With the beast cult of Medusa all around, and a formerly trapped Goddess of Pain and Suffering on the loose, the group decided to beat feet north to Zhind. After several days of travel, with fresh food supplied by Tamil’s snares, Tamil’s love of rabbit got the better of him. Once fine morning, while he was off checking snares with Belsham on his makeshift peg leg, he was ambushed by the same bounty hunter that nearly nabbed him in Strea-Tarl. And according to a beaten and bruised Belsham, Skull-man had some friends with this time! A beastly Wemic, a cleric of Travel, along with whom Belsham thought was an unwilling Delayna and Rudy! Delayna, the thief formerly with the group from the Desert of Exile, was battered and left behind. She shared how Skull-man and the Cleric forced her to help find Tamil else they’d have killed her right off. Rudy, a fledgling bard (renown for the infamous ‘poopin of the pants’ in the recent past while facing the Amethyst Dragon) shared how the bounty hunter was after Tamil for the murder of a former adventurer turned merchant in Zhind. She thought the name of the victim was Hubin Weign. The group rode hard, but couldn’t gain ground on the Skull-man and his cohorts over the next days.

While chasing Skull-man, Yanni’s recently procured spellbook started shaking and rumbling, as did Valeska’s similarly gained flute. Once these objects became very hot and were shaking violently, both adventurers threw them away from the group, and tremendously huge explosions blew the two items into bits. A few hours later, along the northbound trail, the group ran across Judas, a huge gaping wound in his neck and enough bloodstains that would make the Tarresque proud. After stabilizing him, the group did a bit of reflecting. Since Judas was the one that told them originally about the Wizard/lich that Yanni, Tamil and Valeska visited on a side adventure, and he was wounded now, the group concluded that for some reason, items given to them from this lich has suddenly failed to be. After animated brainstorming amongst priest, wizard, warrior and rogue alike, the group concluded that the lich had been destroyed. But what could destroy a lich? The group concluded that only the newly freed goddess of pain could complete such a feat. A goddess freed by them. Someone then thought about Tamil, and wondered how he might fare from such an explosion, as he also had an accouterment on his person from the lich.