Having caught our breath – we proceed stealthily up the corridor. There are no more chambers until we reach the bridge over the stream, where I spot a goblin sentry again. My aim is poor in the dim light though and the shaft misses. Fortunately he rushes towards me and I make short work of him with my sword.
Concerned that his battle-cry may have alerted his comrades, we move forwards, but become aware of the noise of a waterfall up ahead. Slowing down, as the sound may have masked his cry, we peer round the corner, into another cavern. There are two pools of water at the base of the waterfall, held back by low stone walls. One has been breached – obviously the source of the flood that almost swept us away. Three goblins are waiting, but seem oblivious of our presence. Elaina, Aramil and I draw our bows and step out, each aiming to kill one of the three goblins. Aramil and my arrows strike true, but Elaina misses and her goblin runs from the room. We pursue, before it can alert the bugbear, up some stairs and into a larger cavern – we are too late to catch it before it alerts the others.
The cavern is full of loot, and we can see three goblins cowering behind it. To our right are some stalagmites, and a growling noise coming from behind them. A deep voice booms out, asking us who dares to approach Klarg. I start to offer a chance for him to surrender, but suddenly a wolf leaps past the stalagmites and attacks us. I hit it with an arrow as it charges, and its jaws fail to grip on my leather vambraces. A swift slice from Elaina then finishes it off. Garret performs another incantation and the three goblins fall into a deep slumber. We then hear a scuffling noise from behind the stalagmites, and guess that Klarg is attempting to escape via the shaft into the wolf stable that we saw before. Instantly, Aramil, Elaina and Sildar rush out of the cave and down the passage along the stream, to try and block him off from escaping. I rush past the stalagmites and see him climbing down the shaft – I fire an arrow before he disappears out of sight and hit him.
The others rush down the passageway and reach the entrance to the wolf-cave before he reaches the bottom of the shaft – we have him trapped. He rushes to meet us, and with a single blow smashes Elaina against the wall, knocking her unconscious. Aramil and Sildar are momentarily panicked by the ease with which he dispatched Elaina, but press their attacked anyway. Garrett takes the opportunity to deploy his bardic wit and invective against the bugbear, and Klarg is obviously unsettled by it as his next attack is mistimed and misses, allowing Aramil to land a hefty blow on him. Meanwhile I have jumped down the shaft myself, and attack him from the rear. My sword thrust runs him clean through, and he slumps to the ground.
In the cavern above we find a small amount of money (about 30 gp each in total) and some restorative potions, as well as a lot of bulky trade goods they have been looting. We carry this, load by load, back to the wagon, which takes the rest of the afternoon.
7th day of Tarsakh
Next day we return to Phandalin, and restore the looted trade goods to their rightful owner, Halia Thornberry. She is grateful, but continues the longstanding local tradition of complaining about the Redbrands. We agree that they are a local menace, and she offers to pay us some more money if we can capture their leader, Glasstaff, a human wizard, and capture any correspondence he has. We agree to investigate, but decide that dinner and a bed beckon for the moment at the Stonehill Inn. As we step out of the trade store though, we are confronted by 4 ruffians in red cloaks who tell us that we are not welcome in Phandalin. We protest that we are not looking for trouble, but they reach for their swords. We draw first and each strike at our opponents, severely wounding three of them and killing one. Garrett then once again uses his incantation to put them to sleep, and they fall to the ground. We bind them and take them, with an encouraging crowd, to the Town Hall. There we are met by Harvin Wester, the Mayor, who seems a thoroughly weaselly character. I suspect that he will release them the moment our backs are turned – he seems more annoyed with us for antagonizing them, than please that we have eliminated some vagabonds. Sildar however, steps forward, and reveals that he has been sent by the Lord’s Alliance to bring some order to Phandalin, and that he will be taking over that responsibility from Harvin. Harvin seems relieved to be handing responsibility for keeping order to someone else, and invites Sildar to take them into custody and look after them. Satisfied that Sildar won’t be on their side, we retire to the Stonehill Inn for a well deserved drink and meal to celebrate our new found abilities. Unfortunately Garrett still doesn’t seem to be able to hold his ale.
