct control of a powerful and evil being such as this.
Turning back to the approaching gaggle of dead Barovians, he brings forth his medallion and attempts to use his faith to turn the blasphemous things back, but for whatever reason – his growing fear, the presence of the pumpkin headed fiend, or the power and number of these monsters – the zombies refuse to acknowledge Ezra, and continue their relentless advance.
Having drawn his enchanted dagger, Spectreslay, Sir Urik charges into two of the things with the blade thrust out before him, driving it through both of their chests an pinning them to one another. The force of the charge knocks them both to the ground, with Urik still on top of them.
Raymond wades into a small mob of the ghouls, the saber Ada's Love firmly gripped in his hand. While had been reluctant to use the blade found in the sewers beneath Zeidenburg, feeling that a blade so beautiful was not meant to be wielded by one so hideous as he, after witnessing the ineffectiveness of his own sword in the battle with the ghost of the hanged man, he had decided that perhaps it was meant to be so. Indeed, the gilded saber itself almost seemed to be telling him to use it. And now use it he does, easily lopping the groping limbs off of his rotting assailants, and cutting them down one by one. Still, destroying these things is a difficult process. Indeed, all three living combatants are struck by how powerful these walking dead are. Much more so than those that any of them have ever previously encountered; these ghouls fight with a strength not typically displayed in the mindless undead, and have proven especially resilient to attack, with flesh that is strangely harder than putrefying flesh should be and bodies that refuse to crumple to the ground until they have been nearly hacked apart completely.
They are also proving to be incredibly resilient to the power of faith, as Cameron attempts to drive them back once again with the power of Ezra only to once again fail.
Still pinning two of the clawing zombies to the ground, Urik fends off their seeking nails and teeth and pulls the small bottle of holy water from his pack, crushing it against the head of the closer ghoul and breaking the glass against its skull. Like a powerful acid, the pure liquid quickly disintegrates the rotting thing’s head and begins to eat into the head of the creature beneath it. Urik gets to his feet and pulls the blade out of the two corpses as they spasm and then lie still, but before he can catch his breath he is assailed by two more of the living dead that attempt to wrap their filthy hands about his throat. Laying his hands on the knight's shoulders, Cameron mutters a quick prayer to Ezra and Urik feels a renewed strength flood his body, giving him the energy to continue the battle. Pushing his attackers back, the knight sheathes the magical dagger in favor of a weapon more suited to cleaving skulls, and advances into the zombies while swinging his bastard sword in powerful two handed arcs.
No matter how many the three heroes kill, however, more and more shamble out of the fog to feast upon their flesh, and eventually even their battle hardened bodies begin to tire from exertion and from the cuts and scrapes and bruising they receive throughout the onslaught of these ravenous monsters.
Unbroken by repeated failures, Cameron summons his faith in Ezra once again and finally manages to drive off a few of the living cadavers, while Urik pours lamp oil over his blade and ignites it, waving it about before the shambling monsters in an effort to keep them back. Raymond shouts at his companions to take this opening and make a run for the nearest building before they are overwhelmed again, and the heroes scramble for the door of a nearby tavern. Raymond tries the door, which is thankfully unlocked, and all three dash into the unknown darkness of the seemingly abandoned building, praying it is not infested with the hungry dead. As Cameron slams the door shut in the ghastly rotting faces of the oncoming mob, and draws the bar across it, he thinks to himself how lucky they are all that this establishment doesn't feature batwing doors like one of the local taverns in Curriculo.
Pausing to catch their breath, yet readied for battle should there be enemies about in here, the heroes take in their gloomy surroundings. Having the best vision in darkness from years of living in the sewers beneath Curriculo, Raymond scans the inside of the tavern and announces that it appears empty. The interior seems to be one big common room full of vacant tables and bar, with a large hearth in the corner which is most likely the source of the heavy stench of burned meat that permeates the place. Cameron goes to investigate behind the bar, looking for a trapdoor that might lead into a cellar. Catching movement out of the corner of his eye, he manages to duck just as a woman jumps up, and swings a thick oaken staff in a horizontal arc, smashing open a dozen or so bottles rather than his skull.
Quickly taking a good two steps backward, he raises his right hand and brings out his medallion with his left, shouting "Wait!! We are not the enemy!"

Several emotions play over the young woman's face, first anger and determination, then surprise, followed by dawning realization, then relief, and finally puzzlement. "What is this pendant you show me?" she says finally in Balok, as she lowers her staff slightly.
"It is the symbol of Ezra, my lady", Cameron responds.
The girl's puzzlement deepens for a moment, then she replies "Ah. The mist goddess worshipped in the eastern lands."
