Time For Another Round Of Iron Dm!!!

[Breakstone]

Excelent idea with the optional ingredients, Nem.

I can't wait for this one!

 

[Xarlen]

I'm ready for the next game. I sign myself up. If nothing else, I want to suggest ingredients.

 

[Rune]

Like the best pixie pranks, this one is hilariously lethal.

By the way, I meant to comment on this earlier, but...

I love this line.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Thanks, Rune.

It's just bumming me out more and more, though.

I took some good stuff and screwed it up.


Wulf

 

[Rune]

Thanks, Rune.

It's just bumming me out more and more, though.

I took some good stuff and screwed it up.


Wulf

Don't take it so harshly. Those were some nigh-impossible ingredients to work with when you factor in the time limit.

Personally, I'd love to see you and Wicht square off, by the way. That's the fight we all paid to see!

I have faith in yer... (and I thought you'd wipe the floor with me, but that's a fight for another year... Although, I'm not implying that our stunty friend, Radiating Gnome, won't be able to take me either. I'm geniuinely concerned. Now, back to typing for me...)

 

[Radiating Gnome]

may the gods of Iron DM bless Bill Gates

I was sitting there at my computer, on the third page of my entry, and the power in my house went out.

It was like some stupid excuse my students give me all the time.

So I lit some candles and some flashlights, and got to work from where I thought I had left off on my Visor, hoping against hope . . .

The power just came back on. MIcrosoft word had a restored version of my file. I lost a little time, and have some interesting typos in the stuff I did on my visor, but I'm back at it.

Too bad I couldn't harness my inner glow to some sort of generator and run my computer off that . . .

-rg

 

[Breakstone]

Re: may the gods of Iron DM bless Bill Gates

I was sitting there at my computer, on the third page of my entry, and the power in my house went out.

It was like some stupid excuse my students give me all the time.
-rg

Gnome, this is no excuse.

My dog ate my Iron DM application, but no one believed me!

 

[Radiating Gnome]

I need no excuse

The gnome will post, have no fear.

rg

 

[Radiating Gnome]

Tea party
Opium
Talking Mouse
Murlynd’s Spoon
Pixies
Dire Bear
(Serving Wench)
(Nagging Wife)
(I couldn’t work a third one in without it feeling REALLY contrived – there you go, Rune.)


If Betty Ford were a Pixie . . .
A mostly-roleplaying interlude adventure for 4 5-6th level characters.

A little background and setup

The mysterious Brisby Forest sits in a dark, undeveloped part of the Kingdom of Something Appropriate. It is only frequented by daring adventurers, who rarely return and those who do return never speak much about their experiences. The Druids in the Kingdom of Something Appropriate do enter the forest from time to time, but are very close-mouthed about what is in the forest.

This sort of mystery draws some odd folks, that’s for sure.

Near the Brisby Forest is the city of Groveton, the fief of Baron Thorvald.

About a month ago a young rake named Thordis – the son of Baron Thorvald -- who had a taste for hired women, strong drink, and stronger drugs, disappeared. He hasn’t turned up in any of his usual haunts, and the officials that the baron has been sending around to look for him have not been able to find any clue of his whereabouts. Not ready to give up, but aware that his son’s taste in entertainments may mean that the official channels are not the best way to make inquires, the Baron asks his advisors to find some investigators who might have more luck – good hearted folk who might know a bit more about the darker side of the street, but who still want to see justice done, and a son returned to his father.

The PCs, a bit more experienced than the average rabble, are recommended to the advisors by a barkeep that knows them, and they are asked to the baron’s keep for a meeting.

The PCs will have been in the area long enough to know the reputation of the Baron – a bit out of touch but a good soul – and his son – a dangerously unpredictable loose cannon who is always looking for some sort of trouble to alleviate his perpetual boredom.

The Baron’s butler will help the party clean up a bit for their audience with the baron, trying to impress them with the importance of the man they are about to meet, but the Baron himself is warm and personable, meeting with the party in a library rather than a throne room, and coming out from behind a desk to shake their hands. He’s obviously worried about something, and doesn’t waste anytime telling them that his son is missing has he’s prepare to make a generous offer for his return. And he will make good on the offer. He will start with an offer of 1000 gp for his son’s return, but will offer just about anything for his son’s return – up to, as a last ditch offer, a magic item for each member of the party, designed and constructed by the baron’s personal wizard (anything the wizard, who is 9th level, is capable of creating – a list of possibilities will be provided. Of course they’ll have to wait around for delivery, and the wizard won’t start until Thordis is returned). Baron Thorvald loves his son and is not about to take no for an answer.

If the players ask why the Baron’s wizard or even any of the local clerics, the answer is that they have not been able to success fully scry his location, or contact him – there are powerful magical mists that seem to be hiding him. A good sense motive test (DC 20) will also lead intuitive PCs to the conclusion that the Baron’s advisors may not have tried all that hard to find Thordis – they do not think he should be heir to the throne of the baronry and are of the opinion that his disappearance was simply good luck, or perhaps divine providence.

