They find themselves in a large hall with candles and a small table and a lot of doors. Yegods! They are back to the beginning. This time they open a different door and exit into a large and very well tended garden. The gardeners do their best to ignore them and the soldiers are alert but not intrusive, The group wanders about then decides to exit the garden area. As they do so they encounter the garden’s owner
- The Queen. She comes with her royal procession and attendants and the statue of the white rabbit, the march hare and the mad hatter. The group is wrangled into a game of royal croquet, played with hedgehog balls and flamingo mallets.

The game is brief, for the group quickly tires of being bombarded with a prickly hedgehog and tries to quit the game. This angers he queen and she shouts for a beheading.as the group flees into the wilds. A brief encounter with the Smilodon Cat convinces them to seek refuge by the seashore until the hubbub dies down. Along the way they meet a talking griffon who enlists their aid in helping regain a lost treasure for his friend the ex-turtle. The group readily agrees – apparently being more vegetative makes them more agreeable as well – and they embark on the mission. They eat the glowing purple seaweed and hike out into the unknown waters of the apparent ocean.

They encounter a grotto filled with large and angry crustaceans and there is a pitched underwater battle. Eventually the lobster-y threat level is reduced to tolerable and the treasure is plundered. Some pearls and a chalice and a few verdigris’d coins and a flask for the turtle. They return to the shore, return the flask to the turtle and are approached by an emissary of the Queen, who wants them to return immediately to the game of croquet to which they have been invited.
the group RSVP’s to the request by stabbing the messenger to death on the beach.

They decide to leave the area and venture further along the coast.
Eventually they come across a small cove that has a longboat moored within. As the group debates the wisdom of venturing out into the unknown ocean, the sounds of queenly pursuit soon help them to decide in favor of the less immediately life threatening unknown as opposed to staying and facing the might of the queen’s guard armed with a few knives, a sword and shield. Off they go into the water and out to sea.
the further from shore the they travel, the foggier it becomes until soon they cannot see beyond the oars. The sound changes as though they were sculling through a large cavern. They row on….

Suddenly they spy a shaft of light that pierces the gloom and illuminates a large rock in the water. They beach the boat and climb onto the rock. As they gaze into the light they are ‘vacuumed’ into the sky – to reappear in a lake that spans the entrance room in which they first arrived. The difference this time is that there is a large circular opening in the ceiling of the room that was not there before.
The group moves to investigate and is once again whisked into the sky
- this time to ‘fall’ into the nighttime desert. Upon arrival, they are greeted by the enraged Tomorast.

The battle is brief and deadly, but it turns out that the rules lawyering is not in vain. Immediately the group activates various anti-magic protections and moves to engage the demon-wizard. He melees with the group and drains many life levels, and inflicts terrible damage, but beyond Feebleminding Dalliance he cannot cast many (any?) spells. As the saying goes, the pen is mightier than the sword, but the sword is mightier than a wizard without spells and eventually the daggers do the job as the whole group plays mr stabby with Tomorast.

Although the loss of levels will cost dearly, the group is relieved to be alive and back on their normal plane of existence. They camp in the desert for a few days until Dalliance can teleport them back to Waterdeep (or more likely – Shadowdale so the group can recover their items). It seems as though the arc of their lives involving Tomorast is over…at least for the time being. Wizards are pesky, and dead wizards are often even worse.

Humbar engages and is attacked from behind as more skeletons use their power of teleportation to menace Dalliance. Dalliance responds with an Undeath to Death and clears some space. Humbar battles on grimly, but is nearly slain before he uses his Silveryfire to restore health.
Reza moves past Dalliance to try and stem the flow of the attackers and Humbar manages to turn several before being wounded. The part watches as Bud is run through several times by passing attackers.
Then the ‘leader of the pack’ appears. A sumo wrestler sized lizard shaped like Andre the Giant (with a tail) and sheathed in shimmering scales. It exchanges magic missiles with Dalliance, and several skeletons try to shoot her as well. Her Brooch of Shielding turns out to be a handy thing to have. She tries another Undeath to death with mixed results. More attackers teleport between Reza and Dalliance and Lubbitch steps into the breach.