"Ezra is worshipped everywhere"
"Not in Barovia. Here those seeking spiritual guidance follow the path of the Morninglord."
"Of course", says Cameron. He is struck by the auburn haired woman's beauty. A pure loveliness without overt sexuality. A sense of innocence and kindness coexisting with an aura of inner strength, confidence, and determination. Looking beyond her, he sees an old man and a young boy huddled on the floor. Following his gaze, the woman says "The man is named Boris. He has been injured. The boy is Stefan. Both are from this village. My name is Ireena."
"A pleasure to meet you, my lady" says Cameron, bowing deeply. I am Cameron D'Agostino. This is my brother Raymond, and this is Sir Urik, a valiant warrior whom we have recently met."
Raymond and Sir Urik begin to barricade the windows and doors as best they can, while Cameron kneels down at the old man's side to inspect his wound, finding a ragged gouge in the right forearm, bloody and already showing signs of infection.
"He was bitten by one of those… things.. out there,” says Ireena. “I dressed it as best I could with what is available here. My remedies and ingredients are in my room at the Blood of the Vine Inn and I did not want to leave them alone to try and get them."
"It was good that you did not venture out alone, my lady. Is this inn close by?"
Ireena nods. "Down the street to the south at the town square."
Cameron takes the man's arm in his and places his right hand over the wound, while gripping his silver medallion in his left. The old man gasps, but Cameron murmurs him to be still, while bowing his head in concentration. The boy looks on in awe.
"Potions, and ingredients.." says Raymond as he goes to the bar and pours himself a drink. "Are you an alchemist?"
"An herbalist." She replies. "And a healer"
"As am I", says Cameron, lifting his head and speaking softly. "Though by different means. Ezra provides me the ability. I have halted the infection, by Her grace, and have saved his life. The wound still needs treating, however, so it would be best that we try and retrieve your things at first light."
The night the six spend in the abandoned tavern – the silence of the village disturbed every so often by clawing and scratching at the door or windows – is a long one, and filled with nightmares for those who are actually able to sleep. Throughout the night they hear the church bell tolling every hour. Good to know someone else in this village is still alive, Raymond thinks. In the early morn, Ireena brews a tea in the fireplace that she claims has the ability to restore vigor in those who drink it. After they all share a quick breakfast of mostly hard tack, Raymond shimmies up the chimney to the roof and drops a rope down, pulling up first the boy, then the old man, and finally the young woman, Ireena. Cameron and Urik wrap their armor and equipment up in a blanket and tie it to the rope and then one at a time climb up the chimney before pulling up their things and donning their armor on the roof. While they do this, Raymond scans the area. The fog – while still present – has lifted slightly, and he can make out shapes moving about the village square to the south. It appears that a barricade had been erected to block off the street, but it is about to be breached by a mob of the walking dead. The streets in the immediate area seem clear, however, as the shamblers' attention seems to be drawn to the town square for the most part. Hearing the sounds of battle from that way, Raymond shouts to the others that he is going to help before they are overrun and springs from the rooftop, dropping into a roll as he hits the wet cobblestones.

Scrambling to his feet, he sprints toward the town square as Cameron and Urik finish re-equipping themselves and the paladin climbs the rope down from the roof and rushes to join the battle as well. Urik declines to descend, instead running and leaping to the next rooftop, intending to make his way to the town square by going from building to building, a feat that only one who has trained as he has could accomplish while wearing metal armor.

Raymond, meanwhile, is just reaching the town square, where he can now see a lone figure in golden armor and bright yellow mantle, fending off the oncoming dead with a shield and short spear. Two of the hideous things have been felled, but there are nearly a dozen more beginning to pour through a breach in the makeshift barricade.

Giving the mob of dead a wide berth, he leaps at a still intact section of barricade and scrambles to the top, jumping down on the other side. He realizes that the lone defender in the golden armor is actually a woman, and in a moment of chivalry, he runs to her side, putting his body in between hers and the clawing dead arms pressing in on her, and, grabbing her shield arm, he attempts to lead her to safety.
"What the devil are you doing?!?” the astonished woman shouts. "We have to fix the barricade!"
"You can't fix it, you bitch!" Raymond screams back, the moment of chivalry apparently having passed. "Let's go!!!" He continues to try and pull her away from the undead mob, but the armored woman knees him in the groin and turns back to the zombies, impaling the closest one on her spear with a banshee's cry. Muttering and grumbling, Raymond draws his new saber and wades into the horde as well.
