Dalvin picks up the quiver and moves the arrows into his own, leaving out the magical five for Skalla to examine.
"I wonder how Keloch became that creature," he wonders aloud, glancing around the cabin for anything else that might be useful for them or the refugees back at camp.
While Dalvin pokes around, Skalla finishes identifying the magical gear found in the cabin.
Outside of Keloch's cabin, is a small smokehouse built from mud-and-wood. Inside are a number of heavily smoked and preserved fish and strips of meat.
"An infection of the soul, one we were all lucky enough to avoid." Nisa mutters to Dalvin while looking over the wights remains.
"Dalvin, may I see where the lynx wounded you?" She motions to the halfing, pulling hack her hood and stretching her arms.
Dalvin nods gratefully and walks over to Nisa, leaving Drako behind. He winces as he partially rolls up his shirt, revealing the bloody claw marks the lynx left behind.
"It got me pretty good."
Nisa examines the wound briefly, before raising one hand pulsing with soft green light. "A very deep cut...This may feel strange, but it will only last for a moment."
Without waiting for approval, she pressed one finger gently on his arm, as the green energy formed into what seemed like roots, digging into her arm. The room fills with a floral aroma for a few seconds. The roots spread across Dalvin's arm and shoulder blossoming into what seemed like wisps of flowers and leaves as warmth spreads across Dalvin's. Leafy twigs begin to sprout from her head and her arms become mottled with moss and creeping vines. As the energy fades, Dalvin's wound has mostly closed, small leaves of soft light drifting from his arm.
Nisa stands back, pulling up her hood quickly.
"Well. That was certainly... something." Skalla watches the process curiously as Nisa heals Dalvin. "I never thought that 'herbal remedies' could be so literal." She gives Nisa a half-smile, then she turns to leave the cabin.
"We should burn the body, but I fear that we do not have time for that, and besides the smoke might attract unwanted attention."
Rayne nods in agreement as she pushes herself up from the floor. "Let's just... move on." She casts a glance at the body on the floor. "It's not like he's going to follow us."
The Fangwood thin as it approaches the Tamran highway. The towering oaks and firs of the deep forest—so dense at their canopy that the ground below is shrouded in eerie twilight—gives way to a greenwood of sugar maple and yellow birch. The way forward is no less difficult, the ground choked with uncompromising shrubs and bushes.
Oddly, the usual sounds of the forest have stopped. The wind rustles the leaves of the trees, but the only birdsound is a distant woodpecker's rapping. A foul smell—like a mixture of skunk, boiled cabbage, and roses—lingers nearby. Whatever its source, it must be close.
They watch the party intently, barely moving.
The lighter forest cover brings Skalla some relief - the dense coniferous woods had been feeling close and oppressive. She walks deep in thought, her mind occupied with the encounter at Keloch's cabin. She wonders if the manner of his death had anything to do with his restless undead state, and she thinks of all the people who had died at the hands of the Ironfang invaders so far. She fancies that she can almost hear the whispering of their spirits, thirsty for vengeance.
Dalvin becomes very still at Nisa's display, the sudden burst of life strangely triggering a memory in him of being surrounded by the sudden death caused by the Darkblight. When the healing has ended, he tries to shake the feeling off with a weak, "Thank you."
A few days later, Dalvin walks with Drako close by his side, feeling a stronger bond with the pup than he ever had. Guess that comes with facing death together.
"Do you hear that?" he asks. The sudden silence was nagging at his mind. "It's gotten so quiet. This isn't normal."
Rayne walks through the forest ahead of the group, feeling much stronger since their ordeal with the wight, but no less on guard. Try as she might, she can't stop thinking about how helpless she'd felt as all of her strength left her. It wasn't something she wanted to repeat, and it had left her on high alert.
"Do you hear that?" he asks. The sudden silence was nagging at his mind. "It's gotten so quiet. This isn't normal."
Rayne is just about to voice her agreement when she spots something ahead of them and halts abruptly. "Everyone stop," she says, quiet and calm. "There's someone ahead of us. A few someones, actually. Lizard people." She takes several careful steps forward, eyes trained ahead of her. "Hello," she calls out. "I can see you up there. We're just trying to make our way through the forest. We really don't want any trouble."
Nisa rolls back her sleeves, as she tries to follow Rayne's eyes to the location of the Lizard people. "What ugly creatures! And I thought goblins were the worst." Zeekan giggles softly in her head.
She steps forward a few feet, raising her hands to show they were empty of any weapons. "How many are there?" She whispers only a few feet behind Rayne.
"Three," Rayne answers quietly, never taking her eyes off of the group in ahead of them. "At least two of them are armed. I'm not sure about the largest one."
