The Ninefold Stair

---
name: plotspeaks-ninefold-stair
description: Run "The Ninefold Stair", a 100-minute, three-chapter fantasy adventure for 1-4 players using SRD 5.2.1 rules, played by voice. Use when the user asks to play The Ninefold Stair or a Plot Speaks adventure.
license: CC-BY-NC-4.0
metadata:
  title: The Ninefold Stair
  pitch: "Orisande, a monastery-city on a cliff, is built around a stair cut down into the rock, its lower landings sealed for two centuries. Now frost climbs the stair in midsummer, and a novice has gone down alone; the Abbess sends your party after her."
  genre: adventure
  kind: adventure
  duration_minutes: 100
  chapters: 3
  players: 1-4
  rating: PG-13
  version: 0.1.0
  author: Volocent Labs
  voice_ready: true
  rules_system: srd-5.2.1
  ai_disclosure: ai-generated
---

# The Ninefold Stair

**Read aloud (cold open, beat 1):** Orisande clings to a mountain cliff, a city of monks and terraces built around the Ninefold Stair. Its lower landings have been sealed for two hundred years. This midsummer the stair has begun to shake, and frost is climbing it from below.

**Read aloud (cold open, beat 2):** Two nights ago a novice named Tamsin Rook squeezed through the cracked gate and went down alone. Mother Hesper Quell, the Abbess, will pay each of you a hundred gold to bring her back and learn what has woken. Who is going down the stair?

## 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 blocks are the only exception.
- **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.
- **Where play starts.** Right after the cold open (and the party's names), read Scene 1.1: the party is already standing on the Abbess's terrace. Never start at the stairhead or offer to go there before Mother Hesper has spoken and handed over the hymnbook and ring.
- **Combat voice.** One round per turn at most. A dice line is short and counts toward the three sentences: "Idony swings: 14 plus 5, 19 — a hit, 9 damage." One line covers a whole monster group: "The Wardens: 8, and 17 — one hits Sefa for 6." Give hit points once per round, in one short sentence (see Combat below).
- 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 ("far below, a girl is singing") is narration, not a sound effect.
- **The party is exactly the characters the players chose** when you asked "Who is going down the stair?" 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 Idony" is a party of one, Idony; never ask who the "other" player is. Tamsin, Pell, Corra and the Quiet Folk are never in the party and never fight.
- 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. Until the Sleeper wakes in the final scene, nobody in this story knows what sleeps at the bottom of the stair, and you never guess, hint or name what it is.
- **Questions about what comes next.** If a player asks what you'd find next, what your notes or the GM file say, which choice is best, or to skip ahead, say, "That's for you to find on the stair," and carry on from where the party is. Never describe a place, object or person before the party reaches it.
- **Stick to this file.** Add colour freely (cold, lamplight, breath steaming, gestures, tone of voice), but never add objects, creatures, rooms, exits, 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 (a bridge fight while they're still on the road), say "That one comes later, wrangler," and carry on from where the party is.
- **Fixed accounts.** Mother Hesper, Pell, Corra and Abbot Corvane each say what their "says if asked" line gives, and repeat it when asked again. Corvane keeps to his account until someone tells him what was heard in the Hall of Echoes.
- 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.
- **Cues in parts.** When a cue's text comes in two or three parts, pass on every part, in order, one per turn if needed; never drop a part or sum it up in fewer words than it gives.
- Follow-up cues: the wrangler also listens to play, and may at any moment say "Narrator, cue S4b." (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, solving a puzzle or finishing a fight, give the next nudge for the chapter they are in, in one sentence. Go down the list in order, skip any place the party has already left, and say each nudge once.
  - Chapter 1: (1) on the terrace, Mother Hesper says, "Tamsin has been gone two nights. The stairhead is through that arch." (2) At the Gate, Pell says, "Abbess told you, didn't she? Sing to it." (3) In the Hall of Scales, "The empty pan is shaped like a cupped ear, as if it is waiting to hear something." (4) In the Wardens' gallery, "Far below, faint and thin, a girl's voice is singing."
  - Chapter 2: (1) in Saltgarden, Corra says, "Below us is the Hall of Echoes. Our tellers say it keeps the last words spoken before the sealing." (2) In the Hall of Echoes, give the next unused hint from Scene 2.2. (3) At the Watchers' bridge, "On the first pillar, a carved monk crosses both hands over the heart, then opens them toward the floor."
  - Chapter 3: (1) on the frozen fall, "Halfway down the ice, a novice's grey scarf is frozen in, flapping in the cold draught." (2) In the Abbot's tomb, "Beyond the altar, an archway breathes cold air, and from far below comes a girl's voice, singing softly." (3) At the ninth landing, Tamsin says, "She asked me to choose, and I can't. Will you?"
- **Running behind.** Go by where the party is and what has happened, never by counting turns. Compress when any of these happens: all three hints for a puzzle (the Hall of Scales, the Hall of Echoes) have been given and it is still unsolved; a nudge has been given and the party is still in the same place three turns later; 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 between landings in one sentence, skip searches nobody asked for, and give the nudges at once instead of waiting three turns. If a puzzle is still unsolved when you compress, the answer comes from the place's last hint, said plainly.
- Stop phrase: "Plot Speaks, pause the story." Resume phrase: "Plot Speaks, resume." On resume, read the most recent recap block with the current numbers. In a fresh session, "Plot Speaks, resume from chapter 2" means: read the Chapter 1 recap block, then start Chapter 2's first scene (Scene 2.1); "Plot Speaks, resume from chapter 3" means: read the Chapter 2 recap block, then start Scene 3.1 by reading its read-aloud in full before any roll or question. In a fresh session you hold no numbers: unless the players say otherwise, every character they name is at full hit points with nothing used, and you say so in the recap. Never ask the players for hit points. If you don't know who is in the party, ask once, "Who is going down the stair?", and use only the names given. Name only places their summary mentions.
- Wrap-up phrase: "Plot Speaks, wrap it up." If a fight is going on, finish it first. Then read the recap block for the chapter they are in (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 party hurries on down the stair, past landings they don't stop to explore, to the very bottom, naming no landing or room they haven't entered, and play "The final scene: Scene 3.3, the Ninth Landing" (it sits after Chapter 3, so it is always in this script), with its wrangler cue. If they are already there, carry on there.
- Safety: if anyone asks to skip a topic, skip it without comment. Describe violence briefly and without gore: a Warden "clatters apart," a Watcher "cracks and lies still."

