Murder Hobo Squad: A Lost Mine of Phandelver/Dragon of Icespire Peak & Beyond D&D 5E record (Beware Spoilers!)

With the wagons loaded up with the recovered Lionshield Coster crates and a short rest completed, Silda Hallwinter regained consciousness.  He picked himself up and stretched, revealing himself to be stiff and sore as well as bloody, beaten and stripped to his underwear.  Ramond walked over and Laid on Hands, restoring a little vitality, but it doesn’t do much more to help.

They had a little chat and once they had assured Sildar that they had killed all the goblins, preventing future banditry from them, he offered them 50gp to escort him to Phandalin.  He revealed that the goblins had been tipped off about his and Gundren’s journey and were out in force to ambush them.  The goblins took Gundren and all their stuff including a map to a place called Cragmaw Castle.  Wherever it is, it won’t appear on any map by that name.  The Cragmaws are the local goblinoid tribes so its unlikely humans would know it by that name.  He encouraged the party to rescue Gundren and recover the map is it reveals the location to a long lost mine that not only houses great mineral wealth, but a magical forge that creates magic items.  He fears what could happens if the forge fell in to the wrong hands.

Gundren walked over to one of the two fallen goblins outside the cave and picked up a short sword and shield, a little too small for him but good enough.  He then climbed up on a wagon, showing off how sore he really is, despite trying to mask it, and the party set off towards town once more.

The next day the party arrived in Phandalin, a little after midday.  Phandalin is an odd mix of the old and the new.  There are ancient ruined houses scattered around the town, and brand new buildings of wood and stone, and some new buildings are built using the ruins as a starting point.  Up on the hill to the east a large ruined manor house can be seen.  An orchard to the west, and farms can be made out to the south.

The carts ride through to the town square, a few doors past Barthens Provisions, their destination, and pull up outside what the sign says is the Stonehill Inn.  A few door down can be seen a building bearing the symbol found on the crates from the cave, that of the Lionshield Coster.

Sildar speaks up, “Well, my friends, I don’t know about you but I could really use a hot bath, some good food and a soft be right about now.  I’ve hear the local Inn is good.  I’m going to get a room there.  If you come and see me tomorrow at the Townmasters Hall I’ll pay you what I promised.”  With this, he lowers himself off the wagon, still noticeably suffering for his experiences, and heads inside.

Devere and Talindra decide to go book some rooms for the party while everyone else heads to the Lionshield Coster.  They find out there are only 5 rooms available, but the local farms have been known to put up travellers.  They book up all 5 rooms and decide to discuss options with the party.

They deliver the goods to the Coster and introduce themselves to Linene Greywind, the shopkeeper.  She explains she’s not veen able to get a restock from the cities for a few months now as deliveries just go missing.  She thanks the party and offers them 50gp for a reward.  They help her onload around the back and discover she has a back room of weapons and armour, separate from the day to day stock out front.  She says she only sells to trusted customers.  She wouldn’t want her weapons to be used to cause trouble.  She will of course sell to the people who saved her stock (Melandrach buys a quarterstaff).  The party also enquires if she is aware of any nearby keeps or castles, but all she can think of is an old ruined tower up at Old Owl Well.

On their way out, Lenine looks up from unpacking and warns them to look out for anyone wearing a red cloak.  The redbrands are bullies and like to make life hard for everyone in town, so its best to avoid them if you can. When questioned, she says they pick on people, cause trouble, and demand protection money from the local stores, when they take more and do more damage than any local trouble previously.

On their way over to Barthens to complete their original job, they meet up with Devere and Talindra coming out of the inn.  In Barthens they have a similar experience.  They also mention, than Gundren has gone missing and Barthen expresses his concern, although he claims to not have met Sildar before.  He wonders if Gundrens brother Nundro and Tharden are OK.  They have been camping outside of town somewhere and are due to visit for supplies any day now.

Job complete, the party now splits in three.  Araloth and Karson go for a walk around town.  Araloth wants to ask about staying at a farm.  Talindra, Ramond and Devere decide to check out the shrine opposite the inn.

The shrine is a small, simple affair, built in the last few years out of stones taken from the ruins of old Phandalin, and is staffed by a female elf who introduces herself as Sister Garaele.  Talindra asks for some advice from Sister Garaele.  She has a dream she wants to understand.  First she offers up her staff, saying she was recently given it.  It is covered in symbols of luck, and has the symbol of Tymora encased inside a pentagram upon it.  Sister Garaele recognises these symbols as such, but has not seen them displayed with the pentagram before.

Talindra then goes on to talk about a dream she had.  She says she saw this shrine encased in ice and then a town swallowed by the ice from the shrine.  Then a storm came and lightning struck the shrine and everything crumbled.  Then they world rotated to show the other side of the coin.  The shrine and the town on a calm summers day, and spin and spin.  Talindra doesn’t know what it means.  Sister Garaele says that sometimes a dream is just a dream, but the gods have been known to communicate through dreams and rarely make themselves clear when they do.  She cannot bring any significance to any of it, but dreams are often deeply personal so mabye its meaning will reveal itself?

They also ask about local castless but Sister Garaele cannot shed any new light.  Having seen them pull up in the wagons, and looking at their weapons she asks them for a favour.  She needs to ask someone a question, but they won’t speak to her and hopes that if they heroes feed her vanity and offer her a gift she has prepared they may be able to get Agatha to reveal what happpened to a long lost spellbook that belonged to a mage called Bowgentle.  Agatha lives to the east, north west of Conyberry.  The dangerous part is that Agatha is a banshee.  They agree to try, and are handed a gem encrusted silver comb to offer up.

