Penny drunkenly grasped her banjo, "Wait before you go." she strummed clumsily on the instrument, "Show me what you've got?"

Thamkis raised an eyebrow at the busty dwarfess mention

"And here I was thinking you were afraid of your mother, but it appears you're simply seeking her in some other lass. Trust a dwarf to run headlong into doom."

She laced her fingers and listened to Penny's challenge, looking back at the dwarf

"I've never known a dwarven bard to shrink from a challenge Penny. Unless he was tired, perhaps we've imposed on his endurance too much and he needs to rest, recover his strength?"

"Story and song very important, but Barg knows another important thing!"

Barg sprung to his feet on his seat, slamming his hands down

"Does dwarf have gold for trading!?"

Barg's impetuous actions soon stirred the locals to their feet in defense of their racial pride. The arm wrestling that followed was the stuff of legends. Well, local legends at any rate. Gold flowed with the betting.

(OOC: Barg needs to make roll, modified by STR, on 1d20. For every digit over 10 he will have won a gold piece. so, if he had rolled a 14 total using 1d20 + STR mod, he would have won 4 gold pieces.)

The Bard flexed his hands, cracking his knuckles amusingly, and took up his trumpet. With a crooked grin that must have been something of a come on to the local female population he set to blowing a sharp, brassy tune that soon had toes tapping and people singing along. Penny found it easy to step in, but she had to admit that it was an odd combination of instruments to be sure.

(OOC: Penny needs to roll for her performance. Much good and some coin could come of this.)

Thamkis smiled, no Dwarf in his right mind would be told they were up to a challenge by some outsider. The bard was no different. Many of the revellers were known to them from the night before. Thamkis knew a drought of hangover helper wouldn't go unused in the morning. Especially after watching the group of warriors drag Berngalyn over to a table with a dozen roast hens, to large bowls of onion and potato soup, enough bread to burn down the town, and an open keg of dark Dwarven stout.

(OOC: Bren will need to make a fort save to determine the skull bashing quality of her hangover in the morning. And roll for any social skill she has at +4 to possibly learn more information about where they are headed. Thamkis will can use the tavern's kitchen to brew up her hangover helper, name it what you will, difficulty 12 to make up a concoction using cooking, alchemy, etc., whichever skill you would use. Make it by 5 or more and the cook/tavern owner would be interested in acquiring the recipe.)

Penny began playing her banjo but her drunken stupor prevented her fingers to listen to her hands.

ooc perform 10

Barg gripped hands and twisted dwarven arms in rapid wins and triumphant glory, his green sinewy arms twisting and knotting with warped abandon

OOC: Strength check 22

"Yes, Barg is strongest! Taking dwarf gold, like goblins of old! Barg is pleased he could fight dwarves with no serious injury!! Dwarf blood is powerful curse!"

He said the last thing as if the dwarves would know what he was talking about

Brengalyn took to her job of getting intelligence a little unintelligently, waking up beneath a table with some hasty notes scrawled on a piece of paper

OOC: Fortitude save 9, Bluff 12 for charisma check

As Brengalyn woke up groaning, Thamkis was there, sipping on a flask of tea she'd brewed from dwarf moss.

Handing the gargantuan but prone mercenary a syrup of weeds and nettles, she cracked a pigeon's egg into the concoction and bade her drink it.

OOC: Craft (alchemy) 29, explicitly made with replicability in mind as this town seems to get uproariously drunk so Thamkis will leave the recipe with the tavernkeeper in exchange for a single gold piece and the information Brengalyn was trying to get in the first place

"The mighty . . . manticore? Basilisk? What was it you called yourself again? Hardly the great story of a mercenary captain, outdrunk by dwarves."

There was no one to laugh at Thamkiss' humor.

Dwarves lay scattered about the area in manner more akin to dead on a battlefield than unconscious drunks on a tavern floor. Several were trying, with mixed results, to regain some semblance of awareness.

A thick chested Dwarf in a mail shirt, shortsword strapped to his belt, and bronze badge on his chest pulled up in Thamkis' wagon.

"As per the Goblin's request." The Dwarf sheriff said. "Wagon brought to the front of the battle. Or tavern in this case. He wished to be able to get underway this morning even if he was unable to crawl to the wagon. So, I felt like obliging him. It was a solid plan. It was even executed well. He paid the only Dwarf in the area who would actually be sober on purpose this morning to see this through."

He hopped down from the wagon and whistled. A moment later a couple of dwarves walked their mounts up and tied them off to the wagon. The sheriff led his fellows away. It looked almost like they were leaving the scene of a mass slaying. Almost.

"The . . . basilisk. Doesn't matter."

Brengalyn struggled to her feet in time to see the wagon pull up, holding her aching head

"That's us, ready to set out on another great adventure!"

Sipping the hangover cure, she felt a little better, though the drink was still coursing through her at an alarming rate.

Barg waddled to the bar triumphant as the wagon pulled up, smiling toothily

"Barg wants there to be no hardness of feeling after he leaves. How much dwarf gold can Barg trade for a drink for all his newest friends?"

Thamkis looked around worried.

