image [https://i.imgur.com/i83MQoL.jpeg]

The night was dark and eerie in the forests of Duskmoor, and deep in its woodlands there rested a monastery upon a hill. A temple with a wall around it, and clearly not a common place of worship. It resembled a dark castle in the fog, with a bell tower looming above its courtyard.

"How much time do we have left?“ Asked Luthor, with clear concern in his serious voice. He was an aging man with long hair, dressed in dark leather clothes and a coat.

"It is yet unknown,“ a voice from a gilded armor answered. It was the Grand Paladin Aryon Smite himself. The Witch-Hunters usually dealt with the matters of the Realms of Men alone and under their own command, so the presence of such a figure indicated that the problem they are facing right now was far out of the ordinary.

"It hasn't been long since the plague appeared in Aerinthorn, yet the people speak of its mythical nature, which leads many to believe it's more than a common affliction; we could easily be dealing with a curse.“ Aryon added, "The order has decided to send all of its available witch hunters and their acolytes to Aerinthorn so they can disperse to the nearby villages and deal with the task at hand.“

Hearing that, Luthor's acolyte quickly strode to his room. He was a young man with brown hair and blue eyes, and he went by the name Eldon Cay. He walked through a long hallway and downstairs to a basement of a temple, where the rooms were. After opening a large wooden door, he entered his chamber and rummaged through shelves, on one side filled with old books of all sorts and on the other with magical potions, tinctures, and relics.

"Mugwort, there must be some mugwort...“ He spoke to his chin, and as the doors creaked open, he heard Luthor's voice; "Don't forget crimson ruby, iron dust, holy water, and glittering gold.“

"Glittering gold?“

"Catch!“ Luthor spoke and threw a small linen sack. After catching, Eldon peeked inside and saw lots of small golden petals that seemed to shine on their own with a soft golden glow. "The gold is way less potent on its own than silver, the purifying element; however, it has an ability to be infused with holy energy, which creates glittering gold, quite useful against all sorts of creatures, especially unholy and the undead.“ Luthor spoke and left.

Eldon knew he had to prepare fast; the witch-hunters often rode at night, rarely ever waiting for the morning to start their journeys, so he grabbed some ember root too, a spicy herb often used as a remedy to keep the travelers and guardsmen awake during the night.

During that time, Luthor went to the castle's courtyard, passing many sentinels on his way, the temple's soldiers composed of the acolytes that finished their training but were not deemed worthy of becoming real witch hunters. And among them many servants, most often young future priests who are now serving their duty at the temple, who would be occasionally picked by the witch-hunters to serve as acolytes.

Luthor was already a senior and experienced master witch-hunter, and everyone he saw greeted him with a downward nod of respect.

"Prepare my horse, and bring one for my acolyte too.“ He spoke to one of the servants, and the blonde boy obeyed.

As soon as the horses were ready, the two rode out of the monastery gates, down the barely visible road through the forest, and the path slowly disappeared before them. Just in minutes they rode through the dark woodlands at night, lit only by the light of the full moon.

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Eldon could not see well in the dark, barely better than a common person, so he followed Luthor. The eyes of witch-hunters were red, and they allowed them to see in the dark, but that was not the only trait; their main advantage was that they could easily see magic and the magical creatures that were often invisible to the common folk.

Their horses galloped through the woodlands, and both of the horses were raven black. The trail ahead and behind them was barely visible, and the galloping horses only left a handful of flying leaves in their wake, slowly descending through the night.

"Forests of Duskmoor are known for the fae that dwell inside of them, the fairies of the night court, especially active while the moon is full,“ his old mentor spoke.

The silence of the night was not promising of any encounter, but Eldon could not help but feel like he was being watched by the countless eyes from the darkness, so he held his sack of iron dust by his hip, and he held tight on it. Perhaps they could pass before catching their attention, for they must be used to the witch-hunters trespassing upon their lands so close to their secret keep, or perhaps they passed so quickly that they evaded their notice, or maybe the stories of the night fae were simply nothing more than a myth to scare off the wandering peasants to return to their homes.

"The wolves are hungry.“ Eldon spoke, knowing about many encounters between wolves and the peasants, especially after the sacking of Lindenrow, a village destroyed by the Ur'glun horde led by their dreaded warchief Nal'zuk.

And indeed he could hear the wolf's howl in the distance, an ominous sign of the impending dark times, or maybe just a folk superstition, for he could hear many of them for the past months or even years. He wondered if the people simply got used to the omens and ignored their importance, like sitting ducks, or if those were nothing but the superstitions of the old that caught on in the books of lore that the witch-hunters learned from and that their apprentices often read. Yet the howls were closer and closer, and they sounded unnatural, almost like the howling spirits of the past.

Eldon was a good student; he knew well that he should always obey his master, and he read plenty of the books.

He knew about the Age of Calamity, the war of the gods that ended four thousand years ago, and he knew that Duskmoor was known to be one of the battlefields upon which many remains were laid, both of the humans ruled by the king Ventrius the First, crowned by Xorael, the god of light and order, Xorael's servants, the Alofyr, his angelic warriors that fought by his side, as well as the remains of their enemies, the Dark Angels, the Alofyr that took Aroseth's side when he rebelled against Xorael, and the Gorugolm, monstrous servants of Aroseth, the god of chaos and night.

It used to be a lush forest with many rivers and springs, but after the first age of calamity, by the sheer presence of the wraiths and their remains of violent deaths and carnage, it was turned into a dark woodland upon which a thick fog lays every night, and its land has turned into a swamp and moor.

Eldon knew better than to be afraid of the harmless mistwraiths, even if he could see them way better than the common folk, but what made him afraid was not the wraiths nor the wolves, but the reason why wolves became more active at night.