Session 26 - Dark Duchess Part 2

 The party decide to search the rooms on the deck of the ship now that the ice troll is dealt with. They start with the room to the aft of the ship and find a locked door which is quickly not locked by Mochi. Inside they see several empty wine bottles strewn across the floor, a bed, table and a large chest. Sitting against the wall is a skeleton holding yet another empty wine bottle. 

Searching the desk they see there is a Ships Log book, in which the last entry details how the ship was being stalked by a large white dragon. Nogok recognizes the symbol on the skeletons hat and deduces that this must be the infamous Captain Bluemoon, a sailor who ran his ship with fear over respect and was known up and down the coast for his ruthless approach. They try and rack their memories to see if Dragons are known to frequent Icewind Dale, and the only memory that they come up with is of Wulfgar the mighty who slain the dragon to become king of the barbarian tribes many many years ago. 

Mochi focuses their thieves tools on the chest and makes short work of the lock. Inside there is a bag which they quickly recognize as a Bag of Holding. This contains some gold, silver and large and small gold bracelet. 

Nogok takes the bag of holding and Mochi heads to the fore part of the deck to search the rooms there. Finding little of interest aside from a couple of maps of the coast and icewind dale, they decide to check out the room that the ice troll was trying to get into. 

Down in the hold the first thing they see is a scrag cat frozen solid mid roar facing them, and then they notice a large pile of treasure buried under what appears to be many layers of solid ice. They start to work their way through the first layer which takes them the best part of an hour, and as they do they hear muffled voices behind the door. 

As they listen closer they hear the sound of Icewind Kobolds and Throt puts Snorp up front to try and get the door to be opened. 

After a short back and forth in Draconic the heavy bar holding the door closed thumps to the floor and the door opens. The Kobolds via Snorp as a translator explain that they are the servants of Arveiaturace the mighty white dragon, and this is her hoard. The party who had planned to take the treasure, discuss what the impact of that would be, and if they should instead communicate with Arveiaturace to try and create an alliance. Also Throt gets Snorp to sell the idea of them being their own masters by recounting his time with Throt which doesn't quite have the desired effect and instead leads the New kobolds to try and recruit Snorp to their group in servitude. 

They determine that the kobolds will defend the Treasure unless they feel that it would be protected, and the party infer that the Kobolds had decided to tell Arveiaturace that when they introduced themselves they did so as agents of the mighty white dragon come to relocate the treasure elsewhere at her command. 

The party decide to leave the treasure in place, and part ways with the kobolds, which asked for any rations the party could spare. They take the rations and split them up feeding a small portion to a goat they keep in the fore hold explaining that its so Arveiaturace doesn't eat it.

As the party listen intently and start to bid their farewells, they hear a mighty roar from outside the ship and the flapping of enormous wings. They see a shadow move quickly over the hold but the mighty Arveiaturace doesn't land on the ship, instead they hear in horror as she picks up the Polar Bear who was sitting on the ice outside in her talons and flys away to eat. 

They decide its time to get out of here, and quickly make their way down to the ice and back to shore, as they do so they see Arveiaturace circling above, in large overlapping Arcs. They realize she is looking for them and as they get closer to shore they see that she is starting to hone in on their location, and as she gets closer. They continue to shore and see a large figure running towards them holding a club, she runs with a limp and as she gets close she skids to a stop on the ice resting on her club "Need some help friends?" She says as they recognize her as a Verbeeg.

They hastily agree and she casts a spell which summons a large fog cloud, allowing them cover. She leads the way to a small cave which has a very nice protective set of turns at the entry which would block the breath weapon of a Dragon :)

The cave is well lit, and warmed by a fire on which is bubbling some Walrus Stew. She asks the party to make themselves at home and introduces herself as Tinjong a verbeeg who lives here, and often helps those hunted by Arveiaturace.

The party enquire as to her relationship with Arveiaturace and determine that they are not aligned, and that she sees the Dragon as a nuisance more than anything else. She asks if they intend to go to Auriels Island and confront her about the Rime, They ask many questions about this and Tinjong suggests that the party may need to be a little more beefed up before confronting the Goddess.

They decide to head back to Bremen, and Throt tells Tinjong of his healed limp and suggests she seeks out the Verbeeg in the woods north of Good Mead for help with healing her ailment. She decides to accompany them and do as Throt suggested. Parting ways just outside of Bremen she heads through the wilderness to the south to skirt around the towns and avoid the people.

As they arrive back in Bremen they find the merchants in the Buried Treasure, where they ask them of the dragon and if they knew that before to determine that they thought the party would be Strong (stupid?) enough to take down the dragon and win the hoard. 

They give the merchants the captains jacket as their cut of the loot.  And throw a gold piece to Cora for her troubles. 

Leaving Bremen they decide to head to Cair Dineval to check out the castle and see if they can recover Coras son from whatever he has gotten himself into. They get there and find the castle lit and guarded (they removed the guards outside the gates after Etch's performance) and send snow owl to do some recon over the castle. 

After determining the internal layout they head back to "The Uphill Climb" to work out the next steps.