The Knights of the Spoon

3rd day of Mirtul

Having celebrated our success at Cragmaw Castle (and the Greengrass festival) with much revelry at Phandolin, we ask Gundrun to tell us where Wave Echo Cave is, which he willingly does.  It turns out to be surprisingly close to Phandalin after all.  We find the cave entrance without difficulty and venture in.  We find an encampment in the first cave, and the recently dead body of a dwarf, who we assume is the third of the dwarven brothers.  His boots prove interesting (I don’t remember why the sudden interest in footwear) and Garrett takes them upon discovering that they make him more fleet of foot and generally bouncy.  At least he should now be able to keep up with us.

At the far end of the cave is a large sinkhole, with a rope tied, which we descend.  Below we find a widened part of a long fissure, which we explore.  There is a warren of small tunnels running off it, which seems to be the long abandoned mine workings.  We find a round room with many long dead dwarves and orcs, obviously a relic of the fall of the mines long ago.  Beyoind this room we find a vast, fungi filled cavern, which we decide not to explore.  To the south we find several rooms – one has a collapsed ceiling and more skeletons, except these ones animate and attack us.  In another chamber we find an iron strongbox which we are unable to open.

Further north, we find another chamber where we are attacked by 3 ghouls.  We manage to defeat them without loss and penetrate further into a confusing maze of galleries.  We find some stairs going upwards and ascend into a huge chamber where we are attacked by seven ghouls.  This time Elaina is briefly paralyzed by one of them, but again we defeat them.  The central section of the cavern is lower, and we descend some steps, to find a banqueting chamber, again strewn with ancient dead.  Venturing down a cavern to the north, we reach an ancient forge, with more bodies, and a floating, green glowing skull.  Garrett casts an illusion to distract it, and we attempt to rush across the chamber while it is distracted, but the dwarves in there rise and shamble towards us.  The glowing skull also attacks us, firing fiery beams from its eye-sockets.  We are badly mauled, and retreat rapidly to the large chamber again.  We try to take a rest there, but notice another of those strange ceiling worms from Cragmaw on the ceiling, so decide to move on.  We return to the chamber where we killed the 3 ghouls and rest briefly there, before continuing exploring.

After a long period getting lost in the warren, we find another door, behind which I head voices talking in goblin.  We burst in, to find 5 bugbears in there.  The fight is vicious, and we are badly wounded again, but manage to kill three of them.  Garrett sleeps another one, and the final one surrenders.  We notice that the far door is barricaded, and he tells us that it is because there are zombies and a glowing skull beyond.  He also tells us that they serve the Black Spider, and that he is laired somewhere nearby.  We decide that we need to have a long period of rest and recuperation if possible in this chamber.

30th day of Trasakh

Having finished searching the hobgoblin quarters, we return to the store room and then quietly open the door on the other side.  It opens out into a chapel of some sort.  Three goblin priests are praying at an altar draped in black cloth, while two more watch out of arrow slits in the wall.  There are two curtained doorways on the right hand side.

Wanting to prevent the goblins from fleeing and raising the alarm, I am first to enter and run to the far doorway before the goblins can react.  The others block the other doorway, and the combat is short and bloody.  We examine the altar, and see three golden sacramental vessels on it.  It looks like this is the defiled shrine to Oghma!  I strip the black and bloody cloth off the altar, and keep the sacred ornaments.

Going through the curtains, we enter a high and ornately carved ante-chapel.  There is a font with a pile of charcoal in it – searching though it reveals ???something???.  However, our searching is interrupted when a strange beaked snake drops from the ceiling where it had been hiding.  The fight against this is hard work, and my blows don’t seem to have much effect, but in the end some mighty blows from Elaina finish it off.

Stealthily opening the far door, we see it opens out into the small courtyard we had previously observed from the secret door entrance.  We can see a single goblin dozing in there but are concerned there might be many more, so decide to lure it into the chapel to kill it subtly.  Garrett casts an illusion of a beckoning goblin and I try to imitate its voice to ask it to come and help me.  It wakes and comes over to us; we shut the door behind it and I dispatch it with a single blow.  We hear another goblin voice from the courtyard asking where it is though, so entice another goblin in and dispatch that as well.

Entering the courtyard, we peer through the curtain into the guardpost for the secret back door beyond.  There are only two goblins in there, so Garrett and I leap in on them and dispatch them before they can raise the alarm.  We then proceed to the king’s quarters, where we listen and hear various voices.  We decide to burst in, and confront a bugbear, a hobgoblin and a goblin – not the start of a bad dwarven joke but instead obviously the latest set of leaders.  The fight is again bloody, but we are getting good at honing our tactics with these humanoids now, attacking their weaknesses, so we quickly kill them, but not before sustaining significant damage ourselves.  We finish the last of our healing spells and are contemplating a rest, when there is a loud knocking at the door, and some hobgoblins demanding to know what is going on.  Our attempts to stall them and dismiss them fail, and they burst into the room.  There are four of them, and once again there is a bloody fight.  At the end of it, I am forced to drink my last two healing potions to get myself back into fighting form again.

We proceed through the curtain we never investigated before and find a hobgoblin barrack rather than the kitchen we expected.  Beyond this we find the room that they had obviously been keeping the owl bear in – on a fragment of floor high up we find some treasure.

