Chronicle: Session 8

After a generally revelatory afternoon full of people's pasts returning to haunt them in a multitude of ways...Bobby buggers off, because he's got his own things to attend to. (Did he ever fit in an evening of wolf-hunting with Spindle? We may never know.)

The rest of the party pore over the map they received from Hand as they try to figure out what to do. Following the trail they've been given seems to be the only logical thing to do. The most direct route to the X marking the spot would be northeast, stopping off at Einhorn half-way. The party agree to start forging east in the morning - everyone may have darkvision, but Tsalta's leery of walking the woods in the night. Especially with Spindle so liable to vanish into underbrush and get himself into trouble with whatever may be lurking.

Retiring for one final night at Blake's house, the party determine to strike out on their journey first thing in the morning. Settling in for the night, Tsalta leans up against the wall in the front room with her jar of fireflies nestled close to her chest. Spindle's already curled up in the next room over.

Not everyone's quite ready to bed down. Faeleth takes Nuth aside to the corner of the room, where they stand in a moment of awkward silence.

"So," Faeleth says.

"Sooo," Nuth replies.

"You know we have history," begins Faeleth, only to be interrupted by Nothing's mutter of 'Yeah, no shit." She sighs. Touché. But yes. Faeleth continues in a hushed murmur as she confesses to Nothing about the ring, and the voice, and who it belonged to. She thought Nuth ought to know.

Nothing frowns, eyes downcast in thought, and then she asks Faeleth if she knows where this person is. When Faeleth admits she doesn't, Nuth snaps back, her voice rising: then what was the point in telling her, even!? A moment passes. Nothing's shoulders slump as she sighs in resignation. "Thanks, I guess."

Faeleth gives her an apologetic look as she reiterates that she just felt Nuth ought to know. That she owes her that much, at least.

(A thunderous snore from Tsalta blasts through the tension, and the pair momentarily grab on to one another in shock before realising both the source of the sound and who they're clinging to! They awkwardly disengage, deciding not to acknowledge that small indignity.)

As Faeleth turns away and starts heading to the bedroom, Nuth mutters under her breath that it doesn't matter anyway, it's fine. She never knew 'em in the first place so who cares. Whether she's saying that to Faeleth or to herself isn't quite clear, but either way she follows and also gets into the bed, curling up with her back to the elf.

And so the whole party find themselves asleep. Spindle dreams of giants stomping across the countryside.

Morning breaks, the soft rays of summer sunlight warming the bedroom and stirring its occupants to wakefulness.

---

Leaves rustle softly in the breeze. The grass is soft and cool with dew under Tsalta's cheek, dappled sunlight dances through the canopy above onto her face to coax her pleasantly towards consciousness. Comfortable as civilised furnishings may be, waking to birdsong in her ears with the grass as her bed...this is just right. It's what Tsalta is used to, and it's lovely. This is how things should be.

---

When Faeleth rises and makes her way through the house in search of water to drink, she notices that Tsalta is absent. It's not something that would usually concern her - it is the morning, and it's not unlike Tsalta to take little walks - but after yesterday's revelations she can't help but worry that she's abandoned the party in search of her daughter. Faeleth returns to the bedroom.

"Hey, Nothing?"

Nuth scrunches her eyes against the dawn light and rubs her eyes, "Yeah?"

"Tsalta's gone. The door's wide open, she's gone."

---

Tsalta's eyes open and as she grows more lucid she realises that this is very much not how things should be, because she definitely didn't fall asleep outside. Shit. She's walked in her sleep again, hasn't she.

It's amazing it hadn't happened sooner. Her tendency to sleepwalk is what had caused her to drift far enough from home to get lost in the first place - try as she might to find her way back, there would just be nights that she would fall asleep and find herself in some new patch of woodland with no landmarks that told her a thing about where she'd ended up. In the end, she adjusted to her rare night-walks, and held hope that one day she'd wander back the way she came.

She'd not considered that having travelling companions meant that she might find herself wandering away from them, too.

---

When Faeleth declares Tsalta's disappearance, Nothing hops out of bed, curiously checking the other room to check if Spindle's still there. And so he is, laid on his side, running in his sleep as a dog might, dreaming of the joy of the hunt. Nuth nudges him awake with a foot, and he springs to all fours and continues his run - or would, but he luckily loses his footing before he can rocket into the wall. He looks around, confused.

Nuth explains that Tsalta's buggered off - did Spindle see where she went? Nope. He was sleeping tight. In that case...maybe we should track her down? When Nothing suggests this, Spindle stands to his full diminuitive bipedal height with a yawn and a stretch...and as he stretches, his form shifts and he thuds back to the ground on all four sturdy bobcat paws. He sniffs the air, searching for the familiar lavender scent of Tsalta's hair.

The comforting floral smell lingers in the air, and Spindle follows his keen feline nose out of the door and into the village, Nothing and Faeleth following along behind him.

---

Upon the realisation of her predicament - that she's alone and may have lost both her companions and her way of finding her daughter - Tsalta startles bolt upright. She takes in her surroundings. A stream flows through the glade, widening briefly into a sizeable pool before continuing its winding path into the woods. A crystalline stone that she notices seems to be emitting a soft hum juts upwards from the riverbed within this pool.

Also, there are scorpions. There do appear to be scorpions. And they are all, each and every one of them, considerably larger than scorpions have any business being.

