AUTHOR'S NOTE One quick thing: please take a leap of faith with the vision thing! I just thought it'd be a cool idea…and I'm going to say again that this is movieverse, NOT bookverse!
DISCLAIMER Don't own anyone except who I do own…yeah.
A Big Thank You to all of you who review! I love you all!
Emeriel and Calíme did not stop congratulating me once. I'd introduced them to Gauna and Daelin and the five of us settled into our corner of the caves for the night.
Daelin had just fallen asleep when the rain began. I could hear it pounding against the rocks of the mountain. Calíme and Emeriel's ears pricked up and I knew they heard it too.
"What's going on?" Gauna asked. She had noticed the change in our faces.
"It's raining. That's – " I stopped short. Something was coming. Something so dark and perverse that it could only be pure evil.
Beside me, Emeriel shivered. I glanced at her and I could tell she felt them too. "Yrch," she whispered. Calíme looked at us, clearly frightened.
"Laa," I said. "Lá si ve te. Lá nánte yrch." We spoke in Elvish to protect Gauna and the other refugees from knowing what evil was outside our walls.
"Then what?" Calíme asked.
I remembered what Legolas had told me. And I knew what information Aragorn had brought. A low beating rolled through the stone, like the beating of a war drum. "They are Uruk-Hai."
Before Gauna could ask questions or anyone could react, a roar echoed through the rock walls. "What was that?" Gauna asked, clutching Daelin to her.
"That is the Uruk-Hai's battle cry," I explained quietly. "They are preparing to attack."
The horrible roaring got louder and louder and louder, grating our nerves to shreds. The human refugees could all hear it, but my two friends and I had much sharper hearing than the others. I could hear their foul, raspy breath as they chanted in the foul language of Mordor.
Suddenly, "They've stopped!" Emeriel whispered.
Gauna looked at us with wide eyes. "Why have they stopped?"
I didn't answer her right away. I just listened. Very, very faintly I heard Aragorn calling battle orders in Elvish.
Then I felt a rumbling in the ground. It was as if thousands of feet were pounding in a frantic run. And I knew. I looked at the three women around me. "They are attacking. It has begun."
**********
During the battle, we had nothing to do but wait. The clash and clatter of our warriors was heard only by Emeriel, Calíme, and me, but everyone was worried. I could feel it.
Gauna knew what was going on least out of any of us. Calíme had taken Daelin from her, after assuring her that Daelin was quite safe in the arms of an Elf.
"Rae," Gauna said raggedly. "Please tell me what is going on!"
I tried not to look at her. "I know nothing except that the fighting is fierce. I can hear it." She looked at me, obviously confused, as she could not hear it. "Elven thing," I mumbled, embarrassed.
She nodded absently, concentrating on trying to hear the battle. I glanced at Emeriel. She knew that I wasn't telling Gauna everything. She could feel, as I could, the pure evil of the Uruk-Hai. They, just as Orcs, were a twisted and corrupted form of Elves; all Elves could feel when they were near. It was like a shadow that crept over the heart.
I was wrenched out of my thoughts when the ground began to shake. "Rae?" Calíme asked.
"What's happening?" Gauna cried.
"I don't know!" 'Elbereth,' I thought, 'why do they always ask me?'
The rumbling intensified within seconds and ended in a huge explosion. Children wailed and women screamed as the very walls around us trembled. Showers of fractured rock rained down from the shockwaves of the bomb.
Gauna, Emeriel, Calíme, and I had huddled together, Daelin cradled in the middle. The child could sleep through anything! As the debris stopped falling, Gauna looked toward the gates in utter terror.
"They have breached the wall!" she whispered hysterically. I glanced around and saw that all of the Rohirrim knew. "They have entered Helms Deep!"
She was right. Uruk battle cries rang clearly through the fortress as the foul creatures poured through the outer wall. Even the humans could hear the battle now.
Everyone fell silent, listening. I sat still, attuning myself with the horrible events of outside when it hit me.
Something inside my head exploded and when I opened my eyes, they were no longer my own. I saw the Elves and Men clashing with the creatures. Rain clouded my vision as I was forced to watch the bloodshed.
The Uruk-Hai flooded through the hole caused by the explosion. Aragorn called to our army, "Nan barad!" Many of the Elves acknowledged this and began to retreat.
Then my ethereal eyes moved to Haldir battling. The vision would not let me look away as one of them approached him from behind. I tried to call out, but it was as though I was locked inside myself and could only watch.
The cold metal of its blade made its blow. Haldir's eyes opened wide as he felt the cold creep of the weapon. My friend fell. His blue eyes became lifeless.
Coming out of the hellish vision, I screamed and collapsed to the stone floor. My friends surrounded me and Daelin's distressed cries mixed with mine. I could not stand. I lay trembling violently, unable to speak. My voice came back for a moment, just long enough.
"Haldir is dead."
* Yrch = Orcs (Sindarin)
* Laa, lá si ve te. Lá nánte yrch. = No, this is not like them. They are not orcs. (Quenya except for the last word orcs)
* Nan barad! = To the Keep! (Sindarin) from The Two Towers
