Chapter IX: An Elf, A Dwarf, and A Man

The smell of death, smoke, and orc filth suddenly filled Fergus' nostrils. His nose wrinkled at the foul stench as he spotted a spire of black smoke rising in the air from a short distance, along with what looked like a pile of hideous corpses blackened from charring. He covered his nose and mouth with his arm as the stench suddenly made him cough.

"What in Eru's name happened here?" he said aloud as he rode towards the pile to investigate. A grotesque severed orc head on a spear greeted him when he neared the pile, its swollen tongue lolling out from its gaping mouth. That wasn't what stopped him in his tracks, though.

Someone else had reached the smoldering pile first - three of them, in fact. A dwarf with an unruly red braid hanging down his back from his helmet was probing the burning pile with his axe. A blonde elf who seemed to be from the Mirkwood region stood guard as a man with long dark hair searched the pile along with the dwarf. The man's clothes were rugged and well-worn - as if he'd spent years in the wilderness and changed seldomly, as Fergus suspected was actually the case.

The elf's icy blue eyes darted straight for Fergus as he approached the three of them. Fergus almost froze in fear as he noticed him drawing out an arrow from his quiver. The dwarf turned around and raised his axe from his work. The man in the rugged clothes shifted his gaze towards him and rose, walking towards him as he casually rested his hand on the hilt of the sword at his hip. However, the dwarf dashed towards Fergus and reached him first, his axe still drawn as though he were to hack at Angus' limbs.

"What business does a man of Dunland have here?" he asked demandingly.

"I'm headed for Rohan," Fergus responded.

"To do the bidding of Saruman, no doubt!"

"Nay! I come for Théoden!"

"Agh, what does it matter? Their minds are one in the same anyway!"

Fergus' eyes widened in disbelief for a brief moment, and then his brows furrowed in confusion.

"What do you mean?"

"That's enough, Gimli," said the other man, who now stood only a few steps behind the dwarf. He walked towards Fergus until he was standing right next to him, his hand resting nonchalantly on Angus' side while his other still rested on the hilt of his sword. In that moment, Fergus noticed that the man wore a strange serpentine ring with a deep green jewel at its center. He looked up at Fergus, as though to silently give his condolences to him for an unknown loss.

"We just ran across his nephew, Éomer, along with the Rohirrim. He says that Saruman has taken over the mind of the king, and in his fevered state, he had banished his own kin."

Now Fergus was truly grief-stricken - and the man with the ring knew it just by looking at his face.

"Was he a friend of yours?"

"Aye, in a way. It was many years ago."

"I am sorry."

Fergus slightly sniffled before quickly changing the subject.

"What are you all doing digging around this filthy mess?"

"We're tracking our friends. They were captured by orcs."

Fergus wanted to shudder at the mere thought of that.

"I'm the one who should be apologizing now. That's a bad fate for anyone."

"Éomer said that he and his men ambushed the orcs in the night, and that they had left no one alive."

The man sighed as a sudden sadness appeared in his eyes.

"Unfortunately, there's a good chance that our friends were casualties in the night raid."

As if on cue, Gimli dug up a relic from the smoking pile - a badly burned piece of leather bearing a once beautiful metal embellishment, which Fergus assumed was once a hilt for a dagger.

"It's one of the elven belts."

Fergus noticed the elf bow his head, muttering an inaudible prayer. He thought that he caught a glimpse of tears glistening from the man's eyes as he walked over to the burning pile, kicked a blackened helmet, and screamed out in pain. Despite the fact that the king of Dunland didn't even know the name of the other man, the sight still managed to take a hard tug at his heartstrings as the stranger fell to his knees.

"We failed them," Gimli stated, defeated.

The elf removed his hand from his heart as the man looked ruefully at the littered ground before him.

"A hobbit lay here," he stated, placing his hand on an indentation on the dead, yellowed grass. "And here... and here."

"They crawled..." he continued, crawling on his hands and knees himself as though reenacting what he thought had happened.

"Their hands were bound," he said, finally rising to his feet.

Fergus' eyes widened as the man pulled out a hay-covered fragment of roughly woven rope.

"Their bonds were cut." The man's eyes were now peering out into the distance as he dropped the rope and continued to follow the tracks.

"They ran over here,"

Now the elf and the dwarf were following him. Fergus quickly dismounted Angus and began to do the same.

"They were followed," he said, suddenly running in the direction of the tracks.

"The tracks lead away from the battle - into Fangorn forest."

He stopped right where the great mass of trees began.

"Fangorn," Gimli repeated. "What madness drove them there?"

The elf turned to Fergus.

"And what of this man?"

The man who had just analyzed the scene looked over his shoulder at Fergus.

"If you help us, we'll do our best to help you with Théoden."

He walked over to him, studying him as though as a final check to discern him as a friend or foe.

"Do we have a deal?"

"Aye, but I'd at least like to know your names before running off into the blue."

"I am Aragorn, son of Arathorn," the man replied.

"This is Gimli, son of Gloin, and Legolas of the woodland realm."

"And I am Fergus of Clan DunBroch."

"All right!" Gimli retorted. "Let's get this over with!"

...

Frodo and Merida had made some progress on their journey to Mordor. Despite the harsh and frustrating circumstances, the two of them had grown to get along quite well. Frodo seemed to be quite impressed with Merida's resourcefulness and her hunting skills. Yet the Ring bore more heavily on his neck and his heart each day, though he barely showed it.

Frodo looked out ahead and saw the foreboding black clouds in the distance with a streak of fiery red. He from the dark towers that pierced the ominous sky that they weren't the sign of a coming storm.

"Mordor," he said aloud. "I hope the others find a safer road."

Merida raised an eyebrow.

"The others?"

"My friends."

She smiled sadly. During the time they'd been together, he'd mentioned the other eight companions he'd started out with. She couldn't help but think of her own family.

"Aye. It seems that we're all in this now."

Frodo looked over his shoulder at her, his eyes filled with a mixture of rue and compassion.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"That you got dragged into this."

The corner of her mouth twitched up in a smirk.

"I dragged myself into this. If anything happens to me, I've got only myself to blame."

"Do you think we'll ever see our friends and family again?"

"I certainly hope so, Frodo."

"Merida..."

The serenity in his voice was stunning as he reached to gently touch her arm.

"I'm glad you're with me."

With that, he began to walk towards their grim destination. Merida followed close behind. Both were as ready as they ever would be to change the fate of Middle Earth.