Opening credits play over: Transylvania 1887
🎬 Opening Credits: Melodic War Productions presents
🕯️ 0:00–0:08 | Title Reveal: The Lantern Leads
A single lantern swings from a crooked post at the edge of a forest path—its flame steady despite the mist. Beneath it, bootprints fade into damp earth. Ribbons tied to skeletal trees flutter like warning flags. A deck of cards lies scattered, half-buried in leaves. The screen exhales: BAROVIA, etched into a moss-covered milestone. The camera pans to a new signpost: Old Bonegrinder – 3 miles.
🌲 0:09–0:20 | The Road Narrows
The forest leans inward. Branches claw at the sky. A Vistani wagon rolls past, its lanterns casting dancing shadows on bark that seems to flinch. Ravens fly overhead, then vanish into the canopy. A hand—weathered, ringed, trembling—reaches into frame and turns over a card nailed to a tree: The Broken One. A charm of bone and braid dangles from the signpost, spinning faster than the wind allows.
🚶♂️ 0:21–0:33 | The Travelers Move Forward
The wanderers walk the road, each step echoing with memory:
Fleetwood (Richard Armitage) walks apart, eyes scanning the treeline for threats that never quite show themselves.
Clarion (Gwendoline Christie) strides ahead, cloak billowing like stormclouds, gaze fixed on something unseen.
Silverleaf (Tatiana Maslany) trails her fingers along the bark, whispering to the raven that follows them.
Felonious (Ben Whishaw) mutters incantations under his breath, the air around him shimmering faintly.
Greegan (Matt Ryan) rolls his bone dice as he walks—they clatter against stone, revealing The Marionette and The Horseman.
Ireena Kolyana (Tamsin Mackenzie) walks behind them, her cloak drawn tight, eyes fixed on the spirit mirror slung across her back.
Starring
Richard Armitage as Fleetwood
Gwendoline Christie as Clarion
Tatiana Maslany as Silverleaf
Ben Whishaw as Felonious
Matt Ryan as Greegan
Tamsin Mackenzie as Ireena Kolyana
With:
Tilda Swinton as Morgantha
🃏 0:34–0:46 | The Hag’s Hand
A pastry falls from a basket—perfect, steaming, untouched. A child’s hand reaches for it. The forest recoils.
The camera pans upward: a woman in a plum shawl stands at the edge of the road. Her smile is warm. Her eyes are not.
Morgantha (Tilda Swinton) watches the party pass. She does not speak. She does not blink.
Behind her, the windmill turns—slow, deliberate, and wrong.
🕯️ 0:47–0:58 | The Fortunes Shift
The scattered cards rise from the ground, spinning in midair. Five remain suspended: The Broken One, The Horseman, The Innocent, The Marionette, The Darklord. As each is drawn, the forest reacts—leaves fall upward, shadows stretch, a distant howl pierces the silence. Behind the cards, Strahd’s silhouette flickers like a mirage—never present, always watching.
🎵 0:59–1:10 | Final Note: Bonegrinder Looms
The party crests a hill. Below: the windmill looms crooked against the sky, its sails turning against the wind. The final card lands in Silverleaf’s hand: The Artifact. The forest hushes. Even the ravens stop cawing. Fog curls into the shape of a door, then dissipates.
The road continues… But the destination is no longer in question.
🎼 Main Title by Alan Silvestri
COLD OPEN BEGINS:
EXT. OLD BONEGRINDER – Evening
Background Music: Old Bonegrinder | Unofficial Curse of Strahd Soundtrack | Dark Ambient TTRPG Dungeon Music | Loop
The party approaches in silence. The windmill looms, crooked against the bruised sky. Its sails hang limp. The door yawns open.
Effigies line the path—straw heads, stitched eyes, arms outstretched like they’re waiting to be chosen.
IREENA: (softly) “They’re not guarding the road. They’re watching the house. Like something inside might move.”
FLEETWOOD: “Then we move faster.”
One by one, they pass between the effigies. No attack comes. But every head turns slightly in the breeze.
Not protecting.
Not threatening.
Just witnessing.
🎬 The windmill waits.
