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Chapter 2
An Ambush



At the "site" on the shore of the lake they found a dead mule with no packsaddle and a dead human female, with arrow and slashing wounds. Her had dark skin and looked a little like Ingva's by-blow daughter. She also had tattoos up both arms and no weapons, even in the shortspear quiver on her back. A half-orc man with blonde hair lay murdered on the stone nearby. He had an old scar over his left eye and was still gripping his great axe. Both wore mail shirts and a bronze gorget bearing the words "REICH CAVARANIENSTAFFL.” An older human with a full beard and expensive clothing laid out on the hot stone. His fingers showed signs of having his rings pulled free and a dagger was still clutched in his other hand.
Two more humans in leather armor and red cloaks were littered about, both holding short swords with discarded shields nearby. One had a cut splitting his head apart, plus multiple bite marks as if from small animals. The other looked like he got a critical eldritch blast to the face, after getting chewed on by small animals.
The last body they found belonged to a half-elven female in leather armor and red cloak. She was lying a bit apart from the others, like she was sniping from the rim. She had a shortbow, but he quiver was empty. She obviously suffered a short spear to the gut. Ravens still picked at the carrion and continued to squawk.
Marn approached cautiously, keeping an eye on his surroundings and began searching the area for any missed loot or clues. Dardiana went to each corpse in turn and looked them over. When she was done with that, she spoke up, "There was a battle here. Redcloaks versus the merchant and his guards, most likely. The older male would most likely be the trader." She looked around, trying to find the tracks of more men having moved around this place. On a closer inspection, she noticed an odd pattern to things. Some things of value had been looted and others, like the mail shirts of the guards, not.
She did find an amulet behind a rock. It took the form of twelve snakes curving counter-clockwise outward from a central hub, which itself took the form of a vertical-pupil eye. The whole amulet had the look of copper, but the iris of the eye was set with some kind of greenish stone. It was bound by a fine chain of steel links.
Dardiana went back to the corpses and checked the valuable items that were left behind, particularly, what the general weight of the valuable items left behind was. The merchant's clothes might have been worth a bit and his dagger was masterwork. As was the half-orc guard’s battleaxe. Then there were the mail shirts of average quality and some short spears lying around. The heavy stuff was left while the lighter stuff was taken. The Ambushers didn't collect the weapons of their own fallen.
Everyone, even in the thin soil of the Fall, could spot the bloodstains, drag-marks, hoof-prints, and footprints leading to the north-east, past Gregor's position. Grath, who stayed above the "crater," followed the blood stains, toward the woods, or away from the crater, at least. He didn’t go too far, maybe fifty feet or so to the edge of the woods. He was trying to move slowly and silently, but was ready to shout for help if he was attacked and still had his bow ready and knocked. The trail leaving the ambush was fairly obvious, and included drag marks, but Grath didn't have the knowledge to put it all together.
Korgoth kept a weary eye with a weapon drawn. His instincts were screaming at him to leave that place but he was torn because he believed the dead deserved a proper send off. With stern resolution he spoke to the crowd, "We should not leave these bodies to the ravens, we should build a pyre so they may go to Valhalla with all of their possessions!"
Grath returned from his short expedition. "Let the dead bury the dead. Dead need nothing, possessions are for the living. Grath see nothing near, but let all follow trail and kill enemies."
Dardiana took the merchant's dagger. "Exactly as you said,” she addressed Grath. “He won't need this. And we'll bury or burn them after the guilty have fallen. That is, unless, we want to announce our presence."
“Animals need to eat too, we have no right to deny them their feast, leave them,” Marn added in.
Keeping his watch on the rim and watching both directions, Gregor noticed there were quite an amount of heavy trophies left and that generally these redcloaks screwed up heavily, losing three of their own. ‘Good for us,’ he thought. "Grath is right, I guess we better pack the stuff on our mules before it gets taken by some other band of passers-by. The chase could take some time, but we better not waste our time dealing with the bodies. Maybe on our way back. Check the lake, just in case, search the bodies real good, pack, and let's go," Gregor chimed in with definitive resolve.
Gregor and Delphi could see that there were some patches of sand next to the lake where they found the trail left by the caravan as it entered the Fall from the north. At that point it consisted of four mules and five humanoids. The much messier trail leaving the scene to the north east had the markings of two mules much more heavily loaded, two dragged bodies or objects, and six humanoids. It appeared to be aiming for the end of the first mountain spur to the east.
