In a glass darkly

Grit – D1 – a grubby warrior, impatient, but open to trying new things. 

Fripon – T1 – this middle aged thief has a tall tale or two, and a swollen drinkers nose to boot. 

Mirella the Witch – MU1 – A curious seeker of knowledge, with a niggling worry about getting burned at the stake. 

Gottlieb Scheller – F1 – A tall, well built, and bearded halberdier. 

Ferdinand Scheller – F1 – another Halberdier, equally tall, and equally well built. 

William – F1 – A roaming nomad warrior, scruffy and brave.

Kromor – D1 – no ordinary Dwarf, he was raised by humans, eager to learn their ways.

Bud + Lou – NHd – Mirella’s two hounds, kept on a tight leash. 

Ol’ feller – William’s sturdy pack mule. 

Théo + Ramon – NH – two dirty orphans, paid by William to care for ol’ feller. 

The weeks downtime in the town of Tour-en-Savoy had been long and eventful. Whilst a few of our heroes had taken bed rest to heal their wounds, the thief Fripon had kept himself very busy. He had been gambling at the Tap, a seedy bar outside the town walls. There, he’d almost lost one hundred gold pieces in a game of cards with a dashing rogue names Romeo. Just when all was lost, the thief decided to grab his gold and run. A posse were soon out looking for him. Fripon’s companions saw little of him the rest of the week, but heard him coming and going at the late hours of night. 

Two days before their departure to Xyntillan there was a large scene at the Inn of the Black Comedian. A man came bursting in with a terrible story. Dreadful bugs had descended on him and his party in the outskirts of Castle Xyntillan. These bugs had made his allies terribly sick, within a day they were all dead. Strangely the man himself was untouched by the bugs, he put this down to his medicinal bag of barn-weed. Fripon made sure that he quickly jaunted off to the local apothecary to secure these materials. He returned soon after with small canvas pouches supposedly filled with barn-weed. Fripon’s allies took them, with no reason to distrust the thief, and also made sure to follow the apothecaries supposed instructions; to sleep with the pouch under their pillow. 

And so the party set off on the two day march up the mountain road to Xyntillan. To seek treasure and glory. They all slept with the barn-weed under their pillow. Alas, some of the party did not sleep well. Gottlieb had a terrible and surreal dream. He had been walking a basalt cliff face. Beyond the cliffs’s edge was neither sea nor sky, but an empty void in which the moon hung massive and luminous. Whilst there he had met Jaumon Malévol, the sly warrior they had met last time at the castle, and who they had made a deal to help find treasure. 

The second night Grit had a very similar dream. Once they reached the castles periphery, they camped as they have done the last few visits. Surely with their barn-weed pouches they would be safe from bugs. They slept with them under their pillow. Gottlieb again was visited by the dark Jaumon in the dreamlands, being threatened that if they did not summon him as per their agreement, he would haunt them all in their dreams forever. 

The party decided to follow the instructions of the Dreamwirght. The note they had received from him told them to intone his name thrice, and to breathe deeply the roses of the courtyard. 

At dawn the party snuck through the central gatehouse, went into the collapsed northern tower, and crept through the gardeners room they had found before. Onto the vaulted parapet rose garden they went. 

Mirella, ever the wise, took her hounds up to the roses, whose beds were littered with corpses, and got Lou the hound to sniff the roses. Almost immediately the hound fell asleep. A trap! The party quickly moved to the east of the parapet, looking to gain ingress into the castle through another door. Alas, it was stuck. Kromor pulled out his crowbar, “I’ll clear a path!” 

Then, with a moan, the body parts strewn throughout the mud began to writhe. An arm lashed out at the sleeping dog, wounding it, but also waking it up. 

“Get that door open!” 

With a few good lever points the door was cracked open. Kromor smiled in victory, turned around to only see that three of his party had fallen asleep. The heavy fragrance of the rose garden was poison! William, Gottlieb and Fripon were all snoozing like babes amongst the lush flowers and writhing body parts. 

“Drag them in, now!” And so they did. The party took a few moments to catch their breath. They were in a dank chamber with three doors. 

Then, with a puff of black smoke, Gottlieb the halberdier suddenly transformed during his slumber. Laying in his place, fully awake, was Jaumon the Dreamwright. Jaumon stood up, wiping off his silk hose and jerkin. 

“Well then ladies and gentlemen, shall I lead you to this treasure?”

The party were utterly shook. Where was their friend and brother?

“Gone forever I’m afraid, lost on the high seas of the Dreamlands. Now, do as I say or I shall do the same to you.” 

Utterly intimidated, unsure whether this Dreamrwright could indeed send them permanently to the land of nod, they decided to follow his instruction. They woke up Fripon and William. 

“We are moving into a very dangerous part of the Keep, the abode of the master. Even I am not permitted here. Not without permission at least. Keep your wits about you and we shall soon be rich.” 

The plan was to steal a bejewelled necklace from a magic mirror. Jaumon led them North, through a long corridor, a desolate room, and then to a large ornate door. The door’s frame was decorated with cherubs with skull heads, all foiled in gold. The party went in, creeping. Unlike the rest of the keep, which was a mainly stonework walls and flagstone floor, this part had plush red carpets, walls of white columns and fine wallpaper, and the high vaulted ceilings had frescos of angels acting with malice or in obscenity. 

