We arrive to the gates of Winterhaven late in the day and are met by the gate's guardsmen, Bob and Noddy, who asks us if we had managed to destroy the raider's blocking the passage to Bort. Not one to show weakness in front of shabby militia members, i bluff them and say that we had easily vanquished the blockade in a glorious battle, but that during the confusion of the fight, someone had kidnapped Daniel and stolen our mules. Somehow they believe me, the fools, despite obvious signs of a much tougher battle than i led them to believe, and go around town spreading the news of our victory.
We return to the inn for some much needed rest. The news of the Kobolds defeat had spread like wildfire and soon the inn was full of people trying to know more about the battle. Meanwhile, while the rest of the party was busy eating, drinking and boasting about our "glorious" victory, Chuck approaches Salvanna in private with obviously shady intentions. Still smitten with the voluptuous innkeeper, he continues his advances. Salvanna tells him that she is married and that her husband was one of the men who had disappeared after the raiders had come to the region. Not shaken by her marital status, Chuck sees this as an opportunity and makes her a rather indecent proposition: he would do his best to find her husband if she slept with him. Surprisingly, she did not become outraged by this, and after some convincing, they agreed to meet in the stable to consume her part of the agreement... And so, later in the evening, as we all were sleeping confortably in our own bedrooms and confortable beds, Chuck was having his way with the innkeeper down in the stables... We were all secretly hoping he would catch a diseases...
Next morning, we were surprised to find that all the doors to our bedrooms had been marked with a red cross. As we descend to the inn's common room, intent on asking Salvanna what were those marks, we find an even greater surprise. Daniel had returned, looking rather shabby, and was at a table eating some bread, as if he hadn't eaten for days. When we asked what had happened to him, he replied that seeing that the battle was going poorly, he had decided to follow a group of Kobold scouts who were moving away from the battle to try and discover their base and find out what had happened to his father on his own. We were preparing to chastise him for his foolishness, especially since he had returned without our mules, when he revealed that he had managed to go undetected after the Kobolds into their base behind a waterfall and to a dig site nearby, where he had found the missing townspeople and his father working as slaves. This camp was guarded by mostly humans and some kind of draconic beasts. Damn, the kid is definitely a pretty good scout in the making...
Daniel's revelations made clear our next objectives: we should attack both raider camps as soon as possible, releasing the hostages, vanquishing that threat to Winterhaven, and hopefully find out what connections, if any, exist behind the raider attacks and the Death cult's activities in the region. The presence of humans forcing the townspeople to work as slaves was a definite sign that we were dealing with more than just plain old Kobolds on rampage. Before we left though, we asked Salvanna what were those marks on our doors and who had made them. At this news, she became terribly alarmed and kept muttering that we had been cursed by the ghosts that haunt Winterhaven. When we realized we could get no more from her than desperate ramblings, we decided to dismiss the matter for now and head out to the raider's camps.
We decide to hit the camp at the waterfalls first since it is the closest to town. On the way, we ocasionally catch glimpses of kobold scout groups tracking our movements but we can never get close enough to engage. Anyway, they seemed to be heading the same direction as we did, so we would probably battle them at or near the camp. The problem would be that the camp would be alert to our arrival. And so it was.. We arrive at the camp with a large Kobold force already in position at the entrance to a cave. Though it had a fair number of strong Kobold fighters, it was mostly composed of weak and poorly armed Kobolds. The fight was rapidly over in our favor and after looting the corpses we entered the cave.
As we advance, we are met by a smaller force who seemed surprised to see us. Apparently the Kobolds had thought that we would not be able to get past the defenses at the entrance. Battle ensues and things go well, but a few moments later a second wave appears, commanded by a Kobold Wyrmpriest and a burly Goblin named Irontooth. Kobolds commanded by a Goblin? Definitely something strange there... He comes at us spewing threats and curses, but by the time he closes in melee with our frontline, we had already vanquished most of his minions. Realizing this was a much bigger threat than we had yet faced, we immediately focus fire on Irontooth, using our most powerful powers, which much to the Dm's misfortune, all hit and turn the Goblin into a bloody pulp. With his last breath he screams "Kalarel and Lord Orcus, prepare my way!".
Defeating the remaining Kobolds, we proceeded to looting the corpses. In the body of Irontooth we found a small pouch containing a silver key and a message scroll adressed to him and signed by Kalarel. The message revealed that Kalarel had a spy in Winterhaven that had warned him about our presence in the area, but that we probably wouldn't matter because in a few day he would have opened the rift and that the people of Winterhaven would serve as the first victims for Lord Orcus's minions. This was the definite proof that something much bigger was happening in the area. Apparently Kalarel and his Death cult were intent in opening the rift to Hell that we had heard of and were using the raiders as distractions so they could proceed with their plans unhindered. It became apparent that time is short and that we must deal with this soon.
Further investigation of the Kobold lair led us to a treasure chamber where we discovered a locked chest. Kralho could not open it, but when we tried Irontooth's key, it fitted and the lock opened. Inside was a large sum of gold and a magical Dwarven Chainmail. Finally, something of value! Grabbing the spoils, we left the cave and headed for the ruins where Doven and the missing townspeople were being held. More on that, in the next installment.
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