The Rat Tower, A Folk Legend of Almor

This legend and adventure were inspired by a German folk tale I read somewhere once. The story of a wicked ruler who treats his subjects cruelly and gets his comeuppence is the stuff of peasant lore. While the legend is in a form I would call complete the adventure definitely needs some work.

Mike and Eliz. If you are reading this STOP RIGHT NOW!!!

There was a Prelate of Almor, Crabul by name, who came to rule that land during the “Turmoil Between Crowns” (437 CY). Though he held a priestly office, Crabul was a wicked man, more concerned with satisfying his greed than with the material and spiritual well-being of his flock.
He starved the peasants to stuff his storehouses with grain, taxed them unmercifully to fill his coffers, and abducted their fair daughters to sate his beastly lust. And when they had been reduced to landless vagabonds, he had a great hall built of wood, and invited a multitude of the peasant masses to a feast, locking the doors behind them and setting fire to the hall, where they all perished.
That night would be the last good sleep Prelate Crabul would ever have, for when he awoke the next morning his servants told him with alarm how an army of rats had appeared in the night and begun eating the rich fields of grain around his estate. Soon another servant came and reported that the rats had moved on to the granaries. The next servant to appear was followed by a swarm of the creatures which poured into the hall. The wicked Prelate ran for his life, making it to the docks and his waiting barge just before the living tide.
He laughed and mocked them as his ship landed him at a fortified tower on a rocky islet in the middle of the Harp River, but when he awoke in the morning it was to a sight that chilled his blood. The rats had formed a living bridge from one bank of the river, stretching to the rock upon which the tower stood, and swarming across was the remainder of the horde. Soon they covered the rock and began climbing the slippery tower walls, pouring in through the arrow slits and windows on the upper floors.
When the next morning dawned the rats were gone. A group of fishermen rowed over to the tower and knocked in the sally port of the great door, and on the top floor of the tower, among the bones of his servants, they found the skeleton of Prelate Crabul, stripped clean of flesh, still clad in his rich robes of office.
Since that day the tower has been named the Rat Tower, and is used to hold a surplus of grain, held in trust by the current Prelate, to feed the peasantry if there is ever a bad harvest. But no guard is stationed there, for the ghost of Crabul is said to haunt the tower each night, staggering through its halls as a swarm of ghostly rats cover his body, eating his flesh while he screams for mercy that will never come.

A Short Adventure Plot for The Rat Tower - The tower is located several miles upriver from the city of Chathold, and is used as a granary to house surplus wheat for the large estate which is personally owned by the Prelate. Once a year, after harvest, farmers and fishermen from the fief’s villages are employed to replace the previous years store (if unused) with fresh grain and distribute the surplus that they have taken out back to the local villages. This always is done in as little time as possible, since the tower is commonly known to be haunted. The only guard on the island is a large group of cats who are regularly fed by local fishermen who simply dump some of their catch on the shore of the rocky island every few days. The cats seem to do a decent job of keeping the toll taken by vermin on the grain supply to a minimum.
Harvest time is reaching its conclusion and the Factor who runs the Prelate’s estate is getting the annual grain transfer organized. It has been drawn to his attention by the fishermen who feed the cats that their offerings have been rotting on the shore for the last week. The Factor is concerned that something may be amiss in the tower, but cannot find any locals brave enough to investigate. For this reason he has a hired a small group of adventurers in Chathold to check out the situation. A fisherman and his son have been hired to row the party out to the island and wait for them to signal to be picked up.
Unknown to all parties a cloaker has taken up residence in the tower and has eaten the cats. Besides that creature the tower is still haunted by the ghost of the Prelate Crabul.