"N-nice to meet you, Morben," the elf's gracious demeanor elicits a smile of relief from Vark in return. "Uhm... well actually maybe you could help us. Lady Evelyne told us that a Baron from Breanne is riding to try and claim Sheercleft for himself, as if they weren't the ones who let the town get overrun in the first place," he waves to dismiss the tangent. "We wish to head back to Sheercleft as soon as we hand over Morloth to your men, but we marched to the fortress on foot. We were wondering if you all might have some horses that we could use."

"Oh, is that all?" Morben asks with a chuckle, although a bead of sweat on the elf's temple betrays his concentration on the cube in his hand. As Vark and Aiden step forwards from the portal, more soldiers move through to Morloth behind them.

"Angrist!" Morben calls to a nearby warrior who wears a green cloak trimmed in bronze, before rattling off some instructions in elvish.

"Oh, how many will you be needing?" He quickly asks, looking back to the half-orc and his Norscan companion.

"Only four, mi'lord," Aiden says. "One must be fit for a half-giant, though." 

Morben arches an eyebrow at the talk of half-giants, but simply gives Angrist a nod and the other elf marches away out of the room.

A few more soldiers pass through the portal, no longer heavily armed and armoured, but instead carrying crates of equipment. Once the last of their number have departed, Morben lowers his arm with a sigh and the smooth plane of the portal dissolves into a spiral of golden energy that eventually fizzles out entirely.

"Welcome to Wydrioth," he greets Aiden and Vark in Breannian with a nod of respect. "Will you be staying long?"

Aiden looks to Vark, then says, "Hopefully not long at all. Given recent news, we must return to Morloth, and then Sheercleft as soon as possible." He takes in his surroundings, and then belatedly says, "Not...to turn away your...hospitality."

"Oh," Morben laughs, waving a hand dismissively, "think nothing of it. I completely understand. Would you like to wait here, or shall we go together to see where Angrist has got to with your horses?"

Vark turns to Aiden with a shrug. “Uhm... sure, yes let’s go see. Thank you!”

Morben leads the way out of the portal chamber and down a long passageway with a gallery-like view of the town on the right. Wydrioth is built similarly to Hyarantar, but is also significantly larger, with a greater number of stone buildings on the forest floor. Eventually the corridor curves around to reveal a door out onto the wooden walkways between the trees.

Morben shows Vark and Aiden to a platform used to raise heavy burdens up from the glades below. Stepping onto the gently swaying scaffold, he gestures in the general direction of the ropes once everybody is aboard and the pulleys begin to move by themselves, lowering the trio down between the branches. Eventually, they come to a gentle stop on the forest floor and Morben steps off, pointing towards some stables up ahead as they walk the streets of Wydrioth.

"This way. Look, there's Angrist now."

He calls a question in elvish and Angrist appears to answer affirmatively, waving them over. The horses are black, bay, dun and grey, the first being significantly larger than the other three.

"This stallion is for the half-giant that you mentioned," Angrist explains, patting the flank of the powerfully built black beast. All four are saddled up and ready to travel. "The others are geldings, so they'll fall in line. Do they suit your purpose?"

As more elves step through the portal at Morloth, Bründir finally decides to break the air between the three esteemed figures, "Capt'n Finglas, if ye'll come this way, Thurston an' I can give ye th' tour of yer New holdin'." The dwarf makes an attempt at a welcoming gesture as a butler would when granting passage to guests. 

Aiden nods to Angrist. "Yes, very much so," he says. He approaches the horses, his eyes settling on the grey steed. His hands are gentle as he pats the horse's neck. "This is very generous. Thank you."

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Aiden nods to Angrist. "Yes, very much so," he says. He approaches the horses, his eyes settling on the grey steed. His hands are gentle as he pats the horse's neck. "This is very generous. Thank you."

 
"Well, it's not every day that we're handed control of a fortress in the border lands," Morben replies with a congenial laugh, running his fingers through the mane of the bay gelding. "My mother seems to think that she's done you some kind of political favour in exchange, but I have a feeling that we still come out on top if you have the horses that you need to capitalise on it."

The elf gives Vark and Aiden a friendly wink, before taking the reins of one of the horses from Angrist with a nod of thanks.

"Shall we take them up to the sanctum?"

Back at Morloth, Captain Finglas tilts towards Bründir in a half bow of gratitude.

"By all means, lead on!"

