Erik trades glances with Rhiann as he sets his feet and gets ready to fully draw his bow. Malki settles into a crouch by Erik's side...
"I suppose we can wait a while to see if it heads up on its own. But if it looks like It's going to destroy the cart then I reshoot at it or scare it off." Rhiann whispers, making sure to have her own bowbin hand in case the beast's attention shifts.
"Waiting would be my choice. Why risk fighting it for no reason? As long as it doesn't damage the cart, it's not harming us in any way, besides making us wait. If we do decide to fight it, I'll try to use my Grease spell to make it harder for it to charge at us. Just let me know before the arrows start flying so I can get ready."
"All right, we try it your way. Patience was never a strong suit of mine though." Erik settles himself, ready to draw and fire at a moment's notice.
The party assumes positions to watch the grizzly bear from a safe distance while Roderick takes the horses further away to prevent their smell from reaching the predator and of course to calm their own instincts to flee.
Whatever the bear has its face in must really be pungent as it never notices the party despite sniffing the air a few times while it rummages through what's left of the bandit hideaway. It eventually moves off splashing through a small stream and disappears into the forest.
The party cautiously moves back into the vicinity making note of signs that other forest scavengers have already been picking through the camp even before the bear rooted around. The wagon is where it was left outside the camp, and it doesn't take long to get the new wheel connected and set on the axle. Fortunately, this seems to be the only thing wrong, so the wagon is ready to be used as soon as the repair of the wheel is completed.
Roderick points out the wagon will not really be suited for continuing to explore the forest, so if the party would like to do so, he offers to take the wagon back to Oleg's for safekeeping. Trying to take the wagon through the forest will slow exploration progress . The other option which lines up with the original plan to seek out the Old Sycamore of which the bandits have described would be to leave the forest and explore the plains and hills until it is located.
"I think, given the unsettling events of the other night, and the things that may be roaming this forest, we might be better off heading out to the plains to find this sycamore tree. We can collect the stuff taken from the bandits, take it to Oleg's with the cart, and come back to explore the forest more later on." Rhiann suggests, after considering their options.
Erik puts in his 2 copper: "Considering what happened last night, I don't think we should split up into any groups that can't maintain a night watch. That puts splitting up out, and Roderick is right that wagon and forest don't mix well. So yes, let's go find the Old Sycamore."
And then he continues "When we get back, I don't know if Oleg can spring it, but how does everyone feel about getting a pack of guard dogs (5 or so, one for each watch)? No offense Adela, but I don't want to rely on your dreams for warning if something is sneaking up on us in the night..."
"The guard dogs seem a bit excessive...where would we even get a pack of guard dogs out here? If you want to deal with training them, I suppose that could be useful." Rhiann, replies.
"I agree with seeking out the Old sycamore tree first. Hand in what we've collect so far and then come out again sounds like the best idea."
She nods firmly at Eric's words, "Agreed, I don't know where that dream came from? I've never before had any gift of prophecy!'
"The Old Sycamore tree does seem like the best option to me, as well. Shall we set out towards it, then? I do share Eric's concerns about the dangers of the night around here, though. If you can train the dogs to learn to warn us, it might be enough to make sure we don't need to rely on Adela getting further warning dreams."
The group spends an uneventful night in the former bandits camp after spending the day exploring this section of the woods and repairing the wagon.
The expedition moves out of the forest and returns to the hills of the Kamelands. It soon becomes obvious exploring this area is hindered by the Thorn River as crossing it will delay the exploration. .
The party does come across a possible crossing in a place where the Thorn River winds through a 20-foot-deep gulch between a pair of hills. An old wooden bridge spans the gulch, allowing passage over the river. Using this may bring exploration time down...
Erik casts a gimlet eye at the bridge, and looks back at the wagon, and then back at the bridge...
He sets Malki on guard duty, and then starts looking over the bridge carefully, poking at the timbers with his dagger, looking for dry rot...
vs DC 10
Rhian notices Erik checking out the bridge, and turns her attention to it properly, a skeptical expression crossing her face. Walking over, she crouches down, knocking on a few of the timbers and sniffing the wood for a moment.
"We be able to cross this one at a time...maybe. But the second we try to get one of the horses or the cart across this, it's almost guaranteed to collapse.!" Rhiann says with absolute certainty.
Roderick eyes the bridge. "Well, I can lead the horses and wagon to a ford and try and meet you on the other side if you want to cross here..."
He doesn't seem very enthusiastic to the idea, however.
Rhiann's careful examination of the bridge notices that a segment of the banister appears broken as if something on the bridge had fallen through it as the rotting wood gave way.
1 rank +3 trained +2 racial+1 wis
Erik stoops to ruff Malki's ears and replies "We ain't breaking up in this territory son; if we go looking for a ford, we do it together."
