Rudo sets the sword back on its rack, then steps out into the hallway. He claps the boy on the shoulder. "By Silverbeard, that's the smartest thing I've heard all day. We ought to be giving this kid a share." He flashes a smirk at Willow. "Of course we're not actually going to do that. He ought to pay us for rescuing his sorry hide."

Before anyone can respond, Rudo strides past the Dendrar family through the doorway into the storeroom. He bumps Richard brusquely aside as he passes by.

The party follows Rudo out of the hallway and back into the storeroom. Willow pauses to close and lock the armory door, then drops the key into her belt pouch. After she and Burgess step through the secret passageway she turns to close the wall panel behind them as well. It neatly seals the storeroom into total darkness, pierced only by the light of Willow's troll claw.

Rudo leads the way out of the storeroom and through the open cavern. As they approach the wooden bridge, he stoops to retrieve his discarded greataxe, slinging it back over his shoulder. Meanwhile Willow tracks the trail of blood drops across the bridge with Burgess close beside her. She ignores the shadowy bulk of the grotesque one-eyed creature hunched at the bottom of the ravine, gnawing wetly at one of the slain bugbear's limbs. Steamknuckle shudders and looks away as he crosses the bridge. The Dendrars huddle close together behind him, herding Richard along while they too try to ignore the horrible sounds coming from below.

As the party walks along the edge of the ravine, Rudo stoops again to retrieve the javelin he had thrown at the escaping bugbear. He tucks it back into the bundle at his belt with satisfaction. Parchment slides past him silently, his black eyes glittering in the ambient light of the troll claw.

Finally the group reaches the bottom of the cavern chamber. Willow crouches close to the stone floor, studying a drying blood droplet beside the natural stone pillar near the entrance tunnel. The party huddles close behind her, fretfully scanning the surrounding darkness for any sign of danger.

Willow stands and swings her claw around, illuminating the tunnel through which the party had entered some hours earlier. Then she peers around the edge of the pillar and across the ravine's lower bridge to the east, shining her light toward another passageway carved into the far wall. "Haven't been that way yet," she mutters. The passageway is a smooth rectangle of neatly masoned stone, presumably leading to more man-made chambers branching to the southeast of the main natural cavern.

Then she turns her claw back to the short passageway closer by, heading west toward a flight of descending stairs. "But that's where the blood goes," she says. "Not out the tunnel like I would have thought. Down there."

The party gathers behind her and peers into the passageway. The stairs begin a few feet in, dropping off into darkness. A single faint drop of blood glitters on the floor just before the first step.

Willow looks around at the party, their faces illuminated eerily in the magical light. Rudo gives a curt nod. When no one else speaks up, Willow nods in return, then turns to lead the way down the stairwell. The rest of the party follows close behind with weapons drawn.

Willow moves cautiously down the stairs, claw in one hand and shortsword in the other. With each step she alternates between studying the stair beneath her feet and glancing down at the landing ten feet below for any signs of danger. The center of each step is smooth with frequent travel, but the outlines of various footprints can be seen closer to the walls where thick drifts of dust have accumulated. Willow grunts softly as she approaches the bottom of the stairs, indicating with a nod of her head another tiny drop of blood darkening one of the dust drifts along the left-hand wall.

Finally she pauses at the bottom of the stairs, where the corridor turns sharply to the right. Here the flickering light of a dying oil lamp mingles with the harsher light of the troll's claw. To her left is a closed wooden door with an iron handle. She peers around the corner to the right, then leans back. "Ten feet, then another closed door," she whispers.

Zhaquadan points at the nearest door.

Rudo nods affirmatively, then moves past Willow to take up position in front of the door on the left. He grips his longsword with both hands. Willow tucks her claw into her belt pouch, then draws her second shortsword while Burgess twitches with anticipation beside her. Flickering shadows descend on the corridor. The only light now comes from the faintly burning oil lamp affixed to the wall a few feet past the bend.

The rest of the party files quietly down the stairs to gather behind the two in front of the door. Zhaquadan's hammer and shield are held ready, as are Parchment's cutlass and dagger. The Dendrar family waits nervously on the lower steps, swords gripped tightly.

Rudo glances around one last time for confirmation, then reaches out to grasp the iron handle of the door. It turns with a noisy creak. He flings it open, then leans backward in the same motion.

The door opens onto a dark room. The faint lamplight dimly illuminates what appears to be a dirty barracks. Rough wooden bunks are built into the corners, with heaped-up blankets and dirty dishes scattered about. A strong smell of unwashed bodies and rotten meat wafts through the door.

No immediate danger erupts from the doorway, but from their vantage point the party sees two things: first, a small figure crumples into a heap in the shadows of the far corner with a strained sigh, then another, much larger figure shifts its hairy bulk very slightly from just beyond the doorway against the left-hand wall. Whatever it is, it appears to be trying to flatten itself against the wall in an ambush position, but it is not succeeding. The entire party notices the shifting motion and glances at each other in knowing agreement.

OOC: Combat ensues. Initiative order:

Initiative Roll	Character
21	Parchment
20	Steamknuckle
18	Willow
18	Burgess
15	Zhaquadan
11	Rudo
7	Peas
4	Bugbear

Rudo holds up a hand to still the party, then booms into the room, "Stand down! You're hopelessly outnumbered. Surrender, or die."

His blade hovers ready to strike anything that moves in the doorway.

A few tense moments pass. Then a deep, growling voice responds in broken Common, "No fight? You let bugbear go?"