At this point we are weary and bloodied but anxious to finish emptying the castle.  We decide to try and intimidate the remaining goblins, so gather up the heads of the chiefs we have just killed and take them with us.  The next room is a kitchen/refectory with a handful of goblins – we brandish the heads and tell them to leave and never return if they want to survive.  All of them do apart from the cook, and we rapidly reduce him to julienne strips.

Leaving the kitchen, we see that the main hall and gate has a number of goblins fleeing the castle – we do a final sweep and then rest on our swords, our labours here seemingly finished.  And all in time for the Greengrass festival as well.

30th day of Tarsakh

We deliberate on our next approach as we hike back to the cave to rest.  We decide that the disguise plan was a good one, it was just that I stuffed it up by resorting to violence too quickly.  I resist the urge to respond to the criticism by resorting to violence, and agree that we will try the plan again this evening.  This time, though, we decide that we will try the main gate.  My thoughts are that trying the secret entrance for a fourth time is so obvious that there is no way they could be expecting it, but I get voted down.  We decide that we need more intel though, so decide to ambush a patrol and capture a goblin to interrogate.

After resting, we scout around for a patrol and soon find one with two hobgoblins and four goblins.  We leap into action, in a slightly haphazard manner.  My first arrow goes seriously awry, and Garrett’s incantation only sends two of the goblins into a slumber.  We start to get our act together though, and reasonably rapidly dispatch the hobgoblins and one of the goblins.  The last goblin scarpers before we can catch him, using an unusual turn of speed.

We tie up the last two goblins and start asking them questions.  They are surprisingly co-operative, although maybe seeing the two dead hobgoblins and knowing of our reputation helps them.  In return for some food and their freedom they tell us that there are still lots of goblins, but relatively few hobgoblins and bugbears, and that there is no new authority figure to replace the king.  Black Spider is continuing to send them orders, but they are just mercenaries working for him.  They tell us that the main gate is guarded by sentries, but tell us the password.  They also warn us that after the main door there is a pit trap straight ahead, but the door to the north leads to the hobgoblins, and the door to the south to the goblins.  Pleased with this information we give them the coppers that we found on their dead comrades and tell them that they are free, but that if their information is wrong, we will hunt them down and kill them.

Having resting during the day, we return to Cragmaw Castle in disguise and with Garrett disguised as a captive.  He casts minor illusion to help our faces appear more hobgoblin-like.  We approach the main gate and are challenged for the password.  I return the phrase the goblins gave us, and we are let in – so far so good.  There is a brief exchange with the gate guards about our patrol, which I answer in a guttural snarl and then we proceed through the north door.

Beyond the north door, we find a storage chamber with spoilt food, which is obviously still being eaten.  We also find some bloodied chainmail and a sword, which we think might be Sildar’s, so we take it.  There is a door in the west wall, which we open.  Beyond is a barracks with four hobgoblins.  I start a conversation, mindful of the feedback from the rest of the party over the last attempt, and we find that there are very few of the hobgoblins left, very few bugbears, and that the owlbear was their secret weapon, which they are most annoyed that was released early.  We try to withdraw, but they are keen that we leave Garrett there, which doesn’t seem like a good idea.  The conversation continues in a desultory fashion (although they do mention that Black Spider lives in a cave), until the minor illusion wears off.  We see a look of confusion cross the faces of the hobgoblins, so we attack.  The fight is bloody, but we are victorious, although not before both Elaina and I take serious wounds from the hobgoblins, who seem to be hitting with much more vigour than before – they seem to have been training which is giving them some sort of martial advantage.  When the fight is over, we notice a cage of crows by the arrowslit – we surmise that this might be how Black Spider is communicating with the hobgoblins.  Maybe we can release one and follow it to see where it goes?  If only we had someone with a flying familiar…

28th day of Tarsakh

We set out once again for Cragmaw Castle, but this time we have a plan to try and sneak in disguised as hobgoblins, using the equipment from the ones we killed at the caves.

29th day of Tarsakh

We reach Cragmaw Castle again and approach the back door in the dark wearing our disguises, and pretending that Garrett is a captive.  We are not as silent as hoped in advancing and are challenged by a goblin sentry.  I attempt to bluff us in in goblin, but he insists that we must go in by the main gate.  In frustration I rip aside the curtain and attack him with my blades.  Unfortunately there is a second goblin who rushes out of the far door before we can stop him.  We kill the goblin and beat a hasty retreat, but are pursued from the castle.  We retreat through the forest westawards, but they are tracking us and we are not gaining on them.  Finally in desperation, we set up an ambush on the far side of a glade in the dark forest, climbing some trees.  Our pursuers enter the glade cautiously, obviously having sensed that we are no longer fleeing from us, as they never could have kept up with us if they had been this cautious crossing every glade.  They send in ten goblins to check the glade, and when they are half across, four hobgoblins and a bugbear also enter the glade.  Garrett casts faerie fire upon the bugbear, but it only affects two of the goblins and one of the hobgoblins.  Still the light from that is enough for us to start shooting as the goblins and bugbear race across the glade.  The hobgoblins stay back and start a surprisingly effective counter-fire against us.  I am somewhat wounded but we kill the bugbear and two of the hobgoblins with arrows, while Garrett’s spell casts most of the goblins into slumber.  The remaining two hobgoblins flee back to the castle.

