In addition to the bandit hunt, the group was asked to visit the great oak east of the covenant and collect the available herbam vis and instructed them in the ritual to perform at sunset to locate the vis. To enable them to carry out their tasks, Jana provided the group with texts of the spells Compass of the Dismembered Limb and Gather the Essence of the Plant. After collecting a squad of grogs, the group set out for the tree, arriving late in the afternoon. At dusk, Marcus performed the ritual as prescribed and was drawn into a faerie regio, giving him access to the tree's vis-laden fruit. Unfortunately, the text of Gather the Essence of the Plant had been left with Coelia, denying him access to it, but Coelia's quick thinking saved the day (literally) as she improvised a spell to share her eyes and allow him to read the text through them.
The group then located another cluster of trees in which to make camp with less concern for faerie interference. In short order, Keterlyn, patrolling the area in wolf form, spotted a squad of troops approaching. Gunnar rallied the grogs and set out to intercept them and identified them as guardsmen from Rodenberg, drawn by the racket of unruly grogs. They were ultimately turned away by Marcus and sleep followed soon after.
After breaking camp, tent poles and canvas became an improvised litter for Coelia, allowing her to maintain concentration on her Compass of the Dismembered Limb while traveling and they set off through the woods. Shortly after noon, the lead grog, Pessolt, was narrowly missed by an arrow fired by an unseen archer as the archer's companion was heard fleeing through the underbrush. The second arrow stuck in Pessolt's armor as he alerted the rest of the group, then the archer also fled, only to be run down by Keterlyn and interrogated by the magi (with a little help from Kristianus and his axe), ultimately agreeing to take them to his commander and see if an arrangement could be worked out. The bandits' other sentry had arrived first, though, so the group arrived to find the smoke of recently-doused fires and, when Heinz-Dieter was sent ahead to investigate, he found a camp full of men in the process of donning thier armor and taking up weapons while their captain apologized to a mysterious rider whose horse was draped in black cloths.
(Players: Marcus and Rulant (Tron), Coelia and Winand (Darrel), Gunnar (Rykna), Keterlyn (Karen), Stephke and Kristianus (Tyler), Pessolt and Nicklas (Ryan), Tado (Tarin), Heinz-Dieter (John), Salmey and Sascha (unclaimed))
The opposition force was divided into two squads, a squad of 8 younger, but more heavily-armed men with a leaf and teardrop device in the process of donning moderate-to-heavy armor, and a squad of 7 men mostly in their mid-to-late 20s with lighter armor and weapons who used an orange lynx as their symbol.
Riesenstreppe's force immediately charged to engage the lynx squad, ignoring their prisoner (also of the orange lynx) as he fled into the woods. Gunnar rushed the enemy's captain, easily dodged a crossbow bolt, and severed his leg on the first blow, then turned to attack the rider as Keterlyn advanced to support him. He slashed across the horse's flank as it tried to flee, but the horse and rider vanished into thin air before he could finish them off. Meanwhile, Keterlyn took two solid blows and was quickly sent running into the woods, badly wounded. Gunnar turned and entered into an evenly-matched battle with the leaf squad's leader.
The grogs and magi took on the main body of the lynx squad while Coelia kept the leaf-wearing men in their tents with the illusion of a great bear. Isolated from their allies, the lynx squad was outnumbered, outclassed, and quickly fell, though it was not without cost to Riesenstreppe, as Pessolt lost his left leg and Nicklas was struck dead.
Coelia's illusion fell when an arrow wound broke her concentration and the leaf squad finally emerged, but they quickly lost half their number as the one-handed warrior, knowing he was in no condition to fight, fled into the woods, then two archers were ensnared in a Weaver's Trap of Webs, and a fourth was lost to flight after Coelia instilled the Panic of the Trembling Heart in him, though she was then forced by fatigue to retire from the field.
The leader of the leaf squad, seeing that the day was lost, attempted to surrender to Gunnar, but the grog captain refused to allow it and Kristianus cut him down as Gunnar's greatsword slipped from his grasp. The remainder of the squad surrendered to the others as soon as their leader had fallen.
(Players: Marcus and Rulant (Tron), Coelia, Winand, and Gunnar (Darrel), Keterlyn (Karen), Stephke and Kristianus (Tyler), Pessolt and Nicklas (Ryan), Tado and Salmey (Tarin), Heinz-Dieter (Darrel and John), Sascha (Tron and John))
While the senior grogs tended to the group's lesser wounds, Keterlyn, still a wolf, nosed around the camp and discovered an unnatural smell upon the bandit captain. She brought Marcus to examine further and he discovered four items upon him which were touched with minor magics: an enchanted bear claw on a necklace; a small Kuttrolf vial made of pale green glass, apparently empty, yet stoppered and sealed with a thin layer of wax; a hollow egg of darkly-smoked glass; and a medicine bottle containing a thin yellow fluid. These items were, of course, collected for future investigation.
After seeing to the security of the prisoners and ordering the dead to be buried in a mass grave, Gunnar searched the camp for further valuables. In addition to the various weapons, armor, and camp supplies, he also found three chests holding a total of a little over 12 pounds of silver and determined that, though heavily battered, the captain's helm and mail shirt were of exceptional quality. He kept the helm for himself, while the mail shirt was given to Sascha as, of all the grogs, it fit her most comfortably.
The decision was made to spend the night in the bandit camp and watches were posted. Shortly before dawn, the last two surviving members of the lynx squad made themselves known as a longbow shaft pierced Rulant's side, but, fortunately, his armor absorbed the worst of its impact. The ambushing bandits were quickly located and dispatched by Rulant, Sascha, and Gunnar.
Morning saw the seriously wounded strapped to the bandit captain's horse and the day was spent returning to Riesenstreppe. Along the way, Coelia spoke with the prisoners - a slightly difficult task, as they knew only the Frisian language and not the local German - and attempted to convince them to join the covenant's turb. To her surprise, they were quite willing to do so, being largely unconcerned with who they fought for or against, so long as they got to fight.
After placing Pessolt and Heinz-Dieter into Theophilus' care, Marcus, Coelia, and Gunnar reported their success to Jana, who dispatched Rita to visit Herr Schenck in Minden and arrange for additional shipments of supplies to the covenant now that the immediate bandit threat had been dealt with.
(Players: Coelia, Winand, Marcus, Rulant, and Kristianus (Darrel), Keterlyn, Tado, Sascha, and Heinz-Dieter (Karen), Gunnar, Stephke, Salmey, and Pessolt (Rykna))