There are three ghosts in the manor: the ghosts of the three sisters. There is also a demon, a shadow summoned years ago by Erisu. Use the shadow and the ghosts for effect. A touch of cold… a discordant melody, objects that move when no one’s looking, shadows at strange angles. The shadow is evil and murderous. It will attempt to kill anyone that walks alone, or perhaps two people on their own, though it will try to avoid anyone that could kill it (it is immune to normal weapons, but not to magic).
The ghosts are neither evil nor murderous, but they are confused and lost. Remember that Melody and Meryl are twins, but only Melody will appear in the daytime. Build up to her true appearance. First the cold and discordant melodies, later accompanied by a dripping noise, later the dripping noise is accompanied by dark spots appearing on the dusty floor, and finally Melody’s ghost.
Once Melody awakes to the presence of others, she’s likely to re-scrawl “despair” in blood on the main stairs.
Don’t forget the magic resistance of the shadow and the ghosts! When Melody is around, especially, magic is likely to fail as often as it succeeds.
It should rain good and hard at some point in the night, just for effect. They may notice the clouds coming in as they go ashore. They will definitely notice them by the time they reach the garden.
Once Erisu notices them, the piano will appear in the Drawing Room. Erisu is likely to wait until evening to make it appear, so that the shadow will be more effective. Erisu will attempt to convince them to “find the secret of the way into the vault”, but it really wants them to find the secret of the way out. When that fails, Erisu will try to draw them into the vault to feed on their despair. If anyone needs to die either in the vault or before they enter the vault, Erisu can (given time) summon demons or raise corpses.
Arn Gallade
Characters that ask Arn the right questions can hear some of the rumors and legends surrounding the castle’s fall.
He keeps an official bible by his bedside, which he reads each night before sleeping. This bible is one of three Courlander family missals, and contains prayers, masses, and songs as well as biblical remembrances. (The other two missals are at Lisport House in Fork.) The missal was given to Arn by Meril and Eldred’s father.
He may loan the missal to the characters if they are going to the house.
“Take this missal back to my cottage, if you would,” he says. “And here’s a treat for Saul.”
“Saul is a dog that lives down there,” he says. “He’s a good fellow.”
“There is something unhealthy sad in that house. It could wither the unguarded heart. I read a verse from the bible every night when I’m there to drive the desolation from my soul.”
If asked whether he has to worry about night trolls, Arn will reply along the lines of:
“Well… yes.”
“I was going to say that as long as its not in their interests to bother you, they won’t, but that’s not true.”
“I keep the doors locked at night. And I keep the missal on the bedstand and a crossbow on the wall. I mostly worry about Saul, but food’s plentiful enough down there now.”
“You know, when you live out in the middle of nowhere—sorry, sir—like I do, the wild begins to ignore you. I’ve talked with a few of them. They’re an interesting group. But they don’t appear to have any sense of right or wrong, only of pride and greed. It’s like the bible just passed them by.”
Arn’s grandmother (God bless her soul) was a teenager when the murders happened. She believed that the Courlanders drew too much attention to themselves by the Colonel’s success on the battlefield.
Saul (Arn’s dog)
A medium-sized dog looks up at you. He barks but does not move. He is curly-haired and light, and stands perhaps one and a half feet at the shoulder. His tail wags, and he barks again.
Saul is a water spaniel; he is partly wild and keeps his own company. The dog has survived in the wild by knowing who to trust. It trusts Arn. Whether it trusts the player characters is up to them.
Saul has no specific purpose in this adventure. Use Saul as flavor, perhaps waiting at Arn’s door when they arrive, or showing up at the end of the adventure, or when they stop to have lunch in the garden. Saul could use some grooming; there is a brush in Arn’s cottage.
Saul will not go into the haunted house. Saul will also run away if he sees corpses walking around, even if they have glamer of life.
Saul: (Dog: 1; survival: 7; move: 12; attacks: 1; damage: 1d4; defense: +3)
Encounters: Erisu
Erisu Redbreast, an Emotional Demon of despair, is trapped in the Lisport Manor vault. Erisu often takes the form of a robin. Its sigil is a broken eggshell or an empty nest, sometimes with a spider crawling out of it. Erisu gains power from despair.
The Goblin Mage summoned Erisu and sent him to Lisport Manor, where he seduced Melody Courlander following the death of Melody’s fiancé. When Colonel Courlander arrived with two trusted lieutenants, Erisu goaded Melody into stealing her father’s dagger and striking them all. Erisu poisoned the dagger.
