Red Larch is a little town on the Long Road, a few days' travel north of Waterdeep and south of Yatar. It's a way station for caravans coming to or from the cities of the North, with only one in, the Swinging Sword. An important delegation from the city of Mirabar disappeared in the nearby Sumber Hills. The whole down is abuzz with news and rumors of fierce raiders, roaming monsters, suspicious strangers and unseasonable weather. At the far end of town, six unusual individuals stand at the entrance of town. You all met a few days ago on the Long Road; for one reason or another, you all were making your way through the Dessarin valley. Figuring with all the bandit and monster activity of late, you all decided safety could be found in numbers and during your trek through the valley have become light acquaintances. You little groups has reached the first stop of your adventure in the run down town. What do you all do? 

"Finally, some kind of civilization!" Fadi says as soon as the town is visible. "I would love to have a cold drink, a warm meal, and a soft bed. Do you guys wanna do anything else before that?" Although he talks on being tired, his walking pace doesn't reflect that. His skin, green with a slight hue of blue, is as colorful and alive as ever; his long ears, tied togheter by a pair of bronze earings, bounce up and down as he walks - he tends to walk more on the tip of the toes, making he look like he's almost skipping. That looks even more curious as he wears a heavy chainmail and a bronze-stained shield.

"What more could we ask for, after a good, long walk like that?" Valen says. The goliath stretches his ashy grey arms over his bald head and fakes a yawn. His unbuttoned red coat flaps freely in the wind, purposefully showing off his chiseled torso. He briefly adjusts his the belt on his fox hide pants before winking at the group. "Think we've all earned a good night, aye?"

Kalhiri still gets nervous around civilised places. Clogged streets and buildings everywhere, too much to keep track of. The serene wilderness with its open sky, its clean air and soft soil, offers everything she needs and almost all that she wants. “Guess, you all earned that special rest. I, for one, already can’t wait to leave this place behind us.” She sighs as they enter the town and her yellow eyes dart around trying to pierce one back alley shadow after the other. Her lean muscular build is all tense and posed for defence just short of drawing her weapon, too. “Ugh, how much I hate these large settlements.” 

Pyre-Winder winds down from the cloudy sky where he has been providing coverage for the travelling band, in truth soaring is a lot less work than walking especially with the state of his joints. " A fire does sound nice, perhaps a little indulgence won't go astray."

He folded his wings and kept his head on a swivel as they headed in, aware that their group would attract attention and perhaps not all of it would be friendly...he ground his beak a little as he walked....

You all (I assume) make your way to the Swinging Sword, the towns only inn. It isn't hard to find being the largest building in the town. Standing at thee stories tall, this stone inn houses stables and travelers. The innards of this building are warm and inviting, a fireplace making the colors inside much brighter than the dampness of outside. You all walk into the common room of The Swinging Sword, which is stunningly empty; The only people in here are is a single maid cleaning tables, a single half orc in armor who looks bored out of his mind, and a middle aged women with raven black hair sitting at a table in the front of the room going over some papers, she spots the six of you and chuckles. "See Ghileeda, I told you someone would come in today. Adventurers!" She waves "Can I offer you a room, a drink, or both?"

Torfric is hard to miss. His wild swoop of beigy hair crowns a face that, even at perfect rest, has a certain manic gleam to it. His lean figure is made bulkier by a scale hauberk layered beneath a great black coat, festooned with an eclectic array of tools and eye-of-newt sundries.

"There is a certain liquor most taverns seem to keep," he says, to...someone? The innkeeper? He is fiddling with something, and has not looked up from it for some time. "It doesn't have a name, as such. It doesn't need one. The concept defines it, not the recipe, and you know when someone's looking for it. It's swallowed in a single gulp, because flavour is never the drinker's concern. It's cheap, but so foul that none would call it a bargain. It fought tempestuous legal battles to avoid being classified as a poison. When a shambling husk of a man slumps onto a barstool, and he looks at you with his sunken, haunted eyes and croaks 'Get me a drink', somewhere behind your counter is a bottle you reach for without even having to think, something that will help him forget just enough to keep him from madness. A spot of that, if you would."