🎬 SCENE: “Sweet Dreams and Scars” — Ground Floor, Old Bonegrinder, Nevyar 6, Evening
INT. OLD BONEGRINDER – NIGHT
The party steps through the half-ajar door.
The windmill groans—wood, stone, memory.
The air thickens. Sugar-sweet. Suffocating.
Walls twitch when no one’s looking.
And then— the illusions begin.
🎶 [Cue music: Marilyn Manson - Sweet Dreams ( Are Made Of This ) - Official Audio HD
💫 FLEETWOOD
The bakery warps. The scent of pie curdles into leather oil and ink.
He’s back in his father’s study. The journal Morgantha showed him lies open—its pages filled with blame.
A voice behind him. Familiar. Wrong.
FATHER: (O.S.) “You should’ve read deeper, Hawk. All that pride. Prancing, preening…And still you missed the warning.”
Fleetwood turns. A mirror reflects him—bloodied, armored, broken.
The journal bursts into ash.
💫 CLARION
She’s beneath a blanket fort. Candlelight flickers. Her brother’s toy soldier rests in her lap—whole.
A voice hums outside.
BROTHER: (O.S.) “I’m not gone. You just left me in the wrong story.”
The tent begins to fold inward. Slow. Crushing.
The toy soldier melts— Now it’s a tiny version of the infant Walter, revealing a hollow core filled with teeth.
Clarion gasps. The music rises.
💫 FELONIOUS
White stone floors. A sterile arcane library. Scrolls sealed in glass.
Every book bears his name. None open.
A voice behind a veil.
BARGLE : (O.S.) “You chased brilliance. All you caught was echo. Tell me, Felonious—how many names have you carved just to be remembered?”
A parchment floats before him. Blank.
He can’t remember how to write.
💫 SILVERLEAF
A grove. Her clan’s sanctuary. But the trees are blackened. The crest bleeds from the bark.
Her mother’s voice murmurs.
MOTHER: (O.S.) “I gave you protection. You gave it to a curse.”
A stone altar. Her crest—shattered beneath a hag’s claw.
The forest whispers her true name.
It sounds wrong now.
💫 GREEGAN
A cell. Rusted bars. Iron Ring insignia painted in blood and laughter.
Lyren sits across from him. Whole. Smiling.
LYREN: “You walked out. I burned.”
The door opens. Morgantha stands in a guard’s uniform. Clipboard in hand.
MORGANTHA: “You’ve been promoted. Just give me another name.”
Greegan looks at his hand. The ink already bleeds.
💫 IREENA
A ballroom. Chandeliers. Velvet gowns. Music that doesn’t echo.
She’s dancing—with Strahd.
STRAHD: “Your heartbeat isn’t yours. It was mine first. And it still is.”
Her reflection blinks. Her body doesn’t.
🎶 Sweet dreams are made of this…
One by one, the party feels it.
The windmill grins.
🎬 SCENE: “The Defender’s Rebuke”
Illusionary Library of Shame — Windmill, First Floor — Nevyar 6, Evening
Ash swirls around Fleetwood’s boots. The voice echoes—each “Failed” punctuated by a warped chuckle, deeper now, like something rotting in laughter.
Across the desk, the mirror version leans in—bloodied, broken, a parody of protection.
MIRRORED FLEETWOOD: “Pathetic. Always the martyr. Always the shadow behind the spotlight. Even your so-called friends pity you. Even Clarion. You just don’t know it.”
🎥 Fleetwood bows his head. Shoulders tremble.
But not from defeat.
The laugh begins—low, wry, like steel catching flame.
He lifts his gaze. Eyes bright. Brimming.
FLEETWOOD: “You really don’t know me.”
He steps forward, through the illusion’s lines.
FLEETWOOD (CONT’D): “I don’t fight for pride. I fight because someone has to stand in the way. Whether they ask or not. Whether they thank me or not.”
The ghost-voice falters.
Fleetwood’s laugh turns quiet. Dangerous.
FLEETWOOD (CONT’D): “I don’t care if they curse my name. I care that I’m between them and you.”
He draws his blade—not to strike, but to anchor.