We return to the castle, hoping that they will think that we have continued to flee, and investigate the postern gate.  I try to sneak up to it, but am obviously spotted and shot upon.  Even then, I am able to see that it is a stout iron door, and probably not an easy means in ingress for us.  We return around to the western side of the castle, and try to work out how to re-enter through the back door again.  As I sneak up again, I can hear deep grunts from inside, and quite commands and sounds of struggle.  As I try to work out what these are, the curtain is whipped open, and a great creature bounds forth, like a bear but with the head of an owl.  I sprint for the forest, but it is gaining on me, so I turn at the edge of the forest and engage it in combat with my blades.  The others join in as well, and we make relatively quick work of it, expending several spells to defeat it before it can disembowel one of us.

We drag its corpse into the forest and return to considering our options again.

24th day of Tarsakh

We take a short rest and repair the two dams in the caves in case we need to use the water traps again.  Then we set out for Cragmaw Castle.  We find a fairly well trodden track leading in the right direction and my fieldcraft skills tell me that this area has frequent goblin patrols.  We proceed to the edge of Neverwinter Woods, occasionally hiding from goblin patrols, and reach the edge of the woods by evening.

We camp discreetly, and have an uneventful night.

25th day of Trasakh

We awake and make our way quietly through the forest until we sight the crumbling towers of Cragmore Castle.  There is a great doorway opening onto a terrace at the top of a flight of stairs, but many arrow-slits overlook that, so I scout around the castle.  On the south side there is a postern gate, and on the north side, a section of wall between two towers has almost completely collapsed.  in the shadows at the base of the pile of rubble, my keen elven eyes spot that there is a sheet of cloth that has been painted to resemble rubble.  Obviously a secret means of entrance.  I fetch the others and we tether the mules to some nearby trees.

We cautiously enter through the sheet, expecting guards on the other side, but find a deserted area at the base of a collapsed tower.  There is another sheet-covered entrance on the far side, which opens into the bailey of the castle, and a door to the east.  We open the door, which shows a short passageway.  The is a further door to the east and a sheet-covered doorway to the south.  We listen at the door, and hear two voices conversing – one gruff, the other silky.  We decide to burst in and attack them, and prepare spells and weapons.

We burst into the room, which occupies most of the base of this tower.  There are a tall, old bugbear and a female drow arguing.  In the south corner is an unconscious dwarf, and lying on a bed to the north is a wolf.  They are surprised and so we launch an attack.  We guess that the female drow might be Black Spider – the name would fit what we know of Drow habits.  Aramil casts Guiding Bolt at her, which hits as she is not wearing much armour.  The damage is boosted by him using a second level slot on it, and using his bardic inspiration as well.  Elaina attacks the bugbear twice, but only hits once, for minimal damage.  Garrett casts Dissonant Whispers on the bugbear, who is affected – he obviously has low Wisdom.  I attack the drow and hit once.

Next turn we launch more attacks, including another Guiding Bolt and more Dissonant Whispers.  They fight back, but their attacks are mostly ineffective, and we continue to batter them with sword blows and as many spells as we can.  Finally the succumb to our onslaught, including the wolf.  We quickly search them – although the drow has changed shape as she died – she is now an eerily nondescript human – we suspect she may have been a doppleganger.  The unconscious dwarf turns out to be Gudrun, and so we heal him.  Regaining consciousness, he confirms that the bugbear was King Groll, but tells us the drow was just a messenger from Black Spider.  We decide that having rescued Gudrun, we will beat a swift retreat, leaving the goblins to wonder just what has happened.  As we are deciding that, there is a knock on the door, and a voice asking in Goblin whether the king would like his dinner now.  I muster my best gruff bugbear voice and say ‘Later’.  He seems satisfied and departs, so we decide to leave as quickly as possible as well.

Our exit from the castle is unobserved, but when we return to the mules, we find 4 hobgoblins and 2 wolves pawing at them.  We rush forwards to rescue them, and a tough fight, for me at least ensues.  I dispatch the hobgoblin and wolf fighting me, but suffer severe wounds in return which I use my new healing spell to cure.  Aramil and his hobgoblin ineffectually trade blows.  Garrett casts Dissonant Whispers on another goblin, who flees.  Elaina fights the hobgoblin leader and his wolf, who put up a brave fight.  The leader is finally killed, and his wolf and the hobgoblin who is sparring with Aramil flee.  We decide that we need to get out of here fast, so grab the mules and leave as quickly as possible.

27th day of Tarsakh

We return to Phandalin without incident and with Gudrun.  Sildar gives us much gold for killing the goblin king.  However I have not fulfilled my geas of cleansing the shrine of Oghma at Cragmaw Castle, so I, at least, must return.

15th day of Tarsakh

We return to Phandalin after an uneventful trip down the Triboar trail.  Somehow all the lands around seem more welcoming and normal after our defeat of the orc menace that was threatening the area.  We report to Sildar about Kost and the prospectors, and also our defeat of the orc threat (we neglect to mention the single orc that escaped – we will deal with him later).  I also return to Sister Garaele and tell her about Agatha’s response.  She is pleased and gives me the 3 potions of healing that she promised us.  She is also interested by our various exploits and pleased by the way that we handled our various encounters, and suggests that I would make a good recruit for the Harpers.  I had been considering this for a while, but just hadn’t met a representative of this secretive organisation, so I agree to join.  There seems to be no formal ceremony or oath-taking, but she informs me that I am now a Watcher of the Harpers.  Being a clandestine organisation I am to tell nobody (whoops!).