Korgoth fowns and is saddened by the lack of respect for the dead, "I told you to LEAVE their possessions, if any of you steal there weapons or armor you will deal with ME. Take the perishables and money but leave their equipment." Narrowing his eyes, Korgoth looked angrily at the halfling.
Dardiana glared at Korgoth as she took the sheath from the merchant and put it at her own waist. "Feel free to follow your own ideals, but the ideals of others should be up to them. Just like I won't push you until you take something, you shouldn't push us until we don't."
The male halfling looked at Korgoth from the ridge. “I suggest you openly state you are not joining Ashdown or any other of this world's military. Also, I suggest you not attempt to hurt anyone, or we, indeed, might deal with you. In that case, I'll try to make sure you'll live," Gregor responds to the man’s threat.
Korgoth glared around, looking for a moment like he was tensed to attack. Then turned, shouldered his hammer, and walked off without a word. Heading for the north, and Ethandun. As the party watched him disappear through the breach in the Fall rim, some of them thought they could hear the sound of hurried horse's hooves echoing down from Starlight's Razor.
"So what’s the next move? If there was to be an ambush I'm sure we'd have heard something by now," Marn questioned.
Delphi came back to the group, having lost patience with her shadowy stalking. She watched as Korgoth left, and she snorted quietly, "One down, before the raiders even show up? Well, maybe they'll see that as a sign of weakness and finally pounce." She shrugged then requested the saddle pack they had found with the mule, intent on searching it more carefully. She then spent a minute looking it over, careful to not miss a thing. The search confirmed Mart Ortul's story about bolts of dyed cloth.
Delphi also made a search of the site to ensure they wouldn’t miss anything before moving on. Looking around, she did find the amulet behind the rock as well. She moved over to the rock, and she very carefully picked up a strange amulet. She lifted it, careful not to touch the actual face of the amulet. "This looks really expensive, or important. Or, you know, cursed. What do you all make of it? I don't, uh, have much education to speak of." She blushed a bit at her last statement, clearly embarrassed.
"Grath did not see ambush either. Perhaps no ambush? Perhaps ambush ambushers? Ambushers not expect ambush! Also, write on paper and tell Ingva trader not coming and why!" Grath spoke enthusiastically, though they did not know if it was because he wasn’t getting ambushed or because he may be the one ambushing soon.
"I'm afraid the paper Ingva gave me is one-way only, we cannot write on it for her to know. In case I get it wrong though..." Gregor took a small splinter, tipped it in one of redcloaks' blood and put a small mark on the map. "I am done checking the rim and it all seems to be deserted. Whoever did it, did not leave here any rearguard so they are probably marching to some distant site.” Based on general spore, discarded trail ration wrappers, and the remains of a campfire a little further into the forest to the north-east, Gregor surmised that the ambushes were at least ten in number, and were in position at least from the previous night.
Gregor started searching all of the bodies for hidden pockets and such, evaluating everything that might be valuable. He then rinsed and packed the mail shirts, great axe, short spears and other valuables, not including the merchant’s pants and shirt, but possibly boots, belt etc. if of sufficient value. Gregor will end up packing six short spears, two short swords, a short bow, two mail shirts, three sets of leather armor, two heavy wooden shields and a buckler. He was also able to find seventeen gold, three silver and 6 copper pieces between them, and a length of string.
He then dragged all the bodies next to each other and away from the road, covered them with red cloaks then suddenly stopped, looking at the large spot of red on white he had just assembled. "I wonder if these red cloaks should mean something. They are extremely non-practical for any sort of forest warfare."
Upon seeing the amulet as Delphi held it aloft, Gregor responded. “Snakey, hmm...either it's magical or it's a symbol...or both. No idea what it could mean."
"I already used my detect magic spell for the day but I'll see what I can tell from it, if you don't mind.” Marn then held out his hand for the amulet.
Delphi offered it gladly, clearly not trusting the amulet. "It's odd, and it seems strange that the bandits or raiders or what have you would just leave it. I suppose they may not have noticed it, but it seemed to leap out at my eyes." She looked at the taller folk around her, and she smiled. "Then again, perspective accounts for a lot."
Marn started to examine the amulet trying to determine if any of his lessons would help in identifying its nature. The amulet was definitely magical in nature. It was not made of any natural element he had seen before. It had the weight and color of copper, but none of the softness, as a sharp rap with a rock attested. The greenish, iridescent iris appeared to have been achieved using polished mollusk shell, cut to precision. The chain was finely-tooled steel of masterwork quality.