The good news is, however, that they don't seem to pay much attention to Tsalta. A few of them are beginning to stir as the warmth of the sun sinks through their dark carapaces, but there's no sign of alarm or aggression though they're sure to have seen her. They appear to be content to bask.

How very strange. Tsalta eyes the humming stone...could it be responsible for the unnatural size of these creatures? Looking around, the foliage in this glade may not be any larger than it should be, but it's all remarkably verdant and healthy-looking, more than one would expect in woodlands like these. Perhaps there's something to that thought.

She carefully edges nearer to the water in hope of examining it, and as she does the scorpions take notice. Some of them scuttle closer, and it's making her a little nervous. Still, she carries on until she can look down into the river, and the reflection in the crystal clear water reveals...oh dear.

Tsalta's hair. Her treasured hair. Twigs and bits of underbrush jut from the frizzy, tangled auburn snarls, many of her braids now unravelled in part and some having come undone entirey. As bed-heads go, this one is disasterous. She must have been blundering through low-hanging branches or crawling through bushes or...this won't do at all!

Oh, and also the scorpions are starting to look agitated. Tsalta, canny enough to figure that it might be her proximity to their watering hole that's stirring them up, backs away quickly. The scorpions settle down, confirming her suspicion.

Well, then. She's certainly not messing with the water any more. Time to try and find her way back.

Time to try to find Tsalta!

Trusting in Spindle's keen nose, the girls follow their bobcat friend out through Log Hill and into the woodland beyond. The signs of Tsalta's nightwalking are certainly there - huge footsteps in the soft earth, trampled undergrowth, a few wisps of auburn hair snagged in high branches. It's easy enough to follow.

They lose the trail at a stream passing through the forest, but as Spindle sniffs along the banks he catches the scent again! Onwards!

So...how to go about finding the way she came? Tsalta scours the edges of the grove and the trees beyond for any trail she may have left behind.

This is the part where Tsalta rolls a natural one on her Survival check.

Ah, there it is! Broken undergrowth, huge footprints left in the soil. Without a doubt, Tsalta determines, this is is where she came from. Only she could leave such a distinctive path, for after all, who else would have such large feet?

This is the part where Tsalta gets to make lots and lots of rolls for Investigation and Survival and none of them go very well.

On she forges, dutifully following her tracks through the woods, expecting to any time soon emerge and see Log Hill before her.

Now, Tsalta starts rolling well... On the Survival checks to follow the footprints! Great! Just fab. The dice are fickle gods.

---

Tsalta's trail leads the rest of the party, of course, to the glade full of scorpions. Without the knowledge that they're actually pretty chill, only Spindle is inclined to go anywhere near them. Nothing point-blank refuses to get any closer than she absolutely positively has to. No thanks. Faeleth's not reaaally that concerned, given her track record with arachnids, but agrees there's no need to disturb them without cause.

Spindle doesn't care about scorpions! Nose to the ground, he follows the lavender scent directly into the middle of the clearing to a dip in the ground where the floral aroma grows almost overwhelming. From there, he sniffs footprint to footprint out into the trees. And here he discovers a new, much less pleasant odor. Pungent, nasty, unwashed bare feet.

Oh, and there it is. It's harder to detect behind the vile cheesy pong, but there is indeed a faint after-scent of lavender... Spindle alerts his friends with a yowl and a toss of his head - Nuth peers out from behind a tree. "What?"

Spindle then curls up in a heap on the floor. He doesn't know how hot on the trail he really is, and having got to a point where he's unsure of direction, thinks he's led everyone astray. It's the first time his nose has failed him, and he feels genuinely so bad about it. Faeleth goes over to see if he's okay, and gives the disconsolate cat a little scratch under the chin before hefting him into her arms like the world's biggest kitten. Nuth comes over too and gives his head-fur a sympathetic ruffle. "It's alright. We'll find her, don't you worry."

-

It's when she spots the trail of blood in the grass that Tsalta realises she may not have been following herself. She freezes, her eyes following the dark dragmarks along ahead of her. The trees are thinning now, and out on the hillside beyond the woods she sees the wide streak of blood leads to a cave entrance.

She definitely didn't come from here.

She starts to back away slowly, eyes fixed on that blood trail, having a very bad feeling about this whole situation all of a sudden. Whatever poor creature was pulled into that cave was no small thing. Just as she's about to turn tail and run, a roar echoes out from the cave, and Tsalta becomes acutely aware of just how alone she is as the ogre steps out into the grassland.

(Back in the scorpion glade, the bellow booms out through the trees. Nothing looks up from trying to reassure Spindle. "What was that?")

Now, Tsalta's a big lass. This thing is bigger. He's got a good three feet on her at the least, and that's imposing enough before taking into account the sheer musclebound breadth of him. Grasped in one of his huge hands is the antler of a full-grown stag. Or...half a stag. That would certainly explain the blood.

The ogre's bloodshot eyes fix on her.

Tsalta turns on her heel and legs it.

Booming, thunderous footfalls crash behind her, gaining on her by the second, and realising she's not gonna outrun this guy, she swings around with bow in hand. The arrows she looses connect, but they don't remotely start to slow him down. Probably time for a change of plan! Tsalta ducks as the ogre's club swings down on her, and it connects with the shield on her back with an almighty CLANG.

The sound of violent impact on metal rings through the trees, and that's definitely enough to stir the search party to action. Nothing springs to her feet and draws her wand as she sprints out into the trees towards the sound. Faeleth plonks Spindle back on the ground to take off behind Nuth, and after a moment's confusion he races on after them.

