“I guess these ‘mistwalking Vistani’ wouldn’t be on the map, I guess they travel around a lot.  Well, I liked the idea of a town, but if the Vistani are closer, perhaps we head there.  I would like closest of the two, would be my vote.  Or, we could leave it up to Tymora to decide…”. Giles says with a grin.  

" The town i think.  We can ask others about this Vistani fellow there."

The old woman ignores Giles question about her cargo, if she heard him at all.  Soon she has disappeared down the winding forest road and the four of you are alone again.

[After three PCs have weighed in, we somehow have 2.5 votes each for left-Vistani and right-Barovia.  It looks like Zefla gets to break the tie.  Unless she also votes for both/some fraction of the two, in which case DM will just roll a random encounter...]

Zefla watches as the lady hustles away, "She's an odd one, isn't she?"

"Ooh a town?  Now that would be more fun, I mean more information probably than a little camp?  At least that's my vote."

Giles puts his coin away in his pouch with a slightly sad look on his face, that he didn’t get to use it to decide their course.  “Ok, town it is.  Let’s see what this “Barovia” has in store for us…” He readies for a nice walk on the road, watching the bushes and trees for any sign of movement as they begin their walk.  

Soren keeps an eye on the path and the surrounding forest, hoping for Silvanus' Guidance.  Still wary of werewolves, less so of wolves in the daytime, but unsure in this unnatural wilderness and perpetual cloud cover.  Nettle the owl watches wide-eyed from his shoulder as well, as owls do.

Soren Perception plus Guidance:  7 + 3 = 10
Nettle Perception:  16

He also tries to glance at the map and keep track of the eventual turns of the path, forest's edge, or river crossing to try to orient himself as to which way the party is approaching (the town of) Barovia from.

Once forty-five minutes or so pass, Soren murmurs a quiet farewell (for now), and Nettle fades from his shoulder.

Electing to follow the frightened old woman toward what she claimed was a village, and ignore the mystery of the Vistani for now, the party turns to the right and begins walking down the road.

While this wood is strange and unfamiliar, it is not devoid of life.  Small, drab colored woodpeckers flit from tree to tree, tapping the bark in their endless quest for insects.  Lean grey squirrels hunker against the crooks of trees, eyeing you warily as you pass.  Underfoot, the road is littered with game tracks; Wolves, deer, and something larger than deer, elk perhaps.  There is also an unsettling trail of barefoot humanoid tracks that enters the road, follows it for a ways, and then returns to the forest.  While the weather is not freezing, it is hardly temperate for one to go barefooting in the damp forest.

After an hour's walk, the forest thins and then ends, depositing you onto a wide plain.  The fog is thicker here, clinging to the ground and concealing a bridge over a narrow river almost until you are upon it.  Tall shapes loom out of the dense fog that surrounds everything. The muddy ground underfoot gives way to slick, wet cobblestones. The tall shapes become recognizable as village dwellings. The windows of each house stare out from pools of blackness.

As you step into the outskirts of the Village of Barovia, a stiff wind picks up.  The fog is slowly lifted, revealing more of the buildings around you.  This is an old place.  Many of the houses and shops show the hallmarks of wealth and style in their design, with sharply pitched roofs, gardens and large picture windows.  Yet everything is in a dismal state of repair.  Windows are missing glass entirely, or they are closed tightly with the shutters nailed down.  Paint, where it exists, is faded and chipping away.  You pass several shops: Tobacconist; Mincovich's Fine Furs; Karlov's Clocks.  All are boarded up and empty, their roofs sagging in evidence that have been abandoned for years.

As the wind continues to blow, the mist clears entirely, revealing a bluff just beyond the village, a wall of rock hundreds of feet high.  Low mountains rise behind it, one of the ranges you spied from the third floor of the manor house.  Perched on an outcrop pillar of rock, separated from the bluff by a wide cleft in the stone, sits a narrow gothic castle, its many spires reaching into the sky like a lance.

As the wind dies down, a sound begins to cut through... voices raised in anger... the sounds of an angry mob.

X = Where you enter town

XX = Where the sounds of the mob are coming from

Zefla doesn't like the feel of this place.  Not that she is scared or really feeling threatened by it, just doesn't like it and it's unfamiliarity.  She likes at least a little sense of control and here there really isn't any.  Nothing to really cling to in order to try and center where things are.  As they continue to walk, she takes in everything she can, glad they don't hear the sounds of the werewolves anymore.

As they arrive at the village, she wonders what treasures might await through the doors they are passing and what kind of people they would be.  Are halflings as odd to them as they are with the lady they passed earlier?  Thinking of her, "Where do you suppose that egg-shaped woman headed off to?  She sure was in a hurry."

