D11. Sinking Palace
The palace has two entrances: one on high ground to the northwest, the other overlooking the docks. Each entrance has two bullywugs (neutral) and a crocodile guarding it. These sentries deny entry to anyone who doesn’t have an invitation from the bullywug king.
This ramshackle hall is built around a big tree. Two of the tree’s limbs reach out through the walls like enormous welcoming arms. The interior of the hall is roomy, with an open floor plan that allows occupants of the upper story to look out over the lower one. Bullywug courtiers crowd into the space, filling it with their guttural croaks. Their clothing is faded and stained with mud.
The palace has two levels:
Upper Level. The upper level is built around the trunk of a tree. Gathered here at any given time are 2d4 unarmed and unarmored bullywug courtiers, some of them reclining on pillows. Among these noncombatants are three bullywugs (neutral) who would defend their honor if they thought it besmirched by hostile interlopers.
Lower Level. The lower level is submerged in 3 inches of swamp water. More bullywug courtiers fill this space as a trio of bullywug musicians play an upbeat tune on stringed instruments. These bullywugs are also noncombatants.
Clothesline. A clothesline attached to the southwest corner of the building’s exterior has a variety of frayed, patchwork garments draped over it. The line leads to Bavlorna’s cottage, which is heavily obscured by the fog over the lake. The line can support up to 200 pounds of additional weight.
D12. Bavlorna’s Cottage
Four flights of wooden steps rise out of the swamp, ending at a trapdoor in the underside of Bavlorna’s cottage, which is perched atop tall, thick wooden stilts and surrounded by dense fog. See “Bavlorna’s Cottage” for details.
D13. Big Barkless
Several holes dot the trunk of a gnarled old tree that grows on the shore of the lake. The tree has lost all its bark, and a few withered leaves cling to the ends of its twisted, knotted branches. One end of a clothesline is tied to a high branch on the northwest side of the tree. Several old garments hang from the clothesline, the other end of which disappears into the fog hovering over the lake.
Big Barkless is a tree blight, a carnivorous, ambulatory Plant of menacing disposition. While it remains motionless, it easily passes for a dead tree. Four sprites live in hollow cavities in its trunk. Their names are Bitzi, Dandy, Mintleaf, and Timpella. The sprites are a bitter bunch, taunting those who come close by spewing forth insulting words and tiny arrows. They hope to provoke the characters into damaging Big Barkless, thus prompting the blight to fight back. While ridiculing the characters from their hollows, the sprites have three-quarters cover.
Big Barkless remains rooted to the spot until it’s required to act in its own defense, whereupon it uproots itself and attacks all creatures it perceives as threatening. That doesn’t include the sprites, even if the sprites instigated the conflict. The blight will not chase prey into the lake but can move on land as far as it wants.
If the sprites take any damage, they withdraw deep into the tree blight, gaining total cover. The sprites evacuate and disperse into the swamp if the tree blight is reduced to 0 hit points.
Clothesline. A clothesline attached to Big Barkless is hung with frayed, patchwork garments. The line leads to Bavlorna’s cottage. If the tree blight moves more than 5 feet farther away from the cottage, the clothesline snaps in the middle, and the garments fall into the lake. The line can support up to 200 pounds of additional weight.
D14. Toadstool Patch
Your heart suddenly feels cold, filling you with a sense of loneliness that borders on despair. A haunting, melancholy tune played on a flute reaches out to you from somewhere within a field of oversized toadstools.
If the characters follow the music to its source, read:
A slender elf with pale blue skin and black hair sits curled in the shadow of a gray, six-foot-tall toadstool, playing a somber tune on a double flute.
The flutist is a wood elf named Octavian Meliamne, who came to Bavlorna seeking magic that would make him forget his lost loves. A deal was struck, but when it came time for him to pay up, Octavian refused to give Bavlorna what she wanted in return: Octavian’s still-beating heart. As punishment, Bavlorna took what she wanted by force, switching out Octavian’s heart for a goat’s heart so that he would not die. The process left the elf unable to feel or exhibit emotion.
Octavian is truthful with the characters about what happened to him. He knows what Bavlorna did was wrong, but he can’t seem to get worked up about it. He suspects the hag is keeping his heart as a trophy. Unbeknownst to Octavian, Bavlorna is using his heart to keep her meat locker cold (see area B12).
Use the scout stat block to represent Octavian, with the following changes:
Octavian is a wood elf (chaotic good) who speaks Common and Elvish. He has darkvision out to a range of 60 feet.
He has advantage on saving throws against being charmed, and magic can’t put him to sleep.
Treasure. If the characters return his original heart to him, Octavian reciprocates by giving them his pipes of haunting.
While Octavian and his true heart are within 5 feet of one another, any spell that ends a curse can swap the goat’s heart in Octavian’s chest with his still-beating true heart. When Octavian regains his true heart, the goat’s heart appears at his feet as a dead, desiccated lump of tissue. A detect magic spell reveals an aura of abjuration magic around the goat’s heart after it is removed from Octavian’s body, and an identify spell or similar magic reveals what it does. A creature that eats more than half of the goat’s heart gains the benefit of a potion of invulnerability.
Development. Once Octavian has his true heart and his capacity for feeling emotion restored, he skips merrily into the swamp, eventually crossing paths with the Inn at the End of the Road (see “Random Encounters in Hither”), where he stays for the foreseeable future. His joyful presence cheers up the inn’s glum innkeeper, Tsu Harabax.
D15. Bullywug Hut
The wooden door to this dwelling is closed but not locked.
This hut has a steep thatch roof. A small wooden chest rests in the middle of the floor, and scattered around it are six fraying silk cushions.
The air in here carries the stench of decaying fish. A lit brazier hangs from a rafter, providing the dwelling’s only light.
No bullywugs are present.
Treasure. The small wooden chest contains cookware, spices, old fishbones, and a mummified toad. A detect magic spell reveals an aura of evocation magic around the toad, and an identify spell or similar magic reveals what it does.
If the mummified toad is tossed into a pot or kettle of water, it disappears and produces a darkness spell that emanates from the container and lasts for 10 minutes.