The party returned to the Blue Water Inn and slept the rest of the night away. They awoke the next morning and agreed that they would visit Lady Fiona Wachter before attending the festival. When they went down for breakfast they saw that Lady Fiona’s sons where also having breakfast at the Blue Water Inn.
The party approached the sons and asked if they would introduce them to their mother. Nikolai Wachter agreed and they headed for the Wachterhouse after they finished breakfast.
Before they left, Dymos instructed his familiar to stay with Iryna again and to come get them if there is any trouble.
Nikolai led the party to the Wachterhouse and the party were shocked at the sight. The house seems disgusted with itself. A slouching roof hangs heavy over furrowed gables, and moss-covered walls sag and bulge under the weight of the vegetation. As they studied the house’s sullen countenance, they heard the edifice actually groan. Only then did they realize the extent to which the house hates what it has become. Nikolai greeted the servant at the front door. He requested an audience for the party and the servant invited them in.
The party was led to the parlor and the servant excused herself to find Lady Fiona. Nikolai also took his leave from the party and assured them that the servant would take care of them.
In the Parlor, three elegant couches surrounded an oval table made of black glass. All are set in front of a blazing hearth, above which hangs the portrait of a smirking nobleman sporting a broken nose and a tangle of hair graying at the temples. Several smaller portraits hang on the north wall.
The party soon became impatient when they were kept waiting for Lady Fiona for over 20 minutes. Dymos wandered to the Dining Room and stairway and yelled ‘Hello!’, but there was no response.
The party decided to explore the house and search for Lady Fiona themselves. Before they set off, Aldric cast Detect Magic and detected Necromancy below the main floor.
The party moved on and explored the Dining Room..
They found the Dining Room to contain an ornate dining table stretching the length of the room, a crystal chandelier hanging above it imperiously. The silverware was tarnished, the dishes chipped, yet all are still quite elegant. Eight chairs, their backs adorned with sculpted elk horns, surrounded the table. Arched windows made of a latticework of iron and glass look out onto the small, fog-swept estate.
They next moved to explore the Den and found it contained wood paneling, embroidered rugs, colorful furnishings, and a blazing fire making this chamber stifling. Mounted above the mantel was an elk’s head. Across from the hearth, tall, slender windows look out over dead gardens.
The party continued on and explored the servants quarters and back foyer without finding anything of interest.
The party soon found the stairwell to the cellar and heard distant chanting from below. They cautiously went down the stairs and found themselves in a root cellar with a dirt floor. The party saw human footprints trailing from their stairwell to stairs that led up and out to the back of the house.
The party moved to explore the root cellar and ten skeletons erupted out of the floor! The party quickly dealt with the skeletons with the last skeleton being shattered by a playing card thrown expertly by Doc.
Doc is awarded an inspiration for his sense of style.
The party heard the chanting grow louder from the room to the west. The party smartly cast Pass without Trace and opened the door to find a ritual sacrifice taking place. The ritual was being led by Lady Fiona with three cult acolytes. Lady Fiona also had an Imp sitting on her shoulder.
The party retreated and planned their strategy. They all then re-entered the room and surrounded Lady Fiona and the acolytes.
The party attacked and was able to easily dispatch the acolytes and the Imp. The party pleaded to Lady Fiona:
“We are hear to save you!”
Lady Fiona laughed at this plea and the party paralyzed her, knocked her unconscious, and retrained her for questioning using the shackles from the sacrifice.
The party was feeling the original intent of the day had totally got away from them and Dymos shook his head and stated:
“Well, what the fuck we are going to do now?”
The party decided to take an unconscious Lady Fiona with them and explore the rest of the house.
The party made their way upstairs and found two bedrooms they assumed were the bedrooms of the sons. They moved on and explored the library and found that it was almost empty, except for the dozens of cats.
Bookshelves hugged the walls, but most of the shelves were bare. Other furnishings included a desk, a chair, a table, and a wine cabinet. The room had an irregular shape, and none of its angles seem quite right, as though the shifting of the house has set the whole place on edge.