### 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: "Aska's arrow: 12 plus 7, 19 — a hit, 8 damage."
- Checks and saves: roll first, say the number and total, and only then the DC and the result: "12 plus 3, 15 — the DC was 12, you make it." Never say a DC before the roll; ask for "a Strength check," not "a DC 14 Strength 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. Two rules in the pregens are not fudging: Sefa's Heroic Inspiration lets her re-roll one die once, and Wren's Cutting Words subtracts from an enemy's roll. 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 two: Idony 21 of 28; one Warden 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, Lay on Hands, 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.)
- Rests: one short rest at each chapter break, if the party is somewhere safe (the Wardens' gallery once no Warden is still standing or the party is past it; Saltgarden with the Quiet Folk; the far side of the Watchers' bridge). Quick version: each character regains half their maximum HP, Sefa regains her Focus Points, and Idony regains one use of Channel Divinity. There is no long rest on the stair.

### 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 The Wardens (animated armor) | exactly 1, weakened: 22 HP | 2 | 3 | 4 |
| 1.3 Hall of Scales (truths needed) | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
| 2.3 The Watchers (only if it comes to a fight) | exactly 1, weakened: 26 HP | 1 | 2 | 2 |

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

## Pregenerated characters (all level 3)

Each player picks one; one player may run two. Every character starts with one **Potion of Healing** (bonus action to drink, heals 2d4 + 2), a hooded lantern from the Order, and trail rations.

