Episode Glossary
Characters
Dyrnick Vosh: Aging Nornian barbarian who invents a prophecy to recruit help finding a cure for his daughter. He ultimately uses his Revivify scroll to restore Olive instead of saving it for himself.
Dahlia: Dyrnick's daughter, afflicted with the walking rot. Her condition is the true reason for his journey to the Ebon Keep.
Giren Malonan: Ranger sent by New Norn to retrieve Dyrnick. He relents after the party intervenes and leaves Dyrnick his magical handaxe.
Turpentine: Dwarf artificer whose infusions and alchemical support strengthen the expedition.
Mystique: Human College of Lore bard whose songs, spells, and inspiration help the party resist the keep's horrors.
Olive Prescott: Spell-drinker paladin of Alondra. The Depthcrawler kills her, Dyrnick revives her, and she returns to deliver the creature's final wound.
Hale "Frail": Young Gloom Stalker ranger whose rapid crossbow attacks inflict decisive damage throughout the keep.
Keybor: Human Arcane Trickster rogue who carries the lantern across the Black Channel and helps expose the keep's hidden mechanisms.
Budvar Javi: Circle of Spores druid who combines restorative magic with the destructive power of his fungal symbiote.
Kilcary Zorn Kragthos: Duke of the Third Line of Gavra, husband of Isha, and father of Entos. His shadowless remnant wanders the keep in a fractured loop of riddles and memories.
Isha Kragthos: Daughter of Vindelgar and Tasha, wife of Kilcary, and mother of Entos. She awakens when the ritual beneath the keep is broken.
Entos Kragthos: Child of Isha and Kilcary, held in a deathlike state until the Depthcrawler falls.
Lord Vindelgar Delgar: Restorer of the Ebon Keep whose obsession with the Tangled One's song leads him to steal mortal shadows and murder Tasha.
Lady Tasha Delgar: Vindelgar's wife. She attempts to sabotage the ritual by emptying its pale chalice and is killed by her husband.
Annalise Thorlbrin: Scholar who documents the keep's coral infestation, develops poison and antidotes, and recognizes the danger of Vindelgar's experiments.
Gods and Religion
Alondra: Dragon god of rainbows whose spell-drinker paladin Olive opposes curses and predatory magic.
The Tangled One: Ancient oceanic power whose song manipulates Vindelgar and the adventurers. She uses extracted shadows to summon or recover her lost child from the depths.
Eth: Divine figure represented with the sun and moon on the Ebon Keep's doors, reflecting the fortress's preoccupation with light and darkness.
The Ithelion: Tangible divine light whose properties are echoed by the lantern and by Vindelgar's doomed effort to manufacture greater light from stolen darkness.
Organizations and Societies
The Dreg'Damor: Ancient sorcerous clan that occupied the Ebon Keep and left behind the lantern, chalices, crypts, and knowledge of life and death.
House Delgar: Gavran family that restores the keep and is destroyed when Vindelgar accepts the Tangled One's promises.
New Norn: Dyrnick and Dahlia's community, whose council seeks to bring Dyrnick back after learning of his deception.
House Gavra: Maritime government that commissions the restoration and later sends orders to arrest Vindelgar.
The Shadowless: Victims who surrender or lose their darkness through the prism ritual, leaving manic spiritual remnants trapped within the keep.
The Keep's Prisoners: Travelers, adventurers, scouts, and residents of New Norn confined as unwilling subjects for Vindelgar's occult experiments.
Creatures and Nature
Varian Serpent: Colossal sea serpent inhabiting the Black Channel. It attacks the crossing but can be calmed by music rather than killed.
Coral Wolds: Regenerating reef creatures cultivated within the greenhouse and spread through the keep.
Depthcrawler: Enormous creature drawn from the sea by the Tangled One's lighthouse of stolen shadows. It attacks with claws, supernatural cold, and a parasitic brood.
Walking Rot: Wasting disease afflicting Dahlia and driving Dyrnick's search for forgotten resurrection magic.
Tangled Brood: Parasitic eggs and larval growth associated with the creatures beneath the Ebon Keep.
Bleakmire Storms: Relentless cold and violent weather surrounding the Ebon Keep until the chalice ritual is broken.
Items and Technology
The White-Crystal Lantern: Dreg'Damor key that reveals hidden architecture, creates a safe path across the Black Channel, shatters the lesser chalices, and seals the Tangled One's cracks.
