Nothing But Trouble

Winnacer looks relieved as he sees Yaz, Porter and Melchior coming. Immediately he and Milan start to load up the horse with the plague box and the gunnes. As they do so, Yaz starts to cast curing spells upon the bleeding man hunter. The moderate during spell that he starts with has a fairly good effect, and the light curing spell that he casts after that has an even better effect. He then casts one of his last two remaining spells upon the bounty hunter, which is not terribly effective. Porter is now close to being back at full health, however, and all of the bleeding has stopped.

Porter is obviously greatly relieved to be close to full health again and thanks Yaz for all his help.

The bounty hunter than looks at Melchior who is not looking so good:

"If you've got any left, then perhaps you should give him one," Porter says. "We need to keep him alive and I'm not sure he's going to survive unless he gets seen to."

"OK," Yaz replies and then starts to cast upon Melchior. The effects of the healing enchantment are not that great, but they are sufficient to stop the Wise Guy's bleeding and he is no longer at risk of dying any time soon.

It takes four minutes before all of Yaz' casting is complete, by which time Milan and Winnacer have loaded the horse.

"We need to get away from here," Winnacer says, listening to the sound of the babbling goblins that seems to be getting closer all of the time. "Tall Town isn't big enough to hide us for long."

"Destination?" Yaz shrugs. "I dunno. How 'bout the forest? Hide out there for a few weeks?"

He scratches his head:

"Don't know why you jokers are so damn paranoid though. It's just a patrol, they don't know squat about the baby, or us... they just heard some noises. Now that they seen blood, of course, maybe they're curious... but shit, it's not like they're the Slovene Inquisition or something."

"Hey, don't call me the joker," Porter replies. "I don't think the Nyemetz are going to give a crap about a family with their new baby, but evidently some others disagree with me."

Winnacer gives Porter the eye:

"All the tracks led to that stable. They may have figured out that whatever happened started at the stable, and therefore must have involved the new family and Baby Yaz."

"I've seen the Nyemetz kill families for less. Perhaps the lot of you are willing to let blood and let others assume the risks for you, but I'll have none of it in my presence. 'Thinking' that somebody will feel one way or another is not good enough; such assumptions only lead to disaster."

In response to Porter giving him the eye, Porter gives Winnacer the finger.

Yaz takes a drag on his pipe:

"Let's just roll out of here. Gertrude'll scout for us. Won'tcha, girl?"

He reaches up to his shoulder, where the barn owl is perched. She lets out a screech of pleasure as her beak is scratched and then flies away off Yaz' shoulder taking to the dark skies above.

The druid then turns to Fae, when she arrives:

"I can't believe you killed those Wise Guys, Maire'," he says.

Then he thinks about it:

"Actually I can't believe you got lightning out of the sky, with no clouds...! How the f***'d you do that?"

Yaz isn't the only one to have questions to ask now that there is a little breathing space before the Nyemetz start to check out the inn.

Winnacer looks at Porter incredulously:

"What were you doing? You've brought disaster on us for no reason and you barely escaped with your life."

Winnacer catches himself and takes a deep breath:

"I just want a reason. A good solid reason why we are on the run again."

Porter simply responds:

"Act like a pro and talk to me about it when we've got time."

"I don't have much else to do," Winnacer replies. "So let's hear it."

Porter looks at Winnacer like he's an idiot:

"Don't have anything else to do? You just going to stand around and wait for the Nyemetz to arrive?"

Yaz looks frustrated:

"Okay, Civs, tell ya what. I'll take the horses outside of town, to a nice forested spot where I can watch the road. I'll wait there for you. Hours, days, I don't care. Take your time."

Fae looks at the others as she steels herself for the new argument she is about to start with the whole lot of them:

"A'fore we go trompin out o tha city, I do be havin business I canna leave unattended. Why don't tha lot o you just go wait somewhere while I finish?" Fae says in her typical annoyed sounding voice.

Winnacer responds by giving her one of her 'just do whatever you want because I can't be bothered to argue with you and you know damned well that there's nothing that I can do to stop you in any case' looks.

"I've got business to attend to as well," adds Porter, "so I'd rather find a place to hole up in the city than leaving now."

Porter pauses for a moment and then suggests:

"Shouldn't one of these churches be grateful enough to help us out? Or how about where that woman is staying that Rowan is guarding? That sounded like a good safe house. With Yaz spell, we shouldn't bring anyone back with us."

"We'll have to find some other place to meet up, as I'm sure that the goblins have got the gate covered and so it will be unwise for any of us to enter the city proper until the fuss has died down," Winnacer replies to the pair of them. "So this rules out heading to any of the churches as a meeting point because they are all on the wrong side of the gate."

"I suggest that we all meet up somewhere else in Tall Town later."