What follows is a series of trips, stumbles, and second winds as the party races towards the roars and clatter in the distance. A full minute's run in the distance.

Time for another change of plan! Tsalta weaves and ducks the ogre's strikes as she tries to apologise - she's sorry, she's not here to cause trouble, she didn't mean to disturb him, can he please leave her alone?

She gets her answer in the form of another vicious battering strike that she barely manages to deflect with her shield. The ogre snarls in frustration and he tosses his club to the ground in preparation to fling his arms around Tsalta, who doesn't quite manage to slip out of the way this time. She finds herself pinned against his chest, face-to-stanky-ogre-armpit, and her feet lose purchase on the grass as he begins dragging her backwards towards the cave.

So Tsalta does the sensible thing. Tsalta knows what you do in a situation like this.

Tsalta provides the ogre with a swift and unceremonious knee to the nuts.

He roars in shock and no small amount of pain, stumbling back a couple of steps, but his grip holds tight. And then he headbutts Tsalta in retaliation - something in her nose crunches a bit on impact and ow ow ow ow ow, gods, ow.

She can taste the blood running down over her lip, and she wonders. Is this Ogre Hot? Maybe? He's got her very much overpowered and there's only one thing for it...

Tsalta leans back in the ogre's arms enough to lock eyes with him, and she licks a little of the blood from her lips in a way she hopes reads as seductive. "You speakin' my language?"

A dark grin spreads over the ogre's gnarled features as he raises an eyebrow and replies, "Why do you think I'm taking you back?"

Ew.

Okay. This might work. She flashes him a coy smile, batting her eyelashes, "Well, in that case there's no need to be struggling, is there? I'll come along willingly, you know..." When the ogre says he finds the struggle more fun, well, Tsalta gives a suggestive wiggle of mock resistance - oh noooo, woe is her, whatever is she to do. WINK. ;)

And it works! A throaty chuckle rumbles its way up from the ogre's chest as he loosens his grip on Tsalta, turning her around by the shoulders and shoving her roughly towards the mouth of the cave with a growl of, "Get in there..."

Now, that's all well and good, but Tsalta has no plans of actually banging this nasty-ass grossboy who has yet to learn that consent is sexy. How to stall...

She turns and winks over her shoulder, taking a moment to strike a provocative little pose.

"You'll have to catch me first, big boy!"

---

Bounding ahead with his cat's agility, Spindle enters the hillside clearing just in time to see Tsalta take off across the grassy slopes. The ogre chortles as he makes a half-hearted grab for her as she darts away, "My kind of game!"

A burst of stabbing pain flares in Tsalta's shoulder. In the glance she gets before shock sets in and sends her tumbling unconscious to the ground, she discovers the unfortunate reality of ogre foreplay: the tip of a javelin, pierced all the way through.

To be fair, to a fellow ogre that'd basically be a long-range love-bite. Alas. Tsalta is not an ogre, so down she goes!

Spindle leaps over her fallen body to stand with his fur bristling between her and the hulking brute, but the ogre pays him no attention as he trudges forward - that is, until the bobcat sinks his claws into that tree-trunk of a leg. The ogre's dark chuckling halts, his smirk drops as he glowers at the (comparatively) tiny creature that's snarling up at him.

"Pesky pets."

He's swatted aside with a frustrated swing of the club that connects with a nasty crunch.

"She's mine."

Another battering swipe into Spindle's flank, and this situation is starting to look pretty not good because he's gone from perfect condition to pretty beat-up in the space of a few seconds. Doesn't stop him from digging those claws into every spare inch of ogre he can find, though, determined to force him away from Tsalta (who is at this point not looking so hot - by now she's starting to bleed pretty badly from that javelin puncture).

The ogre's face contorts in frustration. "Pets can't be bad if they're dead!"

Nothing bursts into the clearing to the sight of Spindle just barely ducking clear of the ogre's club, and Tsalta face-down in the grass nearby, unmoving. Potions, god damn it, Tsalta has all the potions in her damn hair! But that's actually pretty convenient - Nuth rushes to her, sticks a hand into that mess of auburn and pulls out a red bottle that's promptly uncorked into the fading Tsalta's mouth.

There we go. Snatched back at the last moment from the jaws of being a single saving throw between life and death, Tsalta gasps back to consciousness.

And that makes everything so, so much easier! As Faeleth arrives on the scene, the ogre finds himself very much outnumbered.

(Try as he might to take his mounting frustration out on the cat he sees as having put a spanner in the works of his wonderful morning, the ogre's lost his focus, thrown off by these new arrivals and his conquest's revival and this fuckin' cat biting his fuckin' ankles.)

And oh boy, now she's got backup, is Tsalta ever ready to put up a proper fight.

She brings her warhammer round in an arc, lining up her strike just so-

"FUCK THAT. YOU TRY AND GET THAT ANYWHERE - ANYWHERE - NEAR ME..."

-she doesn't quite manage to hit him in the dick. Which is tragic, but a warhammer to the gut is a warhammer to the gut...although honestly, he seems more hurt by the sentiment than the impact!

"I thought," he roars, "we had an AGREEMENT!"

Tsalta brings her shield arm up as he takes a violent swing at her, deflecting the impact of his club with a deafening ringing-out of metal that reverberates up her arm.

(All the while, the rest of the party help - Spindle gnawing and slashing at his legs, Nothing darting around and firing off crimson blasts at his face, Faeleth launching arrows as she darts from tree to tree.)

