Astraden stabs the worg. It yelps, looking badly injured.
Seeing Carina get some distance, Tanith breathes a little easier until one of the worgs latches painfully onto his calf again.
Growling, he's spins to put the evil beast down for good.
Farrukh slashes at the one he's flanking with Astraden.
Spiny struggles to his feet and moves to attack another wolf.
Cuetzpalli moves to support his Kordly brother. "Get it, Tanith!"
Seeing Carina get some distance, Tanith breathes a little easier until one of the worgs latches painfully onto his calf again.
Growling, he's spins to put the evil beast down for good.
Tanith beats the injured worg down, then delivers a kick that instantly breaks the neck of the worg attacking Astraden.
Finding his original target dead, Farrukh slices into the worg to the south of him. Another slice of red appears on the snarling beast.
Yelping, the two remaining worgs turn and flee. They quickly run past the unconscious winter wolf, heedless to their "master's" demise.
Cuetzpalli throws his trident at the retreating worgs, targeting the injured one. It's a very long distance to throw a trident, but he makes a valiant attempt at it anyway. Spiny begins eating one of the felled canines, tearing at its flesh noisily.
The trident catches the fleeing worg in the back of the neck, killing it instantly.
Cuetzpalli grins as the trident reappears in his hand. "I like this thing," he says. "Everyone gonna be okay?"
"Finish off the rest of these things and we will be." Astraden begins coup de gracing the worgs around her.
When all have been stabbed/hacked/etc., she calls Olidammara for a bit of healing.
Carina heeds Astraden, drawing her light crossbow and firing at the last worg running away.
"I meant the ones around here," Astraden says, smiling. She peers out into the darkness. "Don't think I can hit that one."
"Well, that was definitely a way to start the morning, eh?"
"Eh," Astraden replies, shrugging. "Still night where I come from. I'm gonna move my bedroll and go back to sleep."
Eben shoots a (purely spiteful, at this point) snapdragon at the tail of the last fleeing worg, just to leave it a burn scar to remember this fight by, and then fires the remaining two high in the air.
After that, he simply basks in Astraden's healing bursts, restored to a fully un-frost or bomb burned state. Then he goes over and checks on the horses, just making sure they didn't get bothered by wolves themselves. Inspecting the winter wolf carcass, he asks, "Hey, is this pelt likely to be worth anything?"
"Because I have no clue..."
"Anyhow, I'm grabbing another few hours of sleep too. Don't wake me for anything less than a tarrasque attack..."
Carina's face turns a deep blue with embarrassment as her bolt goes sailing off into the dark unknown. Even Astraden's healing isn't enough to take it away.
She coughs as the smell of dead worgs fills the air before bending over to move her bedroll. "I don't want to sleep in the middle of a bunch of dead furry creatures--they smell awful."
"They probably taste awful, too. Wolf sure does." Astraden checks the pelt.
"Spiny will probably eat a couple of them...but we can move somewhere less stinky, yeah," Cuetzpalli says, before yawning. "I could use some more sleep as well."
Tanith wipes the gore from his fists. "Everyone in one piece?"
After doing a pass to make sure all of the beasts are truly dead, he nods Carina's way.
"The bodies might bring scavengers but we can move the camp a little ways away."
"We'll be fine thanks to Astraden, brother," Cuetzpalli says, laying his hand on Spiny's flank. He grins at the cleric. Always there when we need her.
Carina nods wearily at Tanith. "I'm okay. Looking forward to going back to sleep without monsters attacking us, too."
The winter wolf's coat is probably worthless at this point.
The next four days go by peacefully, and the group is able to completely mend with time and magic.
On the end of the fifth day of the journey, however, the group notices smoke rising from a grove of oaks about a half-mile off the path.
"Should we check it out?"
"That's too much smoke to be a campfire. Yeah, we should check it out."
"Since when are you the expert?"
Tanith shrugs. "Call it a hunch."
Cuetzpalli shrugs. "If you say so, Tanith. Hard to tell from here."
"I dunno, Tanith. I've lived around campfires near half my life, and that looks exactly like their kinda smoke." Astraden shrugs. "No harm in visiting whoever lives up there, though. Maybe we can swap food provisions." The Oeridian strikes out towards the smoke, leading Lynwerd.