"Well then, let's all meet up at Snehurka's warehouse," Porter replies. "It's the only place that any of us know in Tall Town other than the 'Boar's Head'."

"Fine," Faewen'il says with a shrug and then heads off away from the inn.

Porter looks after the departing magess and then returns to glare at Winnacer:

"Time for me to go too," he says. "See you later."

"I don't see that we need to use the non-trail making ensorcellment any more," Yaz says. "Now that no one's dripping blood anywhere and there are foot and hoof-prints everywhere anyway, I can't see that there's any way in which they can follow us."

He pauses and then thinks for a moment:

"In fact, I don't see why I need to get out of town at all. I haven't got anything to hide."

"I'll be up in Winn's room," says Yaz. "See how my kid's doin'. See you guys in a few hours."

Winnacer glares at Yaz as he turns around and re-enters the inn, leaving Winnacer stuck with the all the baggage and Melchior.

The young Lord rolls his eyes and then looks at Melchior and then at Milan:

"Milan, I think that we need to make a quick trip to Litultovitze to drop off our luggage," the young Lord says to his squire. "The trip to Litultovitze is less than a day. We can ask them to hold our supplies and the Wise Guy until we return then head back to Opava. We should be back before midnight."

Milan gives a shrug:

"Whatever you say Lord Stradheim," he says.

Winnacer nods and pats Milan on the shoulder:

"We're going to need another three horses if we are going, because this one is already loaded," he adds. "Could you head around to the stables and bring them out?"

"There might be some goblins around there, but hopefully they will not suspect a lad such as yourself. If they ask any questions then just tell then that you are the stablelad that needs to exercise some of the horses. If anything goes wrong, then activate your armor and shout for me."

"OK," agrees Milan, and then he heads back into the 'Boar's Head' in order to get the horses.

For a while, Winnacer is left alone with the very confused looking Melchior who is still well bound and is unable to make his escape.

After a few more minutes, Milan rides around the side of the building riding one of the horses and leading two more. He looks a bit concerned as he hands the reins of the other two to Winnacer:

"I think that we better go quick now, Lord Stradheim," he says. "There are lots of goblins around the back of the stable now. More than twenty of them. They're starting to go through all the buildings around where the fight happened asking questions. They asked me about it too."

Milan grins:

"I pretended that I wasn't very clever and didn't understand them and they let me go."

Winnacer cannot help but smile as Milan says this.

"But after I opened the door to the stable they started searching in there. I reckon that they'll be through the inn any moment now."

"We must leave right away then," Winnacer says. "Help me to get the Wise Guy over the third horse."

Milan dismounts and between him and the LawBringer, they manage to lay him over the saddle.

The pair of them are just climbing into the saddle when five goblins appear through the reception armed with swords and short bows:

"STOP YOU," one of the goblins shouts in bad Bohavian.

The thought of waiting for the goblins to close so Milan can get some practice runs through Winnacer's mind, but he thinks better of it:

"Armor up and let's go," Winnacer says as he hauls himself into the saddle. He slaps Milan's horse once the squire has the reins of the chest bearing horse, then makes to leave with the prisoner-toting horse in tow.

As soon as Milan gets into the saddle, he shouts out 'Fabio' and the clothes immediately morph to form full plate.

"STOP, STOP!" the goblin shouts as they start to make off. Seeing that they have no intention of stopping at all, the goblin barks out an order and then the squads immediately takes their shortbows from their shoulders and fire a volley at the swiftly departing riders.

Milan is slightly behind the others and gets most of the volley aimed towards him. A couple of arrows ricochet off his platemail harmlessly, but another of the arrows hits the horse's flanks badly.

The horse whinnies with the sudden pain and rears up. Milan struggles to keep control of the horse, but he was taken by surprise and falls off, landing painfully on his back. As he falls, he looses his grip upon the reins of the horse carrying the bound Melchior and the horse starts to gallop away following Milan's now riderless mount, which has started to run for its life.

Winnacer looks around to see four of the goblins drop their bows and surge forwards towards the prone squire. The goblin doing the shouting originally runs into back into the inn shouting at the top of his voice.

Meanwhile, after leaving Winnacer and Milan with the evidence, Yaz walked back into the inn and headed up to knock on the door to Winnacer's room. A few moments later, a very nervous Yosef opens the door. He looks highly relieved when he sees that it is Yaz:

"Oh, Mr. Yaz," he says. "I'm glad it's you. I thought it might be the goblins."

Yaz walks in and sees that Maria is sat on the bed with Baby Yaz lying next to her. The druid walks over to the bed and sits down next to the boy and lights a Nemotz smoke:

"You want one?" he asks Yosef and Maria.

Maria politely declines, but Yosef readily accepts the smoke.