Aiden laughs, nodding in agreement. "Geopolitically and militarily, I'd agree," he says as he takes the reins of the grey gelding. "But as I understand it, we have no need for a fort miles from Sheercleft. And we'd rather it be in the hands of allies than our enemies once again."

Morben smiles warmly and continues chatting with Aiden as they walk back towards the tree lift.

"It's curiously placed, Morloth. It's not on any pass into the mountains. It's not a central lynchpin with a broad area of control. It could certainly be a staging point for occupying the Hrona foothills, but it would have served that purpose better closer to convenient supply lines. The only thing that really makes it stand out is its back against the face of the mountain, which tells me that whoever built it wanted it to be defensible. That begs the question; what were they defending?"

“They were defending all of Arden... right?” Vark replies as he leads the chocolate brown bay gelding towards the lift. “There... well there are lots of old fortresses like Morloth that were built after Morohta. To defend against... the shadow. Maybe it’s location made more sense back then.” He looks to Aiden for a affirmation before looking back to Morben, his eyes searching for any recognition of this ancient lore.

"Maybe," Morben answers with a shrug, "Mother would probably know more about that sort of thing. When you say "the shadow", do you mean demons, or undead, or what exactly? I've never heard of a 'Morohta', but that's an elven word. It means shadow war... Well, Iorhael always did say that I should pay more attention to our history," the elf admits with a chuckle of embarrassment. "You say that there are lots of these castles? Scattered around? Why?"

Once the horses are all secured atop the lift's platform, Morben makes another magic gesture, causing the contraption to begin to ascend into the trees.

“Uhm... well...” Vark scratches the back of his head, wondering where to begin. “By shadow I mean like dark elves, and Talona or maybe you know her as Araushnee? And.... Erevan? And chromatic dragons too and well yeah probably undead and demons and... orcs as well. Basically all of the enemies of humans and elves and dwarves banded together under a... a dark god. That’s the shadow. So an alliance was formed and heroes rose up to fight back, and they won. After they won apparently they built a bunch of fortresses to defend Arden in case it happened again. But that was a long time ago...” It had never occurred to Vark that all of the ancient lore he’d been uncovering was not common knowledge, especially among the long lived elves. “We’ve uhm.... we’ve been learning a lot of history in our adventures.” 

"Huh," Morben muses, securing the platform once it reaches its destination. "I've heard stories about 'dark' elves, but I've never actually seen one. They say that they live in a frozen wasteland full of monsters, far away across the sea. It's mostly a story for children, really. Behave yourself or the dark elves will take you away and feed you to the spiders."

He grins through an awkward laugh and rubs the back of his neck.

"Just how long ago was all this?"

“Yeah! The frozen place is called Necorath, the alliance sealed Talona away there. And I’ve seen dark elves... not in person I mean, but in visions.” He glances at Aiden, momentarily self conscious that he is saying too much. “Uhm... I think the Morohta happened a little over a thousand cycles ago. But.... well even though it happened a long time ago, it feels like it’s all still happening now. The witches who were occupying Morloth were trying to channel Talona’s power, and when we saved Sheercleft there was a Breannian cult trying to harness... uhm... similar shadow powers that were sealed under the town. I’m worried that there are others out there trying to do the same.”

"Well, even the eldest elves don't live for more than a millennium and our elders can be... reluctant to talk about things that they wish to forget," Morben admits, leading Aiden and Vark back towards the teleportation circle.

"When I was a child, my great-grandmother used to tell me stories about her youth. About how she was born into belegdin - the great silence. That must have also been more than a thousand cycles ago. She used to say that when she was born there were no gods. No temples, no priests. Not until the Seldarine ascended to watch over all elf kind." Morben laughs again. "Grandmothers like to tell children all sorts of stories though."

He pauses for a moment at the door to the circle's chamber and gives Vark a curious look.

"What kind of 'visions' have you been having?"

Aiden studies the inquisitive elf, wondering for a moment if his interest in Vark's vision was truly based in curiosity or if it indicated something more sinister. But Morben's interest seems genuine to Aiden's eyes, and he shrugs, waiting for Vark to answer while pondering the fact that this isn't the first time that he's heard someone mention stories from a time when there were no gods. Thane Forgekeeper had mentioned something similar off-hand. He had a strange feeling that this wasn't a story told at a grandmother's whim. The beginnings of a theory were beginning to form at the back of his mind.