Alas, their plans were thrown into disarray when a few days
before the new moon, a fleet of boats flying the royal banner of Kellowai
arrived in town. These anchored in midstream, and landed a noblewomen to speak
with the March Baron. The party starting digging for rumors, finding out that
such a visit was unusual, as was the stated purpose (to resupply the Citadel of
Amrath).Their investigation was interrupted when the beggar Rikar, previously
befriended by Turrick, arrived to breathlessly tell them that the March Baron
had ordered the party’s arrest and his men were spreading out across town to
find them all. The group quickly decided the best place for them in the
circumstances was out of town, so Rikar led them to an area where several
buildings were built against the town walls. As Darnorth with his magic boots
helped the party clamber over the wall, the guards in an adjacent tower challenged
them and opened fire. They were quickly silenced by Erijay’s sleep spell. Kern
left a handful of coin and Sweet Jenny in the beggars care, and arranged to
meet him on the Commons outside the town walls the next day to get more news.
The group hid in the marsh, and watched as parties of the
March Baron’s horsemen fanned out to the north and east searching for them.
They also noted a party of riders heading up the old Stonehell road towards the
dungeon, a party that did not return before dark as did the others. Next day
Kern made his way to the Commons to meet Rikar.
He learned from the beggar that King’s envoy, Lady Glendril, had
convinced the March Baron that the party had fabricated the whole hobgoblin
story to discredit him, so they could
usurp his baronial seat and replace him with the axe wielding Erijay. He also learned that the Baron’s men had
ransacked their new house, and hauled away the bedridden hench-elf Elineel to
the dungeons beneath his keep. Obviously unable to return to Westmist right
now, they decided to head downriver to intercept the smugglers, a modification
of their original plan. Stopping at the old smugglers camp, they found it still
deserted and unused since their last visit. The party set an ambush around it,
while Kern hid by the river to watch for boats. No smugglers appeared, but late
in the evening, the royal flotilla passed by and disappeared into the evening
mist.
The party continued their watch overnight with no result,
before boarding their boat and heading downriver through the morning mist.
Before too long, however, they emerged from the mist only to find the royal
flotilla at anchor just 60 yards ahead. Quickly back paddling, they tried to
evade, but were spotted and one of the vessels pulled anchor to pursue. With
more rowers, the royal ship caught up and the men-at-arms aboard opened fire
once the party came within visual range. They were supported by a great warrior
plate mail and what appeared to be Lady Glendril, casting spells. While half
the party continued to pull for shore, Erijay dropped a sleep spell on their pursuers,
knocking out many of the men at arms and several rowers. Eazam used his rope of climbing, and Turrick his net,
to try ensnaring the Lady, but to no avail. In the meantime, she spoke the
magic word ‘tella’, dumping the party into waist deep water as their boat
turned back to a box, and proving they in fact faced the magician Alia. While
Kern tried to grab the box, one of the rowers ensnared it in a net and began to
pull it towards his own boat. The rest of the party traded missile fire with
the enemy, except Riley who successfully cast silence on Alia, neutralizing that threat. The fight turned in the
parties favor when Eazam was finally successful in ensnaring Alia in his
rope. Kern, meanwhile, waited until
their magic box/boat was almost onboard the enemy vessel before speaking the
work ‘spaz’, returning the boat to full size and in the process crushing the
enemy boat and dumping everyone onboard into the water. While Eazam pulled the
bound magician to shore, the rest of the party use missile fire to pick off
those crew who had not yet been pulled under by the weight of their armor.
The other vessels were now approaching, so the party ran
into the mists to hide from the search parties. These gave up by nightfall, and
when they checked in the morning, all sign of the rest of the fleet was gone,
with just the debris and bodies from the previous day’s battle remaining. Kern
dove into the water to recover the body of the drowned plate mailed warrior,
dragging it back to camp. They stripped both the body and Alia of valuables,
and cast Detect Magic to discover
three magical potion vials. Then, Erijay successfully cast Charm Person on Alia, and the party proceeded to learn all she knew
about the smuggling operation. As a river smuggler, she had been hired in the
city of Kingsford to run arms and supplies down the rivers to the hobgoblins at
the ruins of Narmor. She didn’t know who was doing the hiring, having dealt
only with middlemen, but it was obviously someone of influence and wealth. She
also knew there was someone in Westmist involved, but again did not know
his/her identity. She had lead about 7-8 runs downriver, filling several
warehouses below the ruined castle (serving as the hobgoblins headquarters) on
the island portion of Narmor. After each run, she and her men would row the Folding Boat back to the east bank of
the Great River, then proceed overland to Kingsford to arrange another trip. As far as she knew, the hobgoblins were
planning an invasion of the Kingdom of Kellowai, starting with Westmist. She
had no idea when the attack was coming, but did say this was her last trip
downriver. The party was left to ponder these revelations and plan their next
course of action.
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