After leaving the Tree Stone, we headed southeast to the Sun Stone. We crossed the river and saw the stone just a short while later. A few bears and Ricklings tried to prevent our arrival, but Laurenna and I quickly taught them the error of their ways.

Once again, I approached, then touched the Stone. Once again, its instructions appeared before me.

"The gentle warmth of the Sun is stolen, so now it only burns. Free the Sun from the Halls of Penumbra."

I figured that since Aevar, in his story, traveled west to find this Penumbra place, that seemed like the best direction to proceed.

Turning west, I saw two standing rocks, almost as if they were guiding us in the right direction.

We crossed the river and continued west. The path we had taken was a ditch, and easy to follow.

We approached two more standing rocks when suddenly, we heard a terrible roar, and the sound of a heavy creature racing towards us.

It was a huge brown bear, and he wasn't happy with Laurenna and myself intruding upon his territory.

The huge creature raised itself to full height and took a huge swing at me with a paw full of very large claws. I was glad for the fact that I was wearing the Ring of Weapons at the time, as my shield deflected the blow. Laurenna started shooting arrows at the bear, and I swung at it with my broadsword, delivering a serious blow to it's underside. Laurenna dropped her bow and drew her own longsword, joining the battle. As the bear swung at her, it left itself open to attack from my own sword. When the bear swung at me, it was open to attack from Laurenna. I dared not use any kind of spell, such as God's Fire here, as Laurenna was too close, and would be killed by such a powerful spell. It didn't matter, however, as between the two of us, we were able to kill the huge bear. We both needed to use a healing potion, however. That bear was serious.

It was just a few steps later that we came to a clearing, finding a number of bears and wolves. I told Laurenna to stand back a bit while I cleared the area with God's Fire, removing any danger of being eaten alive by these beasts.

We arrived at the entrance to a small, dark cave.

"This must be it." said Laurenna. "We were pretty much guided due west right to this spot."

"I believe you're right." I said. "I didn't see any other caves until this one, so...."

I looked into the hole. It was dark. Really dark. Light just seemed to die inside of it. Checking to make sure we had torches ready, we lit one and headed into the cavern.

Light really didn't do well in this cave. Even with the torch, it was hard to see even a few feet ahead of us. I put on my Belt of Night-Eye, and it helped a bit.

"What's the plan?" asked Laurenna.

"We know there are creatures guarding the caves, based on the story of Aevar." I said. "I'll see if it can hit them with a spell of God's Fire first as they approach. I'll attack with sword. You use those nice silver arrows on them."

"You got it." she replied.

We started down the cave, the light from the torch barely helping Laurenna, but it certainly helped my Belt of Night-Eye, which amplified any little bit of light available. All of a sudden, I could see a dark shape ahead in the distance. I didn't know what it was, but I wasn't going to take any chances. I let the creature have it with a spell of God's Fire. The creature ran rapidly in our direction, and all I could make out in it's oddly humanoid shape were two glowing red eyes.

The light dimmed as Laurenna dropped her torch and grabbed her bow. The creature smelled of dead flesh, swinging it's sharp claws at my face and eyes. It spun around and lashed out with it's foot, kicking me in the chest.

Silver arrows started to appear in it's hide as Laurenna started shooting at it. My fire spell had done serious damage to this creature already. A few fast hits with my longsword killed the monster.

We met yet another of these creatures further into the cavern.

Fast and furious, they fought like a creature possessed by nothing but hatred for anything that lived, kicking and lashing out with their very sharp claws.

We found four more of them in the deeper reaches of the caves, seeming to come from out of nowhere, fading into the shadows, then jumping forth once again for another attack.

It was all Laurenna and I could do to kill them all before they killed us.

We ended up going in several directions, and found several dead-ends for all our trouble. We tried a tunnel we hadn't gone down before, and after killing off yet two more of these night creatures, I managed to see a glimmer of light up ahead of us.

Yes, really big and ugly.

I used my clanfear ring, summoning my 'pet' instantly.

"What are you going to do?" asked Laurenna.

"Blast him with a few spells." I replied. "Stand back and let me hit him first. He'll charge our position. When he does, be ready with that nice long sword of yours."

"I'm ready." she replied, looking at the clanfear standing just behind her.