We enjoy another restful evening and night at the Stonehill Inn.  Even Harbin the mayor seems pleased with us, telling us that there has been no reprisals from the Redbrands, and the town fells better for their absence.  It turns out that us getting rid of them was one of his best ideas.

16th day of Tarsakh

We arise early and set out for Neverwinter, as being the shortest route to Thundertree.  Elaina is keen to return, as this is the village of her birth, from where she was exiled after it was destroyed in the eruption of Mount Hotenow 40 years ago.  The ruins have been cursed ever since, so this once prosperous village was never reoccupied.

On the road, we join a caravan, which makes our journey to Neverwinter safe and rapid.

19th day of Tarsakh

We arrive in Neverwinter in the afternoon and find an inn to stay in (last time I was here I was so poor I had to sleep under a hedge).  We also purchase 2 mules and their tack in order to carry our equipment for us.

20th day of Tarsakh

We set out for Thundertree along a well marked road through prosperous agricultural country.  As we approach Thundertree though, the great Neverwinter Wood looms ahead and the land becomes deserted.  The track leads to Thundertree, but at the entrance we find a sign saying:

Danger – Plant Monsters and Zombies

Do Not Enter

The village beyond is ruined and overgrown.  A tower on a tall mound looms over the centre of the village – intact apart from the roof which is partially ruined.  We tie our mules to the sign, and enter the village.  The first few hours are just ruins, and we poke our heads in to see if there is anything left.  Suddenly, some of the shrubs around us shake themselves and tumble towards us; lashing us with thorny whips.  The fight is relatively short, and we hack eight of them to pieces, while only taking a few scratches ourselves.  We resolve to not examine any more of the ruined cottages.  The next building is more complete, although the roof is sagging.  The sign outside identifies it as having once been a tavern.  The door is shut, so we peer in through the windows.  The inside is divided into two rooms, a bar, and a kitchen cum brewery.  We decide not to investigate.  Turning a corner as the road winds round the base of the mound, we see a house ahead which appears completely intact, with a closed, iron banded door and heavily reinforced shutters.  We guess that Root{} the Druid might be living there, so walk up and knock on the door.  An unwelcoming voice responds and asks us who we are.  We identify ourselves and state we are looking for {} the Druid.  It asks who sent us, and we say that Ma Appletree mentioned the druid.  At this point, he opens the door and rapidly ushers us in.  He tells us that he is worried about the shrub-monsters and also the ash zombies, several of which he has locked in the tavern that we looked at – a close escape.  However he tells us that a more immediate issue is the green dragon that has taken up residence in the tower!  Although he does mention that the dragon has at least killed some of the giant spiders that live on the mound around the tower.  This all sounds a bit tough to be frank.  Plus he mentions that there are some black-robes strangers wandering around Thundertree as well, who may or may not be associated with the dragon.  We tell him that actually we just came here to find out the location of Cragmaw Castle, and he happily shows us where that is on our map of the region, explaining that we will be doing the area a favour if we rid it of the goblins who are there.  I explain that I have been charged by Oghma with the same task in a dream.  He also mentions that he knows of the location of Wind Echo Cave, and will tell us if we help him drive the dragon away from the village before it settles her.  We explain that we feel that we should go and rescue Gudrun as a matter of priority, but will return to help him in a few days.  He is happy to let us go and will wait for us to return.

We return to Neverwinter, and then down the Great Road and up the Triboar Trail to where we were first ambushed.

23rd day of Tarsakh

We find our way back to the goblin caves and find them unoccupied.  We clear out and camp in the large chamber that the goblin chief was using.

24th day of Tarsakh

The night passes uneventfully, but as we are leaving, we see a party of six hobgoblins approaching the cave.  They don’t appear to have seen us so we duck back into the cave.  Garrett goes up to the bridge over the stream to watch for them entering, and the rest of us go back to the cave with the water reservoirs.  As we hoped, one of them is still full of water.  We wait until the hobgoblins enter, and then Garrett casts a minor illusion of a noise further up the main passage.  As they come to investigate, Aramil and Elaina break the dam, releasing another rush of water down the passageway.  All six hobgoblins lose their footing and are swept out.  We rush down to engage them while they are not on their feet.  They are bruised, but are starting to get up.  I shoot one with an arrow, wounding it.  Garret casts a Sleep spell, which affects 4 of them.  Elaina and Aramail rush forward to attack them, followed by me.  We attack the remaining two and kill them in a couple of rounds of combat.  We bind and search the others, and find a scrap of parchment with a badly drawn picture of Garrett and a reward for 25 gold pieces for his capture, signed with a black spider.  We try to question the remaining hobgoblins, but they refuse to talk or be intimidated, so I behead them.  While Aramil and Elaina repair the reservoir walls in the cave in case we want to use this location again, I craft 6 stakes and place the heads on them outside the cave.

