As the dust settles, the shimmering residue still clings to bark and cloak, faintly alive in the gloom. Radagast stares at it as if he has seen a wound open twice.
Radagast the Brown
No... this is the concealment sign. It did not hide you, it marked you.
The Hooded Sentry goes rigid at the ridge, ash trembling from their sleeves. The old scent of memory turns sharp, like a door opening in a sealed room.
Saruman
The hunters were meant to lose the trail. Someone in the White Council can still read what was left behind.
Tuiwen
The ritual left a signature, and it is not fading.
Radagast rubs the glowing residue between his fingers, then looks west toward the darkened woods. His expression hardens, not with fear alone, but with recognition.
Radagast the Brown
This is the betrayal's work. The lie was never perfect, only delayed. We are found.
✓ Quest Accepted
Neutralize the magical signature
“She uses her cleansing light to neutralize the signature.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Magic, rolled -1)
Tuiwen lifts her blade and lays the other hand over the glowing patch on her cloak. Pale light gathers at her fingertips, quiet and intent.
Tuiwen
The signature is in the cloth as well as the ground.
Her cleansing light spills outward in a thin wash, and the residue hisses to silver, then goes dull.
Radagast the Brown
Good. Hold it steady, child. Let the light take every last thread.
The magical mark fades from bark and hem alike, leaving only ordinary ash and singed leaf-mold where the beacon shone.
Saruman
Too late for the hunters to lose it now. They will feel the break.
Above them, the dark firs answer with a low, uneasy stir, and from somewhere beneath Dol Guldur comes another slow shiver through the earth.
Quest Complete
Neutralize the magical signature