Turn 32 -- Barge Duty

After a restful night, Gnore rises from his slumber and begins to don his armour. As he straps his blades into their proper position, the dwarf moves to the window and looks out into an already crowded street bustling with more activity than normal.

"Why are their so many giants now in this small town?" he wonders as he completes his preparations and picks up his backpack. "S'pose I'll ask one of the others at breakfast." He then leaves his room and heads down to breakfast.

Waiting in the common room and already enjoying a hot breakfast are Dain, Kersath, and Talimar. Gnore greets each member of the party with a nod before taking his place at the table. After a few minutes, the waitress returns with a tray of sweet cured bacon served in one of Mistress Panella's small, fresh loaves of bread. Each of the companions have come to enjoy these loaves and bacon very much.

Gnore takes a moment between mouthfuls to ask his question, "Why are there so many armed people in the town now?"

"We asked the same question of Garyld last night," begins Talimar, "Apparently others have heard of the raids by the orcs as well as the kidnapping and have come to the valley in search of fame and fortune. Garyld believes none of them are as organised or skilled as ourselves and as such, many of them are ending up as orc soup."

Gnore looks at Talimar meaningfully as Talimar's last remark hit quite a bit too close to home for the dwarf. Feeling a rebuke meaningless, Gnore simply nods his head and continues eating his breakfast.

Back upstairs, Beleg has risen early and made his morning devotions. Feeling greatly refreshed after a bath and a night in a real bed, he dresses in breeches and tunic and attaches his main-gauche to his belt. He then grabs his lute but leaves the rest of his gear in his room before heading down to the common room for breakfast. Once there, he looks around for his companions and upon spotting them head over to the table, pausing only to smile at the serving girl.

"Good morning to you all," he says with great enthusiasm, "Any recommendations for breakfast, I'm feeling famished."

"Mistress Panella has a delicious batch of hot bread and her cured bacon," answers Dain.

Kersath smiles up at the obviously refreshed paladin, happy to see Beleg's mood has come back to normal.

"Well well, if it isn't our song-happy warrior, all up and ready for life this morning," says Kersath as his smile widens. "Glad to have you back, friend Beleg."

"Glad to be back," says Beleg as he returns his friends smile.

Soon after this, the rest of the party members come downstairs to join their friends for breakfast. All save Kre and Ras who have yet to wake.

"Good morning all," says Randor as he takes a seat at the table, "It's nice to sleep in a bed again, isn't it? Everyone seems to be here. Where are out thieves? Not in trouble I hope? Oh well, they aren't as unlawful as I originally thought. They're probably sleeping in after playing dice all night or taking a walk. We'll have to wait for them before we can leave for Thurmaster, Shadowdale, and then the mines."

"They are fine," begins Kersath in answer to Randor, "Kre ran into a little trouble last night that I had to help him with and I asked Ras to watch over him this morning whilst I spoke with Talimar. They will be down shortly."

"What kind of trouble?" begins Randor, his answer coming rather swiftly as Kre and Ras walk up. Kre's face has several cuts and bruises on it, a prominent black eye over his right eye. He also appears to be holding his side gingerly. 'Broken ribs' think Dain and the others with skill in healing.

At the curious glances from his friends, Kre sits down and begins to answer their questions, explaining that he was almost kidnapped by agents of the Zhentarim who were obviously after information about his missing father. The men roughed him up and were a few minutes away from killing him before Kersath arrived to save him, killing three of the four men in the process. The last man, the leader, a rat-faced little man escaped though.

"It's really nothing," says Kre as Dain tries to look at his bandaged ribs, "Kersath bandaged me up last night and I'll be fine. A little sore for a while though I'm sure."

At this time, Barthelew comes over with a scowl on his face for Kre. "You broke a table and three good chairs, as well as several good mugs!" he says as he shakes his finger at Kre, "I will be reimbursed for this!"

"Of course," says Kre wearily, "My friend Ras here will take of everything I'm sure."

As Barthelew stomps off, Ras and the rest of the party look at Kre curiously as the thief explains, "Desperate circumstances call for rash behaviour sometimes. I'm sure you all understand," he says a bit sheepishly.

After everyone finishes speaking with Kre about his encounter, Kersath speaks up, "Well, we're all rested and cheerful this morning, with the exception of Kre of course. That's good, now to more pressing matters. We have to find the girl and I think the clues lead to only about one possible place, and that's the mines."

He then looks in the direction of Ortho, Druckner and the other dwarves, "Did you fellas find anything from Ol' Grizzler?"

Druckner is the first to speak up on the matter, "Well, apparently word has spread about the Red Feather Company's fortune. So we've got competition I guess. We have one advantage though, we now have the Grizzler's map of the abandoned Garlstone mines. They still belong to the Carman family apparently but they haven't been worked for some 60 years. They stopped bein' profitable when their water-logging problem got out of hand. That means we'll have to be extra careful for rotted support timbers and rockfalls."

He then ends his report by turning to Ras, "By the way, Ras, can you put 5gp to the Company's expenses for the map? Thanks."

