As Arekhel's Elven sight slowly focusses once more upon the watchtower, she gives out a small gasp and tries to point to where the militia men are slowly removing the carcasses of the dead Goblin's from the groundfloor room. Targon leaps up the stairs to the second floor in search of Valdo, leaving three men below.

To her somehow 'altered' sight, the room is filled with a darkly billowing cloud that swirls around the walls to turn in upon itself and roil in inky blackness around the moving shapes of the men that work on, oblivious beneath. She tries once more to call out to them but croaks as her voice fails for the sight that even now is coalescing within the air of the room.

Hovering above the humans, a darkly insubstantial form with outstretched arms of nights hollows and a strangely ashen haggard face with whitish beard drawn down and away to mingle like smoke with the ethereal swirling of the cloudy air, stares down upon the figures below, it's eyes indistinct yet flaming dully with red-tinged fires.

Arekhel sits down heavily upon the turf and stares with stupefaction at the form that is slowly become more corporeal as the moments pass.

One of the militia men suddenly voices his concern.
"I think Arekhel is right. There is a feeling of evil here that is making my skin crawl. Lets get the others and be out of here. I feel exhausted from all this fighting. Targon should be back soon with the Captain and then I say we go. I don't care for..."

But before he can finish the sentence, his body goes rigid as the dark mass he cannot see suddenly sucks in upon itself and drops from above to cloak the man in its blackness. A pitiful and mortal scream is heard but somehow, it seems to emanate from somewhere inside the cloud, from somewhere a long way off...

Upstairs in the second floor, Meraina, Sealvach and the Hobbits clearly hear the scream and shudder at its sound. Although even to them, it seems to come from a great distance away, they can all hear it clearly.  Both Sealvach and Meraina run to the stairs and peer down as Targon skids to a halt on his way up. Meraina is the first to carefully creep down towards the ground floor, with Targon at her side, and looks carefully around the corner of the stairwell across the ground floor room. They both see a militia man backing away frightened from a pool of swirling darkness that is now visible as it gains infernal strength and swirls at the height of a man in the center of the room. A faint shape can be seen flailing within the roiling inky blackness and the occasional flash of something bright in its depths. There is a further dull moan but this is faint and by now, of abandonment.

The other militia man backs up to the foot of the stairs beneath the woman, his eyes rooted to the column of darkness before him. His weapon is drawn in an attitude of defense but he is clearly terrified.

Meraina pauses only for a minute to see what this darkness is doing. It appears to be stationary in the center of the room but a faint colouration is slowly appearing somewhere towards the top. Snarling and vowing to get Valdo for not taking the Elves seriously enough, Meraina quickly trots back up the stairs, alerting all on the second floor about the 'darkness'. Looking at the mouldy door again with distaste she decides to carefully make her way to the third floor and warn the rest of the party, in particular Heladil.

On the third floor, she comes across the aftermath of the battle that is even now in its final stages...

First to receive Lochan's aid is the fallen militia man with the thigh wound. He has panicked and tried to remove the dirty arrow but has only made it worse. Lochan tries his best but the arrow breaks and the man yelps in pain before finally passing out from shock and loss of blood.

Boldor is not an easy patient either, but eventually Lochan has the Dwarf's arm in a tourniquet and sling. He's not bleeding any further but swearing mightily at all around him. Lochan just shrugs and moves on.

Blood covered hands are looked upon with deep eyes, full of wisdom. But hardly in his life has Froin had to defend his life, let alone others, from these foul creatures. His life given to the building of great innovations. "Now life has turned down a darker road." Froin looks at Boldor and then at the others around him. The floor collected with the blood of enemy and allies. 

'This place is evil...' comes the voice of Arekhel in his mind, but Froin's thoughts are far from the evil that may lurk further within the watchtower. Moving away from Boldor and Lochan, Froin looks down at his mace, but decides against using it. Putting a bolt into his crossbow, Froin moves towards the inner chamber looking at Valdo, awaiting his command.

