Intro
The party rolls into a small town to find the village green is abuzz with life. Wooden trusses support wreaths of ribbons, benches are laid out in rows, and at the head of it all is a wooden arch dressed in a tangle of fresh spring blooms. There’s a wedding on!
The mood is light and the townsfolk are chatty! Should the party engage with any of them they’ll obviously mention the wedding they’re setting up for tomorrow, and a passerby off-handedly remarks ‘Of course those two would end up together! Jus’ about the only lucky thing ‘ats happened to either of ‘em!’
This is the wedding of the Cursed Couple.
Daytime
The townsfolk are mostly busy with the set up but a few are willing to chat in passing, though they offer scarce little interesting information.
Bond Birtwhistle, the town’s innkeep, is busy in his storeroom taking inventory. He’s only willing to serve one of his ales and one of his wines. He’s not tapping anything new tonight, not even for the bachelor party. He will tell the party – if asked – that he’s worried about having enough for tomorrow. If a party member asks whether the couple have a big family Bond will laugh. “Quite the opposite,” he’ll say, “Neither of ‘em got any family left. That’s for why the whole village’s comin’ together to celebrate, else ‘eyd have no-one. Means they’ll well drink me dry ‘tween the lot of them.”
Bond’s wife Penny is similarly busy with prepping food, along with their three young children (who seem to be slowing her down more than helping things along…)
Kaspar Findlay, the mayor, will be the celebrant for the day. He’s stern and anti-social. If the party has a Cleric, Paladin, or otherwise religious member, he will be quick to hand off responsibility to officiate the wedding. In his own words “I’ve learned to keep well away from those two.” But is largely cagey about why. Anyone else in the who gossips about the mayor wwill be quick to remark that he’s a real curmudgeon but all it takes is a bit of brandy and he opens right up to be all friendly and chatty. Convincing Bond to sell them some brandy will be a little tricky (Persuasion check) if the party decides they want to butter Kaspar up to learn more.
If they do, Kaspar will gladly drink the afternoon away and talk about how he’s had to record all the deaths of the couple’s relatives and each has been more outlandish and tragic than the last. First was the groom’s mother, who was washing clothes in the river when a log drive came rushing on a wave of snow-melt. One dug into the riverbed, spun end-over-end and kicked up a second log which flew out sideways clocking her in the head. Then his father, just before the funeral, slipped while helping dig the grave, gashed his leg on his shovel blade, caught sepsis and died before the service could even take place. A few years later his older brother was accosted on the road by highwaymen, went to hand them his purse, but tripped in the process and fell on the bandit’s outheld knife. It went straight into his neck. His younger sister died in childbirth, which wouldn’t be the strangest thing by itself, but the baby got tangled in the umbilical cord and suffocated before it could be delivered, and her husband died the very next day when he was kicked in the head by his horse.
The bride’s family experienced equally unlucky deaths, all across a series of years.
– One was struck by lightning
– One was next to a tree which was struck by lighting that fell and crushed them
– One fell off the back of a wagon, got knocked out, and landed face down in a mud puddle which drowned them. The wagondriver didn’t notice they’d even fallen until they arrived back home.
And so on…
The mayor doesn’t even charge them taxes these days since he figures one day he’ll go to collect and find himself trampled by a herd of cows or something outlandish.
The town’s haberdasher – Muriel ‘Moo’ Shuckwell – is a notorious gossip and is the only townsperson willing to neglect her setting-up duties to chat with the party for an extended time. She talks mostly about how it’s lovely the town’s coming together to celebrate since the couple have no family left, and that they deserve some happiness after such an unlucky run. She’ll readily let slip a few details that are meant to be secret. First is the bride is most likely with child. Moo saw her leaving the herbalist with red raspberry leaf and nettle just two days ago. Second, ‘Brownmouth’ (“Don’t ask how he got that name.” She says with a wink), has some rockets and flying candles to let off right at the ceremony’s completion. These fireworks are supposed to be a surprise to the couple and most of the townsfolk. Lastly, she’ll say the couple don’t pay any taxes these days, which is funny given how much both their fathers used to grumble over a wine about how the taxes they paid made it impossible to feed their families and get ahead in life. How ironic that the couple’s tax-free life meant they could afford this wedding that their fathers weren’t even around to enjoy.
If anyone in the party happens to be a woman over 40 (in human years) one of the children will stop and scream at them ‘It’s Granny Mud!’. One of the older kids will scold them saying ‘That’s not Granny Mud, it’s just some lady with wrinkles.’ before hustling them back into the game they’re playing.
Evening
If they’re staying at the inn, the party will inevitably encounter the groom’s bachelor party. It’s a fairly humble affair with a bit of drinking and dicing. Bond remains stingy but does eventually tap a fresh keg for the crowd – altogether 9 men strong – after their continued insistence. “If you run out of drink tomorrow remember it’s you that wanted it now!” Bond warns.
With a bit of drink in them, at one point the men start sharing humorous anecdotes at the groom’s expense.