They went up a grand staircase. Jaumon told them to move quickly, they could not stay still long, and to avoid the sining at all costs. They did indeed hear singing coming from the East, where they saw a huge double door that was glowing with runes.

Kromor followed instruction and opened a door at the north. Inside he saw nearly two dozen undead figures leering. “Sod that!” 

“Get inside! Get away from the singing!” Jaumon insisted. So in they went nervously, expecting a great battle. But to their surprise the figures appeared partially melted and totally still. The stench of paraffin lingered in the room. All of the undead figures were wax works. Phew. 

The next room was lined with bottles with a fighting dummy in the centre of the room. A bottle flew off the wall into the dummy. 

“A poltergeist!” Mirella cried. The party rushed through. 

In the next corridor they saw a path leading to the south. A great doorway lined with skulls. Scythes, blades, and a handle with a large hole at it’s centre. A sign above the door read ‘The masterpiece of death.’ 

“Would you like to give it a try?” Jaumon asked. 

“Get lost!” 

So the party were led east, around a few winding turns until . . . 

“We have arrived. The masters collection of magic mirrors. Go in quickly, and snatch the necklace from one of them.” 

They went in and Grit looked into one of them. He saw himself and his party reflected, only they were all headless. He felt compelled to flee, but managed to steady himself. The two hounds however, Bud and Lou, began shrieking and howling and fled in terror. Mirella held on tight to their leads and was dragged down the corridor. Ferdinand and Kromor came to her aid. They managed to hold the dogs at bay, but couldn’t calm them down. They tried food, and a firm finger wag, but alas the dogs had to be released, and so they tore off into the depths of the castle never to be seen again. 

Inside the mirror room, with Jaumon yelling hurrying encouragement beyond the door, the party began exploring. 

Fripon found a large revolving door. It was segmented with just enough space for one person to pass through at a time, each side of the door had a large ornate mirror. Into the carrousel Fripon went. On the other side he found another hallway lined with plush red carpets. An exit?

William approached a mirror. Within he saw a fine ballroom filled with dancing spectres. He began to hear music. Soon he felt as though he were beyond the pane of glass inside the room. A fair maiden wearing a white gown floated towards him, offering a chalice filled with deep red wine. William tried to turn away and leave. The maidens comely smile twisted into a hateful grin. All the dancers froze, turned and leered at William with malice. With a great amount of will our hero pulled himself from the scene and back into the mirror room, and without a seconds contemplation struck the mirror with his weapon. It shattered and erupted with blood. 

Grit began searching behind and around the frames of the mirrors, daring not look inside of them again. Soon enough he found a small alcove with a sliding door. He took the mirror off the wall and slid it open. Inside was a fine banned chest with a brass lock depicting two satyrs. Finally a score. 

At the same time Kromor found the mirror with the necklace on the other side. Jaumon became enraptured, and encouraged them to grab it. The party however began harassing the Dreamwright. 

“What if we just throw him into the mirror instead?” They laughed. 

“Fripon, do your masters bidding and grab the necklace!” Jaumon cried. 

Fripon, who had just emerged from the rotating door lunged at the mirror, pushing his hands beyond the glass to grab the emerald encrusted necklace, but then looked up to find himself trapped on the other side of the mirror. Down by his feet were several skeletal husks. 

“Damn it Fripon, you useless cur! Another one lost to the mirror realm.” 

The party began to encircle the Dreamwright, combat seemed imminent. They began to grab their weapons, but the dark lord had the initiative and fled at full pace into the castle. 

“This is not the last you’ve heard of Jaumon the Dreamwright!” 

The party decided to flee through the rotating door, into what they believed was the same hallway they had passed earlier. One by one they rushed through, until the surly Dwarf Grit tried his luck. 

Inside the carousel, Grit’s reflection stepped out of the mirror and grabbed a hold of him. The struggle between the dwarf and his evil clone pushed the door backwards, back into the mirror room where the two dwarves began scrambling and fighting. Grit had also been carrying the mirror with a trapped Fripon inside who watched from the frame in horror, unfortunately this was dropped to the ground where it shattered. Inside the mirror realm Fripon watched in horror as the world around him cracked, splintered and then collapsed around him like a crumpling sheet of paper. A painful way to die. 

At this moment, those on the other side of the rotating door realised that this was not the hallway they had visited before. 

“Grab the chest, retreat!” 

And so they all fled, back the way they came. In the waxwork room Ferdinand was almost accosted by two waxworks that suddenly animated, but his quick footwork kept him alive. 

Out and down they ran; down the stairway; out through the golden door; all the way to the parapet and the courtyard; with a long run they made it all the way back to the woods, where Théo and Ramon camped with the mule. 

“Why are there two Grits?” The orphans asked with worried faces. 

“What are we going to do about this?” The party pondered. 

They couldn’t tell the two apart. As they started probing and questioning, one of the grits leapt at the other. They wrestled and grappled across the wooded camp, one throwing the other onto the ground, mounting him and began trying to hammer his head in. Mirella tried splashing both with holy water, to no avail. Then Mirella tried pulling out the hair of each, but both seemed real, they were identical in every way. How would they know which was which? There was not enough time to figure it all out, as one of the Grits hammered the others head into a bloody pulp. Once the Grit was dead, the surviving one blinked out of existence. 

“Well at least we have the chest.”

Inside they found a pile of gold and two fancy gloves embroidered with scythe shapes on the back. They lugged all this, and their dear friends corpse back to town. 

What will they do next?