The battle presses on, and a pair of lizard induced fireballs roasts the hapless villagers in their cells and slays the berserk Humbar.
There appear to be reinforcements on the way and Dalliance falls back.
She focuses on the imposing figure and finally manages to land a successful Disintegrate spell as Lubbitch takes a flurry of blows that culminate with having the side of her head bashed in and she dies…again. Dalliance summons a quintet of zombies to intercept the attackers and Barada readies his spear…which he lofts about ten feet down the hallway…oops!

Once the leader is slain, a few more rounds of combat brings the rest of the skeletons to hell. the nobility is released and escorted back tot he surface. The fallen are returned to the living, and Barada removes his hat of disguises at an opportune time so the real Lord Mourngrym can retake the helm – though he is deeply troubled by having to take credit (and blame) for things he did not do. The party remains on hand for about a month, to see that things are operating smoothly and that no real threats remain. They spend time identifying magic items and so forth. Feaster needs to return for training and so forth. The group discusses options.

Before they depart there is a great celebration where they are treated as guests of honor. Many speeches are made and proclamations are read.
The final proclamation of the evening is the most interesting. As the page reads from the scroll his voice changes rapidly to a guttural growl, ending with the words “Tomorast sends you to your doom” – and everything vanishes.

The party comes to their senses falling down a seemingly endless hole…

Sorely vexed at this alteration of plans, the Baradagrym and ‘generals’ move out to the newly extinguished and still burnt-smelling command center. There they espy what appears to be a swarthy woman clad in plate mail, riding a Nightmare and swinging a wicked bastard sword at anyone unlucky enough to be in her path. Accompanying her are a quartet of devilishly beautiful ‘angels’ with eye sockets of flame and wicked recurved bows that shoots bolts of fire into hapless villagers and castle guards alike. While the generals plot for a moment, the ‘angels’ start wrapping up folks with ropes, haul them 40 to 60 feet into the air then drop them on their comrades. Meanwhile, the nightmare lady seems to have landed on the top floor of the tower.

Sensing that unfurling the ‘Mission Accomplished’ banner over the smoldering remnants of the castle may have been a wee bit premature, the group springs into action. Lord Baradagrym turns invisible and starts climbing up the outside of the tower while the rest of the group charges up the interior stairs, Barada earns the bowshots of the angels – but his vest of missile repulsion taken from Mr.Slippers comes in handy and turns the arrows back upon the attackers. Enraged, they come closer and begin to hack at him with swords. Barada hauls himself over the lip of the platform and finds himself face to muzzle with the Nightmare.He hauls himself over the edge and in a move born of desperation, dives into the open trapdoor.

Meanwhile, the group has climbed to the final ladder, just in time to meet Barada as he tumbles through the opening. When Reza tries to climb the ladder, he takes a wicked blow from the invisible woman on the landing. Seeing that the ladder is a short trip to a beheading, the group backtracks, unfurls the carpet and starts the arial battle.
Reza drinks a preemptory potion of flying (just in case the carpet goes down), Dalliance fires up the globe of invulnerability and they’re off. It is a few minutes of frantic maneuvering on the part of the party to try and get Dalliance within range, while the attackers teleport about at will, wreaking havoc and summoning hordes of Lemures to slay and devour as many hapless dalesfolk as possible. As they manuever, the group shoots arrows and slings and hurls darts at any attacker they can find that is within range.

