After receiving the mission regarding the rescue of Argeleb’s daughter in their previous mission, the group sets off towards Rhaglaw yet again. The trip there was quite uneventful, and the town was surprised to see the adventurers again after being there so recently. Alfirin asked about Gandalf, who apparently were already there just a couple days ago and went ahead. The town was able to give more information regarding the lay of the land, and the best entry point across the river.

The group travels to that point and make a permanent camp before trying to cross by themselves, planning to keep the horses at the camp for safety. Niana can sense rain, which will cause the river to course faster, so the group decides to try and cross the river that night before it completely destroys the remaining ice from the winter. Alfirin uses levitation to cross over to the other side, then uses it to get the others over slowly.

Shortly after everyone crosses and set up a camp for the evening, it begins to rain heavily. Despite the rains, they were able to see a group of riders dressed in black cross by on the road on horses. Expecting trouble, they hid from sight, and then took a deer trail the next morning in order to stay hidden.

They reach the top of a hill, and can see a village and a fortification to the distance. While the village is populated as far as they can tell, the farms surrounding the area are wildly abandoned as far as they could tell. The group makes their way down to the farms to investigate further. Inside of the farmhouse, they discover several skeletons on the ground, possibly dead from the Plague that ravaged the land. Inside of the barn, it’s discovered that it was rat infested and unable to make a shelter out of it. Many of the other farms were the same, or completely abandoned.

Edra and Addrymir go into the village in order to scout it out while the rest of the group wait in the driest abandoned farmhouse. The village appears to be originally of Dunedain make, though a lot of the newer houses are made of sod, with a tall tower in the middle of the town. A guard comes out and challenges the two of them, asking what they want, since they don’t get many villagers. Edra tells them that they lost their village to the Angmar army and are passing by, needing shelter for the night due to the rain. The guard gives them a pass and lets them into the village, pointing them to the “Red Hooves Inn”, the only tavern in town.

Once they step into the inn, they are hit with a wave of humidity. The building is super crowded with several ill people and many animals. A man comes up to them and gives them a tasty stew and mead, then asks where their coin is. Edra hands them coin, and the bartender realizes that the coin is of Arthedain make. The inn became suddenly silent and the sounds of weapons start to rustle. Edra quickly says that the money was easy to take from Arthedain and the inn calmed down. The bartender allowed him to trade it for the local currency, which he happily accepts.

After some observation, they are able to make out that there are two major groups in the inn – the hillmen and the dundelings. Addymir sees a group of people hunkered down, whispering to each other and pointing at them. Addymir started to believe that these men believed Edra to be an easy target for pickpocketing, and his suspicions were confirmed later in the evening. As one of the men try to make a pass at Edra’s coin purse, Addymir successfully threatened him to the point where they received more respect from the tavern through the rest of the evening.

They find out from various conversations throughout the night that Cameth Brin is half empty right now and is occupied by hillmen. There is a representative of Angmar there, with orc bodyguards. The plague killed off the previous residents of the fortress, though shortly after the hillmen settled down, a lot of them caught the plague too. It managed to wipe out a lot of the farmers, though they were lucky enough to salvage enough food to barely survive the winter. Cameth Brin tends to be invitation only, where guards have to lead people through the castle due to the number of traps. They also overheard a tale of a back entrance into Cameth Brin, and while they suspect that it may be underneath the tower that is by town, it’s near impossible to confirm due to the ghosts, according to the locals.

Once they regroup, the team decide to split into two parties – Addymir and Alfirin decide that they will try to see if the back door is underneath the tower, while the rest go in through the front door as a diplomatic party.

Addymir and Alfrin leave first and made it up the cliff to the tower rather effortlessly. Once they scale the tower and find their way inside from a window high up, Alfirin finds a foundational plaque inside, with a sentence saying that the “Numenorians will rule this land forever”. They open a door in the tower, and Alfirin comes into an encounter with several ghosts, circling her and saying in Numenorian, “Leave us alone!”. She responds that she means them no harm, and the ghost says that the “White Council will meet”. More ghosts come out of the walls and ask why she’s here. She says that she is looking for secrets lost, specifically the entrance into Cameth Brin. They tell her that the entrance through this tower has been blocked off by the hillmen many moons ago. She tells them that the hillmen have taken over their lands, and they are very upset. They wish they could do something about it, but they are bound by a spell and are trapped in this world until the Witch King frees them. Telling the ghosts that they will think about it, the two adventurers were able to take their leave from the tower.

