Summary
The party is teleported when they touch the ring worn by one of the barbarians. They are still in snowy mountains, but have no idea where they are. Before them is a winding path leading to a cave whose opening has been carved into a roaring dragon's mouth. It appears to have been made by dwarves. The party moves up and into the cave and spots tracks from barefoot humans in the snow outside, presumably more of the strange barbarians. Inside is a large cavern, with multiple passages leading off of it. At the rear are what appear to be a couple of cells with iron bars set into the stone of the cave. The adventurers head down the first passage to the right and find a small cave with three very young white dragon wyrmlings. Two attack the party while the third ducks out of sight around a bend in the cave. Tannhaus, Tetsuo, Dafni and Varis are hit by blasts of dragon breath while fighting. The third wyrmling has gone outside through another passage and attacks Caeli, Hadrian and Virion from behind. The party splits in two and defeats the dragonets.
Moving into the main cavern they examine the cells and find a dragon egg a wyrmling hatched from. There are multiple passages leading out and they turn into the northeast one, but they spot a light coming from another passage and double back. The light is coming from a crudely carved stone brazier with a snowflake symbol like on the ring. A blue flame burns in the brazier and a misty image of a woman appears. The braziers sits on a shelf with a dagger, piece of white furred pelt, and a book. They examine the book, which is a religious text perhaps describing some of the winter gods and it appears to have been written in blood. They take the pelt, dagger and book and move on. They find a room with bedrolls and such, it appears to be a camp, possibly for the strange barbarians. Beyond is another chamber, with trenches carved in the ice floor. Cuts of meat are stored frozen in the trenches and beyond is a blood stained chamber where two of the strange barbarians are butchering an owlbear. The party decides to try to parley with them and Caeli tries to speak to them, but they are offended by the party trespassing and attack. They each throw a javelin tipped with the poisonous black stone, then attack with swords. Tetsuo fires two arrows, then recovers a thrown javelin and uses it to attack a barbarian. Virion fights with sword and a Sacred Flame spell. Varis drops Bonfire spells behind and Caeli fires Magic Missile and Hadrian hits with Toll the Dead. One of the barbarians drops, then gets back up. Concerned they're undead, Virion tries to Turn Undead, then Dispel Magic. The party continues to hammer them and the barbarians are knocked down, then get back up. Hadrian breaks through the melee to flank the barbarians. Concerned they can't be killed, Varis shifts into a polar bear to grapple a barbarian. Tetsuo tries to taunt one of the barbarians about why he won't die and the barbarian replies that their lady protects them. Virion has a revelation and yells at Caeli to go extinguish the blue flame bowl. She runs to the other room and Tetsuo goes with her. Virion ties up the barbarian Varis has grappled while Hadrian duels with the other. Caeli casts Dispel Magic on the flaming bowl and the fire goes out. Bereft of the magic, the barbarians are vulnerable and Hadrian kills the second barbarian and the first stops struggling when he sees the other has been killed.
The party interrogates the barbarian but doesn't learn much from him. The goddess Auril has been growing in power for two years, which ties in with what the adventurers have heard. Oddly, the barbarian doesn't recognize the ring that brought them here. They do learn they are a few days travel south east of the Ten Towns and there are more of this barbarian's tribe patrolling the area. Tetsuo decides to experiment with the ring and everyone holds hands as he puts it on. Strangely enough, they are teleported back to where they first touched the ring on the trail to Bryn Shander. Virion hears a woman's laughter. Since they know where they are, and it's only about noon, they decide to continue heading for Bryn Shander. The party travels the rest of the day and stops for the night and in the early evening of the next day, they spot a walled town in the distance. Figuring they can make it there in a couple of hours, the party pushes on and arrives late in the evening.
The town guard at the gate stops them, but they talk their way through with the fact they are messengers from Waterdeep. The guard passes them and makes a suggestion of a good inn, which is on the other side of town unfortunately. Passing through the town square, they come upon an unexpected sight: a man chained to a stake, about to be burned alive. The crowd jeers him and a magistrate pronounces his sentence of multiple murders. The red robed man protests his innocence weakly and the magistrate drops a torch, setting the woodpile aflame. The party questions the magistrate and he says the man was a Red Wizard of Thay who betrayed a group of local adventurers and murdered them.
After the execution, they talk to the magistrate, but Tetsuo rubs them the wrong way. The party smooths things over and the magistrate will tell the leader of the town council where they are staying. The party learns the wife of one of the murdered adventurers works at the inn if they want to investigate the rumors of treasure. Also, they were sent with a message for a wizard here, she is also staying at the inn.
The inn is decent, but with an odd decoration, one of the man-sized fish that live in the local rivers has been stuffed and mounted on a plaque over the fireplace. But this one sings nonsense every so often. The staff says it was enchanted by some drunken wizard to say silly things, but the first quote from the fish sounds oddly prophetic…
The next day, the town leader visits and tries to enlist the party to help in a struggle with some duergar. They learn a little more about local events and agree to help fight the grey dwarves.
Silly Quotes and Smart Remarks
The party was teleported to the mysterious location
Chmiel "We fell through the plot hole into the cavern"
The party finds a stone brazier burning with blue flame
Jim "I throw my name in the TriWizard Cup"
Beside the brazier is a dagger, a piece of white furred pelt and a book
Jim "Before I pick up the book, I say 'Klaatu Barada Nikto' "
Lee describes the book as being written in blood
Jim "Whoa, I was closer than I thought"
Searching a room used as a sleeping area by the barbarians
Lee "There's a chamberpot, nothing too exciting unless you're into that"
Callum and Emily couldn't make it, so their characters were in the "reserve"
Kevin "They'll be the only ones to live"
Jim "I might"
Varis goes into bear form
Chmiel "They're beary athletic" and more in that vein…
Goddess Auril freezes items of beauty to preserve them
Brittany "She's the Snow Miser!"
Auril offers her followers power
Kevin "Does she offer turkish delight?"
Kevin suggests visiting the other local towns
Chmiel "The Ten Town Tour?"
Discussing a problem
Chmiel "Burn it"
Jim "That does seem like the local solution"
