L14. Study
The door to area L13 is ajar. The staircase in this room climbs 20 feet to area L16.
A staircase runs along the wall of this circular room and climbs to an upper level. Tucked behind curtains of moss and ivy are numerous bookshelves bearing ancient tomes, and built into one of the bookcases is a tall oval mirror in a wooden frame. Flickering candlelight emanates from the eye sockets of a human skull resting on an open rolltop desk.
Skabatha Nightshade spends part of her day here (see “Where’s Skabatha?” earlier in the chapter); if present, she is seated at the writing desk and scribbling notes to herself while cursing various “unappreciative” child workers under her breath. If Bavlorna Blightstraw fled Downfall in chapter 2, she is slumped against the wall under the stairs and consumed with self-pity. She’s in no mood to fight or have a conversation, so she mumbles and curses to herself, attacking only in self-defense.
The shelves contain books of Feywild lore, all written in Elvish, each of which has a withered frog’s body stitched into its spine. Kissing the frog or stroking it with a moistened finger causes the frog to croak the book’s title in Elvish. Notable tomes include the following:
All Things Sticky, Slippery, and Sweet, written for children, illustrates and describes substances that would fascinate them, such as boggle oil, troll spittle, and various flavors of tree sap.
Fantasma Demento’s Codicil of Conundrums is a lavishly illustrated book of fey puzzles and riddles. Answers to the puzzles and riddles are written in invisible ink.
gobliN eht fo hguaL tsaL is a thin, illustrated book describing nilbogs, who are capricious fey spirits that possess goblins, foment chaos in goblinoid society, and use their magic to drive others to do the opposite of what they desire. All the book’s writing is backward.
Pity He’s an Elf is a collection of illustrated short stories about an elf adventurer named Aethyn Ourglas, who travels the Feywild and befriends dangerous creatures in surprising ways.
The Queen’s Gowns depicts and describes famous gowns worn by the Summer Queen, with asides written by the gowns’ equally famous designers.
Tales from the Gloaming Court is a set of eleven hefty, green-covered, illustrated books filled with stories and illustrations of Feywild intrigue that shed light on the Seelie and Unseelie courts. (Volumes 3 and 8 are missing from Skabatha’s collection and can be found in chapter 4.)
Three Rules to Rule By is a thin, dog-eared book that describes the rules of hospitality, ownership, and reciprocity in detail (see “Rules of Conduct” in Prismeer Overview).
Twilight Tides is a fat, wrinkled book about navigating the oceans of the Feywild.
After two books were stolen from her collection (volumes 3 and 8 of Tales from the Gloaming Court), Skabatha placed wards on every one of the remaining books. Any book that is removed from her study turns to ashes instantly. A detect magic spell reveals an aura of abjuration magic around each book.
Shelved among the books are hundreds of scrolls that bear no magical wards; they describe encounters with individuals who struck bargains with Skabatha, and the horrible curses she put on each of them for failing to uphold their end.
Magic Mirror. The oval mirror built into one of the bookcases functions like the magic mirror in area B1 of Bavlorna’s cottage (see chapter 2).
Rolltop Desk. This desk contains quills, ink, a human skull fashioned into a lantern, a treasure (see “Treasure” below), and a rolled-up wanted poster bearing a sketch of Will of the Feywild, along with the following text in Common:
Wanted: Will of the Feywild!
Find this flibbertigibbet and deliver him to me alive and unharmed, and I shall make you as strong as an octopus!
Granny Nightshade
Any character who can rightfully claim this reward is better off not doing so, for it comes in the form of a potion that, if drunk, gives the imbiber a Strength score of 4 (the strength of a normal octopus). The effect lasts until the creature receives the benefit of a remove curse spell, a greater restoration spell, or similar magic.
Treasure. Among the junk in the rolltop desk are the following interesting items:
A varnished human eyeball inside the lower half of a small hourglass that hangs like a pendant from a necklace made of woven hair. This is the Hourglass Coven’s hag eye (described in the “Hag Covens” section in the Monster Manual).
A black-feathered quill with a bone tip that magically produces its own ink (150 gp). The ink is the crimson color of fresh blood until it dries, whereupon its color changes to sepia.
A Tiny clockwork toad with AC 5 and 1 hit point. If a creature places the toad on the ground, it hops 5 feet across the ground on each of the creature’s turns in a random direction and makes a croaking noise that can be heard out to a range of 30 feet. Any creature that licks the clockwork toad must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or be poisoned for 1 hour. While the creature is poisoned in this way, other creatures are invisible to it.
