In An Age Before – Part 35
Chapter Twenty-five
The War of the Elves and Sauron, Eriador - The Second Age of the Sun
For a spirit such as Helluin's, 'twas obvious that there was no choice but to go to war. If Ereinion required not her service, then she would fight on her own behalf. A great and ancient enemy had arisen, and now he threatened all that she held dear. After the incident with the Laiquendi, Helluin knew that her rage would find its best outlet on the battlefield, for t'would not be extinguished so long as Sauron made war upon her people. Beinvír, whose eyes now held a fugitive light akin to that of some few from Doriath such as Amdír, saw this as clearly as did Helluin, and had accepted it even ere the Noldo admitted it to herself. And so in Lothron, (May), of 1695, the two ellith made their way east towards Eregion, for they would go to war as an army of two.
They crossed Baranduin north of the Old Forest, bypassed the arcs of downs to its east, and made their way following a track south of the Weather Hills. Now they went with stealth, and the lessons Beinvír had taught Helluin long aforetime preserved them. Nórui, (June), came and went. Ost-In-Edhil fell and Celebrimbor was slain in Cerveth, (July), taken whilst defending the guildhouse, and then put to torture. 'Twas assumed that Sauron took from him the Seven and the Nine, and as Helluin had predicted, slew his captive once he learned he had not the Three.
Helluin and Beinvír were surprised to find the city but recently fallen. Helluin had expected it to be taken within a fortnight of the enemy's arrival, but it had gained a reprieve. Celeborn had come 'cross the Caradhras Pass with many Sindar out of Lórinand, and they had engaged the vanguard, slaying well 'nigh two thousand of the Yrch ere they were forced into retreat by the arrival of the main host.
When he arrived, Elrond had joined his cavalry to Celeborn's infantry, giving the Eldar yet more flexibility to engage the army of Sauron, and they had staved off the siege of Ost-In-Edhil for o'er a month. In that period of grace, many refugees had fled the doomed city. These attached themselves to the Elven forces, for therein seemed the only safety and hope.
But from the beginning it had been a slow retreat back through the lands south of Glanduin, and as the enemy's numbers allowed them to widen the front, Elrond and Celeborn had been forced back lest they be flanked and crushed against the Hithaeglir. They had finally been required to hasten the withdrawal of their forces. Then the city was laid bare to the Host of Sauron and so 'twas besieged and taken. Elrond and Celeborn moved slowly through the northern precincts of Eregion during late 1695, fighting upon their rearguard and then their left flank too, for by winter the Yrch held the far shore of Mitheithel and made many sorties 'cross that river against them.
Soon only two choices remained open to the Elves. Either to follow the Bruinen north from its juncture with the Mitheithel, cornering themselves against the Hithaeglir, or in desperation, to cross west o'er the Bruinen whilst the Glamhoth sought to cross the Mitheithel to pursue them, and then flee through the increasingly rugged terrain leading up into the Ettenmoors. But to do thus they would have to act ere the highland rose, for 'twixt the branching of the two rivers the land lay fairly flat. In that flatter land, (the area south of the lands called The Angle), they could be easily o'errun. And they knew that with so many refugees they would ne'er outpace the Glamhoth and win free to the west. Also the Elves would then be forced to defend both right and left flanks, and a retreat in either direction afterwards would be hindered by the rivers. Either way they were trapped, but by staying east of the Bruinen, at least they were protected upon their left flank by the Hithaeglir. And last, there was the unspoken hope that a pass might be found o'er the Misty Mountains and thence to safety in Rhovanion.
Elrond and Celeborn decided to stay east of the Bruinen, and though they would eventually be trapped, they saw no course but to prolong their survival and trust in hope. Behind them the land filled with the enemy, but the corner they retreated into narrowed the front. This actually worked to their advantage. Staying east of the Bruinen also forced the Glamhoth to advance through the increasingly broken lands to their west. The enemy followed them e'er more closely and their position became e'er more grim.
