Chapter 133

The Last of Them

I don't know what difference it would have made to Thráin to know that in the world beyond a lot of people were doing all that they could to ease their path. There wasn't much else that we could do but make sure that Sauron had eye for everything except for what happened in his own lands and on that score at least, all our efforts were a resounding success.

We in Minas Tirith had decreed that it was important that we should be on the road at first light, so naturally I barely slept. I dozed a bit in a chair for an hour and after that it was back to work. I don't think Boromir slept at all, so that night, at least on that front, nothing happened. Again. I could see a pattern beginning to form and not one that I appreciated very much, as readers have probably surmised.

My parents were not coming, but they had decided against returning home, citing that they would much rather be here to get the news as soon as it was available. Mary had returned at nightfall and had immediately declared that while she really didn't feel like going anywhere near a battle, it was her lot in life to keep an eye on her wayward sister, so she was coming with us. And wild horses couldn't have kept Peter away.

We had decided that we could go big or we could go home, so naturally we went completely overboard. The Mûmakil were brought out and festooned with all their usual implements. Boromir, another one with slightly insane and reckless ideas, had suggested that Faramir could ride on Teddy to demonstrate that he was well above everyone else while Aragorn rode a horse. Of course everyone agreed that this was a splendid idea and we should implement it immediately.

Fortunately no one invited me to ride one.

I didn't think we'd have many troops who could still move, but it turned out that we had. I had gone down to the place where the gates of Minas Tirith used to be some hours before we were due to leave and I was stunned by the number of people already there. That number only increased in the following hours. Nobody talked a lot beyond the bare necessities, so the mood was grim and determined. No one really knew how this was all going to turn out, but it was clearly understood that nobody was going to back down.

It is good to note that most of these foot soldiers had absolutely no clue what was going on. Their own immediate commanders had no idea why this was happening. They had no idea about the Ring and the Fellowship and they certainly didn't know about the plan we few had concocted to fool Sauron.

You might have thought that this would increase the risk that someone might accidentally give the game away and I certainly raised this point. Boromir pointed out to me that Faramir was a highly regarded commander of their people with a lot of local knowledge, which Aragorn did not have, so no one would find it strange that he took charge.

In all of this I did sometimes stop to wonder how the Fellowship got on and if perhaps they were already at Mount Doom, thus making it quite unnecessary for us to go on the road again at all. Evidently it was not…

Thráin

Thráin opened his eyes to dark skies and four faces that were a complete study in worry and consternation. Gimli stared at him as if he were a particularly difficult piece of text he meant to decipher. Sam's expression reminded him uncomfortably of Duria. Frodo looked afraid, although, he was pleased to find, not of him, because he did not back away in horror as soon as Thráin opened his eyes.

'You gave us quite a scare, Thráin,' said the least worried looking member of the Fellowship. 'Gimli feared for you.'

Yes, he would. He did quite a lot of fretting these days, a considerable bit for Thráin's safety. In the interest of peace within the Fellowship he held his tongue about it. Besides, they were all prone to fretting these days. He himself was not immune.

He sat up and found that while he could, the effort took up more of his strength than he would like. He was as weak as a new-born babe. The Ring had done this simply by being near, by touching his skin. How much worse had it been for Frodo?

He sought out the hobbit and found him pale, but sitting up. He also no longer had the Ring, which had passed to Sam.

'Here, drink.' Gimli pressed the waterskin into his hands. 'Get your strength back.'

Water would not restore his strength, but it would perhaps clear his mind, so he drank deeply. It ought to worry him that he barely tasted the foulness of the water anymore. In truth, most food had lost its taste as well. Though he had not discussed this with the others, he suspected that it was much the same for them.

'We cannot go on as we are,' he said when he was done. By now he had lost count of the times they had been forced to face this fact. Their latest strategy had helped them through only a few marches. Now it had to be discarded.

No one argued.