She stops in her tracks when she notices the castle.  Between the idea of an actual gothic castle and how it was precariously perched.. was a sight to behold.  Hearing the angry mob finally breaks her thoughts... "Want to go check out what that's all about?"

“Right…. I feel that we shouldn’t walk right down the Main Street and into an angry mob, *ahem* a group of lost souls, angry people in search of guidance and leadership, willing to listen to none.  How about we go around the outside and get a look at this before we walk right into it?”  Giles looks here and there, , listening, trying to pick out any words or names…

Burr heads toward the mob...

As they approach the town of Barovia, Soren points out to the group where he thinks they are on the map.  Likely coming from the woods just south of Barovia, crossing the bridge northward over the river.  With the gothic castle... Castle Ravenloft according to the map... to the northwest...

In truth, Soren has no idea what makes a castle gothic.  But something about its stark position, looming upon the bluff makes him look around nervously.  Like a rodent seeing a bird of prey and knowing the bird of prey sees him.  He shudders and turns his attention back to the city... ah, town.

As always in "urban" areas, he defers to his companions, tending towards not-Father Giles' caution and Zefla's curiosity.  But when Burr takes off towards the crowd, Soren anxiously suggests "ah... perhaps we should stay together?  We are pack now, the four of us, in strange territory."

Ineffectually, he tries to split the difference, following behind Burr but not getting too far ahead of the others.  He looks around - does the town of Barovia look deserted?  As if all of its residents have congregated to form the mob to the south?  Soren's hackles rise, sensing the hostility in the air.

Burr walks through town toward the sounds of raised voices, Soren following behind.  

Soren, the town does look deserted, but a closer look reveals not all the homes are empty.  You catch glimpses of a faces peeking out of a few upstairs windows along the way.

The two of you pass the first functioning shop you have seen.  The sparse light from this building spills out from behind drawn heavy curtains. A sign over the door, creaking on its hinges, reads “Bildrath’s Mercantile.”

Next door is a dark, two story townhouse.  As you pass, a moaning sob emerges from within its open doorway.  There's no time to investigate, as up ahead something happens.

As they turn south toward the sound of the mob, there is a gasp from the crowd ahead, the shouts turn to cries of anger and fear, and the people begin to disperse.  Perhaps 20 souls run up the street in your direction.  Some carry torches, others drop them to sputter in the muddy street in their panic.  The dart into doors or duck into alleyways, trying to get off of the street.  Those who notice you recoil with the same look of concern as the old woman from the road, but their fear of whatever happened behind them is too strong and they race past you.

With them out of the way, you get a better look ahead.  At the end of the street is a large manor home, clearly the seat of a wealthy merchant or noble.  A few figures are still outside, one of them a long-haired blond man; he wields a sword and is threatening the rest of the crowd.

You see the following play out, but from a few hundred feet away and not all the conversation is audible.

Giles, circling around the back of the buildings avoids the wash of the crowd, though he hears the cries and shouts.  Coming around the back corner, he comes upon the following scene and has a front row seat.

Two men are dragging an old man inside of a mansion, the old man limp and bleeding from a massive headwound.  Another man, tall and blond, covers their retreat, sword raised. 

"You've killed my father, wretch!" the blond man cries, his wrath directed at a dirty, bearded man within the remnants of the crowd.

Undeterred, the bearded man picks up another heavy rock.  "Your family brought this upon yourselves!  You bootlick the devil, and now your sister frolicks with him in the midnight forests!  There is a witness!  Ireena doesn't deny it!  The harlot has made herself the play thing of...".

"And so what if that's true?"  the blond man challenges, his eyes raging, advancing on the rest of the mob.  "So what have you accomplished, eh?  If the devil is fond of my sister, how will he deal with the man who murdered her father?  The town Burgomaster?!  When the devil sends his beasts to Barovia, who do you think they shall come for, Jaromir?  What will you say to him, when he calls you before him?  What will you say when Strahd is knocking on your door tonight?"

With these words, the lingering members of the mob begin to lose their nerve and retreat.  The one called Jaromir tries to rally them, shouting, "See?  They appeal to the dark one!  They seek succor with the devil himself!"  But seeing the rest of his cohorts melt away, he too turns and flees into the gloomy morning.  The blond man gives a half-hearted chase, before turning and running inside the mansion, with a side-eyed glance at Giles as he passes.

Burr surveyed the scene with a frown, no one seemed in immediate danger....he'd found in the past when a mob formed it was often his folk who felt their wrath, no one much cared what happened to charcoal burners.

But this seemed something more....though similar in many ways....blaming victims for their own misfortune seemed a common response whether in Faerun or Barovia...

Disgusted he spat on the ground and headed toward Giles.

