Date: June 29, 2025
Players: Sean D. (Sören Ironwood – Aasimar Paladin), Chris (Radley Fullthorn – Human Fighter), Carey (Traxidor – Half-Elf Cleric), Trip (Daermon Cobain – Half-Elf Rogue)
Previous episode: Session Twelve: Wintersplinter Walks, Valaki Burns
Previously in Barovia…
For twelve days they have walked the Mists. Five devoured by the Death House. Three since Valen’eir’s last breath. One ancient tree felled at Yester Hill, its black heart feeding a blighted effigy called Wintersplinter — now reduced to splinters by a single arrow from Daermon Cobain’s bow.
Yet for each victory in Barovia, another horror sprouts like rot in the vineyard. The bones of saints go missing. Vineyards burn. Innocents vanish. And now, Strahd himself sends an invitation as if the party were dinner guests instead of prey.
The Devil’s Letter, the Party’s Defiance
The adventurers gathered in the low firelight of the Blue Water Inn — their borrowed sanctuary in a town that has become a puppet stage for devils, mobs, and vampire spawn. A messenger, face pale as the mists, delivered a letter sealed with Strahd von Zarovich’s sigil. Within: honeyed words, the chill of civility:
“My friends,
Know that it is I who have brought you to this land, my home, and know that I alone can release you from it. I bid you dine at my castle so that we can meet in civilized surroundings. Your passage here will be a safe one. I await your arrival.—Your host, Strahd von Zarovich”
A polite summons from the Devil himself.
Traxidor, the party’s half-elf cleric and keeper of the Life Domain, was the first to speak against it. He remembered Strahd’s eyes at Yester Hill: the cold amusement, the way the vampire lord toyed with them like cats with mice. He felt the weight of his divine purpose — and the chill of being noticed by something that could snuff it out like a guttering candle.
Radley Fullthorn, Human Fighter and Eldritch Knight — half muscle, half arcane curiosity — joked about what wine might be served. Daermon Cobain, Swashbuckler rogue, leaned in the shadows near the window, flicking a silver coin between his fingers, unreadable as ever. Sören Ironwood, Aasimar Paladin, marked by radiant vengeance, scoffed. If the Count wanted to sup with them, let him come down from his rotting throne.
In the end, they decided: Not yet. They would not dine at the Devil’s table. Not when the taste of Wintersplinter’s bark still clung to their blades.
Edicts, Wanted Posters, and a Town on its Knees
The morning brought no sun — just gray dawn filtered through the tattered veil of mists that never truly lifts from Barovia’s back. Outside the Blue Water Inn, the hammer of nails on wood echoed like a funeral drum. Townsfolk, cowed and bloodied after the massacre at the Festival of the Blazing Sun, gathered to read proclamations:
I, Lady Fiona Wachter, descendant of a great and noble house of Barovia, exercise my right to assume the office of Burgomaster...
Lady Wachter, once a conspirator lurking in the corners of Vallaki’s drawing rooms, now ruled the town in open fealty to Count Strahd. Her edicts clawed the last hope from the bones of the people: the worship of the Morning Lord, once a fragile bulwark against the darkness, declared heresy. Militia pressed back into service under her Reeve, Ernst Larnak. A new curfew. A mass grave ordered for the festival’s victims, piled north of town like so much refuse.
And most chilling: The Society of Vallaki’s Maidens. Every eligible young woman now forcibly inducted under Wachter’s watchful, matronly eye. A mockery of protection — more like cattle counted before slaughter.
Radley ripped down a wanted poster: Baron Vargas Vallakovich’s son Victor, now marked as a fugitive. Izek Strazni, the baron’s monstrous enforcer, also hunted. Ghosts in a town overrun with them.
Ashes and Puppets — The Tour of Despair
They walked Vallaki’s burned veins — scorched houses where Strahd’s minions had driven families into the streets like rats from a burning barn. At the town’s north end, a great pyre burned — a pillar of greasy black smoke, bodies rendered to cinder and whispers. Children stared into the flames, fathers carried wrapped corpses on rickety carts.
Seeking answers, the party ducked into Blinsky’s Toys — an unlikely crucible of secrets and mockery.
Inside, Gadof Blinsky, the so-called Wizard of Tiny Wonders, greeted them with manic glee. A jester’s cap on his head, a trained monkey named Piccolo dancing on his shoulder, he crowed his tagline: “Is no fun, is no Blinsky!”
