Know Your Enemy!
Here's what you know about your mysterious foes:
Their identities are hidden, even amongst their fellow villagers.
They are numerous, organized, intelligent, communicate well with each other, and know their home terrain extremely well.
They appear to prefer subterfuge, ambush and poison to fair, honest combat. But if exposed and cornered in their home, they'll fight to the last man.
They have no fear of torture or death, except perhaps Derek Desleigh and whoever escaped the inn via a rope from the back window.
At the inn they were striking to subdue, wanting their victims captured alive and placed in cages. After the battle at the Inn, they seemed content to burn you to death at the barnfire ambush.
Many of them are simple farmers and villagers, but not all. Derek Desleigh successfully backstabbed Pelias.
They might be charmed.
They kidnapped a family that spoke to you.
You've gotten dire warnings from the Gades that almost anyone in the village could be an enemy. You know you are being watched by villagers.
Hoom knows the Golden Grain Inn isn't a real business, and that Bertram Beswill recently purchased an inn property in the capital city of Hookhill.
Their goals and motives are unknown. This limited exchange offered the most insight to date:
Inferno wrote:
All warmth leaves Beswill's face as he steps back and says to the adventurers with icy politeness,
“Please drink. I think you’ll find it quite a relief. A blessing, really. To abandon at last all the dreadful, worldly burdens you bear, many of which you’re entirely unaware until you’ve let them go. Your oaths, your duties, all your many tiresome responsibilities. The fear, the doubt, the very uncertainty of life itself. What a terrible weight. Be free of it, won’t you? We can help you do that."
As one, all the eyes of the many different patrons watch the strangers.
Beswill raises his glass.
“May I propose a toast? …To knowing inner peace, clarity of purpose, unity, and contentment at last. Now, drink up, my friends. Drink up.”
The inn is utterly silent... The calm before the breaking of the storm.
The strange, old hermit
claims there are three dens of evil in Briarsgate: the Golden Grain Inn, the old Foaming Mug Inn, and the Church of Merikka.
The enemy raised villagers from the dead and condemned them to everlasting undeath. (If the heroes had slain more villagers at the first battle at the inn, would they have faced more zombies later?)
You found an evil shrine to a horrific serpentine reptile god in the tunnels beneath the Golden Grain Inn. Undead creatures in league with the enemy seem to worship this evil thing.
Horrific, reptilian men were discovered at the abandoned Foaming Mug Inn.
Between Derek Desleigh and the many survivors of the battle at the Golden Grain, here's what they know about you:
They know what you look like and how you fight.
They know there are demihumans among your number and that you have infravision.
They know there are spellcasters among your number.
They know that you spoke to the Gades.
They know you killed Bertram Beswill, defeated a score of men at the Golden Grain Inn, and searched its basement but not the tunnel beyond the barred door.
They know Moogeye escaped imprisonment just before the Golden Grain Inn burned to the ground.