"So what do you want to do?" he asks his companions.  "Find somewhere to hole up, strip me and bind me and hope?  If I am not in armour and I am unarmed, Brugar should be able to knock me senseless, especially if you trip me up first." he says looking at Alasha'an.  "And Brugar has that rope ....  "

After a moment he adds, "Unless someone has a better idea ..."

Yetta's grin fades quickly.  "I've got some manacles, too," she notes, looking away.  "They're not great, but they're metal."  She shrugs.  "I don't know if they'd hold better than Brugar's rope, but they might help."

"Aren't I supposed to eat a load of garlic, or something first ...."  Hamin asks with a shrug.

"Lots of rope," Alasha'an asserts. "And the manacles. Tie his shoelaces together too!"

"I'm a lot better at killing than unconscious, but I'll hold you while Brugar hits you." She grins at Hamin. "Don't suppose either of you can magically charm him?" the elf asks Ayas and Yetta hopefully.

"Be good if we can catch wild game, assuming there's any left now. He's probably going to want meat.."

"So that's one of three. Brugar can find the mine which is two."

"Got my boots back, so if we find the flying mountain I can get up there if we time it right, but I can't carry everyone. Rope again? If we get to a high point and it's not too far over us, I can take the Dwarf up and then we can pull everyone else up, but that's a bit dicey. Wonder how they get their supplies up to it?"

Hamin trusts that Alasha'an, Brugar and Yetta will do their best for him, and will do their best protect him from any harm that might come his way - as well as protecting  anyone that he might try to harm.

As such he will resign himself to what ever suggestions the three come up with.

"Ah got no better suggestion than keep walkin' an' see what we can find along the way. Find somewhere to 'ole up on second night where we can tie ye up an' keep everyone safe 'til the moon sets again. Ah 'eard summat once about it bein' the light of the full moon what triggers the change, but Ah guess we'll all be findin' out a few more of the details afore this is done."

"Three days," Varl ventures. "One day either side of the full moon."

"That special cell they had Vaden Kiang in ... you too," he nods to Alasha'an, "they prevented the change, but even so, you could tell that the beast wanted out."

"I'd say we get away from here, then once it starts we go to ground and wait it out.  We don't want him changing on us while we're," he pauses taking a deep breath, "trying to catch a flying mountain !"

"Sorry," he apologises to Hamin.

Just for a moment Hamin  looks blank as Varl's apologizes, then realizes the  man is apologizing for  mentioning his issue.  The old warrior nods then tries to make the man feel more comfortable with one of his few forays into humour ...

"The only thing wrong with that statement, is that we won't be trying to catch a mountain.  We WILL be catching it ...  "

Which explains why Hamin doesn't try to be humorous very often ...

"Wander about and trust to luck.." the elf shakes her head as she provides a less optimistic view of Brugar's suggestion, though the sigh that follows indicates her bowing to the inevitable.

"Why not? It's worked for us thus far!"

The gruel that Brugar's magic spoon provides is tasteless but surprisingly filling, moreso than the fare that was your lot in Habmor'Anto, and at least this night there is enough to go around.

You get what sleep you can in the chill too-short hours before the false dawn of this Dark Age, your rest uninterrupted, to break your fast on more of the same gruel, before you begin your journey, judging direction as best you can.

With the mists gathered about you once more you set off across the hilly terrain.  Though there seem to be no landmarks worth the telling, these are the stones upon which Brugar trod in his youth, and the Dwarf knows them in his bones.  Once he has his bearings he guides you true, though none are pleased to see what has become of the Dwarven River (the Saura'sira as Ayas knows it, the Foul Flow), now turgid and rank.  The hills give way to blasted plains where stand the twisted remnants of the forest that once was.

It is here that you settle for your second night, more than one eye turning to Hamin in concern as the moon above grows ever fuller, but the change is not yet upon him and again you your sleep is not disturbed.

The next day you enter the mountains proper, they that were once so simply known as the Dwarven Mountains in honour of those who lived and toiled there, now Orodedanai which Ayas reluctantly translates for you as the Mountain of the Small Men.  And now the going is harder, the ground steeper and rockier, though Brugar does his best to pick a path through it.

With still an hour or two of the poor light from the mist-hidden sun remaining, you chance upon a cleft in the stone where part of the rockface has collapsed, recent enough that no animal has yet laid claim to it, and here you decide to make your camp and what preparations you can for the trials of the night to come.

After they have made camp Brugar pulls out two coils of rope from his backpack - the enchanted Rope of Climbing and a length of ordinary hemp rope. He shrugs apologetically to Hamin.

"Sorry, Longshanks. Gotta be done," he mutters.

Looking around at the others he asks, "Who be best at knots? Ain't me, that be sure an' certain."

"Yep." Hamin responds stoically, as he submits himself to the ministrations of his colleagues.  Then a thought strikes him, "Should I take my armour off?  What about my other gear ....."

"Yes," Yetta says, firmly, as she pulls her manacles out, trying to ignore the sound of the metal.  "Definitely."

She looks at the shackles in her hand and then at her father, and tries for a half smile.  "I thought this was supposed to be every little girls' dream.  `Dad, you're grounded'."  She sighs a little.  Maybe humor is genetic.

With a thin smile at his daughter, Hamin strips himself down to his loin cloth.

"I am good with knots," the elf modestly avows, with a quirk of her lips at the Dwarf, "though I think we can spare you a blanket for warmth," she tells Hamin, turning her smile on him. "Don't want you freezing to death and all my efforts going to waste!"

