We rejoined Heddro and Iceborn outside and headed for the only inn Fellhaven had to offer. The rain was coming down pretty heavily and it was nice to be someplace dry. We sat down for a warm meal and I must say the soup was wonderful. After Heddro had dried off, he came back down. Something caught his attention at the window.
“What is it?” I said as I walked to the window. I got up on a chair to look out and he pointed to a group of figures down the road. A mob was approaching. I ducked down a bit.
“You shouldn’t concern yourself with them,” said the barkeep.
“What do they want?” I asked as I watched them turn down an alley, quite relieved they had not headed for the inn.
“If you don’t bother them, they won’t bother you. You should just keep to your business.”
“Who are they?” Iceborn asked.
“I can’t really say,” was the only answer.
“Come on,” I prodded.
“Really, I can’t,” he began to get uncomfortable, as if someone was holding something over him.
“Hey, we won’t say anything, it’s just us here. What are they doing?” Iceborn continued to try for more information.
At this point the man looked genuinely worried for his life. “LOOK! I think you’ve worn your welcome here. You’re clearly only going to get me into trouble, so I’m going to have to ask you to leave! All of you!”
“WHAT?!” Heddro interjected. “Hey! This is the only inn in town, and it’s raining!”
“Well, I guess your friend should have thought about that. Get your things and get out!”
“Oh, come on! I didn’t say anything!” Heddro continued to complain as he went to get his things. “I can’t believe you got us kicked out!”
We stood in the rain, trying to think of someplace to go. Stables were not safe considering the mob, nor did we want to try our luck with anyone else in Fellhaven, so we determined the safest thing would be to set up camp outside of town. We trudged out into the woods a bit, looking for a safe place where we might put together a somewhat dry camp. Kriv and Cherry used their combined strength and finesse to get the most efficient use of a tarp and some trees. I could do very little to help, so I tried to get some measure of the storm. Lightning would flash and light up clouds as far as I could see, and it seemed like the storm would never end. I planned for a long, wet night. Having contributed nothing but a bleak forecast to the group setting up camp, I saw they were having trouble finding a way to make a fire. I did the only useful thing I could think to do and created a small magical fire. We organized watch shifts. Heddro would go first since he couldn’t sleep anyway, then I would take a shift, then Kriv and so on. The sound of the rain in the trees soon soothed me into sleep.
Having been waterlogged and eating only soup for dinner, it wasn’t long before I woke up with a full bladder. I got up to relieve myself, half asleep and wandered a short way from camp. I had begun to wake up a bit when I got back and realized that Heddro was nowhere to be found. “Damn it!” I thought. It was probably nothing. He might have been doing the same thing I was doing, but considering our history together, anything was possible. I needed to wake someone up, if only to keep an eye on the camp for a while. Since Kriv was next, I decided to wake him.
“Kriv,” I tapped his shoulder. He woke up and the inner lids of his dragon eyes were still partly closed. “Heddro’s gone.”
His eyes opened fully and his pupils narrowed. “What? Gone?”
“It may be nothing, but someone needs to keep an eye on camp while the other looks for him.”
“You want me to look?”
“Hmm,” I stopped to consider who would be better at protecting the others and who would be able to sneak out to locate Heddro, “no, stay here. I can look.”
He had not left too long ago, the ground was still wet, but the tracks had not been washed away yet. I followed them through the bushes until they disappeared completely. “He’s in a tree, he’s got to be.” I looked up and something hit me on the head. Nothing big, but it stung a bit. I turned to see Heddro hiding in a tree. He put a finger to his mouth and gestured for me to climb up. I looked around a bit and tried to climb the tree. He had to reach down and pull me up because the branches were a bit far apart.
“What is it?” I asked. He pointed down a hill to what looked like a mining operation. The area in front of the opening was cleared out and rimmed with torches and what appeared to be the mob from earlier was gathered outside the mine chanting. “The cult!”
We watched for a moment, and a bolt of lightning struck a ledge by the mine. The chanting got louder and from the ledge a ghostly figure appeared. Its voice was loud and echoed off the rock face of the mine. The worlds were no language I could recognize, but one word stood out: Tharizdun.
“Oh no! Tharizdun,” I said to Heddro.
“What the hell is that?” he asked, and I explained to him about the chained god. “Hold on, I thought we were going after some five-headed dragon b!+*#.”
“We are, but she works for him.”
Heddro leaned back on the truck of the tree and put his hand to his head, “What did you get me into?”
“Nothing! It wouldn’t have been our business at all if you hadn’t kidnapped the girl in the first place, but that’s beside the point now.”
“What are we going to do?”
“We have to tell the others, but I’m not sure if we should go in now or wait until morning when the cult is gone to look around.”
“I’m all for waiting!”
“Me too, but something tells me they might have the boy’s father. Someone could be dying right now. I just down know if it’s worth us risking our lives too.”
“Let’s go back to camp and see what the others want to do.”
We climbed down quietly and returned to camp. Kriv was waiting, but starting to get worried. We asked if he had heard anything. He said nothing but lightning so we explained everything we saw. The others woke up at this point, hearing us talking, so we discussed our plan.
“I know the guy at the inn said if we just minded our own business they wouldn’t bother us, but we ARE involved already. It’s a cult to Tharizdun,” I told them, “I’m worried the boy’s father might be down there. I think they must have recognized the wagon or something.”
We went back and forth over a matter of heroics, but determined that we are no good to anyone if we run in there and get ourselves killed. We would wait out the night and investigate the mine in the morning.