'How then?' Frodo asked. The words breathed despair and hopelessness. 'What is left that we have not already attempted?' When this prompted no immediate response from any of the others, he continued: 'We have almost no strength left to give. You said it, Thráin, that it grew stronger in here, because this is where it was made. It's true. It's grown so strong and so heavy and…'

'But not so powerful that it can take our minds,' Thráin interjected. 'These manipulations are its greatest weapon. It tried to use that against us, but time and again we defeated it.' They had come close to losing themselves at times. Thráin was no exception to this. Yet when one of them stood on the brink, the others had pulled them back. None had fallen. It served to remind themselves of this not inconsiderable achievement once in a while.

Legolas understood this. 'So now force is all it has left,' he said. He nodded at Thráin. 'You are right, my friend, this attack is but the last resort, the least of its weapons.'

'It's not nothing, Mr Legolas,' Sam said indignantly. If there was any who could testify to the brute force that the Ring was capable of, then it was he.

Even in these dire times and this inhospitable land, Legolas refused to be taken aback. 'I did not claim that it was nothing. I know that it is an increasingly heavy burden to bear, but we should find hope in its current tactics, for if it has resorted to these, then we know that it has admitted its defeat in the use of its most dangerous tools.'

Sam took the time to consider this and then nodded.

'Look, that's all very good and well,' Gimli said, sounding so much like his father that anyone might have been forgiven for indeed mistaking Gimli for him, 'but that doesn't tell us how to carry on, does it? We're days away from that thrice-cursed mountain of fire and we can barely stand.'

There was entirely too much truth in those words.

He looked from one to the other and saw the same realisation on all of their faces. They were so close, but their strength was failing. They had the will, but not the strength to carry on. Yet they must.

'We cannot give in now that we are so close to our goal.' This he knew.

'I know we can't,' Gimli snapped irritably. 'So how should we do it?'

The question was posed at him, but it was Sam who answered: 'As we agreed,' he said, face solemn. 'Only we don't let it touch us again.' He produced a piece of cloth that looked as though he had cut it from his elvish cloak. He carefully wrapped it around the Ring and then tied it up with a piece of string, winding it around and around before he tied it off with one of his fabled knots. 'It wants us to stop. So we don't give it what it wants.'

The attitude was almost purely dwarvish and yet there was hobbit wisdom in these words as well. Perhaps it was because the solution he proposed was so simple and so self-evident. Had he not just thought himself that it was the contact with his bare skin that seemed to have sapped his strength? Now Sam proposed a solution to that. Aye, the weight of the Ring would not be lessened, but perhaps they could learn to handle that for just long enough.

Three days, he told himself, casting his gaze on the fiery mountain that was their destination. Surely they could hold out for so long?

'You are very wise indeed, Sam,' he complimented, meaning every word of that. 'I am glad that you are here with us.'

If truth be told, he was exceedingly grateful that Legolas and Gimli had come as well. The book was wrong about a great many things. They had done right by the Fellowship. Their presence had made a difference when it was needed most. If any one of their current Fellowship had not come, could they have made it this far?

He did not know.

He did not particularly care to find out either.

Sam looked at his feet, embarrassed.

So Legolas made the embarrassment worse. 'Truer words could not have been spoken,' he declared. 'Great is the wisdom of the gardeners of the Shire. We should not have got so far without it.'

'When you return home, songs will be sung of your great deeds,' Gimli predicted, embarrassing their valued gardener even further. 'And what songs they will be.'

'I don't know about that, Mr Gimli,' Sam said. 'But I do know that there will never be any songs or gardens or good sunny days unless we do what we have to do.'

More wisdom.

'That is very true, Sam,' Thráin agreed. He rose to his feet and found that he could do so without collapsing instantly. He was weaker than he would have preferred to be, but he could stand and he could walk. He could make his strength stretch just far enough to carry a hobbit for a few hours. There was fight in them still.

'I shall carry Sam,' Legolas announced before Thráin could extend the offer himself. 'Thráin, would you take the barrel?'

