"I haven't seen them but I know they are there... feel free to look around if you want. Not sure what I've done to aggravate any spirts. If you can manage to find them and make them go away I'll pay you what I can. They seem to like the window that faces out of town most." She heads back into her house and attempts to restore some order to it.

"The window facing out of town, hmm?" Interesting. Perhaps they were about to uncover themselves a mischevious little chwinga. It'd certainly save them a lot of time to be able to catch one here and now, and, assuming that there was only one that was harassing this woman, they'd be able to get a bonus in the form of some payment. Granted, Kythor was a bit skeptical of the idea that they would receive a rather large bounty for dealing with this creature, as they hadn't discussed the terms of their agreement first, but they could always talk about it after the fact. For now, Kythor needed information. Wandering towards the window, Kythor quietly crouched down by the windowsill and began to search for tracks of any sort. He also thought about perhaps trying the window itself to make sure they weren't dealing with somebody whose senses had long-since departed them, and that these 'spirits' weren't simply a product of her imagination, but then he spotted something curious.

It was a set of small tracks, leading from the window to a nearby thicket. Looks like their hunt had begun.

"Hey, over here," Kythor called out to the party as he waved them over. "Looks like these spirits haven't been gone for too long. See those tracks?" He pointed to the tracks as they began on the windowsill, then traced the path they took into the thicket. "Tracks lead into the thicket." The tiefling slung his backpack off gently, cradling it in his arm as he pulled out the lantern they'd been given by Dannika. After closing and replacing his backpack, the tiefling fiddled with the lantern for a brief moment to light it. Once lit, Kythor watched it closely to see if it reacted as he held it out towards the thicket.

As the lamp lights the flame quickly goes from the normal orange red to a green color. Kythor does notice that the tracks lead to the thicket and seems to have a trail behind it as if an object was dragged by the being that made the small tracks.

Following Kythor, Jitter saw tha tracks, the tiefling pointed out.
The halfling slowly advanced with stealth 7+7=14 towards the thicket.
What he saw, made him giggle at first, then he remembered the fish jerky.
Jitter pulled a piece out, and broke it off into smaller chunks, as he laid a trail of it leading from the thicket to himself.
" Come on my little friends, I won't hurt you, unlce Jitter has some tasty treats for you."

So this was what a chwinga actually looked like. He had to admit, watching a trio of them pretend to eat clashed somewhat with the image he'd formed in his head. He'd imagined some sort of trickster-like, whimsical spirit, not this. The tiefling stepped aside to allow the halfling to act - as he said, he wasn't unwilling to try to negotiate with the chwinga before they resorted to more... brutish methods. Especially these ones. Something about them seemed very childlike, Kythor mused to himself as he watched them play-eat. Once they'd talked one of them into helping Dannika with her research, he'd have to figure out some way to make sure that she wasn't abusing the poor things. He might not have sympathy for the denizens of the natural world, but even he saw handing over a defenseless child as an irredeemable sin.

Still, Kythor was cautious. Ideally, they would be able to converse with the chwinga after luring it over. From there, they could sort this mess out between them and the woman whose house they had been rummaging through, and once they take care of that they may be able to convince one of them into coming with them to Good Mead. First, however, they needed to persuade the creature to come closer and listen to what they had to say. The tiefling crouched down beside the halfling, where he slowly held out his hand as a gesture of peace. "Come, little one," Kythor said, hoping to soothe the small sprite. "We mean you no harm." Although he wasn't sure if these creatures were capable of speech or understanding the Common tongue, he was sure that speaking in a soft, low tone of voice would suggest to the creature that they had no hostile intent.

The chwinga with no cutlery waves to the two that just entered the clearing. It gestures for them to join them and makes an eating motion.

Jitter looks at Kythor "I think we are being invited for supper."
"Which is really great, cause I'm hungry."laughed Jitter.
The halfling slowly made his way towards the Chwingas, "Hello there, thank you for inviting us for supper, my name is Jitter, and that's Kythor." he said in his native tongue.

