Bilbo waits, but Zokar doesn't arrive. After a few minutes the cultist who went to find him returns and says "I talked to Zokar, he said all the jobs are full right now but when your friends are done with their shifts, you can either train drakes or guard the eggs."

Elfo, Gourbain, and Nars continue helping to dismantle the guard tower and build a cart.

Hooflepoof and Black Barry are in the drake training room, where the young drakes, now loose, are ravenously devouring dead kobolds. Black Barry hides in the corner, while Hooflepoof sneaks down the stairs (avoiding the top step, though it probably doesn't matter now) and explores the kobold barracks. He finds a couple of rats sniffing around the old wineskins and food scraps, and kills them. Behind one of the beds over in the corner he finds a fairly large leather pouch containing 38 gold pieces, 152 silver pieces, and exactly 704 copper pieces that are sorted into piles of 8 coppers each. He continues searching, turning over bedrolls and pillows and whatnot, and finds a wooden box containing 6 amulets of what appear to be varying quality, but apparently of fairly common craft, as one might find in a town market. He stashes them in his pack.

Karat and Elbolin, meanwhile, have just knocked off two kobolds and are wondering what is down in the pit that forms the south half of the cave. The key is hanging on a peg just across from the door, so they grab it and creep down the stairs. They find three large egg-shaped objects down there, each about three feet tall. As they are trying to examine them, Karat hears the breathing of some creatures down there - moderate-sized creatures, it sounds like, human-sized or so - and so she looks around more carefully and notices a roper hiding among the stalactites. A roper is a powerful creature, but it doesn't attack, perhaps because it isn't clear if the adventurers are enemies or friends. Whatever else is lurking down here may have the same dilemma. Elbolin and Karat don't want to get into a fight with these creatures, so they sneak back up the stairs and lock the gate.

Just then a berzerker comes in from the direction of Anamith's shrine room and asks "What is going on here? I heard some singing." But before anybody can answer, he notices the missing kobolds and asks "where are the kobolds?"

Elbolin answers, "one of them was singing some kobold song, and then they heard some noises down in the pit, so they went down there to check it out."

"What kind of noises?" asks the berzerker.

"I don't know," answers Elbolin. "It didn't sound like anything to us, but it's our first day here. They thought it was worth checking out, so they went down there."

"Hey kobolds," calls out the berzerker, "what's going on down there?"

Obviously dead kobolds aren't going to answer, so Karat uses her thaumaturgy to make it sound like there are ominous whispers down there. "Did you hear that?" asks the berzerker.

Karat and Elbolin answer almost simultaneously, simulating expressions of alarm, "yeah, what was that?"

"I'd better check it out," says the berzerker, "where is the key?"

Karat still has the key, so she unlocks the gate and the berzerker descends the stairs. As soon as his attention is away, Karat locks the gate as quietly as she can, trapping the berzerker in the pit. He doesn't seem to notice right away, but they know that he will soon, so they dart out the door into the passage connecting to Anamith's room. They pause in the passage just outside the room, where they can hear the half-dragon and a berzerker talking casually. They seem to be nearly in the path of escape, such that if the Karat and Elbolin tried to pass them, they would be immediately blocked.

Remembering that there is a chute in the west corner of the room that comes down about 30 feet from what was Frulam Mondath's chamber, Karat throws a rumbling noise from that direction, as close as her thaumaturgy can muster to sounding like something falling down the chute. Anamith and the berzerker immediately stop talking and listen for the source of the sound. Karat follows it up with mysterious whispers from the same area, so the half-dragon and berzerker jump up to investigate.

Karat and Elbolin seize the opportunity to dash through the room and into the passage leading to the north, without even looking back to see if they were noticed. The passage dumps them out into the kobold barracks, where they run into Hooflepoof. Elbolin gives Hooflepoof a big hug, which Hooflepoof takes awkwardly. Being aware they may not have much time, they tell their stories as quickly as possible: Elbolin and Karat about the chamber with the eggs and their escape, and Hooflepoof about Black Barry having a bounty on him and being captured and now freed.

"We killed two kobolds," says Elbolin. "How about you?"

"Twelve," says Hooflepoof, although he probably undercounted. The three of them go up the stairs and reunite with Black Barry, who is still hiding there.