[IC] The Caravan Trip - Firespine Mountains and Beyond
Saddling up in the darkness, waterskins and rations loaded, the Leafblade Company is joined by their Guard tracker, Bellis Tral, a human woman just entering middle age. Sturdy and tanned from a life out of doors, with hair bleached pale by the sun, her keen hazel eyes are often roving, missing little. She rides a little bay mare with a neat pack attached to her saddle. Along with her are Fothbar, Garvin, and Wedd, three young members of the Guard who will act as messengers, relaying back to the Fort at regular intervals.
The Troll Hunters, plus Grollock's band and a few more members of the Guard, are finishing up their own preparations. Commander Brighthearth goes and hands a scrollcase to the Lieutenant in charge of the troll party, then goes to hand another to Bellis before addressing the Leafblade Company.
"All right, Grollock and the Troll Hunters will go back along the priests' road, and you'll be heading along the tribute road, looking to meet at Smoke Peak. If all goes well, it's a three-day journey to Smoke Peak from here, and then another week and a half to Firegold Citadel. Fharlangn watch over your journey, Heironious grant you victory," he says.
With that, the gates will open once more, and you can begin your journey.
Though most of the Leafblade Company can either see in the dark or have little difficulty navigating only by moonlight, those few who aren't so visually blessed can rely on the senses of their mounts. Demon seems to relish the dark, not surprisingly. Bellis leads you along the paths, selecting various turns through the rock walls of the peaks until the moon climbs high in the sky and it's clear it's growing close to midnight.
You can rest for the rest of the night without incident, the night warm enough to do without a fire - useful, as there is little to burn here. The next day and night also passes quietly, and though you keep yourselves alert looking for any sign of the tribute caravan or anything else odd, you spy nothing out of place. By noon that day you are beyond the reach of Fort Cross' scouts and now into the less-tamed part of the mountains. In the morning of your second full day, you begin your search anew. By mid-morning, the vultures give you your direction. Around the next bend lay the shattered remains of a what was once a sturdy treasure-wagon pulled by battle boars. The wagon's off-side wheel is broken and part of one side is staved in. The battle boars, big as oxen, with their studded leather armor and iron-shot tusks, lie dead in their traces. The bodies of three dwarves with shattered weapons lie scattered around the site.
The drone of flies and the cawing of vultures fills the canyon, as the stench of death is thick on the wind...