04.04 - "Hill Giant mating season"

The group had the next day as a full day off before heading into the Fields of the Dead. They discussed a plan to create a diversion with the pig. Blak would ride up the train to detect any magic going on in the wagons that seemed fishy… Gamble would send Slinky in to scout inside the wagon that Blak picked.

Blak had a magical hit in one of the wagons, and A'postrofae spoke to the warpig, telling him the plan - as the warpig “got away”, Brynne and Able chased after it, drawing the attention of practically the entire wagon train. Using the distraction, Gamble rode up beside the cart and set slinky inside. Slinky saw crates, and wanted to get into them so he started gnawing at the ropes that held the crate in place. Unfortunately, he was too small to open or tip the crate at all. Apostrofae then told the warpig to ram the cart, which he did, causing the crate to tip over and fall out the rear of the wagon, smashing into pieces.

A pile of gold fell out, and Brynne and Bismark ran up to the two Teamsters that were making moves to kill the warpig, telling them that all was under control and that they would take care of the pig. As brynne walked off with the warpig, Bismark and Blak offered to help clean up the gold. Slinky grabbed some gold pieces and ran off.

As they helped clean up, Blak saw one of the items that had lit up as magical - a ring. Blak magically made the other crates start to shake, the guards were distracted enough for him to swipe the ring into his pocket.

They brought it back to the camp, and Able was able to identify the symbol on the ring as being a ring of protection. Brynne put it on and told gamble to punch her. He did. Then they passed it around to try it on, punching each other to see if it had any effect.

Blak kept the ring of protection, and the wagon train moved on the next morning

Able made contact with the shifty guard that was sticking too close to the wagon that had all the gold. Meanwhile, Leda had a conversation with Gamble about his involvement in the chaos of the day. Gamble claimed no involvement, in fact he was the most behaved person there that day. He admitted to Leda that his pet Slinky has a tendency to grab shiny things, and that he would gladly give them to her.  He also expressed his surprise at the amount of gold being carried by that wagon. Leda told him that she was too, since they had declared that they were carrying clothing, not boxes of gold, and that she would be keeping an eye on them.

As the wagon train was stopped, Orvuestra and Hendren took 2 other guards off to take some archery practice. Before long, the wagon train heard a scream from the direction that they went. The party mounted their horses and took off in that direction.

They arrived at a pond, where they saw Orvuestra, the two guards, and Hendren running towards them. Bismark took off at full gallop to get to Orvuestra, and as he did, caught sight of the female Hill Giant that was chasing them. As Brynne rode the warpig around the other side of the pond, she saw another male hill giant not far behind - both completely naked and angry. Blak rode up to behind a tree, using his mantle of inspiration to inspire his comrades, but quickly one of the giants picked up some boulders and threw them at the tree, knocking it down onto Blak and pinning him. Apostrofae threw down a magical growth of spikes which surrounded the hill giants. Still angry, the woman ran at Hendren, and swung her club, taking his head completely off, which rolled over toward Bismark. Bismark dismounted, telling Orvuestra to take the horse and ride back to camp as quickly as possible. As she rode off, she fired a couple arrows at the giants, landing a pair of hits on them.

Bismark charged forward to hold off the giants as Able magically summoned a web to entangle them. Gamble launched a chaos bolt out of his mouth, shooting flame over the pond that connected with the female hill giant who fell as though dead, then bounced off to the other giant, which then ricocheted and hit Able's horse, killing it, and throwing Able to the ground.

Able began to get up onto his feet, saying “Well that wasn’t so bad.” just as he looked over and saw a long beard of multicolored feathers growing on Gamble’s face. With the remaining giant entangled, Bismark struck it with his rapier and, feeling a surge of energy from his god, attacked again, chopping off the flopping member of the giant who fell, bleeding out. The group then lifted the tree off of Blak, and Bismark tried to use Helm’s power to heal him, saying ”be healed, friend.” The power flowed through his hands, as a blue glow eminated from them. As blak stood up, he took his hand, which was scratched and bloody and extended it to Bismark, who took it in his own.

Before long, Leda charged up to see what the ruckus was about, just as a tentacle reached up out of the pond, dragging the male giant down into the depths unseen. In the grass beyond the pond lay a dead female hill giant, and a headless Hendren.