Session 11: The Aftermath
General Summary
After a tense night in the Burgomaster’s mansion, the party awoke to new mysteries and lingering tensions. Dameion discovered a book titled Van Richten’s Guide to Werewolves among his possessions, uncertain who placed it there. Meanwhile, Hader—who remembered little of his nighttime alter-ego’s actions—shared an uneasy silence with Dorian, the memory of their heated confrontation still fresh in Dorian’s mind.
Before the morning meal, Ismark and Ireena asked for the party’s help in burying their father, Kolyan, at the local Church of the Morning Lord. They also promised to guide the group to Madam Eva afterward. With the Burgomaster’s coffin in tow, the party made its way to the church—only to find Father Donavich had barred the doors.
Dorian and Dameion deftly picked the lock, revealing a once-hallowed space now in disarray. Splintered pews and scorched walls bore witness to a desperate struggle. Father Donavich knelt at the altar in silent despair; his prayers for divine guidance had gone unanswered. He confessed that his son, Doru—who once fought alongside Van Richten in a failed rebellion against Strahd—had returned home as a vampire spawn under orders to kill him. Unable to bear destroying his own child, Donavich locked Doru in the catacombs below, and in his grief, lost the power to bless Kolyan’s grave. He believed that if the “creature wearing his son’s face” were dealt with and his holy symbol returned, his faith (and thus his blessing) might be restored.
Venturing into the catacombs, the party found Doru, a vampire spawn—but not a mindless one. Saphira and Dameion both sensed traces of the Morning Lord’s grace that seemed to grant Doru enough willpower to resist murdering his father. After carefully testing Doru’s restraint with the smell of blood, the group chose a more compassionate path. While Dorian and Hader staged Doru’s “death,” Dameion and Saphira used the Return Stone to whisk him away to Bastion.
In Bastion, Doru was secured in the first chamber of the Endless Paths for his own safety—and everyone else’s. Nymeria then revealed that vampirism can be cured in two ways: by slaying the original vampire, Strahd, or by confronting the Dark Power bound to the Amber Temple that created the first vampire. To awaken this Dark Power, the party would need Amber shards scattered across Barovia—one of which lies at the bottom of the Endless Paths themselves.
Report Date
14 Feb 2025
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