Eventually, Dalliance manages to uncork a good lightning bolt and Barada manages to feather the wounded angel to death with +3 arrows.
The lady on the bad horse attacks unexpectedly and almost finishes off Lubbitch with a single blow with her constitution draining sword. Reza drops the Justicar into the courtyard and nearly spits a villager.
Dalliance tries to feeblemind, disintegrate and magic missile her – all to no avail. The battle continues on for a few more moments and the outcome is looking dicey when Dalliance’s last limited wish apparently succeeds and the lady falls victim to a feeblemind spell.
Within moments she is bore away on the back of her dimension-hopping steed. Sensing that the battle tides have turned, the angels make haste to leave the premises. Huzzah! Lord Baradagrym has done much to restore faith in his rule through his fearless acts of leadership in the skies above the castle as hundreds can attest to having witnessed.

A day later, the group prepares for the aforementioned dungeon foray of prisoner rescue and goodness. This time they manage to descend and proceed towards the cells. there Barada starts unlocking cells and releasing prisoners. Reza, Lubbitch and Humbar move past him along the line of cells. There they encounter the flaming-eyed, armor-clad skeletons – who teleport past them and start charging Barada and Dalliance…who vaporizes the attackers with her undeath to death spell. Another trio pops up and it takes several rounds of concentrated effort on the part of the trio of fighters to dismantle the attackers. Beyond them lie even ore cells – containing the lord’s parents, the ranger in question as well as nobility loyal to the lord of shadowdale. Just as things look rosy, the cry rings out from the hall…”Ambush!”

They smash through the next door they encounter and move forward…into another ambush. Humbar takes a bolt through his neck and almost dies. Dalliance fires up her spell of arrow reversal and saunters into the hallway in preparation for lightning bolting the offending attackers. She follows up the bolt with another large ball of fire. Man, the interior decorators are going to be busy trying to put the interior of the castle back together. First they’ll need to extinguish everything.
Wheeling left, they power through the last visible doorway and into the private chambers of Lord Mourngrym…who looks grim indeed. Humbar goes berserk and attacks the noble. While Lubbitch and Humbar pummel the life out of him, the rest of the group prepares for what comes next. In a moment of inspiration, Barada dons his hat of disguises and some of the lord clothing and goes off in search of junior officers with Reza and Dalliance in tow, Finding a group of officers trapped behind the wall of fire, he uses his charm ability supplemented with Dalliance’s spell of mass suggestion to convince the officers that the threat has been eliminated and they need to get busy manning the walls in anticipation of the large army heading towards them. Lord Baradagrym sets up a robust defense and rallies the troops to man the walls. Bud is sent off in bird form to alert the dalesfolk that the castle has been taken and they are called to action in its defense. Humbar, Reza and Lubbitch fly off to issue instructions to the wolves to begin harrying the army’s flanks.
Within the space of a few hours, the fires are mostly extinguished and the walls are manned. When the ‘relief’ force arrives, they are fired upon by ballistae, archers and Dalliance and her wand of fire. Fire!
Understandably confused, the army falls back and demands to know what manner of mischief is afoot. Boom. Boom. BOOOM go the fireballs.
AAAAAGH! go the roasting soldiers. Retreat! go the commanders, and by the time the morning comes the invading army is no more, having broken into smaller groups for ease of foraging and deciding to retreat. The emboldened dalesfolk and wolves go after them and the rivers are awash in blood for days.

With the siege ended, there is an uncomfortable moment when the Lady Mourngrym seeks out her husband. Bud smashes her in the face and knocks her unconscious. While she ‘snoozes’ they search her and the ex-lord and turn up a pair of harper pins. Hm? Harpers? What?
This revelation leads to Dalliance teleporting with the Lord’s corpse back to Waterdeep to seek the advice of the Lathanderites. it is revealed that the lord is a trusted member of the Waterdhavian nobility and deeply enmeshed with the Harpers and their ilk. The most likely answer – once many questions have been asked – is that the Lord was possessed by some entity and used to enslave the dalesfolk in order for the Baneites and the Zhentarim to do their dirty work. The lord is restored to life by the Lathanderites and will return to the ‘dale once it is determined that he is not a threat. Apparently, all that remains is a final jaunt into the dungeons to slay the flaming skeletons and the slithery slitherer, and to free the ranger. With that goal in mind, the group rests for a day or three, then starts planning for what is presumably the final assault on the forces of evil…

