Our group went to the Phandalin Miner’s Exchange, where we exchanged some of our booty for coin, and had a chance to make an accounting of our newly-acquired collective wealth:
- 600 cp & 125 sp & 93 gp
- plus an IOU from Hallwinter for 60 gp.
Halia Thornton had less information than I had hoped, but I like her. She too wants to see the Red Brands destroyed, and has pointed us like a knife at their leader, a man named “Glasstaff”. For a handsome reward, she seeks any correspondence we might find within their hideout, Tresendar Manor, an old mansion at the edge of town.
Thanks to a tip from a local youngling, we were able to stealthily breach the cellar of the Red Brand hideout this afternoon. Deceptively dressed in their own garb, we brought merciless doom upon this benighted cohort of scarlet varlets, and liberated their four captives. Three were unremarkable humans, of uncertain age and gender, but the fourth was a psychically-gifted, one-eyed creature: a strange but ultimately reasonable beast whom the Red Brands had evidently been starving to death… the scoundrels! These filthy Red Brands had so fouled these grounds, they had even awoken the dead in the Tresendar crypt!
After putting the accursed undead to rest, and sending a handful of humans and three more bugbears across the Styx to join them, we recovered much wealth from the ruin, including:
- three platinum Tresendar signet rings (3 x 50 gp) from the family sarcophagi;
- 75 cp, 55 sp, 22 ep, 15 gp, and a gold earing (30 gp) with a tiny ruby from some unlucky Red Brand gamblers.
- From the three Bugbears in the lair, we earned 33 silver and a jewelled eyepatch worth 50 gp
- From the traitor Iarno “Glasstaff” Albreck’s chest, we retrieved 180 sp, 130 gp, and a silk pouch with gems: 5 carnelians (10 gp each), 2 peridots (15 gp each), and a pearl (100 gp).
The monks scrounged some treasure from somewhere in the ruin as well (28 sp, 15 ep, 12 gp, and a pair of 10 gp garnets)… I also took a fancy Dwarvish tome, with a pamphlet telling of “Lightbringer,” a magical mace made by Lathanderite priests, gnomes, dwarves, lost in the mines of Phandelver, from the wizard’s library, along with orders to local apothecaries, and a letter signed by “Black spider” which confirms Glasstaff’s identity.
Finally, we brought our haul back to the inn to rest and recover from the day’s successful adventure, and encountered Sildar the Indolent. I delighted in bearing the bad news that his dear friend Iorno is the traitorous villain Glasstaff. Broken inside, Sildar was forced to finally acknowledge our group’s supremacy with a proper reward: 200 gold pieces… though, he made no mention of the 60 gold he still owed us for transport to town. I won’t press the matter at the moment, but will instead give him time to grieve for the friend he has lost. This journey has produced more wealth for our little party than I dare say any of us have seen in our lives.
Thanks be to Beshaba, Maid of Misfortune: your seeds we sow, your bounty we reap! Klaatu barada nikto amen.