"I don't need a lot of sleep, not that we're likely to get much with.." Alasha'an breaks off with a shrug. "Give me four hours and I'll take it from there."

"You don't need to see this," she tells Yetta with unlikely gentleness, holding her hands out for the manacles. "This is most certainly not what little girls dream of."

She snorts. "I just wanted an interesting life. Guess that's what I got!"

With a small nod, Yetta hands the manacles to Alasha'an.  She gives Hamin a forced smile.  "See you in the morning," she says, and walks out of the cleft, moving to the side and out of view.

Brugar stays to watch Alasha'an's handiwork.

"Yeah, there is s'posed to be some 'erb or summat wot'll cure ye, if'n it don't kill ye, ain't there? Don't remember wot it were, though, an' don't know if'n we got any anyway."

He shrugs apologetically.

"Ah got antitoxin, me cloak o' resistance, ring o' protectin' an' me amulet o' 'ealth. Dunno if'n any of 'em would 'elp ye, Longshanks, but ye're welcome to borrow 'em tonight if it might 'elp in any way," he offers.

"I don't know." Hamin responds with a grimace.  "I suppose they can't do any harm, and perhaps I should keep my lucky stones as well?  The sentinel said there was a chance of controlling it, if the will was strong ..."

When the time comes Hamin will lay quietly, eyes closed, mentally rehearsing, over and over again, all the drills that he was taught as a young soldier.  He might not have always done the things the drills were supposed to teach him -  but he knew them intimately.

Though it is not something that you usually wish for, this evening it seems to take forever and an Age for night to fall ... but at long last fall it does.

With his lucky stone in his pocket and Brugar's cloak around his shoulders, and a thick blanket besides, it finds Hamin trussed and tied, bound in chains and with the Dwarf's magic rope binding his ankle to a heavy rock.

Varl accompanies Yetta, with a nod to Hamin that he'll look out for her, but still keeps a respectful distance from the young woman, unwilling to intrude too close during what will come.

The other three of you stand watch, all plans to sleep in shifts now abandoned ...

Perhaps before you saw the old Abbot change from man to beast you might have yet held out some hope that the one-eyed warrior might somehow not be tainted with the curse, but still when it comes as the pale moons light, but a single turn away from full, touches the Urthe with cold uncaring fingers, it is shocking.

Not the physical change, as unwilling flesh is painfully twisted and molded into another form, nor the cries of agony that accompany it ... no, it is the aftermath that is most terrible, when you look into the eyes of the man you know and love and see nothing within but the beast, the animal that longs to rip and tear.  That wants blood.

Your blood.

The creature that was Hamin strains and tears at his bonds, and they prove no match for his teeth and preternatural strength, but the iron manacles are another matter, and no matter how hard he tries, they do not yield, nor does the rope around his ankle.  Though try he does, howling all the while, the whole night long.

Till the moon mercifully dips below the horizon and you are afforded a few hours as he quietens then slowly returns to himself.

"That were innerestin'," Brugar comments as he orders the enchanted rope to unknot as the sun rises. "Rest a few hours while ye can. Ah'll go forage around a bit to see what Ah can find to eat. There be gruel in me bowl for any as want it."

He will leave the campsite soon after and see what his survival skills can turn up.

OOC: Brugar Armbuster rolled 24 using 1d20+13.  Survival skill check - foraging.

"Sorry ..." Hamin groans in response to Brugar's comment.  "Worse than Slayer ..." he adds in a croaky voice.

The old fighter is clearly drained from the previous night's battle against the moon's influence on his body.  His skin appears grey, and he is lethargic, except for his single eye, which flicks from side to side as if he is waiting for something.

"Innerestin'!" Alasha'an shakes her head as she apes the Dwarf's words and accent, watching him as he heads off to the hunt.

"Not the word I'd choose," she mutters with a wry grimace, holding up a ring, the twin of which sits on Hamin's finger. "Just got the first few seconds," she assures him. "More than enough to remind me that I had this on, and that 'listening in' would do no damn good for either of us."

She slips the ring back onto her own hand.

"We're going to have to wait it out here," she tells Hamin. "That flying mountain can wait till we're good and ready for it."

Brugar is gone a few hours, but when he returns, he has in his hands a brace of some small vaguely rat-like creatures, sufficient to give you all a couple of good meals should you dare a fire to cook them.

Having partaken of the gruel and with water to ease his parched throat, Hamin is somewhat recovered from his long ordeal though still tired.

"Seeing you like that.. and after what the old abbot did to the sentinels," Ayas is unable to conceal his horror at what Hamin now suffers, "I don't know how they were able to stop him in the first place.  They must have done as we have done and bound him before the change was upon him."

"For all my gifts, I have nothing that can help you," the elf apologises.

Brugar tugs at his beard, though it looks as much a sign of vexation as deep thought.

"That Sentinel, Vaden Kiang, when 'e warned ye of the change 'e spoke of the pull of the moon. That be meanin' the full moon, don't it? So if last night were the full o' the moon, be ye safe from the change for another month, or might ye change again soon as the moon rises tonight. Do any of ye 'ave any knowin' of that kind of thing?

"This spot be no better'n any other to 'ole up for the night. Ah reckon we oughta walk on for a few 'ours at least. Stop when ye be too tired to go no further or if'n we find a better spot to 'ole up in tonight," he suggested. "Ah reckon as we'll 'ave to bind ye again tonight, longshanks, at least until we see if'n ye gonna change again or not."