He would take the barrel because if he did not, then Gimli almost certainly would. And his kinsman was not well, not by any stretch of the imagination. Gimli never spoke of it, but he barely used his injured arm. It hung limply at his side and when someone accidentally bumped against him, he shied away from their touch.

Maker be good, he prayed. Do not let him lose the arm.

Gimli made his living by his fighting. He was a valued member of the Mountain guard, one whose skill with an axe surpassed Thráin's, whose favoured weapon was the sword. If he lost an arm, his entire future was in jeopardy. No dwarf would shy away from death in battle, but many a dwarf that returned from war with less limbs than they had when they set out found it hard to reconcile themselves to this new disability. There was no shame in it, but not being able to work as they had before would be hard on them. Dwarves weren't made for idleness. They were made to work and craft, to stand and fight if need be.

If Gimli could no longer do that…

It did not truly bear thinking about.

Gimli grumbled a few words about suspected special treatment, but said no more about it. The protests were too few and too feeble. Our strength is failing. He said nothing about it, because what purpose could it serve?

Thráin hoisted Sam onto Legolas's back and then took up the barrel himself. A full barrel was barely a challenge to a dwarf and one that was only half full was even less so, but he was not as fit as he usually was. Quite to his own shock and horror, he found that he would not say no to spending several days in a bed.

I am turning mannish indeed.

'How are you, Frodo?' he asked to distract himself from that rather startling thought.

'Better than you,' Frodo said frankly. He pushed aside the makeshift cloth around his neck to demonstrate the effectiveness of it. The skin was discoloured with the bruises that the Ring had caused, but it hadn't broken. The Ring tried them hard, but they still stood.

'I was the means by which you moved closer to its doom,' he said. Was it any wonder at all that the Ring sought to bring him down? Mahal only knew how it treated Legolas, but the elf still moved at a brisk pace, so it stood to reason that the Ring had not yet won this particular fight.

'No.' Frodo walked beside him and he looked straight ahead. 'That was not the reason.'

'Then what was?'

'You are still a danger to it.' Again, Frodo did not meet his eyes. 'It cannot get to Aragorn, but it can get to you.'

He accepted this news in silence. It was not truly news, but every once in a while someone or something would remind him. 'Be that as it may, it is not relevant now.' Yet even as he said it, the vision of the lone dwarf in the empty halls played on his mind's eye. Much as he wished to forget, his survival was a matter of some importance to people other than himself.

'Perhaps you should not carry it then,' Gimli said. 'If that is what it wants.'

For a moment duty warred with duty, but it was not a long fight, for the answer was clear in his mind. 'The quest comes before all else.' This was the choice he had made, the commitment he had accepted before this destiny had been revealed to him. When the war was done, he would turn his mind to that and to Khazad-dûm. But not yet. 'I came to be a help, not a hindrance.'

'Is Gimli not right?' Legolas wondered. 'Are you not the hope for your people?'

He did not like where this was going. 'In this moment Thoren is my people's hope.' He knew what had to be done and he did it so very well. 'And we would be wise to place our hope in him as well, as it is his decision to defy Sauron that has cleared our way before us.' But at what cost? How he longed for home, for news!

'And yet…'

'I shall not shirk my duty, Legolas, and if you do not wish to offer offence, you shall say no more about it.' He was no man or elf that he required special treatment because of something that was beyond his control. Aye, he'd fallen and the Ring had tried him hard, but he stood and he walked.

Let that suffice.

Legolas took one look at Thráin's face and chose wisdom over foolishness. 'You do not seem so heavy, Sam,' he observed. 'I feel no weight from the Ring. Does it try you hard?'

Sam took a few moments to consider this. 'No, it doesn't,' he realised with some surprise.

They all pondered this for a little while until it was Gimli who thought of an answer. 'It is the Lady's doing,' he proclaimed. 'There is magic in these elvish garments, aye, and power, enough to resist this darkness perhaps.'