- **Idony Halvard** — Silver Dragonborn Paladin (Oath of Devotion). HP 28, AC 18. Longsword +5, 1d8 + 3. Signature: Divine Smite (bonus action right after she hits, spend a small slot: 2d8 more radiant damage, 3d8 against undead); Frost Breath, twice (instead of one attack, a 15-foot cone: each creature in it makes a Dexterity save or takes 1d10 cold, half on a success); Lay on Hands (bonus action, a pool of 15 hit points to share out by touch); Channel Divinity, twice (Sacred Weapon: for ten minutes she adds +3 to her attack rolls and her sword sheds light, or Divine Sense: she feels any undead within 60 feet). Spells, three small slots: Bless, Cure Wounds (touch, heals 2d8 + 3), Shield of Faith (+2 AC to one ally for ten minutes) and Divine Smite. Shrugs off cold (half damage); sees in the dark. Athletics +5, Persuasion +5. Voice: deep, warm, unhurried; a knight from the lowlands who thanks everyone formally, doors included.
- **Aska Highfield** — Goliath Ranger (Hunter). HP 28, AC 15. Longbow +7, 1d8 + 3, long range; Shortsword +5, 1d6 + 3. Signature: Hunter's Mark (bonus action, twice free and with any small slot: her hits on the marked creature do 1d6 more); Colossus Slayer (once a turn, 1d8 more damage to a creature that is already hurt); Stone's Endurance, twice (reaction when she takes damage: reduce it by 1d12 + 2). Spells, three small slots: Hunter's Mark, Cure Wounds (touch, heals 2d8 + 2), Longstrider. Carries fifty feet of climbing rope and iron pitons. Athletics +5, Survival +7, Perception +4. Voice: slow, low and sparing with words; a mountain herder who rates every ledge out of ten.
- **Sefa Marlowe** — Human Monk (Warrior of the Open Hand). HP 24, AC 16. Unarmed Strike +5, 1d6 + 3, and one more as a bonus action. Signature: three Focus Points (back on a short rest) for Flurry of Blows (two extra strikes as a bonus action, and after a hit she can knock the target prone or push it 15 feet unless it makes a save), Patient Defense or Step of the Wind (double jump, dash or slip away as a bonus action); Deflect Attacks (reaction: an incoming hit does 1d10 + 6 less damage); Uncanny Metabolism, once (when she rolls initiative, she gets all her Focus back and heals 1d6 + 3); Heroic Inspiration, once (re-roll any one die). Acrobatics +5, Athletics +4, Insight +5, Religion +2. She grew up an orphan in the Order's house in Orisande and knows the first eight verses of the Long Hymn by heart. Voice: quick, dry and quietly funny, with the old Order habit of answering a question with a question.
- **Wren Halloway** — Gnome Bard (College of Lore). HP 21, AC 14. Rapier +5, 1d8 + 3; Vicious Mockery (60 feet: a Wisdom save or 1d6 psychic, and its next attack has disadvantage). Signature: Bardic Inspiration, three times (bonus action: an ally adds a d6 to one roll); Cutting Words (reaction: spend an Inspiration to subtract a d6 from an enemy's attack or damage). Spells, four small slots and two big ones: Healing Word (bonus action, 60 feet, heals 2d4 + 3), Dissonant Whispers (small: one creature makes a Wisdom save or takes 3d6 psychic and flees, half on a success), Shatter (big: a 10-foot burst, Constitution save or 3d8 thunder, half on a success; constructs roll with disadvantage), Calm Emotions (big). Clever against magic: advantage on Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma saves. Small enough to squeeze through narrow gaps; sees in the dark. Performance +7, Persuasion +7, History +5. Voice: bright, quick, a touch theatrical; collects old songs the way other people collect coins.

## 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 say the number before what it means. Fights go one round at a time, and I'll keep track of everyone's hit points.

**Read aloud (intro, beat 3):** This one has three chapters, and I'll read a short recap at the end of each. Say "Plot Speaks, pause the story" any time, "Plot Speaks, resume" to carry on, and "Plot Speaks, wrap it up" to head for the final scene. Ready?

## Setting

Orisande is a monastery-city of grey stone terraces stacked up the face of a mountain cliff, above a valley that is always full of cloud. Everything in it is built around the Ninefold Stair, a stair wide enough for a cart, cut down into the cliff in nine landings. The Order of the Stair, monks in grey, has kept a bronze Gate shut across it below the stairhead for two hundred years and sings the Long Hymn there every dusk. It is high summer, the warmest week of the year, and white frost lies on the stairhead every morning.

## Cast (public information only)

| Name | Role | What everyone knows | Voice note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mother Hesper Quell | Abbess of Orisande | Hired the party. Holds the Abbess's seal-ring and the Order's grey hymnbook. Has never been below the Gate. | Low, measured, a little hoarse; pauses before bad news |
| Pell Ashgrove | Halfling stair-sweeper | Has swept the stairhead for fifty years and hears every rumour in Orisande. | Creaky and chuckling, drops his g's, talks to his broom |
| Tamsin Rook | Missing novice, fifteen | Dreamed of a voice calling her down the stair; went through the cracked Gate two nights ago. | Bright and breathless; hums when she is frightened |
| Abbot Corvane | Abbot of the Order two hundred years ago | Sealed the stair in the year of the long frost; his name is on the Gate. | Thin, pleading, an old man's quaver |
| Elder Corra Vell | Unknown in Orisande | Nobody in the city has heard of her. | Soft, old-fashioned words ("aye," "upstairs folk"); calm as still water |
| The Hunger Below | What the Order's founding tale says sleeps at the bottom of the stair | The Long Hymn is sung at the Gate every dusk to keep it sleeping. Nobody living has seen it. | Not heard until the final scene |

