The Gathering Storm Part 3: Two Rude Awakenings

As the party slept deeply and recovered from their wounds, they were awakened by the sound of marching feet and an excited crowd outside the Thunderwater Inn. Kessler had swiftly rounded up the guilty parties, the Holtz family and Cobblepot, who were marched in to the centre of Stromdorf in iron chains. The servants of justice quickly realised that this was little more than a lynch mob, and although unscrupulous, the Holtz family had actually acted in league with their mutant child to stave off the threat of the beastmen.

Rushing in to the town square and shouldering their way through the baying throng of locals to the front of the crowd, Magnus protested that the family should not be out to death based on the prejudices of the mob. Although heard, the wizard's protests were shouted down by the superstitious locals, and Kessler ordered the death of the conspirators and cohorts of chaos. The head of the Holtz clan demanded trial by combat. It was now the turn of the dwarf with no name to step before the crowd and bravely volunteer. After one last attempt to persuade Holtz of his folly, the two fighters battled to the death with the dwarf emerging triumphant. Following his defeat, the rest of the clan and Cobblepot were hung by the necks. Justice had been done, but not quite in the way that the servants of justice had intended.

However, this was not the last that the servants of justice would know of the Holtz clan. In the dead of that night, the party were awakened by banging on the Thunderwater Inn door. Quickly preparing themselves they ventured downstairs, to be joined by Shaft who had also been staying at the inn. As the inn door buckled, splintered and finally crashed in, a shambling horde poured in to the tap room. Briefly alighted by the muzzle flash of the innkeeper's blunderbuss, the now four heroes stood grimly together as the corpses of the Holtz and Cobblepot were revealed! Animated by some dark necromancy, the corpses were once again put to rest by the combined arrows, axes and magic of the party. Bonded in battle, Shaft and the others vowed to stand together against whatever evil had been awakened.

Emerging in to the town and peering through the dark and rain, illuminated by the now omnipresent lightning was an old, bearded scholar making his way through the town square. This individual turned out to be Professor kopfchen. Kopfchen's anatomical skeleton had also been brought to hideous unlife by the dark power that appeared to have swept over Stromdorf. The dwarf shattered the mocking skeleton with a single swing of his great axe, and the servants, now united together returned to the Thunderwater Inn.