The White Moose

Nimsy Huddle, the town speaker, tempts you with freshly baked, halfling-shaped cookies. Her house was clearly built for humans, but most of the furniture is sized for halflings, with a few big chairs for visitors of taller stock. Four halfling children scamper from room to room and climb a ladder up to the loft, chasing one another with wooden swords, while a fire crackles in the hearth in Speaker Huddle's cluttered kitchen. "Our loggers are being terrorized by a white moose," says Speaker Huddle, "and the beast has eluded the hunters we've sent to kill it. We depend on the forest for our survival. I wouldn't be a very good town speaker if I let a dumb moose get the better of us. Will you help?" When the party asks for more than tasty treats as an incentive, Speaker Huddle is willing to pay them 100 gp for the moose's head. The party agrees, and starts the tedious process of rolling dice, getting lost, fighting random forest animals like bears and wolves and such. They split up, realize that was a bad idea, and some of them find the tomb and just sit and wait for everyone else to show up. But they find the tracks eventually, the tracks lead to a large, circular indentation in a snowy hillside. Rising from the middle of this circle is a triangular gnomon of beautifully carved crystal that stands twenty feet tall. A ten-foot-high berm hugging the circle's eastern edge has evergreens growing around and atop it, sheltering what looks like a sarcophagus buried under snow and enclosed by a half-circle of pale blue crystal pillars. North of the berm is a delicately carved gazebo made of marble, and south of the berm is a row of outward-facing, white marble statues atop granite pillars. The six elevated, white marble statues arranged in a line depict slender, robed figures facing northward. The engraving on their faces has been worn away by the wind, but pointed ears make the statues identifiable as elves. Rising from the center of the circular depression is a tall, triangular, crystal gnomon—a device one typically finds in the middle of a sundial. It is thick near the base and narrows to a sharp point at the top. The snow around the gnomon has melted away, revealing a circle of symbols carved into the stone around it. The symbols depict phases of the moon, suggesting that the circular depression is not a sundial, but a moon dial. Something has punched a rough hole in the wall in the northwest edge of the depression, creating a dark opening that leads under the hill. The party goes to explore the gazebo, and decide to come back to it, and figure out how to get into the inside of the tomb. The party then finds the crumbled entrance to the barrow. The spacious chamber tucked under the hill is strewn with bones and holds the sleeping forms of several harmless animals (foxes, hares, goats, owls, wolf pups, and young bears) that share the space peacefully. The white moose makes its lair among these creatures as well when it's not out terrorizing Ten-Towners. Here the party encounters the awakened white moose, it fights them here, which startles and scares away the other animals. The white moose packs a punch, but is otherwise dispatched. With the clever use of the moonbeam spell, Vaede unlocks the doors to the two remaining rooms. The first room is a circular chamber that has an intricately carved domed ceiling twenty feet high. A beam of light shines down from the top of the dome, illuminating a rectangular stone sarcophagus. Someone has turned this tomb into living quarters, as evidenced by a rack of drying herbs and an unfurled bedroll behind the sarcophagus. When she hears the door open, Ravisin the frost druid ducks behind the sarcophagus. Hidden alongside her is an awakened shrub (a berry bush) that follows Ravisin everywhere, in case the druid gets hungry and wants some berries to munch on. Eating the berries has stained the druid's teeth blue. The druid climbs onto the sarcophagus when characters enter the tomb and shouts, in Common, "Ten-Towns will be destroyed—if not by my hand, then by the Frostmaiden's!" The druid then attacks, fighting to the death. At last, Ravisin uses her final, gasping breath to say, "My beasts will avenge us!" The awakened shrub is terrified of Ravisin and doubly frightened of fire. He happily spills all his secrets;

Ravisin blamed Ten-Towners for the death of her twin sister, also a frost druid. (The shrub doesn't know how or when Ravisin's sister died.) Ravisin hides her sister's corpse in the sarcophagus.
Ravisin awakened many beasts and plants throughout Icewind Dale. Some of them, such as the white moose, are of an evil bent. Others aren't. Ravisin often complained about the scruples of the plesiosaurus she awakened in Maer Dualdon.
Ravisin used moonbeam spells to trigger the moon dial, enabling the white moose to scry on loggers and hunters by using the magic mirror.

He also allows the players to pick some of his berries, Atala reaches out to try some, and as she does, the shrub shivers in...pleasure?? Ew. The shrub really is quite annoying, and insists on following the party from now on. The contents of an herbalism kit are spread across the top of the sarcophagus, which the druid uses as a worktable. The sarcophagus lid weighs 350 pounds, and moving it aside causes the tomb to fill with a horrible stench of decay. Tucked under the corpse inside is a sharkskin pouch that contains two potions in crystal vials: a potion of resistance (radiant) and a potion of vitality. The party follow a corridor, which narrows before ending at a wall upon which is mounted an oval mirror seven feet tall and half as wide, encircled by a decorative stone frame. Vaede casts moonbeam again, and attunes the mirror, using it as a crystal ball. The party looks over Icewind Dale, they see Auril's abode, a frozen island with no fixed location. It is constantly being relocated by the churning of the sea moving ice. They peak in on the events at Caer-Dineval, where they see Speaker Crannoc being held captive in his keep, surrounded by unfamiliar faces. All wearing amulets of chardalyn. The party debates the merits of trying to break the mirror and take it with them, but ultimately decide against it. After the events inside the barrow, the party revisits the sarcophagus outside. There is a puzzle there....but Dain's solution is to...well...if you were there you know what happened. Startled, the mummy inside rises to life...after life? The Mummy has been in the tomb for AGES, and bemoans the lost knowledge of the realms. He gives a lengthy explanation of the netherese cities, elven history, and dwarven history. After his stories, the mummy goes back to his sarcophagus, exhausted, and tells the party to leave him be. He's done talking, and has done his socializing for the next century. The party returns to Lonelywood with the proof of the Moose's demise. As a show of gratitude and goodwill, Nimsy Huddle offers the ramshackle inn as an investment property. The party accepts, and spend the next week or so rebuilding the inn, and hiring employees. They leave the bush at the inn, and name it The White Moose Inn.

Completion Date
November 13th 2022

Parent Plot

Rime of the Frostmaiden

Related Characters

Related Locations