Chapter XLVII: Race of Death
Lynza called out a greeting as she approached the three waiting friends, who stood, eagerly awaiting her return.
"How'd it go?" Draylen inquired, hopping up to stand beside Mordae, who had risen when he first detected the other vampire approaching.
"Ah, just wonderful," Lynza replied dryly. "I think we made some progress, though."
"Yeah?" Celebdraug prompted as she rose from her perch on yet another fallen log.
"We need to get back to Rivendell and muster the troops," the vampire woman announced. "At dawn, we attack Khazad, and you two can have a shot at this ring you've been wanting so badly."
"Excellent," Mordae commented emphatically, nodding.
"And, after that," Lynza continued, "I have Vrayon's full support, or at least the scumbag won't stop us, in attacking the Lychen home country."
"How in the blood Moon did you get him to do that?" Draylen cried, a gigantic, uncontrolled grin spreading over his face.
"Well," the vampire leader admitted, "I'm sure he has some hair-brained scheme up his sleeve, but we'll take it down with the rest of the foul-blood wolves."
"Does he know about us?" Celebdraug interjected, gesturing to herself and Mordae.
"Not to my knowledge," Lynza responded. "Though, he did comment on the fact that my snipers were excellent."
Mordae puffed out his chest in mock-haughtiness. "Of course."
Lynza giggled slightly, then stopped as she saw the bandage around Draylen's arm.
"Is it bad?" she gasped, rushing forward, extending her hand as if to examine the wound.
"No," the vampire hissed, pushing her away, "But if everybody keeps poking it, it's going to end up that way."
"Fine, fine," Lynza surrendered, holding her hands up slightly and backing away.
"Good girl," Draylen commended her.
The other vampire hissed teasingly and Draylen hissed back; the elves had begun to wonder if the sound represented some odd form of vampire cursing.
"Well," Mordae commented, pushing thoughts of foreign language study from his mind, "Shall we return to base?"
"Are you up to it?" Lynza tentatively questioned Draylen.
"For Illúvatar's sake," Celebdraug answered before the vampire could respond, "He's been shot in the arm, not had a sword run through him."
"As my caring counterpart put so eloquently," Draylen added with a dirty look at the elf, who grinned happily, "I'm fine. And if one more person asks me, I'm going to ram this staff up their..."
"Draylen?" Mordae's voice was soft.
The vampire raised an eyebrow in response.
"Are you alright?"
Draylen launched himself at the elf, who caught him by his left shoulder and spun him backwards. Before the play-fight could really begin, however, Lynza put a firm hand on either of the offending parties' shoulder and pulled them roughly apart.
"We have dwarves to fight," she chided.
Mordae shrugged innocently. "What do you think I was doing?"
Before Lynza could stop him, Draylen's fist struck the same side that Celebdraug had beaten earlier, causing the elf to double over slightly.
"Man," Mordae gasped, "You two are really asking for it."
Celebdraug maturely stuck out her tongue at her cousin, who responded with the same elegant gesture.
Lynza sighed as she prepared to transform and begin the short return journey back to Rivendell.
"I'm the only sane person left in this god-forsaken forest."
"I resent that!" Celebdraug cried.
Mordae and Draylen exchanged glances.
The elf threw up her hands. "It's true, but I still resent it!"
An hour later, the four crested the last hill leading to the fortress; Mordae and Celebdraug running on the ground, Lynza and Draylen flying through the air a few meters above them.
"Race you," Celebdraug panted to her cousin as they entered the final hundred meters.
Mordae responded by kicking into his hardest sprint, a pace that easily outdistanced the vampires and momentarily shook off Celebdraug, who slowly regained the distance until a single stride separated the two.
Just as they neared the first building, Zalok raced out to meet them, directly in the racing elves' paths.
The lieutenant dove to the side as the Noldor rocketed past, sliding to a halt a few meters farther.
"Who won?" Mordae – who had his hands on his knees as he attempted to catch his breath – gasped to the well-mannered vampire, who shook his head slowly in wonder.
"There is someone here to see you," he answered slowly, marveling how the two turned every image of elves he had ever imagined on its head.
"Really?" Celebdraug sounded quite surprised. "Did...it...give a name?"
"No," Zalok replied, "She did not."
"Species?" Mordae inquired thoughtfully.
"Elf," the lieutenant responded confidently. "Silvan, perhaps. Blonde hair, green eyes...very fast..."
"Niphredil!" Mordae exclaimed in shock. "Where is she? What is she doing here?"
"She is in my quarters, but I do not know if she has awoken yet. She was quite overcome by exhaustion."
"Take us to her!" Celebdraug demanded.
"Please," Mordae added.
"My pleasure," Zalok retorted with a slight mock-bow. As they turned to depart, Lynza and Draylen transformed, arriving just beside the three.
"Holy blood, you're fast," Draylen marveled to Celebdraug as he strode quickly to catch the others. "There is no way I could ever keep up with you."
"I've trained for a while," she responded with a smile.
The five walked in silence for a moment.
After a few seconds, Draylen piped up. "Where we going?"
"To meet one of our friends."
"Is she hot?"
Celebdraug smacked the vampire brutally on the back of his head. "She has a man already, and I think she's a little out of your league."
"Says a lot about you," he countered smartly, raising his hand to ward off continued attacks.
"Children," Mordae reprimanded as they arrived before Zalok's room. "Behave yourselves."
Celebdraug sighed, pouting. "If you insist."
She was running again, pounding ever onward, but this time, it was not in the treed forests of the north. Instead, she ran along the plains of the southeast, gliding over hills, free as an eagle. Yet, suddenly, there was that terrible, slightly familiar smell...burning, rotting...death.
