Zoom 2023-09-21 22:30

The flight across the river
The party has been herded toward the river and away from Brandygeres between 3 groups of presumed hostiles.
Approaching the river, we pause in the woods to relearn spells, taking what we think will help with an attack while we cross the water.
The woods are waterlogged, the trees growing in swamp or open water, and we squelch our way through a couple of miles to reach the river. We did consider flying over this section, but we would have to go above the trees or be whipped in the face by branches and bump into the tree trunks all the way to the open water. We figured that any pursuit would face the same delay.
At the edge of the trees, we cast our series of Fly & Levitate spells, along with preemptive Resist Cold & Slow Poison in readiness for falling in the water. Then it's chocks away and we take to the air to cruise across the 30' of water between us and the other bank. It's so close that some can cross it with Jump spells.
The other bank is much the same, but we can hear someone hurrying through the trees toward our position from the East. We keep flying and hold our course perpendicular to the river and soon outrun them. We've now been going since midnight, crossed the river about 04:30 and we are now very tired. We find a dry patch in the forest and camp without trace for an hour or so to recover.
Joshua takes the form of an owl and sees that our pursuers have also stopped on a hillock within the trees. By 6am they show no sign of movement, so we push ahead until noon, turning further to the South as the shortest way onto dry ground. By noon we are still in the trees, but find another dry spot ot 84.043 for a proper camp with a fire (using natural fieldcraft to reduce the smoke) and sleep til the next morning (when we relearn spells). Overnight our pursuers have given up and crossed the river back toward Brandygeres.
As we head out into the savannah, Francis finds good hunting (assisted by Joshua in falcon form) and bags 3 impala. Our food stocks are increased to 80 man-days worth.
We take a heading roughly ESE to skirt the North edge of the woods, aiming to turn South at the narrowest point (somewhere around 113.050) to Dragon Lake.
As we continue, Joshua spots a group of 4 wooden hots at 105.051 from about 7 miles away. We detect no sign of life (no movement, no smoke) and decide to take a closer look. We find 2 houses for living in, 2 storage sheds, and at the edge of the woods a smokery and a charcoal-burning stack. The construction is sturdy and the whole place appears to be closed up for the season while the owners have moved on. There are plates etc for 6-7 people, but room for many more here.
We stay for one night of comfort indoors before continuing our trek through the wilds in winter.
Even though we successfully avoided combat and gathered no treasure, there will still be xps.