As the two of them puff away, Yaz speaks with Yosef:

"About that name you gave the kid, Yo," Yaz starts. "Yaz isn't much of a name. I been thinking you could change it a bit, to something better. Like... Yazhua. Howzat? Yazhua's a nice name, and it's got that Yaz thing in there, if you wanna keep it. Also sounds kinda like the druidic word for 'the innocent one'... The trees and plants and animals all have their own names, but in formal druidic and in our prayers we preface the names with yazhua to make it more, like... regal or something."

He pauses:

"It's not really yazhua, it sounds more like a gust of wind through the trees, just like the whole language really, but it's close enough."

Yosef shrugs:

"What do you reckon, Maria?" he asks her. "Sounds pretty good to me. Sounds kind of posh."

Maria smiles and nods her head:

"Yazhua," she says to herself, testing the word.

"Yes, I like the sound of that. It sounds formal, but he can still be our Baby Yaz," she smiles.

Further conversation in Winnacer's room is interrupted by the sound of loud knocking the door:

"OPEN DOOR MUST YOU. CHECK WE MUST YOU," a voice behind the door says in the high-pitched raspy voice that can only be coming from a goblin.

Yosef looks towards Yaz a little nervously:

"I suppose that we better open it," he says. "Hopefully Mr. Stradheim was right when he said that we've got nothing to worry about."

Yosef walks over to the door and opens it. Two goblins look Yosef up and down for a moment and then barge into the room. They look at Yaz, and then Maria and the baby and then start to search the room more carefully. They soon see the caskets of gold, frankincense and myrrh and are curious about them, as the caskets are very ornate.

"What this?" one of the goblins asks everyone in the room.

Before any of them have a chance to answer, they are all interrupted by the sound of the scuffle outside as well as goblin shouts. The two goblins immediately stop their investigation of the caskets and head for the windows. Seeing the ruckus in progress, they quickly open the windows and take their shortbows from their shoulders.

Down below, Winnacer quickly hooks the reins of the horse carrying the plague box and gunnes around the pommel of his saddle, draws 'Old Bohavia' and then wheels his horse around and surges towards the goblins, looking to slay them all before they have chance to take out Milan.

As he does so, the goblins realize that dealing with Milan will have to wait for a while as they draw their shortswords and prepare to meet Winnacer's charge.

The young Lord charges in hacking to the right and left of him with 'Old Bohavia', easily hacking two of the goblins to pieces. Unable to reach the LawBringer above them, the remaining ones try and bring the horse down, with one of them inflicting a slight wound on it.

Upstairs, meanwhile, Yaz follows the goblins to the window to see what's happening. When he sees that it's Milan and Winn who are in trouble, he directs Gertrude to fly in the face of one goblin to disrupt its shot. Gertrude is a short distance away, however, and so the goblin archer has chance to let off a couple of arrows at the young Lord before the owl manages to interfere with his aim. With only his back and breast plates to protect him, one of the goblin's arrows manages to cut the young Lord slightly in the thigh.

While Gertrude flies towards the first of the goblins, Yaz goes up to the second of them as he shoots another arrow at Winnacer that flies high above the young Lord's head.

The druid then clumsily tries to gives the other a shove out the window. Unfortunately for the druid, the goblin sees him coming and sidesteps out of the way of the druid with such swiftness that it is as much as the druid can do to avoid falling out of the window himself from the momentum.

The goblin immediately drops his shortbow and draws his sword, screaming at the top of its little green lungs for assistance.

Down below, Winnacer's warhorse decides that it has had enough of being poked by goblins and lashes out at the two greenskins with its hooves, smashing the skull of one of them in the process. Atop the horse, Winnacer brings 'Old Bohavia' crashing down upon the last of the goblins, easily cleaving it in two.

The young Lord calls out to Milan:

"Get the chest away, I'll meet up with you later."

Milan gets up off the snow-covered ground, looking a little dazed. He quickly heads for the horse carrying the chest and gunnes and starts to mount.

Four goblins appear from the upstairs windows of the inn and send a volley flying towards the pair of them. Arrows bounce off the armor of Winnacer and Milan, but neither of them is injured. Two arrows pierce the flank of Winnacer's mount, however, and the horse is starting to look pretty injured.

Winnacer was sure to have some words with his colleagues after this was all over.

Back upstairs, Yaz quickly draws his magickal scimitar and lashes out at the goblin before him, but the nimble goblin manages to dodge again and counter-attacks with a lunge from his shortsword. Yaz manages to avoid taking any damage from the attack, however, thanks to the protection of his magickal bracers.

