Disclaimer: Do I have to say it?

A/N: Some of my ideas came form the Garth Nix trilogy: "Sabriel", "Lirael", and "Abhorsen". Thank you Garth Nix for your most creative mind! Sorry if I don't remember the movie quite as well, I haven't watched the Two Towers in a long time.

The Black Book

Chapter 8: The last charge

Illy began to grow longer and longer. Her pommel shaped itself to resemble a seven- pointed star, glowing with a red light. I looked at it, and saw a ruby pulsating along with my rapid heartbeat, stuck in the middle of the hilt. Illy's blade grew to look like licking tongues of flame, two tongues on each side, with one long, leaf-like one in the middle. Those odd marks still ran up the steel, never ceasing, making me dizzy as I tried to follow them with my eyes. However, as the steel molded itself, the signs moved faster and faster. I shook my head, and looked up.

The dead uruk was still smoldering, giving off the strong reek of death. The smoke wafted around me. I wrinkled my nose. Still no one moved. They just stared off into space, frozen in time. One uruk was running toward me, watching me with unseeing eyes. His foot was raised and his hands seemed to be swinging a scimitar too. I looked around, and saw Legolas holding his ears and watching the dead uruk underneath me, his bow wrapped around his shoulder. Aragorn too was holding his ears, but was looking at me. All the other creatures were looking at me, pinching their ears with strained looks, or watching the corpse sizzle. The rain kept coming down mercilessly. I wiped my hair from my eyes.

"This is odd." I said, seeming to myself that I was stating the obvious.

Illy was now turning a red color, and smoking. I just let her do her business; there was nothing I could do. Everything but me seemed to be frozen in time, but, how? Was it Illy? A thick sheen of mist was rising from the corpse slumped on the ground in front of me. I cleared my throat, and walked around the dead thing. I walked around a bit, and decided to look at the uruk that was running toward me. I approached the uruk with extra caution. I took a baby-step toward him, and waved my hands around, shouting gibberish and meaningless words at his face. I raised an eyebrow, and poked his cheek, but nothing happened. He still was looking straight ahead, still watching where I should be with those horrid yellow eyes.

I sighed.

"Well, what am I going to do now? I'm caught in time, in a way. I've never heard of anything like it." I scratched my head. I stood there for another moment, and then turned around. I saw that Illy had finished her metamorphosis. I waltzed over. I shook my head disbelievingly. Something caught my eye.

The markings that I saw before were changing right before my eyes! They were moving much slower now, and forming the Black Script!

"I am Ilfirindulin. Wielded by the Daughter of Darkness. The cursed made me." I read in the common tongue.

The writing flared, and then disappeared. Everything started up, a cacophony of harsh ringing scimitars and the clanging of swords, giving me a jolt of panic. I heard screams now, bursting my eardrums, and war cries shattering the cold air. I quickly grabbed the "new" Illy's pommel, and swung her around, bending into the protective stance. She crackled with excitement. I knew that ururk was coming straight for me. The uruk belted out a large bellow, and walloped my sword with a shattering blow. His scimitar cracked a little, somewhere near the top. The pain of the blow numbed my arms for a moment, and then I swung up and severed its head. He gave a skin-crawling cry. His head flew off his neck, and down into the valley beneath. Blood yet again spattered my body. I licked my lips and tasted the metallic tang of fresh blood. My how I missed it. Varanadon gave a great cry, and spewed fire onto the ground around the Deeping Wall. Screams issued from far below. I had forgotten all about Varandon. Battle just eats up all my thoughts.

Everything was complete chaos. There were people running this way, uruks running that way, everyone running into each other............ And me in the middle.

I heard Aragorn say something, and point toward the ground, motioning for Legolas to do something. Legolas fired a white tipped arrow, and then another. I turned my attention back to the battle, and whacked at another uruk. It grimaced, and stood through the pain, but I whacked at it again and it crumpled beneath me.

At that moment, I heard a deafening explosion in front of me smack the rain and air and everyone. I felt a rumble, and was flung to the ground. Something hard had walloped my stomach, making my gasp and flop on the stone. The wall had been destroyed. Debris and bodies had been catapulted into the air, sending a man hurtling through the air toward me and my stomach. I sat up, rolled the dead man off me, and gathered Illy back into my grasp. I stood, and looked at all the dead things. Blood washed on the stones like a small stream would. I will always see death, won't I? I wondered. I swiveled my head around, and saw a dishevled elf standing a few feet away from me. His bow hung limply in his grasp, raindrops falling off it at irregular intervals. The elf was sopping wet.

Legolas was looking down at the hole with a stricken face. I stalked over, lividness creeping into my red eyes. I whacked him on the head with the flat of Illy's balde. He whipped around and glared at me with his wounded blue eyes. "Damn elf!" I said, "Why did you blow up the wall?!"

"I didn't! I tried to stop that beast from destroying the wall and--"

"You didn't stop it, did you?" I interrupted.

No answer. Legolas hung his wet head.

"Well start helping Aragorn then!" I motioned toward a huge mass of uruks running at the broken wall. Elves were charging down a small hill, with Aragorn at their point. He was yelling to the Valar like he was going to die or something. Mud splashed everywhere, making the uruks look even browner and the elves even dirtier.

