I have a number of things to write tonight here, journal. Thankfully the council of Gailten, the one which I was summoned to yesterday morning, has permitted me to continue to write. However, they did take the medallion from me, there was nothing I could do about it! But there are some interesting developments that they revealed to me.

First off, I was summoned yesterday at about midmorning, and the council grilled me right on through the day on things like my hometown, my upbringing, what I knew of Berthwell's Legion and plenty of other ridiculous things before they cut to the chase and asked me just what connection I had to Thyldas. Only one of the council members had ever known Thyldas in any personal way, and this was because Thyldas had come to visit Gailten while it was still under construction, and had requested a meeting with him to discuss city planning. It seems that Thyldas was a major figure in Drakksford, and a member of the city council there. He was also an ambassador and trade negotiator with Berthwell and Hildarg-Quelltor, the shipping megalopolis on the far northern shore of the continent. Gailten was started as a mining settlement, mainly just a cluster of small huts and a rock-processing house for the mining of Obarg Ore. Obarg is a deep, black glassy stone that is used in construction, jewelry, and primarily in weapons- blades, arrowheads, pommels, and javelins. Thyldas had been one of the founding members of the settlement, and regularly checked up on it. The council members didn't believe me when I told them that I had only known Thyldas while he was still on my island and I was a very small child. Furthermore, they were skeptical of my tale of Daanli, which they coaxed out of me after a long day of true confessions, all of them completely worthless to the council.

They began to get weary of questioning me and finally let me go at about 1 in the morning. I was so tired that I recorded nothing then, and just went to sleep. But know I am awake and I must record quickly before they surely summon me to another council meeting, this one probably to decide my fate. Ah, there is that ill-fated rapping on the door again. Farewell, journal, I know not when I shall write in thee again.

But there, I am waxing poetic.

Hollas, March 16th, Twelfth Y.o.E.

Now I will continue the story I began in my journal here yesterday.

After I picked up the silver object laying in the mud where the dying man had thrown it, I realized that it was a Medallion of The Berthwell Legion. The Berthwell Legion is based out of Berthwell, a massive city-state of formidable power, lying about 190 miles East along the coast from Dumarken. Ships carrying freight bound for or coming from Berthwell were very common in Dumarken, and only slightly less so in Twildenshire. I had known a man from our island, his name was Thyldas, and he left in search of fame and glory. Years later, when my father had taken me to the mainland and Dumarken, I had seen him there, and he seemed at once to have aged a great many more years than he actually had. He smiled when he recognized my father and I, and while he spoke to my father, he handed me this silver medallion, and let me play with it for a bit. I was entranced by the superb etchwork engraved onto its surface. When he had talked to my father for a bit, he bent down and told me that he got the medallion for his services in a mighty battle for the Berthwell Legion. On the back of the medallion it was engraved: "To Thyldas, one of the bravest sons of Berthwell - for his service in the Battle of Antil-Nochor".

And so it was the same medallion that I held in my hands right now. And my eyes strayed up to where Thyldas was struggling in the quickmud... "B..ert...hwell.." he gasped out slowly. And I understood that he must've returned to the Legion. I could see he was actually wearing some kind of muddled, tattered uniform as he sank into the muck. All of this flashed in my mind and then it shattered when I felt the sharp point of a spear pressing into my back. "Hand that over here." the second warrior said in a level voice. "No." I replied almost cheekily. "Hand that over by order of the magistrate of Gailten!" intoned the first warrior in a rising anger. "You may take me to Gailten, but this medallion was intended for me, and you would be wise to leave me unharmed." I replied. What was I thinking? I had no way of proving anything to them, and as to that last threat? Warning? They could just kill me right here and have their medallion. But something in the way I spoke to them made them falter. I had struck some kind of nerve, but what nerve I had no clue. "Alright, you'll come with us. But one false move and I swear you will feel a bit more than just the tip of this spear." the second warrior said at length.

I chanced a look again to where Thyldas had been struggling in the quickmud. He now lay quite still, and had ceased sinking. The warriors escorted me up the side of the sand dune where the two wild men (trackers, I supposed) were waiting, like hunting dogs waiting for their masters. They put me on the back of one of the reptilian "Gorlaugs" as I've learned they're called. We set off towards Gailten, and were within a few miles of it after an hour of slithering amongst the dunes. Several times I pressed the warriors for information about Gailten, the name of the settlement I had glimsped from the mountainside several days ago. They wouldn't so much as tell me the name of its streets. When we arrived, they immediately handed me over to the prison warden, and I was locked up in a holding cell for the remainder of the day and night. So, I have spent much of my time pondering the medallion Thyldas gave me, which the guards let me hang on to, curiously enough. They also let me keep my journal, mercifully, as you well know if you are reading this. I wrote until I was tired yesterday evening, and this morning I have done nothing but write. I shall have to draw a sketch of the medallion, or make a rubbing- they're knocking on the cell door for me.

