0603 The Ruined Cottage
HexDolmenwood Campaign Book · p.250
Open source p.250Choked with thickets of brittle, barbed bushes. The wind whistles with almost voice-like susurrations.
Choked with thickets of brittle, barbed bushes. The wind whistles with almost voice-like susurrations.
- Terrain: Thorny forest (4), Dwelmfurgh / Northern Scr.
- Lost/encounters: 3-in
- Ley Line Chell (p18): Arcane spell-casters perceive the curious dual sensation of balmy heat and biting cold.
- Within the Ring of Chell (p20): True fairies are afflicted with a spiritual malaise; teleportation and summoning are ineffectual; magic of illusion or charm has a 2-in chance of failure.
Charred Cottage
Beside a sluggishly flowing stream, in a clearing ringed by ancient and rotting firs, sit the charred remains of a cottage. Its burnt timbers lie scattered within the roughly square frame of its foundation stones. Tall grasses now occupy its dirt floors, swaying in a gentle breeze.
At night: Voices murmur near the ruin, muffled and frantic as if in heated debate. This is the sound of muttering phantoms congregating and exchanging secrets. They manifest among the trees and drift to the cottage’s broken doorstep, where they hover for the remainder of the night.
Approaching the phantoms: If approached with proper deference, they converse warily with the living; if provoked, or if any Drunes are with the party, they attack.
Secrets of the Phantoms ()
Secret 1 The Big Chook (hex 0606) is in sooth a psychic emanation of a nightmare-plagued dragon slumbering in the lakebed. 2 There are still frost elves living in Dwelmfurgh, in a place hidden behind the Falls of Naon (hex 0504). 3 The Drune guard a magical mirror of great power upon the Phantom Isle (hex 0706). 4 The legendary robber Dewidort of Smerne hid his treasure horde close to Wight Falls (hex 0607). 5 The being called the Hag was once a fairy princess; her hut can be found by searching in the central regions of Hag’s Addle (hex 0908). 6 The lost tower of the renegade Drune called the Aubrathon is on an isle in the Brinemere (hex 1103).
Muttering Phantoms
Humanoid figures composed of tendrils of mist and eddies of dead leaves, which combine into larger vortices when the phantoms gather. These minor ghosts are created when a mortal dies clinging to a perilous secret. In death, they value secrets above all else, trading them as a form of currency.
Demeanour: Curious, suspicious, argumentative.
Speech: Urgent, barely intelligible murmurs, which become clearer when conversing with the living. Woldish, Old Woldish, some Drunic.
Desires: To collect and trade secrets. To cause mischief for the Drune, whom they dislike and fear.
Rewards: Once per week, the phantoms are willing to share a single secret of their own (see Secrets of the Phantoms), in exchange for a non-trivial secret of equal value. If the PCs share an untrue secret, the phantoms manifest and attack them in their sleep days later, regardless of location.
Medium Undead—Sentient—Any Alignment
Level 4 AC 16 HP (18) Saves R11 H12 B13 S14 Att Touch (, + slow death) Speed 40 Morale 9 XP 180
Undead: Silent before attacking. Immune to biological effects (e.g. disease, poison) and mind-affecting spells (e.g. Vapours of Dream, Paralysation, Dominate).
Immunities: Only harmed by silver weapons, magic, or magic weapons.
Slow death: The victim is cursed to suffer a melancholic yearning for death. They must Save Versus Spell each morning upon awakening or suffer damage, fading into nothingness should they reach 0 HP. The curse can be reversed by magic of curse removal or by sharing a worthy secret with the phantom.