11th day of Tarsakh

Leaving Agatha’s hut, we return to the ruins of Coneywood, but as the day is yet young we decide to press on and see what the problems at the Old Owl Well are. We find a trail heading that direction and follow it – soon it becomes apparent from the tracks that prospectors have been using this trail recently. I stop occasionally to see if I can hear or smell any traces of orcs nearby, but am unable to.

Around midday we reach an untidy campsite next to a stream occupied by a number of human and dwarvish prospectors and miners. They talk to us, and welcome us when we mention that we have been sent by Sildar to investigate their problems at the Old Owl Well. The explain that they were prospecting up their recently, and wanted access to the well there (which is the source of the stream we are currently standing by) as a water source. However there is a man there in a tent, and when they approached him, he set a pack of zombies on them. We offer to go and try and resolve the issue. They also mention the problem of orcish raids, and we say we will look into that as well.

Garrett and I scout ahead of the clank brothers to have a chance of coming on this man unawares. We reach the crest before the old tower and see it for the first time. It is obviously very old and very ruined. The tower is only 15-20 feet high now and surrounded by rubble. There is also the low ruins of a curtain wall around the top of the hill as well. We can see a colourful tent pitched in the bailey. We wait for the clanks to come up and have a brief council of war. I am in favour of circling around the hill and ambushing the occupant of the tent from all sides at the same time. Aramil however suggests that we should talk to the occupant first, which is an interesting approach, but one we decide to go with. I still circle around the hill with Garrett though, while Aramil and Elaina approach frontally. When they reach the bailey, the door of the tower opens and a horde of zombies comes shuffling out. Aramil waves his holy symbol at them, and all but one go back into the tower. A man has emerged from the tent by this stage and Aramil engages him in conversation. Obviously impressed by our ability to dismiss his zombies, he talks to us, and explains that he is a wizard from Thay called Kost and the zombies are his servants that he uses to protect him from the orcs while he investigates this tower. He is interested in knowing who built the tower, and offers us some money if we will ask Agatha the question for him. We suggest that he should give her a present, and after initially demurring, he provides a jewelled box to give her. He also offers to reward us if we will deal with the local orcs, and we agree to do that as well. We get an agreement from him that he will not harm the prospectors and will allow them to mine near the tower provided that they don’t disturb him. He agrees and we return to the prospectors and explain who is is and what he wants (mainly to be left alone).

We return to Coneywood and then back to Agatha’s hut. Garrett enters again, singing a song, but she throws him out because he had already asked a question this morning. Aramil enters instead, and she accepts his (Kost’s) gift and tells us the name of the wizard the built the tower (the name is meaningless to us).

It is late in the evening now, so we return to Coneywood and camp for the night in the same place. This time, we are attacked by stirges in the middle of the night. Only Elaina, who is on watch, avoids being bitten and manages to kill hers. Garrett and I also kill ours quickly, and Elaina attempts to help Aramil killing his with her sword. She is rather enthusiastic though and her sword blow, while killing the stirge, does quite a bit of damage to Aramil.

After the excitement, we settle back to enjoy the rest of the night, which is uninterrupted.

12th day of Tarsakh

In the morning, we head towards Wyvern Tor to find the orcs. It takes us most of the day (Wyvern Tor is a long way away) before I start to sense the presence of orcs in the wind and through the earth. We find that they are encamped in a cave in a ravine, and I feel that there are probably only a few of them in this raiding party. We spot a lone sentry, who doesn’t spot Garrett or myself, and I manage to kill him with a single arrow, albeit enhanced with Hail of Thorns.

Garrett and I then sneak up to the cave mouth, and see another 6 orcs, including one who is obviously a chief, sitting around a fire inside the cave. Garrett and I prepare spells while the clanks join us. As they do, Garrett and I step into the mouth of the cave. I fire another arrow on which I have cast Hail of Thorns at the chief and the two orcs on either side of him, while Garrett casts Shatter on the fire. Aramil and Elaina then step forward to protect us from the orcs attacking us. The orcs are suprised, and we attack again – I shoot another arrow at the chief, killing him, while Garrett casts Sleep, which drops all but one of the remaining orcs. However the ear-splitting noise of the Shatter spell has awakened an ogre who was obviously sleeping in a niche that we hadn’t seen before. He rushes us an strikes Elaina, although the blow is stopped by her armour. We engage in battle with the ogre, and manage to kill it without loosing any of our numbers. The last orc manages to escape in the confusion though. We loot the cave for treasure, and decide to camp the night here as we are so close to sunset.

13th day of Tarsakh

Next morning, we return to Kost and tell him his information, and collect our reward.

Returning to Phandalin via the main road (as the Redbrands seem to be too cocky to set watchment) we stop by at Sildar to break the bad news about Iano Albrecht to him, and return Thel Dendra’s body for burial.  We explain that we haven’t managed to kill Glasstaff yet, and need rest before we can take him on again.

9th day of Tarsakh

We return to the Stonehill Inn for a meal, and yet more adulation from the general populace.  After a good, and uninterrupted, night’s sleep, we return to the catacombs via the back entrance we found last time.  Unfortunately, the dungeon turns out to be completely deserted – Glasstaff and his bugbears have done a runner!  Disappointed, we return to Phandalin via the Sleeping Giant tavern.  We stake out the tavern, and observe a female dwarf bustling around the kitchen door.  Garrett goes over to engage her in conversation, and finds her thoroughly unpleasant.  She recognises him, and accuses him of having ruined her tavern by driving away (or killing) all her clientele.  Our view that she should try and raise the standards of her establishment fails to get much traction.