And there it was, a battlefield on an endless marshland. Bodies – men, women, young, old, horses, humans, Eldar, Drow – lay scattered everywhere, all in the grotesque positions of those taken too soon.
The acrid stench of the marsh, combined with the climbing flames that burned to the south and the corpses all around, made for an overwhelming sense of oppression, coldness...death.
The girl ran harder, gaining ground rapidly, soaring over the water without even touching it, yet not seeming to near the end of the bodies.
There, an old man she recognized. Elfwine, blood spattered all around him, his face grim.
Beside him sprawled Eorlmer, who was also covered in blood, his face covered with a mask of intense pain.
At the end of the bodies, the horse man, Dacil, obviously dead for quite some time.
Suddenly, there, in the distance, was clear land. No bodies, but a dark horde of purple tinted elves...Drow.
She felt drawn to the man in the lead, face hidden from the stench by a black mask, riding atop a massive steed. A woman, Drow, also with a mask, lay against him, seemingly unconscious, but what was strewn on the mount behind him that caught the girl's attention.
Aragorn. Gandalf. The horse girl...Athfaë? All of them bloodied, beaten. Confusion rocked the girl, followed by utter shock.
She felt herself rushing, faster and faster, to the east, rising above a mountaintop, toward a dark, gloomy castle. Blackness.
Glorfindel! The elf's face flashed before her, white with pain and stress, his eyes hollow. She reached for him, her hand seeming to stretch leagues, then it found another. Her eyes traced up the muscular arm, to the dark face, covered by flaming tattoos. The bald head, covered in black depictions of flame, the piercing, cold eyes.
Mornië.
Mordae gripped Niphredil's hand tighter as she let out a scream, thrashing wildly in the bead she lay in.
Her green eyes snapped open, meeting Mordae's calm yellow irises, and she let out a quiet moan, relaxing slightly.
"Everything is alright now," the elf soothed, gently brushing a strand of blonde hair from Niphredil's forehead.
The girl panted for breath, her heart still racing. Hot tears streamed down her cheeks, and she held Mordae's hand tighter.
"No," she murmured, surprised that her voice seemed to have returned, her throat no longer dry. Though she could not recall it, Zalok had given her nearly a dozen canteens of pure, cool water from Rivendell's streams, along with a supply of lembas normally consumed by a full-grown man over three days.
Niphredil swallowed, reveling in the absence of the dry, constricted feeling that so often came with extreme distance running.
"It's not alright," she argued weakly, attempting to sit up in the bed. She paused, gazing coyly at the faces that she had not seen before; Celebdraug and three vampires she did not recognize.
Mordae knelt beside the bed, gently pushing her back down. "Why?"
"They've taken them. Mornië took them all..." Niphredil moaned, recalling the terrible images. "So many dead..."
"How, Niphredil?" Mordae's voice was strained with seeing one of his friends in such a dire situation and the unsettling words she was muttering.
"They said...they said you told them to go. The Dead Marshes...it was a trap..."
"The Dead Marshes?" Celebdraug cried, glancing at Draylen, who shrugged.
"I have no idea what in Udun you three are saying."
Celebdraug patted him reassuringly on the shoulder and returned her attention to Niphredil.
"You told the horsepeople...on the palantír...""No!" Mordae denied. "I didn't!" He shot a questioning stare at Celebdraug, who shook her head vigorously.
"Then...who?" Niphredil's eyes widened.
"Mornië," Mordae growled.
"He has them all. Aragorn, Gandalf, Athfaë..." the Silvan's voice choked. "Glorfindel. He's had him for the longest. A day and a half..."
"You ran here from Rohan in a day and a half?" Mordae sounded skeptical.
"Twelve hours, actually." Niphredil managed a weak smile. "Why do you have that written on your forehead?"
Mordae put a hand on the Silvan's forehead. "Are you delirious?"
"I wish." Tears began to flow again from the shining green eyes, causing a look of pain to flash over Mordae's face.
"Where are they?" the giant growled, beginning to rise.
"I don't know," Niphredil moaned. "I saw them in a dream. They looked like they were in Rohan. Barely out of the Dead Marshes."
Mordae cracked his knuckles. He spun, his normally soft eyes hardened to the cool gaze of a professional killer.
"Lynza." The elf's voice was cold, unearthly. "I thank you for your hospitality. I will return as soon as I can, but I can't promise anything."
"Wait!" Lynza cried, her eyes desperate.
Celebdraug slid her hand into Draylen's as she prepared to say good-bye.
"Wait," Lynza's voice was soft. "I...I'm sorry. I should not be so selfish." Her voice trailed off. Suddenly, her head snapped back up. "I am Vrayon's sister."
"What?" Some of Mordae's normal tones had returned to his voice.
"Vrayon and I are kin."
There was a long pause.
"Why are you telling us this?" Mordae inquired, his voice returning to the typical baritone. His eyes widened suddenly.
"Za'vryn! The Blood-Gates!" the elf cried. "You have access to them!"
Lynza nodded slowly. "Would you please...please...stay and assist us with the dwarves. You can acquire the rings, and I will transport you to the mountains of Isen Meares at the same time the Drow arrive there. You will rescue your friends, and accomplish your mission."
"Niphredil?" Mordae questioned.
The elf woman sighed. "That is how it must be. I pray for your haste, and may Illúvatar guide your sword."
"As always. Heal quickly, for we return by mid-day."
"And then," Celebdraug added, "We're going to make Mornië wish he had never been born."
