Session A22 — Black Spider Discovered

Summary

The morning after the bugbear barracks battle, the party rests in their captured strongpoint and receives an unexpected visitor: a paper origami crane that folds itself under a barricaded door, carrying a letter from Vajra Safahr, the Blackstaff of Waterdeep. The letter sets four directives — chief among them, capture the Black Spider alive. Kavu dispatches a Sending to frost giant queen Gertie, and receives a cautious but promising reply.

Pushing north into the cave, Othorion achieves one of the session's quietest acts of violence: two bugbear sentries eliminated in succession without a sound, followed by the identification and capture of a doppelganger posing as a drow supervisor. The doppelganger, pressed past its tolerance, reads Othorion's surface thoughts and shouts the name "Jarlaxle Baenre" into the cavern. The rift bugbears surrender. Kelvin discovers the Gauntlets of Ogre Power on a long-dead skeleton in the rubble below.

The session's final act is an extended magical duel against Nezznar the Black Spider in the high chamber — a drow in black leather and robes who names Roland by his full name before summoning spiders, counterspelling Darkness, fireballing the party, disappearing, and ultimately trying to negotiate his way out of a grapple. He calls the cave's objective by its name: "the forge of spells." Othorion brings him down to the gag-and-rope stage twice, and is downed by a staff crit when Nezznar breaks free the second time. The session ends mid-combat with Nezznar pulling the pouch from his mouth as he rounds a corner and Othorion bleeding on the floor.

Key Events

Morning in the Barracks — Recovery and Attunement

The party spent the night in the bugbear barracks, door braced with pitons from the inside. The pitons had been set at DC 20 to break. No one came through.

Kelvin had taken a punctured lung from the previous session's critical wound. In the morning, he attempted self-surgery using Othorion's mirror — a grim bit of improvised medicine that did not fully close the wound but stabilised it well enough to continue. He would be making Dexterity checks at disadvantage for the rest of the session. This wound would carry over into A23.

Roland attuned to the Cloak of Protection recovered from the barracks. Under the table's updated attunement rules, the process took one hour with no ability check required. Kavu ran his morning fire-breathing exercises and offered his standard praise to Kossuth while the others prepared themselves.

The Paper Crane — A Letter from the Blackstaff

During the party's breakfast, a folded paper crane appeared at the base of the barricaded door — moving on its own, slipping through the gap in the wood and pitons, then unfolding itself to reveal a letter.

Roland read it aloud. It was from Vajra Safahr, the Blackstaff of Waterdeep — one of the most powerful arcane officials in Faerûn.

The letter had four directives:

1. Capture the Black Spider alive. The drow known as the Black Spider had been orchestrating events across the region. The Blackstaff suspected a larger scheme and needed him taken for interrogation.
2. Frost Giants. She was dispatching a team to investigate. No further action required from the party at this stage.
3. The Young Green Dragon. She required his name and the details of any arrangement made.
4. The Red Wizard near Old Owl Well. A team had been dispatched to intercept and evaluate.

Kavu's reaction to reading the Blackstaff's name was unambiguous:

"Bajra motherfucking Safar."

Sending to Gertie Orelsdottir

Kavu had prepared the Sending spell specifically to reach the frost giant queen, Gertie Orelsdottir — the female frost giant who had led the assault on Tresendar Manor and demanded "the artifact."

He sent the message in Giant. The precise wording was characteristically Kavu — a compressed diplomatic statement that touched honour, grievance, and the offer of terms.

Her response arrived in the silence of the cave:

"I do not see why this should have taken so long to demand. This said, I do not disagree. I shall consider."

Not agreement. Not refusal. Consideration — from a queen who had attacked their town. The thread was alive.

The Rift Cavern — Silencing the Sentries

Heading north from the barracks, Othorion moved ahead to scout while the party followed at a distance, Kelvin maintaining Pass Without Trace to add +10 to every stealth roll in range.

Othorion's roll: 41.

"Nothing in here has perception capable of even approaching that."

The cavern opened into a wide chasm — a rift running across the cave floor, a cold stream falling from the western wall and tumbling north into the dark. Iron stakes had been hammered into the rim, ropes hanging into the rift below. In the rift itself, two bugbears were working — a drow supervisor standing on the rim above, barking orders down at them, with two bugbear sentries standing watch.

The supervisor's words carried:

"Nesna has said that he divines something is down there. You will find it and retrieve it."

