Half-Witch - Solo Cairn One-Shot
A half-witch enters a fallen tower, found in the wastes of Frostwyck. A solo adventure one-shot I ran with Cairn 2e, Mythic, and Joseph R. Lewis' adventure, Witches of Frostwyck. Three scenes, played for about an hour and a half.
I. Into the odd
Trees made brittle, cradling chalk snow. Piling up, spilling over onto a white horse, and its rider. A pearl-robed feminine figure atop a mare; waves of exhausted hair wing a stern face; herbs rubbing in one hand and a compass spinning in the other.
One or two brambles poke out the ankle-height pile of snow, the horse crumpling through. Up a hill the path winds, flanked by a fallen tower. There. Solena pockets the compass and the herbs, and stops.
[Investigate the tower 0/4]
[Chaos 5]
“Ears open, bug.” Her voice is warm.
? Random encounter ?
tbl: No
She waits. The air stills. Thin trees, viewing paler and paler the farther you look, like thinning paint.
“Giddyup.”
Solena canters closer. Moss and fractures overgrown cover the ruined stones. Antiquated masonry. There was a time I might have lived somewhere like this.
Litters peek over the snow—furniture, china, shreds of a red cloth—other unnotables. Solena glides off her mount and frays into the ruin, eyeing it all. Both her hands gentle beneath the red silky shreds. Could I have worn something like this, once?
In a different pile, a broad wooden shield peers at her. She picks it up.
? Is it her style ?
tbl: No
Too heavy. The shield thuds in the snow.
Further, the snowpiles clear a rectangular spot. There lies some smoke, hovering, ebony. Solena steps through, billowing it around her steppers. Ah. A wooden hatch thunks beneath her feet.
Her thoughts flit over to the horse. I’ll light a fire for you, first.
Walking back, scanning for danger. “You’ll be alone here while I descend that hatch. Keep me posted.” Pat pat.
II. Down the hatch
[Investigate the tower 1/4]
[Chaos 4]
The heavyweight hatch shuts overhead, with it, the smell of smoke and pine leaves. Sol sniffs twice. It's musty in here.
Her left hand equips a torch from her pack, and after an incantation whispered, fire appears. Not here either can she see the floor. Covered in white, it is—in bones. Piled over the entirety of the wide chamber; dead people, their remains all stacked up across.
? Does she know what this is ?
tbl: Yes
Sol’s face is in pain for these people. She walks across the boned floor, some cracking and brittle beneath her feet. A ring of white bones in the middle. Next to it is a real price; a red gemstone, an eldritch eye.
The trouble’s gonna be what’ll happen if I tamper with it; I could run, I think, if I’m fast enough.
She unsheathes a pearl-white blade, white knuckling its dagger handle. She feels around for her herbs pouch. Good.
Solana kneels down, smoke rolling, and picks up the red gemstone, and stows it away. Now the smoke.
III. Now the smoke
[Investigate the tower 2/4]
[Chaos 5]
gen: Altered Scene, Add A Character
? Is the new character from outside ?
tbl: No
Her fingertips brush against the ringed bone, and as if in response, the smoke ceases. She twirls it in her fingers, and bears it.
Then the people in this place are unhappy. Groaning, several skeletons rise around her. Solena sprints.
d: (Solena - DEX) 12<11 -> Failure
d: (Skeletons - DEX) 8<13 -> Success
Outnumbered. She barely makes it through to the stairway when a boned palm comes grasping forth, mud and frost on its rimed pearl, coming at her throat.
d: (Skeletons - Rusty Sword) 1
=> [Solena|HP 9/10]
She swiftly knocks free of it, and retaliates with an elbow upward at the skeleton’s jaw; the other hand pushes her upper weight, intending to smash its head into the stone wall.
d: (Solena - Dagger) 3
=> [Skeletons|HP 3/5|STR 5]
d: (Solena - STR) 2<10 -> S
Crashing bone splinters. Her palm bleeds against cobble, bruises on her fist. Grunting, she starts up the stairs, waving her torch to keep them away. The skeletons don’t stop, chasing up after her, trying to avoid the torch.
d: (Skeletons - DEX) 1<13 -> S
They don’t relent, keeping up despite the flames, which barely make contact except with tumbles at the walls; Solena nears the heavy ceiling door now. The undead wave their bones and weapons at her, grasping for her life.
d: (Skeletons - Rusty Sword) 4
=> [Solena|HP 5/10]
And they do make it to her, she’s still keeping up and fighting as athletically as she can; a witch as she is, able to fend off numerous attackers despite. Dodging under some swings, smashing some of the skeletons’ heads, she makes it up to the door, and tries to push it open.
d: (Solena - STR) 19<10 -> F
But it’s too heavy, she’s too outnumbered, and here they are to take her life. She weighs her options, and considers it not worth it—a red gem is more than nothing, the smoke ring can go!
Weaving sideways and getting cut anyway, she brings herself to remove the ring from her torch hand, and flings it down the stairs. The groaning skeletons see it go.
? Do they keep fighting ?
tbl: No
Low mumbling escapes their chattering mandibles, as they give space to Solena, the half-witch.
She holds her hand to her sides, bruises on her arms, bleeding as she is. The torch drops on the ground, so she can use both hands to push the hatch open.
d: (Solena - Catch a breath) 4
=> (Solena|HP 9/10)
Dark black smoke hisses out as she shuts the door closed. Her horse whinnies at her, and lopes through the snow to meet her. “Some crypts are best left untampered, boy. I have relearned that lesson.”