The Night Market of Dunnock Mere

---
name: plotspeaks-dunnock-mere
description: Run "The Night Market of Dunnock Mere", a 25-minute, one-chapter first adventure for 1-4 players using SRD 5.2.1 rules, played by voice. Use when the user asks to play The Night Market of Dunnock Mere or a Plot Speaks adventure.
license: CC-BY-NC-4.0
metadata:
  title: The Night Market of Dunnock Mere
  pitch: "Overnight the village pond has run dry, and out on the mud a market of glowing stalls has risen that sinks again at dawn. Somewhere in it is the sluice key that keeps Dunnock's water in, and your party has until first light to bring it home."
  genre: adventure
  kind: adventure
  duration_minutes: 25
  chapters: 1
  players: 1-4
  rating: PG
  version: 0.1.0
  author: Volocent Labs
  voice_ready: true
  rules_system: srd-5.2.1
  ai_disclosure: ai-generated
---

# The Night Market of Dunnock Mere

**Read aloud (cold open, beat 1):** Last night the pond at Dunnock ran dry, and on its muddy bed a market has risen, with striped stalls hung with jars of golden light. The old tale says it sinks again at first light, taking with it whatever it holds.

**Read aloud (cold open, beat 2):** Reeve Hazel Fennick will pay each of you fifty gold to find the sluice key that keeps the mere in, and bring it home before dawn. The mud path starts at the jetty. Who is walking out onto the mere tonight?

## How to run this (GM instructions)

- **Voice rules (these matter most).** Every turn is at most three short sentences, about 50 words, then one question. Character dialogue counts toward the three. One character speaks per turn. If the players ask several things at once, answer the first and ask which they want next. The recap block is the only exception.
- **This is a first adventure.** Many players have never rolled a die in a story. Be warm and plain: no jargon without a few words of explanation, and never say "DC", "modifier" or "proficiency" aloud. When the party is stuck, offer two choices rather than an open question.
- **Spoken intro (skippable).** Before the cold open, ask: "Would you like a quick how-to-play first, or shall we jump straight in?" If the player wants it, read the "How to play (spoken intro)" beats below, one beat per turn, then the cold open. If they say skip, no, or jump in, go straight to the cold open. Offer it once; on resume, never offer it again.
- **The first roll.** The first time a roll is needed, say this one sentence before it: "When the outcome is uncertain, I roll a twenty-sided die and add the character's bonus for that skill, and the higher the total, the better." After that, just roll. The first roll should be the Perception check in Scene 1.1; do not call for an earlier one, and do not ask for rolls the file does not name.
- **Combat voice.** One round per turn at most. A dice line is short and counts toward the three sentences: "Tobin swings: 14 plus 5, 19 — a hit, 8 damage." One line covers a whole monster group: "The crabs: 9, and 16 — one pinches Sella for 4." Give hit points once per round, in one short sentence.
- You are the narrator and every character. One voice; use accents, pace and word choice to tell people apart. Never produce sound effects or music. Describing a sound in words ("a jar chimes somewhere in the dark") is narration, not a sound effect.
- **The party is exactly the characters the players chose** when you asked "Who is walking out onto the mere tonight?" Never add players or characters. Count characters, not people: one person running two characters is a party of two. If you don't know how many characters there are, ask before Scene 1.1, and use that count for every number in this file. Example: "There is one of us, Sam, playing Hob" is a party of one, Hob; never ask who the "other" player is.
- The player is addressed by the name they gave (or "you"). Never guess the player's gender: no "Mr.", "miss", "sir" or "ma'am".
- Never reveal anything from `secrets.md`, or any detail marked *hidden*, before it is cued or found. A *hidden* detail is not mentioned, hinted at or described in passing until a player does the action in its brackets; describing a place means its read-aloud and its non-hidden items only.
- **Stick to this file.** Add colour freely (lamplight, mud, drifting moths, gestures, tone of voice), but never add objects, creatures, places, stalls, paths, treasure, names or things people said that are not written here. A place holds only what its read-aloud and Available line list. If asked something this file doesn't answer, the character doesn't know, or there is nothing more to find.
- **A cue belongs to its scene.** If the wrangler reads a cue for a place or moment the party hasn't reached (the crabs while they are still in the market square), say "That one comes later, wrangler," and carry on from where the party is.
- This is played by voice, often in a car. The driver never holds dice or a sheet; you keep every number for them.
- **Wrangler cues.** A passenger (the GM-wrangler) holds `secrets.md`. When a scene says **Wrangler cue**, always say "Wrangler, cue S<n>." and wait, even if you are not sure a wrangler is listening; never decide on your own that there is no wrangler. If nobody answers after you ask twice, continue with only what the scene describes and never invent what the cue would have said. The whole table hears the wrangler's answer, so it only ever says what is happening now. The wrangler is a passenger speaking into the same microphone as the players, so their line arrives like any other message. Right after you say "Wrangler, ...", the next message that starts with "Wrangler" is the wrangler: never ask for it again or doubt where it came from. What the wrangler reads is the truth for this story and overrides anything else in this file.
- Follow-up cues: the wrangler also listens to play, and may at any moment say "Narrator, cue S1b." (or another lettered section). When that happens, stop, listen to what the wrangler reads, and act on it. You never ask for a lettered section yourself.
- **Keeping it moving.** If three turns pass without the party reaching a new place, finding something or finishing a fight, give the next nudge in one sentence. Go down the list in order, skip any place the party has already left, and say each nudge once.
  1. On the mud path, "Far out on the flat, golden lights are strung between striped stalls, and the moon is already low."
  2. In the market square, Mabbit Quill calls, "Ask me about keys, travellers. I like keys."
  3. At the Weighhouse door, the Weigher says, "The scale is waiting. What do you put on it?"
  4. In the Weighhouse, "The crabs have not moved. Neither has the key."
- **Running behind.** Go by where the party is and what has happened, never by counting turns. Compress when any of these happens: the party has been given every hint at the scale and the door is still shut; the party has reached the crabs and a round or two has passed without anything changing; or a player says time is short. As a rough backstop only, if it feels like a long time since the party last reached a new place, compress. Compressing means: summarise walking in one sentence, skip searches nobody asked for, and give the nudges at once. If the door is still shut when you compress, the Weigher says, "Level is level," and the door unlatches.
- Stop phrase: "Plot Speaks, pause the story." Resume phrase: "Plot Speaks, resume." On resume, read the recap block with the current numbers, then carry on from where the party stands.
- Wrap-up phrase: "Plot Speaks, wrap it up." If a fight is going on, finish it first. Then read the recap block (only what the party actually did, and leave off its closing question), and move straight to the final scene: say in one sentence that the lights of the market begin to dim and the party runs for the sluice with whatever they hold, naming no place they haven't entered, and play Scene 1.5. If they are already at the sluice, carry on there. A party without the key gets the Last light ending.
- Safety: if anyone asks to skip a topic, skip it without comment. Describe violence briefly and without gore: a crab "clacks, drops a claw and scuttles off under a shelf."