"I agree with Erik. Best if we look for another way over without splitting up. Besides, I'm not sure I feel safe crossing this bridge, even if we don't take the horses and the cart along. Best to be careful, right?"
She eyes the bridge cautiously, and as she does, something grabs her attention in the water.
"Hey, look, look!" Lyra exclaims in her tiny voice, jumping up and down on Alyssa's shoulder. "There's something shiny down there!"
Alyssa nods as she pets her bird companion, pointing at the river, slightly downstream from the bridge. "I see it too. Look there, on the water. Wonder what it is."
Erik stoops to ruff Malki's ears and replies "We ain't breaking up in this territory son; if we go looking for a ford, we do it together."
Roderick puffs his chest and scoffs, "I would have found a ford and gotten across to make camp before you even caught up." His words are at odds with the obvious relief his face expresses at Erik's words.
Roderick puffs his chest and scoffs, "I would have found a ford and gotten across to make camp before you even caught up." His words are at odds with the obvious relief his face expresses at Erik's words.
Alyssa chuckles lightly as she turns to Roderick with a smile. "Then staying with you is definitely the best choice. We get to avoid this shaky bridge and will still end up crossing over faster!"
She then looks to the rest of the group, pointing down again at the shiny object she spotted. "I think I could just make out the edges of an ornate chest, partially covered by the river's algae. Think it might be worth to try and get it out?"
Adela squints as Alyssa points out what she has seen. "Oh yes! Perhaps we could lower someone on a rope, or hook it up?"
She also votes for taking the cart to a ford with the whole party.
"Looks like the chest went over the side through that broken spot there" Rhiann says, pointing to where the rotting wood had given way. "It's definitely worth trying to recover it, then advance along the river to a better fording spot"
"That looks cold, wet and generally miserable and I wouldn't get my hopes up to high; if it was valuable, somebody would have come back for it" is Erik's first comment. He continues "But if we are going to do this, I ain't trusting a bridge that won't hold a man's weight with the ropes. Let's back the wagon up, chock the wheels and leave the horses in harness. Then we can string ropes from the wagon. Roderick, it will be your job to keep the horses from panicking. We run two or three lines off the back of the cart, depending how much rope we got..."
"But before we go down there, the only other reason I can figure for someone abandoning a chest of valuables would be if there is something down there that's dangerous. So I'm gonna take a look around..."
1 rank +3 trained +1 wis
Roderick nods sharply at Erik's suggestion and begins using some rope and spare blankets as padding to hook up two other party members' horses side by side with the horse harnessed to the wagon. Their strength should be great for keeping the wagon solidly in position. Hopefully a need for sudden speed will not be required.
: Erik does not see much activity. Some dung from small mammals who are clearly using the bridge to cross can found, but there does not appear to be recent tracks for larger animals or humanoids.
The chest remains silent and cold in the Thorn Rover's current. Its image ephemeral as the moving water distorts with the light. It has lain there at the bottom for who knows long. Its place in the universe isn't likely to change for now.
Erik looks around, hefts his coil of rope and says "If we ain't got more rope than this, I don't think we got enough line to do that fishing job... Still, that chest looks to have been down there a long time, I figure it can wait until we get some more rope from Oleg."
"Yeah, if you think we need more rope, best to see if we can get some at Oleg's and come back later. It would be quite a bit of bad luck if the chest was gone when we got back." Alyssa nods at Erik, and then looks to the rest of the group. "Shall we go look for that ford, then?"
With a tad bit of concern regarding the possibility of the chest being discovered by the wild inhabitants of the Greenbelt, the group departs to finish exploring the area. Aside from the bridge and the chest in the water below, the only thing of note the party stumbles across is a steep, massive tor rising from a hillside. A lone watchtower perches at its zenith. A quick search shows the wooden scaffolding is solid enough but hasn't seen a visitor in a very long time. Evidence of some long ruined supplies shows this may have been an outpost for some former reclaimant, bandits, or even a failed homestead.
The party finds a convenient fording location after searching the west side of the Thorn River. The exploration of the east side continues without notable encounter. Alyssa spots a group of semicircular hills rise in the distance; each is topped with large, flat stones. The formation does not appear natural.
Looming over all the hills in the northern Kamelands, a graying hulk of a sycamore tree clings precariously to its last years of life. The 100-foot-tall tree is a well-known landmark (just as the bandits described) and is visible for miles around. After spending part of the day exploring the area around the tree, the party sees a trail heading in the direction of the giant sycamore. The footpath through the hills is flanked by dark hawthorn trees.