They then head in to the inn and join their friends for a few drinks and a snack.  They share a tale Elsa the barmaid imparted about the Redbrands.  They recently killed a man in the street in front of the whole town.  Thel Dendrar, the local woodcutter stood up to a group of them after they had been being inapropriate with his wife and they just cut him down in front of everyone.  A few days later his wife and kids just dissapear.  No one knows what happened to them, but Elsa blames the Redbrands.

Karson and Araloth went for a walk around town to see whats there, and to find a friendly farmer to put up Araloth.  Given the choice between the orchard and the farm, they headed to the farm and met Qelline Alderleaf, a kindly female halfling in her mid 40s.  She said she would be happy to put them both up in her hayloft.  She would be grateful to have someone around who knows how to handle themself.  Times had been hard recently.  She doesn’t like it when the Redbrands come around.  She sent her son Carp to fetch a few blankets and a jug of water out to the hayloft.

After leaving the farm they decided to check out the Sleeping Giant tap house, having heard thats where the Redbrands like to hang out.  As the aproached they saw four men in red cloaks on the porch outside.  They blocked their entry and made it clear they weren’t welcome.  When hands started to settle on hilts, Karson and Araloth decided it was time to leave and went back to the Stonehill Inn.  After a long chat, the group decided the best thing they could do would be to deal with the redbrands and came up with a plan.

The plan they decided on was simple.  Araloth would had north and sneak around to the far side of the tavern, staying out of site.  Bilba nad Karson would head south towards the Alderleaf farm and then cut north, and hide in the bushed opposite with their bows ready.  Then the others would split in to pairs, and head down the street acting loud and drunk (the characters had consumed a few drinks by this stage, so bonus points for method acting).  Ramond and Melandrach went first, followed up by Talindra and Devere.

Ramond set one foot on the short steps up to the porch and found a redbrand holding the posts either side blocking his way.  He told Ramond he shouldn’t be here.  Outsiders aren’t welcome.  They should leave.  Ramond played drunk and said he just wanted to see if the beer was better here.  The other three redbrands stood up from their resting slouches.  Steps Redbrand insisted they should get out of here they ain’t welcome here.  Ramond said he only wanted a beer.  Three sets of hands started to rest on hilts, and steps Redbrand pushed Ramond in the chest, moving him down off his step.  Everyone drew weapons at this point.

Steps Redbrand stepped down to fill the gap Ramond had just vacated and as he did Ramond drew his weapon from its scabbard and straight up across his face.  His enemy was barely able to swing his weapon before Ramond shoulted out, “Surrender!” as his greatsword came down hard on his enemies shoulder, its weight drawing it down in to his chest, requiring a solid tug to remove it from his corpse.  Araloth came from around the corner and tried to vault on to the porch, but misjudged its height, getting up there but not enough to clear the railings.  Finding himself off balance and the primary target of two armed men he dropped back down to the ground and returned to around the corner.

As he dropped, an two arrows came flying from across the street.  One hit the railing right where araloth has been, and the other hit one of the porch redbrands.  One headed down the steps and the other two tried to jump off the porch.  One of them lost his footing and slipped, knocking the wind out of his chest, remaining folded over trying to get his beath back.  Purple fire cam up the street from the west, and hit the side of a redbrand.  Close behind hit came Devere who jumped up on to the side of the porch, said a blessing to Lathander and then laid both his hands on to the back of the prone redbrand.  As Devere closed his eyes, the redbrands skin went pale, and became sunken, he started to inhale and judder, and then his breath stopped and he fell limp, a life less husk.  Everyone froze for two heartbeats and took in what had just happened.  Devere stood there, a look of shock on his face as he stared at his hands.  “I …I’ve never cast that before” was all he could mutter.

The pause ended as Karson came running across the street with his swords ready.  As he swung  at one redbrand, another went for him but was cut short as an arrow tousled Karsons hair and went straight in his attackers eye.  As his face hit the ground the arrow was forced out through the back of his skull.  As karson was running, two more Redbrands exited the tavern and went to street level, ready for a fight.  Araloth came back from around the corner and jumped up on the porch as they were coming down.  With no enemies to hand, he readied himself by the door in case anyone else came out to attack his allies.

Our party made quick work of the remaining redbrands, until they found themselves surrounding just one, who was backed against the tavern, with nowhere to go.  Devere tried to knock him out with the butt of his mace, but must have been pulling his punches, still shocked by what he had done.  The guy dropped his blade, and a little urine escaped down his trouser and he accepted whatever happened next, but death did not come.  As the party demanded answers, he dropped to his knees and was tied up.  He revealed they were based up at the manor on the hill, there were around 20 of them, and they were lead by a wizard names “Glasstaff”, but other than that all they got was pleads for their captives life.

As the questioning started, Araltoh and Devere, already on the porch, went in to the tavern.  The Sleeping Giant was empty, dirty, and in a state of disrepair.  It had clearly seen its share of bar fights.  Araloth headed over to the bar to help himself to a drink, but found a female dwarf hiding behind the bar.  As the spoke, they found out she was the barkeep, and unwilling servant / hostage of the Redbrands. Once she found out they were enemies of the redbrands she offered them free drinks.  Devere offered her 5gp to help undoing the damages caused by the redbrands.

The party gathered outside the inn in the mid afternoon sun and discussed what to do next.  Deciding that if they rested before acting, the redbrands would come for them in their sleep and be better defended by morning, they agree to head up the hill to deal with them today.  Despite being terrified of the repercussions, they manage to persuade the barkeep to escort the prisoner to one of the two jail cells the town has.  before she leads her prisoner off using his own weapon she advises the party that she has head drunken redbreds let slip that their hideout is actually beneath the manor in its cellar.  There should be an entrance in the side of the building near where the kitchen would have been hidden by some bushes.

As she turns to leave, the party heads off to the east, up the hill to Tresendar Manor.