In that increasingly steep terrain the retreating Elves cowered. Following the River Bruinen north into the mountains, they would finally have been o'erwhelmed, save that from Khazad-dûm came an army of 15,000 Naugrim, and more incredibly, with them marched 4,000 of the Nandor 'neath the command of Prince Amroth. Their coming was timely indeed. These allies assailed the right flank of Sauron's army, and by their threat drew off the pursuit of the Noldor and Sindar. Thus they prolonged the campaign in Eregion through the winter and into the following spring.
Taking advantage of this respite, Elrond and Celeborn fought a running battle against Sauron's vanguard, using the cavalry for hit and run tactics and the infantry for ambush, whilst making stands at every favorable emplacement. They fought a bitter war of attrition, e'er seeking to whittle away at their enemy's numbers whilst preserving their own. Much of 1696 passed as they slowly continued north 'cross 150 miles, giving ground, but forcing the Yrch to buy it dear with many lives.
For some time they had also known that upon their right flank moved a force, unseen and unknown, save that in the mornings their scouts would find a score of Yrch with their heads hewn clean off. More were found having fallen to bowmen, and these were invariably shot in the right eye with a precision that could only have been the work of Elven master archers. In the course of Elrond and Celeborn's retreat, which eventually led them to the hidden valley that became Imladris, their unseen benefactors took 'nigh nine hundred heads. Beyond Bruinen lay a killing ground, and the sentries and scouts of Elrond and Celeborn's forces would hear from those upland woods the cries of pain and shrieks of horror as their enemies died in the darkness.
In the night, the screams of the Yrch came to their ears from dusk 'til dawn. Some died so close to the camp that their carcasses were discovered 'nigh the pickets and the supply wagons. But ne'er did the sentries of the Elven force discover who had aided them, for the killers' stealth was complete, akin to that of the Laiquendi of Ossiriand in an Age before. They knew only that some friendly company had turned The Angle, and the hilly ground to its north, deadly to their foes, and they were very thankful.
Neither rain nor snow stayed the killing. The slaying continued even after the discovery and establishment of Imladris in the first wintry month of 1697. It only abated when the principal host of Sauron's army turned south to exterminate the Naugrim and their Nandor allies in the spring of that year. In this too they failed. The allied force retreated to Khazad-dûm and Durin's Halls were shut. The doors upon which Celebrimbor had labored held fast, and so even in death the son of Curufin frustrated his enemy. In all the long years ere his fall, ne'er did Sauron Gorthaur enter Hadhodrond with war.
Helluin and Beinvír followed Sauron's main army south and witnessed the results of the ancient hatred 'twixt the Glam and the Naugrim. Both sides spared no mercy for their enemies, but the Yrch mutilated the Dwarves they slew, burning their heads so the dead could ne'er find rest entombed. They burned their prisoners alive as well, knowing the screams carried through the night to the ears of their comrades.
The sight of the decapitated remains and the smoldering ashes of the bonfires enraged Helluin and Beinvír when they came upon them, and as the weeks passed both became more grim and accelerated their war, slaying e'er greater numbers of the Glam. Indeed a desperate urgency seized Helluin; she felt she could ne'er slay enough and hastened through the darkness seeking e'er more foes. The Yrch soon feared assignment to their own right flank, for thither the night's darkness that they naturally favored had turned deadly. Some enemy marched with them, able to see when they could not, silent beyond their capability to hear, having no discernible scent, leaving no spoor, and possessed of a hatred for their kind that was beyond anything they had e'er encountered. And ne'er were there any survivors, only corpses. Rumors passed in whispers amongst them, numerous as locusts.
By the early summer of 1697 their companies were so intimidated by their unseen foe that even when the heads of their dead were cast into their camp just ere dawn, none ventured forth to counterattack. Rather, they hid the heads lest their lord command them to seek out this enemy. Oft they were forced to disavow the existence of whole companies, or claim they had deserted when they failed to answer the call to battle. The Yrch knew and hid the truth from their master. Their comrades had been slain silently in the night.