At the other window, the second goblin immediately drops his bow as Gertrude starts fluttering in his face, hooting loudly. The goblin draws his shortsword and lashes out at the bird and Gertrude narrowly avoids losing a wing as the shortsword shears a couple of feathers from her. The owl panics after her close shave and heads for the skies leaving the goblin to turn his attention to Yaz.

Maria is starting to scream now, clutching Baby Yazhua close to her. Yosef is paralyzed by fear. Alerted by all of the shouting, another goblin comes through the open door of the room and draws its sword ready to take on the druid.

Back outside, Winnacer and Milan prepare to make a quick getaway now that they are both in the saddle. The four archers in the upstairs of the inn as well as two more that have appeared in the doorway of the inn all quickly take a shot at them as they depart. The volley of arrows flies towards them, with most of them falling well short of their targets. One of the arrows, however, manages to find a chink in Milan's platemail. Already badly concussed from his earlier fall, Milan slumps over and falls from the saddle, hitting the ground yet again. He doesn't move; blood starting to seep from his wound into the gray snow beneath him.

Winnacer looks back in horror seeing that not only is Milan down but that the horse carrying the plague box and gunnes is galloping away. The two goblins at the entrance to the inn drop their shortbows and start to run towards the once again prone squire.

Upstairs, Yaz is oblivious to the combat, finding himself with three goblins to contend with. He manages to cut one of the goblins slightly, but not sufficiently to fell the greenskin. The three goblins lash out at Yaz with their shortswords, but luckily none of them can find a way through the druid's defenses.

Winnacer leaps off his mount to tend to Milan's wounds quickly. His horse stands idly by as Winnacer quickly rips a strip from his jerkin and stops the blood from pouring from Milan's shoulder.

As he does so another volley of arrows flies towards him with three of them finding their mark, injuring the young Lord quite badly.

Just as he finishes, the two goblins get to him and start to attack the young Lord with their shortswords. Winnacer manages to dodge one of the thrusts but, only wearing his back and breast plate, the other one manages to cut him badly. Winnacer stands over Milan's body and quickly draws 'Old Bohavia' once more, ready to reap his revenge upon the greenskins.

At the sound of battle breaking once again through the night air, Porter told Fae to hold on and headed back to the 'Boar's Head'. Fae, never one to listen when people dictated things to her, turns around and heads back with him as well, muttering under her breath about incompetence. As the pair of them sees the fray in full swing, Porter realizes that return fire won't do a heck of a lot good against the goblins who have good cover in the windows. Instead, he draws his bastard sword and dashes toward the Inn. As he reaches it, he sees two goblins rushing out, brandishing their shortswords, coming to reinforce those upon Winnacer.

The bounty hunter charges towards them, easily hacking the swordarm off the first of them, killing the goblin easily. He tries to follow up by slashing at the second, but the greenskin parries and thrusts at Porter, nicking him slightly.

Fae sees the four goblins in the windows looking for new targets. Quickly, she starts casting before spreading her fingers and aiming towards three of them. There is a flash of light as three bolts of pure magickal energy fly from her outstretched fingers heading towards the archers. They each hit their marks. One of the archers falls from the blast, while the other two scream out with pain.

Looking for some payback, the three surviving archers send a volley towards the magess. Well protected by her many magickal protection devices, none of the arrows hit her.

Back inside Winnacer's room, Yaz tries to keep the three goblins upon him occupied and away from the Kristus family. He lashes out at the injured goblin and easily cleaves his lucky scimitar into the goblin's side, felling it quite easily. The other two try and strike back at the druid, but one of them misses totally and Yaz manages to dodge away from the other's blade.

To Yaz' annoyance, another goblin, alerted by the sound of the continuing melee enters the room to join the fray.

With Milan now out of danger, Winnacer tries to concentrate on finishing the two goblins upon him as quickly as possible. His fury is effecting his concentration, however, and neither of his blows connect with his foes. The two goblins strike back, with one of them cutting him slightly from a glancing blow.

Porter tries to take out of the last goblins before him, but the goblin manages to dodge the blow. In return, the goblin manages to cut into Porter's thigh quite badly.

Upstairs, Yaz continues to slug it out with the three goblins. A good thrust from his scimitar takes down another one, but the other two strike back at him. Once again, however, the goblins are not having the luck that their comrades outside are having and the pair of them both miss.

Not wanting to stand around getting shot by the archers, Faewen'il runs to get behind the cover of a building. Another volley of three arrows flies out after her, but all of the arrows hit only the ground behind her. As she reaches the safety of the edge of the building, she can see that two goblins are running towards the gates of underground Opava.

