This is a fanfiction for Lord of the Rings (LOTRO, specifically, because it ties in better with the game than with the books alone.) A rather general summary would be the following:
A band of seven is sent to Angmar to destroy the three growing evils there. Their many hardships cause tensions amongst them, and in the end their success depends on whether Iorthiel, the rune-keeper, is strong enough to force Angmar's leaders back into the shadows.
This fanfiction will often be told from different points of view. I'll do my best to make it clear who is speaking without telling you directly.
The title I have temporarily called "Winter's Song" because the minstrel supposedly telling the story is called Nessawing Wintersong throughout Middle Earth.
I hope you enjoy it. :)
Prologue: I'll Tell You A Tale
In the early days of the third age I was sent for to join a band of my brethren on their journey to Angmar. I was asked to take the life of a dark elf whose power was stretching beyond the borders of his dark abysmal land.
I declined to participate in this quest.
You may insist I tell you immediately the reason for this decision, but the moon has only just now dethroned the sun in its blue palace. If you lack the patience to rest at my feet and hear my song, then join shameful Iorthiel in her study at the Last Homely House. She'll welcome you with wide-open arms and embrace you, yes. But she will not be able to spin such a tale as this… or at least, in truth. She is not the minstrel of our band.
But I digress.
Many a year after my declining I was sent for again, but this time I was apt to hide myself in the well-liked pub of Breetown. I severed the lengthy silver tresses of my hair, and in my common sorrows downed goblet after goblet of hard liquor. I wore a black hooded cloak to mask my features, and wore only a plain prospector's tunic and simple shoes on my feet.
That didn't stop young Ethenna and Mithrod, of my beloved Lórien, from discovering me playing a drunken ditty on my lute. They scolded me harshly, knowing my obstinate air and my tendency to refuse orders. They then took me to Rivendell where I met the other four fools who would be the other half of my band. My task this time was to destroy the power of not one, but three dictators reigning in Angmar.
One of the three was the dark elf, whose power most certainly exceeded Angmar and was poisoning the North Downs.
I did not want to join Elrond's chosen in this dark deed. Not because I feared for my very life, no. Already I began to feel the darkness consuming my will. Whether I was to join the Free Peoples or Angmar in the upcoming fight, I knew not.
What, you choose now to sit still before me? My habits, unfortunately, have not changed. I demand payment for my tale. Thirteen silver coins for every hour I sing for you. And if you be kind, perhaps an extra few for my troubles. Don't fuss, you unintelligent bastard, I will not con you tonight. I mean only to pass on the truth of what happened in Angmar that fateful year. As I mentioned before, it started in Breetown. In fact, it was a cloudless night outside the Prancing Pony after a mild thunderstorm. I scarcely remember, though, due to drowning my sorrows in a flask or two of ale…
Chapter 1
By Break of Dawn
"This is where she chooses to spend her time? A simple human pub?"
I shot a glare in Mithrod's direction. "Clearly she looks for warm, comfortable friendship, rather than suffer in your kin's wintry grasp." Likewise, I was glared at.
"The Firstborn are not cold like the winter, darling Ethenna." Mithrod tossed his dark silvery hair behind his shoulders and wiped the raindrops from his face. He made his way up the stairs to the doorway of the pub, not bothering to look back while speaking to me. "But we are much wiser than the Secondborn."
I snorted. "And much less good-humored." Looking up, I noticed the moon was sitting at its high point in the sky, and I looked back at my elven companion. He was already shutting the door behind him. My exasperation already at an uncomfortable level, I stormed up the stairs and right through the door after him.
The Prancing Pony was quite animate that night. Many of the Breetown residents were dancing and having a good time, and I noticed two or three small folk dancing on a table next to where Mithrod was standing. I knew he was not too warmhearted of hobbits, so I assumed he simply hadn't noticed them yet. His eyes were unreadable, but I understood he was trying to be as slight as possible in order to quickly find his sister and get us both out of here. He was not of the merrymaking type, and I learned that quickly. Positioning myself near Mithrod, I searched for Nessawing… that is, after all, what she was called.
Mithrod's strong hand gripped my arm and pulled me toward him. His voice was hushed and yielding, but I was cautiously trained in advance to hear him.
"She disguises herself as a boy," he murmured, gesturing suddenly at a dark figure playing a black harp in the corner of the pub. A few cups were scattered about the person, one or two were overturned, and beer stained the floor where they had fallen. I raised my eyebrows. Never before had I dealt with a drunken elf before.
Well, there is without a doubt a first for everything after all.
I tore free from Mithrod's grasp and strolled over to where the minstrel played her harp. The instrument was horribly out of tune, and unfavorable to the ear of a woman like me, who had grown up with lessons in not only the harp, but the lute and the theorbo as well. Her voice as she sang along was slurred and low, and she sounded fatigued. Her attire was black to match her harp, and at first I was uncertain that she was in fact female at all, let alone one of the Firstborn, for from what I could see of her hair was messily cropped and hanging in her face. After brief hesitation, I grabbed her arm and made to hoist her up.
