Episode 9 - A Tale of Two Caers part II

With the twilight of morning our heroes woke from their slumber ready to face another day. A hearty breakfast greeted them in the main hall and they said their farewells to Speaker Crannoc and his staff. Grom fetched the sleds and the dogs and presented the stable boy with a gold coin for taking good care of them.

With everything set, they made the short journey northeastwards along the shore of Lac Dinneshere arriving mid morning. Passing the ruins of the old Caer from which the town took its name and a rather large and impressive dwelling by the towns standards our group of adventurers came to Frozenfar Expeditions. The dogs and sleds were stabled and following a brief conversation with the shop owner Atenas Swift, our heroes made for the one of the local Inns named The Northern Lights, whereby they would most likely find the town speaker, a Silver Dragonborn ex adventurer named Trovus. 

The inn was mostly empty apart from the odd fisher and the sound of snoring coming from a dark corner. The Inn is run by a couple of sisters, Allie and Cori. discussion with the sisters and their telling of their complaint about a missing lantern, one that hangs above the front door of the Inn and that gave it its name, provided a small but useful insight into the troubles suffered by the town of late and the almost hapless investigation of a less than sober town speaker. 

The only clue to the recent spare of robberies have been Dwarven sized tracks leading out of town but no one has seen or could even imagine why dwarfs would be stealing. All notions of invisible dwarfs (Duergar) were met with quizzical expressions by all parties. 

Having quaffed their ales and finished their meal our intrepid adventurers set out into the snow to try to find any trace of the thieves. Heading out of town to the north in the direction of Kelvin's Cairn they came upon a set of sled tracks and so it was decided to follow these and see if it would lead them to the site of the Duergar outpost they had learned about from their encounter with Durth Sunblight back on the Easthaven Ferry.

After trekking for 2-3 hours across the snowy landscape a stone structure could be seen jutting out from the hillside just North of Kelvin's Cairn. As the terrain sloped gently upwards towards the base of the mountain an almost Crescent shaped structure with a small stone bunker like building situated to it's front guarding the path towards a set of large double doors. A small frozen stream also meandered down from an opening at the base of the high carved walls. Our heroes were able to perceive that although the bunker like structure looked to have a number of arrow slits there was a small unguarded route that could be traversed between the bunker and the base of the cliff. 

With a somewhat risky plan agreed Tor cast "Pass without Trace" and our four willing heroes quietly and stealthily made their way to where the frozen stream exited the base of the structure. Lead by Grom and crawling inside the party soon came upon a vertical shaft. Using his climbing gear to traverse the vertical icy walls Grom found himself at the top of a well inside the outpost. Immediately opposite we're a number of cages containing bleating goats while in the far corner there appeared to be some other kind of lumbering beast but it hadn't spotted Grom and so he was able to lower a rope for the others to climb up.

The mix of smells of goat and rotting flesh permeated the nostrils. As their eyes adjusted to the internal light given off by burning torches in sconces on the walls the hulking creature in the far corner looked very much like an Ogre but it's shambling movement and vacant expression as if it didn't notice these new comers to this large hall gave away the possibility that this ogre could in fact be undead in some way. 

Not wanting to waste the opportunity of surprise Shayde drew her sword and rushed straight up behind the creature unleashing an auto critical hit with her Assassinate feature before retreating back towards her companions. Aldrick, dragon staff in hand summoned forth a torrent of fire from its nostrils and flung three streams of Scorching Ray all of which exploded against it. Seeing the others attack Tor stuck her hand into the grey bag of tricks and hurled out a furry ball that transformed into a panther before hitting the floor and leaping forward to attack the ogre as well. With a quick prayer to Marthammor Duin Grom used his bonus action to invoke hail of thorns and let fly with his crossbow.

The ogre managed to dispatch the panther and it slowly shambled forward into a barrage of crossbow fire, fire bolts and bonfires as our party began to retreat into a nearby passageway. Using her speed and agility to get in front of the group Shayde took up position behind a closed door listening for sounds of anybody or anything that maybe approaching from the other side and readied her action.

As the fight with the Ogre continued on the edge of the main hall where our heroes had entered two Duergar moved through the door that Shayde was guarding to be met by her blades. Simultaneously 2 more Duergar joined the fray behind the Ogre with one of them using it's enlargement action to grow to the same size as the ogre. The ogre itself having now got into melee range with Aldrick attacked only to be thwarted when Aldrick used his reaction to cast shield and deflect the blow. 

Tor used her bonus action to cast Shillagh imbuing her staff with magical energy before attacking. As the skirmish continued Shayde managed to overcome the two Duergar in the corridor behind them and was able to re-join her team to face this new threat. Unfortunately Grom became the target of a Duergar mind attack causing him to drop his crossbow and move towards the ogre zombie. 

Seeing her friend and companion acting unusually Tor proceeded to cast Heat Metal on the Duergar leader before invoking her combat wild shape to transform into a ferocious brown bear. Aldrick conjured up a Chromatic Orb but his aim was off and the spell was wasted.

With the confrontation hanging in the balance Aldrick unleashed a barrage of Magic Missiles and fire bolts at the Duergar Mind Master The enlarged Duergar landed several heavy blows against Tor but with the aid of her bear form and her Stones Endurance she was able to weather the storm and didn't fall unconscious. 

With only 5Hp remaining Tor once again invoked the spirit of her goddess to transform into a bear and with a savage bite was able to take down the Ogre Zombie for good before turning on the enlarged Duergar with her claws. 

Having overcome his sudden bout of mindlessness Grom reached for his great axe and felled the Duergar Mind Master with a swift stroke making sure to only render him unconscious for further interrogation once they had found a safe spot to rest up.

To be continued..............

And so this was another truly epic session full of fun, laughs and late night questing. Thanks as always to Pete for being a great host and DM. Until next time.