Session 11: The Mountain Climb

General Summary

The party decapitated the corpse of their would be assassin, Sephek Kaltro. They found the body do be long dead, apparently of drowning, and animated by a vengeful spirit. They left the body outside the inn, being far too tired to take any responsibility for its disposal, and all went back to sleep. In the middle of the night they were all awoken to the sounds of shouting coming from below and the innkeeper's rousing them all to come downstairs. Below they found Trovus, the silver dragonborn speaker of Caer-Konig. He seemed to be very tired and slightly drunk as he loudly interrogated the party about the headless body he found outside with a note on it. During the questioning the Shorard sisters diligently made him comfortable, bringing blankets and warm broth and setting him down in chair in the corner. Before long he was snoring away, oblivious to the world. The sisters explained that Trovus was well meaning, but had taken on far too much responsibility himself. In the wake of the recent thefts throughout the town he had taken to patrolling the city all night, though with his love of drink and lack of sleep most mornings townsfolk would find him asleep in a snowbank. Waking near midnight with their plans to meet Sephek unexpectedly cancelled, most of the party spent some downtime working on their various projects. Bhur stops by the Hook, Line, and Sinker, a local tavern still open at this hour. He asks about the thefts recently in town and finds that in addition to the magic lantern from the Northern Light, a pair of goats was stolen from the tavern. Bhur also overhears part of a conversation between two fisherfolk, only catching a few words, evil wizard...burn...stake...adventurers. The following morning the party meets up with their guide Jarthra Farzassh at Frozenfar Expeditions. They set out across the tundra towards Kelvin's Cairn. It takes them the better part of 6 hours of travel before arriving at a sheltered but abandoned base camp. Five sled dogs remain tethered to an overturned sled, apparently having eaten all the supplies within reach but still hungry, cold, and miserable. They are freed by the group and fed some of the remaining supplies. Natali is able to find out they've been stuck here for days, and would like to return back to town. So they do.

The party begins their climb up the mountain, passing by several mountain goats who idly watch them. The party is caught in an avalanche while passing a vast expanse of white snow, setting them back a couple hours. They eventually come upon the barely conscious form of Garret, whose suffering from exhaustion and some minor wounds. They tend to what they can and learn that his group was ambushed by a yeti. He was hurt and tried to lead it away, he ran down the mountain but it eventually caught up to him at the top of a cliff and knocked him over. He is concerned about his group and insists on searching for them. The party continues along, with Jartha's expertise making good time on an icy cliff face with only narrow ledges to climb. They approach the area where Garret's group was ambushed and find a cave entrance. Bhur sends Snowball ahead to scout and finds a yeti tyke playing with a halfling like a ball, the whimpers and cries of pain alerting them that she still lives. The group works out a plan over the next half an hour or so, eventually deciding on a foggy rescue attempt. The plan seems to go off with surprising efficiency and the party begins to head away from the cave with the exhausted halfing, Perilou Fishfinger. As they retreat from the cave she tells them of the ambush, and how Mokingo attacked the yeti after it injured Garret and how he was slain and eaten while she could do nothing to help. She doesn't know what happened to her other companion, the tiefling wizard, Astrix. She hasn't seen her since so she doesn't think the yeti got her, perhaps she fled further up the mountain and found shelter. Before going too far Grimsby noticed the rumblings of something large slowly plodding up the trail towards them, it was still beyond the curve of the path but very close. The party chose to stand their ground and fight, loosing arrow and spell upon seeing the large yeti returning with a dead mountain goat.

After killing the yeti and chasing after its mate, they found the yeti cave abandoned. They set up to make camp and rest from their exertions.