(Author: Alasia)
Leila stared off into the darkness, her heart screaming
in pain and confusion. The Emyn Muil was black with dark and she somehow
felt that it matched the feeling she had in her heart. A strange sense
of foreboding had filled her not long after Siendar had appeared. What
of Jairah? Would she live? Was it truly her selfishness that caused the
female elf to become wounded? The answer to these questions would not come
to her, she wasn't really sure if she wanted to know the answers.
"Your heart crys for someone and yet you run from him."
Her head snapped up and she watched as Siendar sat down next to her,
"Aye. I do not know if what has happened is my fault or not... I changed
the story. It's all my fault."
"Story? You make no sense Lady Leila," Siendar said.
She closed her eyes, "I cannot make sense of what I do not know. I
can tell you though, that I am here by accident."
"Accident?"
"I don't belong in this world - Or in mine. I thought that I may have
found a place where I could stay and love and be loved," she sighed, "But
I have caused so much pain."
Siendar remained silent fro a moment, then spoke, "What has happened
is not your fault Leila Morgan of Scotland. You were brought to this world
for a reason, how do you know if it was to save your beloved or something
more? Jairah made the decision to help you. She knew that if she did she
would be changing the course fo fate, and she helped you anyway. She could
have just let Boromir, son of Denethor die, but she sensed the love you
have for him, for it radiates from your very soul, and he returns those
feelings, but is torn between the mission and how his heart longs for you."
"How do you know this," she asked in surprise.
"Ah, I am not ordinary," Siendar said, "Do you know how to use a sword,
daughter of another world?"
"Yes," she said, confused, "Boromir taught me how to use one. Why?"
Siendar held a shape up in the darkness and placed it in her hands.
It was a sword, a long thin sword, slightly like a katana, only double
edged, "What-"
"This sword os known as Hope in the common tounge. It is the only one
of its kind and it will protect you well," the elf said.
"I don't understand," she said.
"Take your things and head for the Fangorn forest, track down the Ent
called Treebeard. With him you will wait until you lover comes into Rohan,
and then you will go to him," Seindar spoke, "Follow your heart Leila.
Jairah will live, she is strong."
"I do not know the way."
The elf stood and handed her her pack, pulled her up and pushed her
westward, "Go west until you exit the Emyn Muil, from there go west by
north, do not stray your course. Follow the burnt path and it will lead
you."
"Burnt path?"
"You will see," he answered and then pushed her in the right direction.
*****
This really sucked. Or, that's how Leila felt about
all of this. She had been wlking through the Emyn Muil for three days,
and she was positive she had veered off course at lest four different times.
What she wouldn't give for a compass. For all she could see there was no
'burnt path'. There was nothing but bits of green over jagged rocks. She
sighed as she reached the top of a hill and sat down on one of the less-sharp
rocks and placed her head in a hand. Why had she followed Siendar's advice?
Was it because he was an elf? Was it because he had known so much? She
really didn't know.
She looked up at the clear blue sky for a moment
before turning back to the west. Her only notion of it being west was because
the sun was setting. She sighed once more and scanned the landscape, her
eyes brushing over blackened land and moving on. Wait! Blackened land?
The burnt path! She had found it! She stood and grabbed her pack before
charging down the hill to the wide strech of destroyed earth. She stoped
and looked around at the decimation of the little bits of grass around
her. This was not a narturally created path. This was Orc made.