The Hook: The Baron’s largess. The party might refuse, theoretically – because, after all, who wants to live the high life. The Baron might resort to some other forms of compulsion, in that case – threatening to imprison the PCs and their families and close friends, shutting down the tavern of the friend who recommended them, etc.

Part 1. The Investigation Begins.
A little gather information work in town paints a pretty stark picture of young Thordis. He was more than a womanizer and brawler, although he was that in spaces. He had also developed a taste for smoking opium.

The first personality they will encounter as they make the rounds in their investigation is a Tavern that they know was frequented by Thordis. It’s not the sort of tavern they would frequent – wealthy merchants and minor nobles are the usual customers there, and the prices and quality of the service and entertainment reflect the clientele. This is where Thordis would usually begin his evenings.

Dropping his name a little, at first, will reveal the party line that no one knows anything, but a bit of convincing will direct the party to one of the serving wenches in the tavern – Estelle, the daughter of the innkeeper, who watches her closely from across the tavern room while she talks to the party.

A DC 17 spot check will notice that Estelle is pregnant. (yes, it's Thordis', but she's not the only one to bear a bastard of his in town).

Estelle first insists that she knows nothing. A bit of prodding will reveal that she’s afraid that he got into some sort of trouble in the opium den he frequents

Estelle can tell the party about another rumor – she can tell the part about someone who might know more. Siggid, a woodsman and drunkard who had befriended Thordis in a brawl a few year back They both had a taste for drinking and smoking, so they became fast friends.

Going around to Siggid's house will bring out a sweaty, beefy woman, Marga, who wastes no time in laying into the party for not having real, respectable jobs -- why don't that settle down and grow something, build something, craft something -- no, their kind have to go around killing and breaking all the time -- sure, they always have money, but there's a lot that is a lot more important than money, which she wished her deplorable husband might some day realize, things like community and family and trust and honor and all the things that those who live by the sword would have no real idea about, moving from place to place as they do, etc., etc. etc. If they can get a word in edgewise she can tell the party the she knows Thordis and is appalled that his disappearance causes so much consternation, the no good sack of meat, and not one person has come around to ask about the disappearance of her husband and sole source of support -- is the baron going to do something about her missing husband? Send some motley lot of mercenaries out to drag him back home to face the music?

She can also tell them give them a few tips on making some contacts with the local thieves guild that runs the Imagatorium, the opium den that her husband frequents with his rich buddy, the prince.

Making contacts with the rogues guild will take some interesting roll playing, but in the long run it's not that hard to find out where the Imagatorium is, once the dealers have given the party the runaround long enough to be sure that they are not going to try to arrest any of the rogues.

In the den things are difficult. It’s dark and smoky and just being there will give the party members a bit of a contact high – they’ll feel a bit woozy, have trouble focusing on faces, etc. The place is just a room full of velvet pillows and mattresses, littered with people in various stages of stoned out of their gourds. Most of the addicts there are quite altered, and don't have a lot to offer, but one of the dealers there can tell the party that Thordis and Siggid left a few nights ago, talking about going up to the Brisby Forest to find the Mouse's tea party. They can pick up only a little more information than that -- they left with very little gear, just rode out of town in the middle of the night and were never seen again.

Part 2 The hunt

Should the party report their findings to the Baron, he will shoot a very concerned look at Ottar, but otherwise encourage the party to continue with their investigation.

The party loads up their gear and heads off to the woods to look for Thordis. Reaching the woods is no problem, but they are warned off by everyone they pass -- don't enter the woods, you'll never come back, etc.

At the edge of the woods, there are no tracks to be found. The woods themselves are three kinds of horror movie creepy -- misty, dank, shadowy, and just plain scary. As they take their first step into the woods they hear a screech. A wilderness lore check (DC 15) identifies the call as that of an owl in distress, but they can’t find the source of the screech if they go looking (it’s actually a pixie sentry).

As they move through the woods, the only tracks they find are the intermittent prints of a huge Dire Bear, but the tracks only appear in intermittent patches, and they are unable to track the bear.

A few more jarring, spooky moments later they come upon a small clearing, which entirely filled by a striped tent pavilion.

The occasional sound of china clinking can be heard within the tent.

A wilderness lore check of DC 15 will note the heavy musk of a bear in the area, but there won’t be any sign of it in the clearing.

They circle around the pavilion looking for an entrance. Eventually they find it, being held open for them by a young human boy. “Please come in,” he says. “We have been expecting you, and have saved you seats at the table. There is always room for more at the Party.”

Entering the tent the party finds a table laid out to serve as many as 20 human-sized guests. Most of the seats are taken, but just enough remain to seat the entire party.

There are several more children in the room. They are all similar enough to clearly be siblings of some sort, and all seem to be roughly the same age. Everything in the pavilion is finely crafted, gilded and accented tastefully with gems. The china is pure white, and the food on the table – a generous supply of fruit and pastries.