In Cerveth, (July), of 1697, something inside Helluin snapped and she took to impaling the dead and leaving their cadavers to be found by the living. She did this in retribution for the mutilation of her friend, Celebrimbor, for only now after two years had she learnt the truth of his grisly fate.
At this time Sauron allowed his forces a respite of well 'nigh a year for pillage and plunder, seeking to terrorize all the peoples of Eriador into despair. Save for the lesser force left to threaten Imladris, his companies went to and fro, well 'nigh autonomous, indulging themselves freely in their malice. The Yrch hunted down Men and Elves, burned towns and homesteads, and ruined such tillage as they came upon. They were charged only with rendering Eriador a wasteland, and to this task they bent their efforts with glee. 'Twas a campaign of terror, and in this environment Helluin and Beinvír took up an even more gruesome form of war.
After two years of constant bloody conflict o'erlying centuries of animosity, Helluin's rage rose to new heights even she had ne'er ascended to aforetime, and in that state she committed atrocities. Beinvír was sickened, disheartened, and demoralized, but Helluin was unable to break off the killing and the subsequent dismemberment of her fallen foes. They were 'naught but fodder for her darkness now, grisly material compulsively used to the best advantage in terrorizing the enemy, for cruel though they were, Helluin understood that the Yrch knew fear. The Green Elf remained by her side, knowing that if she left, Helluin would continue on to her death with no care save the destruction of her foes. In sorrow she stayed to guard her friend's back, though she barely recognized her anymore.
Now 'twas not uncommon for a company of Yrch to come upon an acre of their fellows torsos impaled upon spikes and rotting in the sun, whilst nearby lay piled their heads, arms, and legs, hewn off with a grim sense of necessity. In the darkness of her hatred, Helluin left fields in which legs stood like rows of grain, wells were filled to the brim with heads, ears were strung upon cords crossing the roads, and footpaths were paved with tongues.
When the Yrch marched to savage the hill that would one day host the town of Bree, they found that someone had been there before them. Upon the slope a macabre tableau had been constructed. Thither paired arms and legs were set so that they appeared joined, standing on their own without bodies. Heads were set with hewn neck atop hewn thigh, two per torso, that stood embedded upside-down to the chest in the earth. O'erhead the branches of the trees were decorated with hands. A lone surviving Orch was discovered, eyeless, earless, and tongueless, wandering on his stumps amidst the dead. He could tell them nothing, could not even beg them for death. Of course they ate him, for he alone was unrotted.
Eventually such doings could no longer be concealed. Sauron learnt of the mayhem and went in person to visit a scene of carnage. He was led thither by a fearful company of Yrch, to what had once been a pleasant hamlet of Men ere it had been burned, and thither he saw the fallow winter fields guarded by scarecrows made from the dismembered body parts of 100 of his soldiers. They had been cobbled back together with sharpened sticks joining sundry elements in service to a grim sense of humor. Legs took station at the shoulders, invariable two rights or two lefts on a torso. Arms were appended to hips.
Sauron laughed at the scene as he had not since the campaign began, and then placed a bounty of 10,000 gold pieces on the ones who had created it. Of course he'd ne'er intended to pay, indeed he would have slain any who attempted to collect, but he wanted the leader of the perpetrators. Such a cruel one, he thought, could easily be compelled into his service and would rise quickly in the ranks. To such a one he would soon give a Ring, the first of the Nine, for he deemed this enemy a Man. The Eldar had not the stomach for such things…ne'er had and ne'er would.
By torturing the company that had led him thither, he finally learnt all of what had been visited upon his Glamhoth since shortly after the war began. That they would conceal such from him left him wroth, yet at the same time amused. And their fear was delicious. He added their bodies to the field, but his scarecrows lacked some intrinsic spark of inspiration. It perplexed and irritated him. Eventually he came to understand that he had not the hate of the original creator.
Only many years later did he realize something else about the artworks, (for so he deemed them). As he ruminated in the Bard-dûr upon his defeat and contemplated the rebuilding of his strength, he noted that only upon the Glam had such acts been committed. When he had found companies of Easterlings slain, they were left as they had fallen, none mutilated, none reduced to trophies. And the sheer numbers of the dead made doubtful the mortality of the perpetrator. 1695, '96, '97, and '98; four years…o'er five thousands slain. No Man was so fell. It reeked of Elven prowess.