Immediately, Nessawing ceased her playing and before I knew it, her hand was at my throat. I could see some of her face now; she had sharp, lovely features, but those were difficult to focus on when her ice-cold eyes were wide and glaring right into my green ones. Knowing her to be a bit… well, drunk at that moment, I did not make a move to escape.
Mithrod was by our sides in less than a heartbeat; I barely knew he had arrived. He seized Nessawing's wrist and, with a snapping motion, tore her from my neck. The minstrel recoiled and moaned softly, then attempted to knock him off his balance by hooking her foot about his ankle; this did not work, for her sluggish reflexes cost her the element of surprise and Mithrod heaved her up to her feet before she could finish. Glancing at me, he hauled her out of the Prancing Pony and into the street. I rubbed my throat, gulping delicately, and before I joined my partner, snatched up the dark harp, for the minstrel would be most likely defenseless without it. I departed, pretending not to notice the many hobbit eyes on me as I passed by. Stepping outside, I nearly slipped, forgetting that it had not long ago finished raining. I saw the two elves arguing and stepped toward them.
What I noticed first about this minstrel was her hair, unusually fashioned for an elf as enduring as she was… or so I had heard. It was bright silver, similar to Mithrod's own mane, but she had obviously trimmed it with a weapon of her own, for in a few places it was unkempt and cut in an uneven manner. Both elves turned to me at the exact same time, and I had a split second to compare their features before I made the connection. I raised my eyebrows.
"I never knew you had a sister, Mithrod." I looked to him for an explanation. His eyes were narrowed in impatience.
"My sister," he began, doing all he could to contain himself from gnashing his teeth together, "is of vital importance to this quest. Without a renowned minstrel, we could very well perish early on in our travels."
"'Renowned', my estimate, is just a worthy adjective to win my support for your little errand," Nessawing jeered, her voice containing just barely a hint of sharpness. "If you simply want recognition, you can ask Gandalf himself to accompany you to… wherever it is you are departing to." She waved her hand, the action being a bit delayed due to the spirits she had consumed. I gave Mithrod a frustrated stare.
"She does not yet know where we are going?" I folded my arms, a sigh of annoyance escaping my lips. "We need to leave shortly, you know."
Mithrod bowed his head, a gesture I had come to acknowledge as a sign of contained wrath and impatience. "The Firstborn have a way of handling things properly and carefully, so I cannot permit you to intervene, Ethenna, else—"
"Else what, the whole of Middle Earth will turn upside-down, and all will be lost to great and terrible Sauron?"I bared my teeth, furious. "That's our fate if we do not handle matters speedily here."
Nessawing, I noticed, had taken interest in Sauron's mentioned name. She studied me closely and then asked, "Sauron? The apprentice of the illustrious Morgoth?"
Mithrod's eyes were like melons. "What arts have you been meddling in all these years, Nessa?"
She tilted her head to the side in contemplation. "I have become a neutral force in the endless war between good and evil in this world." Her eye had a strange glint in it, one that seemed dimly poignant. But taking into consideration the time that had already been wasted, I pushed the suspicion to the back of my mind and turned so Nessawing could see me clearly.
"Elrond Halfelven of Rivendell has asked this of me, and of your brother: to create a band of hope with one significant goal." Nessawing watched me warily. Mithrod continued my thought.
"We, sister, are to destroy three growing evils in the shadows of Angmar, the realm of the Witch King himself." Nessawing immediately turned her face away from us both, her features troubled, her limbs stiff. I frowned in bewilderment. Mithrod gripped her shoulder and turned her back to face him. They were nose to nose in height. His voice had found its patience. "I know the ghosts that haunt your soul from so many decades ago. I ask you to forget them… for this mission will rid you of them forever. Is that not why you ran away, to find a solution to the haunting?"
"I ran away to find the ghost that still haunts me, brother." She looked up at him blankly. Her eyebrows twitched once with emotion. Then they dipped in a glower and she sneered. "I never will find it. No longer do I desire to. I desire to seek rest in this life, for I've done nothing but wash blood off my hands since the moment my soul entered this body. I want peace. And I will not claim that peace by joining you and your 'troupe' in a small and most certainly unsuccessful venture that will result in all of your deaths."
I sighed. Mithrod and I both knew this answer was coming.
"Well, then Nessawing, I regret to say that you will not enjoy the journey back to Rivendell." Mithrod wrapped a thick arm around Nessawing's waist. "We should arrive by break of dawn. He hoisted her up and she shrieked, clawing at her kin, shouting short phrases of magic to make him go limp and drop her. She did not succeed. Her harp was in my hands, and not hers. She was powerless.
I smiled ruthlessly, fingering the instrument with a delicate desire to keep it from her for as long as I possibly could. "I will surely enjoy wandering the dark lands with you, Nessa Wintersong."