Erisu is still trapped in Melody’s body in the vault. Erisu has used Glamer of Life to make Melody’s body appear as it did when she was alive: a beautiful young woman. Note that despite being in a corpse, Erisu is not undead, he’s a demon.
Drawing people in to the vault
Erisu knows how to get into the vault, but not how to get out of it. It will occasionally goad people into coming into the vault, so as to drive them to despair and increase its power.
It desperately wants to leave, however, and is continually trying to determine how to leave the vault. Erisu will make various suggestions, using surface telepathy, to people in the drawing room who might have some way of helping it out.
1. “You might try playing it backwards.”
2. “Maybe there’s a secret door on the wall?”
3. “Maybe there’s a secret entrance in the corner behind the piano?”
4. “Are there any strange circles inscribed anywhere?”
None of these are the answer. Note that while the players will be trying to enter, Erisu is trying to leave. That’s why its suggestions will not be the one it knows brings them into the vault. It will save that for later, when it just wants to mine the characters for their despair. For all of its suggestions, it will try to make them seem “natural”, as if they were the recipient’s ideas.
“There’s a melody that starts… doesn’t that sound familiar?”
It will also act as if it has only been in the vault for a few days or weeks.
“Oh, thank god, you have found me.”
“I ran here to hide when my sister tried to kill me. She was crazy! She tried to kill everyone! I think she did kill them!”
“But I don’t know the way out. I thought I did, but the melody for the way in does not work. I have been here for weeks.”
“I do not know why I live when he died. I don’t know why I live when I neither eat nor drink and my tongue thirsts like fire.”
Erisu Redbreast (Emotional Demon: 8; Evil; Survival 43; Move: 12; Attacks: 1 dagger+1; Defense: +2; Damage: 1d6+1; Special Defense: immune to normal weapons; Magic Resistance: 8)
Demonic powers: Glamer of life, summon unnamed demons, surface telepathy, raise skeleton/corpse, familiar, familiar’s eyes, Long Hall of Despair, poison
Demonic power points: 20+ (can store up to 24 points and have up to 32 points in play at any one time)
Intelligence 13, Charisma 16, Wisdom 11
Erisu has 20 points at the start of the adventure, but may have used some or gained some depending on the characters’ actions.
Erisu carries the dagger that Melody used to kill her family. It is a +1 dagger. He’ll likely poison it if he expects company. Remember that using poison will require a called shot. Also, because Melody is dead and mostly a desiccated corpse, it is easier for Erisu to hide the weapon. Attempts to perceive a hidden weapon on Melody are at a penalty of two.
If Erisu fears defeat, it can pretend to die at an opportune blow and let the Glamer of Life fade.
“Why have you done this to me?” she cries, and she crumples to the floor. Her eyes stare dully toward you from the ground as her body decomposes before your eyes.
Erisu almost never reveals itself as a demon. It waits for the victim to solve the puzzle or for despair to set in when the victim realizes they’re going to die. Either end is a win for the demon, since it either gets to escape the vault or feed on despair.
Erisu: Poison
Erisu can enchant a blade with demonic poison for two demonic power points. This is how Melody killed everyone in the house except the one servant who survived. The poison is strength 5 (level minus three), and causes 2d6 points damage per round. It lasts for 80 minutes (level times ten).
The Long Hall of Despair
The walls loom inwards and the hallway buckles beneath you. You are in a dense city, its ancient walls lurching inwards. Dull eyes stare out of tiny, misshapen windows.
Sending a victim into the Long Hall costs Erisu four demonic power points and requires that Erisu touch the victim. The victim is allowed a Willpower roll to avoid the effect, but at a penalty of Erisu’s level. Once affected, the victim crumples to a fetal position and becomes insensible, trapped in a mental nightmare of twisting, looming barriers filled with everything that has ever caused them despair or might cause them despair.
The halls will appear differently to different people. To a person raised in the country, it might appear as in the flavor text above. To a person raised in the city, the halls might appear as looming trees, with dark, sinister branches grasping inwards.
Things inside the Long Hall can range from replaying despairing scenes from the character’s life over and over with more and more despairing outcomes; to such strange scenes as their dead grandmother bringing them tea and cookies and berating them for everything bad they’d done since she died—while holding a bloody butcher knife between her teeth.
If they try to get out of the Hall this is a Charisma contest between the victim and Erisu. Each attempt takes one round in the real world. Erisu can only send one victim at a time into the Long Hall.
Demonic powers
Erisu gains one point per day of despair per despairing person. It currently has twenty points.