The second group walk to the entrance of Cameth Brin itself and tell the guards that they wish to meet with the King, on behalf of Arthedain. It didn’t take long for them to be summoned, and the group was blindfolded, led through the trap room, and brought down the stairs. King Bragga is there with his wife, wearing a turtle crown. He looks at Edra and said that he is surprised that they were able to come so quickly since he had only sent his letter a few days ago. Edra said that Arthedain had the foresight for this situation, then gives the king a large coin purse, saying it is a gift from Arthedain. As Edra is speaking, he sees that the ambassador of Angmar is there with his orc bodyguards, trying to intimidate them.

As a demonstration of strength, it is suggested that Arthedain and Angmar should have their bodyguards fight – first one to draw blood loses. Einar volunteers and does battle with one of the orcs, though has trouble with the spear that he was given and ends up losing. The orc calls him a weak human and puts him to shame, and Bragga calls the demonstration rather boring overall.

Edra calls for best two out of three, in which the Angmar diplomat laughs at him and asks about his third. Addymir serendipiously shows up after their adventure this morning at the tower, and Edra immediately introduces him. The ambassador takes one look at his smaller build and laughs, saying that his orc can snap him in half. Edra said that he will surprise you, and that’s why he is going second. Once the two face off, Addymir immediately takes out his dagger and throws it at the orc’s leg, drawing blood and ending the fight right away.

The ambassador said that was cheating since it was supposed to be a melee battle. The king found it impressive due to quick wit, though says that the next fight will be melee only. Edra introduces Addrok, who calls out to Toklus as he draws his axe, and then was easily able to bury the weapon in the orcs’ chest.

King Bragga is very impressed, and said that Arthedain has regained their honor and standing. He says that in exchange for the princess, they want food for their land. Edra said that they will write a letter, and that they want to see the condition of the princess. The guards bring her out, and she is rather feisty, trying to fight her way out of their grasp. After being prompted, she looks at the group from Arthedain and says that she doesn’t recognize Edra or any of the others, until her eyes lay on Niana. She manages to break out right there and starts running towards her. The guards catch up and start to restrain her again, eventually pacifying her by giving her a good knock on the head.

Edra steps in and says that the deal is conditional on the health of the princess. Bragga said that they have tried but she is very aggressive. He does let Niana towards her since they seem to know each other, and the two of them talk in Dunedain. She asks Niana if this is a rescue attempt, which Niana nodded. The princess smiles slightly and says that she will not try to break out until they go through with it. She also gives Niana a ring to give to her father to let him know that she is okay. Upon closer examination, Niana notices that the ring has a snake eating its tail on it.

In order to keep their end of the bargain, Edra writes letters to all of the petty lords to see if they will contribute on the behalf of the king. Niana also sends a letter via bird to Alfirin to keep her updated on what’s going on. The group then comes up with the plan that they are going to honor the deal, though before the food comes they will find the underground passage to whisk her away and blame it on Angmar.

The next morning, Niana wakes up and finds a note crumpled at the floor saying that “The princess of Arthedain will die tonight unless you do something”. The whole group was summoned to review the letter, and Edra was surprised that it was written in Gondorian.

Edra goes to ask the captain of the guard, Valadan, who refuses to really tell much about himself. They notice his sword was Gondorian, and Addymir who was with him point out that he’s wearing the Gondorian equipment rather well, as if he was trained to wear it properly. Valadan has said that he took it from his dead father. They chat a bit about the secret entrances around the castle, though Valadan admits that he doesn’t know any more than Addymir. However, he does tell him about the passage from the Princess’ room down to the hot springs underneath the castle. After Addymir’s left, and as Edra was following, Valadan grabs his shoulder and whispers to Edra that they should beware the King’s wife.

To get on his good graces, Edra does tarot reading for Bragga and predicts that there some danger to him in his future. The king seemed rather guarded, and Edra tells the King that they need to meet again later that evening in order to continue reading his future, and also encouraged him to bring his wife as a way to distract her while the rest of the group works on rescuing the princess.