FLEETWOOD (CONT’D): “And if you want them…”
He straightens. Solid. Unshaken.
FLEETWOOD (CONT’D): “Then come through me.”
🎭 The mirror cracks. The shadow flickers—then crumbles.
🎶 The music stutters. Warps.
Then cuts—like conviction slicing through illusion.
Fleetwood stands alone.
But never isolated.
Illusion Space – Old Bonegrinder – Nevyar 6, Nightfall
The blanket fort is perfect.
Too perfect.
Clarion sits cross-legged on a nest of pillows, the candlelight warm and flickering. The toy soldier rests in her lap—pristine, untouched by ash or time. The tapestries around her shimmer with childhood patterns: stars, wolves, the crest of her house.
A lullaby hums from nowhere.
MORGANTHA (O.S.): “You were safe here. You were loved. You could be again.
The candle flares.
Clarion remembers her wedding day. Her hands in Fleetwood’s. His gentle smile. Felonious and Silverleaf standing by. Greegan toasting with a stolen drink.
CLARION: “I am loved.”
The toy soldier lifts its head.
TOY SOLDIER: (softly) “Stay. We’ll protect you this time.”
Clarion’s hand trembles.
She closes her eyes.
🎭 The illusion holds its breath.
She opens them.
And speaks.
CLARION: “You didn’t protect me.”
She lifts the toy soldier—
—and places it outside the candle’s glow.
Its paint begins to peel.
The lullaby distorts.
CLARION (CONT’D): “You made me forget what I survived.”
She stands.
The blanket fort begins to unravel. The tapestries fray. The candle gutters.
MORGANTHA (O.S.): “You could be whole. You could be beautiful.”
CLARION: “I am whole. And I am enough. Because I remember.”
🎥 The illusion collapses.
The toy soldier cracks.
Clarion walks through the ash, cloak trailing behind her, eyes forward.
She does not look back.
🎬 SCENE: “Iron in the Blood”
Greegan’s Illusion Cell — Windmill, First Floor — Nevyar 6, Deep Evening
The walls sweat memory. Rust runs like old wine down stone and steel. The Iron Ring insignia pulses—sharp as knives, loud as guilt.
Lyren leans forward from the cot. Shadow-shaped. Grin gleaming like a broken coin.
LYREN: “Still a thief. Still a killer. Still wearing that smile that gets you close before the knife lands. You’d sell every one of your so-called friends for a bit of shine, wouldn’t you?”
The air thickens—choking on its own accusations.
GREEGAN: (teeth clenched) “Not anymore.”
Morgantha looms in the doorway. Guard’s uniform crisp. Clipboard dangling. Teeth just visible beneath a centuries-old smirk.
MORGANTHA: “Promotion’s yours. Just give me another name.” She holds a bag of jingling silver pieces. Thirty, perhaps.
🎥 Greegan straightens. Slowly.
Turns to Morgantha—not Lyren now, but the hag beneath the mask.
Eyes narrow. Grin sharpens.
GREEGAN: “You made one slip-up, Granny.”
The cell flickers. Clipboard wilts. Insignias crack.
GREEGAN (CONT’D): “You showed me you.”
He rolls his shoulders. Leather and iron scrape against memory.
The illusion hesitates.
GREEGAN (CONT’D): “And I am not in a regrettin’ mood.”
He draws his blade—not dreaming it. Deciding it.
GREEGAN (CONT’D): “I’m in a stabbin’ mood.”
💥 The walls explode into ash. Lyren gone. Morgantha’s shadow dissolves into spark and mist. The Iron Ring sigils shatter like cursed glass.
Greegan walks forward. Slow. Real.
GREEGAN (CONT’D): “They already had my worst years. They don’t get the ones I’ve still got breath in. And neither do you.”
The windmill shudders.
🎬 SCENE: “The Grove That Was”
Illusion Space – Old Bonegrinder – Nevyar 6, Nightfall
The forest is perfect.
Too perfect.
Silverleaf stands in the grove of her childhood—trees tall and unburned, the air rich with birdsong and the scent of elderflower. Her clan’s crest glows from the bark of every tree, pulsing like a heartbeat.
