It is mildly distressing that I count as a success a day in which we didn’t burn anything down or make any new enemies, but here we are.

In fact, contrary to making new enemies we established an ally for ourselves – of sorts. We met with a werewolf who told us that Strahd has poisoned her pack (I believe merely metaphorically…?) and installed one of his henchmen at their head. We developed a plan to challenge him to single combat, cheat, and wrest control of the pack from him, gaining their allegiance against Strahd in the process. Before undertaking that particular endeavor however we decided to strengthen ourselves by pursuing some of the other prophecies, and with that goal in mind we made our way to Kresk.

On our way we were waylaid by a pack of direwolves. After dispatching them, Strahd appeared and inquired pointedly about our absence at his table. We dissembled and demurred, but he still seemed quite adamant that we join him within a week’s time and to drive the point home he set the skeletons of the fallen wolves against us, though fortunately Arianna’s divine connection rendered them largely ineffectual. Strahd’s invitation only served to renew our dedication to pursuing the prophecies, and we continued toward Kresk.

When we finally arrived at Kresk, we found the burghermeister to be eccentric to say the least. He addressed us from the walls and refused to open his gates until we brought him wine. Recalling a crossroads pointing to a vineyard, we retraced our steps. En route, our growling stomachs and our denial from Kresk put our nutrition foremost on our minds, and we conspired to dress and preserve the meat from the direwolves, which should keep us trekking through the woods of Ravenloft for quite some time, though I have some concerns about scurvy.

With our immediate need of food met, we decided that Kresk was a silly place and that we wouldn’t rush back to it. Instead, we investigated the prophesied “dragon’s house,” based on a lead we got from the werewolf about a certain manor.

The trap on the manor door was mercifully defunct – I was not looking forward to a repeat performance of our entry to the wizard’s tower. Once inside, we felt…watched, somehow. But that didn’t stop us from getting down to the usual business of looting the place for anything not nailed down.

We found a large sitting room without much in it, but next door was a storage room for wine with a little elf who had gone looking for missing children and become one himself – he took cover in the manor but wanted badly to leave, insisting it was haunted. I am most curious to prove or disprove that claim!