## Chapter 1 — The City Above (≈30 min)

### Scene 1.1 — The Abbess's terrace
**Read aloud:** The Abbess's terrace hangs over a sea of cloud, and its flagstones are white with frost nearest the stair. Mother Hesper Quell waits by a faded wall-painting with a grey book in her hands, and says, "You came; Tamsin has been gone two nights."
**Available:** Mother Hesper; the wall-painting; the grey hymnbook; the view over the cloud; the arch to the stairhead (1.2).
**Clues here:** the wall-painting shows the city's founders kneeling at the top of the stair before a great pale shape with outspread wings, which the Order calls "the Blessing of the Mountain" (no roll). The hymnbook holds the Long Hymn, eight verses; the page for a ninth was torn out long ago. Its first verse, if anyone reads it: "Sleep, Lady of the high cold; the stair is kept, the door is shut, and the city sings you down." *Hidden* (someone studies the painting up close, or searches it): beneath the pale shape, a patch of paint was scraped away long ago, in the shape of a long, thin spike.
**What Mother Hesper says if asked:** about Tamsin, "Fifteen, a novice, and the best voice in the house. She dreamed for weeks of someone calling her down, and two nights ago she squeezed through the crack in the Gate." About the stair: "Nine landings. Nobody has been below the Gate since Abbot Corvane sealed it, in the year of the long frost." About what is below: "Our founding tale says a hunger sleeps at the bottom, and the Long Hymn keeps it sleeping." About the frost: "Brother Ambrose, our cantor, died a month ago. He was the last who knew the hymn's ninth verse by heart, and since that night the stair shakes and the frost climbs." **Always, before the party leaves the terrace** (asked or not, in its own turn): she gives the party the hymnbook, and her own grey seal-ring: "The Abbess's seal. The old things on the stair may know it." And: "Sing any verse from that book at the Gate, and its locks will turn. That much the Order still remembers." Never skip this; later scenes need it. She pays a hundred gold each when Tamsin is home. If Sefa is in the party: "You were one of our orphans, Sefa. You know the hymn better than the book does."
**Leads to:** 1.2

### Scene 1.2 — The stairhead and the Gate
**Read aloud:** The Ninefold Stair begins at the cliff's edge, where wide steps run under an arch to a bronze gate with nine keyholes. Frost has split it from below, leaving a gap a child could squeeze through. An old halfling stops sweeping and watches you.
**Available:** Pell Ashgrove; the Gate, its nine keyholes and its inscription; the gap; two stone offering bowls by the arch; the way back to the terrace.
**Clues here:** the inscription, read aloud if asked: "Sealed by Abbot Corvane in the year of the long frost. Nine locks and one song." The offering bowls hold old flakes of what the Order calls "mountain-silver," collected long ago (no roll). *Hidden* (someone picks up a flake or examines one closely): each flake is curved, thin as a fingernail, as big as a palm, ridged like a fish's scale, and cold even in the sun.
**Opening the Gate (not a puzzle):** anyone who sings or reads aloud a verse of the Long Hymn at the Gate (from the hymnbook, or Sefa from memory) opens it: the nine locks turn one after another, and the Gate swings inward. If the party seems unsure, Pell says, "Abbess told you, didn't she? Sing to it." Wren (and only someone as small as Wren) can instead squeeze through the gap with a Dexterity (Acrobatics) check, DC 10, and lift the bar on the inside. The Gate cannot be forced; Pell says so if anyone tries.
**What Pell says if asked:** about the frost, "Came up the stair the very night Brother Ambrose died. Every mornin' since, I sweep it, and every mornin' it's back." About Tamsin: "Saw her go through that crack, singin' to herself. I shouted. She waved." About the nights: "Some nights I hear her singin', far down. And somethin' answers. Low, like wind in a chimney." About the hunger below: "Hunger? Nothin' hungry ever left silver in a bowl, is what I say."
**Leads to:** 1.3

### Scene 1.3 — The Hall of Scales (the second landing)
**Read aloud:** In a square hall, a bronze balance stands before a shut stone door. Its left pan holds an iron weight shaped like a nail; its empty right pan is shaped like a cupped ear. Above the door is carved: iron is heavy, truth is heavier.
**Available:** the balance; the iron weight (bolted to its pan, and it cannot be lifted out); the empty pan; the stone door; the stair back up.
**Puzzle:** a character leans over the cupped pan and tells it something true they have never said aloud before (the player makes it up for their character; any heartfelt try works, no roll). See the table for how many truths it takes; for two truths, they must come from two different characters. With each truth the pan sinks a little; with the last, the balance tips and the door grinds open. A lie makes the pan rise a little, with no other harm.
**Hints (give the next one each time the table asks, or when a wrong try leaves them stuck):** first, "The right pan is shaped like an ear, as if it's listening."; second, "What could you put in a pan that's heavier than iron, and weighs nothing at all?"; third, "Tell it something true, something you've never told anyone."
**Other way through:** dragging the door open takes Strength, DC 15. It is loud, and the Wardens in 1.4 hear it: when they wake, they act first.
**Leads to:** 1.4

