The last light of day shone through the window of a guest-room at the Crossway Inn as Amardal finished her letter. She had seized the chance to write privately after Munher left to take Scéolang on a walk around town. Now night was approaching and her friend had yet to return. Rumor had it that bandits prowled the roads to the north and south. Yet contemplating the misfortunes that might befall Munher and her faithful hound if they strayed too far from Herne would aid them little should the worst come to pass.
With one last look at the darkening sky, Amardal lit a candle and pushed the letter aside. It would have to wait for the next courier willing to brave the neglected roads of the North.
Her next task was closer to home. During the investigation in Ruddymore, Tirannun had found a dead goblin carrying a satchel. After a cursory inspection, he had given the bag to her. Worn and rudely stitched, the satchel itself was nothing special. Amardal was far more interested in its contents, which she poured onto the table with little ceremony. Dry leaves, their edges curling in the winter air, tumbled out before her. Among them were weeds that grew tall and stubborn along the abandoned roadways of Eriador and a few nettle-leaves. As difficult as they were to acquire, they would have been of little use to a wandering scout, let alone a goblin.
What the weeds and nettles had in common was a resemblance, however crude, to the third sort of leaf that she found in the satchel. Even withered from the cold, their shape was familiar. The toothy-edged leaves spreading like splayed fingers belonged to no other flower than gaurphilin, the queen of poisons.
The jumble of leaves in his satchel suggested that the dead goblin was neither a gardener nor wise in herb-lore. Neither stealth nor luck had saved him. He had journeyed down from the north only to be slain not by a watchful Dúnadan determined to battle the vestiges of Angmar but by a bandit whose wits had been diminished by terror and privation.
Another woman might say that the gaurphilin was only there by coincidence, a stitch of bad luck. Amardal was not so confident. Goblin-shadows lingered at the edge of her vision as she swept the leaves back into the satchel. Then she shoved it inside her pack, where Scéolang knew not to sniff around, and collapsed on the bed.
She slept fitfully that night, tormented by the possibility that the goblin was not alone. Amardal dreamt of shadows, relentless as bloodhounds, creeping through the lonely galleries of Minas Eriol and into the red hills of Cardolan. They would find their quarry soon.
