Cast · The Coven
Granny the Pie-Seller
AliveHostile
The sweet old woman with the too-good pies turned out to be Morgantha, a hag with two sisters and a windmill. We fought them and lost, and we have sworn to go back.
At the windmill with both her sisters, still holding Radu. She beat us. We are going back.
- Last seen
- The Windmill
- First met
- Session 4
- Last seen in
- Session 7
What we owe, and what we are doing about it
-
Go Back for Radu
Our word to Vasha: we will come back and see off the hags. Her mate Radu is still chained in the mill.
At the windmill, Granny's cart held a woman bound in a silver net. We took her with us when we fled, and flee we did: two of us were turned into frogs, Clover was smashed, and three hags laughed us off the hill. By the fire that night the woman, Vasha, told us what was in the pies. It was her arm, and her mate Radu's, hacked off and grown back again and again. Radu is still chained in the mill.
Vasha stayed behind to watch the place. "I would really appreciate you coming back and trying to help mount a rescue, but I'm not going to expect anything of you." Our answer was "You have my word that we will come back and attempt to vanquish these hags, with you or without you." If we ever meet the pack in the west, she says the words "Radu and Vasha need help" might buy us a hearing before Kiril's wolves tear us apart.
The mill is back east, two days short of Vallaki, and we are about to go west. We have not forgotten.
- Who
- "Granny", the pie-seller of the Village of Barovia. Her name is Morgantha, and she is one of three hags at a windmill on the road west. Her sisters are Bella and Offalia (we all say "Ophelia").
- Where
- The windmill, about two days short of Vallaki.
- Status
- Alive and unbeaten, with her coven whole and a prisoner we swore to free.
- First met
- Session 4, on a doorstep in the village, the first Barovian to talk to us at all.
Granny
"Ooh, hello dearies. You're a colorful lot." She was selling from a rickety wooden cart and it smelled of fresh bread. She knew at a glance that we had come out of the mist ("You're mist walkers"), noticed we were carrying the colours of the Durst family, and said the Durst house "hasn't been seen. It was outside the mists."
The pies were a gold piece each, "a whole meal for two people", and kept for a fortnight and more. Asked what was in them, she said "butter, flour, love, protein," and took offence when one of us asked whether the protein was people. They were the best thing any of us had ever eaten.
She was chatty about everything except herself. The lord in the castle? "The devil he is sometimes referred to as. Of course, he is wise and generous and all that good stuff." Mist walkers? "It's been quite a while since the last mist walkers, and it often means that Strahd becomes more active." She told Osric which mushroom was safe, pointed us to the tavern, and said she lived "a bit outside the village in a mill" with her sisters.
Sirius tried to read her and got nothing. That night, Fëanor, Drew and Lily all dreamed bright, vivid dreams, and Lily woke up already eating.
The windmill
Two days out of the village, at dusk, we found a leaning mill that smelled of herbs and fresh pies, with a ring of old standing stones behind it. Granny came up the road with her cart. Lily stepped out and asked to buy more pies. "We have some in the windmill, but you'll have to wait in. My sisters are not as friendly as I." Pressed about the enchantment our magic had found, she was almost proud: "They are enchanting pies, I will admit. So you got me."
Then Sirius edged round to the cart ("You don't get to touch my cart"), we heard muffled screaming inside it, and Granny ran for the mill faster than any old woman ever has, shrieking for Bella and Ophelia. Lily opened the cart and found Vasha, gagged and bound in a silver net. The mill door burst open on three hags, one of them with Granny's face, warped and purple: "You shouldn't have poked your nose in, dearies."
How it went
Badly. Bella put Osric through a nightmare. Offalia's eyes went black as ink at Lily: "It would be unwise to attack our best customer." Sirius spread his raven wings and frightened one of them, and we hurt Morgantha a great deal without her seeming to notice.
The next round, Bella looked at Sirius, said "Ooh, ee, ooh. You lot are spicy, aren't you? You, winged one," and he was a frog. Morgantha did the same to Osric. Lily ran in among all three of them, scooped up both frogs, and took Morgantha's claws across her back for it. Fëanor's guiding bolt was the only thing all night that left her "a bit hurt." Clover's fire and Drew's acid washed off ("Nice try, deary"), and Morgantha smashed Clover to scrap almost in passing: "And take your toy, too."
"That's it, right, you three dearies run. Don't come back." They stood in their doorway and laughed, and they did not chase us. They did not need to.
What we know now
- The pies were made of Vasha and Radu. The hags hack off their arms and the curse grows them back. We cremated every pie we carried. Lily put it best: "I feel bad about having eaten a person while also still wanting to eat a person."
- Night hags draw their strength from the three. Break the coven, and the others weaken sharply.
- Radiant light hurt her. Steel, fire and acid mostly did not.
- They know our faces. And to anyone watching, attacking her looks like beating up the old lady with the lovely pies.
- Lily is free. It took days, a rope, a tree and a lot of kindness, but the pies no longer have her.
What we promised
To Vasha, before we left her watching the mill: "You have my word that we will come back and attempt to vanquish these hags, with you or without you." Radu is still chained inside. We are going the other way for now. We have not forgotten.
What we still don't know
- Can we catch one of them alone on her pie rounds, before the next full moon?
- What are the standing stones behind the mill? We have only seen them from the road.
- What did she mean about the Durst colours, and a house that was outside the mists?