Travel to the inn

One morning, the adventurers awake to a beautiful, sunny day. To the north, however, in the direction of the Wayside Inn, storm clouds are gathering: very strange storm clouds in the shape of three swirling lightning bolts.
The town council sees this strange phenomenon and becomes concerned. Earlier that morning a group of settlers left to pick up supplies at the inn. The council asks the adventurers to investigate immediately.

A Violent Atmosphere.

As the party is gathering their equipment and preparing to leave town, the group of settlers dispatched earlier returns, without the goods they were sent to retrieve. The group is soaking wet, and one of the larger carts is being pulled by one horse instead of two.
One of the two soldiers that was accompanying the caravan reports that when the group got within a mile of the inn, the weather became so violent they couldn’t continue. The driving rain, fierce winds, and hailstones the size of apples impeded progress to a crawl, and then one of the horses was struck by lightning and killed.
When they retreated just a few hundred yards back down the High Road toward Leilon, the weather was perfectly calm again. The group decided not to risk trying to complete the journey to the inn, but the other soldier sent to guard the caravan agreed to stay and keep an eye on the situation. On the way the the Inn the characters encountered a set of Armors of Talos. When the characters get to the point where the bad weather starts, the soldier who stayed behind to observe is being attacked by the three suits of armor. (The characters might remember the armor from the Wayside Inn on their previous visit.)

A wall of storms surges and howls in the distance. The sunny, mild weather gives way immediately to rain and hail, violent winds, and electrical discharges. Passing in and out of the wall are three figures in plate armor, each swinging a flail at a lone figure in splint armor wielding a longsword. The lone fighter, taking on the three in plate, wears the emblem of the Leilon garrison.

The soldier, a veteran named Emmalou, is fighting off three air elemental myrmidons (see appendix A). These suits of armor were the same ones crafted by the Wayside Inn’s blacksmith, Teega.Thankfully the characters did not steal any armors from the blacksmith which means the 3 armors on the road are the only ones they'll be fighting.
Curse of Talos. If a character is hit with a lightning strike attack from any of the myrmidons, and then fails their saving throw and becomes stunned, a mark resembling three parallel lightning bolts appears on their head. It can only be removed by a remove curse spell, and its effects are noted later in this quest.
Note that three of these creatures is a deadly encounter, even for 6 characters of 8th level. For fewer characters, or for lower level characters, have the enemies start at half their normal hit points, and allow Emmalou to assist the characters for longer than normal by increasing her hit points.

The Creeping Storm.

The combat takes place at the edge of where the stormy weather rages. The air elemental myrmidons are bolstered by the storm but are weaker when outside it. The edge of the storm expands outward at a rate of 5 feet per round, on initiative count 20.
If the myrmidons are within the storm, their melee attacks are made with advantage. If they can be tempted outside the storm’s area, they attack with disadvantage and have disadvantage on saving throws. They move out of the storm only if they have no targets to attack in melee within the storm.

Aftermath.

The heroes defeated the armors and kept Emmalou alive. Thankfully she revealed the following information.

• The stormy area is slowly growing larger. Emmalou had to retreat several hundred yards to remain outside the zone. She has no idea what is causing it, but such blatant and powerful forces of magic are nothing she wants to be involved with if she has a choice in the matter.

• When she was in the stormy area, the lightning was everywhere, but it never struck the suits of armor even though they were made of metal.

• She was almost struck a few times, but she kept repeating prayers to Talos, and she thinks that is the only thing that saved her.

• She does not want to enter the stormy area and the characters were not able to persuade her.

Lightning Strikes

When the characters enter the storm zone around the Wayside Inn, they must contend with the weather, which becomes an enemy more deadly than most they have faced.
As the party travels to the Wayside Inn through the storm, have each character roll a d6 for the number of times they are struck by lightning as they approach. If a character attempts to pray to Talos and succeeds on a DC 15 Intelligence (Religion) check, they are not hit by any of the strikes.
The characters got hit by multiple lightning strikes before they reached the Inn but managed to survive.

Conflict Type

Skirmish