I'll record as much as I can, later.

-Hollas

Today has been a sad day. All that will be said here concerns fated comings and goings. Ah, but I am writing in a mode that I don't usually write in.

Let me begin at the beginning:

I made my way painstakingly down the last rocky ridge of the mountian and finally set foot in the Moss Dunes at about the middle of the night. I was greatly fatigued and so I set up a hastily built campsite and promptly retired for the night. Upon waking, I found that it was nearly past midmorning and the campsite I'd made had already thawed out from the light frost during the night. Something smelled funny, though. I thought I could sense some sort of sooty, rotten reek coming from over the edge of the dune on my left. I thought nothing much of it as I packed away my gear and prepared for the remaining journey to the unknown settlement. But the awful stench only grew stronger, and I decided to go and see what was making the foul odor. As I peered over the edge I suddenly heard a gasping cry come from behind me. Standing on the top of the dune exactly behind me were two wild-looking men, jumping up and down and pointing frantically in my direction, all the while making loud screaming noises. Suddenly there appeared over the edge of the same dune a party of men, only these men were clearly warriors. They carried harpoons oddly enough, and rode on low-laying reptilian things. As soon as they spotted me they broke into a weird, slithering canter. The only sure thing was that they were headed for me, and they didn't seem friendly. I stood for perhaps a second or two, deliberating as to what I should do, when the more irrational part of my mind took over and I scrambled over the edge of the dune I was climbing quicker than you can say Dumarken Is Doomed. What I scrambled over that dune and into nearly scared the tightly woven threads of my sanity into unraveling themselves.

Squirming and slithering in this black morass of tangled vines and squelching sand that I had unwittingly jumped into was a man. If you indeed you could call it a man. He was waist deep in quickmud, and sinking ever so slowly, his twisted, half-rotten form making sickly crackling noises as it feelby struggled for release. I nearly doubled over at the smell, and to think that I had been camping not 200 yards away for the past 8 hours! The man began to moan, first in long slow drawn out gasps, then in louder, quicker yelps and screeches, reaching decibel levels higher than some birds of prey I've seen. Then its unseeing eyes fell on me, and a decomposed look of recognition flashed across its flayed face. "Brruuuukkvvillll!", it moaned pitifully. Just then the reptilian things carrying their riders came pounding over the edge of the dune and slid to a stop as soon as they saw the black quickmud and the thing caught in it. "Got the sucker." said one of the warriors. His face was painted an unhealthy white and he had a jagged piece of bone thrust through one ear as a kind of grotesque earring. "Gonna suck the sucker right down into the pit of Hades, that mud will. Heh, heh." said the other one. I turned to face them, but they scarcely regarded me for a second before returning their gaze to the squirming, rotten thing in the mud. "He won't last too much longer, leastaways not long enough to infect any of the others. It's just a right that he should get sucked under, safest place for him to go." the first warrior continued. "What is he?" I finally ventured to say, before introducing myself hastily. The first warrior looked at me intently for what seemed like an hour, "I have not heard of your Isle that you hail from, nor do I care, really. And as for this man, Hollas, you may look your last upon his face, what's left of it. There was a time, I think, when he was a well respected old man, and his face was wizened with age, and lined with wrinkles and he gave much good advice to all who came. But that was before The Blight came across the desert in the form of a man."

I was dumbfounded, this writhing thing had been a person, and now it was stuck in a pit and dying merely because of some disease? "Brrruucakcas-ahks-vvvill!" the infected man was stuttering. "Can't we at least end his misery?" The second warrior asked now.

"Nay, I wouldn't waste a good arrow on him when the mud will do him in jist fine in another couple a hours." They were obviously beginning to forget that I was even there, so I blurted out: "What is The Blight that you spoke of?" The first warrior looked at me sharply, as though he hadn't known another person was around, and then he began to carefully tell me about The Blight. I learned that one day, a strange, cloaked traveler had come to Drakksford, selling Elixirs of Life. Several of the regional practitioners of magicka bought some off of him. They declared that it was of the highest quality they'd seen. This pleased the cloaked wanderer, who identified himself as Lord Dwindlemere, emissary for the Dark Fortress. At this, many of the townspeople became suspicious of him. While no one had ever heard of the "Dark Fortress" or of any Lord Dwindlemere, or why someone so named should come to a small desert town selling elixirs and then declare himself a messenger from a mysterious land to the West, they nonetheless distrusted him from that point on. He proposed a treaty with the villagers: "grant safe passage to all of the men on errand for the Dark Fortress, and we will trade with you in all manner of magicka supplies and rare valuables.". Many of the townsfolk were intrigued by this offer, and a faction of the town sided with Lord Dwindlemere. However, the majority of the educated governing officials of the town declined the offer. "Too bad..." was all Lord Dwindlemere had said before he packed up his wares and set off across the desert northwards. On his way out of town, he reputedly turned back to address the villagers one more time: "I certainly hope then, for your sake, that the Legions Of Vaspagh don't turn their undead eyes upon your tiny, happy existence, for when that happens, there will be no assistence from the Dark Fortress... or me." And with that, he tossed away a small silver vial of potion. A vial that was retrieved against his mother's wishes by a young boy. A vial that was opened and promptly began to kill the inhabitants of Drakksford at an alarming rate.

