Candlekeep Mysteries

M1. Foyer and Hallway

The characters emerge from the portal in the grand foyer of the mansion. On this side, the portal looks like a double door.

Matreous, a neutral human sage (see the x), is startled when the characters appear. After his initial surprise, he introduces himself to the characters and expresses his delight that they have opened the portal to the mansion. He has been trying different command words for the last half hour to get the portal to reopen.

Matreous takes on a thoughtful expression and pauses for an instant, tapping his chin in thought. The mansion must be a treasure trove of information, and there's no telling what wonders it holds! As an example, he shows the characters an intricately carved figurine of an imp that he has found and is taking back to Candlekeep for study.

Matreous explains that he would dearly like to continue to explore the mansion's mysteries himself, but he could be much more useful back in Candlekeep. Thanks to the research he conducted to find the mansion, he has the skills to keep the portal open from the other side. If the characters take this chance to explain their errand to him, he is willing to accompany them back to their village in exchange for their time and efforts exploring the mansion.

If the characters agree to explore the mansion, Matreous steps through the double door leading back to the study room. When he does, the characters hear Matreous shriek as the doors slam shut, locking them inside the mansion. (Matreous lets out the shriek as the imp figurine in his possession reveals its true nature. The characters can't help Matreous until they find a way to reopen the portal.)

M2. Patio

A semicircular patio paved with gray flagstones is nestled against the building, lit by the swirling indigo miasma that surrounds the mansion.

M3. Library

The shelves contain books on Fistandia's favorite subjects: arcana, natural science, religion, astrology, and planar travel, as well as volumes of poetry, mythology, and folk tales.

M4. Exercise Room

This room was where Fistandia practiced her martial and magical skills (at the expense of the fine floors). The mannequin has numerous cuts and chips. The weapons in the rack are mundane but finely made. There are four daggers, four quarterstaffs, and twenty darts in a bandolier hanging from one of the pegs. One wall holds diagrams of attack and parry positions for wielders of staffs and daggers.

The broom is an animated broom. If left alone, it goes about its duties cleaning the floors and ignores the characters. If a creature attempts to grab it or menace it in any way, it attacks.

M5. Study

The door to this room is left ajar so the cats can come and go as they please.

If the characters enter the room, the cat sits up, meows plaintively, and approaches. If they feed it or pet it and make a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Animal Handling) check, it follows them until they leave the study or venture up the stairs, at which time it heads to the kitchen (area M6). If the characters don't pay attention to it, the cat waits for a short time, but then loses interest and leaves for the kitchen.

If the characters spend 30 minutes investigating the books in this room, they discover the following facts:

• Almost all the books in this study were written by someone named Fistandia. Most are her memoirs.
• Fistandia was a powerful mage as well as a priest of Mystra. She frequented Candlekeep to further her studies.
• In exchange for Fistandia's pious service and achievements in expanding the arts of magic, Mystra granted Fistandia a permanent extradimensional mansion for her to reside in when studying in Candlekeep.
• Fearful that a guest might become trapped in the mansion, Fistandia hid the command word to open the portal to Candlekeep on the spines of seven books in her mansion.

M6. Kitchen

The door to this room is left slightly open so the cats can enter and exit.

The kitchen is run by two homunculi named Cumin and Coriander. Most homunculi can't speak, but these ones have the ability to speak Common. When the characters enter the room, the homunculi greet the new arrivals in squeaky voices:

The homunculi have had only the cats and the faerie dragons in area M9 to cook for or clean up after for ages, so they practically trip over themselves in their eagerness to provide any service to the characters. They pester the characters for tasks to do and insist on serving them fresh bread and soup.

The duties of the homunculi are confined mostly to the kitchen and the adjoining dining room (x). They don't know much about what happens in the rest of the mansion, but they can answer direct questions with the following information:

• Cumin was created by Fistandia, while Coriander says that a mage named Freyot created it.
• Their masters went away a long time ago.
• They have been warned by their masters not to touch any books that have single letters on their spines. (The homunculi don't know the significance of these lettered books.)
• Fistandia used to go into the planetarium (x) and disappear for a long time afterward.
• Something keeps building piles of books in the library. (The homunculi are unaware of the swarm of animated books in x.)
• The imp that Fistandia summoned hasn't been seen in some time.
• The faerie dragons in the arboretum (x) are mischievous but harmless. Try to stay out of their way.

M7. Pantry

The shelves in this pantry are stocked with sacks of flour, vegetables, preserved meats, and other staples—all the dry goods needed to sustain a household.

M8. Dining Room

In addition to the furnishings described above, this room is adorned with unremarkable tapestries that depict grapevines and the process of making wine.

M9. Arboretum

The door leading from x is partially open.

