The fellowship agreed that they would not fall victim to the taunting to cross the chamber to confront Cofen-Taur. They retreated and looked for a way to attack Cofen-Taur from behind.

The fellowship then explored a room next to the courtyard and discovered a Desdursya Shamaness dead. They cautiously approached with Jesoc using Mage Hand to see if the shamaness was truly dead. The Shamaness did not stir but the party was still unconvinced. They only approached after Arbun unleashed an arrow into the Shamaness with no response.

Upon examining the Shamaness, they discovered that she was covered by spider bites and appeared very ashen and pale. The fellowship continued to explore the rooms that were next to the courtyard and discovered a dead Shamaness in each room.

Finally, the fellowship were able to make their way around and attack Cofen-Taur from behind. Kifak quickly downed a potion of Fire Giant Strength and cast Storm Door as the battle was engaged! The fellowship was able to defeat Cofen-Taur’s two Desdursya guards easily before the main battle was engaged. The tide of the battle ebbed and flowed with the fellowship finally defeating Cofen-Taur thanks to Arbun’s Gambler’s Blade.

As Cofen-Taur collapsed his face became totally blank and featureless. All the colour was drained out of his face with no eyes , nose, or mouth visible. The fellowship examined Cofen-Taur and discovered the Palantir in a pocked of his robe. Before they took the Palantir, Kifak sent the following message to the king:

“Have something of value to send, confirm you are alone and have the bag. Seer is dead, face went blank. Went by name Cofen-Taur”

The king replied:

“All good, alone. Send Item”

Kifak carefully rolled the item from Cofen-Taur’s pocket into the bag of holding and the bag expanded and felt heavy before it became an empty bag again a second later.

The fellowship discussed whether they should just leave now as they have the Palantir, but Jesoc remembered that the king’s knife, Angrist, was also stolen by the Seer and likely here. Remembering this, the fellowship decided to explore the rest of Cirith Ungol.

They were shocked as they next came upon a four-armed Gargoyle, but were thankful that it appeared to just be a statue. The party examined the Gargoyle statue but found that its hands held no knife and the statue had no switches or inscriptions. They also tried to move the statue, but it would not budge.

The fellowship continued to explore and next came upon a couple of rooms with dozens of Orc warriors. The Orc warriors informed the party that they were not going out there again and shared with the party how they were sacrificed and slaughtered to try and get past the spiders in the courtyard. Kifak successfully intimidated the Orcs to come with them, but the Orcs were following very half-heartedly. Eventually Kifak gave up and sent them back as he saw that they would be no benefit in battle.

The fellowship stealthily crossed the courtyard to explore the rooms on the other side of the courtyard. The courtyard seemed quiet and they were able to cross without incident. They first came upon a storage room where they discovered a chest with four potions – two light green and two dark green. The fellowship was able to determine later that these potions were two potions of short rest and two positions of long rest.

The party continued on a found another corpse. This time it was a Desdursya warrior that was face down with a knife lodged in his back. Jesoc approached and pulled the knife out of his back. Jesoc looked at the knife and confirmed that it was indeed Angrist.

The fellowship discussed what to do with the knife before they decided to throw it in the bag of holding without warning the king.

The fellowship decided to return to the courtyard after exploring all the other areas. When they looked at the far side of the courtyard they saw what looked like hundreds of Desdursya Chieftains watching the courtyard from the balcony. It didn’t look like the Desdursya Chieftains were watching them, but rather something else in the courtyard.

The fellowship slowly made their way across the courtyard and soon heard sounds coming from behind them. Two enormous spiders were slowly coming towards them. The fellowship moved towards the spiders and attacked. Although the spiders were fearsome and deadly, they were no match for the fellowship.

After the spiders were defeated, the fellowship looked up and saw that the Desdursya Chieftains had disappeared from the balcony. Seeing that there was no one left to oppose them, they slowly made their way through the tunnel under the balcony to the main gate.

The fellowship decided to leave Cirith Ungol and return to Minas Tirith before they travelled to Dol Amroth for the final journey.