Welby surveys the obliteration of the Feathergale Society and, comprehending the destiny of his new friends, imparts that each of four elemental cults occupies a haunted keep. Then he is gone.
Interrogation of the captured Feathergale knight begins with a request for clarification regarding Howling Hatred, but the knight finds his captors unworthy of exposition. Thuy the initiate, rattled by Simon’s puppeteering of Merroska’s corpse jumping off the bridge, corrects the misconception that the Feathergales eat people, which is some relief to soup eater Rollen, but he admits they do ritually sacrifice people on occasion. Offered freedom, the initiate fanatically jumps off the drawbridge but the faithless knight flees into the Sumber Hills.
Before his theatrical departure, Merroska’s person was relieved of a Besilmer helm, handed to Argyle, of unknown magical properties and an onyx bug, which Simon pockets.
Simon reckons maybe two knights and Savra remain in the spire. The Sumber Hills offer no safety so the spent adventurers hole up in the first floor dorm to rest. Blameless, unscathed by battle, monitors the window while Barrin camps the stairs. Barrin, after an hour, observes a knight sneaking down the stairs but at that moment Rollen screams himself out of meditation from a nightmare of a rushing black skull and the frightened knight hurriedly retreats back up the stairs. Another scream, this time not from Rollen, pierces the tower from the roof a short time later.
Barrin tiptoes through the darkness, up the spire stairs, to investigate. He finds no one on the upper floors until he reaches the roof. From concealment on the stairs he can see a person kneeling out on the western ramp, slick with blood and holding something he cannot distinguish. Barrin withdraws to the first floor and whispers to Blameless that even the Sumber Hills Ankhegs would be safer than this wack-a-doodle spire with its screaming, kneeling blood people up all hours of the night. They scrum the issue for six more hours while Rollen monitors the sleepers until everyone awakens refreshed and ready to face whatever horror awaits upon the roof.
Methodically ascending the spire, the party search the rooms for intel and loose change and find some of each. There are several copies of a primordial devotional to Yan-C-Bin and some journals kept by Merroska. One entry in particular interests Allana: Prophet Kalinoth, D.Div., who Allana learns is a lost spirit to the fragment of elemental evil, issues a warning about the forces of Opeth. Other entries refer to sacrifices made to Yan-C-Bin and a letter found on Merosska’s desk incontrovertibly associates the nefarious Howling Hatred air elemental cult with the Feathergale Society.
Alone on the roof, Savra, in a dreadful state, remains kneeling on the ramp. The adventurers emerge from the stairs and unhesitatingly gush buckets of empathy for their dear friend Savra, now clearly holding someone else’s lungs in each outstretched hand, much like her victim gushed buckets of his vital organs and fluids all over this miserable scene. Argyle searches his spellbook for something helpful, but finds nothing for freeing a thrall. Meega tries an open-hand orcish technique without results. Blameless attempts a high level command spell like he has seen Allana perform, but Savra sees through his poor execution. Simon makes a psychic link, but he too is enthralled and begins to suffocate as the elemental’s true form reveals itself to him. Desperate, Allana touches the Opeth crystal to Savra and Yan-C-Bin retreats. Broken but at least in her own senses, Savra implores the group to flee urgently, so Argyle scoops her up and they make for the stables to escape on hippogriffs and vultures. They spirit Savra to the Lance Rock portal and through to Ardak’s cottage. The mounts are freed except for Holly the Hippogriff whom Simon brings through.
Ardak arrives home more surprised at seeing the party back so soon than at Simon’s prankish pet filling his living room. Ardak calmy retrieves a feed bag for Holly who is magically pulled into it. He pulls out a pouch of halfling tobacco and offers some to Blameless who helps himself but is not pulled into the pouch. Ardak casts sleep on Savra and listens to the executive summary of the Feathergale adventure. He appears uncharacteristically flustered when presented with Thurl Merosska’s journals and urgently excuses himself.
During Ardak’s absence, Rollen peruses the primordial manuscript acquired from Welby and is astonished to discover it is a history of High Forest, his own homeland. Impossible though it seems, the ancient elemental battle recounted an estimated 4500 years ago exactly describes the battle Rollen personally recollects a mere 20 years ago.
Ardak returns with an elf wearing a long robe, introduced as the chancellor of Quastarte, and two Spellguard who depart with Savra on a litter. Argyle objects to the martial incarceration of his ward but Ardak assures him she is good hands and Argyle acquiesces. The chancellor’s attention turns to Allana and he strongly advises her to not publicize Opeth’s presence as it puts Opeth in danger. Simon proposes changing Opeth’s name to Jerry which solves everyone’s problem except Jerry’s.
After the chancellor leaves with a swoosh, Rollen asks Ardak why his memory is 4480 years out of time. Ardak responds, in his enigmatic fashion, that the world is a mysterious place. Following that bit of profundity he indulges the usual Q&A. The black arrow Rollen carries cursed him with the rushing skull nightmares, but the effect is temporary. Ardak identifies the unidentifiable helm as a helm of identify. The proper deployment of the onyx bug, he tells Simon, is to throw it on the floor and shout the elvish word for “flying”: RIMPA. The result of doing so is not tried, not queried, and not explained, so that little experiment awaits some future desperate crisis.
Rollen requisitions two arrows from quartermaster Schmeck and they suspiciously regard each other for a couple of awkward minutes before Rollen departs, checking himself for planted medallions.
