M13. Worker Cells
Six dingy cells strung with hammocks line both sides of this corridor. Loud snoring comes from one cell, and the noise of a rumbling stomach from another.
Two unarmed noncombatants occupy the cells. Wart, a male goblin (neutral), is sound asleep; Kizz, a female goblin (neutral good), is too hungry to sleep and sits in her cell, nibbling her toenails. If the characters offer food to Kizz, she gratefully accepts and tells them three secrets by way of compensation:
She found a key and hid it under the seat cushion of a throne in one of the prop rooms (area M4b). Kizz doesn’t know what the key unlocks.
Goblins who anger Creeping Lyn are turned into wooden masks. A few guests have been treated the same way.
There’s a belfry in one of Motherhorn’s turrets (area M20), but Creeping Lyn boarded it up.
M14. Orrery of Tragedies
This cylindrical chamber houses a whirring contraption bolted to a revolving metal disk that serves as its base. Metal spheres and sickles are attached to the ends of long metal arms that sweep back and forth, clicking loudly and rhythmically like the hands of a giant metronome. The apparatus is inlaid with characters from strange alphabets, and smoky wisps in the shapes of these letters rise from the contraption as it revolves. The whole device hums and crackles with lightning.
Rising from the middle of the mechanism is an eighty-foot-tall copper pole made of eight ten-foot-long lightning rods attached end to end. It extends upward past a ring-shaped gallery that forms the chamber’s upper level, through a hole in the fifty-foot-high domed ceiling.
Three goblins wearing overalls and tinted goggles use brooms to sweep the floor, seemingly untroubled by the noise.
When she’s not watching plays from her ornithopter pad (area M21) or asleep in her room (area M22), Endelyn Moongrave is on the balcony (area M19) that hangs 20 feet above this chamber, where she can be seen by characters who look up. She is positioned in front of the door to area M22. If the other hags were forced to flee their lairs in Hither and Thither, Bavlorna Blightstraw and Skabatha Nightshade are on the side of the viewing gallery opposite where Endelyn stands, trying to make sense of their sister’s wicked contraption.
Creatures on the balcony have three-quarters cover against attacks made by creatures on the floor below and vice versa, due to the mechanism’s many moving parts. Members of the Hourglass Coven who find themselves at risk of being captured or killed flee to the Palace of Heart’s Desire (see chapter 5) using their vehicles or mounts, which are parked in area M21.
Contraption. The Orrery of Tragedies is 20 feet tall and 60 feet in diameter. It uses magic and mathematics to produce its prognostications, and it can sift through possible futures to identify the most likely ones. As the contraption turns, it emits smoke in the form of letters that spell out predictions, which Endelyn transcribes in a black book like the ones shelved in the oracular library (area M7). The orrery magically predicts the future of creatures whose paths are destined to become entwined with the Hourglass Coven and who are doomed to meet a tragic end. It serves no other purpose.
The device is powered by electricity transmitted through its central element: an 80-foot-tall lightning rod that forms its vertical axis. A creature that touches any part of the lightning rod, enters the contraption’s space for the first time on a turn, or starts its turn in the contraption’s space must make a DC 15 Dexterity saving throw, taking 44 (8d10) lightning damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one. A creature in metal armor makes the saving throw with disadvantage.
The Orrery of Tragedies isn’t one object, but dozens of smaller objects joined together. To destroy the whole thing, at least eight of its components (not including the lightning rod) must be reduced to 0 hit points. Each component is a Large object with AC 19, 27 hit points, and immunity to lightning, poison, and psychic damage.
The central lightning rod is eight 10-foot-long lightning rods attached end to end. Each smaller rod weighs 100 pounds and has AC 17, 25 hit points, and immunity to lightning, poison, and psychic damage. Reducing one of these rods to 0 hit points destroys it and causes the rods above it to fall, making the lowest rod the most obvious target. If three or more of these rods fall or are destroyed, the assembly is no longer tall enough to conduct lightning; the contraption shuts down after 1 minute and remains powerless until the lightning rod assembly is rebuilt.
Contact with an antimagic field shuts down the contraption for the field’s duration. A successful dispel magic spell (DC 19) causes the contraption to shut down for 1 minute, though it remains charged with lightning during this time.
Goblins. The goblins sweeping the floor are unarmed noncombatants (neutral evil) named Dungus, Kak, and Spoorx. They wear tinted goggles to protect their eyes from the flashes of light that the contraption gives off. They are tight-lipped and would never willingly betray Endelyn. If combat breaks out here between Endelyn and the characters, the goblins flee down the nearby spiral staircase.
M15. Theater Boxes
Two 20-foot-high balconies overlook the stage (area M2), with stone steps leading up to them. Use the following boxed text to describe the balconies if the characters approach them from the amphitheater:
Two stone balconies are fringed with thick drapes of musty velvet trimmed with black lace, and the black marble railings are decorated with leering alabaster masks. A large, square mirror set in the wall behind each balcony is flanked by wooden panels painted with thunderclouds and lightning bolts. An upholstered bench on each balcony faces a grand view of the stage and the stormy sky.
Each mirror is an 8-foot-square pane of two-way glass with AC 13, 4 hit points, vulnerability to bludgeoning damage, and immunity to poison and psychic damage. Hidden behind the two-way mirror is a semicircular room containing a pair of padded armchairs that face the mirror, allowing those in the chamber to observe the theater boxes without being seen.
M16. Darkling Balloon Dock
The door to area M14 is closed but not locked.
This tower contains a sparsely furnished guest room attached to a stone balcony. The door connecting them swings back and forth in the wind.
If Trinket, Bauble, and Charm’s rain cloud balloon (see chapter 2) is tethered to the balcony and the characters have not already seen it or destroyed it, add:
An enormous flying balloon made from a bulging rain cloud is tethered to the balcony’s battlements.
If Charm the darkling elder and her two cohorts, the darklings Trinket and Bauble, fled Hither in their rain cloud balloon, all three are lurking in the guest room. Charm’s detached shadow is also present unless the characters destroyed it earlier in the adventure. Like other detached shadows found in Motherhorn, Charm’s shadow is a Fey, not an Undead. A creature whose Strength is reduced to 0 by the shadow’s Strength Drain attack does not die but falls unconscious instead. The creature regains consciousness, and the reduction to its Strength score disappears, after it finishes a short or long rest.
If Charm’s shadow stole the magic spool of thread from Bavlorna’s cottage in chapter 2, it gave the item to Charm at the earliest opportunity. The darkling elder is patiently awaiting an audience with Endelyn and plans to offer up the spool of thread as a gift to gain the hag’s favor. Charm won’t give up the spool of thread without a fight.
The darklings are merchants and thieves, not cold-blooded killers. They take no offense at the characters’ intrusion and are willing to do business, provided the characters do not threaten them.
If the darklings are not here, the room is unoccupied, and no treasure can be found among the tower’s furnishings.
Unicorn Horn. If the Story Tracker indicates that the darklings have the unicorn horn, that fact no longer applies if the characters encounter the darklings here. When she saw that the darklings had the horn, Skylla the warlock (see area M11) convinced them to give it to her, rather than risk other members of the League of Malevolence taking it from them by force.