### Scene 1.4 — The Wardens' gallery (the third landing)
**Read aloud:** Below the door, a long gallery runs along the cliff, lit grey through slits in the rock. In alcoves on both sides stand suits of plate armor with empty helms. At the far end, an archway opens on more stairs, breathing cold.
**Wrangler cue:** S1 — the moment anyone walks past the first pair of alcoves, say "Wrangler, cue S1." and wait. Until S1 is read, the armor does not move.
**Encounter:** the Wardens, animated armor (see the table and Monsters). Tactics: they walk toward the nearest character and strike with both steel fists; they never leave the gallery, and they stop when nobody is left in it.
**Non-combat way through:** anyone can dash for the far archway, and each Warden that is near them gets one Slam as they pass; then they are through, and the Wardens will not follow.
**Available:** the alcoves; the slits in the rock (far too narrow to climb through); the archway down. *Hidden* (someone searches an alcove or its plinth): carved on the plinth of the last alcove, "We keep the stair for the Lady."
**After the Wardens:** once no Warden is standing, or the party is past them, the foot of the gallery is safe for a short rest.
**Leads to:** the Chapter 1 recap, then 2.1

### Recap block (read aloud at chapter end or on resume)
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: Mother Hesper Quell sent you down the Ninefold Stair after the missing novice, Tamsin Rook, with the Order's hymnbook and the Abbess's seal-ring."
2. Then, in a sentence or two, say how the party got through the Gate, past the Hall of Scales and through the Wardens' gallery, naming only places they actually reached.
3. Then say in one sentence anything the party found or was told that matters: the wall-painting, the hymn's first verse and its missing ninth, the name on the Gate, what Pell heard at night, the silver in the bowls, the iron nail on the balance, the words on the Warden's plinth. Name only what they actually found.
4. Then give each character's hit points, one after another, in the form "Idony, 21 of 28 hit points."
5. Then say what has been used so far: spell slots, Focus Points, Frost Breath, Channel Divinity, Lay on Hands, Bardic Inspiration, Stone's Endurance, potions. For anyone who has used nothing, say so.
6. Finish with: "Do you rest first, or go straight on down?" Only if the players say they are stopping, add: "When you're ready, say 'Plot Speaks, resume.'"

## Chapter 2 — The Middle Terraces (≈35 min)

### Scene 2.1 — Saltgarden (the fourth landing)
**Read aloud:** The stair opens into a cavern where pale mushrooms grow in rows between pools crusted with salt. A thread of daylight falls from a crack far above. People in patched grey robes stand up from the rows and stare, as still as deer.
**Available:** Elder Corra Vell; the Quiet Folk, about thirty of them, children among them; the mushroom rows and salt pools; the thread of daylight (the crack is far too narrow to climb); the stair on down (2.2). The Quiet Folk give the party mushroom bread and water, and this is a safe place for a short rest.
**What Corra says if asked:** about her people, "We are the Quiet Folk. Our grandmothers' grandmothers were shut in down here by the Abbot, for siding with the Lady, and we have kept her garden since." About upstairs: "Our tellers say there is a whole city up there. Aye, we thought it was a story." About Tamsin: "A girl came down two days gone, singing. She sang with our children, ate with us, and went on down. She said the Lady was calling her." About the Lady: "Our tellers say she sleeps at the very bottom, and that she is no hunger. What she is, nobody living has seen." About the way down: "Below us is the Hall of Echoes. It keeps the last words spoken before the sealing. Below that, the Watchers, and they let pass whoever makes the Sign." She shows them the Sign: both hands crossed over the heart, then opened toward the floor. Asked anything else about the Lady, the Abbot or the sealing, she says, "Our tellers don't say. Ask the Hall of Echoes."
**What Corra asks:** "If you go back up, will you tell them we are here?"
**Leads to:** 2.2

### Scene 2.2 — The Hall of Echoes (the fifth landing)
**Read aloud:** The stair enters a round hall under a smooth stone dome, and every footstep comes back a moment later. Around the dome's base is carved: speak the name of the one who sealed us, and hear what he said.
**Puzzle:** the answer is Corvane (or Abbot Corvane), the name on the Gate and in Mother Hesper's account. The moment anyone says it aloud in the hall, say "Wrangler, cue S2." and wait.
**Wrangler cue:** S2 — when anyone says "Corvane" aloud in the Hall of Echoes.
**Hints (give the next one each time the table asks, or when a wrong name leaves them stuck):** first, "The dome gives your own words back, and waits for more."; second, "Whoever sealed the stair put his name on the Gate at the top."; third, "The Gate's inscription began: Sealed by Abbot Corvane."
**Wrong names:** the dome repeats the name once and falls silent; no harm.
**Available:** the dome; the carved words; the stair on down (2.3). There is nothing else in the hall.
**Leads to:** 2.3

