CHAPTER 39 - The road goes ever on
Together they dragged the craft to the shore once they disembarked, and Orophin led them up a winding path towards the mainland. Stealth was key, and soon the treeline thickened, heralding the edge of the wood. It was early morning, the air crisp and chill. The thick gloom of night still shrouded the land.
During their journey, there was nothing but the swaying of the craft, and the presence of the silent elf before her. It had served to temper the lengthening hollowness and the swell of crimson loss inside, if only a little. But where before the sea sang to her of beauty and hope and belonging, now it seemed to mock, crowning her dejection, and it belied another tune. The empty, even smile, the clawing at her mind. The unseen manacles digging into the depths of her. They burned. The half-orc felt uncertain and confused after the violation, as though she had never been her own. As though all notions of freedom and escape had wilted, crushed beneath His will. And now, her feet planted into wet sand at the edge of the world, she knew not what to do; or where to go.
She followed Orophin. Her eyes had dried and her hair was become disheveled from her hasty run. There was a deep, sudden, and painful tug. Not harrowing, debilitating pain, but dull and persistent. It was not unlike an unseen thread within, tightly wrapped around the center of her being. Different from the manacles of the shadow, it was not black with hate nor dripping with dormant malice. If she were to describe such a thing, it would be silvery and soft, ever lengthening with each step she took from its unknown source. It never forcefully pulled at her. It did not proffer any meaning. It was simply there. Hurting. It ached more than the sting of her burnt palms, and Kal swayed for a moment. It hurt more than the loss of light she had glimpsed in the pure, eternal shard. She could not think of him. Not now. Not yet. Kal fastened the satchel with her belongings across her body and moved forward.
Senses sharpened amidst her surroundings, her hand reaching for the wolf's hide without thought. Eron pawed his way along reluctantly, his head lowered, ever turning towards the shore. She felt his loss as keenly as she did her own.
Once they reached the edge of the forest Orophin turned towards her. Their eyes met and held. There was a salty breeze in the air, blown from the sea without.
"Gratitude," Kal worded flatly, unsure what else there was to say. He probably hated her still, having never heard a word from him nor been able to read his shuttered features. This one was light-haired also, like L-
She foiled the thought. When he said nothing, Kal bowed her head and began to walk ahead without looking back.
"I lost my brothers, to the armies of the Dark One."
Kal stopped in her tracks, her face flushing red, fearful shame tightening her chest. She hoped he could not see the taint. But if he had not, then surely there was little this one could garner. She slowly turned to face the elf, expectant. Kal found she cared little for whatever scathing words he may have for her now, at their parting. She would face them, say nothing, then be on her way. They had wished for this after all, ever since a knife was placed to her throat all those weeks ago.
"I did not know." Late did the half-orc realize her mouth had opened, and words spilled forth.
Orophin looked to the left, towards the dark grey sea. His gaze settled back on her. "I hated you at first, despite all assurances from the prince that you were different."
Her hand went to her breast of its own will. The invisible tug flared, and pain came with it.
The elf watched this keenly but said nothing. "My Westron is poor," he spoke meaningfully, as though this should aid or comfort somehow.
Kal looked away from those striking elven eyes.
"You are wrong in this, half-elf."
Her eyes involuntarily cut to his in brief astonishment. Not only for his use of the term, having never heard it from any of them before, but for the sorrow she saw in his gaze. Kal blinked, then looked to the ground. "I must go." As she left Kal barely heard his last words, and wished she had not.
"You belonged."
Her aching palms were a hindrance, and she would need to wrap them over before they festered. The burns were not deep but scathing enough to give her grief for a good while. Kal tried to recall what she had come to know of herbs and their properties, hoping she could find something of use in the wilds.
She had not gotten too far before her hearing discerned a shuffle and a stir. Kal had no time to reach for her sword as a male voice cut the silence.
"Where do you think you are going?" the question sounded from somewhere above.
She paled.
A flash of dark and green, and Tadion was before her.
Kal groaned inwardly. The second to last being she could face at the moment. He had possibly been on sentry duty this night, unwilling to linger once his wounds were passably healed.
"Away from here," Kal muttered going around him, her steps sure and steady. If she kept walking he would surely tire of following her. He was bound to return either way. She could not look at him, could not behold the features so known to her. Ones which had already begun to haunt. She could not bear to hear his voice, its cadence and tone so similar to one she had listened to with such yearning during those few stolen nights by the sea. She kept walking.
No such luck, for next, she was staring into his face as the elf deftly dropped down from a tree to stand before her anew. A similar memory rekindled, of a meeting long ago in a dying forest, where an elf had startled her. They were enemies then. Kal flung the thought aside.
She forced her hands into fists, so he would not see the full extent of the burns nor wonder about then. Slowly, she raised her gaze to his.