Long he pondered this and then he realized that one of the chief amongst his enemies he had ne'er seen nor sensed in battle 'til the very end. In the great wars of the First Age she had been remarkable, slaying any who came 'nigh in her wrath. In the past war she had not been seen ere the final defeat. Whither had she been all those years whilst Eriador was contested? Whither had Helluin Maeg-mórmenel hidden? He had not been able to see or sense her after his failed attempt to entrap her in 1600. She had closed herself to him more completely than any other of the Eldar had been able to do. Now he wondered. Had it been her? Had the darkness he'd sensed in the Sarchram cirth o'erflowed upon her ancient enemies, the Glam? Yes, perhaps such a one could have accounted for the plethora of the dead. He contented himself with the fantasy and his shell showed signs of becoming excited, but he would probably ne'er know for sure. Then he turned his black thought to Númenor. The Dúnedain had earned his enmity and he would bring them down if it took him an Age.
In the meantime the army of Lindon had taken the field. Gil-galad and Glorfindel, Gildor and Erestor, and the others of the lords and knights of the Noldor had moved to battle. With them went many of Círdan's Sindar, and those Númenóreans who were at Mithlond when the war broke out. They had begun by assailing their enemy's left flank, (his right flank after he turned south), and they did what damage they could. At one point they marched but a couple leagues from where Helluin and Beinvír engaged the Yrch each night, but they too ne'er discovered their identities. Throughout 1696 and 1697 they were unable to join their forces with Elrond and Celeborn, and they were always greatly outnumbered. Then after the Naugrim and Nandor retreated to Khazad-dûm they were slowly driven back west.
At last, as 1698 came to a close, Sauron recommitted to his purpose and ordered his army to take Lindon the following spring. Then he gathered together his companies and marshaled them to a front of war, for the third host he had left training upon Gorgoroth would soon be capable of battle. The remnant of his vanguard and host still numbered 52,000, whilst the Eldar and their allies he deemed no more than 15,000. When the campaigning season opened in 1699, he would sweep them into the Gulf of Lune. Once that was done and he held two of the Three, he would return to finish with Elrond ere he crossed back into Rhovanion and laid waste to Lórinand. He would then have all the Elven Rings, for from Celebrimbor he had already taken six of the Seven and all of the Nine. He had soon discerned whither the Three were hidden and who their keepers were.
Gwaeron, (March), S.A. 1699 opened the campaigning season and Sauron ordered his army to advance. He assigned only a token force to guard against action from Imladris. The rest drove the forces of Gil-galad before them in retreat to Baranduin, and by mid-Gwirith, (April), the king was desperately trying to regroup on the western bank, south of Sarn Athrad. Sauron ordered his northern companies to move south in an encircling gambit, but the troops seemed sluggish, their advance far slower than it should have been. They were mostly Yrch in those companies, some eighteen thousands strong, and he suspected lagging or desertion. After the war he resolved to flay the veterans.
The northern companies received their orders upon 17 Gwirith and made to cross the Baranduin, southwest of the gap 'twixt the northern and central downs. Once west of the river they planned to sweep down upon the Elven King, whose primary host was 100 miles to the south. 'Twas a good plan and they began the crossing, glad to leave behind En-Dôrsôr¹, the Abhorrent Land, the dreaded Land of Atrocities in northeastern Eriador. ¹(In fact lore hints that the name given to that land in the Black Speech more closely translates as, "The Land of Wasted Meat")
About them all lay stifled. Save for the fleeing of the water and the groaning of the breeze, not a sound could be heard but the tramping of their own boots. 'Twas more silent than death; not a bird chirped, not a beast scrabbled to hide. This green and rolling country seemed scared out of its natural voice. The notion of a land terrified to silence the Yrch found gratifying, and the lack of enemies was welcome. They should have known 'twas unnatural.