As an eighth level emotional demon, Erisu can have up to 32 points in play at any one time. It currently has the Gargoyle (5 points), the four Crowns of Eyes (2 each, for 8 points), the shadow (1 point), and the Glamer of Life (1 point), for a total of 15 points in play. If Erisu does other things, such as raising Eldred as a walking corpse or sending a victim to the Long Hall of Despair, you’ll need to make sure that Erisu’s total points in play do not exceed 32, and that the total spent after the adventure starts don’t exceed its current demonic power total.
| Power | Cost | Running total |
|---|---|---|
| Gargoyle | 5 points | 5 points |
| Crowns of Eyes | 8 points | 13 points |
| Glamer of Life | 1 point | 14 points |
| Shadow | 1 point | 15 points |
| Long Hall of Despair | 4 points | 19 points |
| Corpse Eldred | 2 points | 21 points |
| Eldred’s Glamer of Life | 2 points (includes independence) | 23 points |
| Poisoned dagger | 2 points | 25 points |
| Up to four other corpses | 2+ points each |
If Erisu’s power in play exceeds its limit, Erisu will need to drop some of the powers, such as letting the victim out of the Long Hall, or letting Melody’s Glamer of Life drop, or Eldred’s glamer and raising.
Encounters: The Shadow
Erisu summoned a shadow years ago to keep his secret safe. The shadow strangled Meril I; Erisu animated Meril I’s corpse and had it push the stone gargoyle off of the roof, and then arrange itself underneath the fallen stone as if it had been struck by it. This demon waits in the attic for orders from Erisu. Erisu can see what is happening through the shadow.
Shadow: (Demon: 1; Moral Code: Evil; Survival: 7; Movement: 12; Attacks: cold grab or suffocation; Damage: d6; Defense: +9; Special Defenses: immune to normal weapons, -10 to perceive in shadows; Magic Resistance: 1)
Suffocation requires a called shot. If successful, the victim is allowed an Evasion roll, or the shadow has them by the neck and automatically hits every round thereafter.
Erisu may also summon other demons or animate available corpses, if necessary. If the shadow is destroyed, Erisu will need to summon another demon or animate a corpse before it can perceive what is happening beyond the vault. It will still be able to use surface telepathy to communicate with anyone outside the vault, but will not be able to see or hear what is happening.
Encounters: The ghosts
The three daughters are trapped in the house by the monstrous nature of their murder (or crime) and the lingering demonic power of Erisu. If Erisu is banished or killed, the ghosts will be freed.
If anyone attacks Melissa or Meryl, they are likely to cower in fear, crying “Melody! Why?” before fading back through the walls.
Remember that Meryl and Melody are twins, and sixteen years old. Meryl will be submissive and meek; Melody will be frightening and crazy. Meryl appears healthy. Melody appears thin and gaunt.
The first ghost they see is likely to be Melody’s, though they might feel the presence of someone next to them as they look out the window at the garden, or surprise Meryl in the twin’s bedroom or her mother’s bedroom. They might see faces—Melody’s, Meryl’s or Melissa’s—peering out of the upstairs windows if they spend any amount of happy time in the gardens. Joy is not something the ghosts have seen much of this past century.
When Melody’s ghost is around, they’ll hear a faint cacophonous music from far away.
You hear a strange noise far to the south. It sounds like a piano, like someone clumsily moving a piano. Notes with no melody over and over, very faintly.
Second, they’ll hear a dripping noise before they hear the music.
You suddenly realize that you’ve been hearing a dripping noise from up the stairs. It gets louder, as if it were approaching, a loud liquid plop on the stone floor. It stops for a moment. In the silence you hear that faint cacophonous melody as of someone banging away randomly at a piano. And then the noise fades, and you hear the plop-plop-plop disappear into the distance.
Finally, the music and dripping noise will be followed by Melody’s appearance. Remember that the melody only occurs if the piano is still in the vault and Erisu is playing it.
You hear that faint, cacophonous melody again, at the barest edge of your hearing, and then an out of sync beat, like dripping water. A dark spot appears on the floor, oily, black, with a hint of scarlet; again, a few feet away; and a few feet away. The line of dripping liquid follows the music past you and into the hallway beyond where it and the melody fades into the distance.
Meryl and Melissa will appear walking down hallways at night, or peering around corners day or night. Meryl and Melissa can also affect small objects, moving them slightly. As a phantasm, Melody has even more power to affect the material world.
They might also see a face peering down at them momentarily from a window while they’re outside in the garden.
The ghosts have the run of the house, but cannot enter the vault except by going along with a living person playing the piano. They will not do so, however, unless convinced to do so.