Emerging, the group unrolls the carpet and ascends in the pre-dawn light, rising above the fortress – to the very tip of the tower top.
There the group assaults and kills the two lookouts (lookout!), then enters the tower from the top, using the Wand of Opening to stealthily unlock a trapdoor. They descend, then descend again – passing through a meditation area and a shrine to Tempus (which prompts a bit of worship from the barbarian cleric). Descending further, the group prepares behind a locked door. Still silenced, the wand is used again to unbar the door and the group bursts into the guard’s lounge area, There they make short work of the three surprised occupants, then cast about for a new direction to travel.

Reza’s snout sniffs out the smells of the flying beasts through a doorway, but it is decided that that direction is unlikely to house the fortress’ lord. So, the group descends further. On the next floor, the group surprises and lays low a half-dozen guards with alarming rapidity. The barbarian suggests taking a prisoner for questioning in the next encounter and downs a potion of stone giant strength in preparation. Using the ‘bbitch’s x-ray eye to peer through a few doors reveals another duo of guards, and the barbarian leads the charge through the door. Seizing the nearest one, Humbar roars ‘surrender’ as he smashes his hammer into the guard – slaying him instantly. When the second one turns to run, Dalliance unleashes a stream of magic missiles to kill him. Pausing to discuss prisoner-taking strategy, the group rumbles onward and engages another pair of guards. One is slain by Reza’s ministrations and Barada wounds the other one with an arrow.
When Humbar tackles the wounded guard, his strength bears the guard to the floor and smashes his head upon the stone floor. Woops.

Descending on the stairs the group finds the occupation command center, a hubbub of activity. Beyond, the rooftop sprouts a collection of tents and warriors are beginning to stir as the group uses a ring of fire to race into the room, setting tables ablaze, burning maps and injuring many. This prompts a panicky exit from the command center and the group bursts around the corner and slays a trio of guards before heading down the next flight of stairs. On the way down, the sounds of the alarm ring out behind – ahead – all around them.

Indeed, footsteps ring out on the stairs below – heading upwards.
Dalliance pokes her head around the bend and sends a ‘welcome!’
fireball at then onrushing attackers. The first fireball gives pause and the second helps the survivors decide to seek other areas less full of flame and explosions. The group gives pursuit and engages a group of junior officers in their quarters along with their wives and children. After the first six are slain, the rest are persuaded to surrender in short order and the desired information is finally found, The lord of the castle, Lord Mourngrym has quarters just down the hallway and around the corner. The group pauses for a moment to gird themselves for a final push to find their quarry.

Leaving their de facto headquarters, the group uses one of the crossroads to reach the northern foothills where it is decided that Reza will represent the party in single combat against Frostbite – a hulking, elephant-sized, ancient dire winter wolf. Reza quaffs a potion of Storm Giant strength in preparation, while Humbar casts Favor of the Deity upon him and WEapon of Impact on his mace. While the druids and hundreds of wolves and the rest of the party look on, the battle is joined.

The wolf howls and Reza’s knees are a little less steady, but there is little time to recover for the beast is upon him. They battle, smiting each other mightily. The beast rends and bites, and unleashes blasts of frigid cold. It hurls Reza to the ground on several occasions and it is only the silveryfire that allows him to persevere and win the day. He unleashes a barrage of wicked blows, driving the beast to the earth. The wold rolls over and exposes its belly, signaling defeat. All wait to see if Reza will slay the beast – but in the end he accepts the beast’s submission. Now the pack leader, Reza delegates command and control to the defeated Frostbite in a druid-mediated conversation. With assurances that the wolves of the wild will aid as they can, the group turns it’s attention to the forest folk.

