A topsy turvy day, and if you’re of the type to measure your day in hours, you’d probably call it brief.
Right now I’m measuring the day in dire wolf bite marks, and it looks a bit long to me.
But back to this morning we go.  There is much to tell.

We wake, we shake off the nagging feeling that we’re out of our minds to be doing this, we grab a bite, we start getting ready. Marco Lansett points out that the big ice-covered door at the back of the cave wasn’t there when he left this place, we all turn to look at the door except for Klajdu who has skipped ahead and is there opening it.

Out spills flickering firelight and the smell of roast pig and the sensory overload of an entire banquet scene.  We’re scrambling into formation but especially given that we all just slept on this freezing stone floor, we’re a bit stunned.  In other words we proceed cautiously.  It’s strangely underpopulated, at least by humans.  There are three dogs, or if you will, chronometers.
There’s an old man who calls out a welcome to us,  there’s a woman next to him who nods sagely from time to time but says nothing.  The old man bids us come in and share his bounty. He claims to be the Winter King. When asked he doesnt have anything helpful to say about why he’s out and about instead of being dead and frozen in a block of ice.
He seems jolly enough but it’s all too easy.  Plus do I really have to give up this scepter so soon?  Klajdu steps up to the table and takes a bite of something, I pick up a cup of ale more out of reflex than any sensible impulse.  Beulah asked a question not entirely as politely as a true king might require, but it goes over just fine.
He’s a bit scruffy for a king perhaps. Things are a mite awry.  But you know, maybe the dogs ate his valet last week and he’s been roughing it.  Who knows.

Tungsten isn’t buying it though.  He cocks his head and says “something’s fishy about all this” and that’s all it takes.   The king says “Oh Bortek knew this wouldn’t work”, and the world goes back to trying to kill us.   It’s better this way.  Makes more sense.

The dogs are now dire wolves, each the size of a brick outhouse. The woman loses maybe half her height, grows some pointy ears and starts working magic that I don’t like the looks of one bit.  The ‘king’ leaps on top of a wolf while it’s still growing to full size, rides it over and takes a swipe down at us with a decidedly non-regal greataxe.
Occasionally I think he followed it up with a handaxe for good measure.
Klajdu, Tungsten, Fitz and Carn’ibald are getting hammered.  A dire wolf on either side, the elf/gnome/bitch blasting them with some horrible cold light that knocked Klajdu down (no mean feat).   Still, we’re holding our own.  Well everyone else is.  Beulah’s filling the false king and the wolves with arrows, axes and swords are sinking in left and right,  and I’m there trying everything i can think of and I cant seem to get the hang of this new scepter.
At one point I teleported a little too eagerly behind the enemy line (why cant i stop doing this?), and Shazia must have looked like a giant milk bone or something, at least until i cowered manfully behind the bed…
Carn’ibald did a spectacular leap and flip over the table, switching weapons as he did so I think. It was too fast for me to follow.  After such an impressive display unfortunately the blade failed to land at first but either it was a feint or he passed off the failure brilliantly because the next second it did hit.  Fitz wasn’t to be outdone and not long after he had his own spectacular jump, leap and flail going, coming down on the table in a great clatter of alecups and roast pig bits.  Much healing was needed and not very much was on hand.  Fortunately Beulah got to use the new healing she’s been threatening to use on us, and it was surprisingly excellent, even including a surly “There there” from her and a brief pat on the shoulder. All this in between twin strikes so she’s a pretty scary healer.  Im still afraid.  But aside from Klajdu getting knocked down once and aside from these great blasts from the damn witch, we started to get the upper hand.  Once the dogs started going down the witch thing multiplied and we had to deal with three of them.  At some point around this time I guess I started yelling loud enough because my curses finally started landing.   Fitz nearly got taken out but some well timed healing saved him.  Gods I cant keep all this straight.
When it was all over though we had a new surprise.  When the last witch fell her illusion faded and we saw that the cups of ale and the roast pig was just….   rotting…  ohgod.  Klajdu who’d taken a bite of… something.   Was it that?  god i hope not.  Ohno.  that’s much worse…..  Klajdu wasn’t looking good at all.  And that’s saying something cause this guy’s skin is grey on a good day.
So, some people are asleep already.  The fires are still going, and the beds turned out to be real which is a nice bonus. Over in one of the beds someone’s having a rough time of it actually.  I’m over on the floor cause I still feel a little guilty taking a bed – here I am carrying this scepter and I haven’t felt cold yet this whole trip.