L15. Redcap Patch
To one side of the giant, toppled tree is a grove of bearded willows on the bank of a murky woodland pond. A patch of tilled earth spreads beneath their boughs. The caps of several red toadstools are just beginning to emerge from the loam.
The toadstools are the tips of the hats worn by six redcaps that are forming under the earth. Any creature that tries to pick a toadstool causes its redcap to rise up out of the earth, outraged at being awakened early. This redcap is not fully formed and has half its normal hit points.
Whenever Granny Nightshade’s key stops turning, 1d3 redcaps emerge fully grown from this patch, leaving any remaining redcaps under the soil, still not fully formed. The risen redcaps loiter here until they see something they can kill or until Granny Nightshade gives them a mission.
The redcaps are hostile toward creatures other than Granny Nightshade. However, if a redcap is offered a gift, it accepts the gift and becomes so angry at the thought of having to reciprocate (see “Rules of Conduct” in Prismeer Overview) that it clutches its chest and keels over dead at the start of its next turn.
L16. Granny Nightshade’s Bedroom
This room has two closed doors, one leading to a 20-foot-high balcony and the other leading to area L17. Neither door is locked. A staircase descends to area L14.
Almost everything about this bedroom is orderly, from the bed with the patchwork quilt to the ornamental pigs arranged in a neat row on the dresser. Such tidiness is at odds, however, with the decaying dollhouse sitting on the bedside table. This three-foot-tall edifice has seen better days and is now besmirched by peeling paint, mold, and rot.
Behind the dollhouse, by the window, moths flutter inside a large bell jar. Facing one another along the outer wall are a pair of doors. Next to the door closest to the staircase is a wooden rocking cradle with a neatly folded blanket in it.
If Skabatha Nightshade is here, she is asleep inside the dollhouse in her miniaturized form. While Granny Nightshade is sleeping, a character must succeed on a DC 12 Dexterity (Stealth) check to sneak up on her without waking her. Talking near the dollhouse also awakens her.
The dollhouse is fully enclosed, rather than being open at the back as a normal dollhouse would be. A Tiny creature can enter the dollhouse through its front door or one of its windows and explore its interior, which has a gloomy foyer, parlor, kitchen, and dining room on the ground floor; two bedrooms, a sewing room, and a nonfunctional bath on the second floor; and a spooky, spacious attic. If you used the “Lost Things” adventure hook and Granny Nightshade stole from the characters, any items that their lost things were transformed into are kept inside the dollhouse’s attic, along with the items listed in the “Treasure” section below.
Characters who inspect the outside of the dollhouse closely can see that the roof is hinged, like the lid of a toybox. It is held shut by an arcane lock spell that only Granny Nightshade can bypass without using magic. No amount of brute force will open the sealed roof, but a knock spell or similar magic opens it, granting access to the attic and its contents. Granny Nightshade also set a password (“rumpleclump”) that, when spoken within 5 feet of the dollhouse, suppresses the arcane lock spell for 1 minute. Cradlefall and Pincushion know the password but won’t divulge it unless their very existence is threatened. Mishka (see area L13) also knows the password and shares it with any characters who are willing to help her.
Creatures inside the dollhouse can’t be affected by spells or attacks that originate outside the dollhouse, and the dollhouse is enchanted to be immune to all damage. If it is knocked over, each creature inside the dollhouse must succeed on a DC 15 Dexterity saving throw or take 1d6 bludgeoning damage from colliding with walls, furniture, and junk.
Jar of Moths. Granny Nightshade keeps these moths to ameliorate the effect of her curse: after she wakes each morning, she forgets all about the first creature she sees. This means that Granny Nightshade doesn’t think about the creature, doesn’t see it in front of her, and instantly forgets anything it says. The effect lasts until she finishes her next long rest or until she takes damage from the creature, at which point she remembers everything. So, to lessen the risk to herself, Granny Nightshade placed the jar of moths where it would be the first thing she sees when she emerges from her dollhouse each morning.
Rocking Cradle. This cradle is painted with images of green dragons. It belongs to Cradlefall, though the wyrmling has outgrown it. It contains a folded, threadbare blanket.
Treasure. The attic of the dollhouse contains the following valuable items:
A pair of embroidered velvet slippers (15 gp)
A false eye made of solid gold (25 gp)
A cracked hand mirror with a gaudy, bejeweled handle and frame (65 gp)