Cameron reaches the mob of undead trying to force their way through the barricade and, perhaps inspired by the intense bravery of the two defenders on the other side, wields his faith in Ezra like a ram, forcing several of those closest to flee before her symbol in his outstretched hand. He then charges into the thinned ranks, just as Sir Urik leaps down from above, nearly cleaving a ghoul's chest in half from the force of his aerial charge. The zombie begins to get back to its feet, ribs protruding and blackened, putrefied organs spilling out, but Urik soon lops the head off and the corpse falls to the ground again, lifeless. Seeing that the tide is turning now and that his brother and the other two defenders are finishing off what's left of this wave of the undead siege, Cameron turns and runs back to the tavern, urging the three others to one at a time jump into his waiting arms. The four begin hurrying toward the town square as the dead finally begin to notice them and approach. Once through the breached barricade, Cameron tells the others to run for the inn, while he and the other defenders feverishly try and repair the hole in the barricade before the living dead begin their siege anew…

As our heroes and their allies struggle to repair the makeshift barricade against the ravenous mob of walking dead in the Village of Barovia, let us now turn briefly to a darkened chamber some unknown distance away. Nothing stirs in this pitch black room. Nothing living, that is. The only thing that can be seen in this darkness is a pair of burning red eyes that pulsate with a fiery malevolence.
A burst of flame erupts in the center of the chamber as a brazier suddenly springs to life, even though devoid of coals. Now that the room is somewhat illuminated, we see the stonework of a keep or a crypt, and the source of the burning eyes can now be seen as a shadowy figure sitting on a throne on the far side of the otherwise empty room.
Within the fire burning in the brazier, a visage can be seen; a grotesque being with a gourd-like head carved in a hideous grin.
Cold bony fingers grip the arms of the throne. A voice issues forth from beneath the burning eyes; a dry and sinister voice.
"Ah, Lord Pumpkin,” it says. “What news do you bring?"
The odious gourd head speaks in its haunting baritone, plumes of greenish smoke emitting from its mouth as it does so, deadlights blazing from within.
"I have been successful. The boy was killed. The cleric found the book and used it. The blaspheme was created. The necromantic plague was unleashed. And the dead now walk the streets of Barovia."
The glowing red eyes burn fiercely then soften.
"You have done well, my friend. And what of the girl?"
"She remains safe."
"Excellent. She is of critical importance. And the Invidians – have they arrived?"
"Just a short while ago. They have encountered the walking dead and narrowly escaped. I believe they are with the girl now."
"Ah, splendid. Everything is transpiring according to my design. Return now, my friend. I shall have other tasks for you."
There is a pause, and a pulse of light within the sickening pumpkin head. This is obviously not a creature used to being given tasks. If the figure on the throne notices, however, it does not show any sign. Finally, the gourd thing nods and disappears, the flames in the brazier following soon after, plunging the room into darkness once more.
A darkness pierced only by a pair of burning red eyes.


Notes: This chapter was actually two gaming sessions worth of story. I had originally written each session as a different entry, but decided to combine them because it flowed better, and because the sessions had each been very short. The first session ended with the coachman leaving the characters to fend against the zombies. The section with Raymond exploring the sewers I had actually run with Mike while waiting for the other players to arrive for the second session and did it as sort of a flashback, but when I revised the entries, I inserted it chronologically into the narrative. For a while, with people's schedules, we were having trouble getting everyone there for the start of the game, and both sessions had started more than two hours late. In between, I thought of preparing little solo 'mini-adventures' that I could run if we ever needed to wait for other players to arrive, and that is where Raymond’s exploration of the sewers came from. Like I did with the previous chapter, I revised it a little from what I had originally written, although I didn’t need to do that much, since I was already getting into the swing of writing by that point. I fleshed out the dialogue between Cameron and the Invidian soldiers and the dialogue with Sir Urik, and then added a couple of references to the history of the land.
At this point we also got a third player, who was playing on a trial basis as a character I had created for him. If he worked out, he would have eventually gotten to make his own character after the party left Castle Ravenloft, where Sir Urik would have most likely died horribly but nobly. As it turns out he only ended up playing three sessions, and Sir Urik was run as a non-player character afterward.
While he is not named in this session, the man in gray robes with the ominous black bag that the characters encounter at the beginning of this chapter when they try and explore what remains of Old Seccolo is Dr. Malus, and his appearance was done in reference to an ongoing storyline in my Ravenloft campaigns. The Dollmaker – an evil child murderer – is pursued by the living corpse of the parent of one of his victims, whom he also murdered. The undead Dr. Malus first appeared in one of my games in 2002 and has appeared a few other times over the years, on the trail of the Dollmaker but never able to get his revenge. The two finally met and had it out at a special game/party I did in February '07, where the roles of Malus and the Dollmaker were ironically played by Rob and Mike, respectively. In that game, Dr. Malus finally got to bring his nemesis to justice once and for all, and then crumbled to ash, his work in this world now finally done. As far as timeline goes, I set the beginning of this current campaign before the events of that game, so the Dollmaker and Dr. Malus are both around, and since I had just had the Dollmaker appear in the previous session, I thought I'd have Dr. Malus show up briefly, still on his trail.