What seems out of place at the table are the other guests. While they all seem to be eating with quite refined table manners, behaving live tea party guests, they are all in dirty, tattered clothing, and are obviously at various stages of starvation and malnutrition.

A child holds out a chair for each member of the party.

Once they are seated, they hear a voice. It will require a DC 30 spot check to spot the source of the voice – a little mouse, standing upright and wearing a white robe tied at the waist with a bit of string. The party members can check each round – roughly after each exchange of questions and answers – to try to spot the speaker.

What’s really going on:
Brisby forest is under the protection of a powerful druid named Harek. Harek has not been around for a few years, though – he left the forest in the care of two of his most trusted cohorts – a Pixie Druid (student of Harek’s) named Angilix, who is the leader of a band of pixies that live in the woods, and an Awakened Mouse Wizard named Welby.

The pavilion is a prison of sorts – a quarantine that developed here years ago when some evil hunts men came into the wood looking for sport. Over time it has gathered a growing number of evil men – men that Welby and Angilix believe are better taken out of the world.

Most of the pavilion is a layered web of illusion. There is a table there, and the chairs are real enough, but the only food at the table is a bit of gruel doled out to each guest from a bowl filled for every meal with a Murlynd’s Spoon. As the spoon only makes enough to satisfy the nutritional needs of four people, the food is being spread too thinly, and the guests are slowly starving to death.

None of the guests have any memory left. Each is some sort of villain from the local area – killers, highwayman, rapists, and Thordis and Siggid are there. The guests will all speak politely to the party, ask a few polite questions, but will only say that they don’t recall if they’re asked any questions in return. All of the guests have had their memories wiped by the Pixies’ arrows.

If the illusion of the pavilion were to be dispelled it would reveal the crude mass grave, which has been dug and filled in by the Dire Bear. In it are the bodies of many other prisoners who have slowly starved to death at the Tea Party.

Back to the Story . . .

Welby will deflect questions about himself until he is spotted, preferring to focus his scrutiny of the party.

Welby will question the party about their lives, and their past deeds, with a keen interest in the crimes they have committed against others. As the party answers questions, the children will be milling around, refilling teacups and offering napkins to the guests. While doing this, the children(pixies) are using their detect thoughts ability to see what the PCs are thinking about while they answer the questions, and if they tell a lie or a half-truth about something, the child will titter and giggle. If they think of an event in the past that they do not bring up, the child will say something in sylvan, and then Welby will ask the PC directly about the event in question.

Welby will spend time examining each of the characters – questioning them about their pasts, etc. If they sit still for it, he will make a determination about them – should they stay at the tea party, or should they be sent back into the world. If they don’t have questionable acts on their conscience, at least none that Welby and the Pixies can detect, Welby will reveal himself (if he has not been spotted) and ask them what their business with His Tea Party might be. Again, if the party lies, a child will giggle.

Welby’s explaination of the Tea Party:
“My tea party is the last party that these people will attend in their lives and it is the best party, filled with all the foods they love and new people to meet, every day. They will never leave. They belong here – the things they did in the outside world sent them here, one way or another, and it’s here they’ll stay. Keeping evil out of the world is a good thing, is it not?”

Welby’s defense of his own small stature (not just tiny, but FINE):
“Don’t judge me by my size, bootfolk. I am the sworn protector of this forest. If you dare to try to lay a hand on me, the woods will come alive and punish you.”

Angilix, the other partner in this scene (the Pixie Druid) prefers to play along as one of the children, and will let Welby do the talking.

The party is in a tough spot. (assuming a mostly-good party) The Pixies are not evil, and they are not doing especially evil things – starving to death at the tea party isn’t the best way to go, but as the Pixies keep the guests pretty devoid of memory, they are not aware of the length of time that they have been there, and without a frame of reference don’t realize that they are wasting away to nothing.

Should the party be a fairly despicable bunch, Welby will decide to keep them there, and signal the pixies to attack, putting them to sleep and wiping out their memories.

Let me do the talking:
Negotiating with Webly will be difficult, as the party will have very little to offer that would make a difference to him. The one thing that Webly wants enough to consider releasing some of his prisoners is to find his master, who has been gone far longer than he should have been. Welby will explain that he and the children are waiting for the reappearance of Harek, and if the party could go find him and bring him back – or bring some news of him, they would be grateful enough to release Thordis and Siggid, should the party ask for him, too.

Finding Harek will be a whole separate adventure, not detailed here.

It’s possible that the party will find some other leverage that will convince Welby that he should release Thordis, but as Welby isn’t very frightened of the party, and the children are acting as his lie and bluff detectors, it’s going to be a tough sell.

Welby will have to be convinced to trust the party to not decide to try to have their memories wiped by pixie arrows when they leave the forest.