After a few minutes of discussion on the mine, Beleg interrupts, "Dain, what about the ring?"

Dain shakes his head and a look of concern crosses his face, "Last night, I was unable to divine any information from the ring. I don't understand the thing at all! Anyway, we need to go to Thurmaster to get the ring identified but we obviously need to go to Shadowdale in order to get supplies. So, I propose we do this: Half the party get orders from everyone and go to Shadowdale to get equipment, the other half of us can escort the barge to Thurmaster and have Tauster identify the ring. Since it will take longer to go to Shadowdale the rest of us can bring the ring back here to collect the payment for solving the problem of the mire. How does that sound? It would save a lot of time." He then looks to the rest of the group for discussion.

Talimar nods thoughtfully, "That would be the ideal solution, except for one thing; there are bands of 20 orcs wandering the countryside. If we stay together we can handle them but with only half strength..." Talimar shakes his head, "Then they would become a real problem."

"Aye, you have a point there..." says Dain, "How many more orcs could there possibly be in this blasted land. I've never seen more in one place ever. And I've travelled from the Sword Coast to the Dale Lands. It's a bloody infestation!"

Randor agrees with Talimar, "I think that splitting up would be a bad idea. I say we go to Thurmaster and then to Shadowdale for supplies."

"Nix on the split," says Ortho, "It leaves us open to too much risk from attack or other problems."

"If it's a mage ye need, we did hear tell of Elminster at Shadowdale. Of course, he may not be available."

"Tal, here's where you earn your cookies. Make a decision and let's go. If we're votin', me vote is for Tauster as I didn't get to speak with him last time. To Tauster, back here, then on to Shadowdale if ye all feel the need. I'm anxious to explore those mines but I'm not fer splittin' the party to get there sooner."

"Dain does bring up something though." says Talimar to Ortho, "Last night, he and Randor and I got offered another job of barge duty. We escort the goods of a fellow named Gelderon to Thurmaster and he'll pay us 55 gold crowns a man. What does everyone think of that offer?"

"Gettin' paid to do what we wanted to again," says Druckner happily, "I love it when a plan comes together."

"Aye," agrees Kre and Ras together.

"Barge duty again," ascents Beleg.

"Agreed," say the others.

"It seems like our course is set to Thurmaster and Tauster to check this ring, if there is anyone against that course of action, please speak now?" asks Talimar.

As no one is in disagreement, Talimar turns to Garth, "Friend Garth, what are your plans? I don't know about the others but I feel you would be a great asset to the Red Feather Company. Would anyone object to Garth joining our numbers?"

"I will join the company as long as I am free to continue my work for the Lady Selune," begins Garth, "No one or anything can stand in my way to help those less fortune than myself. I will continue to preach the ways of my Lady. But in the meantime it would be an honour to join this company."

Talimar then pulls out a red feather from his backpack and presents it to Garth, "Welcome to the Red Feather Company, Garth."

As the company finishes up their breakfast and breaks, Ras walks out with Garth, discussing the distribution of Company wealth and funds.

Meeting down at the river after an hour, the party arrives to greet the man Gelderon and board his barge. Gelderon is very excited at the prospect of having so many armed men for his escort and quickly sets off down the river quite content. Surprisingly, a number of the townspeople line the shore and wave toward the Company as the barge passes, heading east. Once again the company settles in for what they believe to be another boring journey west along the river. Kre spends the morning and most of the afternoon resting and recovering from his beating the previous night, with Ras and Kersath looking over him occasionally. The dwarves spend the time drinking out of another keg of ale that Ortho acquired from the innkeeper Barthelew.

Randor and Beleg are conversing about the strange religious beliefs of the Red Wizards of Thay far to the east while Beleg works on tuning his lute. Talimar and Dain have the ring out and are once again studying it in hopes of finding anything out about it.

The afternoon passes uneventfully and thankfully the weather has warmed a bit so the river journey is not too cold on the party. Shortly before evening, Gelderon brings the barge closer to the shore before finally bringing it to anchor. Their stopping point is along the northernmost margins of the Thornwood, three to five miles from Hog Brook.

"We are too heavily laden and slow moving to make the journey east in one day," he says to Talimar, "We must camp for the night as darkness is too dangerous to guide the barge through the river."

"Alright," answers Talimar as he instructs the party to begin preparations for the evening.

Everyone departs from the barge and goes about the tasks of setting up camp. The few deckhands that Gelderon has working to empty the barge of the goods in case something should happen during the evening. Because of the events of the recent past, everyone remains quiet during the evening, Beleg not even playing his lute despite encouragement from the rivermen. Talimar doesn't even allow the building of a fire for the evening.

Without the heat from a fire, the party spends a chilly evening as everyone tries to get some sleep. There is nothing to report from watch to watch as the evening progresses. About two hours before dawn, a slight drizzle begins to fall on the camp, obscuring the vision of those on watch. About an hour before dawn, with the rain still falling, Gelderon's nightmare becomes reality as arrows from flying out of the reaches of the Thornwood! The party is under attack!