Lessons from the Mists: Session 42 - The Amber Temple

Welcome back to Lessons from the Mists! This week, the heroes continue to explore the Amber Temple and meet some of its strange denizens... Let's get started!

The Recap

We begin this session with the heroes fighting the amber golem guarding the intact treasury and the nothics that were drawn by the noise of Angvar and Kane breaking the vault open. The amber golem uses its slow ability on Ylenia and Angvar, and Ylenia fails her saving throw. Meanwhile, outside, Kasimir, Kane, Mary Sue Ann, and Pidlwick engage the nothics. While Kane and Mary Sue Ann defend themselves well, Kasimir is significantly injured by the nothics’ attacks. Eventually, the heroes kill the last of the creatures, and loot the treasury.

They spend about an hour in the treasury (in stretches) looting as much as they can reasonably carry out of the Amber Temple. Afterwards, Mary Sue Ann leads them through a fissure in the north of the room into a vault containing three amber sarcophagi with wisps of darkness within. A spiral staircase against the north wall rises into another room. Kasimir kneels and touches one of the amber chunks, and communes with the Dark Power within. Ylenia also touches the amber, listening to the conversation. He pledges himself to Zhudun, the Corpse Star, and accepts the pact that might allow him to resurrect his sister if he can find her remains in the depths of Castle Ravenloft. When he turns around once more, he looks like a corpse. Mary Sue Ann asks him if he understands the costs of making this deal and attempts to understand his strength of mind. While he is confident in his ability to resist the Dark Power’s urges, Mary Sue Ann is not convinced.

Angvar speaks to the other two Dark Powers trapped here and meets Khirad, the Star of Secrets, and Tenebrous, the Consuming Dark. Tenebrous is annoyed about his useless champion upstairs, and Angvar learns it is a lich, but Tenebrous will not divulge his name. Names have power.

The party ascends the spiral staircase into a massive library. Six bookcases ascend into darkness with floating ever burning lanterns illuminating the lower space. Mary Sue Ann attempts to read some of the books, but all appear blank. After further investigation, they learn that the books are protected by command words to reveal their contents. With no way of learning these command words, the heroes enter the hallway to the west and into a richly appointed bedroom. Sitting on a divan in the center of the room is a lich with glowing red eyes. “Do I know you?” it croaks.

Ylenia leads the conversation with the lich and learns that he has little memory of who he is or who built this place, but knows much about the Domains of Dread, Barovia, and the nature of the Dark Powers. He freely offers information that the library might provide.

Mary Sue Ann leads the gathering of information in the library. She asks about the act of sealing Vampyr away, and he gives her a ritual that will bind the Dark Power in amber — but it is a taxing and dangerous endeavor. They must incapacitate Strahd first, then the connection can be severed, which will bind Vampyr. She also learns about the rituals needed to reconsecrate the Fanes of Barovia and restore the Ladies Three, which will significantly weaken Strahd. She must copy these rituals because the books will be destroyed if they leave the library.

Kane and Ylenia ask if there are any blueprints or maps of Castle Ravenloft stored here, and the lich tells them there is a model of the castle south of his bedroom. Those two leave with Kasimir while Angvar and Mary Sue Ann continue their research in the library.

Angvar asks about the metaphysics within the Domains of Dread, and the nature of souls here. The lich tells him that the Domains of Dread are demiplanes that float freely through the corners of the Shadowfell. The Dark Powers are ancient and cannot occupy the space that mortals reside, but they must feed on mortal souls. If a mortal dies within a Dark Power’s domain according to the way in which the Dark Power feeds, their soul will be consumed. For example, Vampyr feeds on the souls of those dead by exsanguination. A vampiric Darklord seems a fantastic way to keep the Dark Power fed. That being said, souls cannot escape the mists without proper guidance or allowances from the Darklords. Souls are recycled in this land, and he also mentions those poor sods without souls. The heroes realize the people without sparks in their eyes are without souls. The lich tells them roughly 30% of Barovia has souls. The heroes are stunned by this revelation. Mary Sue Ann asks about the strange nature of magic here and the sight of corpses that look like them, and he says that this world is not governed by the rules of reality as she understands it. The reality here is defined by the will of the Dark Powers, nightmare logic rules the mists. Mary Sue Ann also asks what will happen to Barovia if Strahd is defeated and Vampyr is sealed away. The lich tells them about Darkon, which suffered a similar fate when its Darklord, Azalin Rex, disappeared. It will slowly be swallowed by the mists over time. He says that when Strahd made a deal with Vampyr, he damned this entire valley and its people. There is no reversing that decision. Unless, of course, another Dark Power and Darklord were to take up the mantle of ruling this Domain.

