Follow the Theft — The Poisoner’s Trail
Adventure placement: After investigating the suspected necromancer or obtaining an equivalent lead to the missing research; the optional dungeon is not required. Purpose: Follow missing research and purchased ingredients into the supply chain, then compare the evidence with the attacks on the Order of the Sacred Vigil. Play style: Investigation, interviews, records, and one optional confrontation. No required combat.
1. The Evidence They Already Have
The characters may have returned from Magister Oren Vahl’s laboratory with a ledger, testimony from his acolyte Lenna Drost, or evidence of missing research. They also know that the outbreaks in Vauclerc and Stahlburg followed contaminated wells, and they may have traced Matthias Veyr and Brother Aldren to the secret Order. They may or may not possess the Black Briars’ signet ring. None of these discoveries, alone, names the poisoner.
Read or paraphrase: The pages from the laboratory smell faintly of vinegar and dried herbs. A line of purchases has been carefully entered in the margin. Several sheets have been cut out cleanly, leaving their thread binding intact. Whoever took them wanted the knowledge, not the book.
2. GM Truth — Keep Separate from Player Knowledge
Elias was a scholar who discovered a document contradicting an important religious doctrine. The Order of the Sacred Vigil suppressed the document, and Canon Severin Kessler was chiefly responsible for Elias’s capture, torture, and execution. Elias’s surviving brother learned enough to seek revenge. He later tortured and killed Kessler, took his signet ring, and used it to pay the Black Briars. He obtained or copied Vahl’s research and used poison in the public wells to create outbreaks, spread chaos, conceal targeted killings, and provoke the Order into reacting.
Konrad deliberately killed Matthias Veyr through the contaminated water in Vauclerc; the poisoning also harmed innocent residents. He personally poisoned Brother Aldren in Stahlburg using a targeted dose, potentially a different preparation. Both were murders by poison, but the deaths need not have identical symptoms. The Ashen Rector and his animated dead are a separate adventure thread, not participants in this conspiracy.
Design rule: The clues below are proposed concrete details for this chapter. The players must earn conclusions by comparing testimony and records; no witness knows the complete history.
3. Four Trails to Investigate
| Trail | Where to investigate | What it can establish |
|---|---|---|
| Missing research | Vahl’s inventory, Lenna’s workroom, the laboratory’s back entrance | Someone removed pages on toxin preparation and water-soluble compounds. |
| Ingredient purchases | Apothecary records, herbal suppliers, carriers and warehouse receipts | A second buyer acquired materials overlapping with Lenna’s legitimate orders. |
| Travel and access | Gate registers, stable ledgers, road tolls and hired transport | An unidentified buyer or courier moved between Stahlburg and the Vauclerc road near the outbreaks. |
| Targeted officials | Aldren’s correspondence, Veyr’s letters, restricted Order records | The person spreading the poison may also have been tracing the Order’s members. |
4. Scene: The Apothecary’s Counter
A supplier named Greta Heller sells herbs, salts, and alchemical reagents to physicians, dyers, and independent researchers. She remembers Lenna’s legitimate orders because they were regular and carefully documented. A separate customer made smaller purchases in cash and asked unusually specific questions about compounds that dissolve in water. Greta cannot identify this customer with certainty.
The characters can inspect duplicate receipts, compare handwriting, ask about packaging, or check which deliveries were collected in person. Greta’s records indicate that the second buyer used an assumed name, Martin Krell. This is an alias, not the confirmed identity of Elias’s brother.
What the scene does not prove: Buying reagents is not proof of poisoning. The important discovery is the overlap between missing research and an independent chain of purchases.
5. Scene: The Laboratory’s Missing Pages
Vahl’s original inventory contains page numbers and brief subject headings for a set of experimental notes. The removed pages concern extraction, stabilization, and dispersal of substances capable of causing involuntary muscular activity. Their absence can be confirmed without reconstructing a usable formula. Vahl admits that a visitor once asked about the practical application of his work and that he failed to record the person’s real name.
Lenna remembers finding the rear workroom disturbed after a day when several suppliers and messengers came and went. She cannot say whether the missing pages were stolen then or earlier. The characters may compare the laboratory’s visitors with Greta’s receipts and the dates of the outbreaks.
Optional complication: If Vahl fled in the preceding chapter, Lenna and the inventory still supply the essential evidence. If both are unavailable, an annotated duplicate kept by a supplier or a surviving inventory sheet preserves the lead.
6. Scene: The Carriers and the Road
A wagon office near Stahlburg’s market maintains a book of short-haul deliveries and hired carts. Its clerk, Emil Rausch, recalls a sealed crate booked under the name Martin Krell and collected near the Vauclerc road. The entry places the buyer in the region at a suspicious time, but it does not establish what the crate contained.
