1205 Gorthstone

Elegant, golden-leafed beeches seem to caringly shield travellers from the elements.

• Terrain: Tangled forest (3), Aldweald
• Lost/encounters: 2-in-6. Encounters are 2-in-6 likely to be with 1d4 elf knights (DMB) in the service of the Earl of Yellow (p32), clad entirely in yellow and mounted on great golden wolves (as dire wolves, DMB).
• Ley line crossing Hoad/Ywyr: Arcane spell-casters perceive the wailing cries of infants slowly fading into the moans of the dead, repeating in an endless cycle.

Haunted Pool

At the very centre of the hex lies a large glade, about 500′ wide, surrounding a 300′ diameter pool of clear, placid water punctuated with clusters of pale green water lilies. At the very centre of the pool is a tall, black obelisk—the Gorthstone.

Weather reversal: An odd magic wraps the glade, whereby the day’s prevailing weather conditions are reversed. On sunny days, the pool is veiled with fog and storms; in the deep cold of winter, a clement warmth surrounds the stone; and so forth.

Gazing into the waters: Reveals the pale, shrouded form of a young woman, drifting among the lily stems: the Phan tom of the Pool.

Touching the waters: Awakens the Phantom of the Pool, who rises from the water. The person disturbing the pool must also Save Versus Spell or fall instantly into a deep slumber for 1d3 hours.

Drinking the waters: Causes a person to instantly fall into a deep slumber for 1d3 hours, with no save.

Gorthstone

Those who successfully cross the pool arrive at a 20′ wide dais of crumbling, weed-clad sandstone. Atop it stands a 15′ high obelisk of hard, black rock, veined with silver.

Guardian: The Audrune Haygral. Stepping on the dais alerts him of intruders, causing him to summon 2 Drune cottagers (DMB) and 1d4 bramblings (DMB) that arrive in 1d6 Turns.

Examining the stone: Reveals tight bands of ancient Old Drunic script close to the base of the stone and more recent Drunic runes around the middle.

Inscribed spell: The Drunic runes describe the arcane spell Trap the Soul (p457). See Ley Lines and Standing Stones, p18 for details on learning this spell.

Old Drunic script: The ancient script provides instructions for a ritual that may be performed at this site to dispel even the deepest enchantments. The ritual requires the participation of three arcane spell-casters of at least Level 5 and must be performed upon the night of a solstice. At the culmination of the ritual, the magical components of the enchantment are unwoven and released as free-willed demi-plasms —entities of pure magical energy. The Drune know further magical techniques to bind and command these entities.

The Audrune Haygral

Incorporeal: Haygral has abandoned his physical form and now exists solely within the flow of the ley energies around Gorthstone. His body lies in temporal stasis, ritually interred in the crypts of the Drune Lodge (hex 0507).

Powers: Haygral cannot interact with the physical world directly, but can send word of intruders to the Drune Aegis.

The Phantom of the Pool

A pale, spectral human woman dressed in the sodden white vestments of some long-forgotten sect. In her eyes burns an eerie blue light. Upon being awakened from the pool, she drifts towards the nearest living creature, beseeching that “the Staff of the Apostle must be restored.” If the listener does not understand her pleas (or ignores or mocks her), she attacks.

Demeanour (Neutral): Despondent, hateful of the living who do not understand her plight.

Speech: Otherworldly wailing. Woldish.

Desires: To be laid to rest by the reconstitution of a staff, belonging to the Church, that once imprisoned her.

Combat stats: Spectre (DMB). If slain, returns 7 days later.

History: Originally a high priestess of a Gwyrae sect, the Church trapped her spirit within the Staff of the Apostle, a powerful relic. When the Drune destroyed the staff here through the disenchantment ritual engraved on Gorthstone, she was released as a demi-plasm. The Drune then bound her to the pool to act as a guardian for the stone. She believes she can be freed by recreating the staff—practically, an impossibility. However, she can in fact be freed by performing the disenchantment ritual on the pool itself.