“Remember when he was dancing with Florrie at Old Gus’ 80th? She was all batted eyelashes lookin’ ready to tangle him up, then he threw up all down her dress?”
“He’s always been rotten with women! He ought to’ve married Ginny but she got swept away by that singing greenskin from that troupe! Shouldn’t have let her go to that show aye boy?”
The groom takes these all in stride.
“It’s not just women the troupers knicked from him, you know he lost his ma’s jewellery box that night because he bought the whole thing with him instead of just the ring? Had anyone else picked it up from the green it woulda been returned, it were definitely nabbed by one of the mummers.”
This one gets a stilted, more awkward laugh.
“Ahh it’s not his fault troupers are all thieving bastards. It is his fault we all saw Old Gus’ pecker that one night!”
This gets a much bigger laugh. The storyteller continues, through tears, “Remember ‘is face?” He does an impression of the groom clearly tripping and falling, “And Gus didn’t even notice until he tried to walk away!” Another impression, this time the storyteller stands up and does a stumbling shuffle as though his pants are around his ankles.
“It was only because Tremmy’s dumb dog bolted in front of me!” the groom protests, “And for no reason!”
The banter moves on to another topic…
The bachelorette’s gathering is more subdued by comparison, should any women in the party seek it out. It’s mostly the married women of the village gossiping and sharing tips for a happy marriage. Some are a little lurid, “If he’s really got one up on ya in an argument just pull your blouse open!”, others are more practical, “Nothing’ll soothe a truly colic baby, if you really need the sleep it won’t hurt it to let it cry out the night in a barn loft.”, some border on old wives tales, “If it’s born on a cold day in summer it’ll be clever, if it’s born on a hot day it’ll be strong.”
None of them are drinking so the conversation never gets too out-of-pocket and unlike the boys they’re better at saying lots while saying nothing. “Just as long as you don’t lose too many and they come out healthy…” one says with a sweet smile. “When it’s your family it’s you what keeps ‘em safe…” another mentions off-handedly.
Out on the village green everything seems normal. If the party decide on a whim to check things in more detail they’ll spot two curious things. The first is that the flowers on the arch seem damp. It could be easily mistaken for night-dew but a Nature check reveals it’s an alcohol-based solution. It was applied recently. The second is the wooden brackets for the kegs and barrels look unusually aged. Witha relevant check it can be discovered that they are starting to rot.
Investigating Further
At this point your players will likely suspect there is something greater afoot here. This couple isn’t simply unlucky, they are in some way cursed or even having their lives actively meddled in.
With it getting late into the night the town will be a poor source of further rumours or information, except for perhaps Bond. If the party inform him of the damaged barrel brackets he’ll remark at the strangeness as they were fine and solid when he set them up earlier that day. Depending on what the players ask he can divulge the following:
– Granny Mud is a character in one of the children’s games. It’s something new they’ve invented since he was a boy. One of the children will play ‘Granny Mud’ and if they manage to get dirt on another child they’ll be ‘turned ugly’ and are eliminated. The last one left ‘pretty’ is the winner. He has no idea where they got this game from, nor do any of the other parents. They all chalk it up to children’s imagination.
– The mayor is notoriously lazy. He finds it no surprise that Kaspar passed officiant duties to the party (if this took place). His hunch is he stopped collecting the to-be-wed’s taxes out of laziness, not caution. He apparently hasn’t even tried to attract Logging Gangs to the town since the last ones stopped showing up a few years back, and the whole town has got poorer as a result while the woods have started to get overgrown.
– He doesn’t consider the groom to be unlucky, just a bit clumsy and slow-witted. The bride isn’t much better. As for the bizarre deaths across both their families, he concedes that in that department the couple have suffured their fair share of misfortune. He does, however, note that those who perished suffered the real misfortune, not the surviving couple. By his measure they’re lucky, not the other way around.
If the party ventures into the woods during the night they’ll have a hard time finding tracks (high check), but once finding them will easily be able to discover a hovel of twisted tree trunks with stacked stones bewtween them. They’ll also be able to easily sneak up on it if desired and ambush the occupant.
Said occupant is a hag. Upon defeating her the party can investigate the hovel and find signs implying she belongs to a coven. The remaining to hags of the coven will set upon the hovel, arriving there about an hour after their sister is slain, and can in turn be dispatched.
If they venture during the day it will be easier to find tracks but they will be detected in their approach and the hag will be prepared for their arrival, making for a much more challenging fight. If they take too long to arrive after being detected (for example, by stopping to rest on the way) the entire coven will have convened at the hovel and prepared for the encounter. This will be an especially deadly fight, possibly one beyond the party’s capabilities.
Outcomes
There are a few possible outcomes to this whole scenario, depending on the party’s actions.
Firstly, they may not get swept up in the affairs of the town at all. If they leave in the morning before the wedding they will not bear witness to the events of that afternoon, perhaps only hearing about them by way of rumour in a nearby town some days later.
