Day 61: Never Have I Ever

General Summary

The party, keenly aware that the following day would see them marching on Castle Ravenloft Ravenloft to try and win the battle they'd been heading towards since the moment the mists surrounded them — or perhaps even earlier, when they all found themselves in the Trollskull on that fateful night — did their best to prepare and wrap up their business first. Bodaway began the day in thoroughly baffling fashion, when his breakfast came with a side of several Sendings from none other than Gulloth Ninath. Gull cheerfully informed Bodaway that, following Ponto's dream interaction with Bodaway, he'd remembered his own conversation with the man. This was particularly perplexing for Bodaway as, though it had only been two nights from Ponto and Gull's perspective since Ponto and Bodaway had spoken, for Bodaway it had been about 32. Still, the pair spoke for some time, Gull showing a level of cheerful carelessness regarding his use of spell slots that would have given other mages in other campaigns panic attacks. This wasn't the last surprise of the day — the party also saw a noticeably more cheerful, assured Sir Godfrey Gwilym emerge from the greenhouses, though Bodaway was the only one who pinned down the reason behind it without being told. Having spent the night in vigil to Lathander, Sir Godfrey had regained some of the paladin powers denied to him in undeath, including his Aura of Protection, which left all of those near him feeling bolstered and fortified from sheer proximity to his faith. The party had little time to process this, however, before Bodaway once again found himself receiving messgaes — these ones somewhat more restrained in their diction and use of spell slots, though no less flirtatious. Ponto took his turn at reaching out, checking in, only to drop the conversation at the first mention of the Coalition. Sylvain, too, received a message, not long after Bodaway's conversations. Kyra checked in, somewhat sassing him for his timing, as she was in the middle of something, promising to check in in another couple of hours. As the party made their final journey to the spot in the hills west of Ravenloft where their allies would hide and provide shelter for any prisoners the party sent their way, the more weary among their number bolstered by Godfrey's protective aura, they found themselves once again untroubled by anything on the road. Once set up in the mansion, the party continued their preparations for the following day. Sylvain gave several of his personal items to Danica for safekeeping; Bodaway tried and failed to scry on Ismark, leaving the party to speculate as to whether something was protecting him from the magic, or if he'd simply succeeded on the throw; the party discussed the merits of Never Have I Ever, and who to include in their Heroes' Feast the following day. Not long after they'd settled in, Osrin received a message from Cal — the first coherent one she'd received in some time, giving them the first date they'd had to reference for time back in Faerûn in about 24 days. Though Cal had any a few messages, she used one of them to empathize with Osrin and reassure her of the validity of her feelings, saying she knew what it was like to face impossible odds. Gross. Oileán invited Ayduin and Godfrey to join her in prayer in the greenhouse; the rest of the party decided to come along, too. While Oileán and Ri-An prayed to the Huntress, Ayduin focused his intentions in the name of the Weaver, Bodaway reached out to the Raven Queen, Osrin sent prayers to both the Ladies Three and Alandras, and Sylvain sought out the Seeker and Tymora. (Thankfully, no goddesses spoke into his head that time.) In the midst of all this solemnity, Kyra sent her second message, somewhat later than previously promised, making Sylvain jump — and giving that much more food for thought to Fiach, who'd been spying on them the whole time and was fascinated by how much blood was involved in Bodaway's prayers. Sylvain said his possible goodbyes, which we're sure Kyra found really reassuring. The praying done, the party turned to the crucial business of a game of Never Have I Ever — something they hadn't done since one of their first nights together, fresh out of the Feywild, one of Osrin's first memories of the group. Joining them were Godfrey (incapable of getting drunk), Azuth (peer pressured into participating), Makar, Mathghamhain (serving as translator for her cailleacha companions), Flann, Coirt, Danica, Elvir, and Carac. Though some of their companions were unfamiliar with the game, they quickly learned the main premise when playing with friends: brutally targeting them in front of an audience to force them to drink their shame away. Ri-An took issue with this approach, and began making an effort to punish the entirety of the group. In the midst of all the revelry, Bray at one point appeared to thank Bodaway for his letter and the ball, and to ask him to keep an eye out for Bray's cousins, who are all babies (not like him; he's 9) and in some cases not even wereravens. Also making an appearance was Fiach, who solemnly laid out what seemed to be an attempt at carefully carved wood and stone tinker's tools, which Ri-An reviewed with equal solemnity.