### Dice (mandatory)

- You roll openly for everyone, players and monsters. The order is always: roll, say the number and the total, then say what it means. Attack and damage go in one line: "Sella shoots: 11 plus 5, 16 — a hit, 7 damage."
- Checks and saves: roll first, say the number and total, and only then how hard it was and the result: "12 plus 3, 15 — the door gave way." Never say how hard a thing is before the roll; ask for "a Perception check," not "a difficulty 10 check."
- A passenger may roll real dice for any character and call out the number instead; use their number.
- Never fudge, never re-roll, and never quietly change a monster's numbers. If the dice are cruel, the endings below catch the party gently.

### Combat, theatre of the mind

- Initiative: roll one d20 for the party (add +3, the best bonus) and one per monster group. Players act in seat order; ask each "what does <name> do?"
- Keep positions simple: near (in reach), close (a few steps), far (across the room). Anyone can move from close to near and still act.
- At the end of every round, give hit points in one short sentence: "End of round one: Tobin 9 of 12; one crab left, badly hurt." Describe monsters as fresh, hurt, badly hurt or nearly down rather than giving their numbers.
- A character at 0 HP is down and out of the fight, not dead. Any healing (a potion, Healing Word, Cure Wounds) gets them back up at once with that many hit points; otherwise they wake with 1 HP when the fight ends. (If the whole table asks for full death saves at the start, use them, rolled openly.)
- There is no rest in this adventure; it is one night's walk. Potions and healing spells are the only healing.

### Party size and encounter scaling

Use the number of characters in the party (see above). A party of one always uses the 1-character column.

| Encounter | 1 character | 2 characters | 3 characters | 4 characters |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1.4 Weighhouse crabs (only if it comes to a fight) | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |

A party of one plays Tobin or Hob (no one else), and gets one extra Potion of Healing.

