Missed a session report in there. In session five the girls descended into the dungeons beneath Castle Tintintagle. Way down deep, even below the wine cellars and prisoner cells, in a barrel-vaulted chamber, rests a massive circular stone trapdoor. Guarded by sigils and signs and incense braziers and blessed candles, and lifted by two chain-and pulley systems, the room acts as a seal against the hordes of chaos. Every so often, the Knights of Marlinspike delve the depths of that ever changing realm. Sometimes the return with great treasures and strange magicks, and sometimes they return not at all. After a full day, the warden seals the dungeon up, and life returns to normal.
In short, I had nothing prepared, so we ran a random dungeon from the DMG’s Appendix A. No monsters, a few traps, a lot of winding hauls, and an empty room containing only a magic dagger, and the girls called it quits.
The next month, things were a little more interesting. Having learned my lesson, I printed off a quick one-page dungeon called The Well of Knowledge. In it, a magic scrying pool is guarded by four spirits of the martyrs to a lost and forgotten god. It’s one of those “pull four hidden levers and get a cookie” dungeons, but with just a little thematic flavor and solid clues, it made for a nice two-and-a-half hour session.
Campaign-wise, the set-up was easy. Their primary goal on this forgotten island is to find their missing sidekick, Tokio the little shroom-guy. Mustafar the friendly ki-rin swooped by the castle and suggested the girls hit up the well. The knights cautioned the princesses that it was a blasphemous place in which many knights had met their end. Throwing such caution to the wind, as is the way with young girls, they went anyway. Some traps, some light role-play as the spirits helped or hindered the PCs prorgress, and one big fight against a living statue, and the scrying machine gave the girls what they came for, a vision of Tokio running scared through the woods.
Pursued by a great hairy beast, the little guy didn’t make it far before being snapped up the thing’s jaws and hurled out into the calm waters of an unfamiliar bay. A long-fingered and wicked-clawed hand with webs between its digits snatched the desperately swimming mushroom-guy and dragged him down into the depths. The beast turned, revealed as The Coyote, in whose service the girls declined to participate, and laughed.
“That’s Hex 9!” the girls exclaimed.
And they were right.
They are now determined to explore the depths of the bay, but with only one potion of water breathing – obtained from the dwarves of Shockhaven – they’ll have to first figure out how. But that’s a mystery for another session.
This, by the way, was Session Six of the campaign.