Angvar then asks how many Dark Powers are contained within the Amber Temple. He tells them there are twenty still here, after Vampyr was released. Mary Sue Ann and Angvar attempt to learn about which Dark Powers have been communicating with the two of them, and he tells them that Mary Sue Ann’s is likely Shaelan-Thel, the Hearthkeeper. Angvar’s is likely the Great Taar-Haak, the Five Headed Destroyer. However, he mentions that Angvar’s soul seems spoken for already. He detects a fiendish blemish on it.

Meanwhile, Ylenia finds a book called “the Incants of Exethanter” in the lich’s lair and takes it for Mary Sue Ann. She opens up a door that leads south and a mountain of skulls cascades down. She and Kane shovel their way through to a small hallway with a chest suspended on the ceiling. Kasimir casts fly on her and she attempts to pick open the lock, which is inscribed with the following message in Celestial: “Greed has no place in the heart of a scholar, for the greatest treasure is knowledge.” When the chest opens, nothing is inside, and Kane and Kasimir plummet down to the floor below as the ground disintegrates in that chamber. Kasimir falls unconscious from the fall, and Ylenia falls to the lower level as well after the fly spell has ended. They regain their feet in the plundered treasury, haunted by poltergeists. As detritus begins to rise around them, Kane casts spare the dying on Kasimir, hoists him over his shoulder, and the heroes run out of the room. They re-enter the library from the staircase behind the forty-foot tall statue of the wizard in the main temple, and decide to rest before going further. The lich offers to be their guide, which the heroes gladly accept. However, Kane is obviously very distressed about allying (albeit temporarily) with a lich.

After their rest, the lich leads them south, through the room that once contained the skulls, past a crumbling balcony in the temple, and through a feast hall that looks richly decorated and appointed with fresh food. He tells them to not touch the copper ewer if they value their lives. He moves south into a hallway scorched by fire inhabited by a corpse clutching an icy staff and three floating skulls burning with green fire. He dismisses them, then leads the heroes into the chamber containing the model of Castle Ravenloft. While Kane spends an hour making maps of the castle, Ylenia loots this room, the staff from the corpse, and an adjoining old potion storage room, giving all her contents to Mary Sue Ann to identify. The staff she gives to Kasimir to identify, which he keeps afterwards. Angvar attempts to intimidate him into giving it to them, but Kasimir is not cowed. A tense moment passes where Kasimir readies himself for battle, but Angvar lets it pass.

The lich leads the heroes down to the lower level and the northern vaults, which he opens for them, shooing away a waiting group of nothics and a death slaad. Mary Sue Ann enters a vault and communes with the amber sarcophagus containing Shaelan-Thel. She gets the truth of what Shaelan-Thel wants: to be freed and to feed on the souls of children. She tells Mary Sue Ann that the horrors of the world will corrupt the innocent young ones, and it is better to save them from that fate, and to give them to her. Mary Sue Ann is horrified, and Shaelan-Thel tells her she has been holding off her soul’s affliction. If their connection were to cease, Shaelan-Thel will no longer protect her. Mary Sue Ann speaks to the others, and tells them that if there needs to be someone to rule Barovia, she will do it with Shaelan-Thel. Angvar refuses to accept that keeping this realm around requires the sacrifice of children to an eldritch god. Ylenia says that if they need to make a deal with a Dark Power, they should consider all their options and meet the others. Angvar also asks Kane if he is okay, since he has been “white knuckling his holy symbol.” Kane tells him that they need to kill the lich, or else his god might spurn him. They accept this.