Now their march to battle should have taken them three days; instead it took seven and they arrived with but seven thousand troops alive. They ne'er saw an enemy the whole time. They were ne'er challenged. They faced no lines of foes. Yet all too oft a soldier would keel o'er mid-stride, an arrow in his heart, or eye, or throat. Such might come from any direction, and even when there was no cover they themselves could have used, still they were unceasingly assailed. Not once was there a volley sent against them. The arrows came singly, but always precisely aimed and deadly. The survivors were even unable to mark with certainty from what direction the twang of the bowstring had sounded.
Scouts were the first to disappear, and these were oft found impaled and left in their path, revealed to the companies suddenly when making the crest of some pleasant hill. Their fearsome enemy still marched with them. Eventually the host clung together, sending forth neither advance parties, nor scouts, and in this way they seldom took the quickest route. Many were the arguments and fights that broke out amongst their captains as a result, whilst they painfully made their way through the lands of the Laiquendi of Eriador. Thither they lost well 'nigh eleven thousands, mostly to bow fire. At least the survivors were well fed.
When they finally arrived at Sarn Athrad on 24 Gwirith, they found their own army already encamped thither. The battle had taken place two days before and Gil-galad had withdrawn yet again. In his place brooded far worse; a furious Sauron awaited them. Their master's presence in those days, a beautiful blonde youth, tall, unnaturally handsome, and glowing with a compelling darkness, offered them a smile ere the troops were taken and impounded.
"What dost thou fear?" The Master softly asked the commander of the Glamhoth, his sweet and musical voice almost a caress. His bright gold cat's eyes veiled their cruelty 'neath a veneer of sympathetic concern thinner than the tender skin of his unblinking eyelids. Love for a comrade, one might almost have thought it, for his words dripped with caring sincerity. A fool would have believed him friendly and likeable. He certainly appeared noble and heroic in his spotless, chromed armor with its intricate gold inlays and multi-hued cloisonné. But there was always the accompanying darkness.
"Y-you, Lord Sauron," the Orch whimpered as a stream of foul, stinking water left his body in his terror. Gorthaur paid no attention to his wet legs or his loss of control.
"And what else, my faithful liege? Surely there must be something?" He asked, the charade of pity reflected perfectly in his features. Oh, how he enjoyed his sport.
The Orch was quaking in fear and for some moments no words came to his tongue. He had an answer, but couldn't force it from his lips, for t'would damn him. His master sighed, then gently laid a hand on his shoulder and gave it a comforting squeeze. The Ring he wore felt cold as ice and the Orch couldn't help but shrink from its touch. He had seen those same bare fingers strip meat from a screaming prisoner's bones.
"Come now, speak thy concern," the Master gently encouraged.
"A-an enemy…m-maybe Maia, maybe V-Vala; long against thee, L-Lord Sauron," the Orch finally stuttered, "h-he impales, slays th-thousands…" 'Twas no good and he knew it. Then a will greater than his own froze his tongue and he spoke no more.
"I see," Sauron said as if agreeing. "'Twas unfair to pit thee and thy troops against such a one. No soldier can oppose a god." He offered the Orch a calming smile. "Thou art weary. Go now to thy rest." His lord turned away, a cruel grin taking shape on his lips.
The Orch choked back a cry of despair and began shaking so badly he could barely stand, but the audience had ended and there was 'naught to do save force his legs to carry him from the tent. Outside they were waiting for him just as he expected, for he had seen this happen oft aforetime. Thither he was grappled and stripped.
They took him and laid him out 'neath the weight of many hands. And when his struggling had ceased and his panic had given way to despair, they flayed off his skin and turned him loose to run through the camp screaming in pain, whilst others jeered and tossed upon him their rations of salt. Bloody footprints marked the path of his disgrace.
Eventually they ignored him and he crept beyond the perimeter, thinking to quench the burning of his anguish in the river. From the bank he saw his skin, waving in the breeze as a pennant atop his master's tent. He looked away from that horror and into the woods, and thither he saw a lone figure in black armor approaching, blue eyes kindled with a terrifying light. The black sword came down swiftly and hewed his neck. Then for one moment more he looked up into the face of the most frighteningly beautiful Elf woman he had e'er seen.