"Has anyone seen Penny? We should make sure she's up."

Brengalyn's pride twisted the cruel knife of self-expectation in her strong heart. With a surge of returning strength she climbed into the saddle, carefully so as not spill a drop of Thamkis' concoction, and sat upright in the saddle. Immediately, waves of nausea and regret washed over her as the combination of thirst, sun, and sounds assailed her like a back of rabid hellhounds.

Thamkis gave a whistle and a light crack of the reins and the wagon lurched forward. Many had gathered to look on and wave as they departed. That most couldn't stand easily or comfortably didn't seem to matter to them. The barkeep came out with cups of steaming brew and announced that he had the Mad Witches hangover cure on hand. For a price.

Barg grabbed hold of the side of wagon and hefted himself up to hang, drunkenly with his mug of stout ale, between the tall wagon wheels as they left town. After the night before with the competition, open acts of aggressive lovemaking, and impressive over eating, the barkeepers of the various taphouses, taverns, and beerhalls were sure to say their farewells to the party as they rolled out of town.

Evening would find them staring down an oncoming storm. The chill of the wind left no doubt that they were not only ascending the mountain, but that they were advancing into cold, treacherous conditions as well. Gone were the summery days in the lowlands. Coming at them now were lands of thin air, cold, and danger. Veering of the wagon-wide track that wound back and forth up the mountain, Thamkis drew the wagon up close to a shielding rock wall that towered over them but kept the vehicle and its team of animals under the thick cover of stand of maple and birch trees. The sun was sinking behind them and the cold was coming.

Penny woke with a start in the back of a wagon, a look of confusion common to those who had slept the day away from a hangover. Spot licking her awake. She hastily got up went to look for her friends. "Ohmygosh it's cold!!!

Brengalyn drew what she could around herself to ward off the cold, even breaking out her thicker gloves (though sadly still ill-equipped for earnest cold)

"We need to get more shelter. Better shelter. I don't know!"

OOC: Survival check 20

Amazingly, Brengaly was saved by the narrowest of magins when Penny's massive canine mount flondered on the acculating ice as the road began to freeze the mounting winds. Pushing the beast to find the others before the storm could overcome them as they bound along the darkening road.

Brengalyn was just turing to face the others, noticing the scant condition of Barg's attire (and the increasing shivering), just as the big mastiff came barreling, the sliding, then crshing past her close enough that she got a whiff of Penny's perfume.

Alas, Thamkis' time tortured and wordly tea kettle took yat another hit when the mastiff knocked the water filled vessel into the trees with a loud clang of tin on rock. Penny cringed knowing full well how close the mastiff, and she, were to an untimely death in the mountains. And also knowing full well that the mountains would have nothing to do with it.

Barg was off, clearly cold and shivering, to try and find the tea kettle before it was too late

"Stupid stupid hateful dog! Only sadness comes when dogs are near!"

OOC: Perception check 15 to search

Barg kicked at the bushes searching for the tea kettle when a handle appeared. 'Ah-ha!', he reached out to grab it when there was another handle in the weeds. He grabbed that one to. Yanking at both, because one must be the tea kettle, he surprised when he had to use all of his strength to lift with. After a moment of snot bubbles, grunting, farting, and more than a few uncomfortable pops in his joints the handles came free.

The lid was stone. Easily three feet across and half a foot thick. The sudden surge of momentum sent the Goblin onto his back, under the heavy stone lid, with a woosh of expelled breath and no small amount of drool. It was cold, muddy, and glorious. Mostly because, there to his right about five feet away was the crone's sacred tea kettle. Barg smiled under the crushing weight of the stone, he found the kettle!

"If we can endure the night, I can magically shield some of us against the cold. Perhaps we should head back for a bit to find shelter?"

Thamkis was dismayed to see the party's spirits flagging so, especially as they'd be dead all the same whether they were sour or not.

The sound of Barg moving stone drew Brengalyn from her stupor, shaking herself off

"What's that you have there Barg?"

That the mercenary drew her weapon was more habit than anything else, but she was cautious of strange moveable stones.

Barg hoisted the tea kettle

"Barg has found potkettle! Is most good find. Also rock with kettle handle!"

He smiled his widest smile

The opening was obviously carefully carved into the stone. There were even rungs down into the darkness. On the inside of the covering lid was a symbol that oddly resembled a Goblin holding sun or glowing orb over his head.

Thamkis ambled over and took a look at the stone, inspecting the carving

"An ancestor of yours it seems, Barg. Strong and powerful."

She leaned to look into the hole Barg had uncovered

"It likely isn't as cold down there, if we can find a place to keep the mules warm we could investigate . . ."

Barg's eyes went wide and he dropped the kettle to stare at the carving of a goblin

"Yes! Is very smartly likeness, most good Thamkis! Barg will find this goblin and defeat him perhaps? Prove he is strongest, get his own carving?"

The kettle clanged from the stony rim of the tunnel and fell into the darkness below. Barg had a moment to look down as the shiny, burnt, coppery vessel of tea love fell from sight. Several heartbeats passed before there was the sound of the tea kettle landing on loose stones below.