Her mother’s voice drifts through the leaves.
MOTHER (O.S.) : “You were safe here, gwinig. You were loved. You could be again.
A stone altar rises from the moss. Upon it: a new crest, whole and gleaming. No claw marks. No blood.
MORGANTHA (O.S.): “Take it. Forget the fire. Forget the curse.”
Silverleaf steps forward.
Her hand hovers over the crest.
🎭 The illusion holds its breath.
She closes her eyes.
And listens.
Not to the birdsong.
But to the silence beneath it.
To the absence.
To the lie.
Her eyes snap open.
SILVERLEAF: “This grove burned. My Naneth burned.”
She lifts her hand—
—and crushes the crest.
It shatters like glass. The altar cracks. The trees begin to bleed.
SILVERLEAF (CONT’D): “You don’t get to rewrite what I survived.”
The forest flickers. The birdsong warps. The air turns cold.
Morgantha’s voice twists.
MORGANTHA (O.S.): “You could have been whole. You could have been loved.”
SILVERLEAF: “I am who I am… because I remember.”
🎥 The illusion collapses.
Ash falls like snow.
Silverleaf stands in the ruin of her grove—burned, broken, real.
She kneels.
Places her cracked crest on the altar.
Not to restore.
To honor.
🎶 The windmill groans.
But Silverleaf does not.
🎬 SCENE: “The Choice Unburied”
Ground Floor — Old Bonegrinder — Nevyar 6, Nightfall
The air hums—like dying stars. Resonant with recovered truths, bitter strength, and shattered illusion.
Each of them stands clearer now.
Heavier. But sharper.
Then— a sound like silk tearing.
🎭 Ireena gasps.
Her dagger clatters to the floor, unused.
The ballroom melts—chandeliers to cobwebs, velvet to rot. Strahd’s silhouette fades like smoke too desperate to hold shape.
She stands amid the remains of a false past.
Eyes wide. Chest heaving. Steady.
IREENA: “I’m not her.”
She touches her chest. Not in fear. In affirmation.
IREENA (CONT’D): “I say who I am, not anyone else… not you. I choose to be me.”
🎥 Silence greets her. Reverent. The others reappear at her side.
Fleetwood softens. Silverleaf nods. Clarion steps closer. Greegan gives a half-smile, all grit. Felonious mutters—
FELONIOUS: “Good.”
It carries weight.
The windmill groans again.
But now, they’re not walking into horror.
They’re walking in as themselves.
And whatever Morgantha throws next—
They’ll throw themselves right back.
🎬 SCENE: “Ash and Crust”
Old Bonegrinder – Ground Floor – Nevyar 6, Nightfall
The cursed bakery awakens.
Ovens thrum with heat that never burned clean. Fruit pies pulse on the shelves, crusts rising and falling like lungs. The scent of sugar thickens—then curdles into something older. Something wrong.
The walls twitch.
The floor groans.
And then—
Morgantha descends.
Her silhouette stretches across the warped beams. Her daughters flank her—Ophelia and Bella—eyes gleaming, mouths already whispering spells.
🎭 The party draws weapons. No speeches. Just instinct.
⚔️ The Fight Begins
Background Music: Fighting the Hags | Unofficial Curse of Strahd Soundtrack | Dark TTRPG Combat Music | Loop
Fleetwood intercepts Morgantha’s first strike, shield raised, blade flashing. Her claws rake across his armor, sparks flying.
Clarion hurls a vial of holy water—Ophelia shrieks as it sears her shoulder.
Felonious chants, scrolls burning in his hands—arcane light slams into Bella, sending her crashing into the flour sacks.
Silverleaf summons vines from the cracked floorboards—binding Morgantha’s legs, slowing her retreat.
Greegan rolls beneath the table, daggers flashing—he slashes at ankles, dodging curses and claws.
🎶 The pies begin to sing. A lullaby in reverse. Sweet dreams unraveling.
🩸 Ireena Falls
She lunges toward Morgantha—dagger drawn, eyes blazing.
But Bella’s claws catch her mid-stride.
