The large creature and the last Redbrand run off in opposite directions, leaving the group alone in the barracks. Mella heals Elada and Never moves the small goblin to one of the beds, waking him in the process. Danak takes Patches’ eye patch, it is black leather set with semi-precious stones.
Liarel and Never stand watch at the stairs while Elada listens at the door at the end of the hall. She doesn’t hear anything, so she opens the door. The goblin has come to stand by Liarel and Never, holding a plank. The door opens onto a large room with a table and chairs at the center. We enter.
Never talks to the goblin who introduces himself as Droop. Never gives him a dagger to defend himself with. Mella gives Droop two gold coins, which he promptly eats. Droop is very excited to “get ’em” and seems more than willing to join our group.
The next door leads to a hallway, another door straight ahead, and stairs to the side. Mella hears stone scraping stone from the stairs. Danak hears a bubbling sound from behind the door. We carefully open the door onto what looks like an Alchemist’s workshop. We pile into the room and close the door. There is another door to the right which leads to a bed chamber with a writing desk. We thoroughly search the two rooms for Glasstaff’s correspondence and anything else that could be helpful. Never finds some gems and two magic scrolls, Liarel finds a book about invisibility potions and a journal with historical references to the lost mine of Phandelver. On the desk, Danak finds a letter from the Black Spider.
Danak finds a secret door in the wall of the bedroom which leads to stairs climbing to a small landing and another hidden door. This door leads to the supply room just before the cavern. We re-enter the cavern just to verify the layout and Mella enters the crevasse to find the chest from before missing. We make out way to the southeast corner of the cavern and follow a path which leads to yet another hidden door which opens onto the flour-covered store room.
We backtrack through the cavern to the locked door in the hallway before the supply room. We manage to get the door open to find an armory. Mella and Liarel take long swords. Having found no sign of the creature or any remaining Redbrands, Never asks Droop where they might have gone. He says he doesn’t know about the humans, but the bugbears probably went to Kragmaw Castle. We decide to finish our search of the hideout anyway and Droop indicates that there are four rooms we haven’t seen. After a bit of wandering on our own, we ask Droop to show us the four rooms. He takes us to rooms we’ve already seen, but seems very proud of himself.
We make our way back to Glasstaff’s room to finish looting and rest a bit. Once there we notice a rat scurrying about. We think it might be Glasstaff. Liarel turns into a cat and chases it. Droop follows and manages to hit the rat with a stick, at which point it falls and vanishes into nothing. Back in the lab, we read the note from the Black Spider. It is addressed to Irno Albrech (who we recognize as Sildar’s contact in Phandelin) and asks for Dwarven maps.
Mella wants to burn the building down. Danak obviously opposes this. They fight for a bit and Danak manages to swing Mella over his shoulder. Mella realizes that Danak is planning to move in and apologizes.
We head back to town and talk to Droop a bit more. He says he’s originally from Kragmaw Hideout, which we come to realize is the cave we happened upon on the Tribor trail. He says he likes us better and Liarel gives him some silver, which he pockets.
Once at the Miner’s exchange we give Hollia the letter and she pays us. She tells us Irno was a wizard who came to town and then just disappeared, it appears to become Glasstaff. We go to leave, but Hollia asks Mella to stay behind. She asks if they’ve heard of the Zhentirim, an organization similar to the Lord’s Alliance who value wealth, power, etc. They have strict rules, but they could use Mella’s help, if they would like to work with them. Mella says they’re interested and Hollia tells them to check in with her in a week or so and to not say anything about this to the others.
Once Mella rejoins the group we head to Daran’s. On the way we run into Sildar. He doesn’t seem to know that Irno was Glasstaff. He tells us to pop by his office at the townmaster’s later. Once at Daran’s we pass along our new information and get Daran’s opinion on the Lord’s Alliance. He says they’re good folk, just a bit too structured for his liking.
We head to the townmaster’s hall, passing an Orcs Wanted poster. Never tries to block Elada’s view so she won’t see it, but she notices it anyway and pockets it. We settle down with Sildar and share our new findings with him. He pays us for getting rid of the Redbrands and we talk about rescuing Gundren from Kragmaw Castle. Sildar says we also need to figure out the location of Wave Echo Cave, that Gundren had a map on him but it was taken when they were captured.
As we start to leave, Sildar pulls Danak aside and asks him to join the Lord’s Alliance. Danak promises to think about it and come back later with an answer.
Back at the inn Liarel reads the journal she found. It rehashes the history of Phandelin and the Wave Echo Cave. It seems to have been written when the mine was operational. It tells of a mace named Lightbringer, which was ordered by a priest of Lythander but never delivered as the mine was lost.
We plan to head to Thundertree in the morning.