Niana goes out to meet with Alfirin to dig into the closed off tunnel underneath the tower as a possible passageway out of the castle. Ghosts comes to Niana and speak with her after bowing since the recongize the right that she was wearing, asking if they’re able to assist her in any way. She tells them that they need assistance with getting the princess out of Cameth Brin– once they dig the tunnel clear, and with permission, the ghosts would be able to wreak havoc over the agents of Angmar. The ghosts like this idea, and once they make an agreement, their binding starts to break which sends an instant message and location to the Witch King of Angmar. The power that was used prompts him to immediately move towards the citadel. Niana was able to sense this as well, and then starts to dig as much as she can using the power of the ring in her posession, along with assistance from Alfirin. It doesn’t take them long before they managed to make it into the Queen’s bedroom. They were surprised to stumble onto her, though she was deep asleep and did not startle when they stumbled into the room. They find it suspicious that she’s asleep at 11 am, and begin to worry if she is another entity entirely.

The two of them make their way out of the tower, and then notice that there is some slight steam coming out of some nearby rocks. Sensing that these may be linked to the fabled hot springs underneath the castle, they enter the nearby cave to investigate. As they are exploring the caves, which are short and they had to crouch, they eventually enter a room with tall ceilings. They see a craggy face in the wall and notice quickly that it is a troll that is resting. Niana casts Dull Hearing on him, which does snap him awake and he spots them, starting to charge. As Niana starts to take off, Alfirin takes the time to cast Grace on herself before running. The two manage to get out as the troll crawls on the ground looking for them.

Niana was able to recognize her way around and leads them into a huge room that is lit by water. The ceiling is rather high, and the room is rather warm. In the middle of the lake, there is an island with a huge snapping turtle in the middle, lounging around. The water, they noticed, has a magical component linked to it, which may be how the snapping turtle grew to such an enormous size. The two of them search for where the elevator is, and they eventually find a door. Niana works on getting the door open, and hears black speech as the door slowly opens. Alfirin is able to understand the speech and recognize it as Angmar’s people, who say that they only have another couple hours until they meet up with the “crazy bitch”.

The two of them then hear the turtle awakening, though they manage to hide themselves as the turtle moves to eat its dinner. The two of them take their chances by opening the door and moving inside into the dungeon. They find the dumbwaiter, and they pull it down to their level. They do not hear the orcs anymore and believe that they had already left, so they start climbing up the rope.

In the common room above, Einar, Addrymir and Addrok are waiting until the changing of the guard at 8 pm, which is when the room will be the least populated and gives them the greatest chance of rescuing the princess from her room. As the guard starts to gather and make their way through the castle, they notice that the diplomat from Angmar, his bodyguards and the queen are fully armed and heading towards the common room as well. The three men bolt directly into the common room and slam the door behind them. Addrok uses his body to keep it shut as Einar starts bringing a table from the middle of the room to assist. The two shieldmadiens that were guarding the room to the princess start heading over to the door, wanting it opened back up so that they can talk to the queen. Addymir convinces them that the orcs are after the princess, so that their duty is to protect the princess first.

Alfirin manages to emerge from the dumbwaiter, which surprised the two shieldmadiens, and they start running to capture her. As Addymir tells the maidens that Alfirin is part of the group and shouldn’t be harmed, the door disintegrates, exposing the queen and her posse behind it. Without thinking, the shieldmaidens shout “Magic” and start jumping towards the orcs in battle. Luckily, Alfirin was able to grab the key to the princess’ room before they dove fully into the fray.

Alfirin then runs up to the door and unlocks it, dodging a blow from a frying pan as she swings it open. The princess suddenly finds herself embarrassed, and takes a look around the room to assess the situation. Addymir loudly whispers to her that her life is in danger and that she needs to escape via the dumbwaiter. Niana shouts for her and motions her to join. As the princess gets on the dumbwaiter, she tells Niana that she has the most interesting idea for escape, and they start to make their way down. Before turning to the rest of the group, Alfrin relocks the door, bends the key slightly and drops it on the ground.

Addrok and Einar use the table as a makeshift door to buy the rest more time to get the princess out, but it doesn’t last long before the table completely disintegrates and they are left face to face with the orcs. As the group readies their weapons, Addymir shouts into the sleeping quarters that there is an attack in the castle, which prompts several soldiers to quickly grab their weapons and rush towards the door.

Using Addrok as a shield, Einar and the soldiers are able to attack from behind and cause damage to the orcs in front of them. As Einar manages to fell one of them, the queen comes up from behind and launches a shot of lighting directly at his chest, and he falls to the ground. Addrok shouts at them that he’ll continue to hold them off, but everyone else should try to escape as fast as they can. Alfirin and Addymir are able to tell that the dumbwaiter is available and start making their way down themselves. Shortly after, Einar had enough strength to grab onto the rope and ride it down with them.