We return to Sildar and break the bad news to him, but declare our intention to track him down, as we suspect he has fled to Cragmaw Castle, whence we need to go to free Gudrun.  However, Sildar doesn’t know when Cragmaw Castle is.  At the Town Hall though, we do see a notice about travellers on the Triboar Trail being attacked by orcs based near Wyvern Tor.  Sildar also mentions that he is concerned about reports that prospectors in the mountains to the east near the Old Owl Well ruins have been chased away by undead monsters.  The Old Owl Well is an old watchtower from the magical Netherill Empire, and he fears that there might be some old, bad magic there that is causing this problem.  The Old Owl Well is also relatively close to Wyvern Tor.

We go to Halia Thornton, who is also disappointed to find that we haven’t killed Glasstaff, and refuses to pay us as we haven’t completed the task she set us.  We show her a bundle of his correspondence with his orders for alchemical reagents (but minus the letter from Black Spider that identifies him as Iano Albrecht) and she agrees to give us half the fee for that.  We ask her about Cragmaw Castle – she doesn’t know where it is, but suggests that Quentelle Alderleaf might know.

We return to Ma Alderleaf, but it turns out she doesn’t know where Cragmaw Castle is, but she thinks that Reedoth the Druid does know.  Unfortunately he was last seen leaving Phandalin heading for the ruined village of Thunderleaf, which is back up the Main Road towards Neverwinter.

Finally, I drop in on Sister Garaele again, to pick up on her request to deal with a banshee.  She is grateful that we have dispatched so many of the Redbrands, and tells us more of what she wants from the banshee.  It turns out that the banshee is called Agatha, and she wants to ask her the location of a spell-book that once belonged to Bowgentle.  In return she has an ornate silver comb that she is offering.  If we will go to Agatha’s lair and exchange the comb for the information, she will give us 3 potions of healing.

We undertake the perform this mission, and set out up the Triboar trail.  Agatha’s lair is in the forest opposite Wyvern Tor.

11th day of Tarsakh

It takes us two days to reach the ruins of Coneywood, but the journey is uneventful.  Once there, the route into the forest is easily found, and rapidly leads us to a large hut that we assume is Agatha’s.  Garrett enters and uses his charm and musical prowess to flatter her, give her the comb and get the question answered.  Bowgentle’s spellbook was traded over 100 years ago to a necromancer called Tseonarth from Iriaebor.

We quickly leave the prison in two groups, so that we can all share the 5 red cloaks we have, and regroup in the corridor with the locked door.  I am all in favour of continuing on while we have the initiative and element of surprise, but the others think that the family will slow us down and they are vocal in their desire to return home as soon as possible.  We therefore decide to leave by the route we came in, rather than through the dusty hall we haven’t yet entered.  We enter the cavern with the chasm in the floor, and this time it is Garrett who hears the strange voice in his head.  He starts to try and talk to it, and it responds, asking for nice fresh meat.  We continue to ignore it, but as we are passing through the cavern, Mirna suddenly points at one of the bodies in the chasm and starts screaming.  Apparently it is the body of her husband.  We quickly silence her and the children and bundle them out of the cavern before they can raise the alarm.  We rush down the corridor and into the storage room, and then up and out of the dungeon.  We decide to return to the village by the direct road, even though it goes right past the Sleeping Giant which the Redbrands drink in – we bundle the rescuees up so that they are not easily recognised, but in the event, no one is paying any attention to us.

We decide to return the rescued family to Sildar, as being the person who is most likely to be able to continue to protect them from the Redbrands.  We then repair to the Stonehill Inn and spend an hour ‘resting’.

Revived, we return to the manor.  Having noted what appears to be a lack of sentries on the way in last time, we decide to take a more direct route this time, and we don’t appear to be noticed.  We enter via the spiral staircase as before, and the store room appears like no one has been there since we left – the torches are burning low now and several have gone out.  We proceed into the large cavern again, and hear the voice again, except this time we see where it is coming from.  Beyond the pillar on the far side is a strange, one-eyed humanoid that seems to be the source of the mysterious voice.  It asks again for fresh meat, in return for letting us cross.  Garrett suggests the bodies of the Redbrands that we killed in the storeroom earlier, so we go back and grab two of them and haggle with the strange creature.  We ask it where Glasstaff is, and it points to the northernmost passageway.  We drop the two corpses into the chasm and proceed up the northern passageway as it watches us.  The corridor doglegs and then descends a flight of stairs before ending.  At the end, there is a door on either side.  We listen – the right hand door has the noise of bubbling and boiling; the left hand door has the sound of carousing.  We open the left hand door and enter – 4 drunken Redbrands are sitting around a table gaming with dice.  Garrett uses a sleeping enchantment which unfortunately only affects one of them, and the rest of us attack the other three.  The fight is vicious, but we are victorious in a couple of rounds.  We wake the sleeping one and question us.  He confirms that Glasstaffs laboratory is beyond the other door, and also that the other door in this room leads to the further rooms where three bugbears are quartered.