Skalla HP: 17/17 - AC: 17/11/16 Status:
Rayne HP: 21/21 - AC: 16/13/13 Status:
Nisa HP: 28/28 - AC: 19/13/15 Status:
Dalvin HP: 18/18 - AC: 15/13/13 Status:
________________________________
Trog1 - HP: 13/13 - AC: 15/9/15 Status:
Trog2 - HP: 13/13 - AC: 15/9/15 Status:
Giant Gecko - HP: 11/11 - AC: 14/12/12 Status:
Init: Giant Gecko, Rayne (16), Nisa (16), Dalvin (11), Skalla (9), Trogs (5)
When it becomes obvious that the reptilian humanoids have been seen, they shout in a bestial language and make ready to hurl their javelins.
The gecko surges towards the party, scuttling along the forest floor with alarming speed. Its jaws, filled with small triangular teeth, latch on to Nisa's outstretched arm, digging into her flesh.
They are especially rare in the Fangwood, only venturing from their caves once a generation or two.
Children of Stone?
Dalvin barely has time to consider this strange battlecry before the group suddenly finds themselves on the defense. Dalvin paces his hand on Drako for only a second, imbuing him with the spirit of a bull, then pulls out his bow and hurries forward, hesitating just a moment when he sees the troglodytes' gecko bite into the Nisa.
Drako responds to the attack by leaping around the others and at the gecko. The dog snarls and rears back to bite into the animal.
Dalvin lets loose an arrow at the troglodyte on his left.
Oh, come now! Wasn't it enough that they had been driven from their homes by the Ironfangs, friends and family killed, livelihoods burned? That they had to scrounge and scavenge for food, and navigate the perils of the forest? And now troglodytes? The creatures did not usually leave their caves, so something must have caused this unusual behaviour, but Skalla was not going to sit idle as they butchered her companions.
"Come then, and die on our blades." she growls, stomping forward to meet their charge, her feet making rhythmic noises against the ground.
Rayne groans and swears loudly, extracting the daggers from their sheaths on her forearms. Dashing forward, she twists around to the back of the lizard, slashing out at it with the dagger in her right hand.
Nisa steps back from the lizard and then stomps one foot into the ground as vines sprout rapidly across her body. She throws out her hand sending the vines forward plummeting towards the troglodytes like a pusling net.
Skalla HP: 17/17 - AC: 17/11/16 Status:
Rayne HP: 21/21 - AC: 16/13/13 Status:
Nisa HP: 24/28 - AC: 19/13/15 Status:
Dalvin HP: 18/18 - AC: 15/13/13 Status:
________________________________
Trog1 - HP: 13/13 - AC: 15/9/15 Status:
Trog2 - HP: 0/13 - AC: 15/9/15 Status:
Giant Gecko - HP: 11/11 - AC: 14/12/12 Status:
Init: Giant Gecko, Rayne (16), Nisa (16), Dalvin (11), Skalla (9), Trogs (5)
Nisa's blast—intended to entangle and trap the troglodyte—instead slams the warrior into unconsciousness, the vines wrapping tightly enough to draw blood and break bone.
The other trog, gaping at what happened to his companion, and produces a feather from its belt. With a flick of the wrist, the feather transforms into a bird that hovers in front of the troglodyte for a moment. It mutters a few words outside of hearing, and the bird takes flight, heading to the north.
His odd task completed, the troglodyte approaches, replacing its javelin with a stone club. As it approaches, the stink becomes more and more powerful. Rayne and Nisa feel their stomachs churn with the foul smell.
Meanwhile, the gecko thrashes as Drako sinks his teeth into its snout. The bloodied reptile tears away, bloodied, and snaps at the dog. Drako is already moving though, and hops away from the bite.
As the bird begins to fly away, Dalvin quickly aims his arrow towards what he suspects is a messenger.
Drako, hopping out of the gecko's reach, feels the rage of Skalla's percussive song. He rears back and lunges at the gecko again, even fiercer than before.
Rayne's stomach starts to churn as the troglodyte's stench reaches her, and it's all she can do to not empty the contents of her stomach right there on the stinking lizard. She takes a deep breath and focuses her attention on the foe in front of her, lashing out with with one dagger, then the other.
Skalla quickly loads a bolt in her crossbow and aims at the flying messenger.
Growling, Skalla pulls out her battleaxe and swings at the creature attacking Drako.
Insubstantial wisps begin swirling around the half-orc, swooping towards the troglodyte. Those familiar with Phaendar might recognize a few familiar faces among the specters, the visages of those slain by the Ironfang.
Nisa throws out one hand as green energy surges around her. The energy coalesces into a solid form of vines that shot out like a spear from her open palm at the last troglodyte.