Winnacer lashes out once again at the goblins before him and hacks one of them to pieces. The remaining goblin tries to hit him, but Winnacer's breastplate saves him from harm. With a mighty blow from his bastard sword, Porter fells the last goblin before him. Before he has chance to move, however, two more goblins run out of the inn and thrust at him. Once again, Porter proves to be something of an injury magnet, as he is unable to parry the thrusts and both blades pierce him. Porter is starting to look badly injured once again and is starting to regret telling Yaz to use the last of the healing spells upon Melchior.

Upstairs, the sweat is starting to pour from Yaz' brow as he tries to finish off the last of the two goblins. Once again, his lucky scimitar lives up to its name as he fells a third goblin. The last of them lashes out at the druid once again but Yaz' magickal protection saves him from harm yet again.

Winnacer lashes out at the last of the goblins before him, anxious to finish it off quickly and get Milan out of danger, but once again, his fury is effecting his concentration and the goblin is able to dodge his awkward blows. The goblins strikes out in response, but Winnacer easily manages to parry the blow with his shield.

Porter strikes out at the two new goblins that are upon him. Having little better luck that Winnacer, neither of his strikes finds their mark. The two goblins lash out at him with their shortswords, but the bounty hunter manages to parry one with his bastard sword and easily dodges the other.

Upstairs, Yaz tries to finish the last of the goblins upon him, but his recent string of good luck comes to an end as he misses the goblin by a wide margin. The goblin strikes back at him and, once again, it is only the druid's magickal protection that saves him from harm.

The young Lord continues to battle with the lone goblin below, but again the goblin manages to duck under the blade of 'Old Bohavia' avoiding being hit. Spravedelna works in mysterious ways, however, and, as the goblin raises his shortsword to strike the young Lord, it manages to hit itself on the head, knocking him unconscious.

As the last goblin falls, Winnacer immediately picks up Milan's body to put him on the horse. With Winnacer without an opponent at the moment, another volley flies out from the three remaining goblin archers and one arrow catches the young Lord in the calf.

Porter continues to battle with the last two goblins outside the inn, but his run of bad luck continues and the goblins manage to avoid the bounty hunter's clumsy attack. The goblins fare no better, obviously tiring now, as their shots miss Porter by a wide margin.

Upstairs, Yaz is also tiring and he continues the group's run of lousy luck by missing the last greenskin badly. The greenskin takes advantage of Yaz' misfortune and manages a small cut upon the druid's arm.

Winnacer puts Milan's unconscious body upon his horse and then hauls himself into the saddle. Another volley comes from the archers and one of the arrows hits the LawBringer in the arm. Thankfully, however, the already badly injured horse is saved from any damage. Winnacer immediately spurs the horse on and it dashes around the corner of the inn, out of the archers' field of fire, leaving the scene of the combat.

Porter and Yaz are still locked in combat, however. The bounty hunter manages to find some of his former form as he hacks deep into the flank of one of the goblins, sending it falling to the floor. As he tries to finish off the second of them, however, the bastard sword slips out of his hand and drops to the snow-covered ground beneath him. The last goblin tries to take advantage of his misfortune, but Porter just manages to dodge out of the way of his blade.

Upstairs, Yaz continues in vain to rid himself of the last goblin, but the druid is very tired now and he misses once again. The goblin does not fare much better and almost stumbles as he continues to press the druid.

As Porter reaches down to retrieve his bastard sword, the goblin strikes again, but misjudges its thrust and nearly tumbles itself. Porter quickly retrieves his bastard sword and gets ready to take out this goblin once and for all.

Yaz finally manages to get a hit upon the last greenskin. Although the wound is only minor, the goblin is a small one and it falls to the floor to join the rest of its kin. The druid pauses for a moment and hears that there are goblin voices coming from the next room. He quickly leaves the room in order to take care of them.

With bastard sword once more in hand, the now furious Porter lashes out at the last remaining goblin with abandon, and finally hacks it to pieces. As he too pauses to catch his breath, a volley of three arrows comes heading towards him from the archers in the windows. One of them manages to catch him badly in the stomach, injuring him badly.

Porter knows that he is very weak indeed now and so heads back into the inn, looking to find Yaz and get some more healing from him.

Yaz enters the first of the rooms as one of the two goblin archers within cackles with delight as he manages to hit Porter with a good shot. As the pair of them start to nock fresh arrows he starts upon the first of them. Managing to catch the two goblins unaware, killing the first of them is easy. As the first of the goblins expires, the other quickly drops its bow and draws its sword, to start lashing out at the druid. Yaz' magickal protections saves him from harm once more, however.

Porter rushes upstairs to try and find Yaz. He passes an open door with a goblin archer in it first, however. Seeing that the goblin is already wounded from Fae's magickal missile and has his back to him, Porter quietly walks into the room and thrusts his bastard sword through the goblin's back and then heads on to carry on looking for Yaz.