An agreement? Tsalta pulls back her hammer again. It's first thing in the morning, and this gigantic creep picked the wrong girl to prey on. Tsalta's ready to make sure he never gets another chance. Absolutely, utterly furious, she brings her weapon to bear.

"You'd never get ANYONE as fucking good as me."

The blow connects with the ogre's side with a crack and he stumbles back, wheezing. Fury blazes in his eyes as the rejection well and truly sinks in.

"We could have had something beautiful!" Ah, hell hath no fury like an ogre scorned. Thanks to a rage-fuelled critical hit, his club very much connects, glancing off of Tsalta's injured shoulder and smacking her upside the head.

As Tsalta staggers sideways from the impact, the ogre throws his head back in a bark of angry, bitter laughter and Spindle sees his chance. In that unguarded moment, he leaps with all his strength and those huge bobcat jaws latch around the ogre's exposed throat.

From there, all he has to do is not let go. He's several hundred kilograms of cat. Gravity does the rest.

Sans throat, down he goes, hitting the ground with a dull thud.

Spindle helps himself to "breakfast", if you can really call a helping of grotty ogre neck 'breakfast'. When he's done, he pads over to Tsalta to give her a comforting nuzzle. She scoops him into her arms for a hug, sniffling tearful apologies into his fur.

Nuth isn't feeling quite as sentimental. Sure, she's relieved, but also the fuck??? Looking up at Tsalta, she gestures around in exasperation as she asks, "What are you doing here?"

Still weepy, Tsalta un-buries her face from Spindle's scruff and says she doesn't know, she just woke up here, she doesn't know.

Well, at least the squad's back together! Tsalta figures that we might as well see what the ogre had in his cave before we go home, let's see if this near-death experience might have a silver lining. (Spindle spares a moment to cock his leg against the ogre's foot.)

She peeks inside, into...the darkness. Ah. She's had enough trauma for one day and isn't feeling quite up to facing her phobia - how about the others go poke about instead.

Faeleth and Nuth are more than willing to do that job, and a quick survey of the cavern does indeed show up some goodies. Nuth unearths a brightly-decorated satchel that looks to be in quite good nick, and when she lifts the flap to peer inside she discovers a vast empty space - sweet! Bag of Holding!

(She hoists it up for the others to see, delighted to have found something so useful. Tsalta calls, "Nice! ...Can I get in it?" "NO." Worth noting, probably, is how low her Arcana roll was to identify it. In retrospect, HMMM.)

In her search, Faeleth finds a silver chain necklace. It's the kind of thing that would look extremely chavvy were it gold. As it is, it's only moderately chavvy. She puts it on. Nuth sees this and seizes her opportunity to get a bit of payback - "Wow. That looks super fucking tacky." Faeleth flips her off.

Spindle, following them in gnome-form once more, finds some gold. Well done Spindle.

Outside the cave, Tsalta sits and re-braids her hair, embarrassed that the others had to find her in this kind of a state. Nuth transfers a large portion of her belongings (How To Please Your Dwarven Lover, her kobold statuette, all that stuff she figures she won't need to grab at short-notice) to the Bag of Holding.

Loot looted, it seems a good time to get back on track. Tsalta starts to warn the others about the scorpion nest, but they interrupt - yeah, been there, seen those, tracked you all the way here, don't worry about it.

"Sooo, how far are we from town?" Tsalta asks, trying to figure out how severely she's wandered.

Not far, she's informed, tracking her was less than an hour's walk. Could have been worse! Quite a way to sleepwalk, though, Tsalta muses aloud.

YEAH. The sleepwalking thing. Nuth frowns up at Tsalta - does this happen often? Because, uh, woulda been worth a mention. That's something Tsalta agrees with, and she shares her story of how her sleep-walking left her lost away from home.

Nothing proposes that perhaps in future we need to ensure that doesn't happen, or at least a way to keep an eye out. Cos the way we found her, uh, it wasn't looking great. Tsalta sighs and nods - "Yeah. That was pretty bad..." She pulls the little tiefling in with one arm for a brief hug of gratitude. "Thanks, pal."

"S'alright."

The party makes their way back to Log Hill without trouble. Spindle offers up his piece of Nice Boulder to Nothing to keep safe - it's so precious, he says, that he wants to make sure it's well protected and doesn't get lost. She carefully and reverently places it in the bag.

Along the way, a second consultation of the map reveals something that Tsalta had missed the first time around - a town name marked to the west. Fryberg! That's her home! Better still, it's situated on the river and she's confident that we could gain passage towards our eventual destination by water. The miners ship ore to other townships by the river, so... It would be much faster than the trek would be by foot!

(Plus, the river would let us stop off half-way at Einhorn, just like the original plan.)

In light of recent events, Tsalta doles out a potion each to the rest of the party. Just in case they should ever not have access to her hair. And at long last, Spindle tires of his corset, tossing it to Nothing to do with as she pleases. (She just chucks it in the Bag of Holding.)

And so the party return to town, still in time for breakfast. Maybe bordering on brunch? Either way, they head to Jerry's for a long overdue first meal of the day. Sandwiches all around! Faeleth continues the absolute power play of ordering the cafe's 'special energy drink'.

And Spindle? Spindle, gross boy that he is, wants a glass of predator blood. (Nothing rolls her eyes as she remembers all of Spindle's previous attempts at predator-predation, and stage-whispers to Jerry to just get him tomato juice. Jerry rebukes her - oi, he doesn't disappoint a customer, o'wight?)

