Chaya's Journal #11

The Path to the Amber Temple

We returned Arabella to her father, Luvash, at the Vistani camp outside Vallaki. The way he held her… the way she clung to him, silent and shaken—it reminded me why we do what we do. Amid all this darkness, it felt like we had sparked a single flame of hope. For our efforts, Luvash offered us a treasure and, more valuably, a name: Kasimir. A dusk elf. A kind of elf I had only heard whispered about, and never outside of Barovia. First, we returned the bones to Father Lucian. The relief on his face when the sanctity of the church was restored—it was like watching the sun rise in a land that has forgotten light. Then we sought Kasimir. His story... it broke something in me. Strahd maimed them. All of them. Kasimir's ears had been cut. His eyes carried centuries of pain. He told us of his sister, Patrina, whose soul remains trapped—tormented—and of the Amber Temple, a place older than Strahd himself. A place of answers. Darkness, maybe, but answers all the same. Kasimir agreed to guide us, and we made ready to leave the next morning. But there was more than one thread calling us to Berez. One of Madame Eva’s readings pointed there, and the Martikovs believe the final seed needed to restore their vineyard may lie in those ruins. The village was deathly still. Abandoned. Overgrown. And yet… not empty. We met a woman living alone in one of the homes. There was something about her—an uncanny stillness, a slow smile that never touched her eyes. I whispered prayers beneath my breath as we entered, my senses prickling. I cast Detect Magic and nearly staggered—wards, illusions, something buried in the walls.

Rictavio was the one who said it aloud. Witch. And that’s when it all fell apart. Her disguise vanished. The home dissolved into a monstrous thing. My heart froze. I panicked. I cast Silence to try and stop whatever terrible spell she was conjuring… but she repelled it with a flick of her hand. Then she struck. A wave of force slammed me and Lucian to the ground, stealing the breath from our lungs. I could only lie there, the earth trembling beneath me as her house groaned and twisted, rising into the sky on gnarled roots and bark. She is no ordinary witch. She is something ancient. And I fear we’ve woken something that will not easily go back to sleep. We are far from the safety of stone walls and lantern light now.