Soren tastes it like the sour tang of bad blood.  The pack of this town turning against itself like rabid wolves or confused bees.  But some outside force has fomented this conflict.  The Devil?  Strahd... he remembers the letter in the abandoned house written to the deceased Raquon of Greyhawk...

Strahd von Zarovich, Lord and Master of Barovia.  With a sinking feeling, Soren guesses instinctively that Strahd von Zarovich is master of more than this one town, but rather of the entire land of Barovia.  He thinks of the dark gothic castle looming like a bird of prey...

Soren too walks forward, more to close the distance with Burr and Giles and keep the group together.  "Come on Zefla.  Seems as if everyone here is afraid of us, though I do not know why.  Perhaps the man with the sword has answers and may not shun us as these others who killed his father do."

As he approaches, Soren maintains a neutral, open stance.  That of a respectful visitor in strange territory.  He attempts to discern whether it the blond man's gravely injured father might still be alive so that he Giles could heal him (?).  (If so, he will say more once he is close, offering help).

Do you attempt to follow them inside the mansion, Soren?

Quote from Bartjeebus >>

Do you attempt to follow them inside the mansion, Soren?

Not unless acknowledged and invited.  Otherwise too invasive, territorially speaking.

Soren asks for Silvanus' Guidance as he walks up, trying to project a confidence and calm he does not feel.  If he is close enough, he attempts to discern whether the blond man's father, the 'Burgomaster', is dead and beyond Soren and Giles' healing, or whether their spells might yet work.

Medicine plus Guidance:  17 + 4 = 21

IF he thinks healing might work, Soren calls out after the blond man:  "We are strangers in Barovia, just arrived in unfamiliar territory, perhaps from a different world.  But if your father still lives, we may be able to heal him, by Silvanus wild grace andTymora's turn of fortune."

Zefla watches all this unfold in front of her, wondering what they stepped upon and if they should have gone the other way down the path towards the mist walkers.  Might not have been so confusing and well.. dark.  This place just sucked all the fun out of anything.  

She watches as the mob disperses and wonders if the man actually was killed.  How was any of this going to get them back home though?  She looks around for anyone to really talk to and is surprised when she sees Soren try and get a conversation going with the blond one with the sword.  She waits to see if anything comes of that.

As Soren hails the manor house, the door is thrown open again and the blond man steps out, sword still drawn.  "I am at the end of my rope with you..." the man yells, before pausing.  He listens to Soren and looks he and Giles up and down.  He lacks the fear you've seen in the other Barovians... something more like grim recognition playing across his face.  He wavers... hesitates... then sheathes his sword.  "Come inside, quickly, and see if anything can be done."

He allows Soren and Giles (and Burr if he moves to accompany them) into the manor.  You step into a main hall.  Two staircases rise to the second floor and a pair of fancy, if somewhat faded, rugs cover the stone floor. Paneled wood doors lead off in all directions.  On one of the rugs, staining it with dark blood, lies the body of an older man.  He has the same features as the blond man, though he wears a beard and his hair has gone to silver and white.  Instantly you see the man is beyond healing.  He has been partially scalped and his skull is open with a 3 inch crack, exposing brain matter underneath.

Laying across the body, sobbing, is an auburn haired woman in leather pants and a doublet.  Her face is buried in the dead man's chest and she is inconsolable.  Also in the room are three more folk, dressed in garb more like the peasant mob you saw outside.  One is trying to comfort the sobbing woman while the other two stand off to the side, looking traumatized by the entire ordeal.

Seeing the looks on your faces, the blond man nods grimly.  "I thought as much."  He places a hand each on Soren and Giles' shoulders.  "Listen, I can't speak now.  I need to see to matters here.  But I know something of your plight.  Go to the tavern and wait for me."  He pushes you back toward the door, but adds in parting, "Keep a low profile, for now.  Things are bad enough... your kind always attracts unwanted attention."  He then turns and goes to aid the peasant in trying to pull the woman away from the corpse.

None of the fleeing mob stop to speak with Zefla. 

She sees Soren and Giles (and possibly Burr) step inside the manor and then return less than a minute later. 

Looking around, she sees a pale woman with unkempt hair and sunken eyes leaning out from the doorway of a two story townhouse.  She sucks back wracking sobs and watches the townfolk as they flee, reaching out to them, but she is ignored.

( Burr does indeed accompany them within)

When the other three of her party disappear in the manor, Zefla isn't sure what to do.  She didn't get a good feeling from anyone she had seen as she is just about to give up on anyone around, she notices the woman leaning out of her doorway.

She approaches her a little trepidatiously... "Excuse me, but can you tell me what is going on here?  And why.. why are you crying?"