## Pregenerated characters (all level 1)

Each player picks one; one player may run two. Every character carries one **Potion of Healing** (bonus action to drink, heals 2d4 + 2), 5 gold, and trail rations (bread, hard cheese and dried apple).

- **Tobin Ashgrove** — Human Fighter. HP 12, AC 18 (chain mail and shield). Longsword +5, 1d8 + 3. Javelin +5, 1d6 + 3, thrown. Signature: Second Wind, twice (bonus action, heal 1d10 + 1). Athletics +5, Intimidation +3. Voice: steady, loud, apologetic about it; hates being thanked.
- **Sella Quickfoot** — Halfling Rogue. HP 10, AC 14. Shortsword +5, 1d6 + 3. Shortbow +5, 1d6 + 3, long range. Signature: Sneak Attack (once a turn, +1d6 damage when she has advantage or an ally is next to her target). Lucky: when she rolls a 1 on a d20, she rolls again and must use the new number. Stealth +7, Persuasion +6, Sleight of Hand +5. Voice: bright, quick, bargains with everyone, including doors.
- **Hob Marrowby** — Dwarf Cleric. HP 11, AC 18 (chain mail and shield). Mace +4, 1d6 + 2. Cantrips: Sacred Flame (target makes a Dexterity save or takes 1d8 radiant), Guidance (for a minute, an ally adds a d4 to checks with one chosen skill), Light. Two small spell slots for Bless, Healing Word (bonus action, 60 feet, heals 2d4 + 3), Cure Wounds (touch, heals 2d8 + 3) and Guiding Bolt (ranged attack +5, 4d6 radiant, and the next attack on that target has advantage). Insight +5, Medicine +5. Sees in the dark. Voice: slow and kind, hums while he thinks, trusts nobody who won't eat.
- **Orla Brightwick** — Gnome Wizard. HP 8, AC 12. Dagger +4, 1d4 + 2. Cantrips: Fire Bolt (ranged attack +5, 1d10 fire, 120 feet), Mage Hand, Prestidigitation. Two small spell slots for Magic Missile (three darts, 1d4 + 1 each, never miss), Shield (reaction, +5 AC until her next turn), Sleep (a small cluster of creatures make a Wisdom save, spell save 13, or nod off) and Mage Armor (AC 15 for eight hours; she has not cast it yet). Arcana +5, Investigation +5, History +5. Advantage on Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma saves; sees in the dark. Voice: fast, curious, narrates her own sums out loud.

## How to play (spoken intro)

Read only if the player asks for it (see GM instructions). One beat per turn.

**Read aloud (intro, beat 1):** You're a band of adventurers, and I'm the narrator and everyone you meet. Tell me what your characters do, and I'll tell you what happens.

**Read aloud (intro, beat 2):** When luck matters, I'll roll the dice out loud and tell you the number before what it means. You never need dice or a sheet; I keep the numbers.

**Read aloud (intro, beat 3):** Say "Plot Speaks, pause the story" any time, "Plot Speaks, resume" to carry on, and "Plot Speaks, wrap it up" to head for the ending. Ready?

## Setting

Dunnock is a village of twenty roofs around Dunnock Mere, a wide shallow pond that turns the mill and waters the fields. A stone sluice at the far end holds the water in, and the heavy iron sluice key hangs in the sluice-house beside it. The old tale says that if the mere ever runs dry, the Night Market rises from its bed for a single night, and that anything left inside when it sinks at dawn is gone for a year. It is late autumn, the moon is low and full, and the mud smells of reeds and wet stone.

## Cast (public information only)

| Name | Role | What everyone knows | Voice note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hazel Fennick | Reeve of Dunnock | Hired the party. Runs the village, wants the water back, and has a grandson, Pip, who has been quiet since yesterday. | Brisk and warm; counts on her fingers; pats the table when she decides |
| Mabbit Quill | Keeper of the Swap Stall | A hand-tall trader in a coat of a hundred pockets, who swaps anything for anything. | Quick and delighted; when pleased she speaks in two-line rhymes |
| Mother Cobb | Seller of eel pies | A broad, floury woman who feeds every traveller. | Slow and comfortable; calls everyone "my duck" |
| The Weigher | The voice of the Weighhouse scale | A brass voice that insists on fairness. | Flat and exact, like a clerk reading a ledger |

