(Darn it's just out of range...  Thanks!)

"No, no, no," Aluzira says running over to Fluin.  "You didn't have to that!" she yells angrily at the lady.  She kneels next to Fluin and rolls him onto his back, swatting away the midges before tearing off a piece of her tunic to tie around the spear wound.  "Why didn't I buy a healers kit?..." she mumbles to herself, wishing she had one.

Medicine: 22

Torrent continues to run to Fluin, using Shape Water to swish water around in the area surrounding Fluin to disperse the midges before fully approaching him.

It's going to take the better part of a minute for Torrent to reach Fluin, running across the marsh.

Thanks to Aluzira's healing skill, Fluin's condition stabilizes, yet he remains unconscious.

The lizard continues to flee the scene, headed back towards the eaves of the wood to get out of sight.

Ulben, you can hear the woman in the wood just over 35 feet away from you. What do you do?

"who are you!? Do you know Thea!?" Ulben yells at the voice.

"I am Festinate Runner of the Bright Spirit Kin," says the voice, loud enough for all to hear. "I knoweth not this Thea of which thee speaketh. Thou hast been warned! Hunt on our land and suffer the same fate that did befall thy cousin!" And with that she creeps back into the wood, evading everyone's notice.

Anakis, you're now closest to the toad, which stands 85 feet from you, about to spring away across the marsh. What do you wish to do?

"I'm not hunting! These giant toads are dangerous and hurting people!" Anakis yells as she continues after the toad, willing a fire bolt into her palm before throwing it at the toad (Attack: 18 Damage: 7) (moving her full movement to follow the toad).

Your throw misses, and the toad makes another great leap, slipping and falling in the mud where it lands 90 feet away from you.

Torrent, Aluzira, Tarek, Ulben, does anyone have anything they want to do while Anakis pursues the toad?

No

Tarek will try to stop Anakis from hunting the toad, but figures that she would know what is best for herself. After this, he'll call out toward the voice, "I apologize on behalf of my kin here; they can be stubborn at times."

(Just a reminder, Anakis is a kid/teenager and a street urchin, so she's going to act out differently to authority.)

Torrent tries to call out to Anakis, attempting to calm her down so she doesn't get too far away from the group.  "Kid!  We need ta stop.  We'll get 'em later.  We got a bunch this time.We gotta take care of our own!"  

Aluzira will stay where she is but is ready to run after Anakis if she keeps running.

Anakis stops and turns around to Torrent. "Fine," she pouts, "but we almost had that one."

"I know, kid. Ya did good. Trust me, I want to cull em all, but it's not worth getting you or Fluin killed over it. "

(Sorry for the long delay between posts. I've been a little busy over the past couple of days.)

The giant lizard continues to scramble away through the frozen muck, back the way it came, and darts into the dense wood. The giant toad wearily hops away across the marsh, leaving tracks in the mud, until eventually the contours of the land hide it from your view.

Two of the great toads now lie dead in the wood, and Fluin lies unconscious on the domed mound. There is no sign of the other toads that escaped into the wood or the strange woman, except for her spear that still lies near the eaves of the wood where it fell after it hit Fluin. The spear is adorned with feathers and a small crystal knob that hangs from a braided chord. It appears to have once belonged to a door. By spending an hour searching carefully through the dense wood, any thrown or dropped weapons can be retrieved, except for Fluin's javelin which stands embedded in the frozen surface of the pool.

A few hours remain until sunset as the bog gets steadily colder. Anakis and Aluzira are parched and in need of water before the end of the day, or they will risk becoming exhausted, and no one else has water to spare without risking exhaustion themselves. To find fresh water, someone will need to go in search of it.

The bright sun remains in the sky for now, however, reflecting off the icy surface of the pool as calm settles over this corner of the Clouded Bog, providing a moment to reflect on the events which have just transpired. What do you all wish to do?

(No worries! ^^)

Aluzira will sit on the domed mound for a moment, running everything that happened through her head, only serving to fill it with more questions.  "What should we do now?" she asks, standing up, saving the other questions for later.

"Welp.  As angry as I am that they got away, we did a ton ta try ta balance out the Bog.  Perhaps we encouraged them ta be scared'a people."  Torrent looks around, seeing the condition of his allies.  "We need ta breathe and heal.  What was that village you wanted to go see?   Also what happened back there?  We had ''em and all of a sudden Fluin's on the ground"

"The village was called Fallshade, I think.  It's to the West, somewhere," Aluzira replies.  "During the fight, while you and Anakis were ahead going after the toad, Tarek, Fluin, Ulben and myself, were going after the lizard that had started chasing you.  While we were, one of the bog-men came and told us to stop.  She asked if we had seen the markings, that this was Bright Spirit Kin's land, and trespassers weren't allowed to hunt here.  Both Tarek and I had stopped, Ulben hadn't gotten very close yet, but Fluin continued to go after the lizard, not wanting it to hurt anyone.  I wasn't able to persuade him to stop, so she threw a spear at Fluin just before he ran into a swarm of midges.  The last thing she said was that we weren't to hunt on this land unless we wanted to suffer the same fate.  She called herself Festinate Runner of the Bright Spirit Kin.  She also knew that Fluin and Ulben were cousins somehow..."

"I think before we do anything else, we should clear ourselves with the Bright Spirit Kin, you know, try to work things out with them. Then we can stop by Fallshade," Tarek weighs in.

"Yeah, I'd also like to know why my hunt was interrupted."  Torrent says, disgruntled.