If they do nothing but stay for the wedding they will watch as the post-ceremony fireworks graze the wedding arch, setting it ablaze. This causes the bride’s veil and dress to catch light setting the couple into a panic as they try to extinguish her. Before anyone can react, the two stands supporting the largest kegs of spirits will give out causing them to come free and roll down the hill toward the congregation. The alcohol vapours wafting from them will also catch alight, setting the whole green on fire. Townsfolk will attempt to flee, with a number of them being crushed or burnt. Those who do get away will haphazardly band together to prevent the fire from spreading to the other buildings. In a cruel twist, the newlyweds both survive with the bride being horribly disfigured by her burning clothes.
Should the party notice the oddities with the set-up for the wedding and address them (wash the flowers clean and replace the barrel stands), these events will not take place. Instead, the wedding will be set upon by the coven of hags who had sabotaged the whole affair, furious that their plans were thwarted. The party can attempt to stop them, though they will likely claim the lives of many villagers before the party can slay them or force them to flee.
Should the party discover the hag’s hovel and slay her but fail to learn she is part of a coven or otherwise leave the hovel before the coven arrives then the remaining two hags in the coven will descend upon the wedding, this time focusing on the party rather than the villagers. This will happen regardless of whether the party rectifies the issues with the barrel stands and the wedding arch.
Lastly, should the party discover the hag’s hovel and despatch of both her and the rest of her coven, one of two things will happen. If they do not rectify the issues with the barrel stands and the wedding arch the same unfortunate series of events will take place setting the village green ablaze. If these issues are fixed, the wedding will conclude without incident and the couple will live out the rest of their lives free of misfortune.
In all of these situations the party will be able to mitigate the damage done depending on their actions, such as stopping the barrels before they reach where the villagers are seated, or helping to extinguish the conflagration before too many buildings are affected, or possibly even extinguishing the initial fire before the bride becomes too disfigured (though she will almost never go totally unscathed).
The Ignoble Path
Some parties may be less scrupulous and be willing to approach the hag’s hovel looking to negotiate rather than fight. The hag will be open to this but will want things in return. Favours owed, exchanges of knowledge and rumours, and powerful trinkets are all things that will interest her. If the party truly has nothing of interest she will ask for a single favour, revealed after she answers all their questions.
Hags revel in suffering. Some years ago the fathers of both the bride and groom were scouting the forest to see about starting a logging business together since no working gangs had worked the territory for some years. In doing so they discovered the hag, who took the visage of a kindly old lady and read them a bogus fortune promising prosperity. If they told the fates they were willing, their families would be free of the crippling taxes they paid every year to the mayor.
The two men readily agreed, binding themselves to the hag’s foul influence. This is the source of the young couple’s misfortune – a hag’s bargain struck years prior by their fathers.
The hag will now call in her favour. She will ask for the party to abduct the bride and bring her to the hovel before the ceremony takes place. She promises the bride will come to no harm and will be back in town in time for her nuptials. If pressed, the hag will even insist this will see the end of the family’s misfortunes.
Should the party comply and deliver the bride to the hag the bargain will be upheld, the bride will indeed be returned to town in time for the wedding. The bizarre chain of events leading to the fire in the village green will not take place and the coven will not descend upon the wedding. All will seem well.
The bride’s recounting of events will be that the party told her of a long-lost aunt who wanted to see her on her wedding day. They sat in her hut in the woods, drank tea, and reminisced about all the family member’s they’d lost.
A few months later, the bride will give birth to a monstrous baby. This baby will likely be discarded and left for dead where the hag will abduct it to nurse it to adulthood where it too will grow into a monstrous hag…
Alternatives
Naturally it does not have to be hags behind this scheming. Any sufficiently malevolent creature that can be associated with bringing misfortune, disaster, or ruin can be the ‘monster of the week’ for this one.
Perhaps a foul spirit sensed a predisposition for misfortune about the two families and has latched itself to the couple, slowly stoking the coals of disaster drawing them together to create an ultimate catastrophe. In this instance, the wedding will involve an encounter with the spirit as it at last consumes enough suffering to physically manifest itself.
Perhaps the original bargain was struck with a Devil. While the two men knew they were signing their own souls away for the prosperity of their children, they failed to read the fineprint which also forfeited the souls of their relatives.
Other fae also make for a good source for this bargain given their trickerous propensities. In this instance killing them as a solution may be less desireable as an outcome. Indeed perhaps the fae only intended to inflict minor misfortunes but their befoulings kept resulting in horrible deaths. This creates a more morally ambiguous antagonist.
Outro
This set up should be highly adaptable and the limit is your imagination. It makes for a great premise for a one-shot, or a of a monster-of-the-week interlude while the party is on the road between quests.
If you enjoyed this or any of the rest of my work you may also enjoy ‘The One-Shot Show’, my short-form GM advice podcast. Episodes are only 15 minutes long so feel free to give it a quick listen!
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