Legolas swung back around and hobbled down some stairs, drawing his long elf knives from his quiver. I charged ahead, and ran off across the bridge, toward the gaping hole. I hopped over bodies and charged through other ones that were inconveniently in my way, living or not. The rain, oh the rain. It just wouldn't stop! I stopped, and grabbed a helmet off a dead elf. I jammed it onto my head, and leapt away. I ran up to the chasm, and looked down. Aragorn was fighting with every ounce of himself, putting everything he had into his strikes. Gimli was right along with him. Theoden shouted something to them, and Aragorn shouted, "Back to the keep! To the keep!!" The Elves retreated, and were closely followed by Aragorn with a raving Gimli in tow. They scampered back up the paved drive and into the keep, or hall. I ran back the way I came, and took a right turn. I jumped down some steps, and into the keep. The front doors were blocked with rampaging uruks, so I went the back way like the elves just did. I heard another great roar from ahead. Varandon had climbed up the tower walls and snaked around. He was swishing his tail, and then he opened his jaws. His eyes burned a hot copper, and he let forth a huge blast of flames that knocked down the uruks chasing me and all the others around the hole. "Go Medri! Run!" He screamed. Another burst of flame issued from his mouth to encompass the rest of the wave of uruks.

The Rohorrim hustled me in, quickly barricading themselves in with random objects, also known as: chairs, candelabras, tables............ I jumped out of the way of Aragorn. He was pushing a table toward the oak doors. Legolas ran over and helped too. The table seemed heavy, by the look of man and elf straining over it. They huffed and puffed, but couldn't push the table over. "Oh move over." I said. I placed Illy on the floor.

They did, and I pushed the mahogany table over to the door with ease. The table's legs squeaked with the effort. "There, that wasn't so hard, now, was it?" I asked. They rolled their eyes, and started to move the rest of the chairs and other random objects again. Theoden was looking sulky. He said, "We are defeated." The distant banging of the uruks trying to get in was heard. A series of thumps and curses.

Aragorn dropped a chair, and walked over to him. "Your men still fight! You told me until all my men are dead, this Burg will not fall!" He looked over to a high window; sunlight gilded the sill.

Theoden shook his head. I watched them. Enemies at war with each other, how exciting! Aragorn said again, "Your men still fight." A light sparked into Theoden's eyes, "Yes," he said, "My men do fight! This Burg will not fall!" He raised a fist. "Gamling, gather the Rohorrim!" Gamling nodded enthusiastically. Gimli roared an approval, and ran up the stairs that wound up the Burg's tower. An excited grin spread across his face.

Horses were brought into the hall, their hoofs clipping the stone. Another bellow could be heard form outside. I hope he is ok......... The Rohorrim filed out. They jumped onto their horses. Four more horses were brought out, rider-less. The one brought out last was a ragged black one that was rearing and bucking. It had an evil temper. Fire blazed in its eyes. A brown one was brought over to Aragorn, and a white one for Legolas. These were the horses from before. The black stallion was handed to me. I took its bridle, and hopped onto its bare back, grabbing Illy first. It bucked and thrashed and reared and neighed, but I stayed on. It finally ran out of steam. It seemed to me it was a mutt. The other horses had gleaming coats, while my horse was a bit dusty and had a raggedy mane that flopped everywhere.

I patted its head. The last horse was white, and was lead over to Theoden. He said, "Snowmane, this may be our last battle, I hope you survive." The old, white horse whinnied, and nuzzled Theoden's hand. The man hopped up. The chairs and tables were pulled away from the door. A strong, low sound was heard from above our heads. The Burg Horn. The doors were brought back, and Theoden yelled, "Eorlingas!" And charged into the wave of uruks. The last charge of the Rohorrim slashed down the creatures invading their home. We galloped down the drive, hacking at the uruks trying to grab our legs and such. We reached the bottom of the drive, and stabbed away. I roared, and hacked my way through the things I lived with everyday. All the animosity I had toward the foul things was put into my swings.

As soon as I had brought Illy out of a dead uruk, a ray of sunlight crept over the hill. I looked up. More sunlight followed that, and more, until the whole valley was in eternal sunshine. I shielded my eyes, but continued to look up at that hill. The uruks bent down in the bright light, some screaming. The fighting had stopped. Aragorn pointed and exclaimed, "Gandalf! Gandalf has come!" Indeed, a white robed man was sitting atop a gleaming white horse, with a grizzled man beside him. More light poured in.

With a roar, Gandalf had charged down into the valley. Men on horses were rushing down the hill as well, following Gandalf's path. Gandalf raised his staff, and a pure, white light washed itself onto the foul creatures below. The uruks squatted down, and lowered their spears, scimitars being thrown to the ground. A murmur of fear rippled around the army. Gandalf and his horde of Rohorrim jumped over the spear points and collided with the uruk army. Most of the uruks had retreated toward a new forest that had formed............ over night? I watched the uruks run into the tall, ominous wood. The trees let out a bellow, and all I saw, was the shaking of trees. Scared yells and screams came from the forest's belly. The rest of the uruks lay dead on the ground, slaughtered by Gandalf's army.

The fight was over. I sighed, and wiped the back of my hand on my brow. I heard something behind me. Varanadon was being quite the showman. He was flying around the valley, happily spewing sparks from his jaws. The Men smiled, and then let out a happy holler, clapping and crying tears of joy. The fight was finally over.