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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 1191797" data-attributes="member: 1210">A Little Look AroundOthic’s barn holds several garen- green and yellow, yellow and brown or green and brown in color, striped equine creatures.  A number of the stall gates are broken asunder and some of the animals are milling around outside.  The clucking of the chickens as our heroes approach it seems fearful to Trinia.  The coppery smell of blood taints the air heavily.  The poor old man is dead, no doubt of that.  Thelonious gulps softly, examining the body.  It’s clear he died by being trampled by garen; but there are nasty bite marks as well.  Something attacked him, then panicked the garen...? the ranger thinks.Our short heroes exeunt the barn.  Outside, in the fresh air, they look at each other with pained eyes.  Ed has been crying since before they reached Othic’s farm.“Well,” Sandy says hesitantly, “it isn’t really any of our business.  And we have to get the bell made...”  “I think we should help them out,” Ed blubbers.  “He fed us!”“And we do have time before we need to go back,” her twin Coco adds.So our heroes go to the plaza in the center of town.  Not far from it is the bell maker, and they visit him first.  Then they try to seek out Mayor Hob, the man they saw speak to the town in the square.  They manage to sweet-talk their way in to him and offer to help.Hob looks tired.  “Anything you could do, we’d appreciate.  I guess the biggest thing is to find the children.  The longer they’re missing, the more likely it is that something bad will happen to her.”Hob gladly sends someone to show the party the kids’ last known location.  “We’ll send whoever we can muster to help you, but we’ve already looked the ground over and our trackers couldn’t find anything,” he laments. “Maybe I can,” Thelonious says, and once in the shadow of the mountains where the children were last known to have been, he commenced a thorough examination of ground, brush, twig and creek.  After about an hour, he exclaimed, “Here!” and started moving across ground empty to the eyes of the others.  Slowly they followed the ground, Thelonious sometimes muttering to himself.  “Goblins,” he announces at one point, then presses his lips together.  I hope the kids are still alive, he thinks grimly.The party decides to wait for whatever trackers Mayor Hob can come up with to arrive.  At about the fourth hour past noon, a single crabby and unhelpful man arrives.  He’s brusque but willing to follow Thelonious’ lead.Up the skirt of the mountain (which looks to shortly become unclimbable) the party moves, the two trackers working together to guide the group.  “Won’t be able to get up the mountain,” the surly tracker comments.  “You couldn’t find the trail, either,” mutters Sandy.Soon the tracks lead our heroes to a narrow hidden path that ascends.  But it’s nightfall, and soon the climb would become untenable.  “We’ll get an early start tomorrow,” Dogfish suggests.  The group returns to town, the tracker sullenly telling them they’re on their own.  He’s short-tempered and hasn’t had a good night’s sleep in quite a while.  So back to town the clan goes, their dog scampering after them.  A good couple of meals, a good night’s sleep and a few more meals; then they’ll come back.And someone will die.Next Time: The halfling party’s first fatality!</blockquote>

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