Orcs and riderless Wargs thundered past in an endless stream of battle cries, cut short by an elvish blade or an arrow from a longbowman. They seemed to fade into the mass of bodies that lined the slopes of the Mountain, of Erebor. The Erebor that stood so tall and blinding in the harsh light of the sun.
He had not thought much of it before, seeing as his home was Ered Luin – his birthplace and where he'd grown up with his brother. But for all the disasters and mishaps that this journey had thrown at them, Erebor now meant a great deal more. A delirious sense of grandeur swept up inside Fili, and he thought of the throne that lay deep in its heart, waiting for a new King.
A niggling thought refused to budge, however.
Would that King be Thorin? Or he?
Cold fear followed soon after. It was such an immense battlefield and he'd long lost sight of Thorin and Kili too, something he was beginning to regret. He was tiring, swaying dangerously, feet unsteady and breaths coming in short gasps as though he'd been underwater for far too long.
Looking up, his keen eyes scanned the battlefield, and he saw that the fight had moved further afield, closer to the summit again. Too close.
The ominous creaking as thousands of footfalls caused the rocks high upon the mountain to shift and break, piece by piece, did not go amiss to Fili's sharp ears.
Cracks darted through the grey, snapping and clawing out further and further, chasms opening up and swallowing clumps of armies – dwarf, elf, orcs and men alike.
Keen eyes followed the chasms up, up towards the summit, where a great boulder was beginning to shudder in a way that made Fili feel numb to his bones, aches and pains from the battle forgotten.
He tried to concentrate on the hordes of orcs coming his way, slashing and kicking and punching and ducking, building up into a crescendo of orc screams as they were felled, one after the other.
Then the boulder dropped.
It shredded its way through the amassed armies upon the slopes, through men and elves, through dwarves, through orcs and goblins and wargs – anything and everything.
It just got louder, and louder. Closer and closer. The thunder was roaring in his ears, the coarse grey now a blur to his eyes.
But then Fili's mind went haywire, the boulder was the spark that had ignited a roaring flame.
Kili. Where was Kili?
Kili. Right at the foot of the mountain, shooting arrow after arrow. Fighting like there was no tomorrow. It was only when the shadow found him that he stopped and turned.
Icy fear gripped Fili, tendrils wrapping around him, constricting and binding his muscles in place. Why wasn't Kili moving? Move! Get out of the way! He wanted to scream, but no sound came out. Nothing.
And then it fell.
Fili felt it before he saw it. Felt the breath being crushed out of him, even with his scream, like an iron bar in the chest. Except there was no release. It was constant, unrelenting. He felt like a stone sinking in a vast ocean.
"Kili!"
There was nothing left to do but run. Find his brother, his little brother. Find him safe and sound, scared out of his wits underneath a rocky outcrop like he always used to.
He ran and ran; the field seemed to stretch for miles. It just wasn't ending.
Another pang of fear bubbled up inside him, eliciting another panicked cry.
"Kili!" Fili's usually strong voice cracked, his throat shredded raw from battle-cries and his desperate need to find his brother.
He could hear the voices of his fellow Company around him. Nori and Dori, bewildered. Bofur's warning yell, Gloin's caution – the boulder was still moving – Dwalin's roar.
They all seemed to pale into insignificance as he neared. He could see Kili now, the dirty blue and tarnished leather heap among the dark shale of the mountain.
It'd be okay.
But then he heard Thorin's roar. That was agony. That was grief, and anger and shock. That was everything he did not want to hear.
"Kili!" Fili could barely shout, cracking and spitting. His legs were starting to feel like lead, heavy and cumbersome, his lungs felt like they were about to cave in, burning and straining for air that was thick with the stench of death.
He began to falter. His strides became more uneven as he gained more ground. But oh, he was so close now.
And it was then that Fili realised that he should have heeded Gloin and Bofur's warnings, however insignificant they seemed in the midst of his panic.
Fili felt so unbelievably idiotic in that moment. He'd forgotten everything – everything – that Thorin had taught him, years of knowledge suddenly thrown away in a matter of moments. He was running blindly through a war, unarmed and unaware. And now he was about to pay the price.
Orc archers.
The first arrow pierced his armour with a dull thud, but only just. Enough to deliver a nasty sting, but nothing more.
He kept running, damning himself for being such a fool, Dwalin for not grabbing him, Thorin for even bringing him here, Kili for being in the way of the boulder, the entirety of the Five Armies for causing the boulder to fall in the first place. The list grew the further he ran, until it was a endless stream of names and such foul curses in Khuzdul that even Thorin – had he heard him in this moment – would definitely have more than a few words to say.
The second arrow hit closer to heart, and it dug deep. The barbed shaft elicited another hoarse scream from the Durin heir, but still he did not stop. Still he kept running.
It was no longer a case of what Fili could bring himself to do; it was what he had to do. His brother was somewhere in the pile of bodies – that was bad enough, Fili thought – but alive? Panicking? Wondering where his brother was and why he wasn't with him?
He had to find him.
The third arrow. It struck him deep in the chest, just below the second. That was it. He felt the red-hot burn tearing through his chest, exploding. He could not run any longer. He faltered, stumbling and almost collapsing to his knees. The ground rushed up to meet him, but he found himself in strong arms and he was suddenly being pulled upwards.
"No- No, Kili-" Fili choked on his words, spitting and slurring as thick blood started to fall from his lips. His ears could make out a voice, a low hum in his ear, telling him something. He did not care to listen – Kili was so close now.
Fili's words fast dissolved into a series intelligible grunts and spits as he struggled against the iron hold, unable to stand of his own fast-depleting strength.
"No-"
Dark shadows closed in on his vision, even the blinding Erebor failed to ward off the dark for Fili.
At some point, his struggles had ceased, but he felt a crushing weight, warm against his chest. Strangely comforting.
Glancing down, Fili saw the familiar tarnished silver and dark blue of Thorin's vambraces around his chest, keeping him upright. His head felt heavy upon his aching shoulders, so he let it fall, glad when it met the steady rise and fall of Thorin's armoured chest. He could feel the roar that Thorin let out as he was half-dragged along the bloodied field.
Then he saw him. Kili. Still and cold as a stone. Black and blue marred with crimson streaks from wounds and gashes. Empty. Lifeless.
Dead.
His world stopped. Everything stopped. Everything was still.
It was a deafening silence that resonated across the entire plain and through Erebor itself, shaking the mountain to its very roots.
At first, Fili felt nothing but the violent tremors running through his dying body, but then he felt the tear. Deep, embedded in his chest, something that had been built up over decades. It was torn.
There was no clean break - the tear was jagged and broken.
It felt like nothing else before. It felt like a roaring flame and bitter ice and sharp, blinding light as violent as a burning star.
He was on the ground then, the strong arms were gone from his chest and he felt helpless, knowing that he was toeing the line between life and death now.
Gathering all his strength, he pushed one arm forward and dragged himself closer and closer to Kili, muscles screaming in fatigue.
He didn't stop.
He could not stop.
Fili had made his brother a promise, a long long time ago when they were mere children, scrabbling through the tunnels of Ered Luin. He would protect him, of course he would. He would stay with him when he could.
That's what brothers did. Even at the end of all things.
And Fili was damned if he was going to let Kili leave Middle-Earth alone.