Melody can appear day or night. Meryl and Melissa can only appear at night.
Meryl Courlander: Apparition: 1; survival: 5 ; nocturnal; movement: 20; attacks: none; defense: +2; special defense: immune to non-magical weapons, space-shifting; special attacks: cold fear; magic resistance: 5
Melissa Courlander: Apparition: 1; survival: 7 ; nocturnal; movement: 20; attacks: none; defense: +2; special defense: immune to non-magical weapons, space-shifting; special attacks: cold fear; magic resistance: 5
Melody Courlander: Phantasm: 3; survival: 16; movement: 20; attacks: none; defense: +2; special defense: immune to non-magical weapons, space-shifting; special attacks: cold fear, poltergeist power, magic resistance: 10
Melody Courlander’s Phantasm
Melody’s ghost is the most troubled and the most active of the three. Erisu seduced Melody into killing everybody. It used its telepathic abilities to undermine every belief and love she held. Her murders allowed Erisu to take control of her body. But when it took control, Melody understood what happened. She went wild, and took Erisu into the vault, and refused to leave.
Melody’s ghost carries a dripping dagger, dropping blood on the floor. When she is invisible, the blood simply appears on the floor, blotting the dust and moving with her.
If they follow Melody’s ghost, it will turn, crying, and flail at them in self-loathing.
A thin, gaunt, teenage girl walks around the corner in a torn and tattered nightgown, crying, holding a bloody knife out in front of her as if it were the most disgusting worm in the world. Tears mingle with blood, falls from the knife, and splatters on the floor.
She looks at you, and her nightgown billows up like a robin’s wings, launching her towards you.
Melody is thin and pale from starvation. That’s how she died in the vault. She will try to attack once on her way past any offending characters.
Melody retains her paranoia from life.
1. Her older sister never liked her. That’s why she named her son after her twin.
2. Her father deliberately put Alan in danger so that he could force her to marry one of his lieutenants.
Melody will, if possible, write “DESPAIR” in huge, bloody handprints on a wall, probably the main stairs.
As a third-level phantasm, Melody has the poltergeist power and the cold fear power.
Contacting the ghosts
There are two means, within the adventure, of contacting the ghosts: writing in the diary, and playing the piano. Depending on the abilities and magic items that the characters have, they may also have other means of contacting spirits. Monks with spiritual fields, for example, may be able to contact the ghosts.
With the right calmness of tone and clarity of words, the characters can ground the ghosts back into reality. Depending on what they write, a Charisma roll might be necessary to succeed.
If the player characters write in Melody’s diary, Melody, and eventually the other ghosts, will write back, usually in the middle of the night or several hours later. If they leave the diary lying around, there will be entries from December 26. The most detailed entries will be found in the drawing room or the twin’s bedroom. If the diary is left alone it is likely to be moved to one of those rooms by the ghosts.
Entries will be chaotic and random at first, things like:
“Is the war back on?” (Meryl)
“Where is Meril?” (Melissa)
“Where is my son?” (Melissa)
If one of the characters plays the piano, this will bring the ghosts of Meril and Melissa.
You feel the temperature drop; the hair on the back of your neck rises. You feel a cold presence sitting on either side of you at the piano.
The first few times this happens, they’ll need to withstand the cold fear that all ghosts have when they manifest. The ghosts will play the piano in response to any questions at first, lightly, old melodies.
If someone continues playing with them, they can eventually be coaxed to appear more substantial, and to speak. Meril especially will be very eager and bubbly, and will try to sit next to the piano player on the bench. She’s a confused sixteen-year-old girl who has just found a friend. Remember that both ghosts are confused, they don’t know what’s happened to them, they do know that Melody did something awful, and they know that none of the rest of their family is around. They have little sense of time and still think it’s a day or so after Melody’s attack. Melissa wants her husband and her son. Meril wants her mother and father.
Melissa Alegar’s Apparition
Melissa Alegar was twenty years old when her sister murdered her. She was married to John Alegar and had one son: Meril Alegar (the current Meril’s great grandfather). Melissa is worried most about her son and husband. She sees her husband John Alegar in Meril III, and will mistake him for her husband. Melissa can affect the material world but is a less active ghost than Meryl. She will likely write, or join at the piano, only after Meryl does.
Meryl Courlander’s Apparition
Meryl Courlander is Melody Courlander’s twin sister. They were sixteen years old when they died. Meryl can affect the material world, moving very small objects slightly, or picking up a pen and writing with it, or playing the piano.