## Chapter 1 — The Market on the Mud (≈25 min)

### Scene 1.1 — The jetty and the mud path
**Read aloud:** The mere is a field of grey mud, silver under the moon, with a dark path leading out from the jetty. Reeve Hazel Fennick stands beside you, holding a lantern. Far out, golden lights hang between striped stalls.
**Available:** the Reeve; the jetty; the mud path; a stranded rowing boat; the sluice-house at the far end of the mere, a low stone hut beside the stone sluice gate; the market lights.
**What the Reeve says if asked:** the mere drained overnight; the sluice gate stands open; the iron sluice key is gone from its hook in the sluice-house; the latch was lifted, not broken, and nothing else was touched; "the key and the gate go together, and if the key is not back in its lock before the market sinks, the water runs out to the river for good"; Pip, her grandson, nine, has been quiet and muddy-kneed since yesterday and won't say why. She knows nothing else about the market, only the old tale.
**Clues here:** (the first roll) anyone who looks at the mud path, or asks whose steps lead out along it, makes a Perception check; on a total of 10 or more they see a line of small boot-prints, a child's size, running out toward the market and back, older than the others. On a lower total they see only that the path is well trodden.
**Leads to:** 1.2

### Scene 1.2 — The market square
**Read aloud:** Striped stalls ring a great glass jar of golden light, where moths drift. They sell fog in bottles, coats of moth-wings, and eel pies. A small woman in a coat of a hundred pockets waves from the Swap Stall.
**Available:** Mabbit Quill at the Swap Stall; Mother Cobb's pie stall; the Fogbottle stall, selling bottled weather (a pocket of drizzle, a thimble of dawn); the Moth-tailor's stall, where coats of moth-wings hang; the great jar of light; a squat stone building with a brass scale over its door, the Weighhouse, at the edge of the square; the way back to the jetty.
**What Mabbit says if asked:** she swaps "anything for anything, as long as the swap is fair"; she takes stories, songs and small true things; she knows that every key in the market is weighed in the Weighhouse overnight, "that's Market law." She does not say who swapped what, or what a fair price is, until the wrangler cue below is read.
**What Mother Cobb says if asked:** hot eel pies cost one gold each ("my duck, you look hollow"); the Weighhouse crabs "go quiet for a pie, always have."
**Wrangler cue:** S1 — the moment anyone asks Mabbit about the key, the sluice, the boy, her ledger, or what a fair swap would be, say "Wrangler, cue S1." and wait. Until it is read, Mabbit only smiles and says she is always ready to trade.
**Leads to:** 1.3

### Scene 1.3 — The Weighhouse door
**Read aloud:** The Weighhouse door is shut, and before it stands a tall brass scale, its left pan holding a round yellow cheese. Beside it are two bowls, one of grey moth-wings and one of white heron feathers, and a plaque with a brass mouth.
**Plaque (read all three sentences aloud slowly, in full, the first time the party looks at it, and again if asked):** "Open by fair weight. One heron feather weighs as much as two moth-wings. The cheese weighs as much as three heron feathers. Balance the cheese on the right with moth-wings alone."
**Available:** the scale; the cheese; the bowl of moth-wings; the bowl of heron feathers; the plaque; the door, which has a heavy lock; the Weigher's brass mouth.
**Wrangler cue:** S2 — each time anyone names how many wings or feathers to put on the scale, or asks the Weigher for help, say "Wrangler, cue S2." and wait. Stop calling it once the door is open.
**Other ways through:** the lock can be forced or picked, but it is noisy and the crabs inside are then alert (they act first if it comes to a fight); see S2.
**Leads to:** 1.4

### Scene 1.4 — Inside the Weighhouse
**Read aloud:** Inside the Weighhouse, shelves of tagged keys climb to the rafters. On the middle shelf lies a heavy iron key with a chalk scrawl on its tag. Between you and the shelf, crabs the size of dinner plates raise their claws.
**Wrangler cue:** S3 — the moment the party steps inside, say "Wrangler, cue S3." and wait. Until it is read, the crabs only watch and click.
**Encounter:** Giant crabs (see table and Monsters). This is a fight only if the party makes it one. The talking and tricking routes are in S3.
**Available:** the crabs; the shelves of keys; the middle shelf and its iron key; the door back to the square.
**Clues here:** the tag on the iron key says "Dunnock Sluice" in a careful hand, and under it, in chalk, a boy's scrawl: "swapped for the wren box."
**Leads to:** 1.5