Othorion moved to the first bugbear sentry. One hand on the sword hilt, one on the dagger. He drove the sword through the spine and drew the dagger across the throat in a single motion, then passed a contested Athletics check to lower the body to the ground without a sound. The second sentry was across a shallow stream — Othorion long-jumped it without a splash and repeated the process.

Both sentries were down. No one in the room had heard anything.

The Doppelganger Revealed

With the sentries gone, Othorion turned to the "drow" supervisor still watching the bugbears in the pit below. He wanted information — and he wanted it taken, not traded. He closed the distance and dog-tackled the figure from behind, rolling a natural 20 on the grapple check.

Pinning the creature, he pressed:

"What master do you serve?"

"I serve the spider, Nesna. What is it to you, cousin?"

Othorion's intimidation landed hard. Something changed. The creature in his grip was no longer entirely drow-shaped — he was holding something that had been performing a drow. Kavu identified it: a doppelganger.

"It occurred to you now why it is you were able to sneak up to this drow without being seen. They were not a drow."

A doppelganger reads surface thoughts. The party had a name that would mean nothing to most people in this cave, but the doppelganger caught it in Othorion's mind and, unable to help itself, spoke it aloud into the open cavern:

"Baenre? Like, like Jarlaxle Baenre?"

Everyone heard it.

Othorion drove his blade into the doppelganger's shoulder.

"I'm going to stab him in the shoulder for that one. I don't like Lolth."

He gagged it with his leather pouch and held it.

Bugbear Surrender — Kelvin's Ice and Kavu's Presence

The party came around the corner into view. Kavu walked to the edge of the rift, cloak billowing, and addressed the two bugbears still working in the pit below:

"You two, this way. Do not move, or I'll finish the rest."

One immediately raised its hands. The other threw a javelin at Kelvin. Kavu leapt up and intercepted it with his shield — Dex save DC 21, passed — taking the 10 damage himself.

The javelin-thrower stepped backward and found Kelvin's Shape Water ice beneath its foot. It slipped, fell prone, and surrendered.

The cooperative bugbear tied up its companion. Kelvin bound the cooperative one. Roland restrained the doppelganger with an athletics roll of 21 against DC 18.

Kavu surveyed the two subdued bugbears and the dangling doppelganger. He addressed the survivors with warm magnanimity:

"You have fun with the boss who was yelling at you really meanly. We're going to go this way."

The doppelganger was lowered into the rift on a rope — dangled at ten feet depth, hands bound, gagged, like a piñata.

Gauntlets of Ogre Power

The cooperative bugbear, when asked what Nezznar had been searching for in the rift, answered: "We don't know, something magical. We haven't checked this northern section."

Kelvin searched the rift rubble. Among the debris: a skeleton of a humanoid, clothes and gear long since rotted away by time and humidity — but the gauntlets were perfectly intact. Magic had preserved them against everything the cave could offer.

Gauntlets of Ogre Power. Kelvin identified them and passed them to Roland, whose Strength score was immediately set to 19.

The Forge of the Spells Chamber — Nezznar

The party moved down a hallway with Pass Without Trace still active, into a chamber of cracked marble pillars. Bedrolls lay on the floor — six of them — suggesting this had been serving as a command billet. A wooden table on the west wall was stacked with pouches and materials. At the far end of the room stood a nine-foot statue of a dwarf seated on a throne, a mighty stone warhammer across his lap, large emeralds gleaming in the eye sockets.

And between them and the statue: Nezznar the Black Spider.

Drow. Black leather armor and robes. A black staff topped with a carved spider. Two bugbears flanking him. He did not turn when the party entered.

"So it seems I must deal with you myself. Pity it must end this way."

Then he turned, and looked directly at the paladin:

"Roland Riel, I presume."

The floor had been webbed. Kelvin spotted it. Nezznar saw him see it:

"Such a shame. You've seen past my little trap. I suppose we will have to do things a different way."

He cracked his staff on the ground and said: "Arachnus Maximus." A giant spider — quickly dubbed Greg by the table — materialised behind the party. Initiative began.

"Lucian Malfoy is what you should picture when you're talking to Neznar."

Combat — The Black Spider

Opening exchange: Kavu opened with Burning Hands on the spider (it saved for half). Nezznar cast Mirror Image. Haldak attempted Darkness — Nezznar counterspelled it. Roland killed Greg with two attacks, his Strength-19 strikes (fresh from the Gauntlets) landing clean.

Nezznar's Mirror Image still active: one duplicate destroyed by Dispel Magic (Haldak rolled 11, hitting a mirror image instead of the man). Nezznar's response, once the duplicates started falling:

"...you red little shit."