Carina has no idea if the smoke bodes well or not, but at least it might be a sign that people were around.
"I don't see why not. Let's go!" She starts following Astraden.
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Following the advice of their wilderness expert, Tanith, the group heads out to the large copse. As they draw near, it becomes evident that the brawler was correct—this is much larger than any campfire.
As they draw nearer, they catch the smell they've become very familiar with since teaming up with Carina: the smell of burning flesh.
At the center of the copse is a large dugout house dug into the hillside. The house has no door, but the entrance would be large enough for even Eben on his horse to ride inside. The hill is partially collapsed by a fallen tree, though, making that a risky prospect.
Directly outside the house is a great pit, within which lie five enormous burning bodies. They are each the size of a horse, hulking, green-skinned giants with ugly long noses and huge tusks. They appear to have been burning for perhaps a day, and the fire is dying down by the time the adventurers arrive.
"...Beginner's luck." he says to Tanith.
Inspecting the fire pit, he remarks "Huh. Looks like something big crawled out of there. Or tried to. Can't have gone anywhere though, there's no tracks. Or did it fly away?"
Carina's eyes widen. "Oh my... trolls?"
She steps slightly closer to the pile of burning trolls. "Well, somebody had the right idea... but who did this? I'm kinda worried about running into whoever was able to kill this many trolls so easily."
Astraden hands Eben her bridle and steps toward the house, rapier drawn.
Astraden doesn't hear anything. The house/burrow is very dark, and looks like it might collapse if anyone entering it isn't very careful.
Astraden casts a spell, pulling her fingers in front of her eyes and whispering the old Flan word for "vision."
She beckons Farrukh over. "Wanna check that out?"
"Oh, so that's what trolls look like, huh? I always thought they hung out around bridges and stuff." Eben says to Carina as he ties Grifter and Lynwerd to a tree a reasonable distance from the bonfire.
"I imagine they stopped doing that after a while. Bridges tend to be flammable--they don't like fire. Or acid, for that matter." Carina shrugs.
"Do you think they even cook their food, or just eat everything raw because fire's just that scary?" He asks as he finishes securing the horses and returns to the edge of the clearing. "Well, if it's someone that hates trolls that much, maybe they aren't all that bad? Or maybe they are and we shouldn't go messing with them." Still, Eben begins digging out a few choice spell components to have them at hand. He nods toward Astraden as he pulls out a bit of copper wire. "If we're gonna do the usual 'invisible Farrukh goes scouting' thing, we can keep in touch at a distance with a message spell."
Astraden casts a spell, pulling her fingers in front of her eyes and whispering the old Flan word for "vision."
She beckons Farrukh over. "Wanna check that out?"
"Not particularly, no."
"Weren't we heading to Greyhawk to stop some evil world ending cult? I don't think anyone's going to cry over some torched trolls."
"Do you think they even cook their food, or just eat everything raw because fire's just that scary?"
"I think that's part of it--of course, perhaps they eat everything raw because the fear gives their meals flavour." Carina scratches her head.
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"Well, the smell is making my eyes water, but I don't suppose that's what you meant..." he says to Farrukh. And to Carina: "Oh! We're like veal to them. I get it now."
"You said something crawled outta there, though . . ." Astraden looks for any large prints around the entrance. "I can't detect any useful magic in there, though, so I guess it's not worth the risk."
Oh wait...I fail no matter what :'(
"MMMmmmm...veal," Cuetzpalli contributes, rubbing his stomach. "Do we have any reason to think this is connected with what we're dealing with? If not, let's keep moving. We're on an important mission here, it won't pay to get sidetracked."
The next day , the group arrives once again in the Gem of the Flanaess. This time, the guards recognize the PCs and don't bother fishing for a bribe.
The streets of the Free City are cobbled with well-worn stones and scored by deep wagon ruts. Throngs of people of all races, some bearing exotic raiment, crowd the streets. The creak of wagons and neighing of horses is interrupted by the call of merchants hawking their wares and the shouts of customers haggling over prices. The air hangs heavy with the smell of civilization, the stench of sweat and refuse mixed with the aroma of fresh baked bread and fireroasted meats.
Carina manages to pick out the sounds of what seems to be a parade on the march.
"Hey--anyone else hear that? Sounds like a parade!"