The next morning his body was found impaled upside down amongst the chuck wagons. His head had been discovered at the bottom of a stew pot and the cooks had fought o'er the meat. When the army advanced at noon his seven thousand surviving troops were left behind, flayed and impaled upon their own pikes in dishonor. His master chuckled all day, whene'er the image of it came back to him from memory.
"I think I am slipping," Helluin muttered to Beinvír as they sat beside their small hunter's fire that night. The Green Elf looked up from her plate but slowly. Helluin had noticed the increasingly hollow look in her friend's eyes of late and she was worried.
"Thou hast slid far, my friend," Beinvír stated with little emotion in her voice.
"I meant that this morn I slew an Orch who had left behind his skin for his master," Helluin explained, "and I am fairly certain I did him an act of mercy."
"And is that such a bad thing?"
"I find I am no longer sure," Helluin admitted in surprise. She stared down at her hands.
"I think this war has wounded thy heart, for I am sure it hath wounded mine," Beinvír said, setting down her plate. "I have lived but to slay these last years, rather than slaying to live. Worse, we have violated the fallen as would an Orch, or even as Sauron himself. Well 'nigh the only thing we have not done is cannibalize them. It hath left me empty of spirit and I value not the coming day, but rather abhor it. I detest what the morrow shalt bring rather than seek its possibilities. Almost would dying be more welcome."
Helluin looked at her friend in alarm. Such a declaration was a very serious matter in an Elf. So many had died of broken hearts, and oft the first sign of such was an expression of a loss of the desire to live. Therefore when Beinvír told Helluin that she found no joy or hope in the coming day, but rather questioned if death would not be better, she was but a step from despairing and the failing of her life. Her hroa would simply collapse as her fëa took flight to the Halls of Mandos, thither perhaps to heal of its despondency o'er many long years. Helluin had barely sense enough remaining to know that they had to stop…she had to stop. She had been indulging her rage for years, and now she finally understood that 'twas killing her friend. The Noldo dimly recalled that once she had thought it better for Beinvír to take ship into the West than to remain in Middle Earth during the coming war. It seemed like a sentiment from an Age before. Helluin blinked in surprise; in the end she had dragged her beloved through all the things she'd once feared the Green Elf would suffer; indeed even worse. Yet she was still too numb to feel guilty.
"On the morrow I shalt take thee to Imladris, and thither we shalt remove ourselves from this war," Helluin said. "Perhaps we should have stayed thither in the company of Elrond and Celeborn. Looking back I find myself confused, with reasons then both yea and nay, and the enemy being so threatening that I could not but pursue them. And thence to discover the remnant of Celebrimbor's husk dangling upon its pole…" she trailed off into silence for many moments. Finally she said, "in any case, I deem we have done our part, and that more than most."
Beinvír nodded slowly as if exhausted and then lay down on her groundcover of many rat skins. Helluin sat a long time staring at her boots and sucking on her teeth. Finally she too lay down after slinging away into the woods their uneaten food. By then the realm of memories had taken her friend in its clutches and the Green Elf shuddered and whimpered and a slow trickle of tears leaked from her eyes during her repose. Helluin watched, thinking she should feel worse for it, but unable to empathize as she lay 'nigh. For so long she had suppressed all her feelings save rage, and she found those unused emotions now felt almost foreign and difficult to access. Her own memories were mostly of slaughter, bloodletting, and mayhem. It had been many nights since she'd let herself slip into that endless replaying of her daily carnage. She had found that 'naught else could she conjure anymore in the hours of darkness. And it bored her to see again at night the same images as she had created in her waking hours. Better to be numb; better to be rest-less…once a week is enough of such, she thought, and tonight was not her night for rest. 'Tis said that the obsessed sleep but little, for their minds art deemed already fully occupied and have not any room left for dreams.
To Be Continued