Ireena stumbles. Blood blooms across her side. She drops to one knee, breath ragged.
FLEETWOOD: “Ireena!”
CLARION: “Get her out!”
Silverleaf moves to shield her. Felonious casts a ward. Greegan doesn’t look back.
💥 Morgantha Turns Ethereal
She begins to fade—her form flickering, slipping between planes. Greegan moves in, blades gleaming, eyes narrowing. He lunges toward her, and she backhands him away.
FLEETWOOD: “She’s escaping!”
FELONIOUS: “Not again—not without the hagstone!”
But then— Silverleaf’s vines pulse with radiant energy. Felonious’s spell anchors the room. Clarion’s voice cuts through the illusion.
CLARION: “You don’t get to vanish. Not this time.” Her mace collides with Morgantha’s claw. The nails break.
Morgantha screams—her Ethereal shift fails. Her body snaps back into the material plane, bloodied, gasping.
🐺 Strahd’s Wolves Arrive
The windmill shudders.
A low howl echoes through the rafters.
From the broken windows, ethereal wolves pour in—smoke-bodied, red-eyed, silent.
They don’t attack the party.
They go for the hags.
Morgantha shrieks. Ophelia and Bella scramble to her side, dragging her toward the door.
MORGANTHA: (at Greegan) “Thief! You will regret this.”
GREEGAN: “Already do. But not for the reasons you think.”
The wolves close in—teeth bared, forms flickering.
The hags vanish into the storm, Morgantha nearly dead, borne away by her daughters.
🎬 SCENE: “Aftermath”
Background Music: Shadows of Dread | Unofficial Curse of Strahd Soundtrack | 1h Thematic Combat Music | Loop
Old Bonegrinder – Interior – Minutes Later
The party stands amid the wreckage.
Fleetwood kneels beside Ireena, pressing cloth to her wound. She winces, but nods.
IREENA: “I’m… still here.”
Felonious slumps against the wall, eyes scanning the debris.
FELONIOUS: “All that and we still didn’t get the hagstone…”
Greegan laughs—low, ragged, triumphant.
GREEGAN: “Call me a thief, will she?”
He holds up the stone—dark, pulsing, slick with something unspeakable.
GREEGAN (CONT’D): “Well, she ain’t wrong.” (He grins wider) “Don’t ask what I had to reach into to get that.”
🎶 The windmill creaks once more.
But it’s quieter now.
Not safe.
Just… emptied.
🎬 SCENE: “The Cost of Sweetness”
Interior – Old Bonegrinder – Nevyar 6, Night’s Edge
The battle is over.
The windmill groans in its bones. Its sails twitch like dying limbs. The air is thick with scorched flour, blood, and the fading sweetness of dream pastries—sugar masking rot.
The walls breathe. Exhaling centuries of cruelty.
Fleetwood staggers upright. One hand pressed to his ribs, the other gripping his sword like a crutch. His armor is cracked. His shoulder burns.
But his eyes—his eyes are clear now.
He scans the wreckage.
And sees it.
🪵 The truth of Old Bonegrinder.
Grindstones stained not with grain, but bone dust.
Pie tins stacked high—some still warm. Still humming.
A ledger in Morgantha’s hand. Names. Ages. Prices.
A splintered cabinet. Tiny shoes. Ribbons. A doll with no face.
FLEETWOOD: “No. Halav, please… no. Not this.”
Fleetwood runs through the ruin, searching.
FLEETWOOD: “Couldn’t protect them. Didn’t know… Dear Petra, they were eating them. Selling them and…” Tears stain his face. “And we didn’t know.”
CLARION: “Hawk, please. Don’t do this to yourself. Don’t… don’t let *them* win.”
Fleetwood finds a trapdoor beneath the oven.
It creaks open.
🎭 Below: a cellar. Cramped. Cold.
Straw bedding. Shackles bolted to stone.
A faint whimper.
Fleetwood drops to one knee.
FLEETWOOD: (hoarse, gentle) “It’s all right. You’re safe now.”
A child—no older than six—emerges from the dark. Eyes wide. Silent. Covered in flour and bruises.
