What do we do with this ham then?

Are we going to eat this ham or what!

So here we are... company to a hanging ham in a secret lair, with three nefarious looking guards who walk in on us, probably because they heard the rumblings of Balderdash's moaning gastric juices yearning after that chunk of meat.

"can we have some?" Balderdash says, breaking the fight or flight stand off of confusion, as a bead of sweat from the ugliest guard is dislodged from his putrid lip as he mumbles "urgh, guess so?". A different guard, also armoured and with sword, quickly suggests we meet their boss to find out what to do next. This could be positive? well, they haven't drawn their swords on yes, and there is ham!

We are pointed through a door to a small room, with the three guards semi circled behind us like they're shepherding sheep. We see an unfriendly and frankly ugly human who is partially obscured by a ridiculous hood, the type a hoodlum would wear as a status symbol to overplay their self importance and to project fear.

"Why are they here?!" he immediately scowls. Without a beat, Crios flexes his pecs like two landed fish, cracks his neck to the left, and utters like a simpleton "We come to eat ham!"

Obviously this vexes the hooded man, who immediately retorts "take them outside and kill them!" in a cadence as if Charles Dance of the Saltmarsh Performing Arts School had taught him how to do ominous criminal speak.

Fox's eyes hadn't even finished rolling back from being dumbfounded by Crios's comment, when he counters with "I'm pretty good at staying alive!".. probably hoping for a reaction to somehow temper the situation while we start to assess our next move. The hoodlum just shouts "take them, and shove them in with the slaves!"

"Fuuuuu@&..." BISH BASH BOSH!! We never finished our pre weapon unsheathing curse, as the guards knocked us all unconscious before we could do anything.

We awake in a square cage... stripped of our possessions and weapons. We're in a cavern like room, carved out from the rock, and we're in the company of five dwarves...heck! they're the missing mine dwarves, it's pay day! Fox verbalises what we're thinking "are you this missing mine dwarves?"

"yes" one of them says, "we have been imprisoned and waiting what to be told to do, but they're just waiting for something... haven't a clue what this is all about, but I haven't changed my undergarments for an age!"

We are locked in by a giant padlock and chains that hang inside the cubed cell, and the ever resourceful Fox manages to get out his thieves tools that he hid in his boots to have a go to get us out of this cage. The smell of the dwarves is rather ripe as well... kind of like a soft pungent cheese rolled in fetid mud, so a quick exit would be ideal.

Fox, the silk fingered slick talking cad, gets the padlock open without any effort or sound, and we have gained our freedom, at least for now. Istara turns to the Dwarves in the realisation that they could help us escape, and on pressing them inbetween the heady shimmers of their odour, they agree to help, but will not fight. One of the Dwarves seems to be the leader, not exactly friendly, and with an economic grumpy demeanour declares "I am Bjørn". It's as if he preferred to be in the cage!

The cavern is well lit, mostly empty apart from 5 bolts of fabric and 8 small casks full of, well, we don't know. Fox's eyes crackle at thought of some alcohol to swill down his throat while we start to work out our next move.

This is decided for us, as the narrow door to the cavern opens as the first pustule speckled guard leans into investigate what was probably more gastric rumbles from Balderash's ever hungry paunch. Talking of Balderdash... he goes into full fighting monk mode and rips the sword out of the first guards surprised hands, throws it behind him, just as the nonchalant Bjørn pulls a cuss command out of nowhere and freezes said guard like an ice trolls upset stomach contents meeting an ice storm as it manifests its messy exit.

Crios ripples into action, grabs the sword, and then somehow almost misses the stationary guard while delivering an unusually weak attack! Fox launches into action, while inwardly cursing the over muscled Crios's maladaptive performance, and flips the blade to launch a more skilful strike.. felling the guard to near death as he crumbles to a drunken like stupor. As the guard falls, the next guard launches his sword at Crios as he tries to enter the cavern, wounding Crios, and immediately raising his sword to try and finish off our dear weaponless hulk!

"Stay away from Crios you foul fetid rats merkin!" shouts Istara as she sings a song of deathly spells, reducing the second guard to a twitching corpse, as his life force oozes out of his ears. Way to go Istara!

