Tomb of The Serpent Kings Part 4: The Boyz Are Back in Town

The Boyz Are Back In Town

[DM Note: to date we have not spent very much time in Bebbanburg Keep. To be completely honest, we have spent no time in Bebbanburg Keep in any sort of meaningful way. When the game began, I wanted to get the players right into the action and so we started in media res, harrying a band of goblins into the mountains where the party would stumble upon the Tomb of The Serpent Kings. As more than half my regular players had to miss the last two sessions I decided that reuniting in the Keep would be a good way to begin remedying that situation.

Bebbanburg Keep and the surrounding land is inspired by the most iconic of all D&D modules, B2 The Keep on The Borderlands. A fortified outpost at the edge of a larger realm surrounded by a hostile wilderness. My own keep is visually based on Castle Carrick, Atrim. It was one of the first castles built by John de Coursy following the occupation of Ireland by the Anglo Normans. An interesting historical tidbit that I am 100% certain my players couldn’t care less about. It contains most of the features of B2’s Keep, though I’ve added a larger village just beyond the curtain wall as well as several other satellite communities that rely on the keep for protection.]

Following the razing of the goblin warrens Dilbo and Melrond booked passage on a ship sailing back across the Bay of Wolves to seek a cure for Melrond’s horrible disfigurements. Failing that, the still half-mad Dilbo seemed determined to murder the unholy abomination that Melrond had mutated into.

Glad to be rid of the capricious demi-humans, the stoic Maul returned to Bebbanburg Keep with Haco. Well rewarded for eradicating the goblin threat the two reunited with Effje, Ramin, and Sister Cletus. They had not been idle during the dwarf’s absence. 

Cletus and Effje had spent long hours in the archives beneath the Chapel of St. Avandra researching the strange mummy they’d fished from the bottom of a flooded pit in the Tomb of The Serpent Kings. Generous donations to the chapel put Curate Hardel and his acolytes at their disposal and much was learned, through prayer and research, about the once might serpent-folk empire that had stretched many hundreds of leagues to the south when the world was a warmer place. As the earth cooled the serpent-folk moved underground, and the burial complex which the party had discovered turned out to be but one of dozens of subterranean complexes through out the Jotunskegg Mountains. How many remained intact was unknown, and the babbling mummy soon crumbled to dust outside the preserving sludge of it’s watery resting place. No further information would be revealed from that source.

During this time Sister Cletus came in contact with another holywoman who was lodging in the temple -an itinerant cleric of Avandra who had stopped at the keep for a few weeks rest. She was dark haired and beguiling, but overly curious about Cletus’ business. Cletus’ suspicions were further roused when she (along with her two creepy mute acolytes) left in the middle of the night shortly after it became known that more serpent-folk structures were likely to be in the area.

Ramen Nudell, not much interested in serpent-folk or spending her days in a dusty temple crypt reading moldy scrolls, put her talents to use elsewhere. She quickly learned of rumors concerning a once-prosperous farming community at the edge of Baron Phelan’s lands. (Phelan ruled at Bebbanburg) . The distant community had a reputation for almost unnaturally bountiful crop yields, and yet many residents appeared to be leaving town in the middle of the night. Entire families would vanish. Some would return several days or weeks later to resume life where they had left off. Others were never seen again. One rumor said that the town’s well water had been poisoned. Another said that people were being turned into monsters and the evidence was fang marks on the neck. The town was called Orlane. Ramen also learned that the local Guild Master, Yohan Munchberger, was concerned that trade from the south was lessening in recent months, and that one caravan in particular was overdue to arrive at Bebbanburg Keep.

Before deciding on their next course of action the party made another generous donation to the Chapel of St. Avandra, which gained them much renown and good feeling among the common folk in the keep and surrounding village. As a result, when the party hosted a huge banquete in honor of the fallen warrior Alonzo nearly the entire population of the keep’s outer bailey showed up. Unfortunately, things got out of hand and the party’s favorite inn, The Slumbering Giant, burned down. 

[DM Note: The party came into a lot more money than I’d intended last session and I wanted to keep them as cash poor as I could. I am using James Young’s (10’ Polemic) Unified House Rules which have some great tables for spending cash during downtime as a means of gaining even more XP.  80% return on philanthropic donations (in this case to the Chapel) and 100% return on carousing. But things can go wrong. As they did. The party also blew a lot of silver on healing potions and more holy water.] 

The party made haste to reequip and head back to the Tomb of The Serpent Kings before the Bailiff could ask any awkward questions, thought at least one person in the keep knows that they are responsible for the inn burning down. . .