As Alaina draws a fistful of arrows from the brazier of green flame, they spark and smoke with incendiary magic before settling to a lustrous colour, just barely catching the light in new ways that draw the eye and that they did not before. 

Gudrune places her axe in the flame (gaining +1 to her greataxe for 3), while Capone pats his robe down for anything he might place into the flame but comes up empty. 

When Lorken leads the way, after their short rest, the party follows the satyr back into the cavern with the dry waterworks and wheel. 

In the center of the room the shards that formed the Flameskull crackle and spark and smoke with green flame, then come together all at once. The Flameskull rises up. Whole again. 

It turns in the air, performing small circles, drawing strange runes in the air... or drawings-- 

Drawings of people, one in front of the other, one bent at th---

It cackles soundlessly as it watches your eyes trace the pattern in its flames and your expressions change in disgust and realisation. 

"You broke my things, but you can't break me. Imp's gone. I don't see why I should play with you until I get my things back." The Flameskull's bright gaze lingers on one bisected Zombie for a moment. Then it cackles and turns in loops and somersaults again.  

Jayson says, "I think it's trying to raise the zombies again.  I think that's the same green skull we fought in the other room folks.  I think it's tied to this thing here. Perhaps there is some mystical magic that can stop it from regenerating.  We need to kill it again it seems like though first."

Jayson finds cover and prepares to blast it.  

"One moment, Jayson!" calls Lorken. "It doesn't want to play, which I think means we don't need to fight right now. Live and let... well... exist?" To the Flameskull, Lorken says, "No hard feelings, I hope? Who's this Imp you mention?"

The Flameskull's dark eye sockets spark and flicker with sinister green flame as Lorken and Jayson talk, its teeth a rictus grin. It cackles and spins as the Satyr finshes, somersaulting erraticly through the air and streaking across the cavern.

"No hard feelings

, no soft feelings

no feelings at allll    -- not for the dead. Not for the wizard's imp, no, no, no. Always spying, always watching."

With that simple statement, the Flameskull streaks over your heads and into the passage back towards the Forge of Spells, veering around the corner and out of sight. 

Jayson looks on adding, "Mmmm. What's the plan now?  I think I spied an illusionary wall in the last big fight room.  It might have been just for hiding some zombies, but it might be more than that.  We should check it out.  Are we following after them or is there a different direction we're going?  Are the magic items claimed for?  I'll take em if no one else is claiming them."

Gudrune takes the time to use her superior darkvision to look around the full extent of the large cavern and inform you all of the routes onward which you can take, if you have the courage to keep chasing deeper in to the lost mine after the troubles you have faced. 

Jayson says, "Follow me to the northwest area just before the hallway I think there was an illusion of a wall there.  Let's search out the area."

Jayson leads the group where he thought he saw something before they rested.

Alaina takes a thorough look around the area. (Perception 15, Investigation 18)

You find nothing but the accumulated grime of centuries of dust and chipped masonry, the bones of the long dead and the corpses of the recently vanquished, and an unusually intact water wheel in an empty concourse, though it is slimy and blackened, and were it to move again or endure any force it would surely break.

“Perhaps the magic was an illusion of the imp’s, to conceal it, or the method by which the leader of those Raiders escaped us,” the little sorcerer suggests, as he joins the Ranger in her investigation.

His small-but-certainly-humanoid-and-flesh hands clank against stone touching solid wall as he feels for any illusion that might otherwise be insubstantial, to no luck. Eventually he claps his hands together to rid himself of the dust and returns to the other, having checked nearly all the room (everywhere he can reach at least).

Jayson spent time during his rest to examine the mace and breastplate.  Putting them in his bag of holding or equipping them as noted he'd take them if no one claimed them.

Jayson shakes his head, "Oh well.  It must have been just temporary.  There is a path south and the one west that the ruffians took.  Which way folks."

Jayson gets his gear sorted.

(1. There's also the path north via the watercourse. There's also another north path via the room with the Forge of Spells. Just FYI for choices.

(2. You have time to identify 1 item in your short rest, or to attune to it/identify it in the same action. Which do you want to do, and with which of the two items you mentioned? There's also the pendant you took from Halsin's corpse.)

Alaina looks up and says, “My intuition says to take the northern course, by the water.”

Jayson says, "What's most likely more useful to the group.  The Mace, The Breastplate or the Pendant" 

That is the one I will identify only...not attuning it.

"Alright Alaina let's follow the water then. Everyone ready." Jayson either leads on or stays in the original marching order.

"I personally can't use the arms and armor, and frankly, don't like the look of that pendant."

Lorken signals his assent with Alaina's plan, raising his lantern and starting to make his way as quietly as he can beside the empty watercourse.

(Stealth 18)

Just before leaving the chamber, though, he turns to Jayson and asks: "Were you able to work out that pendant at all? It's oddly fascinating."

The pendant is cold to the touch, painfully so. It chills the hand that holds it until it feels almost like the pallid flesh of the grossly unwell ... shortly after their illness is concluded. The magic that fills it however, is strong, and vivacious. Though half the pendant depicts a face with grey flesh, the other half shows the skull beneath riven by old blows and fractures that heal before your eyes, even as other blows appear. 

While you wear this pendant, your skin becomes pale and cold to the touch, and you regain 5 hit points at the start of your turn if you have at least 1 hit point.

Gudrune leads the troop into the watercourse on the far side of the decrepit water wheel. The watercourse is so long dry that it is no longer even damp, dry as a bone and as rough and brittle under foot and hoof as the skeleton's bones that you had just fought. The dwarf puts one finger to her lips as she edges forward and points at something as you round a corner. 

Ahead of you are two bug bears digging through piles of scree with their hands while on a ledge overlooking them opposite where the old watercourse emerges a drow supervisor peers down at them. 

"Dig, dig," it hisses. "The spider's divination says it is down there, so dig, you worthless roughnecks!" 

Jayson whispers to the others, "Maybe take out that drow and the Bugbear will be amiable to help us out or tell us a bit about what they're doing. Thoughts?"

Jayson gets ready to blast the drow once the team decide how they want to go at this.

"I'm all for it," whispers Lorken. "Although there's not much I can do from this far away. I'll be ready to intercept the big fellows if it looks like they want to get involved."

So saying, he flattens himself against the wall at the end of the passage (just north of Gudrune's position) making it easy for the ranged fighters to pass him and potentially set up a devastating surprise attack.

Alaina nods, and tries to take up as concealed a position as she can without sacrificing a good shot on the drow.

Jayson moves in marching order and goes stealthy possibly.

Jayson Stealth:  11 

To get into position to fire on the drow or cast a spell possibly.  He will wait for the others to be ready before attacking if that is what they want to do.

"I'll sneak up a bit and use my eldritch blast on the Drow if we are attacking or if we have another plan I'm ok if you got a different idea."