"You might forgive my curiosity, orcling, but my brother has said nothing to me of any planned traipsing through the mainland." His gaze was searching.
Kal grimaced in a way that made him frown. "I came of my own will. I am leaving."
A dark eyebrow rose, his surprise carefully masked by a jest. "Lovers' quarrel already?"
Kal stomped ahead, deigning no response.
But Tadion was before her again, so close she nearly stumbled into him. "Last I saw you were so joyful there was nothing to blot out your irksome light. Whatever my brother said-"
"Out of my way, elf," Kal threw, now shaking and truly piqued.
He took her by the arm and the familiarity of it caused deep, sordid anger. Kal shut her eyes against the sliver of golden, fanged blackness she felt rising with it. "Release me lest you want bloodshed," Kal seethed.
He did not, his green eyes narrowing. "Are you to return?"
"No." The word slashed through the air, a sword in her throat.
Tadion appeared as though he would speak. Kal was intent on gaping somewhere beyond him, unable to look into features so known, already missed. She startled at his voice.
"You looked me in the eye, and said you would take care of him."
"I lied."
Tadion released her. "No, you did not. But now you are." He seemed at a loss, the green flicker of his eyes dulling.
Kal hesitated. "I have already said my piece to him. Draw it all from there, if you like." And she braved forward, her glance set ahead.
"It will ruin him."
The short, clipped words resounded ominously, shearing through the air as heavy blades cutting into dying underbrush.
"It will ruin you," Tadion continued, nearing her again. "You are entwining. Heed me when I say, it is not something one can simply smother and walk away from. Orcling, listen,-"
She rounded on him then, at the end of her tether. "Watch me!" Kal hurled, self-loathing fueling her words all the more. She could stoop no lower. What did it matter? She declined to meet his gaze. "And you are just like your blasted brother, never knowing when to cease. I have nothing more to say to you. But this should make you glad and bursting with joy, for is it not all that you had wished for?" she bared her teeth. "For me to disappear, and be out of your lives? Sha!" Turning away in anger, she considered the use of her sword if the maddening elf kept following her. And the strongest, hardest truth to acknowledge was that unknowingly, he had been right concerning her all along.
If her words had shaken him, Tadion showed it not. Instead, he remained behind and watched her in silence, her stumbling gait darkened by the shadows of looming trees. She was riddled with grief and guilt. In her eyes he had seen his own anguish, once upon a time in a kingdom long forgotten when he lay tangled and weeping, clutching his Esteriel to him. Returned to the present with a shudder, the dark-haired elf hurriedly retrieved his steps until he reached his fellow guard Orophin. They exchanged a look, and with measured strides the former second-born prince of Eryn Galen took to the trees, intent on crossing to the hidden refuge where his brother needed him.
He found Legolas in the chamber housing records and tomes. A weak torch above bathed his stern features in unsettling lights and shadows. He was pouring over a map of Arda, following a certain path with his finger.
Tadion lingered in the doorway, observing the stiff set of the other's shoulders, the bruising shades beneath his eyes. The younger elf then recognized a dreaded and all too familiar, overwhelming sentiment. One he hated but had lived with for longer than most. He felt powerless, helpless before the signs of loss so deeply carved into the other's face. So clear and ravaging, they were nearly palpable about him.
"What is it?" Legolas asked finally as he continued to gaze thoughtfully upon the familiar expanse of lands.
"Early for strategy, is it not," Tadion finally entered the chamber properly.
A noncommittal gesture. "As good a time as any," the fair-haired elf said offhandedly.
Tadion saw his brother tracing a line across what was formerly South Gondor, then north along the Ephel Dúath. To Mordor. Fear knotted and wrenched at him.
"What is this?"
Legolas gave a brief, sidelong glance. "A way in."
Tadion hesitated. "I assume she told you of it."
His brother nodded.
Deciding it was best to out with it, and that Legolas had already sensed his unrest, Tadion speared forward. "I saw her earlier in the woods, before dawn."
If his brother were still before, there was a deathly edge to him now.
"What happened?" Tadion dwelt on his silence, and the swift flash of pain marring his face before it was doused in bleakness.
"She left, obviously," Legolas answered in the end.
"Obviously," his brother chorused dryly, following the other's barely contained sigh. "And...?"
"And nothing I said could deter her."
"She was angry, seemed distraught. Did she tell you where she was headed?"
"Tadion." Their eyes met.
The younger elf did not often hear his brother call his name as he mainly did on the field of battle, commander to captain. A clear dismissal. So be it. They would speak later. But he would not be so easily dissuaded.
"When do you intend to...?" Tadion motioned at the map.
Steely grey bore into bright green. There was a defiant, regal determination in his bearing which his brother had only rarely seen in the past. It dared against any questioning or dispute. "As soon as possible."
Tadion crossed his arms at his chest. "Good. And I am going with you."