As Gregor looked around at the ambush site he found a faint set of humanoid footprints that came around from the north side of the Fall and followed the departing trail. It looked like somebody with good dexterity trying to be cautious but with no woodscraft whatsoever. The tracks were light and quick, but whoever it is kept stepping in all the wrong places. It appeared to be somebody shadowing the departing ambush party rather than joining them.
"Have got what is needed from here? Grath will carry whatever the mule cannot. Follow trail, or not? More stuff if find end of trail," Grath said as he looked almost bored.
"Do you mind if I hold on to this for awhile? I'd like to run some more tests later,” Marn asked Delphi. And thinking about it, he pulled out the leather book and opened it again and cast Read Magic to see if anything became clear since he had detected magic before. The spell did not reveal any hidden information. However, the scythe and lightning-bolt clasp appeared to be the same alloy as the amulet.
Grath took the masterwork great axe and helped to load the mule with the rest of the salvaged equipment. He also took a long look at the half-orc.
Horbin silently took the length of string. "Well, looks like we best not be standing here when someone arrives, especially if they are lawmen," Horbin said plainly as he made a path to the wooded area.
"I am not afraid of any lawmen, so far. But indeed, nothing to do here unless we want to waste some time. Speaking of which, I propose we hustle for an hour to catch up with cloaks' lead. This could be dangerous, but I guess they are farther away," Gregor addressed the group.
With Gregor and Delphi leading the way, they moved at double speed through the forest along the trail of the ambushers. The lighter members of the party hitched rides at times on the back of the mules. Delphi's pet, though not in the best of health still, seemed quite keen to follow. In spite of its really bad day, it was still a strong animal, obviously well kept.
It was obvious the two mules the raiders were driving were overloaded, and not helping their pace. After a short distance the two sets of drag marks vanished, but the mule prints became deeper and more labored. The lighter trail of the shadower winded along, almost invisible at times, but remained around the raiders’ main trail. The trail appeared to be heading for the end of the nearest of the jagged spurs reaching north from the Godspine. Near the end of their hustle they stepped around some rock and found themselves between the towering knife-edge of the spurs end and a deep, broad, swift river running from east to west. The redcloak's trail, having moved around the end of the spur, now turned south-east.
They noticed at that point a body lying against a tree. He wore a red cloak and held no weapons, his body covered in small animal bites. Clutching at a bloody wound to its stomach seemed futile due to the somewhat more fatal, missing half of his head.
"Looks like someone got angry," Horbin said as he looked at the man. At that point, from some bushes to their right, in the shadow of the rocky spur, they all heard the sound of somebody not moving silently.
[SNAP] "frell..." in a woman’s voice rang out as the twig broke under foot.
Delphi was moving before she consciously thought to do so, darting around the sound at a full sprint to get into a flanking position. She also wanted to see if she could spot the clumsy bigfolk before they had a chance to hide again. She saw the female human rising, with a disgusted expression, from the pitfall that a poorly chosen foothold had dumped her in. Her black-leather-with-brazen-studs armor, while it might be quite the thing for a very exclusive sort of party, was not well chosen for concealment around a lot of green and brown. Although at least she had found a green cloak from somewhere. Her skin tone reminded Delphi a little of Dardiana.
Gregor guided his big dog forward and right, attempting to cut off the "silent"-mover from a route to escape. He dropped his lance and drew a javelin. The smaller dogs moved straight right, loosely following Delphi and barked, at first loud and active, then, just to make sure everyone was aware that they had barked. Gregor saw her about the same time as Delphi, she wasn't far off at all. She was rising stiffly and slowly to her feet, facing Delphi. Her eyes were downcast and she had a notable jaw, that was set very firmly.
Grath drew and knocked an arrow, getting ready to loose it at a sign of danger. He growled, "Shut up, dogs! Too loud!" He peered around intently elsewhere looking for a threat, confident the group could handle one woman for the time being.
The woman rose to full height, still moving slowly, and raised her head to Delphi. She had large, heavily-lidded, very cold eyes and her hands slowly moved to hang by either side. "You throw anything at me, pretty little she-hobbit, and I will do things to you that you may not be old enough to have heard done." She took a step back and to the side, giving Gregor a sidelong look, and crossed her arms over her chest gunbuster-style. "Well then, ladies and gentlemen,” her voice low and deep. "What happens next?"
