Disclaimer: I do not own LOTR, and if I did I wouldn't be writing this.
Author's note: I have several things to say here. First, I want to tell you that this is not a happy chapter. Eldanna doesn't have the happiest life or happiest story. Also, I want to warn readers that although I do occasionally write happy endings, there are no guarantees.
Fire laced through the delicate stone structures of the city. Men cried out as their lives were extinguished. Horses screamed in fury at the indignity of dying in a stone city instead of on lush fields of grass. Children sobbed as their beloved homes turned into their funeral piers. And louder than anything, Léofwyn coughed.
She had been sick since that mournful day a week ago, and though she was strong and her family believed that she would overcome it, she became sicker and sicker under this dark, sunless sky. Now she was frail and thin, a mere shadow of the lively person she had been before.
Déorhild paced, worry for her husband creasing her brow. At every shout, every yell from outside, she seemed to visible shake in fear for her beloved husband who now fought for his country, his home. Looking at her sword that lay against the wall beside Léofwyn, she seemed to make up her mind, and she spoke. "I must go to him. I am sorry, daughters, that I cannot stay here to protect you. But I must protect him. I must."
The two sisters nodded, for they both understood her frustration at being stuck in this home that was now a cage while her husband fought for his life. They, too, felt cramped in this small room, when they should be fighting for their country, their families.
Déorhild approached the two sisters, and hugged Léofwyn frail frame tightly, whispering to her that she loved her, that Léofwyn must get better. Déorhild then turned to her adopted daughter, and held her in a tight embrace. "Keep her safe, Eldanna. Protect her. Promise me... Promise me." Her voice broke with emotion on the last words. She could not be there for her daughters right now. But they could be there for each other.
"I will." Eldanna answered, her voice tight with unspoken emotion. ""I promise." That was the first promise that she made and broke that day.
Déorhild left the room, looking back only once at the doorway to speak her last words to her daughters. "I love you both. No matter what happens, never forget that."
Once she was out of hearing range, the two sisters turned to each other conspiratorially. "Go, Eldanna. Make sure that she returns."
Eldanna looked at her sister, uncertainty evident on her features. "But I promised her..."
Léofwyn interrupted, speaking more harshly than she meant to. "because you had to for her piece of mind. Go, and make sure that when you come back, we aren't orphans."
Eldanna was fighting within herself; to go and perhaps save her parents, or to stay and help her sister. A large crashing sound and the ensuing screams mane up Eldanna's mind. Her sister was strong; the illness wouldn't worsen dramatically in the next day. Leaning down, she kissed her sister on the forehead. "I promise. I'll bring them back to you." That promise, too, would be broken.
Léofwyn, suddenly realizing that she might never see her sister again, called out to the retreating figure. "I love you, sister."
Eldanna turned back, and gave her sister a soft, sad smile, before turning away to the approaching battle.
Eldanna later remembered the sights of the battle only in brief images; instead it was the smells that most ingrained themselves in her memory, and the sounds. She always remembered the sweet, sickening smell of rotting flesh, permeating the air so strongly that all other smells seemed like undertones, sharps and flats barely altering a strong, overpowering note.
In her mind the battle was a series of blurs, sounds of metal on metal, shrieks, a few sharp images, and the mechanical movements of her arms.
A man crushed by the desperate feet of his people. Her first glimpse of her mother, her hair swirling, desperately trying to stay alive and reach a certain point that Eldanna couldn't see. Her father, the object of her mother's gaze, wounded, but fighting still with his left arm. The large orc, hewing her father down uncaring of what he destroyed, the life that ended. Her mother, in grief and shock, dropping her blade, dying knowing that she would join him. After that, the battle was a series of blurred opponents, mechanical movements, and a putrefying stench. Eldanna couldn't feel, couldn't process what she had seen. She knew, in her mind, that she was, once again, an orphan, but she kept catching herself thinking of doctors that her father hadn't gone to and found to be too expensive, thinking to herself that he could go that night while her mother cooked dinner, and then she remembered the orc, the pain on her mother's face.
Eventually, the orcs stopped replacing each other so promptly, and the city began to rid herself of the foul infestation. Once Eldanna had decided that it was time to return to her sister, she lowered her blades, and walked slowly in the direction of her home. She was exhausted, as she began to realize. Before, during the battle, adrenaline had rushed through her veins, but now she just felt exhausted.
As Eldanna walked, she noticed a man, dead, lying in the road, dressed in rich clothes. She was going to walk past him, but a thought occurred to her and she knelt, her long, nimble fingers feeling along the man's belt. Finally, she found his wallet, heavy with coins, and straightened up. Eldanna knew that her sister and she would need the coins more than this dead man.
Eldanna almost walked past her house. She was almost past it when she realized that that burned out shell was her home, the place she had lived for as long as she could remember. All that remained was ashes. Eldanna's first thought was for her sister. She ran through the house, shouting her name. No one answered. Eldanna came to the place where Léofwyn had been lying earlier that day. All that remained was ashes.
Eldanna screamed her fury at the gods, but no one responded. She was totally, completely alone.
Eldanna looked around, carefully searching the ashes, hoping that somehow her sister would be just outside of her sight, to her right, to her left.
Something glinted in the black ashes. Eldanna, curious, pulled it out. It was a bracelet, with her name engraved on it. She slipped it onto her wrist before turning back to where Léofwyn had been that morning, should have been now.
And so Eldanna knelt, bloodstained but not injured physically, clutching a silver bracelet in her white knuckles, desperately wishing that she could cry.
