It finally came. The day I ventured out into the Drownholts, following that sensation of malice I experienced the last time I was there. Luckily I did not have to go alone. I am not sure I could have.
I met the scouts from Rivendell - Faorie, Thendryt and Ruadan - in the Mirkeaves. I have never spoken to a single Malledhrim of my past, but these friends of Elrond were so welcoming and warm, so for some reason I told them everything. Of my childhood days in Greenwood, of the sickening shadow that had fallen. Of my beloved Mirnel and of the clearing in the woods we found. And of how she one night ventured out to the clearing alone, and never came back.
When Faorie's friends had to return to Imladris, Faorie graciously offered to stay around to follow me into the wetlands. I was relieved to have this strong elf guarding my back, not that I was particularly afraid of what creatures we might meet, but more so for the emotional support of facing long lost memories.
And so we went. It was an unusually gloomy night. The boglights illuminated the blackened waters with their eerie lights. Oddly, nature itself seemed overly aggressive. Faorie mentioned as much and I could do naught but agree. All manners of swampcreatures - worms and slugs, cats and insects, emerged to attack us on our way. It was almost as if they where trying to prevent us from finding it. But find it we did.
It was a pool. A small gathering of putrid, black water deep down in the wetlands. Around it lay scattered countless remains of dead bodies. Some must have been decades old, naught but bones remaining, but some where fresher. One corpse of a goblin could not have been dead for more then a few weeks. And there was something very odd about the bodies. It was as if they where arranged, left there. But the worst was not the corpses, the putrid stench or the otherworldly corpse-candles. It was the presence. That which I felt before was even stronger here. It was like an imprinted memory of malice, infecting the air and water and earth around the pool, making the air heavy to breath. It was all I could do not to faint, as I was as transported in spirit back to that day when me and Mirnel found the clearing. It was the same sensation. That I did not react stronger to it then I shall never understand. For this, what once resided here, was pure evil.
We made our way back to the Haunted Inn, where Faorie needed to leave for Rivendell. I went inside and asked around, and learned some upsetting things. The Malledhrim call that place "the pool of creeping death". It is known as the most corrupted, poisonous place in the Drownholts, but some spoke of more things. There are rumors and dark whispers that blood sacrifices are being performed. It seems, that the orcs for as long as anyone remembers have sacrificed lives - mostly goblins but also elves and men - to a creature in the Drownholts they call the spirit of the pool. Why they do this, or what this spirit is, no one seem to know.
I am quite certain now. That which now is that pool is the same spot where Mirnel was lured, where the clearing once was. I believe that whatever spirit once resided there is no longer around, only its evil presence linger. But if it was there, it must have gone somewhere. And I intend to find it.
The Malledhrim tells me that there is a scholar, a historian in Caras Galadhon that is an expert on the primitive ways of the orcs. I shall travel there and speak with her. Perhaps she can shed some light on this.