Kendra was happy to let the ranger take the lead on tracking the little spirits, and before long they successfully found a little group of them. Curious little things, having their little tea party and imaginary meal in the little thicket. Kendra approached slowly after Kythor and Jitter did, introducing herself as they did, though she was unsure if they understood any of this.

"Do you speak?" she asked, hopeful. Maybe Common wasn't the best choice. They didn't seem like beasts so she doubted her spell would be of use, but she knew several languages, and the one she used for some of her... incantations, seemed like the best bet.

"You speak with me?" she asked, in somewhat broken Primordial. If she could confirm they were capable of understand at least one language, she'd be able to speak with them perfectly, though the others wouldn't be able to share in the conversation.

The Chwingas quickly surround Jitter looking him over. They look at Kythor and Kendra as well making little noise. The do not appear to speak and mostly use hand gestures to communicate. They do seem pretty excited that members of the party are joining them.

Jitter digs into his backpack, and removes a handfull of colorful glass marbles.
"A gift for you little ones."
He places them in a small pile. Carefully stacking the marbles before the Chwingas.
Jitter pats his chest, then points to the Chwingas, then to the marbles.
"Friend."

One of the Chwingas begin to look over the marbles. It grabs one then carries it over to the plate with the pine cone and leaves and sets it next to them. It resumes playing the knife pretending to cut food. The one that did not have any cutlery examines another marble before picking it up and offering it to the party.

Kendra held out a hand to accept the marble that was being offered to the party, though she didn't know what they had in mind. They seemed child-like, more interested in games and make-believe than anything else, even when confronted with strangers. "I'm not sure what to do. They don't seem to understand us or communicate. Seems like they're a nuisance to the locals, but not enough to warrant abducting one by force."

She sighed, a little frustrated. Nothing was ever clear and obvious here, was it? For the hell of it, she looked at the one offering her the marble and let her mind reach out to it, her eyes subtly taking on a more violet hue that would likely go unnoticed by the others. If it understood any language at all, it would be able to understand her, but not speak back.

Can you understand me? Nod if yes.

Jitter took a marble ,holding it between his index finger and thumb.
It moved his hand closer in front of the Chwingas, so they could see it.
With his other hand, he removed a small red handkerchief from his pocket.
He held the red handkerchief in front of them, showing both sides.
Slowly he placed the red handkerchief over the marble between his finger and thumb.
Jitter waved his hand over the red handkerchief,"Abracadabra"
(Sleight of hand 17+7=24 )
Jitter removed the handkerchief and the marble was gone between his finger and thumb, and in it's place was a nut.
The halfling laughed and bowed his head, saying "Tada!"

The tiefling watched as the chwingas played and interacted with the party. He'd never gotten the chance to see a chwinga up close like this, and imagined that such would not be a readily available commodity. In his mind, he was wondering how they would be able to accomplish their goals - the goal of delivering a chwinga to Dannika, as well as figuring out how to get these chwingas to stop bothering this woman in Easthaven. Kendra was sure that there was no easy way to communicate with them through a common tongue, and Kythor himself couldn't get a solid read on their means of communication between one another.

"Most certainly, this is a daunting task," he sighed beneath his breath, looking to the others. It was then that a curious idea crossed his mind. The tiefling had lit the lantern Dannika had given them to figure out if any chwingas were in the nearby area. Perhaps they may be able to awe the little creatures with this strange device? Gripping the handle in one hand and the bottom with his other, Kythor cautiously brought the device forward, taking care to not set it down. He wanted to use this to captivate their attention. He had absolutely no intention of handing the device away, at not until they finished delivering a chwinga. "Look," Kythor said, "Magical light!" Waving the lantern around, but making sure to keep it just out of their reach, Kythor watched to see if the little creatures reacted to the unusually-colored glow of the flame.

@Alarielle

The Chwinga nods to Kendra before turning to watch what Jitter does with the marble. The seemed rather amused with the fact that there was now a nut instead of the marble. One does look up to the lantern curiously for a few moments.