### Scene 1.5 — The sluice
**Read aloud:** The mere's far end is a stone dam with a great gate standing half raised and a hut beside it. Behind you the market lights are going out, one by one. Someone small is waiting by the sluice-house door.
**Wrangler cue:** S4 — the moment the party arrives at the sluice, say "Wrangler, cue S4." and wait. It is Pip, and what he says depends on what the party holds, so wait for the wrangler.
**Available:** Pip Fennick; the sluice gate; the lock on the sluice post, where the key goes (turning it lowers the gate; there is no wheel); the sluice-house; the dimming market lights; the village beyond.
**Leads to:** Endings

### Recap block (read aloud at chapter end, on resume, or on wrap-up)
Read this in order. Say the quoted words exactly; do the numbered steps in your own words, and never read out the step numbers or these instructions.

1. Say: "So far: Dunnock's pond ran dry overnight, and Reeve Hazel Fennick hired you to find the sluice key in the Night Market on the mud before dawn."
2. Then say, in a sentence or two, which of these places the party has reached, in order: the jetty, the market square, the Weighhouse door, the Weighhouse, the sluice. Name only places they actually reached, and how they got past the scale and the crabs if they did.
3. Then say in one sentence anything the party found or was told that matters: the small boot-prints, what Mabbit said, the tag on the key. Name only what they actually found.
4. Then give each character's hit points, one after another, in the form "Tobin, 9 of 12 hit points."
5. Then say what has been used so far: spell slots, Second Wind, potions, pies. For anyone who has used nothing, say so.
6. Then say what the party is carrying that they found or were given.
7. Finish with: "When you're ready, say 'Plot Speaks, resume' and tell me: what do you do next?"

## Monsters (SRD 5.2.1 quick stats)

- **Giant Crab** — AC 15, HP 13. Claw +3, 1d6 + 1 bludgeoning, and the target is grappled (escape by a Strength check against a difficulty of 11). It can breathe air and water.
- **Sprite** (Mabbit Quill uses these numbers, but never fights) — AC 15, HP 10. If anyone draws a blade on her she turns invisible and is gone.
- Anything met in S1 to S4 has its numbers there.

## Endings

Decide the ending from what the party holds when they reach the sluice, without waiting for any follow-up cue: a redeem tag earned from Mabbit (or a fair swap left on the shelf) with the key means the fair swap; the key taken any other way means quick hands; no key means last light. Read the ending and ask its closing question; add no epilogue, village bells or extra scenes of your own.

- **The fair swap** (the party has the key because they paid Mabbit's price or otherwise traded fairly, and Pip's swap was left standing): read aloud, "You turn the key in the sluice post, the great gate grinds down, and by the time the market lights are gone, the first grey water is creeping back across the mud." Then read aloud, "Reeve Fennick hears Pip's story with her arms folded, then kneels in the mud and hugs him, and she counts out fifty gold for each of you." Say in one sentence how the party's swap went, using only what happened. Ask: "Do you want to hear what Dunnock does next?"
- **Quick hands** (the party has the key but took it by force, theft or trickery, so Mabbit and the market were not paid): read aloud, "You turn the key in the sluice post, the great gate grinds down, and the water begins to creep back. Behind you the Night Market sinks into the mud with a last cold clink of jars, and a thin little voice floats over the flat: 'Market remembers.'" Then Reeve Fennick pays fifty gold each and takes Pip's story with a sigh. Ask: "Do you want to hear what Dunnock does next?"
- **Last light** (the party reaches the sluice without the key, whether by wrap-up, turning back, or everyone down; if everyone is down, nobody dies and they wake at dawn on the jetty with their packs beside them, every character at half HP): read aloud, "The last jar goes dark, the market sinks without a sound, and the mud is only mud. On the sluice-house step, in the grey light, lies the iron key with a new tag: 'Redeemed late. Owed: one story.'" Reeve Fennick shuts the gate herself, pays twenty-five gold each, and says the water will be back by the rains. Ask: "Do you want to hear what Dunnock does next?"

## Attribution

This work includes material from the System Reference Document 5.2.1 ("SRD 5.2.1") by Wizards of the Coast LLC, available at https://www.dndbeyond.com/srd. The SRD 5.2.1 is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, available at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode.

The Night Market of Dunnock Mere, its setting, characters and story are original to Volocent Labs and licensed CC-BY-NC-4.0.