Yaz is in the next room. He quickly manages to take out the last of the greenskins that has already been badly injured by another of Fae's magickal attacks with a well-aimed swipe of his lucky scimitar. Just then, Porter appears in the doorway, looking like shit and panting badly.

"I think that's all of them now," Porter says.

"For now," Yaz says, "but we took our time about it. I gotta believe that more are going to be heading this way very soon."

"We need to get the hell out of here," Porter replies.

Yaz just nods:

"Yeah," he replies. "You better help me get the Kristus family away. I hate to think what will happen to them if they are found in a room full of goblin corpses."

Yaz and Porter turn around with swords in hand as they hear someone coming up the stairs. Just as they are about to take out the intruder, Faewen'il comes through the door looking concerned:

"There were at least two goblins that got away and are headin for tha city," she says. "They left a few minutes ago an so they could be back with reinforcements any time."

"I nae be stayin around here to save ye again as I nae be havin much in tha way o spells left. I'll see ye at Zosia's warehouse later."

And with that she heads out of the room and out of the inn.

"The good thing," Yaz says to Porter, "is there were no survivors who saw us. Winn's gonna be the guy they're after. But I guess if anyone saw us with him, then..."

"I can get into the city if you can, but I think it might be safer to hide in the trees outside of town. At least there I got spells to keep us alive if we get into trouble. But it won't be too comfy for the Kid."

"Where's Zosia's warehouse? What do you think?"

Porter answers:

"The warehouse ain't far at all, and Rowan should be there, so that'd be an extra hand. If the woman and child can be moved, let's get going. Otherwise, we're going to have to find another room for them and hope they're alone."

"OK," agrees Yaz. "Let's do it."

The pair of them steps over the greenskin corpses and walk next door into what was previously Winnacer's room. Yosef is consoling a sobbing Maria, although he too looks as white as a sheet. He seems to be speechless. Baby Yazhua seems to be oblivious to the carnage of the past few minutes and is sound asleep.

"We need to get outta here before more goblins get here," says Yaz.

"O-OK," stammers Yosef. "If you can take the baby, then I'll help Maria."

Yaz nods and then takes Baby Yazhua in his arms once more.

Yosef looks at the caskets of gold, frankincense and myrrh:

"What are we going to do about those?" he asks.

Yaz looks at the caskets and then at Porter:

"Whatsyername, d'ya think you can carry those?" he asks.

The manhunter lets out a quiet curse and shakes his head before sighing deeply:

"I suppose so."

He picks up the caskets and then turns to the others:

"Right, that's enough messing around. We need to get out of here now before the place is crawling in goblins."

The group heads downstairs with Porter leading the way ahead of Yaz and Baby Yazhua and Yosef and Maria. As Yaz follows him down the stairs, he sees that the badly injured bounty hunter is dripping blood with every step he takes:

"You're doing it again," he says. "Well I haven't got any more of those masking spells and I'm all out of healing now."

"Shit," replies Porter. "We can't lead them to the warehouse."

Yaz thinks for a moment:

"I guess I'll have to use the staff on you."

He reaches behind him and pulls out the staff of healing. He touches the tip against the worst of Porter's wounds and a bolt of green light shoots from the tip of it before flowing over Porter's body. Once the glowing light disperses, Porter is still some way from full health, but it has served its purpose in that he is no longer dripping blood.

"Right," Porter says. "Let's go."

They head down the stairs and Porter passes a very shocked looking innkeeper.

The bounty hunter smiles weakly:

"Sorry about the mess," he says. "We'll make it up to you."

"Serves you right for killing the tree, you prick," mutters Yaz.

They head out to the stables to grab the remaining horses and Porter leads them to the door after dumping the gold, frankincense and myrrh on one of the steeds. He opens it a crack and peers out. He can hear the sound of a great deal of activity heading from the mouth of the entrance to Opava proper, but there is no sign of any greenskins outside the door.

He turns back to the others:

"Follow me," he says and then heads out into the snowy streets once more with the others following closely behind the horse.

Porter then leads them on a circuitous route around the side of the building and through the streets of the town. Every time he comes to a break in the buildings, he stops the others and looks around. He can see that there are now goblins swarming all over the 'Boar's Head' like a plague of locusts. There are at least 40 of them there now. Luckily, at present they seem to be devoting their attention to the inn and its immediate vicinity rather than the whole of Tall Town.

Porter quickens the pace, heading for the dockside area. After a little under five minutes of swift yet cautious movement, they can see Snehurka's warehouse before them. They get up to it and Porter quickly knocks upon the door.

For a couple of minutes, there is no sound from within and so Porter knocks again, more anxiously now as he can hear from the gabbling behind them that the greenskins are quickly widening their search.