Among the shelves of sad-eyed marionettes and morbid dioramas, one thing made even Sören’s celestial blood run cold — a doll, carefully stitched, the spitting image of Ireena Kolyana.
Blinsky told them the truth, in his half-giggle, half-sob: the dolls were commissions from Izek Strazni. The brute came back again and again, each new doll never quite right. His price for not killing Blinsky outright. Radley traded coin for the doll — payment for knowledge, not comfort.
Then came the kicker: Blinsky’s babble about Lydia Petrovna, the hanged Baroness — once a child at Blinsky’s counter, sister to Father Lucian Petrovich of Saint Andral’s. The family traced its bloodline back to Tasha Petrovna, a priestess of the Morning Lord before Strahd’s soul curdled into vampirism. Her tomb, rumor claims, lies in Castle Ravenloft itself — a sliver of hope, or just another grave waiting to swallow the party whole.
Blinsky waved them out with a squeal: “Is no fun, is no Blinsky!”
Victor’s Footsteps: The Burgomaster’s Ruin
Next came the manor of the dead baron — looted and defiled, its fine things already divided among scavengers. Amid the broken furniture, they found a single locked door. With effort, Radley’s armored shoulder split it open.
Inside: a simple room lined with empty wine bottles and more Ireena dolls. A shrine to obsession and failure.
The attic above was worse. Family relics and portraits of long-dead Vallakoviches rotted in the rafters. They traced a narrow path to a door marked with a crude skull and a single scratched warning: “All is not well.”
Sören’s hand found the knob — and a Glyph of Warding found him back. Arcane lightning slammed into his chest, but the paladin of vengeance gritted his teeth and tried again.
Beyond the door lay Victor’s secret. A child’s mockery of wizardry: six animated cat skeletons prowling the rafters, three mannequins turned to face the wall like scolded children. A teleportation circle half-etched under a scorched rug — its runes jagged, broken, deadly to any fool who would stand upon it.
Radley, trained in blade and spell alike, read the runes: “This circle is a death sentence.” The footprints in the soot said someone else had tried — and something terrible had happened when they did.
The Coffin Maker’s Bloody Farewell
Saint Andral’s bones were next. Beneath the ruined churchyard, Traxidor’s divine magic made the dead speak. Miloj, a grave robber barely out of boyhood, whispered that Henrik van der Voort, the coffin maker, had paid him to steal the relics — feeding gold to his starving siblings.
The coffin shop reeked of secrets and death. Coffins stacked like cordwood, each a promise of profit. Upstairs, Daermon found crates cracked open from within — soil scattered like the dirt of a grave dug from the inside out.
In a back bedroom, horror had bloomed. Henrik lay crumpled like a marionette cut from its strings. His guts were scrawled across the walls and ceiling — bloody handprints and footprints suggesting the killers danced upon the air. A swarm of flies buzzed over the ruin of his corpse. No sign of the bones. Only a bag of coins and a question: What vampire spawn had hatched here, then flown back to its master?
Radley bent down, sawed the head from Henrik’s neck, and tossed it over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. No reverence for traitors — just grim trophies.
A Banquet of Secrets at the Blue Water Inn
Back at the Blue Water Inn, the severed head had to be hidden — Danika Martikov would have pitched them into the street if she caught wind of it. The taproom, once a place of warmth, now sat in silence. The townsfolk obeyed Wachter’s curfew like whipped dogs, fearful of the new “civic wardens” and inquisitors that roamed the streets.
Sören asked Danika about Victor. Reclusive. Arrogant. Dangerous. She knew little, but her eyes said she wished she knew less.
Later, Rictavio joined them at supper — a traveling bard, perhaps, or a monster-hunter in motley. His brandy from far-off Darkon burned warm in their bellies as he spun tales of other lands beyond the Mists. They saw, for a moment, the glimmer of what freedom might taste like — before Barovia closed its jaws again.
Werewolves on the Road to Krezk
Morning broke dull and thin as a blade. The party, with the Martikovs’ wagon laden with wine, turned westward toward Krezk. But in the shadow of Strahd’s invitation, all roads are traps.
Adrian Martikov and Dag Tomescu, loyal wereraven allies, threw nervous glances at Radley’s grisly prize — Henrik’s decapitated head. When Sören began flaying the skin from the skull like he was butchering a deer, the Martikovs balked. They threatened to dump the wine on the road and return home — their trust cracking like old oak.