It was good solid reasoning. Thráin could not deny that. It stood to reason that these cloaks, that had shielded them from so many prying eyes, had abilities woven into them by the skilled hands of the Lady who wielded such power. Who truly knew what the ring she wore could and could not do?

'You may well be right,' he said.

None mentioned the Lady's own ring, but there was no need. They all knew without speaking of it. If that magic, made to shield and protect, could be their salvation, he would be duly grateful if he met with her again.

'I still hear it, though,' Sam remarked. 'And it is still heavier than it should be.'

'It is always heavier than it looks,' said Frodo. Seeing as how he'd had it for many years already, they all took him at his word.

'The Lady is not equal in power to the thing we carry or the one who made it,' Legolas replied. 'There is much that she may do, but against this only the Valar could truly triumph. We can only destroy the means by which the Dark Lord binds himself to this life.'

'If his existence can be called life,' Thráin said wryly. 'He exists without a body, without true care or devotion from those who serve him. Who would stand beside him because they chose so of their own free will?'

To him this was perhaps the most baffling thing of all, that anyone could wish to live without friends, without kin around them. What good did rule over all the known lands do if there was none there to keep him company? Thoren ruled, but he had kin to stand beside him and friends at his back to catch him should he fall. He had folk around him to counsel him and to cheer him when his spirits fell.

What did Sauron have, all things told?

Fear and servitude and none of those would sit down for a meal with him.

What a wasted existence.

'It is not in his nature to care for friends and fellowship,' Legolas said. 'This is why he does not understand such things. And his oversight will be his downfall.'

Only if they succeeded in their aims, but this was not the time to speak of such doubts, so he did not. 'His many oversights will be his downfall,' Thráin said. There was many a thing Sauron had overlooked in his quest for power. 'His solitude chief among them.'

Because who would ever stand beside one so evil?

Elvaethor

'Now!'

The arrow flew. Then another. And another.

Elvaethor took no rest in between shots. Neither did his friends. Before they left on their mission Elvaethor had told them two things: that they were putting their lives in unbelievable danger from which they might not emerge unscathed, if indeed at all, and that they had only one chance, and one chance only to do this, so they must do it right. They must also do it very quickly.

They had all taken his words to heart.

To achieve this end he had taken as many arrows with him as he could carry. He sent them off one after the other, keeping the beasts and their riders in his sight at all times so he could adjust his aim if needed. They were constantly in motion, never still as they tried to quell the uprising in the midst of their own camp.

And the arrows hit. He did not stop to see them land, but he heard the screeching of anger turn to screeching of pain. Soon enough the beasts joined, though not for long. One had been hit in the neck and was now in serious trouble. It flapped its wings about to try and regain its balance, but another arrow, in the neck as well, though higher up, put paid to that.

The rider on top of it was not in a much better state. He had four arrows in him. Two had lodged into the legs where they did little harm. They had no more bodies that had veins that could bleed when pierced. Truth be told, neither had they hearts and brains that could be stopped by steel, but damage had been done to them in the areas where their hearts and brains should have resided were they living folk.

That was where they could be killed.

And so one of them was, because the remaining two arrows had found the chest. The relentless screeching increased, rising to a crescendo even as the wind played odd games around him. Then it ended. Between one heartbeat and the next there was nothing there to hold up the robes and armour. They simply collapsed.

So, truth be told, did the winged beast. It screamed one last time before it plunged to the earth where it flattened several still warring orcs. Neither they nor the beast itself did get back up again.

Only one now remains.

Elvaethor turned his mind to him and found that while one of the two had died, the other had not. He had the better mount and had been farther away. He might have seen the danger sooner and so made sure to fly away and out of reach the moment that he could. He still hovered above the camp, but was now beyond the reach of both Elvaethor's archers and the archers on the battlements.

Their arrows were running out.

He realised this when he reached for another and found no more. He came up empty. His supply had run its course and his friends were not far behind. They had done what they could, but it had only been half enough.

