The party awakes to find themselves stiff, sore, and cold; though none the worse, really, for a night sleeping beside a partially frozen lake. As they set out once again along the mountain trail, they tie each other together (to avoid the pitfalls of yesterday and allow Xon and myself to make insufferable jokes).

At some point in time, Molistead gets interested and casts a detect magic on the amulet Annu is carrying. It radiates a faint aura of illusion, and Annu decides to don it (perhaps this occurred earlier, but what they hey, I
missed it at the time) with no obvious effect.

Our heroes successfully bypass the large hole in the path caused by Falahara's misstep the previous evening, and soon find themselves descending from the mountainous heights into a pleasant and secluded valley. By this time, the watercourse had rejoined the game trail they were following, which helps to promote a feeling of care-free ease (for those of the party used to being out of doors). Of course, this can't be a good thing, and is probably why Falahara was taken off guard and frozen.

Yes, in the middle of their march through the valley, Falahara stops abruptly, unable to move a muscle. Almost immediately thereafter, a high pitched, yappy voice demands to know who the party is, why they have disturbed "my valley", and why they should not be immediately sent to the Soulfisher. Xon's hand immediately goes to his weapon, but the sight of a Kobold astride a giant wolf (ok, so it was only five feet at the shoulder, maybe eight feet long) stayed his action. Brief negotiations took place, during which Molistead was identified as one of the "dragon-blooded" and an uneasy truce was established.

As conversation continued, Falahara was freed from the spell which held her, and the kobold Mika Flang noticed something unusual about one of the elves in the party. Uttering ancient words of a spell unrecognized by either Molistead or Annu, she caused both the amulet she wore and the one worn by Annu to become a transparent crystalline material with a glowing hexagonal bar covering most of the radius of the amulets. The bar of the amulet worn by Annu pointed from the center to the clasp at the top while that of Mika's amulet was at an odd angle. Curious that an elf would be wearing that particular amulet, and knowing of her own imminent death, she began to relate what little she knew about these items.

Apparently, in ages past, a great and evil power capable of destroying the world and even the gods themselves was bound away. Seven keys bared the lock that hides this hideous thing, and they were distributed amongst those unlikely to ever co-operate, each clan swearing to protect the amulet and any knowledge there-of. Six mortal clans, humans, dwarves, elves, descendents of dragons, evil orcs, and sons of giants, were entrusted with this duty. The seventh key, the gods themselves protect. The location of the lock is unknown, but even now demons, devils, and fiends search the earth attempting to reunite the keys. Of note is one named Malak, who has recently discovered this valley, and sent minions to wrest my key from me.

As the party was in no way associated with the horrid, evil croohok who killed Mika's entire clan (including Mika herself) and knowing that soon she would exact her revenge and return to the Soulfisher's embrace, Mika made a hard decision and entrusted the protection of the amulet given to the "descendents of dragons" to Molistead, as he was of dragon blood as well and her clan had come to an end. Reluctantly accepting his responsibility, the party begins to realize the importance of these artifacts.

Mika proceeded to detail the attack made the previous evening on her valley, and displayed the corpses of her vanquished foes. While the bodies looked as if they had been around for a week, two were easily recognizable as the assassins who had previously attacked Xon, starting his whole silly escapades through the wilds (of which he will be happy to tell you about if he survives them).

The corpses and the poison they carried were to be burned by Mika, and would have been had the party not interrupted the peace of her valley. As it was, she gladly gave her them the few untainted possessions of the rogues (including one rapier of exceptional quality). Xon saw fit to remove one of the vials of black liquid from the corpses before they were burned (which they had been told the concoction was black adders venom). Mika then gave veryone one berry, stating that this small, shriveled piece of fruit would provide the sustenance and nourishment necessary for their journey out of her valley and back into the ways of man.

Mika escorted our heroes, setting quite a brisk pace that left everyone but Falahara winded, out of her valley. It was a goodly ways past the setting of the sun before she bade them fair travels, bringing them to a camping spot perhaps a days travel from their destination of Travensburg. After that, she disappeared into the woods without a trace, in fact, the path that brought them to this spot seems to be gone, leaving not the slightest indication of how them party got to the camping spot, nor any indication that a secluded mountain valley was anywhere near.

The party awoke after yet another uneventful evening, and continued on their way. Molistead tested the magic of the amulet in his protection and found that it too radiated a faint aura of illusion. After debating for a short while, he decided to don the amulet, which now appeared to be the holy symbol of the Soulfisher, one aspect of Kelemvor, the god of the dead. Upon placing the amulet around his neck, he felt a slight shiver. There was, however, no visible effect, and Annu had been wearing "her" amulet for a number of days now with no obvious ill effect.

It is here that we leave our heroes, on the road to Travensburg, with perhaps a day, maybe a day and a half at most, before Molistead's homecoming.