Then came the peasants — three ragged strangers limping from the east on the Old Svalich Road. They begged for silver, speaking of villages tormented by were-creatures. The party warned them: Vallaki was no sanctuary, not now.
But the strangers’ gratitude curdled like sour milk. In a breath, the peasants changed — bones cracking, fur tearing through flesh. Wolves with human eyes and human hunger.
Adrian and Dag lashed the reins, the horses whinnied, the wagon thundered west. The Martikovs shouted: “Run!”
But the adventurers stood their ground. Sören’s divine axe, Radley’s blade and arcane shield, Daermon’s flashing rapier, Traxidor’s radiant bolts — all met fur and claw under the pale Barovian sky. Two werewolves fell to steel and sanctity; a third slipped away into the forest, a phantom among the trees.
Where the Mists Drift Next…
The wine barrels still creak in the wagon bed. Henrik’s skull still drips in Sören’s pack. The bones of Saint Andral remain lost, perhaps gnawed by vampires in their crypts.
Lady Wachter rules Vallaki in Strahd’s name. The Count himself waits, patient as the grave, his table still set.
In Barovia, the sun is never bright enough to banish what waits in the fog.
🕯️ World & Campaign Primer
Barovia: A land locked in mists and ruled by an immortal vampire lord. Here, time frays and hope curdles.
The Martikovs: Secretly wereravens who defy Strahd, guardians of the Wizard of Wines and the land’s fertility gems.
The Druids & Wild Men: Servants of darkness who conjured Wintersplinter atop Yester Hill.
Lady Fiona Wachter: Now Burgomaster of Vallaki, her loyalty pledged to the Devil.
Strahd von Zarovich: Host, hunter, myth. His invitation remains unanswered.
The Party:
🗡️ Radley Fullthorn (Human Fighter/Eldritch Knight): Brawny, sarcastic, arcane.
🌟 Sören Ironwood (Aasimar Paladin – Oath of Vengeance): Holy wrath embodied.
💉 Traxidor (Half-Elf Cleric – Life Domain): Healer and spiritual backbone.
🕴️ Daermon Cobain (Half-Elf Rogue – Swashbuckler): Silver-tongued, blade-quick.
Next Session…
The road winds to Krezk, and beyond it — the Castle on the mountain.
The Count still waits. The bones are still missing. The mists still whisper.
And so the adventurers walk on.
Verbatim Session Log from DM Sean Scanlon
Session Thirteen - June 29, 2025Players: Sean D. (Sören Ironwood - Aasimar/Paladin), Chris (Radley - Human/Fighter), Carey (Traxidor - Half Elf/Cleric) and Trip (Daermon Cobain - Half Elf/Rogue).The adventure resumes at the Blue Water Inn, where an unknown messenger has delivered a letter inviting the party to Ravenloft for dinner. The adventurers debate over whether they should accept the invitation. Traxidor expresses serious concern, and is unnerved by Strahd's casual disinterest in them during their meeting on Yester Hill. After some debate, they decide to decline the invitation for the time being, and plan to investigate the mystery of the missing Bones of Saint Andral. Outside the inn the find a declaration being nailed to one of the inn’s support beams. Two are wanted posters for the arrest and return of Baron Vargas Vallakovich’s son Victor, and the baron’s enforcer Izek Strazni. The third document is an edict from Lady Wachter:I, Lady Fiona Wachter, descendent of a great and noble house of Barovia, exercise my right to assume the office of Burgomaster. I assume this office by the will of the people of Vallaki, who threw off the yoke of the inept Baron Vargas Vallakovich. In this time of strife, I vow to reconcile Vallaki's past disloyalty towards our dark master Strahd Von Zarovich and make the following decrees:My loyal retainer, Ernst Larnak is ordained as Reeve of Vallaki, who acts with my authority as burgomaster.All surviving militia are to return to their posts immediately. Furthermore, the militia are now under the command of the Reeve of Vallaki.I have established an anonymous order of protectors, who shall serve as Vallaki’s civic wardens and spiritual inquisitors. All townsfolk are to obey them without question.The bodies of all slain townsfolk are to be brought to a mass grave in a field north of town.The further worship of the Morning Lord is declared heretical and is prohibited.All persons must obtain permission from the Reeve before leaving Vallaki.A curfew has been established, and all townsfolk must return to their homes before dark.Finally, I have established The Society of Vallaki’s Maidens. I will personally oversee the society as matron. All eligible young women are compulsorily inducted as members. All marriageable young women will attend the society’s inaugural meeting to affirm their suitability.After reading the notices, the party surveys damage to the town. Throughout it neighborhoods, criers can be heard announcing the Burgomaster’s edicts and more of the posters are found nailed up. The party tours Vallaki, they find multiple burned houses scattered throughout the community. Townsfork tell them some of the fires were started by the minions of Strahd, to force those taking