So now what?

It was unlikely to be long before the orcs realised that something was amiss and from whence the danger came. Much as they loved killing one another, elves and dwarves were a far more appealing prey. Once they realised, they would – mostly – abandon the fighting among themselves and turn on the available elves and dwarves instead. Elvaethor's folk knew this. He had told them this and warned them of the danger.

They had come regardless.

He was content to take the risk for himself, but not for them and not for his family. Tauriel had Thoren to live for. He had a duty to bring her back and see her safe. Then there were Cathy's parting words, imparted on him under the guise of a hug and kiss on his cheek: 'I have lost one brother. I refuse to lose another. Come back.'

In his haste and foolishness he had promised. It was unwise, for none could promise that fortune would be on their side in a battle. Yet promises he had made and so he was bound to keep them as best he could. He had made a promise once and failed to do as he had vowed to do. The memory of it haunted him until this very day.

So this promise he would keep.

'Pull back,' he ordered. Yes, he was reluctant to do so, but these lives were not his to gamble with. Tauriel had Thoren to return to and Fíli had lost more than enough for one lifetime. The loss of a son would grieve him sorely.

As the loss of me would grieve my kin.

The thought was a novel one still, but one that had not yet failed to warm his heart. At times, he feared that he would break apart at the seams from the many emotions washing over him. Screaming sorrow and screaming joy in almost equal measure. The wound of Jack's death was still bleeding, but he had found such kinship as well that his heart was still singing. One emotion was as strong as the other so he was tossed between the two like a leaf in the wind, blowing one way first and then the other.

Tauriel looked at him as though she meant to say him nay, but then thought better of it. Alfur had no such reservations and said his piece anyway: 'That's running away.'

'No, Master Alfur, that is living to fight another day.' As he vowed to do. 'We cannot achieve full victory here. This wraith is beyond our reach, but very soon we shall not be beyond the reach of the many orcs he still commands. We cannot win and our deaths will be to no gain.'

His words struck a chord with his friend, for he nodded. 'Aye, that's sense. I'll guide us back.'

So he did, even as behind them the hue and cry went up. They had been seen and now every orc that breathed would come for them. Perhaps by now they suspected that they had something to do with the commotion that had been visited upon them. Orcs never turned down an opportunity for revenge if they could help it.

Alfur knew the way better than Elvaethor did and he was quick on his feet. Tegalad followed on his heels, bow still in hand. Unlike Elvaethor, he still had a few arrows remaining. Tauriel could boast a few as well, but Kíli had shot them all. The same was true for Lancaeron. They had given it all they had.

'They are gaining,' his old friend reported.

'We are nearly at the ladder. So long as we make it to the ledge ahead of them, we may cut the ropes and let them fall.' As Bilbo had done so long ago. If they could make it that far, then they stood a chance. They'd go in and lock the door behind them. By the time the orcs would have navigated the long way round, they would find only a very empty ledge with a door they could no longer see. 'Go!'

So they went. They made their progress in silence, while the orcs behind them shrieked and cheered and cursed as if their lives depended on it. An arrow flew past his ear and harmlessly against a rock, but the point had been made.

They wasted no more time. None was foolish enough to congregate at the foot of the ladder to carry out a headcount. Anyone who fell behind – and there were none, for Elvaethor brought up the rear and he made sure that they were all there – would be beyond saving anyway. Such was the way of war.

Alfur ushered Tauriel and Lancaeron up the ladder before him, then went himself when he had made certain that the other three were nearly there. Tegalad was the next, then Kíli. By the time Elvaethor could make a start on the ascent himself, the orcs were perilously close. They were not bad climbers themselves. Elvaethor could testify to that. He had seen them before. He knew full well what they were capable of.

His instincts urged him to tell his companions that they should make all due haste, but there was no need; they knew this well enough themselves and acted accordingly. So long as they climbed faster than the orcs, they stood a chance.