Eager to perpetuate recent successes, the gang departs right away for the Sacred Stone Monastery, home base of the Black Earth. Ardak advises caution, but it is their best lead for discovering the fate of the Mirabar delegation and for unraveling elemental evil.
Traveling from Lance Rock, following the Sumber foothills east toward the monastery location, the party traverses a dry gulch and spies a column of smoke ahead. As they approach a flame-engulfed home and consumed barn, Barrin warns Rollen to take care because wood elves burn faster than regular elves. Allana frees the panicking, penned livestock. Simon, acquainted with fire safety, breaks out a window first and throws open the door. Smoke billows out while Simon, Barrin, and Rollen billow in, low crawling beneath the smoke. Barrin locates an unconscious half-elf and drags him out where he is revived and cries out, “Maygan! Maygan!” Simon searches for Selwyn’s hot wife, but no other occupants are found in or around the unburned part of the house. Around the back of the house Blameless determines the fire was intentionally set and Rollen, first familiarizing himself with Meega’s feet, searches until he locates the departing tracks of four Ice Shield Orcs with a stolen horse and wagon, the two ranch hands Obb and Fipp Lavelle, and Selwyn Anderil’s pregnant wife Maygan, alive and well riding in the wagon.
Always eager to help strangers in distress by clobbering their antagonists, the hero party, plus one, take off after the bandit party and soon overtake them trying to free the stuck wagon from mud. Maygan appears safe in the wagon but the ranch hands lay collapsed in the mud while a couple of Orcs lockpick them with their boots. Rollen draws on the nearest of four brutish Orcs and offers to negotiate for the purchase and safe return of hostages. Although out of turn to announce a reaction to the offer, they appear mean and unpersuaded. Blameless, preparing the diamond component in his purse, offers them one last chance to yield. Predictably, they do not avail themselves of an easy out. The closest brute takes a couple of menacing steps, staggers from Rollen’s skewering arrow, and then atomizes into a fine pink mist from Blameless’s fiery orb. A couple of javelins fly at Rollen in answer and then it is business as usual with dagger-punch-punch from Barrin, axe gash from Meega, hammer smash from Argyle, fire bolt from Simon, crackle blast from Allana, and they all fall down. A tap from Argyle’s hammer spares the final Orc for a little chat.
Okkkkkkk, as he self-identifies, freely answers questions. The Ice Shield Orc raids are a response to the strange weather Gruumsh sends as an inconvenient truth for the humans encroaching on this Orc-claimed valley. Also, it so happens, Orcs like taking things and slaves and generally causing mayhem one ranch to the next. What activities and weather they would prefer in the absence of these little opportunities for rowdy antisocial behavior is not clear, but what is clear is that these Orcs are not pursuing some lofty pogrom of elemental evil.
Blameless taps his wrist and wishes Selwyn the best of luck. Selwyn, freshly reunited with his wife, babby, horse, wagon, and ranch hands starts to bemoan his exposure to danger and lack of any place to go, literally a 45 minute walk from his ranch. Blameless inhales deeply preparing to deliver a scathing diatribe on the socioeconomic risks of the entitlement mentality but he is instead peer-shamed into an escort mission to the wealthy Dellmon Ranch, regionally famous as a bastion for Orc resisters.
The party, plus five now, arrives at Dellmon Ranch, though it looks more like a fortress with its compound surrounded by three buildings topped with improvised battlements all protected by defensive trenches and comprehensive fencing. They are greeted by Kurbin Dellmon, of Dellmon Ranch fame, who refuses to leave. His daughter, Dreena, has reached out to the elves of High Forest for assistance in the struggle. As if to punctuate the level of tension, Kurbin’s impetuous son, Fendric, runs by and punctuates Okkkkkkk right in his last remaining hit point. Meega, suddenly a bit self-conscious, is assured she probably won’t get the same treatment because she looks fairly human.
Kurbin offers hot ranch stew for those who want it but Rollen, with his tactical intuition, wastes no time throwing together a master class for the ranch bowmen, and not a ranch moment too soon as ranch scout Flameran Verminbane returns with ranch news of an immanent ranch attack. Rollen deploys most of the archers on the west building to engage the approaching Orcs while the large surprise force attacks in earnest from the east. Fortunately range and line of sight permit engagement to either side.
Rollen has the distinction of delivering the battle’s first hit. Blameless tosses Meega his crossbow, but she swings it around like an axe, sending a quarrel into the dirt. Allana, Simon, and Blameless dispense magical streaks, bolts, and orbs into the hoard while Barrin and Rollen pluck at their harps of arrow launching. With the momentary problem of having no injuries to tend, Argyle blesses Allana, Rollen, and Blameless so that Moradin guides their aim. Meega, beyond even great Moradin’s power, swings the crossbow fiercely sending a quarrel sailing far into the sky. Barrin jumps from the roof to mix it up Old School, that being a school from the time before ranged weapons. Simon creates madness among the attackers inciting green-on-green violence. Allana shifts her hex and streams ribbons of ouchy energy. Blameless, lobbing fiery orbs two at a time, unexpectedly flares in blinding light. Simon enlarges Rollen. The Orcs breach the obstacles and begin pouring into the compound. The hoard slay a couple of ranchers, permanently decapitating one of them while Argyle rushes to save the other. The main attacking force chooses that moment to pull back and retreat, presumably at the sight of Large Rollen ethereally illuminated by a devil-shaped lamp below. Barrin, Meega, and Large Rollen mop up the two remaining Orcs from the feint attack.
Kurbin dampens any celebration with a warning that another wave will be upon them soon.