Predator blood, yeah? Jerry reckons there's probably snakes out in the nearby grassland, no worries. "Snake blood alright for you?" Spindle nods. Jerry calls upstairs, "Oi, Barry! Barry, need ya to go get some snakes, o'wight? Take Berry with ya, o'wight?"

A younger lad and a girl who can be assumed to be his little sister dutifully scamper down and head out of the door. The Tibbs family really seem to love names with a certain...similarity to them.

Everyone else sits down and they're served their drinks. As Nuth drinks her piping-hot tea, Faeleth decants her glass of taurine-rich ~energy drink~ into her silver chalice and ensures to make eye contact with everyone else at the table as she chugs it.

Nuth grimaces. "You're fucked up, you know that, right?"

Faeleth smirks the smuggest possible smirk in response. "Yes." Hey, if Jerry's gonna keep treating this like a beverage, she's gonna keep on calling his bluff. And needless to say, the reactions from her party members make it more than worth it.

While everyone enjoys their sandwiches, Barry and Berry return, and before long Jerry brings round a glass of warm snake blood for Spindle. He downs it, fails his constitution save. Wolf blood's one thing, mammal blood, you know. Snake blood just doesn't taste the same. It burbles back up just as fast as it goes down.

Ever prepared and unflappable, Jerry doesn't miss a beat. "That's alright - oi, Berry, Berry! We got a spillage 'ere, o'wight, c'mere and clean it up!" Berry protests briefly - can't Barry do it?? - but relents and the little girl grabs a mop and gets to cleaning up. (As this happens, Tsalta gives Spindle a Look as though to say, "See, that's why you don't drink snake blood, you wee numpty.")

"SEE." Nuth says, leaning her chin on her hand and raising her eyebrows at the little gnome, "Now are you sure you don't want any proper drink?"

Man, there's some weird beverage preferences in this party. Tsalta discovers at the counter that she doesn't have enough money to pay for everyone's (very expensive) breakfast, and the moment she announces it Spindle just scampers over, throws a handful of gold onto the counter, and goes, "That's enough, isn't it?"

Indeed it is.

Breakfast acquired, it's time to consider the plan for the rest of the day.

Tsalta suggests it might be good to check out the wizard's place. Nuth all but lights up - what, like nickin' stuff? To her delight, Tsalta replies, "Well, you two might be getting me into bad habits, but....yeah."

Faeleth gives the big lass an amicable elbow-nudge - if that's the case, it's time for Faeleth to show her how it's done, hmm? Spindle scoffs. No, HE'll provide the demonstration, he's very small and sneaky! Faeleth chuckles. "Big talk for a little man!"

(Spindle proceeds to try to "prove how sneaky he is" by leaving the cafe, finding a rock, and attempting to 'blend in' next to it. It's a rock about as big as his fist. Natural camouflage or no...bad hiding spot, kid, everyone sees him.)

The wizard's shop has been boarded up since they last saw it. Locked, too. But when Faeleth knocks, she does get an answer. "What do you want, who is it?"

Faeleth enquires why his shop's all boarded up. "Not my shop!"

Well, is he a squatter, then? Why's he locked himself in there? The voice retorts, "Why you knocking?"

Because we want supplies! "Shop's shut!"

....Didn't he say it's not his shop? Who is this?

"It's Blake!" the voice (which doesn't sound super like Blake but nobody's questioned that yet) replies. "Taking inventory for Jerry."

Well, Tsalta would still appreciate some healing potions. The voice repeats, quite firmly, that the shop is not open. At the offer of gold, however, the door creaks open just the tiniest crack.

At this point, suspicion is rising - say, how come he won't open the door to us? Everyone was under the impression that Blake liked us, so hey, c'mon. Why so cagey? We're only here to stock up on travel supplies.

The excuses roll in - he's on Jerry's orders to not open the shop to anyone, it's only because it's us that he's doing a favour like taking a look at the stock (he says, as if we haven't had to bribe him with coin). Nothing hands over the gold she provided for the bribe. It's snatched out of her hand, the door slams shut and "Blake" immediately declares that the shop's all cleared out, nothin' for us, sorry!

What a dick! We got swindled!

Spindle threatens that if he doesn't open up, we'll blow the place down! Tsalta whispers to Faeleth (only half joking) that perhaps then it's time to go to Blake's house and nick from him, see how he likes it. Nuth, meanwhile, slips off to try to peer through the cracks in the boards - she wants to see if he's lying about the lack of stock.

It's hard to make much out in there, though, but...she can just about see him. In the exact same instant that she realises that means she can try to charm this guy, her view of him is obliterated by thick grey fog. Spindle, back by the front door, proclaims, "There! That should smoke him out!"

Whoever's inside didn't expect fog. The voice exclaims in confusion - who did that? What's all this? - and then all too conspicuously says that he hopes nobody's going to go to his house, no, don't do that. There's nothing valuable there!

'Cause that's not weird. Weirder still is that Faeleth, who knows a thing or two about deception, doesn't detect insincerity. He seems genuinely concerned that we might go to Blake's place.

Tsalta and Faeleth, naturally, start heading to Blake's place. "Blake" sounds rather concerned now as he hears their retreat - no, stop, he'll give their money back, just don't go to his house!

Well, what's it worth to him? Nuth's money back and a bit of honesty, perhaps? Why doesn't he want us going to his house?