The Pale Chalice: Covered vessel in the prism chamber that gathers extracted shadows and uses their darkness to restore Vindelgar's body.
Lesser Chalices: Five vessels beneath the keep that store additional darkness until the lantern destroys them.
Prism Chamber: Occult mechanism that channels white light through a great crystal and pulls shadows into the pale chalice.
Greenhouse Poison: Compound developed by Annalise that removes the Depthcrawler's resistance, weakens it, and deprives it of supernatural attacks.
Purple Antidotes: Remedies kept with the greenhouse research to counter its toxins and related afflictions.
Giren's Handaxe: Magical weapon given to Dyrnick when Giren allows the expedition to continue.
Scroll of Revivify: Single-use spell Dyrnick carries for his own protection but sacrifices to return Olive from death.
Gavran Arrest Orders: Instructions delivered by ship from Selendra Cassiandros directing that Vindelgar be taken into custody.
Magic and Cosmology
Shadow Drain: Ebon Keep's active curse, which slowly removes the visitors' shadows and threatens to transform them into trapped remnants.
Shadow Lighthouse: Tangled One's ritual use of accumulated mortal darkness as a signal powerful enough to draw a creature from the ocean depths.
Lantern Bridge: Ethereal crossing generated when the lantern is placed in Gelfar's pedestal. Once removed, the bridge exists only within the lantern's limited radius.
Revivification: Restoration of very recent life performed when Dyrnick reads his scroll over Olive's body.
The Nightmare Song: Compulsion that guides chosen travelers toward the keep, manipulates Vindelgar's ambitions, and ends when the Depthcrawler is defeated.
The Tangled Depths Portal: Archway beneath the keep that provides a route toward Tyve's mainland after the Tangled One is driven away.
Prismatic Soul Extraction: Combination of crystal optics, occult machinery, and chalice magic used to remove and store a person's darkness.
Locations and Realms
Gelfar: Flooded port where the expedition confronts Giren and activates the lantern bridge.
Black Channel: Sea passage between Gelfar and the Bleakmire, inhabited by Varian serpents.
Bleakmire: Storm-bound northern land surrounding the Ebon Keep.
Ebon Keep: Black Dreg'Damor fortress rebuilt by House Delgar and transformed into the center of the Tangled One's ritual.
The Greenhouse: Frosted glass structure containing coral wolds, Annalise's research, poison, and antidotes.
The Grand Ballroom: Banquet hall where shadowless Gavran soldiers continue an endless dance beneath a trapped chandelier.
The Nursery and Bedchambers: Family rooms preserving evidence of Isha, Entos, Tasha's death, and the Delgars' collapse.
The Docks: Harbor beneath the keep where a Gavran ship, its shadowless captain, and the truth of the ritual's lighthouse are found.
The Laboratory and Prison: Hidden complex where captured travelers were used in experiments involving prisms, light, and removed shadows.
The Prism Chamber: Central hall containing Vindelgar, the pale chalice, the crystal array, and the hidden route below.
The Tangled Depths: Subterranean ritual chamber holding the sarcophagus, lesser chalices, Depthcrawler, and portal toward the mainland.
History and Lore
Dyrnick's False Prophecy: Fabricated warning that the Dreg'Damor would rise and create an eternal winter. Dyrnick invents it because he fears no one will risk the keep for Dahlia.
Vindelgar's Restoration: Gavran project that rebuilds the Ebon Keep but exposes its workers to the Tangled One's song and ancient Dreg'Damor machinery.
Tasha's Sabotage: Attempt to stop the prism ritual by emptying the pale chalice, followed by her murder at Vindelgar's hands.
The Festival of Drowning: Phrase repeated by the keep's shadowless inhabitants, reflecting the Tangled One's promise and the victims' suspension between life, death, and the sea.
Fall of House Delgar: Vindelgar sacrifices family, soldiers, sailors, prisoners, and settlers to his belief that extracted darkness will create conquering light.
Purging of the Chalices: The lantern destroys the stored darkness, ends the nightmare song, releases the shadowless dead, and awakens Isha and Entos.
Dyrnick's Redemption: Although he fails to find Dahlia's cure, Dyrnick admits his lie, helps save the keep's victims, and gives up his only revival magic for Olive.
Restoration of the North: Isha can reclaim the Ebon Keep, rebuild Gelfar and the Black Channel passage, and offer aid to New Norn and Dahlia.