The queen then launches a huge fireball to knock Addrok and the guards back, killing several and wounding Addrok in the process, which he thanks Toklus for leaving him standing. The ambassador steps up afterwards, saying that he was looking forward to facing Addrok one on one in battle. Addrok doesn’t think anything of him, yet readies himself for battle anyway. With every attack and block, Addrok moves closer to the dumbwaiter and once he is close enough, he makes a run for it. The ambassador runs after him and tries to swing at him with his axe, but he was surprised to discover that Addrok tossed himself completely into the hole.

Exhausted, the queen makes her way over to the princess’ room and tries using the bent key to get the door open. The group could hear the nastiest shriek as she discovers that the key is completely broken. Einar had little time to process it before Addrok hits him in free fall. Alfrin notices what is going on and manages to grab Addymir, moving themselves out of the way as the dumbwaiter hits the ground. Einar lands in a heap, and Addrok lands on top of him, leaving the two large men gasping in pain.

Niana heals them just enough so that they can move and make their quick escape. Due to exploring the caves before, Niana and Alfirin were able to lead the others through with little event, past the turtle and the troll, out into the open. It takes the group awhile to get back to the river, which is now flooding and rushing with water, which forces them to go to the nearest settlement to cross. Addymir tells the guard of the events at the citadel, along with the upcoming visit from the Witch King, which causes the small settlement to pale. Some decide to rally, asking if the group is with or against them. Addrok pipes up that they need to protect their women due to them being of childbearing age. As some of the group side-eye him, the guards are convinced enough to let them through.

They make their way back to Weathertop without much incident. Many of the group were rather glad, since it meant that they were able to get rid of the princess, who happened to be quite negative in certain aspects. She rode up separately, saying that she merely escaped with the help of the people that were there.

The princess meets with Niana once more, telling her that she was jealous that Niana was able to join the rangers – only males in the immediate family have that option, and it’s something she would rather do than the more domestic duties that are expected of her. Niana returns the ring to her. The princess smiles, and says that she is invited to Fornost at any time, and she will make sure that Niana is given more significant pull in the family.

The rest of the group is surprised by Gandalf, Elrond and his two sons, who seem to have yet another mission for them in wait….

Once the fires die down from the previous battle, Edra tries to apologize to Alfrond that he suspected him in the whole ordeal. Alfrond picked him up by his collar originally in anger, but Alfirin steps in and says that Rangers in their training are taught to be naturally suspicious. Edra adds that while he was initially suspicious, he asks for Alfrond’s help since they are clearly fighting against real evil. Alfrond then puts him down, kneels in front of him and offers his broadsword in fealty. The hunters are impressed except for Lheg, who snarls and says that he is better with his bow than that sword.

The group discusses what to do next and settled on setting the trap again during the day. Lheg volunteers all of his men, and promises that they are the best and would be able to find the wolves extremely easily. Due to the numbers, they believe that it’s possible to actually do both – hunt the wolves down and steer them into a set trap into the ravine. They finally decide that Edra and Einar are to go set the trap in the morning, and Addimyr, Adrokk, Niana and Alfirin keep watch outside until daytime, where they will go and track down the wolves. The evening was peaceful and the village crew were relieved to find the watch safe in the morning.

Whitburt comes out with a rusty shield and axe, saying that he wants to redeem Gerst’s name – he heard that some of the hunters blame Gerst for the previous night and Whitburt knows that he would never perform these acts. Edra and Einar decide that Whitburt would be better and safer off with them setting up the trap. As they made their way to the ravine, a huge pile of snow fell from the crevice on top of them. Edra was able to dodge it completely, Einar took a bit of damage, while the other two hunters took a lot more. Once they freed the hunters and tended to their injuries, the group started to build the trap.

As for the rest of the group, they go over to the edge of the forest and the hunting dogs start to freak out. Niana cast a spell on the dogs in order to soothe them, and while they were able to start going forward, the dogs still were a bit nervous as they continued into the forest. Once they got deeper into the forest, the hunters were able to tell by the tracks that there were nine of them, they were smart enough to stop the bleeding of that one wolf, and that they were zig zagging through the forest finding prey as normal through the night.