refuge out into the street. At the north side of Valaki they find a great funeral pyre burning, where townsfolk are bringing the slain to be cremated. Eventually the adventurers come across an establishment called Blinsky's Toys, and meet the gleeful proprietor Gadof Blinsky inside. He proclaims himself to be the Wizard of Tiny Wonders, wears a jester’s cap, and has a pet monkey named Piccolo. They quickly come to recognize his tagline, “Is no fun, is no Blinsky.” The party is surprised to find a doll resembling Ireena Kolyana. When they inquire about it, Blinsky says it is a special commission. Sören offers to buy it but Blinsky is reluctant to sell it. He explains he makes the dolls for Izek Strazni, and in return he does not kill him. But after a pause, he changes his mind, concluding that Izek is unlikely to ever return for it. He then says he has made dozens of these dolls for him, but he always returns to demand another due to some perceived imperfection. The party then asks about a puppet resembling Strahd. He shrugs and says he makes toys for every child’s proclivities, and he is sure some child will love it. When the deceased baron is mentioned, Blinsky reminisces about his wife Lydia Petrovna. He says he knew her as a child, and that she was the sister of Father Lucian Petrovich. Their family is descendants of Tasha Petrovna, a priestess of The Morning Lord before Strahd von Zarovic became a vampire. It is said her tomb is in Castle Ravenloft. Pleased to have made a sale, Blinky waves merrily as they leave, reminding them gleefully, Is No Fun, Is No Blinsky!”The party then investigates the burgomaster’s manor. Most of the mansion was looted, defaced, and vandalized after the mob hung the burgomaster and his wife. Everything of utility or value has been stolen. However, one bedroom upstairs is locked. With some difficulty they are able to batter it down. Within they find a mostly spartan bedroom, except for some empty wine bottles and a collection of more Ireena dolls, like the one Sören bought at Blinsky’s. Finally, the adventurers explore an attic that was seemingly bypassed by the looters. Most of the space is littered with past generation’s furniture, paintings, and personal heirlooms. A sort of path has been established through the junk, and on the opposite side there’s a door with a skull crudely carved into it. A sign on the handle reads “All is not well.” When Sören attempts to enter he is shocked by a Glyph of Warding placed on the door. After triggering the trap he is hesitant to touch it again, but eventually tries to open the door a second time. Fortunately it yields and the party enters a haphazard wizard’s workshop. The most notable thing in the room are six animated cat skeletons around the room and three small children mannequins standing with their backs to the door in the northeast corner. Searching the room, they find an incomplete and poorly sewn wizard’s robe in a trunk. More surprisingly a teleportation circle under a rug. However, Radley concludes that the runes are all wrong, and using the circle would be extremely dangerous. Closer investigation reveals discoloration on the floor caused by scorching, except for a pair of footprints in the center. The discovery of the workshop raises more questions than it answers.After leaving the manor, the party returns to the graveyard adjacent to the ruin of Saint Andral’s church. There they dig up Miloj and cast Speak with Dead on the corpse. It reveals that he was paid to steal the Bones of Saint Andrew by Henrik van der Voort, who is the coffin maker in Valaki. He then spent the money to feed his younger siblings. The party goes to the coffin maker’s shop. They find the front door ajar, and the downstair’s showroom is filled with coffins. There is also a small study and a workshop. Upstair’s, Daermon finds a large storeroom filled with lumber and a half dozen crates. The crates containing soil have burst open from the inside, and some of the dirt is now scattered around the them. The rest of the party finds the smell of decay prevalent outside a bedroom. Inside the bedroom is a gristly scene. They immediately find Henrik’s eviscerated corpse crumpled in a corner. His viscera and intestines are strewn haphazardly across the room, and the floor is coated with a thick pool of blood. Tracks of bloody hand and footprints are pressed onto the walls and ceiling, indicating his killers seemed to defy gravity. A cloud of flies fill the room and swarm around the body. They search for the bones but only find a bag of coins. The adventurers further defile the vampire’s victims corpse by cutting off his putrefying head, then fling it over their shoulder like its a sack of potatoes. They leave the murdered coffin maker’s corpse to molder where it lay and tell no one about it.The adventurers then return to The Blue Water Inn. The party presumably hid the reeking decapitated head of Henrik van der Voort, because Danika would have a shit-fit about it being brought into