Dalvin's first shot is too wide and too high, but the second is dead-on. The bird vanishes in a puff of bloodless feathers, whatever enchantment that bound it together destroyed by the arrow. Rayne and Skalla combine enough blows to slay the giant lizard threatening Drako and Nisa impales the approaching troglodyte with a mass of vines.
In the space of seconds, the melee is over. The sounds of the forest filter back in slowly.
One of the troglodytes has an interesting item: a delicate flight feather with a crude bird-like bead hanging from the shaft.
Dalvin drops his bow arm to his side with a sharp exhale. He has no way of knowing where that bird was traveling, but he was sure it wouldn't have been good for them to reach its destination.
He picks up the feather dropped by the troglodyte to examine it. "I'm guessing this is what the one used to make that bird appear. Can't really tell what it is though. My guess is that there's more troglodytes up ahead."
Dalvin shakes his head and calls Drako away from the now dead lizard. "It's strange to see them out here in the forest. They normally stay in their caves and just fight with each other."
"Either something has drawn them out, or something has chased them out of their dwellings. Either way, we should be wary."
Nisa looks out behind the party, checking the horizon while she spoke in a serious tone. "Perhaps they were scouts, waiting to see which way the Legion was coming from. When Ironfang moves, many creatures tend to notice."
She walks forward and steps over the bodies, before motioning to the path ahead of her. "Let's keep moving, and get some distance from here. Wherever that bird was meant to go will have their allies, and they will notice their guards are absent given enough time. "
Later that evening, while in camp, the party and Aubrin are approached privately by Taidel and Lirosa, the half-elf siblings that serve as the scouts and hunters for the refugees. They share a worried look before turning to address their leaders.
"We found a body in the woods," Taidel begins, frowning. "It's Gilida."
"Damn it," mutters Aubrin.
"It's bad," Taidel continues. "Something beat her to death. We thought we'd come to you first and let you take a look." Lirosa shrugs, somewhat helplessly.
"You were right to come to us," Aubrin answers. She turns to the party. "Go have a look. I'd come too, but in the dark, with my leg, I'd just slow you down."
---
The scouts lead the party thirty minutes from camp to a dry creek bed. Gilida's body lies in the bed, her face almost unrecognizable beneath bruises and wounds. The hunter was brutalized before and after her death, a testament to the cruelty of whatever killed her.
Nearby her body sits a haversack, which Phaendaran's recognize as Gilida's "magic bag", an enchanted container the trapper used to carry her tools and furs.
Dalvin instantly recognizes the name. Gilida. A trapper like himself. And someone they hadn't managed to get out of Phaendar.
When the hunter approaches Gilida's body, the guilt Dalvin feels shows clearly on his face. He knows it's irrational, it would be impossible to save everybody from the Ironfang, but he can't help it. What had happened to her? Was it the Ironfang? Or did she manage to get away on her own, only to be attacked by something in the forest?
With a glance at her magic bag, Dalvin slowly approaches the body laid out before them. "There's something here... Do you see that?" He gestures to one of the wounds in her body. "A broken fingernail, black, kind of like a hobgoblin's fingernail."
Skalla kneels by the body, gently brushing the mangled features. "They didn't even take her things. These monsters only wanted to inflict pain and terror."
She had spotted the nail as well, and nods when Dalvin points it out. "We can do nothing for Gilida now, but her soul would rest easier if those responsible for this are dealt with. They'be been hunting us for so long, it is their turn to be hunted now."
Scowling in determination, the half-orc rises and glares at the ground as if she could force it to give up the trail of the Ironfang.
Rayne stands back from the others as they examine the body, leaning against a tree with her arms crossed as she seethes quietly, her face expressionless. The Ironfang had always been a massive, destructive nuisance, but they were beginning to take it to a new level. Her bloodlust was rapidly increasing.
She pushes herself off of the tree and starts walking, staring ahead of her. "We should keep moving," she says coolly.
Dalvin shakes his head. "If it was the hobgoblins, they might still be out here," he observes with worry. "We should check out the surrounding area, make sure we aren't bringing the survivors into an ambush."
Dalvin turns his attention to the surroundings of the creek, searching for any tracks that might lead them to Gilida's killers.
You're confident you could follow them.
"A hob's fingernail?" Lirosa asks, the color draining from her face. "They've crossed the Marideth then."
"A broken bridge was only going to slow them down so long," Taidel adds grimly.
Rayne stares at the scouts in surprise before swearing loudly. "You're right. I can't believe I missed that." She looks at the others. "What now? We can either keep moving to the outpost or try to find whoever did this," she says, motioning at the body.
