Incident on the Mountain Road

17th Day of Harvester, C.Y. 592

We set off to the Lortmils in order to help out the Khannenhelm dwarves in their war against the White and his giant army. The lower redoubt was undermanned (or is it underdwarfed). The captain of the defensive fortification, Hetrik, said that the reinforcements had not arrived on schedule a few days previous. That combined with greater numbers of dwarves needed to defend against the giant incursions has left the station in a bad state. Uthgar gave them his Box of Everful Biscuits, and we told them we would make sure the dwarves knew of their situation. Delvanos used his lyrical prowess to encourage the beleaguered dwarves.

We began the five mile hike up the mountain road. The snow was pretty heavy, and the air was quite thin. Uthgar filled us in on the news he had about his people, and what he knew of their history. There are two clans of dwarves in Mount Odenkor, the Khannenhelms and the Thangeddins. They used to be one united clan, but they split many centuries ago. Uthgar believes it was over religious matters. The Khannenhelms revered Moradin, and the Thangeddins were devout worshippers of Dumathoin, the God of Mining and Exploration. There were long periods of warfare between the clans, but that ended about five hundred years ago. About a century ago, Durnegar discovered that the Thangeddin priests were no longer worshipping Dumathoin. They had switched to Abatthor, God of Greed and Avarice. This caused a major rift between the already disparate clans.

When the frost giants began their campaign against the dwarves, it was only the Khannenhelms who began fighting. Apparently the two clans had some arrangement where Uthgar’s people defended both the main fortifications near the ice plains, which separate Odenkor from the White’s home at Gaeth-Orvus. The situation called for both clans to put aside their differences, but the Thangeddin leadership warned against further angering the White. A young group of warriors under the leadership of Ragnok Thangeddin broke rank with the leaders, and they went to join the Khannenhelms. They fought alongside Khannenhelms in the first major engagement of the war in what is now called the Battle of Unity. Something appears to have happened to the Thangeddins, because no word has come from them in over a month. All attempts to uncover what happened have been thwarted by the clan “defenses”. No one has made it past the Hall of Odenkor. Ragnok and his warriors are still at the northern redoubt, but no communication has been received from the eastern redoubt in about a week.

Uthgar’s story was cut short when Vannay’s prying eyes returned from the scouting position. The mountain road up ahead was under the driving winds of a blizzard. As we approached, Vannay determined that the storm was of an arcane origin. We began trudging through the high winds and heavy snowfall. Moments before we would have been buried, Uthgar spotted an avalanche coming down the mountain. Vannay quickly put up a force wall, which shielded us from the deluge of ice and snow. Before we could plan our next step, a massive insectoid worm came up from below and attempted to swallow Delvanos. The archer bard managed to escape with a dimension door, and the worm moved to swallow Safadin. Victor and Creden began warding the party against the worm’s attacks, and Safadin managed to escape the creature’s maw. Vannay dropped a large fireball on the creature, and Uthgar got in several attacks. It looked like the fiery blood in the creature was going to turn Uthgar’s axe into molten slag, but pulled his axe out in time. Victor landed a few powerful punches, but he was not able to grapple the worm. The fiery blood severely burned the Kordite priest. The creature (identified by Vannay as a remorhaz) attempted to use its massive strength to knock Creden off the cliffside, but it missed. Safadin fired a cone of prismatic brilliance at the worm, and it appeared to lose its mind just before shifting to another plane. Vannay put up his secure shelter, so we could ride out the winter storm. Creden prayed to the Saint after our rest, and the storm subsided. Uthgar couldn’t be sure, but he thought he saw a very large white dragon flying off in the distance.

After arriving at the Khannenhelms, we spoke for a while with the clan chieftain, Hondar. He seemed pretty reluctant at first to accept help from the outside world. He believed that it was a dwarven problem, and it would be solved by the dwarves. Delvanos used his silver tongue and irrefutable logic to convince the chief that the war against Iuz would reach the dwarves sooner rather than later. If they accepted our help here, they could return the favor by sending troops to aid against Iuz. Hondar was amenable to this agreement. Victor followed up on this by making sure that our offer of aid was contingent upon them sending troops. If we took out the White and defeated the giants, then the dwarves must send aid. Hondar agreed to the proposal upon one condition. In addition to helping defeat the White, we must do our part in restoring the Thangeddin and Khannenhelm clans. Even if the White and his giants were gone, the Khannenhelms would not leave their mines defenseless while the rift existed between the two clans. The clans must reunite, and for the first time in ten generations, there would be a High King Under the Mountain.