As the hunters are making their way through the forest, Addimyr sees something golden up ahead and freezes. The others were able to see him freeze, and as they focus their vision, they were able to see that the golden thing is part of a building. Lheg was able to recognize that building as Tadashala, a building created by the Numenorian sorceress that lived in the area during the second age. The building, he says, is the reason why they had been protected throughout the ages – the sleeping king lies underneath there, and the legends say that the sleeping king will rise when the village encounters danger. While the building is extremely beautiful and ornate, there was no way to get inside of the building – there were no handles on the large, ornate doors, and due to the height it is impossible to reach the hinges. The group took their notes to come back later, and continue marching on the hunt.

After a short amount of time, they are able to spot house up an extremely large tree. Addimyr was able to tell that while the house is not of elven make, he’s unsure of it beyond that. The villagers had never seen it before, and are a little concerned about it. Once they get closer, they can start to see that the house of rather rude construction, with both human tracks and wild cats in the perimeter. Alfirin called up a greeting in both Western and High Elf, though nobody answered. Since the house was out of the way and not really of their concern at the moment, they took note of it and continued on the trail.

Once they get even further into the woods, the dogs start to freak out. Niana accidentally steps on the foot of one as it flailed around, which caused the dog to yelp loudly. Suddenly a howl is let out from 100 yards away, and it met with replies of other howls. One of the hunters turn to the other, saying that it was the loudest wolf they have ever heard, while the other said that they don’t think that it was a wolf. Niana freezes in place and starts praying. Addrok notices her panic, picks her up in a fireman’s carry and starts moving. As they start running, they are able to see a wolf hurdling in their direction. The bowsmen start drawing arrows to fire when ready, while the hunters with the boar spears starts going to the front. Niana snaps out of it, and shimmied down, grabbing her slingshot to defend herself.

The group finds themselves surrounded by the wolves. While Niana was able to scare one wolf off with a spell, the rest of them were able to dodge and charge forward. The team gets into ferocious battle with the wolves, taking and dealing blows ferociously with them. They were able to whittle the group down slowly, Addrok gains favor with Tolkus as he fights, breaking the leg of one and snapping the neck of the other. The amount of carnage that happened caused the other wolves to become disinterested in the fight and stay away.

As they were fighting off the wolves, a wolf man starts walking towards the group and towards Addrok. Addrok misses his swing towards the wolf man, and the man in return grapples him to the ground and claws at him, causing damage. The group tries to attack him with everything they have, but anything that landed caused very little damage to the wolf man. Once Addrok fell unconscious after wrestling with him, the wolf man turns his attention to Addimyr and grapples him. Addrok fainting caused the other two hunters to run away out of fear, though Niana was able to heal him in short order to bring him back to consciousness. The fight went on for some time, and the wolf man was too strong – draining them of all health and they fell unconscious.

The wolf man tells them as they come back to consciousness that they are much stronger than the little girl that he has been working with. He tells them that he left them alive just so they can tell the town to run away as far as they can, for his enjoyment. As they get up and start hobbling back, he says to make absolute sure to tell the town to run, especially that fat priest.

As they get back to town, Edra and Einar greeted them with relief since they had not run into them all day, then listened to what happened in the forest. Edra knew about the wolf man, and was able to relay the tale – Warg is a creature like Bjorn, so he is a shape shifter, though rather evil and would be out of their league if they were to go against it. The townspeople, especially Whitburt, do not want to leave their homes and the lives that they known. Edra was able to convince the townspeople to stay calm completely, and was so successful that the Thain believe that they’re in the middle of a legend being made.

The people that faced the wolf remembered that he mentioned a woman that was working with them, and brought in the healer woman to see what information she had. She mentions a girl named Hanyae, that lived in the village a few years ago, her parents died of plague. She was obsessed with the sword of Gerst, and the more that she became curious about it, the less comfortable Whitburt became discussing it with her, due to her interest in using it for violence. She left the village a few years ago on her own whim, and nobody had heard from her since.

As Adrokk is meditating, a voice comes from the tomb of Gerst, with the voice saying that he disturbed his sleep. Adrokk asks if he knows of Warg. Gerst says no, and Adrokk tells the voice what had happened to him. Gerst asked Adrokk if he yielded in battle. When Adrokk says no, Gerst asked when Warg is to arrive. When Adrokk said when, Gerst tells him to lure Warg to the tomb. Adrokk believes that it is doable, and Gerst bids him farewell, with Adrokk snapping out of his trance with a start.

