The party had finally managed to dispatch Rhoswen, though not without some heartache as their new arcanist had fallen victim to one of her spells and found himself turned into a squirrel. The party took the now unconscious Rhoswen and removed her belongings from her, then traveled back across the portal and into the Narlmarches and their homeland.

Upon returning to the material plane, the Joseph attempted to message various members of the Fey Council in an effort to determine how to ultimately deal with Rhoswen now that she was defeated. His first response came from Vinroot who responded with a somewhat drunken reply but was unable to complete his message to Joseph as he ran out of time. Next though, Joseph received a response from the unicorn Palombier. The unicorn informed the party that they had been gone for four months even though it seemed to have only been a few days in the minds of the party. He further told them that whatever they did, they should not bring Rhoswen back to the material plane.

With this information in hand, the party quickly decided to send a few members back into the Fellnight Realm to seal the barrier while placing Rhoswen on the other side of the barrier. The group that went into the Fellnight Realm spent no more than half a day there sealing the barrier back up, but when they came back, their companions told them they had been gone for two weeks. At this point, the party wished to waste no more time and headed back to Raven's Bluff to check on the capitol and so that Vlad could finally spend some time with his bride. The party was relieved to find that the realm was still in good hands and that everything had continued to progress smoothly in their prolonged absence. It seemed as though Serani Black had taken well to the role of Baroness in her husband's absence, though she gladly gave the reins back to Vlad upon his return.

The party quickly began going about the business of governing, including appointing Kesten Garess to fill the role of General on the High Council, which was left vacant by the untimely demise of Kanon Phodder. General Garess was happy to fill the post and the kingdom resumed business as usual. Among the matters to attend to was the unfortunate transformation of the arcanist into a squirrel. It took a few tries, but Joseph was eventually able to reverse the effect and Thom was brought back to his normal self.

While the party was resting up in Raven's Bluff, Cice Tappo took the opportunity to walk around town, getting to know the people better. They seemed to be much relieved now that she was no longer a hobgoblin but had somehow become a gnome. Even with the recent trouble with Tenzekill, the townspeople preferred her as a gnome. As she was walking through town, Cice decided to put on a bit of a display for the townsfolk and brought out the magical chicked she had secured from Kanon's belongings when he perished. Squeezing the chicken and uttering the trigger "Wakka Wakka!" Cice felt a strange sensation spread through her. Her voice grew a bit deeper and as she looked down, she realized that the chicken had transformed her into a male! The crowd was quite impressed.

It was about this time that Vlad received a message from Karsten Lebeda stating that hey had lost contact with Varnhold. The message stated that several messages had been sent and even an envoy, but nothing, including the envoy, ever returned. He urged Vlad to look into the matter and see what he could discover about the sudden silence from Varnhold.

Vlad, who had developed a friendship with Maegar Varn quickly convened the High Council and the party agreed that they must set out at once to Varnhold. The party gathered their provisions, and purchased some new ones with their newfound wealth, and made haste for Varnhold. Fortunately they had previously located a shortcut to Varnhold when they had previously visited and they were able to cut some time off on their journey. During this time Cice continued to be amazed by the wonders created by her/his transformation.

As they were crossing through the mountains into the territory of Varnhold, the party observed a partially ruined tower. They also noticed that the area had grown incredibly silent. Aven Darkheart flew up to the tower to investigate and found that it was abandoned. From the tower though he did see that one could look upon much of the territory of Varnhold, including the village that comprised the capitol. He then flew down and decided to scout ahead for the party. In doing so, he located a cave. Aven then decided to investigate the large cave a bit further and Vlad sent his eagle to stand sentry at the mouth of the cave. Aven attempted to sneak into the cave to see what was in there but as he was making his way he heard a growling sound and looked around a large rock to see a five-headed hydra. The beast immediately lunged at Aven and attempted to eat him for lunch, but was unable to get its jaws on the shifty monk. Aven wasted no time in backtracking out of the cave and rejoining the party so they could formulate a plan.

The party decided first to have Cice go up to the tower so he could cast a magical eye spell on the town of Varnhold in an effort to investigate some more. While they wanted to dispatch the hydra they also wanted to make sure that they rescued Varn. Cice's spell showed him that the town appeared to be all but abandoned except for a the stockade which appeared to have a lone spriggan in the courtyard area. The spriggan appeared as though he was attempting to give the appearance of there being more spriggans there than was actually the case as there were helmets propped up on sticks along the palisade of the stockade. Cice was unable to see inside the main building inside the stockade though to determine if there were indeed any more spriggans there. Aside from that though Cice was unable to determine any other signs of life.

With this information in hand, the party decided they had time to fight the hydra and also believed that the hydra may have been responsible for the disappearance of Varn. The party returned to the cave and Aven and Bernard, the paladin rescued from the Fellnight Realm, crept into the cave while the rest of the party prepared themselves at the mouth. As Aven crept in, he once again attracted the attention of the hydra and it rushed out at him. Once again though the monk was able to avoid most of the blows and the rest of the party began to pepper the hydra as well. Cice began to hurl spells at the beast but appeared as though the wizard was distracted by his newest wand as the spells were not nearly as effective as normal. Bernard meanwhile, was anxious to prove his worth to the party and began to hammer the beast, raining powerful blow upon powerful blow onto the hydra. The fury of the paladin quickly proved too much for the beast to handle and it was soon slain. Although Bernard took a few hits from the hydra, the party remained largely unscathed and were left in good position to head to the village of Varnhold to try to uncover the mystery of the town.