Emyr's Curse Revealed--Barovia
General Summary
While Rose was confronting Emyr, Vanya was back at the camp, trying to make himself busy while not wandering too far away. A bird landed on him and started tapping at him and his lute, chirping in a way that almost sounded like speech; when Vanya stared at it blankly, it pecked him on the forehead and he could understand it perfectly. It remarked that someone else owned Vanya's shadow and that he smelled like fire and dog. Things had started going bad the last time a mortal who smelled like fire and dog had come through here. When Vanya pressed the bird, it said that the mortal had been a man, that he'd talked to Emyr, and that everything had gone wrong after that.
Meanwhile, Emyr remarked that he was pleased to see that Rose had clearly kept up her studies and that he was proud of her. Rose begged him to tell her what was going on, and he told her that he'd made a bargain with Madadh-Ruadh, that he hadn't been able to uphold his end, and that all of this was the result. Rose said there was no way Emyr would ever renege on a bargain, but Emyr assured her that he had and that whether he liked it or not, this was fair. Rose said she would do anything she could to help him, and Emyr double-checked that she was freely offering to help him (because evil Emyr is still Emyr, and proper etiquette demands that he not devour his surrogate daughter's personality unless he can tell himself he has her permission).
The bird remarked to Vanya that it personally liked Emyr better at night, but it understood why some of the other fey didn't, leading to an exchange I need to copy verbatim because it's still making me smile days later:
Bird: During the day, he knows he's a predator. But at night, he has . . . oh, what is that thing? Mortals have it, and fey don't. Conscious?
Vanya: . . . conscience?
Bird: Yes! That!
Vanya: *long pause* Could you excuse me for just one minute? *shoots dancing lights flare into the sky*
Emyr leaned in toward Rose and told her that she had always been a lamb to the slaughter, begging for some predator to take her; he would at least be able to bring her back afterwards. Rose had been through enough bullshit with betrayals by people she trusted to get her guard up before he attacked her, but he still got a hit in, draining a point of Charisma and leaving a scar. Rose wild shaped into a hawk and zipped off toward Vanya's flare, with air elemental Emyr in hot pursuit.
A combat that was way more tedious than it should have been ensued. Sorry about that. Emyr was higher level than you all before vampirism kicked his CR up a few notches, so I assumed that you would either run away or try to find some other way to end the combat; Emyr didn't particularly need to change up his technique because "slam attack for Charisma drain" was working out swimmingly for him on a strategic level and alleviating his hunger on a personal-goals level, and I kept hoping that if the ass kickery got blatant enough you'd leave. (Also, he did want to talk to Rose, and wild shaping into something that had a better attack would have gotten in the way of talking even though it would have made things more interesting.) I forgot that PCs never retreat. I don't feel bad about it being brutally hard, but I do feel bad that it was boring. Sorry!
Anyway, the upshot of it all was that Vanya distracted Emyr from Rose with his delicious, charismatic self, Emyr drained a boatload of his charisma and exulted that he was finally full, and when then he drained one of Rose's summoned crocodiles, Vanya pointed out that predators don't keep eating when they're full. Emyr conceded to the logic of this and stood down. Rose confronted him in full high-dudgeon Rose mode, and Emyr told her that a century ago, he had made a bargain with Madadh-Ruadh. He didn't get into much detail about the bargain, but part of it compelled Emyr to grant the requests of anyone who came to the forest. His scrupulous nature drove him to keep his word even in the face of unreasonable requests--until Nicolae came, and asked him to betray Rose. Emyr refused, and the weight of the curse came down on him. Despite the value he placed on courtesy, he'd called Madadh-Ruadh by various insults over the past century--"predator," "parasite," "beast," "blight," "monster"--and the moment he broke his end of the bargain, he became everything he had accused the faerie of being.
Vanya, knowing Nicolae had come in smelling like "fire and dog," told Rose that The Dark Man had orchestrated this.
Rose said she couldn't believe this would be permanent and asked what she could do to undo this. Emyr said she might be able to go across the river and try to advocate to Madadh-Ruadh on his behalf, and asked her if she could get him to make it so he didn't change at night; he liked the clarity and purpose he had during the day, and at night things got messy and confusing (to say nothing of what an embarrassment his mad night-self was). He said he'd let her go, but only if she agreed to return afterwards, because he was a predator without a pack; besides, he'd done this for her, so she clearly owed him (because the only thing better than the Nice Guy Sex Punch Card is the Nice Guy Vampire Punch Card). Rose agreed that she'd come back if he left Vanya alone, but asked why in the world he would kill her anyway if he had done all this to save her. Emyr said it was because he intended to bring her back afterwards, and when Rose looked at him blankly, he said the curse had turned him into a vampire, and that this was what happened to elves and druids who became vampires. (See Elven Vampire)
Rose quite sensibly asked how he could be a vampire when they were having this conversation in broad daylight, and Emyr said that elven vampires were destroyed by moonlight and starlight, not sunlight, but that his curse saw that it was only his vampiric mind that was destroyed, not his body; at night, he had his former mind and soul again, but was also mad with guilt and hunger. He pressed his hand against a nearby tree, and when a blighted spot spread around the spot where he had touched it, he explained that this happened every time he touched a plant with his bare hands, and there was nothing he could do to save them once the process began, and he could feel them dying. He wanted his night-self gone so he could be content in the knowledge that this was his role. Rose agreed to intercede for him (pointedly not saying that she'd be trying to get rid of his night-self), he cast lesser restoration on Vanya without much effect, and then he melded into a tree that immediately rotted away, leaving you alone.
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29 Jan 2022
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