Adrokk tells the group what had happened to the astonishment of everyone, especially Whitburt who became really excited about the event, since nobody had spoken to Gerst in over 200 years. The priest grabs Adrokk’s hand and asks him if he will become the next priest of Gerst, and while Adrokk refuses, Lheg steps up and says that he’ll volunteer to be the next priest. Whitburt initially refuses, but with encouragement from Alfirin, she was able to convince Whitburt to allow it to the surprise of everyone, including Lheg.

Einar and Edra go to check out Tadashala. Edra was able to tell that the building was a hybrid Norseman and Numenorian build, and that there would be a secret tunnel built somewhere. After finding a cave where it would potentially be, they find that the tunnel is caved in and that the tunnel is impassable. The two of them then go ahead to the treehouse.

Edra decides to go first, and as he climbs up the ladder, a sharp sensation pierces his hand. Before he knew it, he became wobbly from the poison that was on the barb and started to fall. Einar was able to grab him on his way down but unfortunately could not keep a hold of him as the two of them fell several stories to the ground. While Edra suffered injuries to his chest, Einar found one of his feet completely broken. Unlike Einar, Edra’s injury didn’t stop him from climbing back up into the treehouse again. Once inside, he finds a journal which he immediately pockets, then spots some runes on a shoddily made table. Upon examination, he can see that they have a potent bomb spell on them. Edra quickly pockets them as well and then climbs back down to meet Einar. Once they are able to fix his foot enough to walk again, the two of them disperse the runes in random places around the forest where it would be hard to gather.

The group gathers back to Gerstberg in the evening to finalize preparations. Not long later, Warg arrives on top of the hill, and tells the people to run as far as they possibly can. As Warg taunts, the tomb busts open and a Wight in armor walks out, dragging the sword of Gerst behind him. Gerst looks at Adrokk and talks to him telepathically, asking Adrokk to bring Warg close to him. Adrokk thinks that he would definitely be able to do that, and after getting Haste casted on him, he starts charging up the hill super fast towards Warg. Gerst then turns to Alfirin and greets her as an ancient one before going into the trees.

Adrokk encounters Warg and then leads him on with childish insults until he was able to bring him closer to Gerst. With a swing, Gerst was able to fell Warg on the ground and began beating on him with the sword. Gerst was surprised to see that he was healing, though the sword was doing massive damage to him. After a few more hits, Warg asks to try and make a deal with him – he promised to leave the village alone forever if the damage stops. Gerst adds that he must also fight evil for a month, which Warg accepts.

Gerst comes back to the village to a cheering populace, and starts going back into his tomb. Before he goes in, he turns to the priest and said, “thank you for keeping the faith”, then has the door slid on him. Whitburt faints in pure joy.

Edra reads the journal. Hanyae wanted to blow up Gerst’s tomb, went into Rhuador and ran into Warg. She promised him the sword of Gerst in exchange for help in destroying the tomb, especially against the priest who kept knowledge from her. She learned the bombs spell from a shaman in the hills and had most of the supplies to do it before the group shows up. Hanyae knew they were trouble and wanted to get rid of them, though felt that it may wake up the wight. Unlike Warg, Hanyae began to have nightmares, and her last entry mentioned that she is escaping to the hills.

Edra had dream sequence in regards to Tadashala – he was able to see that the magical items that were supposed to be in the tomb were all gone, with a note that said “I, Timone, dared”. He looked up Timone in a book, found out that he is famous explorer who went insane, same with people that came into items that he had until it fell into the hands of the elves. Edra writes a letter to the elves warning them about the items and that the items should be returned to their rightful resting places.

When they arrive back in Weathertop, they are surprised to find that the Sons of Elrond are waiting there for them along with the Arthedain Army. King Argeleb II’s daughter had been taken and announced that the Rhuador nation must pay – planning to send the army to march on the capital. When Alfirin goes to hide from the sons of Elrond, she runs into Gandalf who asked how the recruits are doing. She says that they are well, and that Gandalf did hear that they did a great job. He comments that while the King is normally wise, his brashness is unfortunate in this situation. Gandalf said that he would help find the daughter, though he fibbed a little bit – she’s not actually in the capital. He believes that a small team of Rangers could move faster than the army and find the daughter before any real damage can be done. He is going with the Sons of Elrond to set up base in Rhaglaw.