He had forgotten about the Nazgûl.

An enraged scream tore the air apart, ripped through his courage and froze him from the inside out. His senses abandoned him for a moment of mindless terror. Yes, he knew these tricks. He knew what powered them. It availed him but very little, because the fear drenched him from top to bottom until he quivered in terror.

And yet this was not by far the worst of it, because he felt the blade all over again, digging into his shoulder, cold and full of malice. The pain was so acute that it stole the breath from his lungs. He would have screamed in pain, but couldn't. It was not a quick flash of pain either. The pain built. It became ever more excruciating until he could scarcely feel the fear the wraith projected anymore. It consumed his thoughts and left no place for anything else. It became so hard to bear that it was almost too much effort to hold on to the ladder which had become his only tether to safety.

Almost.

A man would have fallen. A man might not have stood, but Elvaethor was no man. He had been born an elf and made a dwarf. He was made of sterner stuff and so he did not fall. The terror did not leave him, but it was forced to share space with courage and sense, where it could not thrive. He fought through the despair and the pain and surfaced, free of neither, but master over them.

'Go!' he shouted up at his companions. Tegalad had frozen and now made it impossible for Kíli and Elvaethor himself to continue on. The other three were still moving, which he took as a good sign. 'Tegalad, go!'

Too young, he thought. Tegalad was too young. He was a child of the Third Age. He never knew the terrors of that war. True, neither did Alfur and Kíli, but being dwarves had given them a distinct advantage in these matters. Not for the first time – or the last – he thanked Aulë – no, he should perhaps start calling him Mahal now – for the strength and endurance he had bestowed upon his children.

'He's not shifting!' Kíli reported. He did not sound frightened, but rather frustrated. 'Go on, you big lump, get a move on!' When this had no effect, he turned to Elvaethor. 'You look to our defences below and to the sky and I shall see what I may do for our companion.'

Kíli was no leader, but he was an able warrior. Fíli and Síf had raised fine sons. Kíli was no exception to the rule. He wasted no time in attempting a risky manoeuvre that would have been suicidal from anyone but a dwarf. With the utmost care and concentration he began to climb past and half over Tegalad, so that he could stand above him, presumably to reason with him face to face.

Elvaethor did not watch. Kíli was right; the orcs were gaining rapidly on them. It was a good thing that he had at the last moment decided against leaving his sword at home, because now the longer blade could easily reach those who scurried up the ladder behind him. He stabbed and slashed and although the position from which he fought was an awkward one, he boasted some successes. Several orcs fell wounded back to the ground. They were high enough up that it seemed reasonable to assume that they would not be fortunate enough to survive this fall. Others leaped out of the way and, presumably, met the same fate.

The orcs were not the problem.

The Nazgûl, now that the rain of arrows had ceased and there was no true danger any more, had joined the fray. Its mount appeared relatively unhurt and if any arrows had indeed found their true target, there was no sign of it on the wraith.

We have only half succeeded.

The Nazgûl retained a little distance. In the past Elvaethor had seen rider and mount swoop down on their defenceless victims, haul them through the air only to be unceremoniously dumped on the ground. He made no attempt to do so now, which he took as a hopeful sign. He was not as sure of his own safety as he would make it appear.

Nazgûl did not need to be very close however to work their foul magic. The first three of Elvaethor's group climbed steadily on, but the Nazgûl's focus was not on them. It was on the other three who were now in trouble. So it shrieked and rained despair down on them. Elvaethor was not immune and neither was Kíli, but they were yet able to pierce through the cloud of hopelessness and despair to do what they needed to do.

He was cold to the bone, but he could not allow that to stop him. Once he did, he would die and self-preservation spoke louder for now than his fear did. He carried on, as he was sure that above him Kíli carried on.

'Fools!' the Nazgûl said at last when he spoke. 'You cannot win.'

