AN: Thanks for the lovely feedback! Here is another chapter. Hope you like it. Remember, Takahashi owns Yugioh, Tolkein owns LOTR, I own nothing, you certainly don't sue.
Little Yugi was very uncomfortable. Sure, there was little he needed to worry about, but the thought of riding into battle on a great horse with swords and spears hardly appealed to his pacifist mind frame. He watched from his soul room as his darker half harnessed the horse with fluent motions, and finally he asked with a pout, "Since when are you so familiar with the art of handling horses, Yami?"
The spirit answered with easily, "My people had horses, remember?"
"But you had chariots," The little boy complained, his mind uneasy. "That's different from actually riding a horse."
The spirit laughed and said, "Trust me, aibou, it is much more difficult riding on a chariot." A slight pause, before the spirit said, "You seem uneasy, Yugi."
"Of course I am." The little boy said nervously. "We are supposedly riding into a war! Doesn't that unnerve you somewhat, Yami?"
With a sigh the spirit replied, "That hardly appeal to me too, aibou. But we have little choice. Do not worry yourself now. I would let nothing harm you." The little boy nodded and said no more.
Just then the trumpet sounded, answered by many shouts and neighing of horses. The child leaped onto the great stallion, took the long spear that stood in the ground a moment ago, and rode away, following the last host of Rohan.
By midnight they had reached the great keep of Hornburg, a fortress carved between cliffs and caverns. Their fortune was ill, for a great host of Saruman was behind them, slaughtering and burning as they came. The host of Rohan quickly went into the great fortress and arrayed their forces, ready to make a stand there.
The child climbed up the deepening wall, and found himself quite alone and ignored by whatever presence on the wall. He looked down, and saw he was just tall enough to see over the tall parapet. The assailing host was gathering. Black shapes could be seen swarming beneath the wall, pouring over the Dike and through the breach. The faint torchlight glinted on their high helms and sable shields.
"I guess that's a fairly good defence." Little Yugi said to his darker half down their mind link, trying to see the best out of the situation.
Silently the spirit shook his head. Arrows began to fly. Finally the spirit murmured out loud, "It seems a little foolish to rely on a defence alone."
"Do not speak of things you know little of, child." Suddenly a sharp voice spoke, and up stepped Eomer wearing a stern expression. "What would you have, with a thousand men against a host of ten thousands?"
"Nothing that you would try." Replied the child airily. "But that matters little right now. See! Here come arrows even as we speak."
A few dark arrows flew past them, too near for comfort. But the child seemed unperturbed as he drew a deck of cards, casually shuffled it. He then took the first card and looked at it with a ghost of a smile, before returning the cards to his pocket.
Sound of whistling wind and rising cries reached their ears. Eomer said with furrowed brow, "Leave the wall, child, and go into the caves. It is safer there."
"Of course." The child said nonchalantly, before turning and left.
Just as he disappeared down the flight of stairs leading towards the depth of the fortress, Eomer saw another swarm of black arrows headed his way, thick as locusts. He quickly stepped away, out of the thickets of arrows. But there was hardly the need. For suddenly before him there was a brilliant white flash, and the arrows, as if rebounding off some invisible barrier, turned in middle air and went hurling towards the assailing host. Shocked and angry cries went up from beneath the wall as more and more arrows went flying towards the very ones who shot them. Encouraged by the awesome display, there came an answer from the wall: storms of arrows and hails of stones.
Eomer watched with awe, feeling grimly satisfied. Just then Aragorn came and stood beside him. "Our little friend has pulled another card from his sleeve." The ranger said quietly, and there was a slight amusement in his voice.
"And surely we will not be slighted in comparison by his tricks?" Eomer asked.
"Then draw your sword," Aragorn said, his voice falling back into its full gravity, "And we shall fight together. The enemy is upon the gate even as we speak."
Two swords flashed from the sheaths as one, a slither of silver in the mass of black. Together the two warriors sped down the Deepening wall. The battle for Helm's Deep had begun.
The child went down the walls and past the inner court, finally reaching the caves of the Deep. There many people were gathered, mostly women, young children, and aged men. They looked up when he entered, some alarmed, others pitiful.
"Come, child, come and sit here with us." A pleasant middle-aged woman said, shifting slightly to make room for him. With a nod of thanks the child took seat beside the woman and her children.
"Here, have a bite to eat." The woman said passing a piece of bread to him, before saying, "Tell us your name, child."
After a second of hesitation the child said, "My name is Yugi."
"Strange name you have. Are you from outside of Rohan? And how come you are here then?" An old man asked.