We decide to face Glassstaff rather than his bugbears, so burst into the laboratory.  The room beyond is filled with alchemical equipment, but otherwise empty.  There is a further door however, so we burst through that into the room beyond, which is luxuriously equipped as a study.  On the far side is a secret door, which is starting to close.  I rush forward, bow drawn, to try and shoot down whoever is leaving.  Beyond the door is a flight of stairs going up.  A figure at the top flings an ineffectual incantation at me and dashes through another door before I can get a shot off.  I follow again and burst into the workshop through a secret door that we hadn’t spotted before.  I rush to the entrance to the cavern, and see Glasstaff crossing the wooden bridge over the chasm.  I cast a quick enchantment and release my arrow at hit.  The spell multiplies the arrows in the air, and the bundle of arrows hits him square on.  He staggers under the impact, but flickers his hand and hits me with a battery of glowing arrows of his own.  I collapse unconscious, but Elaina and Aramil tell me that they rounded the corner a second or two later.  Seeing reinforcements arriving, bows in hand, he gestured again disappeared in a silvery mist!

Aramil swiftly heals me, and I send the others back to ransack his rooms before he reappears with reinforcements – assuming that he has teleported to wherever the bugbears are, while I keep watch up here.  There is nothing of interest in the laboratory other than some monkshood powder, but the study contains a bundle of correspondence.  Critically amongst these is a letter from the Black Spider, addressed to Iono Albrecht, talking about ambushing us.  It appears that Iono Albrecht, Sildar’s friend from the Lords’ Alliance, is actually Glasstaff – from the brief glimpse I caught, his appearance does appear to match the description given.

We decide to leave to regroup in the village and inform Sildar of this new information.  The others grab one of the dead Redbrands from the mess-room to offer to the strange one-eyed creature in order to get back again.  The strange creature seems very distressed by our attack on Glasstaff though, and refuses our offer, attacking Garrett, Elaina and Aramil instead.  I shoot him as he charges, wounding him with an arrow, but he mounts some sort of horrific mental attack on me that knocks me unconscious again.  Aramil dashes over to heal me again, leaving Garrett and Elaina fighting the creature alone.  Garrett takes some heavy damage, although not before landing a couple of good blows himself, but Elaina is having difficulty getting a good hit in.  Having healed me, Aramil rejoins the fray and I also start shooting the creature when I can get a clear shot in.  Finally, we manage to kill it.

Resting wearily on our swords, we patch up our bruises and decide that it is probably time to retreat and rest our wounds, even though we have wounded Glasstaff and would dearly love to finish him off.  First though, prompted by Garrett, I climb down into the crevasse to retrieve Tiem’s body for his family.  Down there, I notice a chest concealed under one of the bridges.  In there, we find some coins, gems, a potion of healing, a scroll of augury and an ornate longsword, which Elaina identifies as Talon, a magical sword of repute that belonged to Sir Aldith Trisander, who was once lord of this manor.

We hear the sounds of bugbears approaching down the south-west corridor so decide to ‘bug’ out.  I can feel a current of fresh air coming up the southern tunnel, so we decide to see if this leads to the tunnel entrance in the woods.  It does, so we return to Sildar.

Having left the Redbrands ruffians safely in the town lock-up, we retire to the Stonehill Inn where we are bought round after round of drinks by grateful locals.  It seems our rooms are on the house as well, so we carry Garrett up to bed and get a good night’s trance, having first taken care to secure our rooms against any possible reprisal from the Redbrands.  Our rest is uninterrupted however, and we descend in the morning for a good breakfast (except in Garrett’s case, who we just dunk in a coffee pot to sober up).

8th day of Tarsakh

Through the haze we remember a couple of things that people have mentioned the previous evening.  One was an off-hand comment that the Miner’s Exchange never seems to be bothered by the Redbrands.  Possibly this is because Halia Thornton is too tough for them, but we get thinking about what she offered us, which was a bounty to kill Glasstaff and take his correspondence.  For someone who was so anti-Redbrand, it is interesting that she doesn’t want us to eliminate the Redbrands entirely.  But, if she was the second in command of the Redbrands herself, and was ambitious for promotion, hiring some dumb muscle to kill her boss might be quite a cunning strategy.  Food for thought certainly, and a reason maybe to not completely trust Halia.

Sildar also asks us to keep an eye out for a friend of his called Iano Albrecht, a short, black bearded wizard who disappeared here a few months ago.  Like Sildar, he is a member of the Lord’s Alliance, and he is concerned that the Redbrands may have kidnapped him.

The second was something that Pip Stonehill said, about a halfling friend of his, Care Alderleaf, who had found a tunnel entrance in the woods, but had been scared off by the Redbrands.  Pip isn’t around (he is running errands) but Toblin directs up to Care’s mother’s farm, which is at the end of the track that leads towards the forest and the ruined Trisander Manor, which we have established is where the Redbrands have their hideout.  We find the farm easily, but Care is also running errands, and his mother, Quelline, doesn’t know exactly where the tunnel he claims to have found is.  We decide to look for ourselves, and I spend a couple of hours carefully scouring the woods, but find nothing apart from some tracks that someone has taken great care to try and cover over, meaning I am unable to determine what had made them.

