The Unquiet Battlefield

Every night, the soldiers who died at the Glass Salt Flats fight their battle again, and this time they are winning.

Offered by. A temple of the dawn

• Sister Imre Calloway, dawn priestess with salt-burned handsThe cutters hear drums out on the flats after dark. Last week they found the old banner pole standing upright again. Someone dug it out of the salt and planted it facing Copperholm.
• Sister Imre Calloway, dawn priestess with salt-burned handsHalf the temple's purse now, half when the dead lie down. Go before sunset. The battle starts when the light goes, and I'd rather you saw the field while it's still just a field.
• Sister Imre Calloway, dawn priestess with salt-burned handsThe rains filled the old wash. You'll have to cross at Tann's bridge. Don't tell him you're for hire. Tell him you're pilgrims. He hates the one and only mildly dislikes the other.

What's really going on. A necromancer has learned that if the ghosts win, the outcome of the old war changes, and with it, who owns the land.

Complication. The route there is flooded, and the only bridge is controlled by a toll-keeper who hates adventurers.

Reward. 50 gp, paid half up front.

How it plays out

Drums over Copperholm

In the dawn temple, Sister Imre hands over half the purse and a cutter's map of the flats. A salt-cutter sits by the altar, refusing to sleep: he swears the dead marched farther last night than ever before, and that a living figure in a grey hood walked behind their lines, reading from a ledger. Let the party question him before they leave.

Tann's bridge

The dry wash is a brown torrent. Old Orvel Tann sits on a stool at the only bridge, a cudgel across his knees, and doubles his toll the moment he spots a sword. Adventurers trampled his late wife's garden years ago. Talking, lying, or doing him a kindness gets them across. Pushing past costs time, and the sun is already going down.

The battle refought

Dusk turns the salt to glass. Corpses in rusted mail crack up from the crust and shamble toward the planted banner, and a warhorse skeleton tears loose to charge. The zombies keep rising after hits unless dealt radiant damage, so the dawn temple's blessing matters here. Hold the ridge until first light, or topple the banner and the hooded figure's ledger blows away into the dark.

Afterward. If the party breaks the night's charge, the dead lie still, the old war stays won, and the temple pays the second half of its purse with quiet relief. If they fail, the dead carry the field before dawn. Within the week a stranger arrives in Copperholm with yellowed papers claiming the flats, and every salt-cutter's lease, belongs to them now.

Ready-to-run encounter: The Glass Salt Flats

• 3 × Zombie (CR 1/4, 50 XP each)
• 1 × Warhorse Skeleton (CR 1/2, 100 XP)

Difficulty

moderate for 4 level-1 characters (250 XP)

Where

Near Copperholm (desert)