Valdo spies the fleeing Uruk but is stayed from his immediate pursuit by Relg who appears beside him.

The Gargath leader looks around, trying to assess the losses the company has taken. His face grows grim as he sees how heavily wounded Boldor is. Then he follows Valdo into the inner room. Realising that the enemies have fled up the stairs, Relg says to Valdo: "We must act quickly before they can reorganise their defense. Either there is a way out of this building or they have reinforcements up there. I'd rather guess the first. So we should follow and hunt them down before they reach it. This huge creature is wounded, it should not be able to move too fast."

Heladil shakes his head. "I fear there may be more up there than a way out. We should heed Arekhel's warning about danger from above."  Heladil urges the others not to give chase. "Why should they flee towards what appears a dead end if there is not something there to support them? We should take our wounded and retreat into the woods for now."

Relg replies:
"We are still enough for keeping up with these creatures, and the longer time we give them, the better they can organise their defense. But you are right, they either have some form of reinforcements up there or whatever, maybe another escape route? However, we have to be cautious when we go - and I still wish to. Valdo?"

Valdo survey's his remaining men. They are all receiving aid from the Ranger. Lochan shows them how to use spare bits of cloth to wrap their wounds closed as none are severely wounded and he gives each a healing herb to place within the cloth.

"Yes, we should finish this, now we've started. If we press the assault we should overcome them. I can't leave Goblin's at my back when we go for the Szreldor. Criocha is almost defenseless remember?"

"I have an idea first, Captain," answers Lochan, taking out one of his flasks of lamp oil and a flint and steel. He finds some rubbish nearby and manages to light it. Slashing holes in the leather bag, the Ranger takes three steps towards the cawing crows and lights the dripping oil and the bag with it. The birds start to flap but don't understand what he proposes to do until he flings the flaming bag over arm so that it splashes hot oil among the broken stones, catching a couple of the birds to slow to react. A great commotion goes up as the dark birds take off into the afternoon air, cawing loudly. "My intention is to prevent the nearby door from being used by the enemy," he says taking out a second flask and doing the same over the floor by the further door.

"Good idea," exclaims Valdo, "but now lets get moving before that lot upstairs have found a way out of here!" Valdo, with Relg, Coru, Lochan and the remaining militia men with Froin following them, head into the central room leaving Heladil behind with Boldor just as Meraina gets to the top of the stairs.

Heladil pauses a moment at Relg's words. "Very well."
With a louder cry to the others he shouts:
"This way!!" but catches Meraina's anxious look and halts in following
Relg.

"There is some sort of black swirling thing downstairs, I don't like the look of it. It is about a man's height and there is a shape in it, I think one of the guards was unlucky and got caught in it.  We better find another way out of here, and fast," she says to the Elf, realising as she does so that the others have all left. She raises her voice to them, not caring whether any enemy can hear her but they don't seem to respond and continue to the foot of the spiral stairs.

Heladil looks worried and comes close to speak with the southern woman. "Yor fears echo my own. I think it is the right time for us to leave this place. But shall we wait until the others have finished upstairs?"

Relg moves forward to the spiral staircase, this time with bow and arrow ready. His shield is tied to his left arm, so it is ready to use but does not interfere with his bow. "It's time to finish what we began," he whispers encouragingly. Going first, the War-seeker creeps up the staircase soon seeing that the spiralled steps pass up at least ten metres to the floor above and any of the enemy could be waiting at the top for them. Relg takes a piece of cloth from round his belt and uses his bow to push it up through the opening. Sure enough, he hears the thrum of bows and the skittering sound of arrows bouncing across the floor. As soon as the sounds return to silence, the Gargath jump up and forward rolling over onto the floor above and crouching in a fire position himself. Coru does the same but to the other side and also fires his bow.

The room is roughly triangular and the two Goblins are firing from an oblique angle from the only doorway in the room. One manages to nick Coru's calf with its strike and the Scout curses as he fires back; missing as does Relg. The two Goblin's don't wait for another shot but flee through the open door. Valdo clambers from the stairs and gets a helping hand up from Relg as Coru goes to check on the door. He sees the motion of a door in the right-hand wall closing just as he peeks through.