So we’ll do it quiet-like:
Should the party decide to try to sneak back after dark to steal Thordis, they’ll find the Tea Party Guests all asleep in their seats, and no one else in sight. The Pavilion is watched by two Pixie guards each night. They flit around invisible and amuse themselves as best they can with the bits of cast off treasure equipment lying around the Pavilion – the possessions of the Guests.

The Pixies have listen and a spot bonuses of +8, so it is conceivable that a stealthy group might be able to get in there to try to rescue Thordis before they notice. A listen check of DC 22 will alert the PCs to the presence of something poking around softly under the table, but they won’t be able to see anything if they look.

Actually pulling Thordis away from the table is sure to draw the attention of the guards, who will immediately sound an alert.

In the event of an alert, the whole gang from “Boring Party Anyway” will join the fray over the course of the next several rounds, and the party will have their hands full trying to make their escape.

Boring Party Anyway:
Should the party dispel the illusions in the Pavilion, attack the children or Welby, or pick some other sort of fight, the illusion will drop, revealing a simple wooden table in the middle of the clearing, with the guest sitting on crude wooden chairs in front of chipped crockery bowls of gruel.

PCs may be surprised that Welby doesn’t disappear, although the children do.

This should be a tough, confusing final battle. At first, most of the children will disappear as the Pixies return to their normal form, turn invisible, and scatter. One of them, Angilix himself, will stay behind, resume his normal form long enough to say. You shouldn’t oughta done that” and then “Here, Dogar! Dogar, Alert!” This, of course, will hopefully give Welby the time to get someplace safe where he can start to cast some spells on the party.

Dogar is Angilix’s Dire Bear animal Companion. He’ll charge into the clearing and roar mightily, in an effort to scare off the party. Should that not work, he’ll do his best to try to drive them off by fighting.

While all of this is going on, the other Tea Party guests will also be in the area – milling around as confused as humanly possible. Most will start to fumble for weapons dropped at their sides weeks or months before, just as a reflex, but each has no memory of anything before the Tea party. They will defend themselves, will take some serious convincing to get them to help fight the bear or to run away with the party.

Webly will find a likely spot and start casting spells to support Dogar. He is a 5th level transmutter, and has a handful of spells that should make things really interesting as the party tries to drive him off. He should be very slippery – he has invisibility, mirror image, dimension door, haste, blink, and expeditions retreat – as well as some offensive spells to remind the party that he’s there if they get tired of chasing him. As a Fine-sized animal, he’s VERY hard to hit, but if he can be successfully grappled he’s probably done for.

After about 6 rounds or so, the handful of Pixies who had been the children in the Pavilion will also start to return to the scene of the battle, lending their support to Welby, Angilix, and Dogar.

If either Angilix or Webly are captured they can be traded for one prisoner each. Or, the party might try to grab Thorvis and make a run for it, rather than stand in there toe to toe and try to fight the whole bunch.

If the party should defeat the entire force of Bear, Pixie, and Mouse, they will find themselves the proud custodians of about a dozen surviving, starving amnesiacs as well as the equipment that those guests had on them when they arrived at the tea party. (Assorted goodies, nothing too extraordinary). The Pixies will also have left behind the Murlynd’s Spoon.

Note: This is really the only fight in the adventure – there has been a lot of roleplaying and scene stuff along the way, but this fight is about it – for that reason, it’s a doozy. It’s not necessary that the battle be a slugfest to the death, however. Welby and the Pixies will probably know quite a bit about the party by the time the fighting starts. Assuming they’re relatively good characters Welby will feel as though they’re better off in the world, and will try to use spells and abilities to subdue the party rather than kill them. The party will awaken on the edge of the forest, each having been hit with an amnesia arrow (Fortitude save DC15 or lose all memory, see MM pg 173 for more details).

If any of the party members remember enough to try to find the pavilion again, the clearing will be empty, except for the mass grave, which will now include the bodies of the guests who had been in the pavilion when the party arrived.

The End:
Should the party manage to return Thordis to his father, the Baron will be embarrassingly grateful. He will pay the party the agreed-upon sum, unless it was the magic items, and then he will command Ottar to complete the items. Ottar will take his sweet time – a month or more per item, depending upon the request, citing the need for rest between, etc.

Thorvald, of course, will be stuck with a much thornier issue – he has a son who had lost his way, and who has been returned to him, but with no memory of his life before – should he have Thordis’ memory restored or accept this as a second chance to raise his son right?

The party might also consider trying to find out who it was that put the idea in Thorvis' head to go looking for the Mouse's Tea Party in the first place -- who might know something about it? But that would be a very short investigation if Thorvis' memory is not restored, and even then Ottar was disguised by an Alter Self spell, so the investigation will probably not go far.

Opponents, Encounters and rewards:
Lots of investigation (reward PCs as a CR 5 encounter)
Rogues (mostly 1st level runners, a few big guns around to convince the PCs to play nice if they get rowdy in the Imagatorium.
Webly, Awakened mouse Transmuter 5 (Cr 6)
Angilix, Pixie Druid 6 (Cr 7)
Dogar (Dire Bear, CR 7)
8 or so Pixies (Cr 4 each)


time for bed.

