No Sunshine Never Killed No Vampire
Delving down beneath the now-shattered stone desk leads us to a room with what look like coffins in them. And a vampire. And some vampire spawn. All looks pretty bleak, as we wonder who will be dominated by the undead monster, until he chooses our ranger as his target.
'Oh, okay. At least Afutavere won't be an additional threat when he fails his saving throw.' But he saves against the domination effect, and it's good that he does. It's not that the ranger would hurt us, but rather it turns out that he is the only one of us who can really harm the vampire.
The vampire has damage reduction except against silver and magic, where the attack must be made by a magical silver weapon to leave a lasting impression. Just magic or just silver won't do, as we find out. The paladin's ability to smite evil works for the limited times he can use it, but otherwise we only have magical weapons, or silver weapons. But not the ranger.
The ranger has a bunch of silver arrows, which when fired by his magical bow are also imbued with magical energy. Each attack strikes the vampire for its full damage, which combines with his hatred for undead and a newly found bow that also doesn't much like undead, and the vampire and his spawn are killed with surprisingly little fuss.
For the first time in the campaign the ranger shines. And with the vampire on the floor and unconscious we work out what to do to kill him permanently. We run a stake through his heart to prevent regeneration, then drag his body upstairs and out to the courtyard, so that he can bask in some deadly sunlight.
And as quickly as the ranger hits his stride he breaks it. 'Can we sing Ain't No Sunshine Where He's Gone?' No, no we can't, because that's exactly the opposite of what we're doing. Let's just hope there are more vampires to fight, so we can feel better about him again.