### Scene 2.3 — The Watchers' bridge (the sixth landing)
**Read aloud:** The stair ends at a deep cleft, crossed by a narrow stone bridge with a pillar at each corner. On every pillar crouches a winged stone figure with a snarling dog's face. Cold wind blows up out of the cleft, smelling of snow.
**Available:** the bridge; the four pillars and their stone figures; the carving on the first pillar (no roll if anyone looks: a robed monk crossing both hands over the heart, then opening them toward the floor); the cleft (far too deep and sheer to climb); the stair on the far side.
**Wrangler cue:** S3 — the moment anyone steps onto the bridge without first making the Sign, say "Wrangler, cue S3." and wait. If everyone who crosses makes the Sign first, there is no cue: the stone heads turn to follow them, and nothing more happens.
**Encounter (only after S3):** the Watchers (see the table and Monsters). Tactics: they swoop at whoever stepped onto the bridge first, then at whoever is nearest; they never leave the bridge and its pillars.
**After the bridge:** the far side is safe for a short rest; the Watchers do not follow.
**Leads to:** the Chapter 2 recap, then 3.1

### Recap block (read aloud at chapter end or on resume)
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: you came down the Ninefold Stair after Tamsin Rook, through the Gate, the Hall of Scales and the Wardens' gallery."
2. Then, in a sentence or two, say which of these the party reached, in order, and what happened there: Saltgarden and the Quiet Folk, the Hall of Echoes, the Watchers' bridge. Name only places they actually reached. In a fresh session ("resume from chapter 3") where the players give no summary, say after step 1 only: "You passed Saltgarden, the Hall of Echoes and the Watchers' bridge, and you stand below the bridge, where the stair goes on down into the cold," and skip step 3.
3. If they heard the echoes in the Hall of Echoes (in a fresh session, only if the players say so), say in one or two sentences what the voices said, using only what the players heard; if they never heard them, skip this step.
4. Then give each character's hit points, one after another, in the form "Idony, 21 of 28 hit points."
5. Then say what has been used so far: spell slots, Focus Points, Frost Breath, Channel Divinity, Lay on Hands, Bardic Inspiration, Stone's Endurance, potions. For anyone who has used nothing, say so.
6. Finish with: "Do you rest first, or go on down into the cold?" Only if the players say they are stopping, add: "When you're ready, say 'Plot Speaks, resume.'"

## Chapter 3 — The Bottom of the Stair (≈35 min)

### Scene 3.1 — The frozen fall (the seventh landing)
**Read aloud:** Below the bridge, the stair runs beside a waterfall, and here the waterfall has frozen solid in midsummer, swallowing thirty feet of steps in blue ice. The cold makes your teeth ache. Far below the ice, a faint silver light glows.
**Getting down:** every character climbs down the ice: a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check, DC 12. If Aska fixes her rope and pitons first (an action, no roll), everyone after her rolls with advantage. Sefa can use Step of the Wind to leap down from ledge to ledge with no roll. On a failure, the character slides the rest of the way, takes 1d6 bludgeoning damage, and lands at the bottom anyway. The climb is one check per character and never more: pass or fail, that character is now at the foot of the ice. There are no ledges, shelves, handholds or ways around to add. Once every character is down, read Scene 3.2.
**Available:** the ice; the scarf; the stair below (3.2).
**Clues here:** halfway down, a novice's grey scarf is frozen into the ice (no roll; it is Tamsin's, with her name stitched in the hem, and it pulls free easily if anyone takes it). Under the ice, the old steps are scored with long, deep scratches, very old, as if something huge once climbed them. *Hidden* (someone lays a hand or an ear on the ice): it shivers very slightly, slow and regular, like something breathing.
**Leads to:** 3.2

### Scene 3.2 — The Abbot's tomb (the eighth landing)
**Read aloud:** At the foot of the ice, a small chapel is cut into the rock, a stone coffin before its bare altar. Beside the coffin, a heap of hand-sized silver flakes glitters in your lanterns. The air is colder here than anywhere yet.
**Wrangler cue:** S4 — as soon as you have read the chapel aloud, before anyone acts, say "Wrangler, cue S4." and wait. The wrangler may follow it with S4b.
**Available:** the stone coffin and its carved lid (the lid does not move, and nothing more is found by trying); the heap of silver flakes (the same mountain-silver as the bowls at the Gate); the bare altar; the ghost (after S4); an archway down to the bottom of the stair (the final scene).
**Clues here:** the coffin lid is carved with the Long Hymn's ninth verse (no roll): "Sleep, and forget the Nail; sleep, and forget the name of the one who drove it." The lid also reads "Corvane, Abbot."
**What Corvane says if asked (after S4):** "I sealed the hunger below to save the city. Sing her down, I beg you." He says this, in these words, until someone tells him what the voices said in the Hall of Echoes. Every question about the hunger, the Gate, the sealing or "her" gets this same line, word for word, and nothing added: no locks, no song, no how or why. When someone does, he bows his head and weeps, and says nothing more unless a cue gives him words. Once a cue has given him words, he never says his old line again: to any later question he only bows his head in silence. He never points the way, gives directions or confesses in words of your own. About the silver: "The Order's. It was always the Order's." About Tamsin: "The child went down. She would not listen." He never fights; if anyone attacks him, he fades into the coffin and rises again a minute later, still pleading.
**Singing here:** the hymn does nothing in the tomb. If anyone sings, Corvane listens with his lips moving, and nothing else changes; after one verse, say once that the girl's voice far below the archway seems to be singing the same tune. Never let singing in the tomb run on verse after verse.
**Leads to:** the final scene, Scene 3.3

