Gunra straightens up, visibly taxed.  He needs a moment to catch his breath before he can speak.

". . . tough. . . earth.  Any of you. . . shovel?"

He drops into a sitting position with a graceless 'thud', then notices the wolf.

"Bury one then leave the others for scavengers?  If that wolf has a pack nearby. . . it would muddle the wounds, erase our combat."

Kane notices the wolf and stays still. He nods to Gunra. “Okay. Well bury one and leave the rest. Animals got to eat to I guess. The hole was taking too long anyway. Thank you for helping me. He tries to signal Nurm, Petmailer and Harmony about the wolf.

Petmailer notes the wolf and says quietly "Yes, I agree with you.  Let's sneak off now, continue on the trail toward the camp."  Petmailer quickly gathers his things and starts to go..

You walk away from the place, the wolf ignoring you in favor of scavenging.

Following the trail, you find a path amongst the plateaus. The plateaus jut fifty to one hundred feet above their surroundings and are difficult to climb except where rock falls and subsidence created natural ramps. The crumbling sides of the plateaus are dotted with caves and tumbled boulder fields. Still no sight of the towers Ignar told you about, but this definitely seems like a good enviroment to hide cultist activity...

You may want to take this opportunity to RP a little, if you'll like. The camp might be around this area.

Kane walks around, looking for any sighs of cultist. But he looks saddened and discouraged. He misses Leyding. When he saw her in that cage...he became furious. He liked her, and she liked him. But he shakes his head. He needs to focus on the mission. Find Milo. Find the masks. Find the eggs.

Petmailer muses as we walk along, "I fear for how this will turn out.  I'm thinking over and over in my head how we should approach, what we should do... but I'm not sure that it will do any good.  Our task seems hopeless."  He seems rather dejected.  

"I miss Helviraena.  I miss sitting out at night on watch, with nothing but the moonlight above me, everything dark, and quiet.  There is too much noise here, too many fights and not enough quiet.  I came from nothing, grew up on the streets, I know that I can't expect much from life, but I am worried about the path that we are on."  

He looks for footprints, signs of any passage, and tries to stay hidden when he can, avoiding being in the open.  

Hamony moves up in the group so she's next to Petmailer, slight spring in her step ever-present. "You know, if I've learned one thing, it's that the odds are only impossible if you think they are. I've done a lot of stupid things in my life, and not all of them have worked out, but the ones that did weren't because I doubted myself." She smiles to herself, as if reliving fond memories. "I miss home, too. But I think we're all here for a reason. This needed doing, and fate decided we were the ones to do it."

As you talk, you see that the footprints you have been following has led you to a path leading to the hollow of a rocky plateau. The lower portion of the plateau rises gently from the surrounding land, but it quickly steepens and ascends above the landscape. Boulders form jumbled heaps at the bases of the cliffs. The level shelves and top of the plateau are covered in long grass, and brush and scrubby trees grow in patches.

Petmailer, when you look up, you manage to see the two guard towers just in time: One on the north of the plateau, another to the east. These towers are 20 feet high and made from rough timbers lashed together with rope. From where you are, you can't see if there's watchers up there right now, but they are large enough for a few lookouts.

Listening closely, you hear distant voices and what sounds like people working.

Adventurers, what do you do now?

Gunra sizes up the landscape, considering the situation for a few moments.

"You're definitely right, a frontal assault is suicidal " He points to the thick grasses and shrubbery around the hollow. "Thick vegetation. They wouldn't build a camp in a valley like that if rain was common. The grasses might burn easy. If we all spread out and start a wildfire, they will be trapped. Some would live. Most would not. Their supplies would be devastated."

He then points out the boulders.

"Those rocks did not grow there.  Steep slopes, weak soil.  The cliffs will make it hard for them to come out and fight the fires, moreso when the vegetation burns away."

Petmailer points out the guard tower and points them to an area out of view.  They quietly discuss the next step.  "I think a grass fire is an excellent distraction Gunra.  How should we make this happen?  Does anyone have any oil or any way of generating that degree of fire?   Should we try to circle around and approach from another side, away from the guard towers?  We could approach from the south or the west."

Harmony follows into a more hidden spot, keeping her voice low. "I have a way to just-" she snaps her fingers "-and create a small fire. It would take a while, but I can do it as many times as I need, and probably eventually get something bigger going. If anybody has oil or fuel that would help the process along."

