Warning: Spoilers below for the adventures, Slivers of Earlann and Menace of the Icy Spire.
The party ascends to the antechamber of the tomb and find that the orcs have not yet arrived and Joyin is still alive. The entire tomb was dark. All of the silvery motes of light had vanished. The pools of silvery liquid were also gone (as was the liquid Ruben had put in his waterskin). The candelsticks no longer opened or closed the secret door. The entire tomb, in fact, seemed completely devoid of any of the magics and enchantments that had once filled it.
The party puts together a litter to carry Joyin and Ruben creates a Tenser’s Floating Disk to carry the bodies of the fallen members of the The Fellowship of the Spear. The trip back to Loudwater takes longer than the trip to the Tomb due to the litter and having to care for the dwarf.
As the party gets closer to Loudwater, the weather takes a sharp turn for the worse. It gets damn cold and starts snowing. So cold, in fact, that when the party reaches the Heartblood River, it has frozen over. The weather is clearly unnatural and Roxy can sense that there is an arcane quality to it. As the party cautiously starts to cross the frozen river (concerned about the ice breaking), a group of goblins burst forth from the snow on the other side of the river. Unlike normal goblins, these have white hair and blue-tinged skin and seem completely unbothered by the cold (we’ll call ’em Frost Goblins).
During the battle, the river turns out to be a rather treacherous location to fight. Many of the party members have a great deal of difficulty keeping their footing on some of the more slippery patches. The goblins, on the other hand, seem completely at home on the ice. Although the river makes the battle a tough one, the party prevails and presses on towards Loudwater.
As they proceed, the weather gets even worse. The snow becomes a thick blizzard and the temperature drops even further. The party literally plows forward through the snow with the stronger members taking turns breaking a trail but it is a very fatiguing and difficult journey. After a few hours of this, they break through the blizzard and realize that they are just a short distance from town. Unfortunately, the combination of the travel, the bitter cold, and his grievous wounds took a toll on Joyin. The dwarf did not survive. (Another Skill Challenge here…regardless of success or failure, the party makes it through the blizzard and to Loudwater. On a failure, Joyin does not surive the trip. On a success, the party is able to keep him warm enough and get out of the cold soon enough to keep him alive, if just barely. The party failed the challenge).
The party is ferried across the Delimbyr and re-acquaint themselves with their favorite half-giant, Bessie. She is looking forward to their date that evening. Everyone heads over to the Green Tankard. Halaskar is informed that none of his friends had survived but their bodies had been recovered. He’s still drunk, has spent all of his coin, and apparently owes quite the bar tab at this point. Roxy rents a room for him and he is carried up and put to bed. The plan is to help him bury his friends in the morning.
Bessie shows up for her dinner date with Deornoth and Berran. After dinner, she says that they get to go home with her. Despite their polite decline (which later turns into desperate pleas for help and frantic cries that they do not want to go with her), Bessie won’t take no for an answer…Pa said she could take them home with her and so she’s going to take ’em home with her. Bessie literally drags the two of them out of the tavern and towards home. Despite their attempts to talk Bessie out of this course of action, she is bound and determined to take them home (for, everyone assumes, a little snu-snu–Futurama reference–but no one really knows for sure what her plans are). Just before things get violent (aah violence, so often the first resort of PCs but always the last resort), Captain Harrowleaf shows up and, with the threat of arresting Pa if she doesn’t let the two gentlemen go, convinces her to do just that. Poor Bessie ends up running away in tears.
While the boys are away breaking Bessie’s heart, Roxy and Tyrande have a discussion with Curovar and the newly met Lady Moonfire, Mayor of Loudwater, about the strange weather in the area. Based on various reports and the information that the Roxy provides, these two think that the source of the weather is possibly in the Dire Wood, just north of Loudwater. About thirty years ago, a dwarf by the name of Draigdurroch had passed through Loudwater on his way to the Dire Wood. He intended on building a tower deep in the woods to conduct research. Lady Moonfire believes that he was a warlock, most likely of the infernal variety. Nothing has been heard from Draigdurroch since then so he probably either left the area or has passed away…the Dire Wood is not a safe place. If the party does investigate, both Curovar and Moonfire would be quite interested in hearing about anything the party might find at the tower. Roxy and Moonfire spend some time pleasantly chatting…Moonfire is also a Feylock and the two hit it off quite nicely. Curovar provides Ruben directions to Draigdurroch’s Tower (apparently he knows where it is), some warnings about the dangers of the Dire Wood, what to avoid within said woods (e.g., areas of large green crystal formations), and sells him some ritual components at a very fair price (due to Lady Moonfire insisting on such).
In the morning, the party helps a very hungover Halaskar bury his friends before preparing for their next journey. Provisions and warm, winter clothing are purchased for everyone and the party heads off for Draigdurroch’s Tower (although they have to get a fisherman to ferry them across the Delimbyr as Pa and Bessie are nowhere to be found…she’s probably still crying due to the cruelty of the callous and harsh Deornoth and Berran).
As the party travels through the Dire Wood, it starts getting very cold again and they are hit by a heavy blizzard. Again, the weather is magical in nature and Roxy determines that the magic is fey in nature…some of the weather is even illusory. Better prepared for the wintery weather, the party pushes on. With Roxy helping to point out what is real and what isn’t, Ruben following the arcane energies and keeping the party traveling towards their source, and the others helping in various mundane ways, the party comes out of the blizzard after about four hours (and much closer to their destination).
As they come around a hill, another group of Frost Goblins rushes to attack and we ended the session. (Success or failure on the skill challenge of the blizzard determined whether or not the party reaches this encounter in a position of relative advantage or disadvantage. Having mostly succeeded on the challenge, the party arrived in a more advantageous position but slightly fatigued…i.e., some of them had lost a Healing Surge).