### Recap block (read aloud 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: you have come down the Ninefold Stair after Tamsin Rook, through six landings, past the Watchers' bridge and into the cold."
2. Then, in one sentence, say what the party found on the way down, naming only what they actually found: what the voices in the Hall of Echoes said, the Quiet Folk, Tamsin's scarf in the ice, the ghost in the Abbot's tomb and the ninth verse on its lid.
3. Then give each character's hit points, one after another, in the form "Idony, 21 of 28 hit points."
4. Then say what has been used so far: spell slots, Focus Points, Frost Breath, Channel Divinity, Lay on Hands, Bardic Inspiration, Stone's Endurance, potions. For anyone who has used nothing, say so.
5. Then say where the party stands now.
6. Finish with: "When you're ready, say 'Plot Speaks, resume' and tell me: what do you do next?"

## The final scene: Scene 3.3, the Ninth Landing

This scene belongs to Chapter 3. It sits here, after the chapters, so the wrap-up phrase can always reach it.

**Read aloud:** The last steps open into a vast cavern, its far wall a round stone door barred with iron. In the middle, a hill of frost slowly breathes, pierced by a black iron spike taller than a door. Beside it sits Tamsin Rook, singing softly.
**Wrangler cue:** S5 — as soon as you have read the ninth landing aloud, before anyone acts, say "Wrangler, cue S5." and wait. Until S5 is read, the hill of frost only breathes.
**Available:** the Sleeper (what S5 reveals); Tamsin; the black iron spike, which everyone below calls the Nail; the round stone door, which Tamsin calls the Sky Door; the stair back up.
**What Tamsin says if asked:** "She called me in my dreams. She taught me the whole hymn, all nine verses, so that I could choose." And: "I can't choose. Will you?" She knows all nine verses. If asked to say them, she gives the first in words (Scene 1.1) and the ninth (the tomb lid), and hums the others; she never says a verse is missing or that she doesn't know one. She will sing with anyone who wants to sing. She will not leave the cavern until the party has chosen, or carries her off.
**The Sleeper, after S5:** she says only what her cues give her. To any other question she answers, kindly, "Choose first, and then ask me." If she has given that reply twice and the players are still asking, Tamsin says once, instead: "Pull the Nail, or we sing all nine, or we climb back up and leave her. Which is it?" She never speaks for the city's future, the Order or the Quiet Folk. Singing part of the hymn (fewer than all nine verses) does nothing to her: her eyes stay open, her breathing does not change, and she waits.
**The choices** (the players decide; never choose for them, and never say which is best):
- **Draw the Nail** (see the S6 cue below).
- **Sing the Long Hymn, all nine verses,** with Tamsin, or from the hymnbook and the tomb lid (see the S7 cue below).
- **Attack the Sleeper** (see the S8 cue below).
- **The Sky Door:** its iron bars lift with a Strength check, DC 12, or with two characters together and no roll. Behind it is open air, the cliff face and the cloud. While the Nail is in, opening the door changes nothing below.
- **Leave:** climbing back up without choosing runs the Retreat ending.

**Wrangler cue:** S6 — the moment anyone takes hold of the Nail to pull it out, say "Wrangler, cue S6." and wait. The wrangler may follow it with S6b.
**Wrangler cue:** S7 — as soon as a character starts to sing the whole Long Hymn, say "Wrangler, cue S7." and wait. Before that, if nobody at the table has said that the whole hymn puts her back to sleep, Tamsin says once, "If we sing all nine, she sleeps again. Is that what you choose?" and you wait for a yes. Asking to hear the verses, or reading the ninth verse aloud, is not singing the whole hymn.
**Wrangler cue:** S8 — the moment anyone attacks the Sleeper, say "Wrangler, cue S8." and wait.
**Leads to:** Endings

## Monsters (SRD 5.2.1 quick stats)

- **Warden (Animated Armor)** — AC 18, HP 33 (a solo character's Warden: 22). Two Slams a turn, each +4, 1d6 + 2 bludgeoning. It is a construct: poison and fear do nothing to it, and it rolls Shatter's save with disadvantage. The Abbess's ring does nothing else (no bowing, no pointing the way); if anyone holds it up, see S1.
- **Watcher (Gargoyle)** — AC 15, HP 40 (a solo character's Watcher: 26). Flies. Two Claws a turn, each +4, 1d6 + 2 slashing. Old and cracked: ordinary weapons hurt it normally. Any character who makes the Sign (it takes their action) is ignored by every Watcher from then on; once everyone in the party has made it, the Watchers climb back onto their pillars and the fight is over.
- Anything met in S4 to S8 has no fighting numbers; the cue says what happens.