The rest of the group quickly assemble in the room, then Valdo, wincing at the pain from his broken rib calls for a swift council. "I feel that we are going to have to play cat and mouse with these Greenskins, men. They may well play this running game for quite a while since I'm sure they know the layout of this level better than we. Our only sure plan is to pin them down with our own bowmen while the rest close assault them with melee weapons. The Goblin's won't want to give us a chance so we will be running head-on into their bows but they don't seem good shots to me. I think if we are careful and don't take excessive risk, we can catch them swiftly. Any questions? Okay, Relg, Coru? would you be our bowmen? If you can stay forward and to the flanks, we can hopefully cut down the odds against us before we all go in with swords."

Relg nods at the idea.
"We shall do it."
"and so shall I," says Froin, joining them.

And that is how they proceed. Relg and Coru out front with bows drawn, their eyes keen for the slightest movement in the shadows as the progress down the narrow corridor. Glancing from the far end, Relg spies a staircase leading to a trapdoor on the left while on the right, the passageway slopes around towards the stairwell. The duo backup until they halt outside the opposing doors. No sound can be heard from either so they first take the one nearest to Relg. Open Valdo's mark, the door is yanked open and Relg and Coru risk a glance as a flurry of arrows whirl through to embed themselves in the wooden door opposite. Relg shouts, "there's only four," in Gathig as he lets fly with a shot that spins a Goblin round, tearing a hole in its side as it drops to the floor. Coru's shot goes wide however as he sees the imposing bulk of the Uruk-hai just behind its archers. As the Goblins step back to reload, Valdo's men sweep forward through the doorway to engage them. Froin fires at the Great Orc, drawing blood but the creature roars and clashes with Valdo and Lochan.

The next few moments become a maelstrom of flashing, slashing blades, of screams of the wounded and brave cries of the victors. As Relg and Coru drop their bows and leap forward to join the fray, Valdo and Lochan push through to challenge the Uruk leader. It stands to meet them but as Lochan feints to the left and stabs in for a light touch, Valdo swings high and to the side, slashing the creature's shoulder wide open and making it stagger to the side. It hardly seems to notice for a moment and aimlessly brings its huge club swinging down to surprisinly catch Valdo a glancing blow. It is enough to knock the Guard Captain back but not until he sees the huge form staring unseeing ahead as it blankly drops to one knee, then keels over behind it's remaining defenders. The expiry of their leader understandably sends the Goblin's into a route and the dash every way to try and escape. The militia men block the door but at least two of the creatures head towards the break in the wall at the far end of the room. The militia men go after them.

Lochan's immediate attention however is held by the site of the other occupant of the room. To one side, where the wall of the room kinks outwards to accomodate the stairs beyond, a man hangs limp from two iron rings hammered into the wall. His anaemic and blood-covered naked body looks barely alive and his lank dark hair hangs down to hide his haggard face. As Valdo joins the Ranger to take a closer look, a slight swaying of the form suggests the man is somehow still alive even though upon closer inspection, his body appears to have been slowly and repeatedly mutilated by many scores of knife marks covering his chest, arms, legs and genitals. Indeed, it almost seems that this unfortunate has been 'bled' by the Goblin's on purpose, perhaps in some dark ritual. Either way, he is a mortal man and alive and Lochan goes at once to check his wounds.

Meanwhile, the Gargath survey the area. Across the room is a roughly made sleeping palet and beside it a wooden flip-top chest with brass corners. Near to the prisoner is another smaller chest of similar make and a pile of clothing.

Meanwhile, outside the tower...
 

Gwalchmai is speaking to Arekhel urgently:
"Even if I could fight, my axe would do no harm to this thing. Only magic can stop it. Arekhel, Can't you do something? If you can't, we must find a way to warn the others before it's too late! And then let's get out of here!"