Now, he claims it's because he heard Tsalta and Faeleth discussing looting his house, but Tsalta's curious how on earth he heard that - that should not have been within his hearing range. Also come on, man, it would only have been a revenge theft anyway. But for real, let's have that money back.

The door opens a crack as the handful of coins comes skittering out - plus a couple of potions. Seems like there was some stock after all, how about that! Spindle seizes his chance and Druidcrafts the odor of skunk spray just inside the door. There's a sputtering and gasping from the person inside, and in his shock his false accent drops - the exclamations of "Augh, oh gods!" sound a little posh, actually. Nothing like Blake's gruff undertone at all!

Tsalta's definitely going to Blake's. As she takes to the street, Nuth goes back to her window and peers through...oops, yeah, still pretty opaque in there. "Spindle! Drop the bloody fog." He does, but the man inside is nowhere to be seen. As Nothing huffs in frustration, Spindle runs over and tugs at her trouser leg.

"Boost me up! Boost me up!"

"That ain't gonna help, Spindle!"

"Boost me up! Just do it!"

She hoists him onto her shoulder so he also has a view through the wooden slats. With a gesture, the candles inside the shop flicker into life, making it much easier to see in.

Nobody's there.

Spindle hops down from Nothing's shoulder, scampering after Tsalta, and after a moment of confusion the tiefling and Faeleth follow suit.

-

At Blake's house, Tsalta knocks on the door. And who's there to answer her but Actual Blake!

He's visibly baffled as she informs him that someone's pretending to be him in the wizard's shop. Nobody's at the shop, he says, it's closed up.

Seeing Real, Actual Blake answer the door, Spindle abandons his pursuit of Tsalta, galloping past the rest of his partymates as he rushes once more back to the shop.

Of course the place is abandoned, door swung wide open, the contents of the shop in utter disarray. Whoever was hiding here grabbed everything they could and left in one hell of a hurry. Nuth heads in and starts poking around. Looks like our mystery man packed up in a rush, and maybe that means he was careless and left behind a useful clue or just like, cool shit to steal.

Tsalta's still hung up on the fact the guy heard her at a whisper. He's not on the other end of our Stone of Farspeech, is he? Nuth flaps a hand dismissively as she rootles through shelves and drawers - we know who's on the other end. But Tsalta's inclined to check. She plucks the stone from behind her ear and murmurs into it - "Hello?"

She gets no reply. Nuth pauses with a frown when she sees Tsalta holding the stone, "Oi, you know what we got told. We don't call him, he calls us, don't he."

Spindle joins the investigation! Unfortunately the scents of a wizard's house, weird and wonderful as they are, are not very illuminating to the nose of a gnome, sniff as he might. But Nothing finally finds something - a hastily-written letter.

It reads,

Albert,

She wants you back. Now.

It's signed off with a familiar small handprint.

She shows the others. What to make of it, though...a letter from Hand, to Albert, about 'her'. Wasn't Albert in cahoots with the Collector?

Tsalta is distracted from the discussion by a voice from behind her ear. Hand speaks fast, his tone hushed.

"What the hell do you think you are doing - I told you not to contact me."

Tsalta looks at the others. "Ah. We should...go..." She gestures to her ear and everyone twigs that she's being spoken to. Hand doesn't want for anyone's response.

"I do not have much time. What do you want?"

Tsalta asks who Albert is. "He is one of hers. I am trying to deal with him."

"Oh, shit, sorry. We'll leave you to it then, pal. That's all we needed, thank you."

No answer from the stone. Tsalta relays what she's been told, and as she does she helps out leafing through the loose papers on the floor and counters. One of the pages catches her eye, because on it is an illustration of a rather familiar-looking ring. The writing on it has been largely smudged or ripped away, but it's definitely the Fancy-Ass Ring that has gone "missing".

"Hey, you remember that ring you lost, Nothing? Says it's pretty powerful, this does."

"Awwww, shit!" Nuth whines. Of all the things to lose in a river! "Ugh, I bet that thing woulda been good."

Filching that ring has been starting to weigh more heavily on Faeleth's conscience by the day. Sure, it's clearly of magnificent craftsmanship and incredibly valuable and she really wanted it, but...she took it before she remembered that she killed the kid's parents. Now it feels unfair.

Faeleth peers at the piece of paper. "Hm?" She glances up at Nothing and frowns, tilting her head a little, "You lost it in the river, you said?" The tiefling nods, and Faeleth does a spectacular job of feigning realisation. "Oh! Shit, hold on-" She makes quite the show of rootling through her bag and pockets, "-I found this on the floor, I meant to give it back to you, I completely forgot! Here you go!"

And just like that, Faeleth produces the Fancy-Ass Ring she's been so covetously hiding away, placing it into Nothing's hand.

Yeah, as if she's buying that. Nuth's eyes narrow at the elf as she slips the ring back onto its rightful place upon her middle finger, "You 'found' it, huh. Alright. Thanks."

Faeleth claps Nothing on the back with a smile. "We good?" She gets her answer in the form of Nothing's raised sparkly middle finger.

The final discovery the party makes among the papers is some information about the key Tsalta carries, among a few others. What's history and what's myth is hard to determine, but it's said they open...well, things that have been sealed away, powerful stuff. Not many details on what!

Tsalta is very excited indeed to learn this. She gathers the others around and shows them - look, she has a key to something big! Some kind of mythical key, guys!

Spindle slips away while everyone else is investigating to go chat to Jerry in private. (Again, practical as he is, Jerry simply creates a quiet place to talk by ordering everyone out of the café for a minute.)