-rg

(AM edit -- spotted a typo, realized I'd put the wrong name in for my opponent in the list of ingredients used. still more typos, sorry about that . . .)

 

[Rune]

Ingredients:

• Tea Party
• Opium
• Talking Mouse
• Murlynd’s Spoon
• Pixies
• Dire Bear

Optional Ingredients Used:

• Serving Wench
• Dead Horse
• Nagging Wife
• Child’s Toy
• Sexy Dancer

An Unusual Trip
A short adventure for characters level 8-12

This adventure is designed to be run with the core rules, but would be nicely complimented by the use of the Oriental Adventures Handbook. Suggestions for replacing the classes of some NPCs with classes from that book will be given in parentheses after the original suggestion.

The History

An insular island exists off the eastern coast of the Western Continent. Until recently, no traders or visitors of any kind were allowed to approach the island, under any condition. Those who managed to get past the naval defense and reach the island, for some foolhardy reason or another, have never returned. Until recently, nothing else was known of these reclusive people; nothing was known of their home, or their ways—the islanders were a complete mystery.

In truth, they had developed a highly organized feudal society, under the leadership of an increasingly weakening empire (the Sunlit Empire). Their customs and traditions are extraordinarily rigid in comparison to those of the rest of the (known) world. Naturally, they had developed a completely self-sufficient economy in the process.

This is not to say that the island is free from conflict; recent events are certainly bloody enough to dispel that notion.

Recent Events

Nearly a year ago, this self-imposed embargo and isolation was lifted by the young emperor, Golden Sunrise Reigns, who had hopes of increasing the wealth of the Empire through trade with the great Western Continent. Many fine products and materials were introduced to the island, while a multitude of exotic products and spices flowed out into the larger world.

By far, the most influencing product to be integrated into the Empire was an insidious substance called opium. The popularity of the drug spread throughout the island with an rapidity that could not be believed and with consequences that could not yet be fully understand—a terrible addiction coupled with a dependence upon the Western Continent for the intoxicating substance.

For his visionary action, Golden Sunrise Reigns was assassinated within a few months. The employers of the assassins have never been verified, but they are most likely one of a few noble Houses who disagreed with the emperor’s goals. Several of these Houses had vested interests in certain trades within the Empire, amounting to monopolies. Furthermore, a number of Houses may well have guessed at the cruel nature that the opium trade would take on and desired to prevent it.

Regardless of the actual employers, the results of the assassination were catastrophic. The fragile bonds holding countless fiefs together were sundered and civil wars began to spring up all over the empire between the fractured, feudal lords.

Golden Sunrise Reigns left behind a successor—his son, Ancient Sunrise Returns—but the boy is barely eighteen months old. Until he has reached maturity, Golden’s brother, Winter Sunrise Hides, has been assigned the duties of the acting regent.

The Setup

The PCs will need to travel by sea to get to the island of the Sunlit Empire. The PCs could be traders, or could simply be traveling with traders to visit a new and exotic locale. If the PCs do not particularly wish or have plans to travel to the Sunlit Empire, it should be no difficult matter to have the ship boarded by pirates or the navy of the Empire (factions of which are run independently by various warring Houses) and brought to the shores of the island Empire. The ship that the PCs are on will inevitably carry a large quantity of trade goods—including, especially, opium—if it is intended to dock at the island Empire at all. Some of these goods may well belong to the PCs, if they are traders.

The PCs will dock in the Sunlit City, a massive port, which serves as the seat of the Empire.

The PCs will be unable to understand any of the denizens of the island unless they speak Draconic, the language of the Empire (presumably because the main structures of worship appear to revolve around draconic idols). If none of the PCs can speak Draconic, an interpreter (level 3 Expert) will be made available to the PCs almost as soon as they step off of the ship—the powerful Houses of the Empire have reason to greet Western visitors with surprising—and suspiciously conspicuous—warmth; with the recent warring, trade with the island has diminished noticeably and the demand for opium only continues to increase.

Consequently, many of the people on the docks are servants of the Houses and have been ordered to greet foreign traders and invite them to the palace of that particular House. Whether the PCs are actually traders or not, the locals will assume that they are. If the PCs explain that they have no goods, or that their goods have been raided, the servants are likely to assume, wishfully, that the PCs are lying in an attempt to drive up the trade price of their goods.

As it happens, the House Sunrise has servants at the dock on the day that the PCs arrive on the island. As the House Sunrise is the House of the acting regent and the infant emperor, none of the other servants will approach the PCs; to do so would mean imprisonment or death for the offender. These servants will not take any foreigners with them until after House Sunrise has left with some.