her establishment and home. The tap room is unusually quiet as the townsfolk seem to be obeying the curfew. Sören asks Danika about the baron’s son, Victor. She knows very little, but explains that he is known to be a peculiar and reclusive child. By accounts he is also demanding and narcissistic. However she says she has no first hand knowledge about him. Soon after, Rictavio emerges from his room for dinner and joins the party. With a relationship more firmly established, this encounter with him is more conversational. They find he is a knowledgeable and engaging dinner companion, despite his almost affectless demeanor. The evening seems to pass quickly, as he captures the adventurer's attention with his many anecdotes and clever wit.End Day Twelve:In the morning the party departs Vallaki to take some of their wine to Kresk. Despite their initial jubilation after rescuing the winery from both the Druids and later Winter Splinter, Adrian Matrikov and Dag Tomescu opinions of the party begin to sour when they see the adventurers casually toting Henrik van der Voort’s head. They periodically give distrustful glances as they drive the wagon to Kresk. Eventually the tension comes to a head as Sören begins flaying the skin from the skull. They refuse to take the party’s wine any further and threaten to unload it on the road if they continue with their barbarity. That is when a group of three strangers approach from the east on the Old Svalich Road. They appear to be a group of peasants, who tell the party they are traveling to Vallaki to find silver implements. They explain they’re community is beset by were-creatures. The party cautions them against going to Vallaki given the truth of events in the town, and they explain Lady Wachter’s rules as the new burgomaster. Dismayed, the farmers ask if the adventurers have any silver weapons they could sell. After saying they do not an evil demeanor comes over the travelers. Before their eyes, the travelers transform into werewolves and attack. Adrian Matrikov and Dag Tomescu snap the wagon’s reins and the horses begin rapidly pulling the wagon down the road. Yelling back they urge the adventurers in the road to run for their lives! However, the adventurers draw their weapons and engage the creatures. Although the battle is pitched the party ultimately prevails. After two of the werewolves are slain, the third flees. The party tries to cut off its escape and casts spells at it, but it transforms fully into a wolf and is quickly lost among the trees and the mists.End Session ThirteenBurgomaster Lady Fiona Wachter
I, Lady Fiona Wachter, descendent of a great and noble house of Barovia, exercise my right to assume the office of Burgomaster. I assume this office by the will of the people of Vallaki, who threw off the yoke of the inept Baron Vargas Vallakovich. In this time of strife, I vow to reconcile Vallaki's past disloyalty towards our dark master Strahd Von Zarovich and make the following decrees: My loyal retainer, Ernst Larnak is ordained as Reeve of Vallaki, who acts with my authority as burgomaster. All surviving militia are to return to their posts immediately. Furthermore, the militia are now under the command of the Reeve of Vallaki. I have established anonymous order of protectors, who shall serve as Vallaki’s civic wardens and spiritual inquisitors. All townsfolk are to obey them without question. The bodies of all slain townsfolk are to be brought to a mass grave in a field north of town. The further worship of the Morning Lord is declared heretical and is prohibited. All persons must obtain permission from the Reeve before leaving Vallaki. A curfew has been established, and all townsfolk must return to their homes before dark. Finally, I have established The Society of Vallaki’s Maidens. I will personally oversee the society as matron. All “eligible” young women are compulsorily inducted as members. All marriageable young woman will attend the society’s inaugural meeting to affirm their suitability.
Read, share, and support:
This tale is forged in the Mists — and carried to you by torchlight.
Subscribe to keep the path lit.
tl;dr: Barovia: Dolls, Bones, and Wolves on the Road
This text chronicles Session Thirteen of a Dungeons and Dragons campaign set in Barovia, a land shrouded in mist and ruled by the vampire lord Strahd von Zarovich. The party of adventurers—an Aasimar Paladin, Human Fighter, Half-Elf Cleric, and Half-Elf Rogue—continues their perilous journey, navigating political turmoil in Vallaki under the new, Strahd-loyal Burgomaster, Lady Fiona Wachter. Their investigation into missing holy relics leads them through a town ravaged by Strahd's forces, revealing unsettling secrets about the Baron’s son, and culminating in a violent encounter with werewolves on the road to Krezk, underscoring the constant danger that surrounds them. The source material details player actions, plot developments, and world-building elements within this ongoing narrative.
Share this post