And then Steelsheen died from lack of computer access over vacation. X.X

I will end your torture now. Muahahaha. I love my cliffies.

Thankee muchly Speechless, Miw-Sher, Melime, DiamondTook, Red Mage and Queen Isis, me buckos! Y'all reign! Keep on reviewin'! Savvy...

Queen Isis, I think I already have... ^_^ and yes, cliffies rawk my world

Speechless, thank you and yes he can, he just did, and your one-chapter thingie with the girl who likes Faramir ROCKS and it's really sad and I reviewed it and this is a run-on sentence

DiamondTook, Sam's thing was kind of where i got my idea from, and I love Pippin too :D

This one, unfortunately, will be slightly less of a cliffie *pouts* *ignores all the relieved looks*

Disclaimer: We don't owns it, preciousss, the world, no we don'ts, Misster Tolkien does, but we wants it!

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Chapter 5: And Back Again

Saali moaned. Her head felt like it had recently been used in place of one of the great festival drums. She could see nothing clearly, colors swirled where they oughtn't to be. Her face and hair were soaked, with sweat or water, she didn't know which.

A hand dabbed at her cheek with a wet cloth. A few drops of water hit her paper-dry tongue; she gulped them greedily. Suddenly, she lashed out a hand and seized the canteen from the hand that held it and dumped its contents down her throat, swallowing desperately and not minding that the water spilled out over the sides of her mouth.

When she finished, she lay gasping for breath for a long, long time. She heard voices, though she didn't understand what they said. She frowned as the swirling colors began to come together into their proper places.

Finally, the vision came into focus. Kentai and Sir - she must be imagining Sir. "Tai?" she choked weakly.

"Saali!" Tai exlaimed breathlessly. "You - you are alive!"

"Am I really?" she wondered aloud.

"Saali. So that is her name," the hallucination of Sir rasped. Why was her hallucination calling her "her"? "She is a widow, then?" it added.

"Yes," Kentai admitted awkwardly. "Saali - Saali, I am sorry, I lost my head -"

Why was Tai RESPONDING to her hallucination? "What - what is going on?" she moaned. Then realization dawned as her head cleared further, the images sharpened, and she came to her senses with the jolt of a slap in the face. Her eyes became huge. "Sir," she breathed.

She was not wearing her helmet. She grabbed it where it lay and clutched it to her. A few involuntary curses slipped from her lips. "I - I - KENTAI, YOU TOLD, YOU LYING -"

"I am sorry! You were dying, Saali; you did not have anything to drink for too long!"

"It happens often, in an army as undersupplied as this," Sir murmured as he rubbed his temples. He looked - confused? Tired? Not angry. It was strange.

Saali got control of herself. Sir looked sharply up at her, and she cringed. "Please. Please, have mercy, I did not hurt anyone. I only wished," she squeaked, "I only wished..." She trailed off under Sir's scrutinous gaze.

They sat there in silence for what must have been at least ten years, by Saali's capable calculations. Finally, Sir spoke.

"Your name is Saali, then."

"Tasaali, daughter of Eishali, sir." The one so named stared at her booted feet. At least he was speaking to her.

"I see." Sir's brows furrowed. "You are a widow."

"My husband was killed in -"

"I do not care," he snapped. "I care that according to Fate's law you have cursed every man here. What have you to say for yourself?" he asked, a bit more quietly.

"Sir, if I may, sir," Tai interrupted, then barged on without waiting for a response. "I have shared a tent with her for at least a week or so now, and I am quite alive, as you can most likely see, sir."

"That would have been more effective," Sir scolded, "without the sass mixed in."

"Yessir," Tai said sarcastically. "But, sir, do you see what I am trying to say, sir?"

Sir answered by not answering. Saali shot Tai a grateful look.

At long last, he broke the silence again (Kentai had been trying to break it for a while with clearings of the throat and fake sneezes). "I am not quite sure what to do in this situation, as it has never happened before. I do not believe there are rules regarding anything of the sort." Saali could tell he was not the type used to not knowing what to do. "But you certainly cannot continue to share a tent with this man. It is shameful."

Tai and Saali blushed in unison. Sir cleared his throat and drew himself up, attempting to regain his look of authority. "We turn back, and go to the Palace, and consult the King," he announced. "We may perhaps discuss the making of a law for use in such situations, and he will determine your penalty. It is the only way."

Saali gave a pathetic little squeak. So much for mercy.
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Thud, thud, thud went the feet of the mumak beneath her. She wished fervently that she at least had a window to look out, for the rocking of the huge beast's back was nearly making her sick.

Sir had decided to place her in this small storage room beneath the war-tower on the mumak's back for the return voyage to the city. She supposed he thought she could not curse anyone even further from up here. Her bedroll was squeezed in amongst extra swords, bows, quivers, and spears, empty canteens, tents, and uniforms. She was constantly afraid that one of the spears would tip over onto her head.

Suddenly, the rocking stopped, and Saali lurched forward, slamming into a box of mail-coats. "Ouch," she said plaintively. This was surely the most miserable place to be spending her last few days. For she was more than certain of her penalty.

Someone knocked on the door. "Go away!" Saali snapped without getting up from her awkward position on the floor.

With that, the door slammed open, and Kentai and Emreni pulled themselves up and collapsed onto the floor. "We were NOT about to keep hanging on that flimsy piece-of-dung rope ladder," Tai shrugged in response to Saali's dirty look. Reni sighed loudly and shook his head, suggesting that he had perhaps made the ladder.