The Sunlit Palace

If the PCs opt to accompany the servants of House Sunrise to the Sunlit Palace (the home of House Sunrise), they are likely to arrive in the early afternoon at the fantastic and unusual towers of a beautifully exotic palace. If the PCs opt to make their way in the City on their own, instead, they certainly will have to do so without the aid of a translator. Even if the PCs can speak Draconic, they will find that the rest of the City is much less civil to foreigners, as old isolationist tendencies are still quite prevalent within the Empire.

Eventually, the PCs may realize that it would be in their interest to accept the House Sunrise’s hospitality and return to the docks to accompany their servants to the Palace. If this is the case, they will arrive at the palace somewhat later. In either case, the PCs will be invited to join the regent and several lords of some of the most powerful Houses in a Tea Ceremony.

Winter has invited a few lords that he least trusts to drink Tea with him, enjoy some entertainment, and converse. Only three of the five invited lords show up. These are Roaring Waterfall Rages, Sleepy Shadow Lies, and Hunting Arrow Whispers. Winter is operating under the theory that the enemy is less able to cause mischief if the enemy can be seen. He is also hoping to kill two birds with one stone, using the opportunity to impress his unexpected guests (the PCs) at the same time.

The Tea Ceremony takes place in the Throne Room—a room almost utterly devoid of furniture, save several cushions (apparently for kneeling on! Nobody appears to sit down anywhere on this island), several very low tables, and one massive, low platform constructed, or at least adorned, with the remains of a massive bear.

This is the Sunlit Throne (although, not a throne in the sense with which the PCs will most likely be familiar—it is merely a large platform to be kneeled upon). The throne has a history, which Winter will be most pleased to relate, if the PCs show interest. Several generations in the past, the Great Uprising saw the end of one dynasty’s control of the throne and the beginning of another—the Sunrise dynasty. The new emperor, Bitter Sunrise Chills, was said to have been a tough general in his day. Legend tells that the general traveled, alone, into the wilderness (which, at the time, was much more vast than currently, Winter assures the PCs) and personally killed a dire bear, twenty feet long and nearly 6000 pounds. The remains became the Sunlit Throne.

Silent women wearing revealing silk robes and wearing white face-paint fulfill the role of serving wenches. The women are uniformly graceful, patient, and watchful as they serve the tea, but the lords of the Houses and the regent never seem to notice that they exist.

One more feature of note is that the room is absolutely saturated with the heady, pungent aroma of some kind of incense. In fact, this is opium and prolonged exposure to the tainted air will cause the PCs (and the NPCs) to loose a degree of control over their senses. The drug should be treated as a poison, with an immediate loss of 1d4 points of Dexterity if the PCs fail a Fort save against DC 20 and a further loss of 1d6 points each of Dexterity, Wisdom, and Intelligence on a failed Fort save against DC 25 one minute later. Furthermore, a PC who fails both saves has developed an addiction to opium and will suffer 1d6 points each of Constitution and Strength damage in the first week without exposure to the drug. The PC will suffer 1 point each of Constitution and Strength for every day thereafter for 2d6 more days, after which, the addiction has been overcome. However, every time that the PC is exposed to the possibility of abusing opium hereafter, the PC must make a Will save against DC 20 to avoid being compelled to give in to that possibility. Opium also has one other important quality, which shall be discussed later.

The evening’s entertainment consists of a group of very seductive dancers. Only a Spot check at DC 20 will reveal that the dancers follow a strange tradition unfathomable by the outer world; that is to say, that the dancers are not the females that they appear to be…

The Assassins

Sometime during the ceremony, a servant will run in and yell that Winter’s prize stallion has been slain. This is the only warning that the opium-affected partygoers will have that something is amiss. Within a round, two assassins leap from the shadows to attack. Their primary targets are the nobles (and the royal), but they will readily engage in combat with the PCs if the PCs attempt to get in the way.

The PCs will have a chance to avoid a surprise round by making a Spot check against the assassins’ Hide checks (remembering the effects of the opium). The opium will affect the assassins in the same manner as the PCs and the other NPCs as soon as they enter the room. They will escape immediately after they have slain all three nobles and the regent, or when five rounds have passed, whichever comes first. The assassins are both actually Rogue 7/ Shadowdancer 3 (if you are using the OA rules, you may wish to replace some or all of the Shadowdancer levels with Ninja Spy levels). They have been hired by one of the two Houses that did not show up to this evening’s tea ceremony, in order to eliminate four of their rivals at once.

If the PCs survive and their host (and his other guests) do not, the PCs may be blamed by the house for their deaths, but most among the household are aware that there are much more likely causes for the deaths than a wandering pack of homicidal foreigners. Even so, the situation should become pretty tense when screams start echoing down the hallways from the personal chambers, which is precisely what happens within a few moments.

The Emperor

As it happens, the emperor-child is missing. A woman wails in the infant’s room, while she stirs a porcelain bowl of rice-paste with a pair of the strange stick-like eating utensils of the locals in an absentminded daze. The sticks are actually magical, and function as a Murlynd’s Spoon, save that the gruel is rice-paste and the utensils are impossible for an unfamiliar connesuer to eat from—in all other respects, the sticks are a [Murlynd’s Spoon[/I]; this was the emperor-child’s private dining set. Strewn across the room are various toys, an open cage constructed of some sturdy reed common to the island, and a closed cage of the same material, inside of which, a mouse chatters to itself quietly. In Draconic.