'No, we cannot.' Just like that, peace descended. He wondered if he now only truly realised that which Thoren had known from the beginning; that there was no true victory to be had here. All they could offer was distraction. All they could do was to pin the Enemy here, far from where his troops would turn out to be most needed. This was their function. There was peace in knowing that, truly knowing it with both his mind and his heart.

This seemed to throw the Nazgûl for a loop. This was not how his victims usually responded. The accepted response was to cower in fear. If he did his job really well they would be reduced to tremoring wrecks who drooled down their own chins for weeks after the encounter. Elvaethor had seen the poor wretches who had been driven out of their minds with fear, chased to a place deep within their own minds from which some of them never returned.

Yet he still stood.

He reviewed his situation. It was not a favourable one. The orcs kept coming up and the Nazgûl pinned him and his friends right there where the orcs could easily reach him. Eventually his luck would run out. And then what?

My task here is not done.

The thought struck him without warning, but it was right. He had come out here tonight to perform a task. Who was he to falter now, when his prey was right before him? No dwarf would pass up the opportunity to do some damage to their foe. Was that not what he had become?

For good measure he had taken a dagger with him. Until this moment it had been harmlessly in his sheath which was attached to his belt. Now he took it. This was what Jack had done that fateful night, the night when they broke the first siege.

What was good enough for his brother was good enough for him.

He transferred his sword from his right hand to his left. He could fight like this, though not as well, but he needed his right hand to throw and that was of more importance. He wasted no more time on conversation. Time was of the essence.

He failed to parry a blow from an orc below. The steel bit deep into his left leg, but he did not let this deter him. He stifled the groan of pain and focused on the task in hand. The Nazgûl was still deliberating what to do next. There would never be a better moment.

So he let the dagger fly.

By the time the Nazgûl realised what he had done, it was already too late to do something about it. Jack had managed to throw his dagger straight into the face. He had done so in the middle of a battle and from a position on the ground. Elvaethor had no such good fortune. He had to throw whilst clinging to a rope ladder, halfway up a Mountain, bleeding from several wounds.

He still did it.

The dagger hit the Nazgûl in the face. It screeched and screamed, but Elvaethor did not waste time viewing the spectacle. He knew what he had done and he knew what the outcome should be. A glance upward taught him that Kíli had against all the odds managed to hoist Tegalad onto his back and was climbing up the ladder as fast as he could. There was no reason to linger.

So he didn't.

Only now did he become aware of the burning pain in his legs. He had been hit there several times while his attention was on the wraith. It was a price he gladly paid, though he suspected Thora would have a thing or two to say on the matter. It did not matter now.

Somewhere in the air behind him the wind picked up. It was a tell-tale sign, so he did not look back even when the wind almost tossed him from the ladder. Then it fell away suddenly. He did not look up either to see how the clouds broke above his head. He could tell that they did by the changing of the light. He only looked up ahead to see the hands of his friends extended, reaching out for him.

'You absolute, reckless, foolish fool!' Alfur cursed when he got hold of Elvaethor's left hand. 'What did you do?'

'What I must,' he replied. He allowed Lancaeron to take his other hand. Between them they dragged him up and onto the ledge.

The orcs were so close, but not in fact as close as Kíli was. He stood ready, sword in hand, to strike as soon as his two friends had dragged his third friend clear. Alfur and Lancaeron half-carried, half-dragged Elvaethor further onto the ledge with all speed.

'Now, Kíli!' Alfur ordered.

Kíli did not need telling twice. Without hesitating he struck the cords holding the ladder in place on one side and severed them. On the other side Thormod stood ready, pale and determined still. He needed two blows to perform the same task, but he did what he had to do and never hesitated.

The ladder fell.

Never to be seen again.

The same was true for the orcs.


So, it's bye bye Nazgûl. You have no idea how happy I am to be rid of them.

Next time: there's living arrangements to sort out and Sauron has another trick up his sleeve.

As always, thank you for reading. Reviews would make me very happy.

Until next week!