Dymos found the large number of cats particularly unsettling.
They returned to the hallway and heard from the next room:
“Little Kitty doesn’t like the smell of you!”
They attempted to unlock the door without any luck. They again heard from inside the room:
“Kitty doesn’t like the smell of you!”
The party asked whomever was inside to open the door and the door slowly slid open.
This room was musty and dark. An iron-framed bed fitted with leather straps stands near a wall. The place has no other furnishings.
Scurrying away from the party on all fours was a young woman in a soiled nightgown. She leapt onto the bed and hissed like a cat.
“Little kitty doesn’t know you!” she shouts. “Little kitty doesn’t like the smell of you!”
The party quickly realized this was the recluse daughter Stella. They tried to clam her down and ask when she had last seen her brothers:
“Kitty hasn’t seen her brothers in years!”
Tess asked Stella more questions about her captivity and Stella replied:
“Kitty doesn’t feel safe!”
“Kitty doesn’t want to leave!”
Eventually Stella confided that Lady Fiona did hurt her and torture her. Stella also shared that Lady Fiona practices the dark arts.
This horrified and disgusted the party and they convinced Stella to join them and leave her room and isolation.
They opened the door to the master bedroom and found that across from the door, a fire sputtered and struggled for life in the hearth, above which hangs a framed family portrait: a noble father and mother, their two young sons, and a baby daughter in the father’s arms. The sons are smiling in a way that suggests mischief. The parents look like uncrowned royalty.
Wood paneling covered the walls of the room. A closet and a framed mirror flanked a curtained window to the south. To the north, a wide, canopied bed lies pinned between matching end tables with oil lamps. Stretched out on one side of the bed is a man dressed in black, his eyes each covered with a copper piece. He bears a striking resemblance to the father in the painting.
Aldric used his lantern and was able to discern that Lord Wachter did indeed die of natural causes in his bed.
The party was becoming more and more repulsed by the actions of Lady Fiona. They continued onto the next room and found it was a storage room that contained a dusty, ten-foot-square room with a curtained window and shelves lining three walls. On the bottom shelf rested an iron chest. The other shelves were bare.
The party opened the chest and found that the contents contained:
- A silk bag containing 180 ep, each coin bearing Strahd’s stern visage in profile.
- A leather bag containing 110 gp
- A wooden pipe that has been passed down through many generations of Wachter patriarchs
- Four scrolls – notarized deeds for parcels of land given to the Wachter family by Count Strahd von Zarovich nearly four centuries ago. The deeds were for the:
- Wachterhouse
- Wizard of Wines Winery
- Ruins of Berez
- Yester Hill
- A supple leather case containing an unbound manuscript titled The Devil We Know – a poetic manifesto written by Lady Fiona Wachter attesting that the worship of devils can bring happiness, success, freedom, wealth, and longevity.
- A blasphemous treatise bound in black leather titled The Grimoire of the Four Quarters, written by the infamous diabolist Devostas, who was drawn and quartered for his fell practices yet did not die.
- A very old letter to Lady Lovina Wachter (an ancestor) from one Lord Vasili von Holtz, thanking Lovina for her hospitality, loyalty, and friendship over the years
The party decided to return and shackle Lady Fiona to Stella’s bed and try and get information from her. After they shackled her, they shouted at her:
“What do you want?”
They struck a mace beside her head to intimidate her and again shouted:
“What do you want?”
Seeing no response, they asked what the ritual was for and Lady Fiona shared that it was intended to overthrow the Baron. The party asked why she doesn’t just overthrow him with force, and Lady Fiona shared that his henchman Izek prevents any direct confrontation.
The party then asked Stella if she would be happy to never see Lady Fiona again. Stella responded yes and the party prepared to set the house on fire.
They first made Stella invisible for their trip back to the Blue Water Inn and Tess spit on Lady Fiona before they proceeded to set the house on fire. The party quickly got a change of clothes and exited out the back door.
The party looked back on the burning house and quietly made there way back to the Blue Water Inn.
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