The wailing woman, the PCs may soon discover, was the wife of Golden Sunrise Reigns—and is the mother of Ancient Sunrise Returns. She is Meadow Gently Rolls. She is obviously distraught, but manages to take time in between her wails to pester the white-faced servant women (whose role it was to care for the child) unceasingly. She repeatedly asks them for an account of what has happened, but the women are all unable to give satisfactory answers. Invariably, they respond that they have no memory of the night’s events. A Spot check made at DC 25 will reveal that each of them has an almost invisible, tiny arrow protruding from some part of their body. Meadow is annoyingly critical of everything at this moment and the PCs should not feel that their status as “honored guests” will exclude them from chastisement. It most certainly will not.

Meadow is currently irrational, but when she regains her senses, she will remember that she has, perhaps, a reliable witness. Meadow is a follower of spiritual magic—treat her as a level 9 Druid (or a level 9 Shaman from OA)—and has crafted a “toy” for her infant—an intelligent mouse, from a normal one (through the awaken spell; if Meadow is a Shaman, the mouse will have to have been purchased from overseas, as Shamans do not have access to awaken). The mouse has, indeed, witnessed what happened to the infant, but is unable to make any sense of it. The mouse heard laughter with no source and saw the other cage open—the cage holding a one-foot tall half cricket, half humanoid-type creature (a grig—a fey sold to the House Sunrise from overseas with the claim that it brought good luck—the baby’s other living “toy”) with the strange stringed instrument (a tiny fiddle, used, the household presumed, for entertainment, but actually played as a distress signal—and a beacon to the fey realm). The cricket-creature hopped out and…disappeared. A moment later, still accompanied by the strange laughter, the baby rose into the air, floated away a few feet, and…disappeared.

If the PCs are still under the influence of the opium, they will soon discover its secondary properties—that is, people can see the traces of overlap between the fey realm and the mortal realm. In the present case, the PCs will see what appear to be trails of glitter suspended in the air.

At this point, the PCs may begin to suspect the truth, that is, that the baby was not kidnapped by rival Houses, as many within the Empire are likely to suspect, but that the baby has been kidnapped by fey (which are completely unknown to the islanders) at a mischievously coincidental moment. In actuality, two pixies answered the call for help sent forth by the grig’s fiddle, rescued him (invisibly, of course), and stole the baby emperor, for no reason other than one simple constant law of nature: that’s what pixies do. On their way out, they made a point of shooting the servant women with their Memory Loss arrows, but, having no idea that the mouse was intelligent, took no such precaution with it.

If the PCs are still under the influence of the opium, they may find the portals used by the pixies (which have not yet faded, but will within 1d4 days) to the fey realm on a successful Search check of 20. These are two-way portals, which may only be used if the person traveling through them is conscious of their presence.

Through the Looking-Glass

At this point, the PCs will be confronted with a number of options, a few of which follow. They may:

a) leave the Sunlit Palace and charter a ship home from the island. This course of action should not be very palatable for the PCs; if the PCs choose this course of action, they will be leaving behind an Empire in the throes of collapse. A multitude of crises confront the island—from a dependence upon opium that far outpaces the availability, to multiple civil wars, to the inevitable change in dynasty. If Winter Sunrise Hides has been killed, an immediate power vacuum will be created. Otherwise, it will take a little while. Ironically, in a few weeks, the baby emperor will be returned to the household, but no one will ever trust that the child is exactly what it seems from that moment forth.

b) become involved in one of the civil wars that are breaking out all over the Empire. The PCs may find that they have been swept up into the schemes of one House lord or another and could be recruited or manipulated into serving, directly or indirectly in the coming wars. If the PCs find themselves in this situation, they are very likely to find themselves conspicuous targets for assassins and rivals. If the House that the PCs sides with wins the wars (through hard years of fighting), the PCs may be awarded honorary positions of authority, at best.

c) help to inaccurately accuse someone of the crimes committed during their stay. If the PCs are not able to discover that fey are responsible for the kidnapping of the emperor, they may well help to pinpoint the wrong person or persons for the crime, should they aid in the investigations. The most likely suspects will be whatever House or Houses are implicated in the assassination attempt. However, the PCs may also suspect Winter Sunrise Hides, who could possibly have arranged the kidnapping out of jealousy (he will never, after all, be able to kneel on the Sunlit Throne) and, furthermore, has a sinister name. The PCs may also suspect the Houses present at the party were involved, as they certainly have as much reason to cause discord within the household as the other Houses and could possibly have disproved Winter’s theory that observation would neutralize their threat. Finally, the PCs may suspect Meadow Gently Rolls is behind the kidnapping. Evidence for this is sketchy, at best, and the motive is nearly non-existent, but most of the people within the household do not like her and will be willing to believe that she is the culprit, if a minor attempt to convince them is put forth. The House Sunrise will gladly reward the party 10,000 gold-worth of exotic trade-goods for their help in bringing closure to this situation.

