Chapter 6

-o0o-

The sounds were growing louder, guiding Elrohir, drawing him. There could be no mistaking them now. It was the sound of an army. The sound of hundreds upon hundreds of men and orcs, talking, sparring, cooking, preparing. It was the sound of his and his brother's original mission drawing him into the belly of the Morgul Tower. It was the sound of their father's concerns given shape.

Could Estel be down here among the orcs and men of Mordor? What of the scream he had heard? It had not been repeated, had been drowned out instead by the snatches of fighting, of conversation, of laughter and song that had followed, that he could still hear - uttered in the Black Speech. He shuddered at the discordant tones, at the terrible disharmony of the guttural sounds, but still he continued on his path. If Estel was down here, he had to know. If he was not then he would at least find answers to their original mission. This was what they had come here for after all; To gauge the size of the army at the Nazgûls' command, the strength they would be able to bring to bear against Gondor in no more than a few days' notice. As his and his brothers' recent travels had brought home once more: it was a short distance from Minas Morgul to Minas Tirith- unless you went by route of Umbar.

The path was still gently sloping downwards, occasionally broken by stairs that led steeply farther down and there was no mistaking that he was moving towards the lower levels of the tower, the lower levels of the entire city, probably carved into the very rock of the Ephel Duath.

He suppressed a shudder, trying to ignore the feeling of tons of rock towering above him, or the call of the dark deep that tried to ensnare his spirit and siphon his strength. He would need his power, would need all his concentration for what was waiting for him at the end of this passage.

At long last he reached it: an opening at the end of the tunnel, a steep, broad staircase that suddenly dropped down for sixty feet, leading into a vast cavern. Partly natural and partly crudely carved from the rock it seemed, illuminated by the flickering dancing flames of a dozen fire pits that threw twisted, dangerous shadows at the distant walls. It must have been many hundred feet across - and it was crawling with orcs. Orcs and dark skinned men come up from the South, their wrists and faces heavily decorated with golden jewelry, their red and black clothes bearing the embroidered likeness of the lidless eye. Sauron's thralls from the south come to join his armies, to do his bidding and prove their loyalty.

The men held themselves apart from the orcs, but they did not seem unwilling to be here. Many were sharpening weapons; glistening spears and long, straight swords of gleaming, white steel that reflected the twisted yellow and red of the underground fires.

The smoke was drifting up the stairs and into Elrohir's eyes, making them water. He was uncomfortably aware of how long he had been standing there, gazing down in dismay at the sheer size of the forces of Minas Morgul. This was worse than he and Elladan had feared, worse than what their father had expected. This force could annihilate the guard left in Osgiliath with ease, could lay waste to the fields of the Pelennor once they crossed the river. Already, Gondor would be hard pressed to answer a sudden onslaught of a force this large.

He tore himself from his musings and belatedly moved, diving off to the side of the passageway, pressing his back against the edge of the corridor right beside the steep stairs, still gazing down at the cavern below. There was more yet to be seen.

At one corner he spotted more light, not the open flames of the fire pits but a much brighter, more controlled glow - forges. The men of the South seemed to stay clear of the area that was bound to radiate unbearable heat but orcs were constantly moving to and fro, milling around the forges, opening hatches, releasing molten, glowing metal. They were making new weapons, Elrohir realized. A steady supply, enough for all the men assembled here and the troops they had spotted in the valley outside. There could be no doubt, Sauron was gearing for war and it was very close. Much closer than he had thought possible. No wonder their father had asked them to come, to report on the true danger to Middle Earth. If he had even an inkling of the vast strength of Mordor his councils must have been dark of late.

Elrohir took a shallow breath, trying not to inhale too deeply of the smoke-enthused air. His mind was running feverishly. What to do next? He caught no glimpse of his human brother, of anyone but Sauron's men or orcs at the bottom of the cavern. Should he turn back? Try to find his brothers near to the place where he and Estel had been attacked, where the mirror had so suddenly split them from Elladan?

