About mid morning on the 21st, the party decides  to once again check the hayloft in Edermath’s barn. This time all of them search — Dare, Lilvari, Mystic and Mercarri take the edges, and Droop takes the center. Lilvari notices a bit of hay that was turned into what looked like a makeshift bed. She focuses her efforts there and finds a broken lockpick. 

Their next stop is Barthen’s Provisions to inquire about any mail deliveries for Halia. Barthen tells them that Halia came in on the morning of the 15th and paid 20gp to have an urgent message sent to the Dirty Dwarf Tavern in Helm’s Hold. This surprises Lilvari because she remembered that the last time they saw Halia leave was before the 15th — when she and Dare were helping sink Freda’s dead husband in the river. Lilvari didn’t know that Halia had been back in the meantime. When asked what the message was about, Barthen apologizes and says he doesn’t know, that it’s against policy to read others’ messages. He calls Narth in from the back room to see if he has more information, since Narth is the one who delivered it. Narth tells them about the symbol on the front. It wasn’t addressed to anyone — just the Dirty Dwarf Tavern, but it had a symbol on the front. He draws it for them on a piece of parchment. Barthen asks Narth about the letter he was supposed to deliver to Dare, Lilvari, Mercarri and Mystic — the one from Gundren. Narth turns pale. He hurries to the back to retrieve it while Barthen rolls his eyes. The letter is dated two days ago. It explains that Gundren and his brothers went back to explore Wave Echo Cave but didn’t get too far. “Something doesn’t feel right,” he said in the letter. “It doesn’t feel safe.” He tells them they don’t have to, but asks if they’d like to meet up at Wave Echo Cave on the 21st at first light and investigate together. If not, that’s fine too. What isn’t fine is the fact that it’s already late morning on the 21st. 

Wave Echo Cave

The party leaves Barthen’s and, using the map Gundren had given them, heads east to Wave Echo Cave. The trek takes them into rugged hills, but it’s uneventful otherwise. In four hours they reach what looks to be a small hole in the side of a rugged hill– nothing like they expected. They go in and after following the tunnel, get to a large cavern. The northern half seems to have collapsed in on itself, leaving a pit about twenty feet deep. They find supplies, a spent campfire and bedrolls. They also find blood. They investigate the rest of the cavern and find a rope heading into the pit. Dare climbs down first and immediately heads into a tunnel to the East. Mystic transforms into a Wolf Spider to make the climb less arduous. Droop, along with his homunculus flying cat Boof, stick close to Lilvari. A few moments later, everyone hears Dare screaming.

They hurry in blindly after him. He’s about a 100 feet past the tunnel, in the middle of another cavern, this one littered with skeletons wearing ancient, rusted armor. The party sees Dare spinning in circles, trying to detach a Stirge from his back. Echoing shrieks and the sound of flapping from above tell them they’re not alone. That’s when nearly a dozen Stirges dive down to attack. 

As the rest of the adventurers fight off the vile creatures, Mystic who’s still in spider form climbs one of the rocky walls, far above where a stirge is being distracted by Boof. She climbs to the high cavern ceiling directly above it and drops down. Boof moves out of the way. The stirge isn’t so lucky. Mystic rides the stirge down to the ground where it splats in a mess of gore between Mystic’s spider body and the hard stone ground. Another falls to the great power of Mercarri’s shit hammer — motionless under a big pile of excrement. The battle wages on for less than a minute. In the end, the stirges are all wiped out.. 

After the fight, Dare leads the others East until just at the edge of his vision he sees a faint green glowing light. After a little debate they decide to head North — Dare in the lead, the others following closely behind. There’s another tunnel followed by another cavern. Unlike the others, this cavern contains a large building carved from stone. The stone door at its front is partly opened. Dare wastes  no time in kicking in it. The room appears  to be a barracks of sorts — beds lining the wall from a forgotten time. In the center of the room are three humanlike creatures with greyish.blue skin. They’re crouching over several skeletons, trying to devour whatever’s left from their ancient bones. As soon as Dare steps inside, the creatures’ heads snap up. Their beady black eyes meet his. In their dead stares he sees nothing but insatiable hunger. That’s when Dare does something pretty smart. He quickly turns and closes the door behind him. Throaty screams erupt from within — screams of hunger, of anger, of hate. They’re accompanied by the meaty slaps of feet against the stone floor as the creatures rush the door.

“So… what do we do?” Dare asks. Behind him, there’s the sound of pounding and scratching at the door. Quickly they come up with a plan, and it’s  a good thing too. The noises from  inside the room stop. The adventurers look back at the door and see bony gray fingers capped with long, black claws pulling it open.