Two invisible orange faerie dragons are perched in the trees. They are mischievous creatures, always looking for fun, but the homunculi and the cats provide little entertainment, so they hope to keep the characters in the arboretum for as long as possible so they can play with them. Giggling incessantly, they fly toward the characters, use their Euphoria Breath, and flit out of danger, still invisible. If they are attacked, they disengage and retreat to a safe place, becoming invisible again if their concentration is broken.

M10. Stairs

The landing at the top of the stairs is occupied by a suit of armor holding a longsword, point down. It sits upon a wooden stand in front of a large window. The armor is clearly decorative, though the helmet and the sword are genuine items of good quality.

Above the armor is a trapdoor that opens upward into an attic that runs the length of the building. The attic is stuffy, dimly lit, and covered in a fine layer of dust. A character who has a passive Wisdom (Perception) score of 13 or higher notices light coming through the floorboards above x. The floorboards can be broken through with a successful DC 15 Strength (Athletics) check to allow access to the room below.

M11. Laboratory

The cabinets are crowded with skulls, bones, mounted animals, rocks and minerals, dried plants, and jars with creatures floating in liquid. Measuring devices, glassware, and other scientific apparatus sit on the tables between books on the natural sciences, astronomy, astrology, physiology, and natural philosophy. Complex charts and mathematical formulas are drawn on a mobile blackboard.

M12. Planetarium

The room is a detailed and convincing illusion of a grassy knoll on a moonless night. Springy turf compresses underfoot, and when the doors to the room are closed, the starry night sky is visible in all directions. Terrain more than 20 feet away at ground level, however, is shadowy and indistinct; only the sky above seems sharp and clear. In fact, the stars shine down with an almost fierce light. Anyone who explores the room discovers that this effect is an illusion and can determine the size and shape of the actual space.

If the characters try to manipulate the telescopes, they find that it's easy to change the orientation of these well-balanced instruments. The telescopes cannot be moved in any other way, however, and are sturdily mounted to their pedestals. The crystal ball is also firmly fixed and cannot be moved.

M13. The Chained Library

To reach this room, the characters must solve the telescope puzzle in area M12 or break through the ceiling from the attic above x.

The three shelves are filled with books bound in iron covers, which are attached to chains that secure them to the shelves—a chained library. The reading desk is used to support the chained books while they are being read. This chained library has been enchanted to be jealously possessive of its contents. It attacks any creature that comes within its reach (use the accompanying animated chained library stat block).

Fistandia's most treasured knowledge is kept here. There are rare tomes on the sciences, arcana, and alchemy, as well as books about planar lore and the summoning of fantastic creatures. All the books are firmly affixed to the shelves by enchanted chains and can't be freed without being destroyed.

M14. Trophy Room

The books are all poetry or heroic fiction meant for entertainment. The trophy heads—a stag, a wolf, a peryton, a hell hound, and a black dragon wyrmling—are purely decorative. The fire is an illusion that looks pleasant but provides no heat. The swords above the mantel are two flying swords that attack if anything in the room is touched.

M15. Bedroom

The door to this room is left ajar, as is the one at the end of the hall to x, to let the cats roam as they please.

When the characters enter the room, the cat jumps down from the chair and stretches. It then follows the characters around the room, mewing at them. If they feed it or pet it and make a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Animal Handling) check, it follows them until combat or some other frightening occurrence scares it off. If the characters don't interact with it, the cat gives up and leaves for the kitchen.

The top drawers of the dresser contain elegant, well-made robes. The lower drawers hold more utilitarian tunics and dresses.

M16. Balcony

The oppressive miasma seems to press in even closer above the mansion here than at ground level.

M17. Alchemical Laboratory

The books here cover chemical science and alchemy. A character who examines the charts and formulas and makes a successful DC 13 Intelligence check determines that the main goal of the research here was to transmute various materials into gold. Judging by the numerous scorch marks and acid burns on the furniture, the laboratory was the scene of several spectacular failures.

Four clay figures rest on a table in the middle of the room. They range from a rudimentary, barely humanoid shape to a small, winged body so lifelike that it almost appears to be a real creature that is merely asleep. A character who makes a successful DC 13 Intelligence (Arcana) check can tell that these are figures used for creating homunculi.

M18. Summoning Room

This is the room where Fistandia summoned the imp that would become the figurine found by Matreous. The current resident of the room is a quasit in toad form. It waits for a creature to approach and then attacks.

M19. Preserved Menagerie

Fistandia considered herself to be a knowledgeable natural philosopher, and she collected many rare specimens to study. She kept examples of common and natural creatures in x, and rare or aberrant creatures in this room. The collection includes a cockatrice, a flumph, a giant fire beetle, a small grell, a myconid sprout, a pseudodragon, four severed hands in the same jar, and a slaad tadpole that's still alive and attacks if its jar is opened.

The empty container once held the mimic found in x. Gravely injured when it was captured, it feigned death until it could recover and escape into the upper levels of the mansion.

The four severed hands have absorbed enough magical energy to become crawling claws. They push the lid off their jar and attack when any creature comes within 5 feet of them.