He fills Jerry in on the events at the magic shop with the impersonator, and then leads him over to see. The moment he claps eyes on the state of the place, Jerry exclaims, "That fucking prick. I bet I know who this was. Albert's cleared the place out and buggered off! He owes me a lot of money!"

Well, that tracks. Jerry's pretty exasperated to be dragged over here when there's little he can do and it's pretty clearly Albert's work as far as he's concerned. He sighs. "Guess we'll call this a bad business opportunity, o'wight? Talkin' of business opportunities-"

Nobody's interested in buying a 'new property on the market' (especially not when he's clearly talking about the old shop!) and Spindle cuts him off to try and suggest he speak to Diamond if he wants business advice.

(And here we learn that Diamond's the reason that Terry left to start his own town. On her - admittedly very sound - suggestion, he left to create his own much more lucrative town. Talented though she may be, Jerry's not a fan.)

Well, that seems to be that. The party agree it's high time they set out on the road. It's early afternoon, which gives them plenty of time to travel before nightfall. Jerry warns them briefly of talk of an impregnable goblin fortress along the road - best be wary.

Pff. Goblins.

On the road the party go! Time to follow the river to Fryberg.

A few hours' walk away, the party encounter a man by the roadside looking rather worse for wear. Tsalta hurries over to the bloodied, bruised traveller, "You alright, pal?"

He was attacked, he says. Goblins on the road ahead - there was a trap, two of them ambushed him. (Oh, good! Two goblins, not a problem.) He only narrowly escaped with his life, but he had to abandon his cart in the skirmish.

Well, we can sort out goblins, no problem. Goblin removal pros, that's us! Tsalta gives him a potion which he gratefully chugs. The traveller says he doesn't have much to repay with, and everyone waves that away - no need to worry about that. We can get his stuff back for him...? He shakes his head. What we find we can keep, dealing with the menace on the road is all he cares about.

He reiterates that they have an impregnable fortress. Sounds odd - that's not the kind of thing you'd expect to spring up overnight?

We wish the traveller well, and he us, and keep our eyes peeled along the way for a "goblin fortress".

It's not a far walk before Spindle spots some goblins - he runs towards them, and they dart into the underbrush. The gnome giggles. "They're scared of me." He continues ahead of everyone, uninterested in the party's attempts to stay low-key. It's goblins! Who cares.

Nuth decides it's time to investigate - she casts Invisibility and hurries ahead to Spindle, whispering her plan to sneak ahead. Very firmly, she tells him not to blow her cover.

Spindle whispers back that no, he's going to keep going and see if the goblins jump out, and then we'll have a fight! They bicker a little under their voices, Nuth in favour of scoping them out and Spindle in favour of rushing in. As they squabble, a huge shadow passes over the road, and both of them look up to see the the massive leathery wingspan of a green dragon as it sails overhead.

Faeleth inhales sharply at the sight and abruptly yanks Tsalta deeper into the treeline and out of view. Nothing forgets she's invisible, freezing in place in hope the thing won't see her if she doesn't move, all but holding her breath until it glides off over the horizon. Spindle glances up but is unconcerned - as far as he knows big ol' flying lizards might just be a feature of the countryside he's never seen before. Whatever.

After that little fright, the party carry on, cresting the hill and finally sighting, in the middle of the road, a rather dishevelled upturned cart. Next to it, bits and pieces of what was probably also a cart once - a wheel here, a plank there. The husk of a cart, if you will, stripped clean for parts.

Those parts, by the look of it, have been used to bolster the first. On closer inspection, the upturned cart has been fitted with extra doors and crude arrow slits, the body of the cart reinforced with spare planks.

To top it all off, painted in sloppy red brushstrokes on the side, hideously misspelled and with some letters fully back-to-front, is written "The Inpregnable Fortress of Dib".

Nuth has to stifle an involuntary fit of giggles. She runs over to Spindle (who hasn't spotted it yet, still busy looking for some actual bastion) and nudges him to point it out, snickering under her breath. "That's our fortress!" Spindle giggles back - that? That's not a fortress!

The two of them move in towards this most unintimidating of structures, Faeleth and Tsalta cresting the hill behind them. Tsalta claps eyes on the view ahead of her and doubles over laughing, slapping her knee - "Look at that fort! Oh, it's so small, it's soooo wee!"

At that, a raspy little goblin voice yells out from within the cart! "This is our castle! It's not small, you're just really big!"

This only makes Tsalta laugh harder. "You're right, I am really very big! But...pffhahaha- but you're so wee! And you're- ahaha, oh- it is so wee..."

The goblins yell in absolute outrage! Spindle takes another step forward, "How about you pick on someone my size? I'm small, and even I think your fort's terrible!"

A volley of arrows fly from the arrow-slits, none quite reaching the smirking gnome. Spindle shakes his head and laughs. "Oh, you want to fight?" And with that, he stretches his arms out in front of him, rolls his shoulders, and turns into a fucking bear.

That's new for everyone involved!

Spindle thunders forward with a roar, and a cry comes up from the goblins - "Man the battlements!" Another rain of arrows from the arrowslits. A couple meet their mark, but he's a bear, it's like a couple of nasty splinters to Spindle.

"Aw, they want to play!" Tsalta gives Faeleth a wink and lights a torch.

Nothing, still invisible, laughs. "C'mon, little dudes! You're not gonna win against us, give it up."

