Clapton's Hammer

A failing, near-empty tavern in the Brown district of Gwyndinas (~0.7 miles from the Colosseum), run by the perpetually sad Mr. Clapton. Built only ~4 months before the party stayed there, it sits — unknowingly — atop a pre-Fall burial ground, and its basement opens onto a crevice descending toward the underworld from which a grief demon had crawled up, slowly draining the will to live from everyone above. The place felt "wrong," like the Veilwood transplanted into a city.

Session 13

• The party bunked here the night of the 6th of Spring's End; Lash slept in the backyard wash-tub (her bathwater bottled and sold as "axolotlan water" by morning).
• Leaving felt like a weight lifting, which roused the party's suspicions. They found the corner "regular," Dorian Montagu, had been dead for weeks, and uncovered the burial ground and the grief demon below.
• Behind the bar, a hatch and crude spiral stair led down 90 ft to a storage cellar, then a locked room holding three will-drained guests (an orc card-player, the bard George, a naked old man), then the demon's lair past a false wall.
• The party destroyed the grief demon with the Silvered Short Sword, cleansing the tavern and freeing Mr. Clapton and his guests. The disturbed burial-protection magic had animated the ancient dead — the Horned Skeleton Elder-race fisherman and his elf-ancestor pupils (incl. Ailendyras) — who must still be re-laid to rest by sealing off the chamber and plugging the grief-hole.

Session 14

• Aftermath: Lash returned from the underworld tunnel and the party set about walling off the burial chamber and plugging the grief-hole so the ancient dead could sleep again. (The inn is also referred to as "Rufio's.")