An unearthly silence filled the air, oppressive in the forest of great trees where little light shone. The forest should have been filled with the sounds of birds, insects, and other animals that dwell in the forests. Instead, this forboding silence reigned supreme, making it clear that anything that broke the silence was a trespasser. Ahren walked with silent steps along the forest floor, an arrow set upon his bow, ready to be fired at the first sign of movement. Wary eyes moved ceaselessly, noting every shape in the forest. Listening on the wind, the sounds of movement were easily heard by him. Moving silently, swiftly, Ahren stood behind one of the twisted, moss covered trees, barely daring to breath as a small group of four robed beings passed by. They made little noise, but it had been enough to warn Ahren of their coming. After a day of avoiding such groups, he was well aware of what they sounded like and what to listen for. Letting out a held breath, Ahren moved on, ever watchful, ever wary.

After another hour of traveling without having run into another group, Ahren felt it was safe enough to where he could afford a moment without his bow ready. Placing the arrow back with it's brothers, he set the bow across his back. Taking his elven shield in his left hand, Ahren stood leaning against a tree, breathing steadily as he rested. Having to travel at this slow pace was more exhausting than if he had run the entire way. It was beginning to wear him down, and it was only a matter of time before he slipped. Hopefully everything would go okay until he was through this cursed place. With a sigh, Ahren resumed travelling, this time taking a path through the treetops.

Ahren wasn't sure what the signal was, a small cricket chirp, or a the noise of something running through the underbrush. One second he was walking smoothly along the limbs of a tree, the next he was falling along with the branch. Flinging his wings wide open, he slowed his descent enough to where he landed without injuring. Robed figures rushed at him from all sides, casting magical spells and weilding glowing weapons. Ripping his own longsword from it's sheath, Ahren parried a blow and spun to the side. Summoning magic of his own, a green fire spread out in one direction, burning everything except for the plant upon which it traveled. To his dismay, one of the druids simply walked through the fire unharmed, clearly mocking him. Ahren fought wildly, managing to hold the enemies at bay with sheer ferocity. Finally, he managed to slip his sword past the guard of one of them and impale him through the chest. Without even looking to see what happened, Ahren whipped the sword back, bringing up his own defenses again. Okay, one down, several to go.

Lómen tread silently through the forest, armed and dangerous to any enemy. But she was still recovering from the changes, the loss of her immortality and its return. Now her new responsibilities in Imythess weighed on her heavily. She needed an escape from the council of the gods, and she decided that there was something she needed to do. She wished to face the wizard that had once possessed her and drained her of her powers. But perhaps that goal was more long term, but she was still determined to gather information about him on her time away from the cold halls of the Temple of Unity.

At her hip, Sûlkrist swayed silently with her as she walked. It seemed elegant, but it was as deadly in her hands as any other sword. And in her hands she carried Cúamarth, a light arrow at the ready. She figured it would be the best choice considering the evil in this forest. The darkness here festered and evil poured from every crevice. She wondered still why the worst of the foul beasts weren't so common here. Not that she wished for an Uruk-Hai encounter.

She liked to vary her path as she walked. Walk among the tree trunks, then in their branches if they were strong enough to hold her. Though most of the lower ones were quite strong enough. She leapt lightly from one branch to another, following a trodden path. It looked like there were several humans that had passed this way. She very much doubted it was someone that she would like to keep company with. She kept her keen eye on the trail as she made her way. She smiled to think that it was hard to track someone that traveled by tree top. Though it wasn't entirely secret; she could see broken branches on the trees that maybe indicated she was not the only tree traveler about the forest. She wondered how often those of evil liked to travel in the tree branches, and she guessed that the number was low.

Ahead of her she heard noises and slowed her pace. She seemed to have found what she had been tracking. Tiptoeing among the trees she readied her bow and cast herself info invisibility. When she could make out what the noise was about, she stopped her progress. There seemed to be a scuffle below, and it looked as though the group's target was outnumbered. His elf-blood was only too readily apparent to her, and she was not hesitant to aid him. The pulled the string of her bow taut, then released an arrow of light in between the shoulder blades of the foe nearest the Elf. From him issued a howl of anguish, and another turned to see where the arrow had come from. She would not hide from them.

Once more she was visible, and she leapt down from the branch she stood upon. Her eys glowed bright gold; she was ready for a battle. She wondered if they might sense her power, and if they might be afraid of her. She certainly hoped so, it would make things easier, but evil is usually over confident in itself. She landed next to the lone Elf and nodded a greeting to him. They would tackle this together now.

This area of the woods was certainly more deeper and darker than the Spiderhaunt area. Everywhere Alaric looked, the trees loomed over him with their crooked branches twisting in every direction. This place looked dangerous, and just to make sure Alaric drew his mighty blade, Skullspliter from it's sheath and gripped it carefully.

Alaric was, as usual, looking for adventure.
A few days ago, Alaric had travelled the mountain range and was captured by a group of Orcs. Rather than fight them, Alaric decided to let himself be taken into captivity and as a reward, he got to fight a brutal fist-fight with a mutant Orc. (An Orc with extra limbs. In this case, this mutant Orc had an extra arm underneath his left one.) Alaric was the victor and as a trophy, he took the Mutant Orc's belt. A beautiful belt with two boars tusks sticking out from the top. Alaric really did admire the belt.