The door finally opens and they see Snehurka's face through a crack. Her face is not quite the color of driven snow at the moment, as her cheeks are flushed and her hair, as black as ebony, is rather tussled. She has a blanket draped around her:

"Oh," she says as she sees you and the horses all before her. "We weren't really expecting any visitors. Do you think you could come back later?"

"No we freakin' can't," Porter replies. "We've got half the freakin' garrison looking for us and we've got a kid to look after too."

Zosia looks over and sees Baby Yazhua sleeping soundly in Yaz' arms:

"Oh, well in that case you had better come in then," she says, opening the door wide.

Porter leads the horses into the entry hall and the rest follow him in. As they all file in, Zosia checks that no one is observing their entry and then bolts the door firmly behind her.

"You had better come with me to the Council room," she says, leading you into the room with the seven little chairs surrounding the little table upon which are seven tiny plates, seven tiny forks, seven tiny knives and seven tiny spoons.

"Please try and make yourselves comfortable," she says. "I need to ... errm ... get dressed properly."

With that she heads out of the room. As they wait in the Council Room, they can hear whispers from outside, following a few quick curses. A few minutes later, Rowan appears in the doorway, combing his hair. He doesn't seem to be any more pleased to see them than Zosia was:

"We really weren't expecting you today," he says. "What happened?"

Porter sighs:

"It's a long story," Porter sighs.

He nods to the Kristus family:

"We found them in the stable, with Maria in the process of giving birth," the bounty hunter continues. "Then some characters turned up that wanted to cause harm to the kid and then a fight broke out. We killed all the bad guys, but in the process we alerted the garrison and only managed to get out of the inn after a fight."

"We need somewhere to stay now. It looks as if most of the garrison is looking for us."

Rowan shakes his head:

"It's St Vaclav's Day," he says with some amazement, "can't you lot stay out of trouble for just 24 hours?"

Before they have a chance to reply, Zosia re-emerges looking a lot more presentable. She heads down the stairs and comes to Yaz. Her frown turns into a warm smile as she sees Baby Yazhua:

"He's lovely," she says, stroking his head. "Can I hold him?"

Yaz looks at Maria who is looking very tired as she sits on one of the seven tiny chairs, being comforted by Yosef:

"Sure, I guess so," the druid replies, handing the baby to Zosia.

Zosia starts to bounce him up and down in her arms making cooing noises at him.

Rowan just scowls at them all and sighs:

"Merry St Vaclav's Day to you all too."

Porter says to Yaz and Rowan:

"One of the horses got loose and took off. Winnacer headed in the same direction, but I don't know if he got the horse or not. Rowan, why don't you see if you can find it?"

Rowan just folds his arm:

"Having uninvited houseguests is one thing, but acting as the houseguests' stable boy is quite another," he replies frostily. "It sounds as if you lost the horse and saw where it sent, so why don't you go and get it yourself?"

Porter snaps back at him:

"Hey, dirtbag, you've been getting laid while I've been getting cut to shreds by Nyemetz and worse. Get your ass out there and find that horse."

Rowan doesn't take very kindly to this at all:

"Carry on like that and you'll find yourself sleeping under the trees tonight," he replies.

Porter looks really irritated at this but only mutters to himself:

"Worthless piece of crap," as he walks away.

Fae mutters something in dwarven to the equivalent of "up yours".

Returning after a short while, Porter has changed clothes and disguised himself, now sporting a full beard and looking older than he really is. He tells Yaz:

"I'm going to see if Winnacer got that horse and check on the situation around Tall Town. I'll be back shortly."

"I'd better go too," says Yaz, "gotta try to find Gertrude, she's gonna be pissed at me. Um, can you guys leave a window open or something? I'll be back, like, whenever, hopefully."

Zosia looks up from where she is playing with Baby Yazhua:

"Certainly," she replies. "It will be right at the top of the warehouse. We need to make sure that this place looks deserted."

With that, Yaz turns into the form of a barn owl, with an orange shock of feathers on its head, and flies through the open door Porter leaves through.

Within just a few minutes of exiting the warehouse, Porter is relieved that he disguised himself as he sees that Tall Town is swarming with goblins. They are working their way out from the inn, going from house to house, barging in on the festivities of the occupants of Tall Town, and searching each of the houses carefully. He decides to take a look at the gates to the undercity, but sees that there is a company of twenty goblins on guard there, and more in the towers. The greenskins on the ground are practically strip-searching anyone trying to enter Opava proper. Most of the potential visitors to the city decide that their trip down under is not that important and head back to where they came from.

While Porter scurries through the snowy streets keeping tabs on the progress of the Nyemetz, Yaz has a scout around as well, from the air. Within just a minute of being airborne, Gertrude flies in to join him and starts hooting at him. As Yaz guessed, the owl is not at all happy at the moment, moaning about how she lost a lot of feathers trying to divert the attention of the goblin archer and came within a whisker of losing a wing. She tells him that she's never going to pull a stunt like that again and that he'll have to take better care of her.