"Do those... Look unnatural to you, too?" Alyssa points to the hills as they come into view. "Did someone or something make them? Might be worth our time to search them, see what we find."[/b>
[B]"These hawthorn trees... They don't look natural, either - try to focus solely on them and ignore all the new vegetation growing around them - they seem too evenly spaced along this path, and they seem to be about the same age, too.
"I don't have answers for you Alyssa, but I do think we have found the Old Sycamore where the mites have their lair. Now what are we going to do to get Svetlana's ring back from them? I think that's all we really want from them... Whatever plan we make, we should establish a camp here, where Roderick can keep the horses, the wagon, and whatever equipment we want to cache, while we go and get the ring."
"A little bit, yes. As if someone planted them rather deliberately...though probably a long time ago. Maybe the work of some druid, though if so, they probably left the area years or even decades ago." Rhian replies to Alyssa's conjecture.
"There's more than the ring, though that's probably the most important thing. There's also whatever supplies the bandits had stashed."
...
"There's more than the ring, though that's probably the most important thing. There's also whatever supplies the bandits had stashed."
"Are we trading or raiding? I figure we could put together a reasonable offer for the ring, which they don't need for anything in particular, but what could we offer them for the supplies? The mites are presumably using those supplies to stay alive in this wilderness..."
"Honestly, the answer to that depends on what happens when we approach, and the reception we receive from the mites. If they've been making a habit of raiding and attacking anyone they can, then it's a threat that needs to be resolved, for the safety of any passing through here. That is part of our charter after all."
"If we're going with a peaceful approach, we could try convincing them to stop attacking people. I could try talking to them, but I'm not even sure they'll even understand me. I don't know if they speak any of the languages I know. I can try, though, if they see us coming and are willing to talk."
"It's worth a try, but we need to be ready for if that doesn't work." Rhiann replies with a supportive nod..
"Whatever plan we make, we should establish a camp here, where Roderick can keep the horses, the wagon, and whatever equipment we want to cache, while we go and get the ring."
Roderick nods and begins looking around for a suitable location among the trees.
"Uh..." Roderick appears to have stumbled across a small clearing about 10 meters off the road. "Perhaps you will want to see this," he calls.
Three dead kobold stripped of any gear or equipment (basically naked) lie in the small space.
"Well, this spot is relatively difficult to see from that path and the trees are a nice barrier from larger predators or monsters. In short it's probably ideal...except for whatever happened here." The young man gestures to the reptilian corpses.
"Huh" Erik is non-plussed to find stripped corpses in a random clearing in the wilderness, "let's see if we can figure out what's going on here, and then maybe find another clearing..."
"Roderick, you search around the clearing going clockwise, and I'll go counter-clockwise, look for tracks for whomever did this. Once we've had a look at the field, Adela, can you figure out what killed the kobolds? "
Taking Malki with him, Erik starts sweeping around the perimeter of the clearing (going counter-clockwise), looking for tracks ...
+1 wis +4 tracking by scent
1 rank +3 trained +1 wis
Adela was already moving towards the dead Kobolds. She studies them as she is preparing to send them on properly.
Once she has determined what caused their deaths as best she can, she informs the party and then prepares a small pyre to send them on.
Erik looks at the pyre Adela is starting to prepare and says "Don't. Bury them, if you must, but a pyre means smoke, which lets enemies know where we are."
Rhiann looks at the bodies, non-plussed regarding what might have killed the kobolds. As Erik stops Adela, she nods. "He's right. If it was the mites, we'd have the advantage of them thinking this area is clear of anything, since they already took out the kobolds they found here. Any sign of new activity will draw attention."
Adela gives a huff of annoyance, even while recognizing the wisdom of Erik & Rhiann's words. She begins to gather small rocks with which she will cover the graves to prevent scavengers digging up the corpses.
When she finally gets to properly bury them!
"I promise I'll help you bury or burn them when we leave here...unless we leave running for our lives, of course." Rhiann replies with a tiny grin at the end.
Alyssa looks worriedly at the kobold corpses, as she waits for the others to see if they can get some insight on what happened here. "Probably best if we search for another clearing afterwards, right? I mean, it seems like a good place to make camp, but it clearly wasn't safe enough for these kobolds. I guess the fact that they were stripped clean afterwards points to some sort of intelligent attacker. Bandits? The mites?
Taking Malki with him, Erik starts sweeping around the perimeter of the clearing (going counter-clockwise), looking for tracks ...
Malki definitely locates some scent and after several paces, it's clear to Erik that Malki is tracking in the general direction of the large sycamore looming over the area.
While Erik easily spots the signs of recent game tracks, what must have been a wild chaotic fight seems to have masked the traces of the victors' exit whether man, fey, beast, or worse.
Adela was already moving towards the dead Kobolds. She studies them as she is preparing to send them on properly.