Now that it came to it, he doubted that he would be able to find his way back there. The corridors had been twisting, bewildering, and filled with a dark enchantment meant to confuse. Even trying to recall the latter part of the path he had taken to get down here was hard, his memories uncharacteristically blurred - and the flight from the orcs before that, his mad dash through the corridors while trying to keep the vile beasts at bay to find a place to turn around and make a stand were worse still. He recalled nothing but the pervading green glow of empty, haunted corridors and the grasping, vile hands behind him.

A sudden noise caught his attention, excitement from the orcs beneath, a barely controlled thrum of slathering whispers, of garish chants and laughter. Something was happening. Turning back he noticed a path had opened among the orcs. They stood back to allow a large chieftain passage and he escorted a prisoner.

Elrohir's blood ran cold as he recognized the dark gray and black of the soldiers of Gondor - of Estel's captain uniform.

-o0o-

The pain in his side was hot, thrumming with the dark power of the Nazgûl who had inflicted the wound there. It was close.

A sudden sound came from above and Elladan stopped, listened, pressing himself against the wall, into a small, windowless alcove at the outer wall of the winding staircase. The small corners, meant perhaps to provide a resting place on the way up the long, wearying staircase, had already thrice shielded him from unfriendly eyes - and there were enough of those in this tower.

Now, steps were leisurely making their way down the stairs. Another patrol, this one one of dark men with grim faces. They wore their beards in the fashion of Umbar but their skin was too fair, a mix - at most - of the men that made up the bulk of the corsairs and of another race of men - one much older, one who had forsaken a doomed island to follow a dark religion, a worship of Sauron - the Black Numenoreans.

The cut of their clothes, the embroidery that stood out in glistening metal thread on their otherwise black clothing left no doubt. And there was a dark hint of power behind their gazes, a wild light in their eyes that few of the secondborn could nowadays lay claim to. Only those of high birth in Gondor - or the rangers of the North; men and women that could trace their heritage back to the kings and queens of Arnor, and of Westernesse.

Elladan held his breath as the men strode by, deep in conversation and oblivious as to his presence. Whatever the sudden appearance of the mirror that had sundered him from his brothers had caused on the lower levels, it had left these upper parts of the tower undisturbed. There was no sense of urgency, no fear of infiltration in any of the patrols, any of the men, he had come across.

This was the fourth time that he had to evade a patrol, but it seemed a normal rotation, and, interestingly, all of them had been composed of men. There was no sign of the orcs that had patrolled the valley outside the city, that had camped in big groups out on the plains beyond the fields of poison flowers. He was not quite sure what to make of it, it could be as simple as a natural distaste of the men stationed here for the lowly, gruesome beasts that made up most of their dark lord's army.

In either case, the number of dark men, both from Umbar and from surrounding Harad was disconcerting. The fact that they went about their business in this tower, beneath the overpowering cloud of evil, without a care, without hesitation, spoke to the state of their soul. These men were lost already, their allegiance given to the dark powers of Mordor, to the undead captains of Sauron's army: the ringwraiths.

He waited for a few seconds longer until the echoes of the mens' footsteps had faded, before peeling out of the shadowed alcove and continuing his way back up the stairs. The thrum in his side grew stronger and Elladan clenched his teeth against the burning pain, against the urge to give voice to his discomfort. Sweat stood on his brow, but he would not be deterred.

Something more than just the presence of the Nazgûl drew him, something more than just their mission of scouting out the strength of Minas Morgul or even Aragorn's plan to capture or destroy the Ithil palantir. It was a call, a whisper, an instinct.

He recognized the feeling from his visions and understood the meaning intrinsically, a feeling that had guided him often during the last millenia. The innate feeling of his brother in danger. Or one of his brothers, he amended.

Beyond the pain in his side and beneath the cloud of the Nazgûl's evil it was hard to be sure, hard to get a true feel for Elrohir through the bond that connected them. It was there still - a light in the green-lit darkness, but a dim one, faint. Too faint for Elrohir to be close by.

Elladan was certain of that, even if he could not truly explain how he knew, how he could so effortlessly interpret the random feelings, the shadows of sensations, that guided him. No, Elrohir was not at the top of the tower - but Aragorn must be. He clasped the Ring of Barahir in his pocket tightly. It was a call, a summons, a plea for help - and Elladan would answer it.