The others are getting bored by this stage, so we decide to investigate the Manor directly.  Various other rumours come back to us at this point.  Glasstaff is rumoured to lair there, at the western end, and there are supposed to be many captives there, guarded by skeletons.  The Manor itself is pretty ruined, and we see no signs of any lookouts or traps on the approach.  In one corner of the ruins, in the remains of the kitchen, we find a spiral staircase descending.   Many tracks lead too and from this entrance.

I descend alone, relying on my stealth and darksight.  It descends one turn and ends in a door.  I listen, but don’t hear anything.  I go back to beckon the others down the stair, and then open the door.  It is unlocked, and opens easily onto a gallery above a large cellar, containing an open cistern, and a large number of barrels and crates.  I descend down to the floor of the cellar and listen at the two doors, but hear nothing.  We gather at the western-most door, mindful of the rumour that Glasstaff lairs at the western end of the cellars.  We open the door and surprise three Redbrands resting in their beds.  The room is too small for anyone other than Aeldrin and Elaina to enter, but we make short work of the ruffians, although one of them does manage to scratch me with their blade before we take them down.  The room has two double bunks and more barrels and crates, but no other exits.  We take their red cloaks as a disguise, and return them to their bunks, mop the floor quickly and extinguish the lights, hoping that a casual inquirer will think they are asleep.

We return to the other door, which opens in to a short passage that leads to a large vaulted hall which ends in two bronze doors, green with age, embossed with a mourning angel.  Dust lies thick on the floor, and it is apparent that no one has entered this hall in a very long time.  Since we are interested in finding Glasstaff, rather than a bunch of undead, we decide not to proceed further.

The chamber appears to be a dead-end, but the tracks above tell us that this is unlikely, so we start searching behind all barrels and crates.  Finally, we find a secret door in the south-western corner.  It opens into a long, unlit corridor that doglegs to the right before opening into a large, rough, lit cavern.  The floor is divided by a long rift, crossed by two plank bridges.  Two rough stone columns hold up the ceiling.  I advance cautiously to check the nearest bridge, and the crevasse.  There is a charnel smell in the air.  The rift is only 5-10 feet deep, and has rough, easily climbed sides.  There are bones littered on the bottom, possibly the source of the smell.  I instantly think of the stories I have heard of ghouls; terrible undead scavengers that eat the dead.  The plank bridge looks little used, and rather fragile – I suspect it would collapse if crossed.  I make my way north on this side of the crevice, and hear a quite voice in my head telling me to come back and cross the bridge.  I ignore it, and it pleads with me to come across the cavern.  I continue to ignore it.  At the northern end, the cavern opens into a worked area, and I beckon the others forward.  Aramil also hears the strange voice.  The worked area is a workshop with tools and yet more barrels and crates.  In an alcove in the north-eastern corner we find another secret door that opens into a north-south corridor.  There is a door opposite, which is silent and locked.  There is also a door at the south end of the corridor, which we open, having first heard nothing.  Beyond is some sort of crypt.  There are two large bronze doors at the south-eastern corner, which look familiar, plus three coffins, each with a skeleton standing before it.  They turn and look at us with empty eye sockets, but do not attack.  We close the door and are preparing to retreat, but then have a sudden surge of inspiration.  There was also another, normal door on the eastern wall, and the rumour mentioned that captives were guarded by skeletons.  Maybe the red cloaks that we are wearing are what is stopping them attacking us?  Elaina picks up Garrett and carries him under her cloak, and we re-enter the room and cross to the other door.  The skeletons make no effort to interfere with us.

At the other door, we listen and hear noises of laughter and screaming.  Assuming that someone is being tortured, we burst in.  The room is not large, and the northern and southern end are barred off as cells.  In the northern one is a young lad, in the southern, two women, who are being poked and prodded by two red cloaked men in the main part of the chamber.  We rush forward and engage them.  Garrett deploys his enchanted invective to good effect, and we swiftly kill the two men.  We search their bodies for keys to the cells, but find none.  Elaina, frustrated, seizes the gate to the southern cell and wrenches it open, allowing the two women to emerge.  They explain that they are Mirna and Nilsa Dendra, wife and daughter of Thel Dendra who we had heard was brutally murdered by the Red Blades a few days ago.  The lad in the northern cell is their son/brother, Nars.  Elaina attempts to wrench that door open as well, but fails.  It is made of tougher stuff.  Aramil lends a hand, but even together they cannot budge it.  Then I remember the tools back in the workshop.  I sneak back, encountering no-one, and grab a couple of crowbars.  Elaina and Aramil once again get to work on the gate, encouraged by the last of Garrett’s inspiration and a prayer from Aramil.  At last they succeed in opening the gate, freeing Nars.  There is a large pile of clothes in the room, and they quickly find their own and dress themselves more decently.  Mirna offers us a family hierloom if we will free them from this dungeon, but I instantly reply that we would free them anyway, and having just lost her husband she is almost certainly in more need of the money than we are.  Garrett aims a swift kick at me, but I avoid it.  We check the clothes to see if there is anything that might have been worn by a short, black-bearded wizard, but find nothing.  Possibly this means he is still alive.  Mirna mentions that the guards change relatively frequently in this cell, so it is not a safe place to take a rest.  We prepare to leave, although there are now seven of us, and only five cloaks.  How will we get the chickens across without the fox eating them?