I'm Derfel. I am eleven years old and I am afraid. Oh so very afraid. The men say we won't last long. And whenever I look outside I don't doubt their words. There are so many of them milling just beyond the Dike. I have heard some of them whisper the number ten-thousand. They shut up whenever I come close though. I think they want to spare me. Little do they know that I have already seen too much to foster much hope.
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With so many of them outside they are making every man count. They have asked my brothers and my father to take up arms. They aren't warriors and Aethelstan has barely turned fifteen. I think they would have asked me too if I hadn't be so young. I'm not strong enough to handle a sword. I can shoot a bow though. I told them so. One of them had chuckled and ruffled my hair saying a was a brave boy. I am not brave, I just don't want to leave my brothers and my father. They are all I have, we lost everything else when the orcs invaded the Westfold. I told them that too.
- What about your mom?
-She left for the other side long ago together with our baby sister.
They didn't say sorry, they simply nodded. Dying in childbirth seems such a mundane thing in times like these.
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They didn't let me fight. If they had I think it would have been like admitting we were truly desperate. Instead they have asked me to be a waterrunner. They have given me a dagger though, a long one, and a leather vest. 'To defend yourself if you run into trouble,' they said. I am no fool. I know what they truly meant.
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They came over the Dike like it was nothing. They are now trying to scale the Deeping Wall, but the men are not letting them. It is hard work though and sometimes I think the only thing that keeps the men up are the encouragements Eomer and the dark-haired man are giving them. He is a strange one. I've heard some of the warriors call him Lord Aragorn. He doesn't look like a lord to me. His clothes are as dirty and tattered as of the rest of us and his chainmail has severale holes. There is a commanding air about him though. Whenever he passes the men stand prouder and whenever our foes see his blade shining like a flame they shrink back. Maybe he is a lord after all.
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My legs are burning. The buckets are heavy and the stairs are steep. But I'm not giving up. I have come to realise how important what I'm doing is. I'm not only bringing water around. I have a third bucket strappped up my back that's filled with stew. It's most often cold and the rain lashing down is making it watery. It's one of the few things that keeps the warriors up though. So I keep on going.
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The fear is long gone. My world has shrunk down to the Deeping Stream, the kitchen and those stairs. All that matters is to keep going long enough just to reach another of the men before collapses.
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I've killed. I've killed my first man. I'm staring at the dagger I'm holding in my hand. My tumble in the water has cleaned it but somehow I can still feel the stickiness of blood. They tried to sneak through the culvert. I was refilling the buckets and I shouted a warning as soon as I saw them. The first enemy to emerge was a Dunleding. As soon as he saw me he came at me yelling. He swung his weapon and on some sort of reflex I ducked. The next thing I knew the dagger was in my hand and in his guts. He toppled over taking me with him in the water. When I had finally clawed my way back to the surface, the fighting was nearly over. Nobody noticed yet another wet little waterrunner. Or so I thought.
-Hey boy are you all right?
I look up into a pair of clear grey eyes. Lord Aragorn's eyes.
-Y-yes sir.
-You don't look like it. Here sit down.
-B-but the men? They need their water and stew!
-The enemy has withdrawn for a while. Rest. From what I heard from the men you worked as hard as any of us.
-Y-yes sir.
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The Deeping Wall is gone. They blasted it up with some explosive stuff. I was in the kitchen when it happened. My father and my brothers were up the Wall. I don't know what happened to them. I was about to run out to look for them but One-Leg Haleth kept me back. He said there is already enough death without recklessly adding to it. I struggled but before losing his leg Haleth was a soldier too. So instead I merely watched the retreating men, looking for them. I didn't saw them though. Maybe they retreated to the Glittering Caves. I hope so.
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The kitchen was closed off soon after the Wall fell as was the well. Somebody has pressed a bow in my hand and I'm now standing on the walls of the Hornburg. I can't use that bow as good as I wish to. It is too powerful for me and I can't draw it back fully. But they are standing so damn close it doens't really matter. I don't even have to aim to hit something. So I just keep on firing blindly. It's the only thing that's keeping the returning fear at bay.
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It is only when I start squinting that I realise that the sun is rising. We have been fighting the whole night. And relief is nowhere in sight. Our foes seem to have no qualms about fighting on in daylight. I see lord Aragorn standing on the walls. He 's talking but I'm too far away. I see the Uruk-hai recoil a bit though.
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Whatever Lord Aragorn said didn't leave a lasting impression. The loud crash tells me the gate has finally been breached. Now that the end is approaching I'm strangely calm. Maybe I'm just too tired to be afraid anymore. I don't know.
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Someone is sounding Helm's Horn. I can't hear it. The sound is too low for that. But I can feel the sound reverberating in my jaw and breastbone and somehow it seems to affect my heart too. It seems to beat stronger. And then I hear another sound. A sound not as deep but more audible, the clattering of hooves. And then in a rush they ride past me, a golden host carried on the sound of the horn. A glorious last charge. WHatever our fate will be we will be remembered.
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There is a lot of shouting outside but it doesn't sound anymore as if there is a battle going on. It is.. joyful. I run outside.
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How I will never understand how but the whole valley has changed. Where once was a large empty plain now stand a mighty forest and no sings of the ten thousand orcs who had been here but just an hour before. Just a couple of Dunlendings and a whole Eored of new men. Erkenbrand had arrived and just in time. With a sigh I sit down, cool grey stone against my back. I can sleep now.