Date: 06/21/10

XP Awarded: 5,293 (Elvisa, Gob, Tongtokl), 2,867 (Kiria)

Start: The Graul farmstead in the Kreegwood, mid winter.

Reaching the front porch, the party sees the flying spellcaster and a beefy spear-wielding ogrekin charging. The shrieking woman pulls one of the wands in her belt out and aims it at the party. Speaking a powerful magical word, a bolt of lightning spits from the copper tip of the wand and streaks across the farmyard to Elvisa, who nimbly dodges out of the way. Gob is right behind her, but moves too slowly and is scorched by the electricity. The bolt continues into the house, blasting a charred hole in the rear wall of the front room.

Meanwhile, the charging ogrekin reaches Elvisa and viciously jabs with the spear, but the quick Shoanti easily avoids the thrust. Elvisa lunges forward and counters with a sharp kick, eliciting a pained grunt. Behind her, Tongtokl begins chanting the words to summon lightning from the clouds overhead after commanding Copper Dragon to attack the ogrekin with the spear.

A throaty cry surprises the party as a second deformed ogrekin swings down from the rafters below the roof's porch. His twisted left leg is encased in a metal frame to hold it upright, and some kind of vestigial twin grows from the back of his neck, its loose and rubbery features emitting gasping grunts and wheezes. He brings his gleaming ogre hook down onto Tongtokl with a mighty swing and badly wounds the gnome, disrupting his spell. With his other hand he sticks two fingers into his mouth and gives a shrill whistle, bringing two enormous donkey rats out from a hole in the ground under the porch. One leaps at Elvisa, missing her, but the other darts across the front porch and sinks its teeth into Gob's leg.

While this is going on, Kiria and Shalelu have quietly arrived at the edge of the farm's clearing. Having left Magnimar two days behind the rest of the party, their boat had reached Turtleback Ferry not very long after the party had left the village down the old road leading along the Skull River. After gathering information on the party's whereabouts, the two rangers set off to track down their comrades, and reached the farmstead just as the ogrekin attacked the party emerging from the farmhouse. Too far from the combat for their archery to be effective, the rangers use the cover of the twisted fields of corn to quickly approach the ogrekin from behind.

Threatened by the giant donkey rat biting at him, Gob steps backward through the open front door of the farmhouse and casts a spell that magically speeds up the party. At almost the same time, the flying spellcaster uses her wand again to send a lightning bolt into the party's ranks, blasting Tongtokl but barely missing Copper Dragon. The lightning punches a smoking hole in the farmhouse's front wall next to the front door, and Tongtokl takes this opportunity to duck through to avoid the massive ogrekin's hook. He summons a ball of flames on the damp front porch in front of the hole he's ducked through, to prevent the ogrekin from following him. Foiled, the ogrekin moves to attack Copper Dragon instead and delivers a powerful blow to the faithful hound. Elvisa is engaged with the first ogrekin and one of the giant rats and cannot help; the other giant rat pursues Gob into the farmhouse and bites him painfully. Kiria and Shalelu have moved into range by now and drop to one knee, unleashing a volley of arrows at the flying spellcaster. With Kiria's new magical longbow, every arrow that leaves his bow is transformed into a miniature bolt of lightning streaking through the air. Unfortunately, the spellcaster's defensive images foil the volley of arrows, though a couple of the images are destroyed.

Gob is badly wounded by now and continues to retreat from the donkey rat pursuing him. Dodging away from its bites, he manages to complete a defensive spell and a number of mirror images of himself appear, confusing the attacking rat which is the real target. The flying spellcaster begins a summoning spell, while Elvisa continues to pummel the now seriously wounded ogrekin. Tongtokl maneuvers his summoned ball of flame to scorch the ogrekin attacking Copper Dragon in attempt to draw its attention away from Copper Dragon. Copper Dragon hits with another powerful bite to the ogrekin with the spear, and a volley of arrows from Shalelu finishes it off. Kiria's arrows strike the images surrounding the flying spellcaster, destroying the last of them.

The donkey rat attacking Gob is confused by the dancing images and misses, and Gob casts a volley of magical missiles into it, badly wounding it. The flying spellcaster finishes a summoning spell and a flaming hound appears on the porch facing Elvisa. It growls and a cone of fire blasts from its mouth, catching Elvisa by surprise and burning her. The spellcaster casts another quick defensive spell and her form blurs and shifts, making her difficult to aim at. Elvisa springs to attack the hound, delivering a rapid series of kicks that kill the summoned monster.

Meanwhile, inside the farmhouse, Tongtokl casts another spell that summons flame to his hand and he prepares to throw it at the remaining ogrekin when he gets a good shot. The rat pursuing Gob continues to chew through his summoned images, backing him into a corner, and Gob hits it with another set of magic missiles. Outside, Kiria and Shalelu concentrate fire on the flying mage, though her defensive spells prevent any solid hits. Alarmed by the storm of arrows, the spellcaster uses one of her wands to fire a lightning bolt at Kiria, but it slows down his firing only momentarily.

On the porch, Elvisa pummels the donkey rat nipping at him, striking it down. Tongtokl hurls a ball of flame out of the farmhouse to hit the ogrekin threatening the badly wounded Copper Dragon, but succeeds in getting his attention too well when the ogrekin breaks off combat to charge in to attack the gnome instead. As the donkey rat that has him cornered gnaws on his last remaining defensive images, Gob finally kills the creature with a last volley of missiles.

Seeing that Elvisa has conquered her opponents and seems to be readying an attack on the spellcaster, she uses her wand to fire another lightning bolt at the Shoanti, who easily dodges out of the way. The lightning bolt continues into the front wall of the farmhouse, blasting another charred hole and narrowly missing Gob as it continues through the front room and through the back wall. Elvisa takes a running leap through the air to strike the spellcaster, but her defensive magic spoils her aim.

Tongtokl uses the flame in his hand to try to burn the ogrekin threatening to corner him, but misses. He calls Copper Dragon to help him, but the ogrekin again slices the gnome with his rusty ogre hook. Tongtokl is now in desperately bad shape - Gob sees this and launches another volley of magic missiles at the ogrekin. Outside, the shower of arrows from the rangers continue, with a couple of them starting to find their mark. The spellcaster swoops towards Elvisa with a spell that envelopes her hand in crackling black energy, but fortunately is too slow to hit. Elvisa strikes and manages to land a punch, but it doesn't harm her too badly.

In the front room, Tongtokl tries to burn the ogrekin again, but the enraged brute charges Gob furiously, barely missing. Gob backs up enough to cast an invisibility spell, then tries to sneak out of the farmhouse. Kiria and Shalelu continue the barrage of arrow fire, taking care not to strike their companion engaged in combat. Threatened by Elvisa's attacks, the spellcaster flies up and casts a spell to blast Elvisa with another lightning bolt. This time the Shoanti is too slow to evade and she gets burned. Seeing that the spellcaster is now out of her reach, Elvisa runs into the farmhouse to help the overwhelmed spellcasters against the last ogrekin and lands a flying kick on his chest, killing him. Tongtokl and the invisible Gob exit the farmhouse where they spy the flying spellcaster, and Gob throws a fireball that explodes on target, showering the farmyard with gobbets of flaming meat and fat.

With the last of the threats neutralized, the party spends the next two hours chopping a hole into the side of the barn and rescuing the three unconscious prisoners from the giant spider lair. Once the prisoners are restored to consciousness, they weep with joy at being rescued, and the group quickly return to Turtleback Ferry in the drizzle.