As Arekhel stares in blank horror at the shadow creature engulfing the poor militia man and listening to Gwalchmai's pleas she slowly becomes aware of a small but insistent movement to her right among the greenery of a bush. Looking finally and slowly round the Elf can make out a diminutive humanoid figure, green like a plant and well camouflaged by the tracery lying upon its skin like the mottles of leaves. The creature blinks its big dark eyes and cocks its head to one side regarding the Elven woman.

Arekhel hears a whispered high-pitched voice comming from the creature before her:
"What brings a Tawarwin to these woods then?"

Arekhel tries hard to concentrate on the little creature. She frowns and whispers back:
"A Tarwarwin? What do you mean my little fellow? Do you mean the black shadow there, which is happily killing my friends? Tell me, do you know more about it? For I think we would be grateful if you knew a way of getting rid of this rather annoying entity... killing my  friends, what a naughty thing to do!" she half smiles and giggles to herself, shrugs and turns back her  attention towards the little creature, expecting an answer.

"So you can see the Morleng then, Tawarwin?" The creature says in its squeeky voice. "It has been here for many seasons now and threatens our glades with its evil gloom. We want to be rid of it, and quickly. We thought you might be able to ... get the Big Folk to help?"

The little creature smiles and looks up at the Elven woman hopefully.

Gwalchmai is bemused why Arekhel should start talking to plants and comes over to see what she is doing. Within a second, the creature panics and dives back into the covering brush, immediately lost from view.

"What is going on here? Who are you talking to?"
While checking that the vortex is not moving toward the group outside, Gwalchmai adds:
"If you can do something against that thing, you'd better hurry!"

Arekhel turns towards Gwalchmai and says angrily:
"Back off! You are spoiling everything! Stay where you are! Our lives may depend upon it!" She waves exaggerately him off and turns again to the bush, speaking in a low voice and concentrating hard on what she says:
"Please, come back my little pet. Please! I want to help you but you need to tell me more. Do not be afraid by my friend there, he might look like a brute but he's nice. He went away, he won't disturb us anymore. Come back! How could I get the...Big Folk to help you?" She stops, her eyes unfocusing for a moment. The Elven woman lies down in front off the bush, half smiling to herself, waiting for the little creature to come back, completely oblivious from now on to the figure of Gwalchmai behind her.

.....
 

After a while the little Faerie figure appears once more in the bush, now above the Elven woman. Being closer, Arekhel can see that the diminutive and childlike creature is clothed in a short tunic of softly wound leaves and gossamer threads; whether from spider-silk or the fibres of wild plants its hard to tell. The creature's skin has a mottled appearance lending it a woody texture although it's delicate limbs are graceful but supple. It's hair is the same greenish brown colour and sweeps up and back to form a shape not unlike a beechnut. Arekhel can easily understand how these creatures cannot be seen by man although to the keen eyes of an Elf, the creature clearly displays a shimmering aura of health and vitality that can only be from the love of Yavanna, the Earth Mistress.

The creature looks warily over towards the bulky shape of Gwalchmai but Arekhel's words sooth it until it speaks once more in the language of the Silvan Elves. "You must help us rid the woods of this evil creature." It says matter-of-factly. Then realises and becomes a bit more forthcoming:
"We need you Big Folk to make it leave the tower. Without its focus the creature will not stay in the world and will go back to its dark home in the North. We Dryads of the woods cannot possibly attack the Morleng ourselves, it would do us the gravest harm but you Big Folk, especially the 'Short-lives', might know of ways to deal with it. It is hurting the forest! Can't you feel the brooding of the trees around you and the fear that all creatures have for that which walks in the 'World-of-the-dead'?"
 

Arekhel frowns again at the words of the little creature. She whispers in Elvish:
"Its focus is the tower...how could we make it leave the tower? By destroying the tower itself? Do you think that would do?"

The diminutive figure titters with high-pitched mirth and puts it's tiny hands to its mouth.
"No, silly. The Morleng's focus will be some sort of ancient heirloom of it's time as a real person in the world. It needs to stay near to its focus to remain at all in this world. If you take away the focus from here, the creature will be forced to follow and then our woods will be free!"