Alaric continued walking deeper into the woods, wondering when he was going to run into a creature to fight. After about an hour of walking, he heard something. The sounds of a scuffle. Creeping as silently as he could, taking care not to tread on any sticks in the proccess, Alaric saw a warrior fighting for his dear life against a hoard of robed individuals. He was doing well, infact he was doing very well. So far, he saw one robed corpse to the side. But sooner or later, that lad was probably going to fall.

*thsssk*

Something shot through the air from the trees, an arrow! It landed in one of the robed attackers who in turn howled in pain. Another person looked to see where the arrow had come from. Alaric looked as well and saw an elf in the trees. There was something different about this elf. She didn't look it but Alaric knew that she was powerful. She jumped down and stared at the robed warriors, nodding to the young warrior.

Then something caught Alaric's eye. A glint of metal to his side, it looked like an arrowhead and sure enough, when Alaric looked in that direction he saw a sniper hidden in one of the smaller but taller trees. He wasn't wearing red robes, instead he was wearing green and brown striped robes to blend in with the forest. And he was aiming an arrow at the female elf.

Alaric knew he had to do something. He crept over to the tree and gripped his sword. Putting all of his strength into it, he swung his mightyblade and in one powerful stroke, he severed the tree... making sure that the cut was at an angle.

The tree began to fall and the robed sniper could do nothing but scream as he hit the ground. A second later, the tree fell on him and crushed his body into the ground. Alaric stepped over the tree and gripped his blade tightly, looking at the robed warriors. It was bad enough that they had out-numbered an individual by at least 7 to one but someone sneaking up and shooting a person was cowardly.

He looked at the other two and smiled, nodding his head... letting them know that he was going to help them. He then look at the robed warriors and snarled at them, raising his blade. Alaric was going to show them exactly why his sword was called 'Skullsplitter'.

Ahren was a bit surprised as first one then another ally showed up to aid him in the fight against the druids. He wasn't going to question his good fortune however, and continued to fend off attacks from the foes. Ahren stood with his back to the elf that had joined him in the middle of the fight, staying as close to her as possible so that it was unlikely one of them would be attacked from behind. Blocking a swift attack with his sheild, Ahren retaliated, swinging his own sword with as much force as he could safely use. While he missed his target, it did force the druids in front of him back several feet, giving him some room to fight in. If only he could take to the air, then defeating these people would have been no problem, but he wasn't going to leave the elf in the same position he had been in, even if it did render one plan useless. Hopefully the combined skill of the three warriors would be enough to end the fight quickly before any reinforcements came to aid their friends.

A brief smile came to his lips, it was time to test out something new on these druids, something that Ahren had never had occasion to try before. Swinging his sword in a wide arc, he forced the druids away from him, giving him a few feet of space. Acting instantly, he swiftly began the spell that he had in mind. The changes began instantly. His skin hardened, becoming scaley, more reptilian. His wings changed, the feathers dissappearing, color changing from white to a shade of brown. In a matter of seconds, the spell was complete, and now Ahren was ready to fight. A chimera; something that was feared by all people. Now the advantage was theirs, for few humans had the might to withstand an attack from a chimera, and there were not many druids left.

With a roar that shook the trees, Ahren launched himself at the foe, claws ripping flesh from bone as his blows landed. While the druids had the advantage in numbers, that would soon change. It was most likely that Ahren and his newfound allies would have emerged victorious, Ahren had just speeded up the process a little bit. Time was important, and they never knew when another group of druids would stumble across them. As it was, Ahren was slightly disoriented looking through three sets of eyes, but for the moment all he had to do was swing his claws and he could hit someone. Feeling a sharp pain in his side, Ahren wheeled rigth, searching for the source. A spellcaster came into view, already beginning another assault. With another roar, Ahren charged, trampeling the druid beneath him. Ignoring the body underneath him, he turned, eager to continue the fight.

No sooner than he had entered the fray did three of the robed individuals come forward to attack him. Through their hoods, Alaric could see that they were nervous about him. After all, Alaric was a muscular barbarian who had an enourmous sword in his hand and a barbarian's axe on his back which could easily slice through the group.

Alaric let rip a powerful battlecry and charged forward with his sword. Swinging it as hard as he could, he attacked the nearest robed individual... whom in turn raised his puny sword.

*CLASH*

Alaric's sword not only hit the warrior's blade but broke it. Alaric wasted no time and cracked the individual over the head with the hilt of his sword, knocking him unconcious. At least Alaric would get some answers from one of them.

Another robed fighter moved forward, but Alaric dived and rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding the scimitar which the fighter was wielding. After getting to his feet, he swung his blade and felt it enter the attackers body. There was a scream of pain as the attacker was struck down.

Alaric was ready to take the remianing attacker down when a roar stopped him. Alaric looked around and saw a mighty Chimera stand where the elf warrior had been. Alaric grinned... now this was getting interesting.