"Find these scouts, I say, before they inform the main host of our presence. And to prevent them from preying on stragglers from our group." Skalla opines, still scowling at the tracks.
Dalvin comes running back from the brush he had been examining. Despite the grim situation, he has a faint smile on his face from his success.
"I can track them down," he says confidently. "Looks like there's three of them, scouts probably. The tracks are only a few hours old. We can find them, and... And stop them from hurting anyone else. Maybe even capture one and interrogate them."
Nisa crouches near the tracks, inspecting them as the group discusses the scouts, "I can attempt to restrain them, I will just need to not hit them... too hard with my vines. Lets get a move on, before they get more distance between us."
Lirosa nods. "Taidel and I will return to camp and keep watch. Who knows what else is out here."
---
Although the hobgoblins took pains to hide their tracks, Dalvin and Drako easily follow their trail, despite the darkening woods. After an hour's hike, he finds their campsite, a trio of lean-to shelters surrounding the ashy remains of a cook fire. Two forms lounge by the dying embers, while a third stands alert at the edge of the camp, keeping watch.
Rayne studies the scene ahead of them. "We could just ambush them," she says with a growl. She was itching to sink her blades into any hobgoblins she came across. "I can skirt around their camp to see if there are more, first."
Skalla nods. "If you can draw away the sentry, we can make short work of the other two." She doesn't seem to have any qualms about killing the two hobgoblins in their sleep.
Dalvin wastes no time in notching an arrow. "We should make sure there aren't more," he nods to Rayne. "Or else we'll end up the ones being ambushed."
"On it."
Without another word Rayne slips away, appearing as though to meld into her surroundings as she expertly navigates her way towards the small camp without a sound. Moving from tree to tree and slinking through the darkness, she carefully navigates her way around the perimeter of the camp, making note of any goblins she can see or interesting noises to be heard.
The hobgoblins near the fire are asleep, although they anticipated a possible fight—both still wear armor. A third hobgoblin, a brute in dark padded armor, stands further away from the light, watching the darkness for any sign of enemies.
None of them seem to notice Rayne's approach.
Dalvin pulls back his bowstring, aiming for one of the lounging hobgoblins near the fire, ready for any indication that Rayne has been spotted.
Following Dalvin's lead, Skalla loads a bolt into her crossbow. It was a bit far even to the closest one, but she dares not go closer for fear of giving away their position.
Noting the two sleeping hobgoblins, Rayne extracts the two daggers from their sheathes on her forearms and crouches low, sneaking between the goblins and past the fire towards the lone sentry. As she comes up behind it she quickly reaches both arms around its shoulders and sweeps both blades across its throat.
Skalla HP: 27/27 - AC: 16/10/15 Status:
Rayne HP: 21/21 - AC: 16/13/13 Status:
Nisa HP: 28/28 - AC: 19/13/15 Status:
Dalvin HP: 18/18 - AC: 15/13/13 Status:
________________________________
Recruit 1 - HP: 17/17 - AC: 16/12/14 Status:
Recruit 2 - HP: 17/17 - AC: 16/12/14 Status:
Scout - HP: 7/19 - AC: 14/13/11 Status:
___________________________
Init: Rayne (25), Scout (15), Skalla (12), Dalvin (9), Nisa (8), Recruit 2 (6), Recruit 1 (3)
Rayne maneuvers between the sleeping hobgoblins, daggers poised to strike. Before she reaches the scout keeping watch, the fire beside her pops noisily. The scout turns to look at it, spots Rayne, then double-takes, eyes-widening. Closer to the light, Rayne can see his face, ashen skin with tattoos ringing his eyes and striping his chin.
Before the hobgoblin can shout in alarm, Rayne closes the short distance between them and sinks a dagger into his gut. She raises the other to finish the job, but the scout stumbles backwards, grabbing for its battleaxe.
Before he can can sound the alarm though, the warrior collapses to the ground, a pair of arrows sticking from his back.
The sleeping hobgoblins stir, but do not wake.
Nisa crouches low off in the distance, watching the others make short work of the sentry. Seeing the scout fall to the earth, Nisa prepares her own attack, knowing her blasts would create significant sound, she was waiting on her allies attacks before launching her own at the closest hobgoblin.
Dalvin crouches, ready to hide as their assault on the lookout begins. Thankfully, the hobgoblin falls easily. Before taking another shot, Dalvin creeps closer to the camp, wanting to make sure that, despite what he gleaned from the tracks they left behind, there aren't more hobgoblins nearby. He whispers for Drako to stay.
Assuming there are no other threats spotted, Dalvin notches an arrow and lets it fly at the closest sleeping hobgoblin.
Not trusting herself to be stealthy, Skalla remains where she is and fires another bolt at the closest sleeping form.