Fireball: With Mirror Image stripped, Nezznar threw a Fireball into the middle of the party. Pass Without Trace ended. Kavu took 7 damage — fire resistance halved it. Others took significantly more. Roland used a healing potion as a bonus action. Nezznar retreated behind a pillar for three-quarters cover.

Haldak, from the corridor: "You coward! Face me like a mage!"

Temporal Haste: Haldak cast Temporal Haste on Othorion — 60-foot movement, extra action per turn, elevated AC. Othorion's speed was now effectively 240 feet per round at full dash. Nezznar did not know this.

Arachnus Maximus (again): Nezznar summoned a second spider, named Gregory. Gregory attempted to bite Kelvin's Ember wildfire spirit — the spirit was immune to fire — and paid for it immediately when the bite triggered fire damage back.

"It accidentally bites the ember wildfire spirit."
"That's a spicy meatball!"

Kelvin commanded Ember to use Fiery Teleportation — the spirit blazed through the room, carrying Othorion and Roland forward through a tunnel of flame. The bugbears caught in the spirit's path screamed as singed fur filled the air.

Kavu moved up, assessed the remaining bugbear with Scorching Ray, and the result was absolute:

"Max damage and a crit... That bugbear just ceases to exist. It's like that bugbear just got snapped."

He had looked at the two surviving bugbears before firing and said:

"I'm not mad at you two. I'm mad at him. But you're in my way."

Invisibility: Kavu held Scorching Ray as a readied action, trigger: Nezznar casts a spell. Nezznar began casting — Kavu fired — Nezznar counterspelled it — and immediately cast Invisibility on himself.

Most of the party could hear him moving. Roland cast See Invisibility — his eyes glowed white — and stared directly at the invisible drow. He walked toward the exact spot:

"Hey, motherfucker. I can see you."

Nezznar, realising Roland was genuinely looking at him, weighed his options and offered:

"I have another proposal. How about you let bygones be bygones — I stop threatening you, you stop threatening me — and we help each other deal with the things in this terrible dungeon and find the forge of spells together."

The party's immediate, excited debate was cut short by Kavu:

"Ain't happening, bud!"

Nezznar cast Ray of Frost at Haldak (blocked by Shield reaction), then Misty Stepped away down the corridor and ran.

The chase: Haldak fired five charges from the Wand of Magic Missiles into Nezznar's retreating back. Othorion (Temporal Haste active) charged at near-impossible speed, closed the gap, and tackled Nezznar to the ground — a straight Athletics check: his roll versus Nezznar's 8. Grappled. Othorion shoved the bugbear's leather pouch into Nezznar's mouth as an improvised gag. The verbal components of every spell in his repertoire were gone.

"Somebody tie the fucker, please."
"I've got the rope!" — Kavu, arriving at a full sprint, billow-caping, holding rope out.

The break: Nezznar critted Othorion in the head with his staff for 17 damage, broke the grapple, and staggered upright. He ran. Multiple opportunity attacks followed — Roland's and the bear's missed; Kavu landed; Haldak's dagger connected for five. As Nezznar rounded the corner, he used a free hand to pull the pouch from his mouth.

Othorion was on the ground. Down.

The session ended there — Nezznar just around the corner, gag removed, staff in hand, bleeding from multiple wounds but moving. The party one member down with the Black Spider still loose in the cave.

NPCs Encountered

Loot / Discoveries

Threads Opened / Advanced

• Nezznar the Black Spider: At large in Wave Echo Cave, wounded, gag removed, Othorion downed. Combat resumes in A23.
• "The Forge of Spells": Nezznar named it during his surrender attempt — Wave Echo Cave's forge is the objective, and he knows where it is.
• Vajra Safahr — Blackstaff Involvement: Waterdeep's most powerful arcane official is monitoring events in Wave Echo Cave directly. The party is now operating with explicit Blackstaff directives.
• Gertie Orelsdottir — The Opening: Her Sending reply was not a yes, but it was not a no. "I shall consider." The frost giant matter may not require force.
• Doppelganger in the rift: Bound, gagged, dangling on a rope 10 feet down. Still there. Has read Othorion's surface thoughts.
• Jarlaxle Baenre — What the Doppelganger Heard: The name was shouted into open air. Any remaining enemies in the cave may now know that Othorion's mind carries that name.
• Othorion — Downed: He is bleeding on the floor of the corridor with Nezznar around the corner.