His own steps, barely audible on the smooth even stone of the staircase took him unerringly closer to the very top of the tower, to where his littlest brother would be waiting.

A new sound drifted down from above, not the harsh sound of hurried footsteps, but the languid, bored sound of ambient discussions. Elladan slowed. He was a whisper of movement, a fleeting shadow as he crossed along the last landing, rounded the last half bend of the staircase and reached its end. No sound did he make that could give him away and undetected he reached the final threshold.

Here the ground evened out, then stretched behind an arched passageway into a simple chamber. Elladan pressed up against the wall, blending into the shadows as he gazed into the room. It was richly decorated, with plush couches draped in red upholstery that were situated around a fireplace blazening with a roaring fire. A few men stood along the right wall, almost hidden from his current position. Elladan strained to see; They were men in uniform, leaning on spears not unlike the ones the patrols he had encountered had been carrying. But the guards could not hold his attention. Unerringly his gaze was drawn back, back to the … things on the couches.

The Nazgûl. Dark cloaks with deep hoods that revealed nothing but a bleak, haunting emptiness above their shoulders. The undead. The ringwraiths.

He had found them.

As if on cue a wave of fear seemed to wash over him like a physical thing. He felt cold. He felt unbearably hot. The wound in his side was screaming. This was the end!

Elladan pressed himself harder against the wall, wishing the stone would swallow him, wishing for the cold touch of the rock to slow his racing heart and his gasping breath. Any sound, any movement might alert the guards and might be his undoing. Sweat stood on his brow as he battled the fear, the terror that spread from the room, flooding the hall, an irresistible wave of condensed evil.

He closed his eyes and a silent plea fell from his lips, soundless but desperate. 'A Elbereth Gilthoniel'. He held on to the prayer, focused his thoughts on the light of sun and stars, a brightness even Mordor could not quench. Minutes passed, but gradually his breathing slowed and his heartbeat quietened. His mental shields were holding. It took all of his concentration and a great deal of his energy, but he fortified his thoughts against the Nazgûl's sorcery, protected his fëa and steeled his mind.

The Ring of Barahir was pleasantly cold in his closed fist. He had come here for Aragorn, he would not turn back. Elladan forced a deep breath past his tightly wound muscles into his ailing lungs, then another, forcing himself to be patient, to relax, to let the wave of terror of the ringwraiths wash over him and dissipate. He would be a rock in the bay, weathering wave upon wave of fear, attack upon mental attack, and he would withstand it all.

He had always prided himself on his ability to focus, to remain calm at the edge of battle. This was no different. The Nazgûl were testing his defenses but they would hold.

As the fog of terror faded, sound reached his ears once more. Dreadful words formed of otherworldly notes, a vile hiss, a breath, a pause. The Black Speech was a terror in its own right to his elven ears, but the speakers were not of this world. Their voices were hatred given sound. And they spoke of Sauron, of a creature in the pass of Cirith Ungol that stank of their master's power - and then they spoke of his brothers.

Rational thought stopped. There was no mistaking the words, their meaning. A half-elven invader being pursued, his mortal companion in chains. Elrohir. Aragorn!

A whole new fear grabbed his heart, this one not conjured by the ringwraiths in the room but of his own making, his personal destiny to bear ever since he had been born a few minutes earlier than his twin. Born as an older brother, a protector. The drive had only increased when Aragorn had joined them. Thousands of years of fighting and seeking danger with Elrohir at his side had not changed his disposition - a mere 50 years with Aragorn certainly had not.

He needed to do something. He needed to set Aragorn free.

But before he could formulate a plan, before he had fully grasped the situation at hand, a door opened. A wave of evil flooded the room, so strong the very lights in the fireplace seemed to dim, the flames burning without warmth, without sound. Then the sensation passed, and in the doorframe stood a fourth Nazgûl. Tall, taller even than the other three in the room, his hood was adorned with a decorated, ghastly crown, its metal a tarnished silver - and oh so familiar.