Arekhel frowns again, as if she was making a great effort to focus on what the creature is saying. She sighs and whispers: "Do you mean this Morleng is in some way attached to a real person of this world. Do you know who that could be? Do you know how we could recognise this person?" She stops, rubbs her face with her palms and says again: "Do you think that by killing this real person, this Morleng would go?"

The Dryad, as the creature appears to be looks confused and shrugs when the Elven woman asks her confused question. "I...I don't understand. No, I don't think the Morleng would be attached to a person. Wait, I will come back."

The little figure disappears into the bushes and is lost from view for a moment. Arekhel strains to look for it but cannot see a thing although she is almost sure she can hear whispering from somewhere beyond. Before she can investigate further however, the Dryad appears before her suddenly. Once again.

"I have been told that the Morleng may have been placed in this tower, for a purpose. It will still need its focus to trap it here but a person won't do. Something else must be holding it here."

Arekhel opens big eyes in total incomprehension. She looks at the Dryad with a blank expression on her face. She then frowns and asks again, with a great effort and slightly slurred speech:
"Hang on...you say this Morleng has been trapped by its focus into this tower? But what or who is the focus then? And do you mean that another spell or entity is holding this Morleng as well? How can we know or help then?"

The Dryad rolls its eyes and waves it's thin arms at the ignorant Elven woman before it. "Look, I can't explain it better to you. We don't know why or how the Morleng creature is here. We only know that you must help us to get rid of it. We don't know how...you must find out!" The diminutive creature seems exasperated with her and crosses its arms in a childishly frustrated manner.

Suddenly the fog that is mulling Arekhel's brain slowly parts for a moment and the Elf puts two and two together and manages to come to the right conclusion.

"Wraith's are the undead spirits of powerful Men who have died in the past due to their excessive lust for wealth and greed of material things aren't they?" she mumbles. "Thus, I remember hearing somewhere, the spirit even after death lingers on, unable to leave those material goods that so held it in life." She smiles as if remembering someone speaking to her deep in the distant past... "Therefore, something unknown and more powerful than this Wraith has taken this knowledge and by moving the 'focus', has effectively shifted the - as humans would say, the 'haunting', from its tomb to this tower; or it may be that the Wraith lived here while still a mortal and by dying here, has continued to haunt the site, unable to make that final step between the Realm of the Living and the Realm of the Dead; to the Halls of Mandos."

"Psst. Psssst!...Oii!!?"
The Dryad catches Arekhel's wandering thoughts again and stands with hands on hips clearly annoyed. "I will have to go now," it says in that almost inaudible Silvan voice, "but I know one more thing that you obviously have forgotten... you will have to be brave my fair Elven maid. For weapons made by the magic of Elves are powerful wards against creatures of the Night Realms but those of Mortal men are like sticks to beat the trees. They will have no effect. Now, I must flee, be wary..." and the creature slips off the branch and disappears amongst the underbrush. Arekhel tries to follow its passage with her eyes but her slow reactions let her down and the Dryad has gone. 

Shrugging, the Elven woman sighs heavily and turns back to where Gwalchmai patiently waits for her a few steps away. He anxiously looks from her to the swirling mass in the tower and back again. Unsure of what she has found to do now. Arekhel tiredly narrates some of what she now knows about the entity but finishes by saying that she is just too tired to help any further. "I have saved you once today Gwalchmai. I don't want to do it again. I'm not going to go anywhere near that place anymore. If the others want to kill that... that Thing, then you can go and explain. I'm just going to stay here...and...take a rest." She sighs again, dreamily and sits down upon a fallen log, staring off into her own world once more. Gwalchmai stares at her, unable to comprehend this affliction that seems to control her but cannot be harsh on her either. He shrugs and turns towards the tower and the militia guards that stand nearby, frightened and hoping for some guidance to deal with the apparition before them.