Lusseriel was sitting at a table in the shadowy inn, in Mirkwood, near the ruins of a settlement. She was near a fire going, and enjoying the warmth. Her backpack was on the floor near her, and she had her journal open in front of her on the table.
The date was scribbled in a messy hand in the corner of the page and she started to write.
“I’ve been remiss in writing for a day or two.
Many things happened. For one, I stayed to help with the healers after the assault of the hilltop fortress those name I forgot if it ever had one. The others of our group helped the assault, I helped the healers.
For some reasons.
Anyway, I finally found my way to the haunted inn in Mirkwood and there I found again some members of our company. Apparently some went scooting ahead or something similar and… Well, they just hadn’t arrived yet I suppose.
Oh and apparently the dwarves sadly arrived with their… Ah, guest of honor. And one of the guards who had helped secure his way here was dead already. If it comes to everyone of us getting killed before we can approach our destination, I’ll take the executive decision to kill the creature myself and be done with it. If I have to die, so will he.
Anyway, we were few in number, but it seems we found nothing better to do than help our new friends to clear the ruins of Dannenglor that are, admittedly, far too close to the inn for comfort and peace of mind.
Somehow, we managed. I credit that more to the fact the merrevail in there weren’t really organized than to anything else.
Luck was on our side. Let’s hope it’ll stay on our side for the rest of our journey here in Mirkwood.
And then, there was today.
I spent a little time trying to alleviate a bit the ambient gloominess of the inn by playing music by the fire.
It actually works. When you don’t use music to add to the gloominess of the inn that is. It can be great fun on its own right, I mean, I’ve done it a time or two or more in the past, and when the time is right it’s absolutely breathtaking. But right now I doubt anyone would thank me if I just ended up depressing everyone with music.
For one I wouldn’t thank myself. That inn and that forest are already terrible for our moral as it is.
I was joined there by Andrahir, Ilthirian and Aireliniel.
Andrahir told us he heard of some problems with one of the dwarves. Honestly I’m starting to think that those particular dwarves are problems on their own anyway.
Andrahir said he didn’t know if it was a problem for us or not but that Cucheron, one of the elves of the hidden guard, was rather alarmed. And “we know how difficult it is for dwarves and elves to cooperate”.
Do we know? I’m sure I would know nothing about it. I’m an elf after all and would never even guess at what he meant by that…
Ilthirian noted that the dwarves, those dwarves at least, should be used to us coming along to help them by now, which is true. We’ve been giving them a hand with their pet project since the beginning so… But perhaps that’s the problem here. They know we all disagree with said project. They know we’d all be much happier if we could kill the orc they were keeping prisoner.
We were joined here by a hobbit. Of all living beings currently in the forest, a hobbit was there. I was more and more surprised by their race. I thought them all very happy to stay in their little corner of the world and ignoring the doings of the rest of us.
Her name is Dealia.
And we learnt in the process that Ilthirian was high from having been scratched on a “weird bush” before coming to the inn. I hope we won’t see anything more than a light high and lack of focus or we may be in trouble.
Dealia seemed to think food could help, when does food ever not help hobbit? We were lucky, it did. It could have had the opposite effect altogether.
And someone, an old man by the look of it, had taken a crow of all creatures, inside the inn.
Well to be fair, leaving it outside may be just inviting trouble and predators so I guess I can see the point…
Andrahir engaged him in conversation and I somewhat tuned it out, too busy trying to figure out which “weird bush” could mean Trouble in our future, I came up with exactly nothing.
Or too many possible bushes alas.
For one, any plant can be described as weird in the right conditions, and Mirkwood is in exactly the worst state possible for that. Half the plant life is overtaken by the corruption exuded by Dol Guldur and half of it is getting used to less than ideal living condition and learnt to survive in the dark and fog and among the left over horrors from the orcs and whatnot. Weird looking can describe about everything in the forest once you put your nose outside the inn. Between the darkness, the fog, the… The general gloominess of the place…
And native or not to the Mirkwood, there’s so many plants and bushes that could cause hallucinations, a high or just be downright poison…
I guess I’ll have to see if Ilthirian remembers which one it is when we next cross path with it. Hopefully without someone else falling in it.
We were joined there by Annag. It was nice seeing her. And then Tirnelion joined us also. It was nice to see our group getting back some of our members.
It’s unwise in this forest to separate and go our own way.
I think the conversations in the inn would have continued on for a while. It was nice, cozy, warm and the forest outside is one of the lest inviting forest currently in existence so I think everyone was quite enjoying staying here.
But alas every good thing has a end, and that end is called a pompous, self-absorbed, judgmental, and racist dwarf.
Andrahir went to see what was it with the shouting, he has far more patience than I do, I wish him luck with that, and he came back telling us that “trouble is brewing”, well sorry, but they brought trouble with them to start with.
Apparently their company is missing two dwarves, and Otri the dwarf is blaming it on the elves. Because it’s logical. I mean, in a forest overrun by orcs, wargs, giant spiders and probably other horrors, not even counting the flora of the place that’s a danger on its own, of course it would be the fault of elves if a dwarf disappear.
Well, if it’s our fault I’m sure they have no problem getting their dwarves friends back on their own, now, do they? There’s no telling what other elves would do to them, hm?
But alas the others are far more patient than I can be and so we went to the swamp looking for the two missing dwarves.
And they were lucky, they had merely been caught by the land and flora’s corruption, and not yet been eaten by a great cat, a warg or found by orcs.
Let’s hope that taught them a lesson.
And then we returned to the inn, found the missing dwarves went back safely after we pulled them out of the swamp.
But I found that my patience with dwarves, which wasn’t very high to begin with, dwindled to almost nothing in a short few hours so I hope the rest of our company is both more patient and willing to interact with them.
If I do, there will be M.U.R.D.E.R.
The nerves of that dwarf… If he’s unhappy with elves, he can start by going back to the hole he crawled out of and leave the Mirkwood. After all Mirkwood is, to start with, an elven territory!
I think I’ll go and play music for a while. Hopefully without interruptions that are of the short, bearded and judgmental kind. Or I may have to remind them I’m also an elf, and if they want to keep accusing elves of all their problems they can go back to the Moria.”
Lusseriel shook her head with a frown, some dwarves really were better than others. She put her journal back in her pack before picking up her harp… Only to sigh at the sight of it.
Yes, before playing it, she’ll have to clean it. Well, that’ll keep her busy for a while. And perhaps enough that she wouldn’t feel like poisoning or pushing in the admittedly nice and large fireplace the next moody dwarf that would cross her path.