Since Alfirin’s group had just been in the area, they would be good candidates for this mission. Gandalf requests this from an old friend, and would really appreciate it if they were willing to volunteer. He did request six extra horses, and they would be able to make haste if they wanted. Alfirin, after some persuasion, was able to bribe the Rangers in charge that they had not checked in yet, then went to regroup with the team in order to discuss what to do next.

A group of scouts meat at Weathertop in mid-March of 1642. The commander of this newly trained team congratulates them for graduating Ranger class. He then introduces the group to an elf woman, named Alfirin, who has a spectacular reputation among the Dunedain and has been assisting them for over 800 years. The commander tells the group that they would do best to listen to her, as she has been through a lot and has great wisdom to pass. Alfirin, after all, will be the one taking the group on their first real mission.

Speaking of mission, he says, he also mentions that there will be two more people joining them on their journey. With a slight bit of pain in his voice, he calls them out to introduce themselves. An older gentleman steps out to meet the group, along with a hobbit valet. The servant, Placro, introduces his master as Edranel, an influential baron who believes that he has a lot to contribute to the rangers. Placro then begins to speak to each person individually, learning of their particular tastes so that he can begin making preparations for the journey ahead.

The commander then begins to brief the group on their mission – one that he believes is challenging, but probably not deadly. After all, if anyone wanted to be a dead hero, they were welcome to join the military – the Rangers want live scouts. The group is charged to go to a small town called Rhaglaw, one that is technically in Rhudaur, but voted a long time ago to be part of Arthedain and has been paying their dues to the country since. They had never asked for assistance until now, where they believe they are having issues with ghosts – though the Rangers believe that it’s not actually the case, and that there must be something else going on. Due to some research on Edranel’s part, it was discovered that Rhaglaw was once the site of a trading empire during the Second Age, though it eventually dissipated.

The trip to Rhaglaw took about a week long and was mostly quiet, apart from the howling of wolves on their way. Once they arrived, they noticed a strange thing about the town – there were no fully completed walls, only some that were started but never finished. One of the scouts, Addrimyr, was able to tell that the walls, due to the style, were first started over 1000 years ago but had never been completed since then and wondered if it was because they felt that there was no need to.

Some of the village guards came out with spears in hand and demanded to know who these travelers are. Once they saw Alfirin, they lowered their guard a little – very few people in the village had ever seen an elf in the flesh, which surprised them. After learning that the group were the rangers that the thain had called for, they took the group to meet with him.

The thain, dressed in white furs, introduces himself as Lavoric, and then tells the guard to summon the local priest Whitburt to the inn, so that they can discuss the haunting problem. Once they all arrive at the inn, they meet with a local ranger named Alford, who had been a part of the town since fall, and then sits himself down with the rest of them without even being asked. Lavoric’s son, Lehg, also sits down with them as well, to everyone’s annoyance. He tries to take his place to Alfirin’s side, cozing up to her, with his dad on the other side of her. Alfirin sharply tells Lheg that she needs her “advisor” next to her. Lheg stubbornly refuses to move and had to basically be evicted by Adrokk and Einar to give Edranel a seat.

After the matter is settled, Lavoric starts telling the group of some of the weird events that had happened in their small town – in the fall, they began to have issues with their sheep disappearing into the woods. Hunters have been found dead with no marks on them, and in positions that suggest that they had been running away from something. Other folks had been going missing – the most recent being two shepherds that went to go looking for their missing flock a month ago and had never returned. As for those in town, they had noticed things moving without anybody touching them, and lights have been spotted floating around the hills with no bodies attached. Strange graffiti has appeared on several buildings, written at night while people were sleeping.

The locals strongly believe that their ancestors protect them, especially the “sleeping king”, and had believed that this is the reason why they never really dealt with trouble for a long time – until now. Whitburt the priest finally arrives and introduces himself as a priest of Gerst, one of the heroes that fought evil for the town and protects them even to this day. The priest also tells the group that there was one more event that very few people had heard of – a rotting, skinned sheep’s head was left on his doorstep as of this morning. Since the group had gotten in very late, they agree to go in the morning to look it over.

The group begin to chat with the ranger Alfrond, who had settled in the area in the fall, and does enjoy his time there. As Alfrond talks about his background, he mentions all the different languages that he knows. Edranel then decides to lean over and whispers “fear” in black speech, which elicits a reaction from Alfrind and Alfrond. Edranel gets a slap in the a face, one on each cheek from the both of them, for using such foul language, the rest of the group left a bit confused.