"I was a companion of the wizard Gandalf, and I came riding with the King's host." The child answered, and a wry smile surfaced as he added. "But now they found me too young and inexperienced to be defending the wall and sent me here."
"You know the wizard?" A small boy of six or seven piped, his little face seemed eager. "Can he really do magic like they say?"
With a smile the child answered, "I believe he indeed can."
"They say you can do magic too!" This was an older boy, maybe ten. "My brother was with Lord Eomer's men, and he told me he saw you with a great dragon!"
This time the child hesitated even longer before replying, but finally he said with a faint smile, "Yes, I can do a little bit of magic. Of course nothing so grandiose."
"Show us, show us!" The children chanted together, all excited and eager for the sudden colourful break in the bleak, fearful wait in the dark caves.
For a long time there was a dangerous glint in the child's ruby eyes. But slowly the red in his eyes cleared to a light violet, and then the child grinned and said, "Of course."
He took out his deck of cards and shuffled it casually, before extending it to one of the older boys. "Draw a card, and do not let me see it." He said in a serious voice, but his violet red eyes were laughing.
The boy carefully drew a card and held it near him. The other children craned their necks and looked, excitedly chatting and giggling. "You remember what the card looks like?" Yugi asked mysteriously. Opposite of him, the boy nodded with a lopsided grin.
"Put the card on top of the deck." Yugi instructed, and the boy followed obediently. "Now I have never seen the card, right?" Little Yugi said with a big smile, and he was again shuffling the cards. Finally when he stopped shuffling the deck, he drew a card from the deck and held it in front of the children.
"I think that's the one?"
All about him the children exploded into laughing praises. Even the adults smiled and laughed. Even though it was but a small trick that fooled only the children, at least it was a good cure for the gloom. Now the children cried together, "Another one, another one!" Their cheerful chant echoed in the dark cave, rebounding off the rocks and water.
But Yugi shook his head and said good naturedly with a smile, "You will learn all my tricks if I perform another one! How about you do something? Like telling me a story."
The children looked at each other, finally the older boy said, "I will tell you the Legend of the Shadow King."
About him the other children gasped, and a little girl said shrilly, "How do you know the story of the Shadow King? Papa would never tell me that story."
"I won a game against Gamod, the old shoemaker, and as a reward, he told me the story." The boy said proudly. He cleared his throat in an important manner and said, "I will began now."
"But Papa said that story is not for little boys or girls." The little girl cried again in protestation.
Some other children shouted impatiently, "Be quiet, Elrynd, we want to hear the story. And no one said we can't hear the story."
So the boy began with his story, "A long, long time ago, so long ago when our forefathers were still live somewhere up north, the Shadow King came. No one knows where the Shadow king came from, or how, or who he actually was, all they knew was that he just came. The Shadow King commanded a great army, with countless horses and chariots and tall warriors riding or on foot. He fought many wars against the free people. He slaughtered many, and looted a lot of valuables, like those pirates from the south you hear so much about."
The children gasped and made thrilled noise, and did not notice the child with the wonderful magic tricks seemed different now. His eyes were red again, and glinting with a steely light.
"And that's not all." The boy went on with his story, colouring it with dramatic gestures. "The Shadow King also had dark magic at his command. It was said that he was a powerful wizard. He could call on monsters to help him in war. He had wolves with three heads, horses with wings, giants, trolls, and too many dragons to count. He was so strong that no one can defeat him, not even the Elves."
"What happened next? Was he never defeated?" The little girl hailed as Elrynd said anxiously, quite forgotten the fact that moments ago she did not want to hear the story.
"Of course he was defeated." The boy said. "It seemed that the Shadow King almost won, but suddenly one day his army vanished, and so did he. Nothing troubling ever came again after that day. No one knew how it happened. Some people say a good wizard duelled with the Shadow King, and cast him out." After a moment of pause for his audience to gasp in awe, the boy added mysteriously, "And you know what, I think that wizard was Gandlf. He is a very power wizard."
Suddenly the red-eyed child, who remained silent all through the story, asked in a tense voice, "And did the story ever say why the Shadow King came?"
The boy seemed to feel satisfied with the question, and he said in a dark, dramatic voice, "That's exactly what I asked old Gamod after he told me the story. And he said no one knew for sure. But old Gamod thought the Shadow King was in league with the Enemy in the East."
The boy suddenly seemed fearful, and he said no more. A hush fell, and people strained their ears to catch some sound of outside news in the silence. There was an ominous feeling hanging in the air. Then muffled and faint, they heard the thunders roll.