Where: West along the road, four days from the village — past Tser Pool and the windmill, on the shore of a grey lake.
Status: 🏠 We are here — lodged at The Blue Water Inn as of the evening of our arrival.
First entered: Session 7, at dusk, through the east gate.
The gate (bring patience, not contraband)
Real walls. A wrought-iron gate. Guards with forms. Entry involves a friendly, thorough interrogation — are you now, or have you ever been, agents of the devil? In league with the Vistani? The dusk elves (whatever those are)? Werewolves? — and the registration of every weapon you carry, down to Lily’s broom handle (“you have brought it to our attention, and therefore it must be registered”). The guard who processed us answers to a serial number: 4368. Thank you, 4368.
Ireena’s rank opened the gate: as sister of the Burgomaster of Barovia she was welcomed with condolences for her father, and best wishes passed to her brother Ismark — the town already speaks of him as the new Burgomaster.
The laws (learn them; the stocks are not hypothetical)
- Speaking the devil’s name is a punishable offense. He is “the Devil” here, nothing else.
- Speaking ill of the Baron is a crime — the second crime on the list, above most others. The Baron is “righteous and proper and true and great and all the above and so on and so forth.” So says 4368.
- Festival attendance is MANDATORY. From the flyer, fresh off the presses: THE FESTIVAL OF THE BLAZING SUN — seven days from our arrival. Failure to attend is punishable by punishment. Children required. There has been a mandatory festival every other week for fifteen years.
- In the town square: a gallows-stage, and three citizens in the stocks — one missed a festival (his mother had died; this was not accepted as an excuse), one was drunk once, and one said something unkind about the Baron.
The texture of the place
A guard on every corner. Fresh posters going up over the old posters. Smiles that arrive a half-second late. Every conversation, every transaction, every arrest ends the same way — say it with us: all will be well. There is also something called a Reformation Centre, which we intend to know nothing further about.
And yet — mark this — people walk these streets after dark without scurrying. That is more than the village could say. The walls are real. What they keep in is a separate question.
Known establishments
- The Blue Water Inn — warmth, wolf steak, and our beds. Also Roger.
- St. Andral’s Church — the finest building in town, with an empty secret under the altar.
- Blinsky’s toy shop — as yet unvisited; we owe Aragal a toy from it, at 20 gold over cost.
- The Vistani camp sits outside the east gate — Vallaki admits no Vistani. We waved. The toy isn’t bought yet.
Open questions
- What exactly happens at a Festival of the Blazing Sun — a festival of the sun, in the devil’s land, enforced at pike-point? Lathander’s? Mockery? Both?
- Who has the bones of St. Andral? (The town doesn’t know they’re gone. Keep it that way.)
- What is the Reformation Centre reforming?
The full record: S7 field notes · S7 recap.