Memories of a time long past, of a siege broken, a battle won and a deep, dreadful despair that had claimed him whole for days afterwards. And though the Black Breath had been lifted, though he had awoken from his unnatural sleep to sunshine and birdsong and to Elrohir by his side, he might never forget the terrors of that time. The things he had seen, the things he had believed, had known to be true. He had thought his twin forever lost, fallen on the field of battle without ever making a choice - forced to eternally remain between worlds, between existences. In his despair Elladan had wanted nothing more than to follow him. But those dreams had been a lie, those fears had proven false - and yet, even now, a lifetime and a thousand leagues away, they were hard to shake.

Elladan forced another breath, clearing the old memory, the remembered terrors, from his mind, just as the witchking spoke: "He resists, but his mind will break soon. Khamûl, your presence might prove useful."

There was a whisper of sound, a cold breeze, a sudden terrible sense of terror, and the pain in his side flared. He gasped, clutched at the healed, scarred skin, in his mind seeing rivulets of blood stream down his side. But there was nothing. His hand remained dry, his shirt unstained. An agonizing minute passed, an eternity of pain. Then it was over, leaving Elladan weak, his legs buckling despite his best efforts to remain upright. And it was not just the strain of the injury, the toll of the otherworldly pain - he knew what the sensation had been, knew what it meant.

The Nazgûl that had tracked Elrohir, that had attacked them at the shores of the Harnen and had stabbed him with a Morgul blade. It was here. Uncloaked, invisible, wielding terror and despair with an even mightier potency* - and now it was going after Estel!

Elladan looked up from where he had dropped to one knee, forcing his body to listen to his commands, forcing his mind back into control. His littlest brother needed him! If he had to take on a room full of Nazgûl to free him, so be it!

-o0o-

Elrohir took the stairs two at a time, his sword drawn, blood rushing in his ears. Below all eyes were fixed on the center of the room, to a place where a raised platform formed a kind of podium - or a stage. Its purpose, certainly, was sport. The distraction helped, for he was running, dashing, down the stairs without a care for the sound of his hurried steps, or who might see if they turned at an inopportune moment. Only getting down there mattered.

Even still, he realized with cold dread, he would be too late. As the orc chieftain tied the struggling prisoner to a rough pole, Elrohir was only halfway down the wide stair. The man's dark, curly-haired head was moving weakly from side to side as he fought against his bounds, fought to escape, but it was all for nothing. Despite the prisoner's weak struggles, despite Elrohir's desperate last burst of speed, neither could prevent the orc's terrible mace from rising and then falling.

One stroke with the large heavy weapon and it was all over. No more struggle, no more need to run. Elrohir halted in his steps, his knees almost buckling under the strain and the realization of what had just happened. "No!" his scream was less than a choked out sob. Too terrible was the anguish as to put voice to it, too winded was he from the hasty flight down the stairs, from his desperate attempt to prevent this, to save Estel.

But it could not have been Estel, a tiny, stubborn part of his mind was insisting. It could not have been. Through all the struggles of the prisoner, all the manhandling by the large orc, he had never gotten a true look at the man's face, but surely, surely, he would have recognized his baby brother without a doubt - even at this distance and through a curtain of stinging smoke. He would have had. He must have had. Surely?

His eyes were burning with more than just the smoke of the fires below, but Elrohir ignored the sting as he fought back to his feet. He was clinging fiercely to the doubt, to the possibility that Estel was yet alive - but he needed to know.

Calmer now, slower, he descended the steps further. The orcs were still well and truly occupied, their spectacle turned into sport as they fought over the body of their prisoner, tearing it to shreds in their attempts to claim it for themselves. Elrohir wanted to be sick, but he would need to find time for that later. Right now he had to focus on getting down there unseen, on making sure of what he had seen, what had happened. He had seen worse atrocities committed by the orcs, and though it never got any easier, as long as he could cling to the belief, to the hope that that man had not been Estel, he could compartmentalize. Lock his feelings beyond an iron wall in the back of his mind and focus on the task at hand. One day he would bring death to all of these creatures, would stand, Elladan beside him, at the Black Gate of Mordor itself to challenge them, but that time was not now.