You move to an out-of-view area, closer to the camp but out of the sight of the guard towers.

As you plan the fire, you get a look into the camp: There's circular huts made from closely spaced wooden or bone poles covered in hide, mud, and sod. Those in the mouth of the hollow are crudely built and decorated with animal skulls. 

You see the cultists, who have gathered at the center of the camp, watching something. Only the humans and human-like cultists have gathered like this: Most of the kobolds are busy with manual labor, and even the few who are amongst the crowd are either guarding something or are trying to blend in to get to see what the rest of the cult are seeing.

You hear a female voice speak to the mob:

"Watch this and remember it well: This is what happens to those who betray the cult!" The voice speaks. "Do not get the wrong idea. He gets to live for now only because our Lady in Black wants him to live, this is his punishment! Any of you won't be so lucky..."

“Hey, Petmailer. You still got those disguises? Maybe you and I should sneak around for a bit..get some Intel.” Kane looks around the group, trying to see what the punishment is. 

Petmailer pulls out his cultist robe, he has a spare, and others have stored them as well.  "Perhaps we should all put these on.  What if we prepare a grass fire as a backup plan / escape plan, but plan to go forward as new cultist initiates to try and get more information?  I think that might work the best."  Petmailer makes sure that everyone has a cultist robe.  

Yes, that is a good plan, we should gather as much information as possible, before we burn the camp down. I am willing to go inside, I might be able to persuade our kobold "friend" to be useful. We should be careful thought, so we won't be recognized. I think the cultists are now quite familiar with some of our faces.

"Another option is that we could send 2 of us in cultist robes up the watch tower, the old "shift change" ruse, and scout out the camp from up there.  There is some risk with that, but it could allow us to view what is going on.  Or we could all just march into camp with cultist robes on, "New recruits, nothing to see here."  Any other ideas?"  Petmailer looks to you for thoughts about how to get into the camp without bloodshed (most of all, ours).

"The fire can be a backup plan but I do not think we should separate at the camp.  It is too big, too dangerous, and the last time I stayed behind, someone got captured.  Taking out the watchtower makes sense.  Wearing the cloak will let you get close enough to the tower without raising the alarm."

Gunra begins to scrounge around nearby, searching for any easy tinder but not leaving the immediate vicinity of the group.

It seems you have arrived as the speech was finishing, as now the group of cultists have begun to scatter. The cultists seem both elated from what they had been told and still exhausted from the raid. With the crowd of people no longer obscuring your view, you finally are able to see the person who was speaking, and perhaps more importantly, who they were talking about.

You see a woman wearing with boyish short, dark hair, wearing purple robes and holding a halberg. She orders a cultist to keep watch on the traitor and to not let anyone do anything to him: The 'Lady in Black' wants him alive when she comes here to the camp.

The prisioner, who appears to be the 'traitor' they are talking about, is Leosin: The monk is tied to a stake and he has been severely beaten.

The woman in purple walks towards the caves and disappears from your view. The guard beckons the people still staring to go back to their huts.

"Splitting up doesn't seem like the move here. It's probably a good idea to-" Harmony begins to speak when her eyes catch on Leosin tied up in the center of the camp. 

"You've got to be kidding me. Are we going to have to rescue him, too? Because if we are, I don't know how long we have until this 'Lady in Black' shows up for him. If we spend time taking the watchtower, we might be too late." She seems irritated at the prospect of pulling the monk out of the bad situation he created for himself. Nevertheless, she starts tugging on a cultist robe. "Let's just walk in. Most of these people don't seem that smart to begin with. They're tired. They're disorganized. Hopefully if we don't draw attention to ourselves, they won't pay us any."

"I agree with you Harmony, let's put on our robes, prepare as best we can, and just walk in together.  Perhaps you can do the talking for us Harmony, and we can help as needed.  We can send a message to Leosin as I did before and see if he has anything to tell us.  He will be guarded and it may be difficult to get him out.  But perhaps we can still accomplish what we came to do, he may be able to help us yet.  If we play our cards right, perhaps we can escape with him as well."  Petmailer starts to prepare himself, he has skill in disguising himself and he puts on the cultist robe and gets ready.