The Invidian general, Warduke, is a character that was created for and featured in the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon and accompanying toy line back in the 80s. They have recently given the character a fleshed out history, statistics for use in the game, and a miniature. For my campaign I'm using the look and the name, but created my own background and statistics that fit Ravenloft better.
A lot of the descriptions of the architecture and general setting that I use when the party visits various towns and villages are usually taken straight from published supplements for the game, with some of the wording changed a little - same thing with the room descriptions in Castle Ravenloft later on. Probably over 95 percent of these entries are my own words, but I did want to point out that some sections were the work of other writers. The introduction to Ravenloft at the beginning of Chapter 1 was also taken from already published material.
The session ended up being just a lot of reading aloud to the players. There was supposed to be an encounter at a farm (I eventually used it in Act II) that was originally supposed to happen on the way to Barovia, but a couple players were really late to the game so I had to skip it because I wanted to make sure the group got to the village of Barovia so that they could meet up with the character of a player who was just starting that day. Consequently there was one less major encounter to break up the long descriptions of the journey and the scenery, and the towns the group was passing through, so it seemed at times like the session was just me blathering to the group. Another problem was that the encounter that I skipped was supposed to net the players a magic weapon which they really were going to need to fight the gallows ghost that was the second encounter, so Sir Urik ended up doing all of the work against the ghost since he had the only weapon that would work against it and I threw in a couple more ghouls for the other characters to fight, since they could not hurt the ghost at all with what they had, since Mike would not get Ada’s Love until the flashback session I did before the next game. The sword was actually supposed to be given to the group after the encounter at the farmhouse. The background of the sword was going to be the same, but it was going to have come into the possession of the farm widow’s husband, who had been a collector of such things and would have been presented to the players, along with another weapon, by the grateful widow and her family.
Another reason the ended up being so short was that I actually home cooked a 'Barovian-themed' dinner for the players. It was a thick pork stew that was heavy on garlic and onions. I used an amalgam of a couple of recipes I got online, although unfortunately I don't think I saved it. I served it in wooden bowls with crusty bread and got compliments from my players for the authentic feel. I also made 'Barovian plum brandy' by combining some plum juice with brandy, but it was still a little too strong to be used for gaming night. I think next time I'll use mostly plum juice with just enough brandy to make it taste like some kind of liquor.
Lord Pumpkin is a nod to an obscure comic book villain that appeared in the short lived Ultra comics of the nineties. I sculpted the head and modified the body to look as close to the character as I could get. I thought it came out pretty good, although I keep meaning to add a little bit of green smoke emitting from the mouth like in the picture taken from the comic.
The verse that Lord Pumpkin sings is from the Clive Barker novel, Abarrat. I remember when I first read it a couple years back I filed it away for future use in one of my games
I wish I could have done the zombie plague better. I have tried numerous times in my Ravenloft campaigns to do the Night of the Living Dead thing and have it really work, but haven't had luck with it. The D&D system doesn't really lend itself to huge mobs of monsters, because the way the rules work, there is really no difference between a character fighting against three opponents at once and fighting against twenty, so you never really get that fear and tension you have in the movies with huge mobs of the walking dead – plus all the dice rolling need for such large groups detracts from the atmosphere. I think the closest I had come to a good system for doing the zombie mob thing was in the "Escape Zombie Castle" scenario I did two years back, but unfortunately the turnout for that game was so low that it totally changed the scope of the scenario and I never could get that zombie movie feel.
For this zombie plague I used the zombies in the book, which were much more powerful and took a whole lot to kill, and then each game turn the group stayed out in the middle of the street I rolled a six sided die - one that appropriately had a skull and crossbones replacing the one. Whenever a one was rolled, I added another zombie, and I rolled one more die for each successive turn. I think when the group finally decided to seek shelter in a building I was rolling a big handful of dice at the beginning of the round.
By the way, the line "You can't fix it, you bitch!" was actually spoken in character by Mike (Raymond) at the gaming table and we all had a good laugh at it, which is why I remembered and included it word for word.
The epilogue was a little interlude scene I had written to sort of bridge some of the sessions and drop some hints and foreshadowing about what was to come, and also as kind of a refresher as to what was going on in the game since at that point we were only playing about once a month and it was taking more sessions than I thought to get through it. Also I kind of forgot about Lord Pumpkin after his brief appearance and I wanted to cement his role in the storyline.