Behind her, another. And another.
Three in total.
🎥 Fleetwood calls out.
Clarion rushes in, casting light.
Silverleaf kneels beside the children, whispering in Elvish.
Felonious conjures warmth.
Greegan guards the door.
Ireena weeps—quietly, steadily.
They came for a heartstone.
They found the cost of sweetness.
And now, they carry more than victory.
They carry witness.
🎬 SCENE: “Ownership and Oaths”
Interior – Old Bonegrinder – Nevyar 6, Midnight
The windmill lies in ruin.
Its ovens still glow faintly, as if reluctant to forget the heat of cruelty.
The party tends wounds. Gathers breath. The cursed heartstone rests in Silverleaf’s pack—heavy as truth.
Felonious stands apart. Fingers at his chin. Blood dots his collar. Magic crackles faintly across his shoulders—residue of defiance.
FELONIOUS (low): “It wasn’t charity. Not from Strahd.”
He paces. Once. Twice.
FELONIOUS (CONT’D): “Vampires don’t play savior. That wolf? That fire? That was a message.”
He glances up—toward the cracked ceiling, the mists beyond.
FELONIOUS (CONT’D) “She is mine…”
His gaze shifts to Ireena.
She sits near the hearth. Silent. Her hand rests on her shoulder.
Beneath the torn coat: a bite mark. Faded. Stubborn.
She holds it like a secret she can’t afford to forget.
FELONIOUS (CONT’D): “Not love. Not protection. Possession.”
He watches her. Long. Quiet.
FELONIOUS (CONT’D): “He didn’t save us. He intervened because someone else touched what he thinks he owns.”
The others are still.
Fleetwood watches the door. Sword across his lap.
Clarion kneels beside a child. Her charm flickers with soft light.
Greegan wraps Silverleaf’s arm, muttering curses under his breath.
Ireena doesn’t speak.
But her hand tightens over the bite.
🎶 The windmill creaks.
Not in menace.
In memory.
🎬 SCENE: “Ashes of the Past”
Exterior – Old Bonegrinder – Nevyar 6, Midnight
The windmill stands in moonlight like a wound torn open.
Its sails twitch in the cold wind, dripping soot from old crimes. The scarecrows have fallen quiet. Their stitched eyes no longer follow.
The children—rescued, silent—are bundled beneath Silverleaf’s cloak. Clarion and Fleetwood keep watch, their eyes scanning the dark, their hands steady. The children’s gazes are wide. But no longer empty.
A few feet away, Felonious and Silverleaf stand apart.
Arcane energy gathers between them like stormlight. They move without words—hands tracing sigils, dust swirling, breath syncing.
The spell is part destruction. Part benediction.
Fleetwood speaks—voice low, scraped raw.
FLEETWOOD: “You know what to do. Make sure they don’t come back here.”
🎭 The ritual begins.
Silverleaf draws her dagger, carving runes into the earth—the same script her mother once used to bless the grove.
Felonious unrolls a scroll of dissolution, humming a melody that doesn’t just break buildings—it undoes memory.
Fire begins not with flame, but with color.
Ghostlight slips from the cracks. The walls creak—like sighs escaping centuries of cruelty.
Then it ignites.
Old Bonegrinder burns.
Not like timber.
Like history rejecting itself.
A child watches the blaze. Her voice is barely a whisper.
CHILD: “Will the bad dreams come back?”
Clarion kneels beside her, offering the toy soldier—its sigil still intact.
CLARION: “Only if we forget why we fight.”
🎥 Felonious turns from the fire. His coat catches embers. His expression is carved from smoke and midnight.
FELONIOUS: “This was only half.”
FELONIOUS (CONT’D): “The rest begins in Vallaki— where sweet pastries bought silence… and evil wears polite smiles.”
Silverleaf nods.
SILVERLEAF: “Let’s see how quiet they are when truth knocks at their door.”
🎭 The party walks away.
Behind them, the windmill collapses.
Not just into ruin.
Into myth.
And in the valley, the mists whisper of heroes who remembered themselves—
and lit nightmares aflame.
End credits play over: Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams (1983)