The item that engrosses him is a severed hand. Desiccated, leathery, smaller and stubbier in proportion than his, perhaps taken from a goblin. He prods and picks at it with some thin, sharp implement, his lurid green eyes tightly focused.

"It's not for me," he adds, absently. "I'm quite sane."

"And an ale," Valen simply adds with a wink, after his companion has described his drink.

"We in the off season or something?" He asks, looking around the room.

Pyre-Winder fluffed up his feathers and settled his head down into his shoulders as they entered the establishment.

" Rooms....I think three should be sufficient?", he said counting out coins as he cocked his head.

" Something sweet for myself in terms of drinks."

“Make it another,” Kalhiri adds to Valen’s request. “Ale,“ she quickly adds as images of nasty spirits flutter through her mind.

”It’s quiet here, huh? Guess, we’re lucky.” While waiting, she makes herself comfortable on a chair at one of the tables, one near a window.

"Make it 3!" Fadi adds after his companions asked for ale, while looking out of the corner of his eyes towards Torfric. He's also intrigued by how empty the place is, but just waits for the answers to questions already asked.

 After taking in the lot of you, the woman smiles. "Rooms and drinks then!" The women chuckles. "Glad to meet you all. It's good to see adventurers around these parts, things have gone belly up these last few months. I saw an owlbear walked into town a tenday ago. And that delegation that vanished." The woman shakes her head. "All of this had been terrible for my business. Not many people traveling with all these foul happenings." She glances down at her papers again, from a quick skim, the Swinging Sword has not been breaking even this last month. She looks up at you all again. "Where are my manners?" My name is Kaylessa Irkell, I own this place."

A tray of drinks you ordered is placed down on the table. A young server woman hands you each the drink you ordered. "You know I have a cousin in Beliard," she says "He says he saw the delegation enter in the morning and that's the last place anyone's ever saw em'. Can you believe that? That a whole group of people can just disappear?" 

"Thanks!" Kalhiri takes her ale and nips from it. "They vanished? Like overnight? " She inquires at the maid, "Couldn't it be that they just left in a hurry and didn't tell anyone? What were they here for anyway?"

"From what I've heard, hey stopped at Beliard, were making way  to Summit Hall, but never arrived. Just vanished along the long road." 

Fadi takes a long, slow sip, with a sounding "ah" after it. "I'm Fadi, nice to meet you. Do you think the owlbear and the delegation vanishing may be related, or just a streak of bad luck around here? Either way, we should track down that beast..."

Listening to this story, Valen lifts one eyebrow. "And how far is it to this, Summit Hall?"

He looks to the rest of the group, "If it ain't too far, I'd say our rest could wait just a bit longer. Rest of you game to hunt some game?"

Pyre-Winder nodded with a weary look.

Kaylessa chuckled "Well Summit Hall is on the other side of Sumber Hills and is a three day walk from this town, so I'd say that a rest here would be in order first." 

"I should very much like to meet the wizard who thought to mash owls and bears together and unleash the spawn on the world. But in lieu of that, I'll settle for the spawn itself. One can learn much of a person from their works alone."

Torfric takes a whiff of his nameless rotgut hooch, recoils in nose-wrinkled disgust, then nods to himself, tipping a few drops into a small glass vial for goodness knows what purpose.

"I don't suppose you've any notion of who comprised this delegation? Their numbers? Were they mostly human? If owlbears played any part in their disappearance, they may prove...difficult to identify."

Kalhiri is uneasy when her companions call for a hunt, "But did it do anything? The Owlbear I mean. And you said that was ten days ago? Might well be that it was just lost, got scared and went back to wherever it came from. I'd be more worried about this disappearance of folks on a street, that sounds deliberate."