After several minutes of examining and playing with the adventures the three chwingas cluster together for a moment. Shortly after they gathered, the two that had originally been using the cutlery wander off leaving the third with the party. It look at Jitter and Kendra patiently as if waiting for them.

@Lurking Krog

Jitter looks up at Kendra, then back at the Chwinga "Ask it if it wants to come with us?"
The halfling opens his hand, palm up as he laid it on the snowy ground.
With his other hand, just using his two fingers imitating walking legs.
Jitter made the gesture as to walk up onto his palm.
"You think he or she understands us?"

The chwinga cautiously walks up to Jitter's palm before climbing into his hand, then up his arm to his shoulder. It sits down on his shoulder holding onto the fur cloak to make sure it stays put.

The tiefling watched as the two chwingas left, leaving their third behind. Strangely, he felt a knot form in his stomach. These creatures were fools to leave their friend to the mercy of four much larger creatures, especially when they had just met them. The naive had no place in the natural world. Sure, they had no plans to harm the chwinga, but they probably didn't know that. Quietly, he hoped that the other chwingas made it home okay, and that Dannika had no intentions to abuse the creature. Speaking of Dannika, he looked over at the chwinga that was sitting on Jitter's shoulder. The fact that this one seemed to like them enough to follow them definitely made their job a lot easier. Now, all they had to do was go to Good Mead, hand it over to Dannika, and from there that would be that. At least, that's how it should be.

Before they left, Kythor wanted to know some things. He still had very little understanding of how chwingas communicated between themselves - for this he cursed himself for not having the knowledge of the tribe to consult - so he wasn't sure if the chwingas would be aware of the arrangement their third friend might be getting into. For that matter, he wasn't sure if the chwingas would respond well to their friend abruptly disappearing after last being seen with a ragtag group of travelers. Besides that, there was still the matter of figuring out how to help the woman who'd asked for their help earlier be rid of her chwinga tormenters. Admittedly, that last part might be easily accomplished through discussion on how to negotiate peace between both parties.

Still, Kythor was invested in studying the chwingas further for his own interest. If he could track the chwingas, maybe he could find out where they lived, and how they lived. If they needed to consult the chwingas or contact them again, they'd be able to easily find them again. Standing up, Kythor brushed the snow off of his person and scooped up his lantern. "Got an inkling we might not wanna let our other two 'friends' disappear into the night just yet," he said in a low voice. "I'm going to see if I can't find where they're holed up at, just in case our business with them's not done yet. Since it seems to've taken a liking to you, Jitter, maybe you could keep your little stowaway busy or ask if he'd like to help our employer? I'd rather he not get the wrong idea from me 'making sure' his friends get home safe."

With that, he leant to the side from the thicket they'd been lured into. From there, he could see that the chwingas had gone deeper into the woods. Admittedly, Kythor wasn't exactly thrilled at the prospect of heading into the woods, especially with their friendly chwinga in tow. Yet, that wouldn't deter him from briefly following them alone. After a delay, Kythor crept from the thicket to follow the path of the chwingas, towards the rock they had disappeared behind.

This was starting to go better than Kendra expected. The little spirit had planted itself upon the halfling's shoulder after nodding in response to her mentally-posed question. So it did understand her. That was good.

What would you say to coming on a little journey with us? she asked it with her mind. A friend of ours needs your help with a project she's working on.

She looked to Kythor. "I asked with magic, but your guess is as good as mine on the response. Maybe I should go with you, if you want to try to convince the others to leave the people here alone."

"Me and Jitter can hold down the fort sorta speak if ya two wanna go after em". Theodorick said looking between the sprite and the rest of the crew. Relatively out of his element Theodorick turned towards the remaining chwinga and smiled saying "ya like playin with people right, we might have a way you can have fun with more people and keep us around so you never have to search folk out to play with". Theodorick wasn't completely sure on how accurate his description of the Chwinga's future life was but assumed it would be similar to his description.