The Year 2063 After A Battle Long Awaited
The tower was high before her, the slick stone black against the night sky. She had thought it would be quieter, that the silence of knight and duty would wrap around her and give away her every step, but the screams of a dying army echoed up the rocky hills of Dol Goldur, and high cries and zinging arrows filled her ears. There were no elven shouts in these calls though, and for what it was worth their silence was a good sign that her army was safe.
She climbed over rocks and up the hill until she reached the gates, and swiftly she felled the orcs that barred the doors. And pressed her ear to the oaken surface. Surely the gates would be better guarded than this, it would be suicide to enter here, but not even an archere was big enough for her to slip through, and she did not trust the falling rock for foot holds. No, this was the only way into the courtyard where she planned to meet the Dark Lord. But as she looked through the cracks she saw the yards beyond empty of vast armies and knew by the flickering light in a high window that the necromancer awaited her there. Her plans would need to be altered. She cursed Oropher and wondered how well he had made his strong hold. Surely there were layers of protection from a siege should the first doors be breached. She had no memory of this place, for even when she was a child the silvan folk had begun their trek north.
She slipped through the stone walls and gaits of the could city until she reached at last the great doors to the ancient palace that sat crumbling on the hill. Cautiously she pushed the door open and crouched behind it, waiting to hear armor clanking, or the thump of an arrow into the wood, yet no sound came. She peered around the frame, and found a grand entry way, with stairs rising to a high throne, and balconies overlooking the white stone for onlookers to see those who came to their kingdom of old. It's beauty was hidden in crumbing heaps. Oh how the dark ones had wreaked destruction on their glorious castle. Vengeance she reminded herself, she had come for blood and ruin.
But before she could begin her long climb to the high tower the door opened again and she raised her sword, and was met not with the eyes of foe, but friend.
"Mithrandir." She whispered in the darkness. "I thought I saw you walking about in the woods below. Though I was surprised that any from the council headed our letters."
"I urged them to listen to your warning, but alas their eyes and ears lay elsewhere. Are you prepared now to face the foe with me, though we are alone in the endeavor?" The wizard spoke gravely, and raised his gaze towards the high tower.
"I am ready for death." She said gazing on the high stairs before them.
"Do not be so eager to seek it my dear. But let us go and free your forest and see what darkness comes to us when we do it." She nodded at his words, and together they made their way up, and up, past the old ball rooms, and ancient dining halls. Past the musty library, and winding courtly wings. Even long abandoned she felt the ghosts of her ancestors about her in the stone, leading her higher towards doom. She swallowed her fear for them, and tightened her grip on the hilt of her blade.
Then at last they came to the highest tower and the door they met was closed. Yet about the frame a flickering of fire could be seen, and Unede felt a cold creep into her heart despite the heat she felt slipping through the cracks.
"His eye is upon us, I can feel his hatred, and I despair." She whispered to Mithrandir.
"Gather your wits child, and let not your courage flee you." He said and placed his hand on the door and muttered a spell of opening. But still they found their way barred. He tried again, this time lighting his staff, and speaking ancient commands.
"Wait." She said at last and lay her hand on his. "These are the doors of Oprophir, built by ancient elven smiths. Ask more kindly, and they will let all who are not a foe pass. Though I am sure a dark magic has come over them, the wood is not quick to forget the commands of its maker."
Gandalf huffed and nodded at her words, then lay his hands again on the doors, and felt the warmth of a homely house still lingering in their timbers. Then they clicked, and swung slowly open, as if some great force delayed their coming.
There before them on a gleaming black throne sat a man shrouded in shadow. His eyes were aflaim and his hands were bound around a sword. Atop his brow sat a twisted black crown, and he seemed to grow taller as the seconds slipped by them. But Unede watched him flicker, he was weak, weak behind his glamour and his crown. Weak without his ring.
The elf drew herself taller and lifted her chin. She raised her sword and said to the shadowy man "Be gone Sauron, be gone from these woods." Then Sauron rose from his seat and stood before them lifting his black sword high, and his size and stature seemed to grow higher and his shadow filled the room.
"Is this what the great King of the elves has sent. A poisoner, a women, a youth of Middle Earth against a maiar. You know better than he, you see the power that I hold, perhaps too you see the choice before you, I am not a foe." His words slithered through the air to her ears and she watched him move delicately around the room.
"Deceiver indeed." Unede hissed. "Your words hold no power here. I am of the house of Finarfin, long enough have your words tainted the blood of my royal house. But now behold, I am come, and I shall drive you from these halls. Be gone necromancer." And she lifted her silver blade higher as her words echoed in the hollowed halls of Orophir.