Delphi frowned at the vague insult, but she held her tongue and her sling until after the woman stopped speaking. The little scout moved a bit more, to put herself in a good position to give chase should the woman take off, before replying. "You could tell us who you are and what you're doing. We've just come across several bodies, and we're awfully interested in finding the people responsible."
The woman closed her eyes to slits, her head back. "Bethlen Gabriel, textiles merchant, journeyman." She shifted her position, as if to keep both Gregor and Delphi in her field of vision. "I was heading up to Whitewater Rip to sell some silk and linen, and study Your People's dressmaking styles. Then circumstances altered. Now," her eyes opened a little, "I am looking at making more bodies. And rescuing Tharholt's thieving little whore of a daughter."
"So what, you want to kill us? You think you, alone, a trader, can take out a group," Dardiana took a look around where the girl was, to see just how surrounded she was. "I think you might want to think again. You're surrounded and don't know what each of us is capable of." She walked back a bit, to a tree, and began to climb it while keeping her eyes on the girl. She leaned back and practically sat down on the tree's side. "So, who's this... Tharholt, hmm? And what was that about rescuing his daughter?"
"Ladies, is this really necessary? I think we have similar interests, though she seems more skillful than her profession would give. Besides, this must be yours," Horbin tried to resolve the scuffle diplomatically as he gestured to the new beast of burden.
"I said nothing of fighting you" she said, giving the word peculiar emphasis. “Although I suppose if you give me no option you could enforce my consent.” Her arms uncrossed, and returned to her sides. "Tharholt was a merchant, nice man, fought well. Should have worn armor. Currently feeding ravens on the fall. His daughter was accompanying him to learn his trade, although I fear she has acquired some rather different professional skills-" she broke off when she saw the animal. "Spike!" she said, much breathier than her tone up until that point. The mule wandered up and licked her across the face.
"So, how far behind them are we now," Horbin asked Bethlen.
She gave the mule a rub on the head. "Not long. I only waited until they were just out of earshot before finishing their friend, whom they had decided was slowing them down. Then I heard you coming, and waited to see what you were."
Grath asked, "How far out of earshot, will hear thrice damned barking? Find secure spot to talk."
"I doubt they are looking for another fight.", said Bethlen. "But I did hear them talking about ‘meeting up with the Trammelburgh look-out party’, if you find that cause to feel any urgency."
Something with hooves neared behind them. They all heard the sound of hooves before they saw, atop a light horse, a heavily armored man riding. His face is rugged, and aside from the armor, he wore a large shield on his back and a heavy morningstar by his belt. After quickly taking in the scene, he slid off the horse inelegantly and sent it on its way with a hard slap over its back.
"You must be Ingva's adventurers," he said matter-of-factly, with unexpected warmth in his voice that contrasted his hard appearance. "This is good. I'm here to join you. And I'm sorry if I'm late to the party, but I had business to take care of first." He looks around with a big smile on his face. "And what a party you've had. Hahah! So... who are we hunting?"
"Six bandits or some such. Follow me...cancel, follow HER." Gregor pointed his javelin at Delphi. He then turned away from the insolent woman, took the javelin away, rode back to his lance to pick it up. Then he called the dogs, who immediately ceased barking and followed him along the trails. He then barked, in dogs' tongue, "Silent. Sniff. Stalk. Do as I do," to his furry companions.
Grath looked at the approaching stranger. "Who this guy? How know Ingva? Grath not remember stranger. First Korgoth resurrect mule, then mule follow to dead guys, then Korgoth leave because could not raise dead any more, and mad no funeral pyre started. Hunting bandits. Maybe stranger bandit?"
"I never saw a bandit who was so quick to give up a good horse," said the merchant, studying the newcomer without emotion. "Still, they are getting further away. And so is your impetuous friend and his My-Little-Wolfpack starter set. Shall we go? If you are not going to detain me, I am going anyway." She moved off, down the trail.
Dardiana slid off the trunk of the tree and followed after the similarly-colored girl. It was the bandit's freedom to kill, but it was anyone else's freedom to hunt them down for the deed. Delphi continued scouting just ahead of the group, taking her direction from the others but relying on her own stealth and skill to remain unharmed. She took careful watch of the new woman; though she seemed innocent enough, looks could be extremely deceiving. And if the woman tried anything, she would find out exactly how deceiving Delphi's appearance truly was.
Gregor followed the trail as it dropped downhill through forest and bush. Relieved of the need to let the others keep up, he made swift and silent movement. The redcloak's trail was a little less labored now, but they were still plainly stumbling about in the forest.

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