Expedition 113: Settling Old Grudges on Frost-stone

**Date:** 26th of Monraal

**Roster:** Gonerton Bergs, Ellie of Dualith, Jamie Fraiser, Ranag Uln, Valorie Vayer.

On the fifth week of Monraal, Valorie again Dreams to Enkidar, and weaves him a story of adventure and scheming:

“Early this week, one of the Tidelighters, Korinn Spellseeker, told us that he had been hired by the Brass Battalion: those mercenaries I told you about, who have been working in Port Vrall in competition to the Ironwood Compact, mostly for Saphira Goldhammer.”

Valorie forms an image of the Brass Battalion’s encampment, complete with soldiers walking about.

“Korinn Spellseeker told us that he had been hired by them to go to Frost-stone to investigate two things of note: mystical runes in a cave, and strange moss high up on one slope. Now, while stealing clues from another adventuring company is quite rude, I had suspicions that Saphira Goldhammer had hired the Battalion to march to Frost-stone, and Saphira Goldhammer is definitely scheming something. So Ellie, our master of infiltration, investigated—”

Ellie slips into the encampment, listening in on the soldiers.

“—And it turns out Saphira *did* hire the Battalion to clear Frost-stone. In fact, they had already headed up a few times in Monraal. That tore it: I needed to know what they were looking for on Frost-stone, because it *can’t* just be metal, Kiore and Fern’s barony produce more than enough of that here. And of course, the Battalion would never tell me, what with me having Charmed them last Fall. That was not a wise choice: it didn’t get me enough information to be worth it. I shouldn’t have made more enemies in moving against one I already had. But that was done, so I had to make do.

“I convinced the other Compact members to put together a party to investigate what the Battalion was doing. We would go up early in the morning, to outrace them, with Fly spells. While we were at it, we decided to also speak to Ur’Hamish.”

Ur’Hamish’s image forms, on Frost-stone.

“I want to convince the Frost-stone Giants to establish proper diplomatic ties with the nations of the East. I know you could just order them to, but they would find ways to fight that—peace won’t work if one side is commanded into it. Ur’Hamish was my best bet for getting the Frost-stone Giants to extend relations on their own terms. I Dreamed out to him, and persuaded him to meet. Grudgingly. I think the only person he hates more than me right now is you.”

Ur’Hamish’s typical expression of derision appears.

“I bandied about that I was meeting with Ur’Hamish to the governments of the East and before long I had a mandate from all three of them to speak about long-term peace, almost by accident. Gonerton, Ellie, Ranag—he’s new—and Jamie, speaking for Verrlex of Vrall, would join me. The plan was hashed out: we would investigate the mystic runes the Battalion was seeking, then meet with Ur’Hamish, at the spot of his choosing, and then spy on them as they investigated the moss. Took a while to get everyone on the same page, but once we did we set out.”

“Just after sunrise on the 26th, we all got together and headed out to Frost-stone. Gonerton had flight magic, and I had attuned to his Gloves of Spell Transference, so between us, we got everyone into the air and headed up through the biting cold to the cave where the runes were to be found.”

Frost-stone appears, and the cave grows larger as Valorie and Enkidar fly towards it. Large scratch marks are visible around the floor, and the cave’s dark interior looms.

“We searched around for a while for clues—we knew the Battalion was prepping for monstrosities, so we assumed the claw marks were from such a thing—and argued about how to go in. Getting adventurer’s into a dungeon is kind of like getting a dog out the door for a walk—they *know* they want to go, but they’ll still hem and haw on and on and the only way to get them to go faster is with a lot of encouragement.”

“What’s a dog? Oh, that’s fair. They’re—”

(There was then a brief digression on dogs.)

“Anyway, where were we? Ah, right, the cave. I summoned a Celestial to have it ready to fight and we went in, sending Ellie ahead to scout. There were Yetis. Six pups, eleven adults, and one huge Abominable Yeti, scarred and tall. Most of them were asleep, except for the massive patriarch. Each of them looked like it could have tanked a Blight spell and given out as much damage as a Dualithi knight. We could scarcely believe the Battalion was planning to fight this many, even with the weight of numbers on their side.”

Images form of the Yetis, the Abominable Yeti towering over them, scarred chest and chilling gaze well highlighted.

“We talked about running, talked about talking with a Tongues spell, and then the Patriarch noticed us and wandered up to see us. Well, we stayed, I tried to talk him down, and though he could talk back, he didn’t consider negotiating for a second. His first attack broke my concentration on the Celestial and woke up all his kin, and for about ten seconds, it looked like we were all going to die.”

“Then Jamie and Ellie beat the patriarch into a bloody pulp and I passed off a spell locus to Gonerton to raise a Wall of Force, separating us from the other adult Yetis. That Wall of Force saved us—the fight would have been a slaughter otherwise. Of course, having three expert fighters who can unload an infantry platoon’s worth of attacks in six seconds helped, too. The Abominable Yeti fought on and on, until his flesh peeled from his bones, his gaze freezing Ranag in place with eldritch fear, but in the end, he died under our focused attacks.”

The battle is shown as Valorie narrates, the Abominable Yeti fighting until bloody and broken, falling before Gonerton’s necrotic magic.