Next, Angvar enters the amber vault containing Taar-Haak and communes with him. The beast within tells Angvar that he will have great strength to kill any of his enemies. He carries the blood spear, a weapon wielded by Khavan, once champion of Taar-Haak. He commands Angvar to be freed, but Angvar refuses. He tells the entity that he has known many people like the Destroyer in his past, people hungry for power and willing to abuse others to gain it. He will not be under their sway any longer. The Great Taar-Haak tells Angvar he is weak, and his champion will not be weak. “Begone, rodent,” the power commands, and shakes the sarcophagus, and Angvar removes his hand. He feels his attunement to the blood spear end, and he tosses it inside, shutting the door on it.

The heroes ask Angvar if he is okay. He tells them that chapter has been closed. Mary Sue Ann returns to Shaelan-Thel and formally rejects her offer, but the Dark Power is not so easily refused. It attempts to control her mind, but Mary Sue Ann resists its influence. Shaelan-Thel is disappointed, but accepts. The Dark Powers do not offer power that is not wanted, and removes her protection from Mary Sue Ann. She gains the “Mist Walker” Dark Gift. The heroes convene in private, and decide the lich will have to die, and Kasimir might depending on how he proceeds.

And that’s where we left it!

So How Did the Session Go?

This session was absolutely fantastic. Everyone had a great time, despite us playing very late into the night, way past the time in which we usually end our sessions. Things were just too good, too juicy, to stop.

We got to engage a lot more with the dungeon crawling mechanics, stretches, and using time as a resource here. The players really liked talking to the lich and getting all the secrets about Barovia and the wider setting of Ravenloft. A lot of the finer details that may not be in official sources, such as how the Dark Powers eat souls and require a champion to do so, is directly from this post by MandyMod over on r/CurseofStrahd. In the official source books, especially in Curse of Strahd and Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft, these topics are not nearly as fleshed out and left to mystery, so I enjoyed giving my players solid answers to these questions. I also sided with MandyMod and her decision to make the amber sarcophagi contain trapped Dark Powers, not vestiges of dead gods or whatever that eventually birthed the Dark Powers. There are still many out there, and their exact number/nature I do like leaving a mystery because I (or anyone in my group) can curate the Dark Powers/Darklords or make their own up for other Domains of Dread if we were to play more games in Ravenloft.

In my personal canon for the history of the Amber Temple, Exethanter and Neferon were both members of the Order of Guardians. They managed to kill a few Dark Powers at great cost, but then devised a way to trap them. Neferon left the Amber Temple to voyage across the planes while Exethanter and the rest of the Order continued to trap Dark Powers, but eventually fell to their darkness and corruption. Neferon returned to be trapped in Barovia, did battle with his old friend who at this point had transformed himself into a lich, and broke his mind. Unable to end his friend’s life, Neferon decided to guard the Amber Temple to the present day.

The ceiling chest trap was one of the funniest things we’ve experienced this campaign. The chaos that ensued from that decision really made me appreciate good dungeon designer’s creativity. One of my players was sort of dreading a powerful spell trap like power word kill, but the disintegration of the floor into another room was such a welcome surprise to him. 

There were some really tough decisions and excellent dramatic roleplay from everyone when discussing the Dark Powers. Kane’s player deciding that the lich had to die or else his god would spurn him was amazing character work. Ylenia of all people was saying that they should consider their options and speak to the rest of them to see if there is a better deal with another Dark Power was such an interesting character choice.

Mary Sue Ann’s player is unfortunately exiting our campaign shortly due to real life circumstances. Her refusal to accept Shaelan-Thel’s offer which will cause her soul affliction (that causes her to disappear from the senses of any person she grows too close to) to flare up once more is the perfect narrative reason that I can have her come in and out of the campaign as often as her schedule allows (she will be intermittently visiting for the remainder of the campaign). It was a miracle how well her backstory and the schedule of this campaign lined up to make this narratively satisfying. The “Mist Walker” Dark Gift was taken from Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft and though those are often supposed to be taken at character creation and as a result of making deals with Dark Lords or Dark Powers or whatever, I think the narrative/mechanical harmony makes this a perfect pairing for Mary Sue Ann and her story. 

Next session, we will finish the Amber Temple.

Until next time!