The third now enraged guard, with screaming fear in his eyes, rages through the door to be met by Balderdash's masterful fist of fury... 'crunch!' as his sword arm is dislocated...and all the while the mysterious Bjørn leans over the dead guard number two.. what is he doing?

Crios has had enough. He grabs the sword and slices the twitching guard number one clean in half, as a smirk smears across his face as if symbolic of regaining some battle honour.

The ever quick Fox grabs the dead guard number two's sword and impales guard three in the heart with a virtuoso strike... felling him instantly into a deathly heap.

Woohoo!! they are all slain!... Istara bursts into song, and our bodies somehow know what to do as we dance along to an old song of victory called Ye Olde Macarena. Sung in goblin ska perhaps?

"What's all that bleedin' noise down there!?!?" comes a bellowing voice from above. While we stand frozen in panic, Istara summons a ventriloquist spell to call back "yeah, all ok!" in the voice of one of the guards. Phew... it worked!

We decide any further frivolous activity is unwise, and we start to make our way out of the chamber, arming ourselves with the weapons and armour of the dead guards. Crios, Fox, and Istara get swords and armour, with Istara nabbing the short bow.

Fox leads the way to turn in the tunnel as he passes a gap to his left, Istara then takes the lead to peak around the next corner which seems to lead to an endless tunnel with many hidden recesses. It's alright for them as they have special vision, as for Balderdash, he might as well be blind. Bjørn picks up a large pebble and enchants with a spell that makes it glow like a star... Balderdash is delighted with his new toy!

We decide that the opening right outside the chamber we were in might be worth exploring first, and Fox leads the way down a sloping sodden tunnel into a smaller chamber that leads into further darkness. Balderdash, empowered by his new illuminated pebble, takes the lead and then throws into the darkness... revealing a cave that opens up to the sea on the right! It appears to be low tide, and there is a small sailing boat with oars! It looks like we have found our escape!

Suddenly two menacing hobgoblins appear out of nowhere, with one bellowing something in goblish "I thought they were tied up!"

Fox launches himself like a kingfisher at one of them, and they tumble to the floor! Crios slices a chunk out of the other hobgoblin who immediately retaliates with an ineffective strike as it winces is pain.

Bjørn listens to the melé by the cave entrance and mutters "pansies" as he shuffles into the centre of the cave, sighing in displeasure followed by "you die!!" in an operatic Dwarvish tone.... Good lord! Bjørn has incanted the sacred flame spell over the standing hobgoblin who now bathes most uncomfortably in its intense column of light, but is not yet defeated! Seeing this, Istara, raises her crossbow too keenly and misses the hobgoblin in her haste, probably distracted by her internal singing of the Macarena she cannot banish from her mind! Balderdash sees his opportunity and runs up to the still stunned standing hobgoblin and punches it through its chest... making its heart explode out of its spine and filling the air with an explosive messy fog of gore! It is dead!

Meanwhile Fox is thrown to the other side of the boat by the Hobgoblin he took down, who then turns its rage towards the others. While distracted Fox sneakily attacks it with sword, slicing it, but the beast is so enraged the damage is unfelt... until Crios takes a mighty downward swing at the hobgoblin... stunning it into static silence, just before its body unfurls into two grotesque pulsating and squirting halves of death.

Fortuitously the boat had all of our stolen weaponry and possessions bundles in it, so we equip ourselves and celebrate yet another bloody victory.

As the victory blood drips from the cave's stalagmites, we agree that we must make our escape to sea before anything else can surprise us, and find our way back to port to claim our reward for finding the dwarves. However, the boat can take 8 souls at the very most, and we are nine... perhaps 10 if you take Crios's hulking body into account.

Fox places his belongings into the boat as we drag the boat out to sea, and he volunteers to swim behind it so we can take all of the Dwarves back to port.

As we cut slowly through the choppy sea, following the coastline, a tired Fox say he is spent of energy, and we decide to make for land so we can continue on foot to the town.

It's about a two hour walk as Bjørn nonchalantly shouts "heal" at Crios who seemed irritated by his minor wound. Is Bjørn our new healer? Will he join us?

Istara tries to enlist the help of the other dwarves by seducing them with thoughts of revenge over their captors, but they remain standoffish.

But first, we must find Manistrad to claim our reward for finding these Dwarves, then lay the path to continued adventures.

To the Whicker Goat we must go.