Still licking their wounds from the recent battle, the party did not want another fight if they could avoid it. Realizing that the make-shift raft was too small for the entire party, Val's warhorse, and their prisoners, the party decided to split up.
Cressidien and Silvermoon tried to move stealthily along the south bank of the
Red River keeping pace with the raft, while Val rode his warhorse, scouting ahead. Everyone else got mounted the raft, along with their manacled prisoners
"Black Bart" Haskill and "Big Ed" Haskill. The raft was moved out into the "fast" current of the river, which was still moving slower than walking pace.
Suddenly Paw Haskill and 5 of his kin (who were also trying to move stealthily) stumbled across Cressidien and Silvermoon. With both sides surprised, combat was joined. The party members on the raft started moving slowly back to shore to help their comrades, lending support via ranged attacks as they moved. Val was scouting too far ahead to circle back in time to take part in the fighting.
The party was able to defeat all the Haskills present, including Paw, but heard others approaching from the south. Quickly searching the dead, they collected 600 gold and discovered that Paw's glaive was magical. They took the gold and the glaive, then quickly continued moving downstream afoot and afloat.
The remaining Haskills did not appear to follow the party past the site of the battle. The next day the party neared a small fishing village. They landed the raft ashore a few miles upstream and made camp, while Cressidein and Almalexia walked to the village (named
Cresskill) and paid 20 gold to have a large flatboat constructed for them. Almalexia also bought the components needed to cast the Find Familiar spell, which she used to summon a cute, harmless-appearing bunny. She named her new pet
Sinclair. Two days later, the party boarded the completed flatboat and continued they journey downstream towards
Westport.
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