Yaz tries to calm her down, but Gertrude continues to sulk. OwlYaz tells Gertrude that he's going to try and find out what happened to Winnacer and Milan. Gertrude tells him not to bother, as she saw Winnacer head out east to where he picked up the horse laden with the gunnes and the plague box that had galloped right out of Tall Town. Gertrude tells him that she saw the LawBringer and his unconscious squire heading south from there, but didn't bother to follow him.

Yaz still suggests flying after Winnacer to make sure that there are no patrols following him, but Gertrude still seems to be reluctant to go, saying that she hasn't seen any signs of any patrols and that, had the goblins got any worgs with them here, then she would have heard them by now.

She does mention, however, that she saw that the bound Melchior got picked up by the greenskins earlier and carted off into the city.

Not really caring too much for the entire thing, Faewen'il finds a place as far from Rowan, Zosia and the Kristus family to sit and scowl. The only good thing about the whole mess was that she still had spells with which to escape if the goblins came calling. Using her Witchfinder gear would be touchy at best and she would rather save that for the last if it came down to it.

At seeing that there is no easy way of getting into the city without the use of magick, Porter reluctantly heads back to the warehouse and speaks to Faewen'il:

"The goblins have got the entrance to the city locked up tight," he tells her. "It's going to take some kind of magick if we want to get in there tonight."

The magess shakes her head:

"I nae be havin the right spells for such a trip today. In any case tha inn probably be shut for tha damned holiday. We be havin plenty o time iffen tha LawBringer wants to be waitin here for tha New Year. It be better to wait until tomorrow when I can be reading up new spells."

Porter sighs:

"Oh well, in that case I might as well just stay here and try and allow my wounds to heal up a bit."

He returns the rest of his weapons to his charm bracelet and takes off his disguise and spends the rest of the day trying to find a way of sitting where his wounds don't hurt too badly.

Meanwhile, in the skies up above Tall Town, OwlYaz and Gertrude descend to the open window of the warehouse where the owldruid tries to patch things up with Gertrude by bringing her a fresh rodent to eat, and saying sweet owly things to her, like:

"Honest, baby, you don't look fat in that at all," and "I dig the way you hoot at me."

Gertrude responds by giving Yaz the silent treatment, looking him in a way designed to inflict the greatest amount of guilt - a skill that comes naturally to the female members of any species.

When it becomes obvious that no amount of smooth talk isn't going to get him anywhere, he takes to the air again, spending the remainder of the day flying, circling Tall Town and practicing his flying technique while Gertrude remains in the rafters of the warehouse, sulking.

The afternoon wears on. In the middle of the afternoon, there is a knock at the door and the sound of greenskins outside. Everyone inside grabs their weapons and waits to see what happens. Zosia, however, looks unconcerned:

"It should be OK," she whispers. "This place looks derelict from the outside and none of the other warehouses are occupied. If we all keep quiet and don't panic, then they should go away soon."

There is another knock on the door and then a silence. Then, much to their relief, they can hear the sound of footsteps heading off.

For the rest of the afternoon and evening all is quiet. Zosia cooks up a quick meal for everyone, which they eat in silence. Tired after the exertions of the day, Yosef and Zosia soon fall asleep, leaving Faewen'il and Porter, Zosia and Rowan to their activities.

Meanwhile, Yaz still flies over the city as the sun descends and darkness falls over Tall Town. He watches the activities of the goblins below with interest, seeing them finishing off their house-to-house searches early in the evening. He notices that they have set up roadblocks on the two roads in and out of the city and are stopping the very few travelers that are attempting to leave or enter the city.

Slightly later, he sees a small cart drawn by ponies coming out from the gates of the undercity containing six goblins. One of them is dressed in rust colored robes while the three goblins with him are dressed in half plate and look particularly mean. The pony cart heads through the streets of Tall Town and takes the east road out of the city, disappearing into the darkness.

OwlYaz continues to fly over the city, noticing how his eyesight is improving the darker it gets. He keeps an eye out for the return of Winnacer and Milan, remembering how Winnacer said that he would probably be back before midnight. However, despite flying for the entire evening and waiting until after midnight, scanning up and down the approaching roads to Tall Town, there is no sign of the young Lord and his squire.

Yaz' wings are getting tired now as well as cold and so he decides to call it a night. He heads back to the warehouse and enters through the open window in the rafters. Upon his return, he sees that all of the others have already given up on waiting for the LawBringer's return and have headed off to sleep. Yaz finds himself a comfy rafter and roosts for the night next to Gertrude, who seems to have forgiven him now.