Players may follow the route through toll records, stable hands, a roadside lodging house, or the original driver. The useful result is a timeline showing that someone with access to relevant materials moved between the two affected settlements. An attentive player may also notice that some journeys coincide with movements of religious officials or the circulation of private letters.
| If the party checks… | They learn… |
|---|---|
| The wagon book | A cash-paid crate moved under the alias Martin Krell. |
| The driver | The hirer kept his face obscured and avoided ordinary trade questions; the description is inconclusive. |
| The toll register | The same cart took a road serving Vauclerc shortly before its outbreak. |
| A second witness | The hirer asked after official visitors or religious travelers, suggesting a second interest beyond supplies. |
7. Building the Timeline
| Event | Evidence to compare | Conclusion available to the players |
|---|---|---|
| Research disappears | Vahl’s inventory and Lenna’s recollection | The toxin knowledge may have been taken without consent. |
| Unusual reagents are purchased | Greta’s receipts | Another buyer sought related materials. |
| A hired crate travels toward Vauclerc | Emil’s transport register | The buyer’s movements are consistent with an opportunity to contaminate the well. |
| Vauclerc outbreak and Veyr’s death | Well-closure dates and funeral testimony | Veyr was among the genuine victims; his death does not prove a separate attack. |
| Stahlburg outbreak | Neighborhood illness maps and well residue | A similar method appears to have been used again. |
| Aldren dies; investigators are ambushed | Aldren’s last contacts, Black Briars testimony, optional signet | Someone may be suppressing investigation while targeting connected officials. |
The chronology should reveal a plausible pattern, not a mathematically certain identity. Allow the party to assemble it in any order. Reward a clear timeline with stronger support from Prelate Rott and permission to pursue the remaining leads.
8. The Connection to the Order
Letters connecting Veyr, Aldren, and Kessler become more important when placed alongside the outbreak dates. The characters may infer that someone is using the sickness to conceal or facilitate attacks against a restricted religious circle. They should not yet know why those men were targeted.
If the party has the signet ring, the archive identification of Kessler gives them a tangible connection to the mercenary payment. If they do not, a messenger ledger, Kessler’s disappearance, or a surviving letter can establish the same broader pattern. The ring is supporting evidence, never a mandatory key.
9. Optional Encounter: The Missing Courier
A hired runner who carried a message for Martin Krell realizes the investigators are asking questions. Niko Brandt, frightened of his employer, attempts to slip away through the market or back streets. Let the party spot him and choose pursuit, interception, negotiation, or discreet surveillance; use obstacles and bystanders to make this an active scene, not another interview at a desk. If caught or reassured, Niko can describe the buyer, confirm the Krell alias, recall a payment or meeting place, and connect the work to a route toward Vauclerc. He does not know the buyer’s real identity or motive. If he escapes, Greta’s receipts and Emil’s transport evidence still carry the investigation forward.
- Persuasion: Offer protection or a fair payment; Niko provides the location of a former rendezvous.
- Observation: Follow him to a lodging house where an abandoned note or receipt remains.
- Pursuit: Use streets, market stalls, and canal crossings as obstacles; failure costs time, not the entire investigation.
- Violence: Niko is not a hardened killer. His fear should complicate threats and encourage alternatives.
The rendezvous is already abandoned. Its useful clues are mundane: a rough travel itinerary, a receipt bearing the alias, and a torn reference to an older religious proceeding. Do not place a complete confession or the suppressed document here.
10. The First Glimpse of Elias
Among the fragments is a reference to an inquiry into a scholar called Elias, whose work was confiscated after a doctrinal dispute. The reference is incomplete: it gives no full account of the document, the Order’s conduct, or Elias’s fate. It is enough to justify seeking the older tribunal records.
The characters may now suspect that the poisoner is interested in both forbidden research and the Order’s past. They do not yet have grounds to conclude that Elias’s surviving brother is responsible. That relationship belongs to the next phase of the investigation.
11. Outcomes and Fail-Forward
| Party result | What changes |
|---|---|
| Complete timeline | They can demonstrate deliberate preparation and connect the outbreaks to a suspicious travel and purchasing pattern. |
| Only purchase records | The alias and supplier give a concrete lead toward carriers or witnesses. |
| Only travel evidence | The hired crate and route point back to suppliers and the laboratory. |
| No ring recovered | Order correspondence and the chronology still support the murder investigation. |
| Courier escapes | A payment receipt, ledger entry, or other witness keeps the alias in play. |
| Players pursue the Ashen Rector instead | That separate dungeon hook remains available; it does not supply the plague murderer’s identity. |
12. Where the Trail Leads
The party now has enough to seek records of Elias’s old inquiry, examine Kessler’s last known movements, and determine why someone is hunting the Order. The next chapter should focus on The Suppressed Inquiry — Elias and Canon Kessler: an investigation of the original injustice and the revenge it provoked, without resolving the final confrontation prematurely.