After being told this, I sensed that my simple, happy journey of exploration and self-discovery might well be the only journey I ever take, as I might not live through it. "Brrrakk-nakk-bbssurukvilll!" the man began to screech, thrashing around like a suffocating worm. Then it stiffened... straightened out, and pulled something- it's hard for me to imagine that it even still had some tattered clothes left on it's body that had pockets in them- out of a pocket and flung it, glittering over the quickmud, where it landed, scarcely ten feet from my shoes. I carefully squelched into the mire and picked the thing up. "Don't touch it! You'll be infected!" the warriors shrieked at me. But I didn't care. Thylmas had thrown his only silver medallion over to me, and I knew why the thing in the mire had recognized me, and I knew what it had been calling out to me.

I'm tired, and weary from a sad, long day, I must rest now. I will continue this entry some other time.

-Hollas Dillan, March 14th, Twelfth Year of Enru

March 13th, Twelfth Year of Enru, Final Year in Cycle of Deshmohn. Today is Quansommery Day back home on the Isle and in Dumarken. By rights it should be so in Drakksford as well. I have just completed my long climb over the range and Drakksford is in sight in the distance. I expect to reach it tomorrow, but for now I can peer across the green and grey of the moss dunes as they segue northwards into a pale brown, the first hints of the massive Kohash Desert. It would appear that there is another settlement, though, which came quite unexpectedly to me as a suprise. It is off to the right of me now, situated within the shadows of the Moss Dunes. I am close enough to be able to see the tendrils of smoke rising from the furnaces. It is still chilly out, last night there was a rather heavy frost on my campsite. But I am making good progress in weathering such things.

Since I have no clear schedule to follow, I think that I may make the extra journey off the path and visit this settlement before pressing on to Drakksford. I mustn't be long, journal, I will write once I've reached the settlement tonight, maybe tomorrow if I am too tired, but I must press on if I'm to make it down to the more temperate climes before nightfall. Something doesn't bode well with these rocky mountians.

-Hollas

"You won't find life on this road. Only the peril of blackness, and where the blackness creeps there comes a tide of fear, one that you cannot stem with sword, nor axe, nor bow."

- Mishkar Dhayassar, March 12th, Twelfth Year of Enru (The Final Year in the Cycle of Deshmohn)

Today I have been on the road for 5 days now and counting. My trek has been long and arduous. The storm has completely muddied the road up and I am forced to keep my balance on the worn cobblestones that form the remains of an ancient pavement for wagons and carts to use. I had spent the past night miserably holed up in that hornbeam, struggling to write up a route to take and studying the old map that Daanli gave to me so many years ago. There seems to be no knowledge that I can glean from it anymore. I cannot seem to understand the symbols situated in the upper left-hand corner of the parchment, though.

The important thing I have to write today journal is not the route which I aim to take, but rather the event of an unexpected and at once pleasurable meeting on the road. At about midday I saw another figure on the road up ahad, coming towards me. It was scarcely another hour before I crested the final hill and he came back into view. I introduced myself once we were close enough, and he did likewise. His name, as you have already seen from the quote above, is Mishkar Dhayassar. He has some, unique views on life. He tells me that he's been living in the dark woods at the foot of the moutains and has heard rumour of evil coming down from the north. I asked him who informed him of this and he merely told me that the forest did. I don't necessarily discount his belief, though someone who has lived with nature as his only friend for so long cannot have the freshest most up-to-date view of the world. As for me, I'll continue north to Drakksford and find out for myself. Mishkar and I had a brief talk, and he continued on to Dumarken, where he plans to gain passage on a trader ship to the southerly continent of Werelinden. Until tomorrow, the rocky slopes beckon.


-Hollas Dillan, March 12th, Twelfth Year of Enru (It is indeed the final year in the Cycle of Deshmohn)