“There was a moment of terror as Gonerton was struck by the Yetis’ magical gaze from behind his Wall, but he kept focus. With the Wall holding, our martial allies could engage the pups and their mother freely—Ellie didn’t want to fight kids, I could tell, but the pups attacked like hungry wolves, they wouldn’t stop. I sent Shatter spells and another summoned celestial across the Wall, and turned the Yetis back. Once our side of the barrier was safe, I used Gonerton’s gloves to share more spell loci with him, and he taught me an elemental summoning spell to conjure Magma Mephits. Yes, the ones that blow up when they die. We threw two waves of mephits at the remaining Yetis and then dropped the Wall to finish them off. It was a glorious battle: Five adventurers outnumbered three to one emerging victorious through tactics and skill.”

“Of course, we felt a little bit stupider after we scoured the caves and didn’t find a single arcane rune. Gratitude and the Brass Battalion had set us up! They knew Korinn would leak anything they told him to us, so they fed him faulty information, knowing I would investigate it. They had sent us to fight an enemy they must have been worried about overcoming, given their preparations, and we had done all their work for them! It was a colossal lie, an elaborate scheme to get even with me after I Charmed them. I couldn’t have been happier!”

An image forms of Gratitude.

“Yes, I had quite underestimated Gratitude! I mean, think about it: he pulled both a Batman Gambit *and* a Xanatos Gambit at the same time. His plan depended *entirely* on me behaving exactly as he expected me to, going after a lead to sabotage him—and that worked! And, no matter what happened, if I took the bait, Gratitude couldn’t help but profit! We fought the Yetis and won soundly, and so Gratitude avoided a nasty battle. If we had instead fought the Yeti’s and ran or been captured, we would have lost prestige to him after his company defeated the softened monsters. If we had died, well, he would be down some rivals. No matter how it shook out, he gained! That’s a difficult sort of plan to pull off.”

“Though, Gratitude did say he was confident the Yetis wouldn’t have eaten us until dusk if they beat us. They apparently don’t like to have meals before they’re most active. Huh? Ahh, yes: he talked to us. At the end of our mission, and afterwards back in Vrall, he said that he ‘felt we had both learned something about each other,’ and that he no longer wished to keep our feud alive. I accepted; he offered peace and asked me only to give up a grudge. Grudges are not profitable, and I was glad to be rid of it. Especially given that he had proved himself to be a dangerous enemy.”

“That said, I’m going to look up whether Yetis *really* don’t eat until dusk.”

“But back to the mission. Let’s see, we covered the last conversation with Gratitude out of order, so all that’s left is… Ur’Hamish. Yes, that was unpleasant.”

“Once we had scoured the Yeti cave for valuables and magically skinned the Yetis, we traveled on foot up to Ur’Hamish’s meeting location. The moss was forgotten; it was surely a trap. The journey wasn’t too taxing, except when Gonerton fell off the mountain and had to be caught with magic.”

“Ur’Hamish had selected a sheer cliff with a tiny path up to it as a meeting spot. He was resting on an ice outcropping he had made, fifty feet away from the closest safe spot. He would not move. And also would not cast any spells to allow him to comprehend us. So we needed to send poor Gonerton out onto the cliff to cast Telepathic Bond to even have a conversation. Which he managed, but he fell off and we had to drag him back up with a rope. Eight times.”

“So after *that* was over, Ur’Hamish was willing to talk. We asked him first about some houses that had been destroyed by Giants in Kiore, but he took offense and said his people had promised not to damage anything. We concluded some other group of Giants must have been responsible, but neither of us knew of any other populations in the East.”

“Trade interested Ur’Hamish; with some bargaining, he agreed to allow us to pacify Frost-stone for human habitation and to respect our traders if we financed the construction of a Colossal Bazaar, sized for Giants, to receive foreign trade for his clan. It can’t be built until after Bloom, due to our overstuffed building queue, but it will be a good boon for the East once it’s finished.”

“Ur’Hamish was not, however, particularly open to establishing peaceful relations with the rest of the nations of the East. He did not see the need until I pointed out that if he wouldn’t speak for his people to the humanoid nations, we might go to you. To be clear, I’m also going to be running everything by you, but Ur’Hamish’s approval will make selling this to the other Giants much easier.”

“After I threatened to go above his head, Ur’Hamish acquiesced to establish peaceful relations, but he wanted something out of it: either a large weight of gold or some rare crafting component; I offered him a Heart of Earth. Once I can acquire one of those, he will begin talking to the councils of the Vrall, Kiore, and New Tidelight. He may also try to build some Heart-of-Earth-powered superweapon to defeat you and reclaim his chieftainship. We’ll keep an eye out for that.”

“Once all of that talking was done, we took our leave and flew down the Mountain. We had made only a little material profit from this expedition, though killing a whole clan of Yetis certainly burnished our reputations. But I couldn’t be happier with how things had ultimately turned out. Gaining trust from someone after you have hurt them is a difficult task; some people never forgive the sights you make against them. It requires more work to repair a reputation or a bond than to make one. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. I hope that I have behind left two old grudges on Frost-stone, and that is payment enough for a hard day’s work.”

**Expedition Result: The Compact, the Battalion, the Giants: Everyone Got Something They Wanted! Success! Except for the Yetis, They’re Skinless Corpses Now.**

**Expedition Level:** 13

**Expedition Loot:** Six Yeti Pelts evaluated at three silver each, put into Loot Distribution.