Saali rearranged herself into an upright position. "So..."

"We really stepped in it this time," Tai announced cheerfully.

"WE?" Saali snarled.

Kentai ignored her. "You should see it down there, Saali. It is absolute madness. The men have not the faintest why we are turning back - there are rumors all over the place. Lots of people are saying the war is over and we can all go home."

WISHFUL THINKING was written hugely on Reni's trusty pad of paper.

"So - Sir did not tell them?" At least there wouldn't be stones thrown at her "bedroom" at night.

"Well, apparently not," Tai grinned. "And I for one shall let them talk. It is quite amusing, really."

"Go on and laugh," Saali muttered bitterly. "You are not going to your death."

"...Neither are you." Tai looked truly confused.

"He is letting the KING decide my penalty! Do you think the King cares for my life? It is the same, most likely, as the penalty for widows found involved in a romance!"

"Well," Tai pointed out, "you are not involved in a romance."

"I suppose," Saali mumbled. She rather regretted that fact. Tai was rather handsome. She could have slapped herself for thinking that. Perhaps, when one was about to be killed, one usually went insane. Or perhaps not. Perhaps she was one of the unusual cases.

Reni covered his mouth to hide his laughter, which didn't quite work, as his shoulders were shaking. Saali glared.

"Well, anyhow, we brought you food," Tai told her, and he and Reni produced bags of flat bread and overspiced meat.

"Thank you," she mumbled, and bit into a piece of meat that did not taste like meat. Then, suddenly, she thought of something. "Reni. You... you are up here... the mumaks... who is handling them?" she said slowly.

Reni shrugged, as if to say, 'What? They are tired. They are not going anywhere.'

He was wrong.
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An unsuspecting soldier, tired and confused after a long day's backward marching, began to pitch his tent a bit too close to the mumaks. Before he did so, he threw his spear aside, with a long sweeping motion identical to the "charge" signal Reni used with his mumaks.
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"Well, I for one am going to sleep. Try not to think about impending doom, all right, Saali?"

Saali's snippy reply was cut off violently, as the entire room jolted backwards, until the floor was completely vertical. With a shriek, she thudded onto the back wall, followed by Reni. They crossed their arms over their faces helplessly as canteens and boxes of supplies hit them. Kentai had grabbed the door frame, and was now dangling by his fingertips, cursing. The pile of spears leaning on the front wall began to tip over with a groan. Saali screamed.

As suddenly as the room had tipped, it returned to its normal position. Saali and Reni were thrown to the floor, Kentai swung off the door frame and slammed into the wall. Roaring curses, he threw himself against the teetering spears as the room began to jerk and roll and jolt up and down, as if an earthquake had hit. The spearheads glinted dangerously.

"HOLD ON, TAI!" Somehow, Saali jumped to her feet. She cringed as a canteen smacked the back of her head. Reni caught a flying arrow that had escaped from its quiver, then swatted aside a bag of tent stakes.

"I - oh, help - LOOK OUT!" Two spears had slipped from Kentai's fingertips. Saali drew her sword and slashed at them, managing to cut one in half. The half with the head attached nearly impaled Reni, but he threw himself aside just in time, and it impaled a tent instead. The other spear hit the wall and stuck there. Saali was knocked to her knees by a heavy box of something, nearly putting her eyes out with her own sword. Cursing, she jumped up again, noticing that Reni was biting his lip so hard to keep from speaking that it bled.

Kentai, in the meantime, was straining every muscle he had to keep the spears from falling. He tried to ignore the rain of objects that pelted his back. "Reni, I swear, I will PERSONALLY SLAUGHTER you when - ouch!"

Saali was suddenly jolted from her balance and hit the door, which swung open. She let out a horrible shriek and clung to the frame, barely keeping a grip on the floor with her booted toes. She was slipping - she looked down and saw the sand zooming past, far beneath her, the mumak's powerful legs pumping...

Suddenly, the legs dug forcefully into the sand, and the room STOPPED. Saali gave a bloodcurdling screech as she swung around to hit the outside wall of the war-tower, clinging to one side of the door frame with one hand and to the floor inside with one set of toes. Just as she lost her grip completely, Tai stuck an arm out, grabbed her round the waist, and pulled her back inside, before collapsing dizzily on top of Emreni, who lay sprawled out with his back against the front wall.

They lay there, panting, for a long, long time. Unaware of human feelings, the precarious pile of spears teetered one last time, then toppled over, blades piercing the floor with a series of chopping sounds. One landed not two inches from Saali's nose.

Awakened from her condition of shock, she jumped away from the two men, slapping Kentai's arm off her. She looked around. The room was total chaos, everything strewn randomly over the floor. It would take work, she realized, to unearth her bedroll.

"RENI. YOU INCOMPETENT -"

"What stopped him?" Saali interrupted Kentai before he killed the mumak-man.

"Well, why do you not look out and see?" Kentai growled, glaring furiously at Reni, who avoided his eyes, completely ashamed. He touched his bleeding lip, only just now realizing its condition.

Saali stuck her head out of the door, gulping down the nauseous lump in her throat and ignoring her shaking knees. Her eyes widened as she took in the scene around the mumak.
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Well, I did say SLIGHTLY less of a cliffie. :D