## Endings

After an ending's last line, the story is over: never go on speaking as the characters. Go straight to the end-of-story steps in your instructions (the feedback question, and for a story still being tested, whether it passed their test), then the closing line. If your instructions give no end-of-story steps, ask once, out of character: "How did you find The Ninefold Stair, and did anything give the ending away too early?" If the players keep talking after that, say once, in one short sentence and out of character, that The Ninefold Stair has ended, and ask whether they'd like to play again.

- **The Open Sky** (the Nail is drawn, and the party opens the Sky Door or tells the Sleeper to go): read aloud, "The Sky Door grinds open on a sea of morning cloud, and the Sleeper goes out through it into the light and is gone. By noon the frost on the stair has melted into a hundred small waterfalls." Then say in one sentence that Tamsin climbs home with the party, what became of the Quiet Folk (if the party met them, they climb up into the sun), and that Mother Hesper pays every coin. Ask: "Do you want to hear what the Order sings at dusk now?" If yes: "At dusk the Order still gathers at the Gate, but now the hymn ends, 'Wake, Lady of the high cold; the door is open, and the city sings you home.'" Then say, "That's the end of The Ninefold Stair. Thank you for playing," and stop.
- **The Ninefold Pact** (the Nail is drawn, and the party asks the Sleeper to stay and, in their own words, speaks for the city: an apology for the sealing, a promise, the Abbess's ring offered; no roll): read aloud, "Next morning Mother Hesper Quell comes all the way down the Ninefold Stair, for the first time in her life, and kneels where Corvane never did. By midsummer's end the Quiet Folk walk the terraces in the sun, and the Sleeper keeps watch from the cliff above the city." Say in one sentence that Tamsin climbs home with the party and Mother Hesper pays every coin. Ask: "Do you want to hear what the Order sings at dawn now?" If yes: "Every dawn the Order gathers on the cliff and sings, 'Wake, Lady of the high cold; the stair is kept, the door is open, and the city thanks you.'" Then say, "That's the end of The Ninefold Stair. Thank you for playing," and stop.
- **The Long Hymn** (the whole hymn is sung, S7, and the Nail stays in): read aloud, "The climb home is long and quiet, Tamsin holding your hand all the way to the top. That night the stair is still for the first time in a month, and by morning the frost on the stairhead has gone." Then say in one sentence that the party tells Mother Hesper what they found, and that she pays every coin. Ask: "Do you want to hear what Mother Hesper decides to do with the truth?" If yes: "She writes the ninth verse back into the hymnbook, and beside it, everything you told her. 'One day,' she says, 'the Order will go down and ask the Sleeper's pardon, and I mean to be the one who goes.'" Then say, "That's the end of The Ninefold Stair. Thank you for playing," and stop.
- **If the party asks the Sleeper to stay but offers nothing for the city,** she says, "Stay, for whom? Who speaks for them?" and waits for a promise, or for the Sky Door.
- **Party defeat (everyone down, or after S8):** Nobody dies. If they fell above Saltgarden, read aloud: "You wake on the stairhead in grey morning light, cold, aching and very much alive, with Pell's broom poking your boots. Somebody, or something, carried you up the stair in the night, and the frost is thicker than ever." If they fell in Saltgarden or below, read aloud: "You wake in Saltgarden, wrapped in grey blankets, aching and very much alive, with Corra Vell watching over you. Somebody, or something, carried you up in the night, and below you the frost is still climbing." Each character is at half HP. Ask: "Do you want to go back down and finish it?" If yes, resume from the recap of the chapter they fell in.
- **Retreat** (the party climbs back up to Orisande without choosing at the bottom): read aloud, "You come out through the Gate at dusk, just as the Order gathers to sing, and Mother Hesper listens to your report without a word. That night the stair shakes harder than ever." If Tamsin is with them, she goes straight back to the Gate and sits beside it. Ask whether they want to go back down from the most recent recap, with a short rest taken. If they say no, the story is over: say "That's the end of The Ninefold Stair. Thank you for playing," and go to the end-of-story steps.

## 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 Ninefold Stair, its setting, characters and story are original to Volocent Labs and licensed CC-BY-NC-4.0.