Rudo flashes a sly grin at Willow. "Yes," he replies. "Stand down, lay your weapons on the ground, and answer our questions. Then we'll let you go." Willow's eyes narrow at Rudo, but she says nothing.

Several more seconds pass in silence while the creature presumably mulls over Rudo's offer. Finally Rudo shouts, "Answer now, dog! Submit to our questions, or submit to our blades. Your choice. Choose now or I choose for you!"

"Okay," the voice replies. "Yes. Bugbear answer questions. We be friends. No need fight. Then let bugbear go."

Slowly, a tufted furry face slides into view from the left edge of the doorway. The bugbear's yellow eyes blink in the dim lamplight as it stares at the party with their weapons drawn. It only takes a moment for the creature's mental arithmetic to reach its grim conclusion. The bugbear's left hand appears, easing the heavy wooden haft of a morningstar down onto the floor just inside the doorway. Then the huge creature steps backward, standing to its full height of nearly seven feet as it slowly backs into the room, hands held out in a gesture of surrender.

Rudo follows the bugbear into the room, sword pointed at its throat. The rest of the party follows close behind, spreading out into a semicircle bristling with blade points around the creature. Burgess growls menacingly.

"Got any buddies hiding in the dark, dog?" Rudo asks smugly. "Light that lamp." His head jerks toward an unlit oil lamp set into the far wall behind the bugbear. "We don't parley with rats in the cellar."

While the bugbear turns to fumble with the lamp, Parchment glides silently around the room to scan for any hidden threats. He comes to the small heap on the floor near one of the corner bunks and nudges it with the toe of his boot. "Lick floor!" he suddenly barks, startling everyone from their focus. The voice coming from his beak is very similar to that of the bugbear, though accompanied by hoots of raucous laughter from others of its kind. "Roll like dog!"

Parchment turns to face the party, and points down to the crumpled figure on the floor. The party sees what looks like a scrawny goblin, sprawled out unconscious on the stone floor. Its face and head are obscured by shadow but it appears to be wearing a close-fitting skullcap of some kind.

"Y-yes, Mosk," Parchment continues, this time in a much smaller and more nervous voice. Followed by a string of guttural nonsense in an unknown language. "No! Talk paleskin!" the first voice roars. "Show them! You are like wench!" More laughter, this time from a greater number, largely human by the sound of it.

The small voice laughs pitifully. Then Parchment vocalizes a faint rustling sound, as if cloth scraping against a stone surface. Followed by a loud splash of liquid, weepy sputtering from the sad little voice, and roars of laughter all around. "Now you are drunk wench! Dance! Dance like drunk wench!"

"That's enough," Willow says. She turns to the bugbear, still fumbling with the lamp. "You degenerate monsters. You'd better have some good information for us. For Yondalla's sake, get on with it!"

The bugbear eventually manages to light the lamp. Its flame sputters to life and spreads warm light throughout the room. The bugbear then turns back to the party, eyes darting from weapon to weapon all pointed at its heart.

"Friends, friends," comes a rich voice from another corner of the room. The party is once again startled by one of Parchment's sudden vocalizations, this time in no small part because the voice produced is that of Glasstaff. Everyone whirls to see what Parchment is up to this time.

Lying huddled in one corner of another bunk is a motionless body, covered with a heap of thick stinking furs. Parchment reaches out to pull them off the body.

Curled up, motionless and splattered with his own blood but still breathing, is the unconscious form of Glasstaff.

"Most excellent!" Zhaquadan exclaims.
"Let's get him and the townsfolk out of here before anything else goes wrong."

"Well, there's still the matter of him," Steamknuckle says dryly as he points to the bugbear. "Is there anything we want to ask him while we've got him here?"

Willow faces the bugbear. "Why are you here?" she demands. "What do you have to do with the Redbrands?"

The bugbear stares at Willow, blinking. "Bugbears..." he says eventually. "Bugbears...friends. Yes, friends with Redbrands." He hesitates, as if about to add something, but trails off.

"Okay...and how exactly did you come to be friends with the Redbrands?" When the bugbear hesitates again, Willow adds, "you are Cragmaw, right?"

"Yes, Cragmaw," the bugbear replies. "King Grol sent us. To be friends with Redbrands." His eyes dart around nervously.

"Of course," Steamknuckle says. "We knew they were connected." He turns to the bugbear. "This is all just a plot to steal the mine from the Rockseekers, right?"

The bugbear looks confused. "Mine? Bugbear knows no mine."

"Enough of this!" Rudo barks impatiently. He steps forward, pointing the tip of his sword at the bugbear's belly. "Tell us why you're really here, or my blade will tell your guts all about what happens to lying mongrels like yourself!"

OOC: Attempting to intimidate the bugbear.
08:00, Today: Rudo rolled 5 using 1d20+1 with rolls of 4.  Intimidation.

The bugbear squirms, staring down at the tip of Rudo's sword. "Bugbear speaks truth! Do not know mine! Grol sent bugbears to make friends with humans, no more!" He looks up at Rudo's face. "Dwarf swore. Bugbear answer questions, bugbear go free. Bugbear answers!"

Steamknuckle steps in, gently pushing down the blade of Rudo's longsword. "Let's give him another moment to answer our questions before threatening to run him through. Shall we?" Rudo scowls, but takes a step back. "Thank you," the gnome mutters before returning to the bugbear. "Now, tell me...who is the Black Spider?"