"Did you try to punch Sylvain because he said he'd try to peg you?" —Gods I wish I'd written down who said this

That night, once everyone who needed it had been given a much-needed Lesser Restoration, both Osrin and Bodaway dreamed. Osrin received her promised meeting with Alandras, and offered the choice of sculpting their dreamscape however she pleased, she opted for the same nondescript park bench he'd chosen. Osrin thanked him for his assistance, which he insisted had been far less fulsome than she seemed to think. She said the conversation may have been a goodbye, and Alandras asked her if she wanted it to be. Thinking on the question for a moment, she decided the answer was no. Bodaway, meanwhile, was gifted his own potential goodbye from the Raven Queen: a memorial, for all the adventurers who had tried and failed before in the task he'd take on the following night.

Bodaway. Though you always remember your visions from the Raven Queen better than you would a normal dream, the memory is rarely if ever perfect, and the things you see tonight are… impressions, fleeting and frightful. There is little from these visions that will aid you the following night. Rather, you get the sense, as the visions proceed, that you are being given something of a funeral, or memorial — a few moments of kinship with all those who have trod this path before you, so few of whom survived long enough to share the memories with anyone who deserved them. There is a flight from Argynvostholt, and revenants still fresh on their vengeance. The faces of Vladimir Horngaard and Godfrey Gwilym are still recognizably their own, though their faces have decayed, Godfrey’s once-luscious long black curls now hanging limp and patchy from a rotting scalp — preserved by magic, but not preserved enough. A half-elf falls in their flight from the vengeful knights of the Order of the Silver Dragon, and a lizardwoman, too. You swear one of their companions, a human woman, trips the lizardwoman, though it happens too fast to be certain. You don’t recognize the human woman, and she fades from the visions quickly, leaving you unsure of her fate. But you recognize her remaining companions — the pale, blonde, dark-eyed young woman whose coloration is so similar to Osrin’s, and the halfling man with the mischievous smile. You’ve seen them both in undeath. You’ve seen them both die. So to watch Strahd hunt them, turn them, comes as little surprise. You see another woman you recognize — a surly-looking half elf with red hair and large muscles. You killed this one yourself. You don’t recognize her companions, the two humans and the half-elf. But you recognize what kills half her party — Baba Lysaga’s victorious cackle follows you long after you’ve left that memory. It’s easy to recognize Calorfin, having seen her so recently — seen her fall so recently, after those long centuries of misery. You see flashes of glorious battle, of triumph, and perhaps you understand better than you ever have before why the revelation of Strahd’s return crushed Calorfin’s spirit so utterly. To behold her in battle is to see the power of her goddess shine through, beautiful and mournful and dangerous and devastating. She summons sunlight with an ease you’ve never seen anyone manage — she glows with it, as if it was made for her. At her side, a human man summons the withered plant life of Barovia to their aid, binding Strahd in thick vines to help keep him in the path of Calorfin’s sunlight. Another elven woman, beautiful and effortlessly dancing around the fight, fills his body with arrows. You don’t even notice the corpses until the battle is over, Strahd destroyed, the sun shining. But you see how all of them sag at the sight, when they return to the spots in the castle where their friends fell, and you have just enough of a sense of yourself in this moment to know that may be you soon enough — running from the failing bodies of your loved ones to finish what you started, leaving grief and resurrection for later. They gather a human man and a gnomish woman, carrying their bodies carefully out of the castle, to lay down in the sunlight that now pours from the sky, instead of the cleric. You’ve already seen Imithren’s demise, and know enough of Rose’s — these visions are brief, fleeting, perfunctory. So too is the chaos and infighting of The Forward Prestige, who you fought as part of in the Tome of Strahd, after first seeing their rogue’s corruption in one of your earliest visions. You are the second of your party to see Helena Farlight, who guided Osrin to her own rebirth not so long ago. You see the love she looks on her party with — her husband, their best friend, their daughter. You see the grief etch into her face as things fall apart, as their friend turns on them, driven mad by the Dark Power pursuing him. You see the sadness and love and forgiveness as her daughter stabs her through the heart, twisting the knife, driven by a charm effect she’ll soon come out of. You see Uthemar Hanali for the second time — before he was made one of Strahd’s servants, before he got his revenge by showing Savva Antonovich the truth