Having successfully led my companions through the many perils of the Black Peaks, I decided that we should turn our attention once more to the pursuit of Etelka Herzen.
We awoke safe and rested in the dwarfen camp of Karak Slumber and went to meet with the dwarven leader. Deagol presented him with the signet rings of the fallen dwarves. He was impressed with the respect we had shown and gave us his blessing to retain the snazzy shield we had got off Gutbags. He confirmed that it was a dwarven artefact of great value and embossed it with the clan's stamp. This made us feel a bit better after losing Lund and Ulthar to the mines. We headed back into town with full bellies and the sole lead we had: Etelka Herzen and her weasel-faced visitor. No information was forthcoming in the local pubs so we decided to head back to the boat. Exiting the last pub on the crawl, Viggo became aware that we were being followed. We looped around the pub to smoke them out but nothing came of it, so we decided to accompany Viggo to go and score some weed. The dealers recognised Viggo and told him to report to a local crime boss, presumably on account of his shady past. Our meeting with the crime boss taught us nothing suprising: Uncle Luigi was very upset with us and there was now a price on our heads.
Plan A at this point was to paint the boat to avoid detection, but at this hour all the hardware shops were closed, so we headed back to the Argy Bargy. Deagol bumped into another of his endless supply of old mates on the docks. He told us that Etelka and the weasel-face chap had made off north up the river on the impressively rapid Blue Fin. We really would have to make haste to catch up with them. We slumbered until morning and commissioned someone at the docks to repaint our boat. We renamed it the Argy Bargy two to complete the subterfuge. Pudding was happy to accompany us to Kemperbad, glad to see the back of the Black Peaks and Grissenwald. Our departure from Grissenwald was magnificent. Linthan's gust propelled us grandly from the docks, while Deagol did a surprisingly good job of steering. The way to Kemperbad was uneventful, but we were stopped immediately on arrival.
We really shit the bed in our conversation with the harbour warden and had to pay him off. With an uncharacteristic absence of disagreement, we headed straight to the Cat and Fiddle to sort out the issue with Uncle Luigi. There we encountered Furio, one of Luigi's enforcers, and Viggo laid on some banter. As it turned out, there was a 500 GC reward on his head, which appeared to afford Viggo the sort of validation mortals seem to require. We agreed to wait until Uncle Luigi was ready to meet us at the winehouse the following morning. Deagol took the opportunity to go shopping. In the morning we headed out and met Uncle Luigi as planned. He expressed fondness for Viggo but maintained that he needed to save face by at least severing a hand. Viggo spilled the beans, relating our concerns around Etelka and her wicked designs to bring chaos into the world. Luigi was receptive to this, but reminded us that he remained 250 GC out of pocket on the vampire contract. We had gone into the encounter feeling rich, but financial compensation was immediately out of the question. Viggo made a decent fist of talking Luigi round but it clearly wasn't enough. Igor stepped up as a true mate and proposed that the debt might be settled with a decent beating. Deagol seconded this. Viggo accepted without protest and took the beating from the goons like a man. To his credit, Viggo never blamed his mates for this, nor did he ever mention it again.
Absolved of our debt to Uncle Luigi, we headed back to the boat and made ready to leave. Renat decided to stay in Kemperbad to return to her peddling, but we did convince Pudding to join us on our further adventures for a small daily wage (2 silver pieces). We set sail eastward along the river Stir following a tip from Uncle Luigi, to seek out the druid Corrobreth in Unterbaum, a town three days from Kemperbad. Our boatmanship during the passage east was oft tested and found to be exemplary. As we passed through the giant heads at the pass of the Argonath, Linthan was struck by a sinister feeling which left him feeling disturbed. Shortly thereafter, we came across the wreckage of a boat sundered on the rocks along the bank. The friendly locals motioned for us to approach the bank. We ascertained that Etelka and her goons had succumbed to the rip tides and had abandoned their wrecked boat. Viggo did a decent job of pretending that Etelka was his aunt, but made clear that she should under no circumstances be allowed to take our boat in the event that she got back before us. Theo, the local boat lad, promised to fix our boat for a decent price; rigging, hull and all, and we headed up the incline to the town, leaving Pudding and Theo in control of the boat.
There we met the townsfolk and found the druid. We had a rest and got to chatting with Corrobreth. It turns out that Etelka had arrived a few days ago, so she had a bit of a lead on us. She and her entourage had been very dismissive of the townsfolk and had set off on horseback towards the Devil's Bowl. Corrobreth proposed a shortcut along the river, so we headed out with canoes. Deagol and Linthan shared a canoe and absolutely aced it. Igor and Viggo embarrassed themselves to the extent that Corrobreth almost cancelled the whole expedition. Along the way, Corrobreth called a pause to look for magic mushrooms. Igor and Deagol joined him in eating some, and Corrobreth pulled a massive whitey.
The next day, we arrived at the path up to the Devil's Bowl. We made camp that evening on the bank of a giant lake within the meteorite crater, and during the first watch a spirit approached us from the water. We quickly roused the others and, having decided not to flee, allowed the spirit to speak. She told us that she had been a member of a party seeking an artefact in this place, and that they had acquired it many years ago. They had come here under the command of Dagmar von Wittgenstein, but Dagmar had slain the party and headed back to her castle once they had found the artefact. She beseeched us to lay her body to rest and so led us towards a cave.
Arriving at the entrance to the cave, we were ambushed by horrendous rat creatures. Igor almost seemed pleased to see them, shouting "Now do you believe me about the bloody rat men?" as he crashed into their ranks. He entered a blood frenzy, cursing the creatures for killing his family. The melee quickly turned against us, with more of the heinous beasts emerging from within the cave and a lumbering rat ogre sealing us in at the cave mouth. With Igor holding the cave mouth and Viggo and Deagol blocking the passage within, the fight was hard fought. The elven spirit acquitted herself well, while Corrobreth did what he could to heal our wounds, albeit in remarkably modest increments. Igor's rage was evident and he didn't merely vanquish his foes: he severed limbs and thus meted out his vengeance on the rat folk. Just when we were reaching our end, Igor dispatched the giant brute and the remaining fiends scattered into the cave. Those that sought to flee on open ground were cut down without mercy.
My companions have all shown some promise recently. Deagol has shown tangible improvement at boating under my tutelage, Viggo has stoically accepted the responsibilities that come with companionship and Igor appears to have been right about the rat people after all. They're not perfect, but under my guidance they're getting better.