"Dunno," says Lalie. "Can't be past ten. We asked the landlady to wake us."
"I think she forgot. The sun's way too high for it to still be morning."
"After what we've been through, I wouldn't be surprised if she did try to wake us and we just slept through it."
Éliane just yawns again in reply, and rubs the sleep from her eyes. After a few moments she throws on a cloak over her shift. "Well I'm going to make her bring us breakfast anyways," she says.
She unbolts the door and pushes it ajar then recoils, wrinkling her nose. "Ugh! it smells like someone's been picking wildflowers..."
[You know that part of the horror movie where it looks like everything is over, but the monster shows up that one more time...? It's harder to do in a blog, but I like to play with formats--
surprise rolls: PCs 5, it 1]
Suddenly, Éliane slams the door and throws the bolt.
"What? What's wrong?" asks Lalie, sitting bolt upright.
Éliane snatches the pistols from the night table. "It's followed us here. That... that thing!"
Lalie grabs a pistol and her sword belt, strapping it haphazardly over her night shift. "Do you think it saw you?"
The door rattles as a heavy form smashes against it.
"I'd say it did."
Lalie and Éliane back onto their beds away from the door. Lalie puts her pistols down in easy reach, and prepares to use her magic.
The thing smashes against the door once, twice, and on the third go the door bursts open as the bolt is ripped free from the frame.
[Round 1 - initiative: PCs 6, it 3]
Lalie speaks a quick incantation as the thing bursts into the room. Greenish flames leap from her fingertips and play over the beast, eating away at its gruesome hide [casts magic missile for 2d4=7 damage; it's down to 11hp]. Éliane discharges a pistol even as it leaps at her. The ball rips into its shoulder, and putrid brown ooze sprays from the wound [3 damage puts it at 8hp]. It contorts in pain and its jaws snap shut well short of Éliane [rolled a 5, missed].
[Round 2]
Éliane fires her second pistol right between its shoulders. It whimpers once and loses all the strength in its limbs, flopping down senseless on the floor [8 damage puts it a 0hp]. Lalie draws her rapier and leaps down atop it, piercing its torso and ramming the point of her blade into the floorboards beneath it [4 damage kills it].
She wipes the steaming gore from her sword on the blankets. Éliane is already reloading her pistols. Both dress in haste and run out of the room, gagging from the overpowering smell of honeysuckle radiating from the slain abomination.
All the other inhabitants of the inn have either been slaughtered or fled, but there are still horses in the stable. Our heroines help themselves to a fine pair, and ride hard for Amiens.
(their next adventure begins here)
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