d) attempt to fill the power vacuum that will inevitably be left when the House Sunrise is absolved of authority. The only real way to accomplish this task would be through a successful war against all of the vying Houses. This may be possible if the PCs have an army across the sea and go to retrieve it, but will be fruitless, even so. Not only would the PCs have to contend with all of the problems outlined in choice “a,” above, they would never be accepted as legitimate rulers by the people of the island.

e) journey through the portals in Ancient Sunrise Returns’ room to the fey realm to retrieve the baby. The fey realm is an unsettling place. The landscape seems to shift under the feet of the PCs and the weather is in constant flux—as are the seasons. Most of the inhabitants of the fey realm are grigs, nixies, and pixies, but the PCs will confront many creatures that are only illusionary—usually bizarrely so—from insane tailors with facial features that stretch beyond the bounds of nature to giant caterpillars which rest atop fungi while they blow multicolored smoke rings from long pipes and spout a fount of incoherent poetry. This is the nature of the fey realm. At some point, the PCs may finally find the young emperor, suspended in mid-air. The fey are willing to give the baby back in return for one favor (they don’t have any real reason to keep him, anyway). The fey are genuinely concerned that the use of opium can allow mortals to enter their realm at will and would like to enlist the PCs’ aid in staunching the flow of the opium trade. Should the PCs agree, whether honestly or not, the fey will allow them to take the baby back with them through a newly created portal into the child’s bedchamber (if the PCs do not agree to the terms, they will be forced through the portal by masses of fey, many of which have the polymorph self spell-like ability). The fey will, from that point on, keep an eye on the PCs. If the PCs ever break their promise, they will very likely come to regret it. If the PCs return with the emperor, the House Sunrise will gratefully reward them with friendship and 20,000 gold-worth of exotic trade-goods.

The Cast

Winter Sunrise Hides was the brother of Golden Sunrise Reigns and is the regent of the Sunlit Empire until Ancient Sunrise Returns reaches maturity. Winter is a Lawful Neutral Aristocrat 7/Fighter 3 (if OA rules are being used, replace the Fighter levels with Samurai levels). He is well practiced in the art of politics and relishes the power that his position implies. Winter has always coveted the Sunlit Throne and many suspect that he may well have had a part in the assassination of his brother, nearly a year ago. Winter may never be the emperor, but he knows how to take what pleasure he can from what is available to him.

Roaring Waterfall Rages is a violent warlord and the head of House Waterfall. His House and House Sunrise have long been rivals—since before the time of the Great Uprising. Waterfall controls a very large army and is waiting for the tiniest excuse—any breech of law by the regent will do—to unleash it. Waterfall is a Lawful Evil Aristocrat 1/Fighter 10 (if the OA rules are being used, replace the Fighter levels with Samurai levels.

Sleepy Shadow Lies is the head of House Shadow, a relatively minor house quickly growing in influence. Shadow is adept at trading information and is said to have an extensive network of spies. Shadow’s animosity with House Sunrise stems from a slight from Golden Sunrise Reigns in childhood. The nature of the slight is known only by Shadow. Shadow would leap at the opportunity to destroy House Sunrise, with or without the promise of the Empire waiting for him. Sleepy Shadow Lies is an Chaotic Evil Aristocrat 5/Rogue 5.

Hunting Arrow Whispers, the head of House Arrow, does not particularly dislike House Sunrise, or Winter Sunrise Hides, but he distrusts them. He fervently believes that the decisions of Golden Sunrise Reigns damaged the Empire beyond repair and that Winter is doing nothing to slow the demise of the Empire. If the regent is not willing to save the Empire, Hunting Arrow Whispers will not shy away from his duty to assume the leadership of the Empire…
Hunting Arrow Whispers is a Lawful Neutral Aristocrat 1/Fighter 9 (if the OA rules are being used, consider replacing the Fighter levels with Samurai levels).

Meadow Gently Rolls is the mother of Ancient Sunrise Returns and was the wife of Golden Sunrise Reigns. Meadow is not a likeable person—she is cranky, irritable, and generally unpleasant. Furthermore, she consistently finds fault with everyone she knows. These annoying tendencies are balanced only by her connection to her spirit ancestors and her great love for her son (she didn’t particularly like her husband and many people, perhaps wishfully, tend to blame her for his death). Meadow is the equivalent of a level 9 Druid (if the OA rules are being used, she should be a level 9 Shaman).

The fey presented in this adventure are much more mischievous and potentially malevolent than the sprites in the Monster Manual. Hopefully, these fey are a bit more reminiscent of the fey of folklore. Assume that all of the fey in this adventure are chaotic, ranging from good to evil (but more likely neutral or evil).