of the man they’d married. You see him find the scene, realize what his daughter has done, comfort her even as he stares at the cold body of the love of his life and knows he has no way to bring her back, that if it were the other way around she could have saved him. He always knew he would lose her too soon — that he would outlive her by several human lifespans — but he never thought it would be this soon. You see him unable to keep a grasp on his daughter as her grief and guilt begins to overcome her; you see him run after her. You see him fail to catch her before she jumps off the bridge at Tser Falls, disappearing into the water and rocks far below. You see the doomed last stand he makes against Strahd von Zarovich, taking the vampire on alone, to die on his own terms. He doesn’t fight quite the same way Sylvain does, but the moves are similar enough to recognize a trained rogue. You know, watching him, that he never stood a chance. You know, watching him, that he knew it too. You see a huge party, partially familiar to you. The elf who nearly killed Osrin’s very soul. Funda, the dwarven Reformer who escaped the fate of his two companions. A little halfling man you’ve never seen before but whose identity you can guess by the stories he tells to cheer up his compatriots as they approach the foreboding castle: Howard Underbough, surely, who escaped to tell the tale, who wrote down the information for your allies back in Faerûn to find. With them, a drow, a half-orc, three humans and a gnome. Some fall to corruption, two of them die. But most of them survive the final battle, and again, the grief of their failure — the fear of your own — almost overcomes you. That they could fight so hard, so valiantly, so cleverly, and be rewarded as they were… Howard, bless his little legs, seems to be everywhere, running around the fight, calling out encouragement to his allies. Funda — the second druid you’ve watched help destroy Strahd von Zarovich — makes decay come barreling towards the vampire, a field of fungi choking the air, crawling up the vampire’s fine clothing. You’ve seen the speed with which Laucien can shoot, and even knowing the targets he’d later take aim at, it’s hard not to appreciate his skill as you watch him use it to fill Strahd with holes. Another cleric, the half-orc, summons sunlight, and it sears the flesh right off of Strahd. One of the humans, a massively buff woman, nearly foams at the mouth as she swings an axe at Strahd again and again and again and again and — Again, the clouds part. Again, the mists retreat. Again, it won’t last. Two more familiar faces — or a familiar face and a familiar set of robes, at least. Dworic the angry fuckin’ dwarf and a young human man who must be Krea Commonbrook, Strahd’s remaining pet cleric. Though while the Krea you’ve seen wore a metal mask, his hands and throat covered with bandages, this one bares his face without shame, and you’re startled to see how young he is. Younger than Sylvain or Osrin — barely 20, by your estimation. All fresh-faced and wide-eyed and probably six months out of an acolyte’s uniform, tops. You see the light go out of those eyes, as horror after horror comes for them and the dragonborn and half-elf they travel with. You see him looking with nothing but dread as he becomes the last of his party standing — the dragonborn flung from a parapet; the half-elf’s head ripped right off their body; Dworic drained of his blood. You see him lose his nerve. You see his spirit break. You see him surrender, and his sobs echo in your mind as Strahd drags him by the robes to the dungeons to begin his penance. You see a group larger than ever before, but equally doomed. Pitchforks and torches and wooden clubs and inexpertly wielded swords, axes meant for chopping trees, not monsters. You see Doru, looking physically the same but much younger in the eyes as he looks around, cheeks flushed with excitement at the energy of the crowd around him. You see Azuth, stony-faced and blind to his own hubris, leading the charge up to the castle. You see them fall, and fall, and fall. You hear the screams of the peasants as they see a zombie for the first time, as one by one they’re drained of life by Strahd’s spawn, as they’re incinerated by his magic. You see flashes of light so powerful and so intense you can barely keep up with who’s casting a spell at whom. You see them in flight, chasing each other. You see the moment where Azuth makes his choice, takes the only chance at survival he might have, and hopes he’ll be one of precious few to survive the long plunge down Tser Falls. The memories are fleeting, impressionistic. But when you wake, you are perhaps the sole bearer of even this much knowledge, save Strahd himself, of the people who have tried and failed to do what you hope to succeed in tonight.

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Report Date

15 Feb 2024

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The Mad Mage's Magnificent Mansion

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Day 61: Never Have I Ever

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