There's a gasp and a snarl from within. "They bring ghosts!" They think she's a ghost? Sure! She can be a ghost. She makes her best spooky ghost noise, but the goblins claim they ain't fraid of no ghosts! There's a squeaking of unoiled turn-wheels as one of the goblin hoists a "flag" - a pair of posh frilly underpants. God, it's just so cute.

Tsalta tilts her torch to Faeleth.

"You want to set them on fire? Oh no, that seems a bit cruel, they're basically helpless." She pauses a second in consideration. "Hold on, I've had a thought." Faeleth takes her bow, lights the tip of the arrow on Tsalta's torch, and fires the arrow right through those fancy bloomers. The silky fabric ignites instantly.

Tsalta and Faeleth are overcome by a fresh wave of laughter. "Nice pants!" Tsalta hoots. The smoldering undies are winched back down into the fort for inspection, and as they disappear inside there's a furious scream - "NOooo! ...YOU BITCH!"

Ah, they probably shouldn't have called her that. If that didn't clinch it, the arrow that lodges itself in Faeleth's thigh certainly seals the deal.

She lights another arrow against Tsalta's torch. "Cheers, babe." Without a moment's hesitation she delivers it straight into the oh-so-flammable woodwork of the cart. Between the dry wood and the cloth drapery, the fire has no trouble catching.

Surely, Nothing reckons, we must have given them a real good spooking now! We're big, we're scary, we're setting their cart on fire. They've gotta yeild soon. Let's see if they can just be given a little push. Still invisible, she makes sure to get nice and close to the cart. "So," she proclaims for the goblins to hear, "you say you ain't scared of ghosts? Well..."

She drops Invisibility and at the same moment, a roll of booming, ominous, impossible thunder rolls across the clear summer sky. Nothing grins, the flames flare, she does her best to look demonic, "Ohhh, you should be scared of me."

A chorus of screams sounds from within the cart, it sounds like a couple of them might have just burst into tears. But one goblin barks out, "Don't be stupid, it's just a girl!". Nuth gets a glimpse of his sneering face through the arrow-slit before he looses his bow at her, and oh shit that felt like it probably went all the way through to the other side. (Fifteen points of damage. Yowch.)

As Spindle bears down (if you will) on the cart, Faeleth and Tsalta train their bows on it...if any goblins pop out, they're gonna shoot. Nuth, clutching her arrow wound with one hand, Eldritch Blasts a hole in the cart's side.

Huh.

Where'd they go? Through the gap, Nothing sees that the interior seems to be deserted.

Spindle rips open the other side of the cart with his massive paws - nope, no goblins! The rest of the party gather curiously around the empty, smoldering cart. Tsalta cracks what remains open with her warhammer, and everyone takes a look inside.

Inside there's, you know, goblin stuff. Some bones, a couple of crappy weapons, some pots of lukewarm oil (oh bless, they'd not managed to heat it up on time!). And amongst it, of course, a hole in the floor.

After "confiscating" the weapons (read: throwing them on the fire the cart has become), the party gather around the hole. Inside, the goblins crow that they're undefeated and the fortress has yet to be breached. Tsalta points out to the party that there's oil here...could always tip a little in, set it on fire, make it less comfortable down there for them. Faeleth nods. "Like smoking out a mole."

There's a solidly unproductive conversation between Tsalta and the remaining goblins. Apparently their number is "legion", apparently the teeny-weeny hole and crappy fortress were all a "disguise", so on so forth, they've got a big-talk excuse for everything.

Tsalta points out to the goblins that they left their oil up here.

They immediately start bickering in Orcish to one another - what idiot left the oil there, oh my god, who did that! Tsalta informs them that she can speak Orcish, and they resume their argument in Goblin this time - "She speaks Orcish, ugh, you said we should learn Orcish so we could talk in secret, what idiot-"

Tsalta can also speak Goblin. :)c

So, who's in favour of pouring in some oil.....? :)c

"It's going down...!" Tsalta sing-songs as she upends one of the pots into the hole. The goblins start to get audibly nervous, but that same gruff goblin that put an arrow in Nuth chastises them - they're not going to do it, idiots.

"Just watch me," Tsalta says, waving the torch over the opening in hope they'll catch sight of firelight and surrender.

"Alright lads, this is your last chance to back out!" Nothing calls down, "Gonna count you down from three, and if you don't come out and run the hell away we're setting it on fire!"

Tsalta isn't sure whether everyone's serious about doing this. She doesn't want to actually do it, and as Nuth starts the countdown she pushes the torch into Faeleth's hands instead.

"Three...gonna set the oil on fire..."

Faeleth looks at the torch in her hands, and then regards the hole with a calm, impassive gaze.

"Twoooo......." Nothing strings it out, sure they're gonna bottle out any second now...

Faeleth drops the torch.

The oil catches, and the flames race downwards as everyone turns to Faeleth in surprise. Surprise turns to abject horror as a few things become abruptly apparent.

Things like the evident flammability of the den's contents. And the fact there were more goblins down there than we were led to think. And the fact that some of the panicked voices, the rising screams, sound to belong to goblin women. And children.

The party recoil from the hole, and the ursine Spindle pulls a few planks over it and sits on top, blocking out the sound at least. (To his bear's nose, it smells pretty damn good, which is morbid but undeniable. To his child's brain, this provides a wonderful opportunity to exercise the skill of repressing memories of a village burning! At least it's not him among the flames this time!)

Congratulations, Team Jailbird.

You accidentally did mass murder by arson.