But Sauron smiled a black grin and laughed shook his head. Then he lifted his own black sword and met her blade in the air as swift as a leaping flame. She parried his blow, and in the heat of their fight Gandalf drew his sword and brought it down upon Sauron. There in the high halls their blades sang, clashing together in the room heated by Saurons firey malice. Blood and sweat dripped from Unede's brow, but her strength did not leave her.
"Strength of youth you have." Sauron said as be brought a broad strike down against her sword. "But behold the age of the silmarils is over, we have no quarrel you and I. Let us share a dark throne together. I can return to you all that you hold dear, raise your father from the dead, bring back the precious King Orophir to serve at your feet. Still your mothers grieving soul. Free all those in the marshes and make you the Queen of a vast elven army. "
"Hold your tongue." She cried between gasps. Behind their spar Gandalf lifted his sword and staff and spokes a spell, but Sauron cut him down with his own magics, and the wizard fell to the ground held there by some great strength. Then Sauron turned again to Unede, and spoke with words tainted of black magic and she felt her mind bend at his will.
"Hear my words maiden, that I am skilled in smithing far more than your blood. We can steal the light of the moon from the white tree, and fill the stones with the gold of the sun. If it is jewels you seek, then I will crown you and remake the gems you desire."
"I have no desire for stones, nor gems, nor jewels, be gone deceiver!" She cried, but he cut down her blade and grabbed her tunic in a great thrust.
"You are weak, all that Finarfin's house has left to give is an untrained child." He lifted his blade to her neck and she felt her arms grow heavy as if the strain of a thousand years of battle had come over them all at once and she recalled her own Kin Gil-Galad in the grips of Sauron and wept that she was to meet the same fiery end. "This is your heart, malleable and frail… soft with love, an exile of the Noldor, hated by her uncle, fearful of her own name, hiding in the woods so she doesn't have to rule in caves, or crevice's. You are nothing, you were born nothing, and you abandoned the only title that gave you purpose."
"No." She said feeling the blade press into her neck.
"Yes." The deceiver hissed. "And hate dwelleth in your heart too, I see it, use it, use it to take vengeance on the one's who truly deserve it. There are elves who would take your crown. You should take the elven rings and serve me. I will bring you to your full strength. You will have my great armies to lead to raze Middle Earth and rebuild as would please you."
But as Unede's heart turned hard, and her ears were washed in is words and she felt the black temptation fill her fea. But, Mithrnadir lifted his staff again and called out in the name if Eru Iluvatar, and Sauron threw her down and turned to meet the Wizards challenge.
Then Unede saw that Sauron tired, and she lifted her heavy arms and drew her blade along Saurons back spilling is fiery blood. The Deceiver cut the staff from the wizards hand with a great cry, and Gandalf fell again bound against the ancient stone floor. Then at last Unede stood alone, weak from battle, and dark words, and Sauron struck her high. But she feigned to meet his blade in the air and stepped to the side, drawing a dagger stabbing desperately towards weakness in his armor, but he moved quickly and brought his black sword swiftly across her arm, she gasped in pain but parried another blow. His strokes fell again and again, until he reached his black hand towards her. She let him come, let him take her by the mail and lift her high.
But Gandalf gathered the last of his strength and raised his staff once more and spoke the mighty words of banishment, and Unede lay her dagger deep in to the neck of her foe, and he let out a great scream into the night. And as he dropped her, he cut his black blade across her belly, and spilled her blood to the floor. Unede gasped as she met the cold stones and took in desperate gulps of air as she watched her red blood stain the white stone floor. Through blurry eyes she watched the shadow flee out a high window and take leave into the night.
Gandalf scrambled forward to meet Unede where she lay. She reached for his hand but he took her desperately into his arms and pressed hard on her belly as she cried out in pain.
"Breath child, breath, the shadow is gone, help comes. Breath." She took a deep wet breath and tears spilled from her eyes.
"Mithrandir." She whispered as her vision darkened. "Don't let him see me, don't let Legolas see me die. Do not let him fade."
"Hush child, speak not of death, lest it come swifter." He whispered trying to sooth her panic. Already he heard the elven shouts of help below.
"Will you sing to me Mithrandir? Will you sing to me of Nimrodel?" She whispered, and as his song began her vision blurred and darkened, and the healers ran into the room, and a young dark haired elleth lay heavy hands upon the warriors' waist, and pressed herbs to her wounds.
"Unede, you must listen to me, I am Elenwe, you must stay awake and here with me now." But Unede did not heed the words of the healer, and found the soft golden dawn crest through the windows on the edges of her vision, and knew that the darkness had gone, and so she let herself slip into the swift sunrise, and heed the cries of the gulls, until at last her feet fell on soft grass and she met a gentle release.