Using the crossroads allows them to cover over a hundred miles in the blink of an eye, arriving at the heart of an ancient forest glen.
There, another crossroads portal stands, but all fear to enter it, due to the fearsome Sussurus that lurks within. The group prepares, but has little time to kill as the beast ‘unfolds’ from beyond space and pops into existence. It resembles a horrid arachno-centaur for the space of 40 seconds, then it resembles a large pile of pulp as the group works its normal tactics. The beast has little chance in the face of triple-strength fireballs and streams of magic missiles and the powerful attacks of Reza and Lubbitch.

Returning to the HQ, the group receives a dispatch. A Zhentarim field commander has seized villagers and is using them as human shields. He means to sacrifice them to Bane in an attempt to cow the rebels. He is making his way to the temple via a road that crosses a river, and a bridge will limit mobility. The group unrolls the carpet of flying and sails off to investigate. They arrive and see the commander, a pair of armored ogres and a quartet of archers herding about three dozen villagers across the bridge in question. Area of effect is not in effect if casualties are to be limited and the group adapts, dropping off a pair of archers to cut off easy passage. Barada, Dalliance, Humbar and Bud continue the attack, with Humbar roaring and charging the enemy. This panics the villagers and they break, exposing the commander and the ogres – who start to fly. Not toe outdone, Bud Feaster ‘chuffs’ into the sky on his slippers and proceeds to batter one of the hapless ogres. Darts from Reza aid in his demise and the second one falls victim to a Dispel Magic that turn his powers of flight into powers of falling. The day is won and the group’s stature increases further, Exhausted, they return to the HQ, deploy the mansion and sleep.

The following morning, Dalliance exits the mansion and is attacked.
The battle is brief but savage and eventually it is determined that the most likely culprits was a trio of Invisible Stalkers. Dalliance is a bit shaken by the idea that someone powerful enough to harness a trio of stalkers cares enough about her demise to send them. Hm.
Anyhow, no time to waste. Recent intelligence suggests that there is a major force heading towards the area, due to arrive within about 48 hours. More reports place a supply caravan on a road not too far from the HQ. The group unrolls the carpet again and they are off.

An hour or so of flight and the caravan is spotted, It has an aerial escort of a huge demonic bat beast with a rider of unknown origin and a smaller satellite rat-bat-toad and rider. A strategy is concocted, and a Globe of Invulnerability and Invisibility 10 foot-radius soon shield the carpet’s occupants. The battle with the fearsome beasts is anticlimactic. A pair of fireballs from Dalliance finish the creature, causing the rider to leap off and begin feather-falling as the beast crashes into the earth below. A Disintegrate spell does for the second flier and the combination of gravity and the earth does for the second rider. The emboldened townies attack and the combined forces swiftly rout the remainder of the caravan guards. With the rebellion now well-supplied, the group turns its attention to assaulting the last bastion of the occupying forces, the Twisted Tower.

Pausing for a span of about 12 hours, the group prepares for the assault and discusses strategy and tactics. Eventually they repeat the inviso-globed carpet strategy and circle the tower, making note of the hundreds of warriors and assorted allies that lurk hither and yon.
Landing near the rear wall, the group deploys a Passwall spell to gain entrance to the building and begins to reconnoiter. they wander about for the space of an hours or two and see various things, explores secret passages and discovers hidden wood cellars. Eventually, they happen upon a richly decorated hallway that terminates in a set of large doors, a single small door and an octet of armed and armored guards, The group retreats a bit to allow for discussion and ponders the options…

The following day, the castle plunder is marked for identification and the more memorable items are investigated. Bud is returned to flesh and the group stumbles across a personal diary of the high priest.
Within they find information that – when combined with what they already know – sets them on a course to find the likely temple of Shar, whose clerics are involved in weakening the weave of magic in the area.

They seek and find and enter, battling a behir, discovering secret doors and corridors, fighting enchanted suits of armor and being sniped by screaming crossbow bolts before finally entering a vast chasm full of floating boulders. Perhaps this is the ‘Grinding Gulf’
they have been seeking…perhaps not. Time will tell…