The group then decide to go their separate ways for the evening. Whitburt and Adrokk have a discussion about Gerst, who Adrokk found very impressive. Adronk then starts talking about Tolkus, the god that he worships, and Whitburt also gotten very into it. The two discussed over several pints of mead, with Whitburt telling more and more outrageous stories about Whitburt. Einar was coerced into helping the hobbit Placro intimidate his way into the kitchen to make Alfirin a vegetarian dinner. Niana got uncomfortable with the amount of people in the inn, so she ended up wandering into the local hall and poked around for awhile. Alfirin starts to play on the mandolin in front of the whole inn and blows Alfrond, who was also playing, out of the water.

Alfirin wakes up very early and notices something strung across the front door. When she lights a candle and looks closer, she realizes that it’s sheeps’ intestines. Once she gets over the initial shock, she notices graffiti in black speech that “this town in doomed” and noticed that the graffiti was written on other important buildings as well. The group starts to have suspicions about Alfrond, since he is the only one that they know who knows the black speech. The group then decide to split into two – one group goes to Gerstbroc to visit with the priest while the other group go hunting for the lost shepards.

Whitburt greets the group that is visiting them and then bring them to go look at the sword of Gerst, which is “frozen in a heart of a drake”. He takes them to an old, yet solid, building. The minute that they walk in, the building radiates cold. They see a massive two handed sword with all sorts of runes on it, stabbed in a rock of ice with a heart in the center of it. Addrimyr was able to tell that it was very impressive, forged in the second era, and could have actually been used to slay a dragon. Edranel tries to go and read the runes, though there is so much magic radiating from that area, where he is not sure where it is coming from – either the heart or the blade itself. Wanting badly to explore the tomb beneath where Gerst is buried, the group fights their urges and instead leaves the building.

The group then goes to talk to Odelar, who is the local healer. She says that she came here originally during the Great Plague since the area needed a healer. When asked about the strange happenings about town, and she thinks that the evil must be coming from the outside, since she is familiar with everybody in the area and would never suspect that anyone would do such a thing. She is concerned about the local hunting accidents that have been happening around town – people have been hitting traps that they have no knowledge setting, and believes that there is trouble in the woods. With that knowledge, the group departs to head back.

The hunting group went into the hills and find a couple of deer that have had their throats ripped out by a warg. Lheg doesn’t see the big deal, but Alfrond does, and tells him of the danger. They send Lheg back to the village to gather more people, with Niana following him. The rest of the group went further in, and heard the howls of wolves, which was weird in the middle of the afternoon. The group decided to fall back to a nearby farm until the rest of the group can catch up. Niana managed to catch up with the group that went to the priest and brought them back to the farm where everyone else was staying.

The group decided to use some bait to lure the wolves out in order to strategically attack them. They bought the pig from the farmer, slaughtered it, and as they are going to go out and execute their plan, the roof of the barn starts on fire. As one of the hunters try to escape, he catches an arrow to the side and calls out “ambush” before falling over. The group decide to release the animals and then intermingle with them as they leave the barn. Niana goes to run for the man who was shot by the arrow, and encountered a wolf, who jumped on top of her and gave her a slight wound. Another wolf shot at Adrokk, who blocked the attack with his shield and took a shot at it with his weapon. Addrimyr also dodged the wolf that lunged after him, but was not able to inflict any wounds on it.

As the group escape the barn, they see a large and imposing figure shooting flaming arrows from the bow, stunning several of the group. Several of the hunters shouted that it was Gerst and started to run away from the situation. The shadow man calls out for the wolves, and they run back towards him, going through him as they run back into the hills. Addrimyr was able to rally various hunters from running away, which breaks Adrokk from being stunned, though Alfrin and Einar still continue to be shocked about the situation. As Niana goes and healed the damaged, another arrow is shot towards Alfrin and Einar. Alfrond was able to block the arrow from the two of them and fell to the ground, injured.

As the group manages to try and contain the chaos, the shadow man goes back into the woods. When the fires died down, they found an arrow in the roof of the barn. Addrimyr was able to determine that it is man-made, modern, and probably local. The group believes that they may be dealing with a real wight, and that it may be getting help from a local man. Adrokk mentions that he did inflict the wound on one of the wolves, and it must be dripping blood on its way back to its home. They then begin to discuss their next steps on whether to strike when the iron is hot, and if it would be beneficial to follow the trail…