So he forced himself to stay silent as he watched the carnage, forced himself not to react as he looked closer, studied the severed head, the torn off limbs. As he came closer, ever lower towards the level of the orcs he was increasingly certain. It had not been Estel. The relief was as fierce as it was brief. One prayer answered by the Valar, but still he was lost deep within the roots of Minas Morgul, surrounded by an army of orcs - and a man had just lost his life. A man from Gondor. There could be no mistaking the uniform, the faded emblem of the white tree embroidered with light gray upon a muted black.

And he had not been the first sacrifice. With a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach Elrohir acknowledged this horrid truth. Not all of the blood, not all of the limbs now strewn about the pedestal, or fought over by raging orcs came from this one man. He swallowed against the bile that was threatening to rise, clinging to his erected barriers, to the wall that sealed his feelings. He grabbed his sword harder.

He remembered the scream he had heard before, the one that had pulled him in this direction in the first place. The last sound of a dying man. The orcs were butchering their prisoners for sport, for petty entertainment. The thought stoked the flames of rage, of age-old hatred that was never far, always waiting to be unleashed and he embraced it. Once more the tower seemed to give it power - a power that Elrohir could use, that he needed. Hatred pushed through his feelings of dread and helplessness and enveloped him entirely in its welcome embrace. It whispered of revenge, of destruction, of recklessness - and Elrohir listened.

There were more prisoners here, men that he could help - and there were orcs that would pay.

When he reached the bottom of the wide staircase, hugging the wall, moving like a shadow amongst the many that danced over the dark rough stone, he caught movement. Rough laughter and the unmistakable sound of fighting, a brawl between orcs, but not close to the stage where the foul beasts were still fighting over the ghastly remains of their prisoner. No, right ahead. And Elrohir thought that there, somewhere amid the grunts, the snatches of black speech and the sound of flesh meeting flesh, he could hear shouts in a fairer tongue. The language of Gondor, shaped into desperate cries for help, into pleas for mercy from creatures that did not understand the meaning of the word.

The orcs only laughed.

The sounds, Elrohir could now see, came from a tunnel up ahead. A dark gaping maw in the rock wall that must lead to dungeons or cells beyond. He raised his sword and drew nearer, silent as a wraith. Let the orcs laugh. He would put an end to their merriment.

Gazing around, he confirmed that he remained mercifully undetected. Apart from the orcs already inside the tunnel, no one seemed to pay this area of the cavern great interest. Perhaps no further sacrifice was scheduled for the immediate future, perhaps the sport still proved exciting enough back at the raised central stage.

Elrohir's features twisted in distaste, and he hardened his resolve. He allowed himself a last deep breath as he reached the edge of the tunnel opening, pressing against the wall, readying his sword and offering a last prayer to the Valar. This gamble was risky, any undue noise, any commotion, any escaped orc could set the entire cavern, the entire army of Minas Morgul at his heels.

Something dark and not altogether alien to him, whispered that it did not matter, that the more of the foul beasts he could free from their miserable existence the better, but he tried to listen to his more sensible parts. Tried to conjure one of the stern lectures Glorfindel was so fond of, the ones that made him feel like a wayward elfling and that doused the flames of his hatred like a bucket of cold water. He had little success.

With a final thought for his brothers he turned the corner and faced the orcs that waited beyond.

-o0o-

tbc...

A/N: another post right on time - I'm on a roll :D The plot thickens, the dangers take shape, recklessness abounds - nothing good will come of this I fear ('muhaha' cue the evil laughter). All fun and games aside though - thank you for your continued interest in this story, thank you for reading and special thanks to each and everyone of you that left a review, including the guests that I cannot answer directly - you give me the motivation to keep writing and editing. Thank you!

* their chief weapon was terror. This was actually greater when they were unclad and invisible; and it was greater also when they were gathered together."
Unfinished Tales, Part 3, Ch 4, The Hunt for the Ring: Other Versions of the Story