Chapter Fifteen: Crimson Leaves
Rúmil awoke, his face and chest glistening with sweat in the spare moonlight that glittered on the white sheets. Bent over his knees, he pulled a hand through his snarled hair to try to calm his racing heart. That dream again… He should have known it would return even after he had tried to drown it. He glanced across the small talan where his bunkmate's—Thillas'—empty bed lay. Healer's flet still. Shivering, though he did not feel cold, Rúmil threw back the covers and dressed quickly.
It was early morning yet and light had not yet reached its searching fingers through the foliage. The smooth, rhythmic pulse of his strides and heartbeat calmed him as he ran along a slender deer path cutting through the western woodlands. The sun was just brushing the treetops and pushing long, blue shadows west, threading the thin mist with beads of silver and copper. With the return of steady and familiar routine, and the comforting sun warming his back, Rúmil could breathe again, his nightmares receding into the darker shadows, shying from the sun.
He took a wide loop eastward, avoiding the stretch of burnt lands low and withered to the banks of the Nimrodel. He had gone nowhere near the place since that horrific night. He had tried to remove himself as much as possible from the horror, the frenetic activity, needing the calm to orient his thoughts and restore some manner of balance to his life.
As the sun began its slow ascent, he knelt at a stream to splash his hot face. Raising his head, he caught sight of a small form he had startled out of the ferns. For a moment, the fawn's large liquid eyes stared into his, then, with a flick of a long, velvety ear and a flash of white, it was gone into the safety of the thick woodlands.
Running away, little one? The furious energy that had spurred him on thus far, drained from Rúmil's limbs and he felt unbearably weary all of a sudden. Getting to his feet, he trudged slowly back to barracks.
His eldest brother spared him a brief nod of greeting when he appeared on the parade ground; Haldir had had little time of late. Since the battle, the patrols had dissolved into all but chaos. Many dead soldiers had to be replaced with living ones and the family members of those they had been unable to find clamored for news and restitution. It did not help that their Captain treated them with increasing distance, retreating ever to his darkened talan, giving way to darker thoughts.
Rúmil stood on the corner of the parade ground, a wide clearing in the midst of the forest where the soldiers drilled. And sometimes ate and slept as the recruits well knew. For a long while, he watched them spar.
The sergeant-at-arms had been slain and the Captain had yet to name his replacement. The lieutenant attempting to fill in was encouraging the soldiers into ragged lines. Rúmil shook his head in disapproval at their sloppy attempt. Fedorian, when he had been the officer he once was, would have stripped the commanding officer of rank for allowing his soldiers' dressings to look like that. But the poor lieutenant looked flustered enough without knowing what he was doing. This was not his job, his panicked gaze said.
Rúmil watched as Arenath, passing across the parade ground, snapped at the hapless soldier who flushed dully and quickly redirected the orders his officer barked.
Glancing towards a group of warriors, lounging in the shade after a morning's hard march, Rúmil recognized his brother, Orophin, among them and their friend Ancadal. Wandering over, he caught the last snatches of their conversation.
"—at the very least he should take leave," a regal-looking elf, a lieutenant by the marks on his tunic, pursed his lips in seeming deep disapproval. "He has been so strange lately—it is a wonder he still commands this post."
"Now, Laer," Orophin put in mildly. "that is a bit much, do you not think?"
"Why?" the other retorted. "Have you seen aught of him of late? He did not even come to the services."
Rúmil knew of whom they spoke and almost walked away. He hated hearing his commander being discussed in such a manner. But the arrogant lieutenant's next words gave him pause, his hands clenching unconsciously.
"He ought to be replaced. A more… capable… officer would serve much better." The gleam in his eye showed all too clearly who he thought that better officer could be.
Rúmil snorted derisively, drawing the attention of the one who had spoken.
"You have something to say, pup?" Laer put in quietly, a supercilious eyebrow raised.
Rúmil's eyes narrowed, his voice low and harsh. "You are not fit to speak so. You do not know what we suffered—what he suffered. You cannot imagine and you would not have done a better job."
Without waiting for a response, he walked away, ignoring Orophin's call for him to return.
Sparing his youngest brother a short glance, Haldir left the parade grounds behind him, heading deeper into the forest, away from the ruin that he could just see over his shoulder, angled, dead trees poking forlornly from behind the leafy sheltered ones that had escaped the inferno.
Geilrín and Silivren are dead. How many more would fall before this was over? He couldn't let his brothers be among them. He would miss them terribly but at least he would know they were alive elsewhere. Rúmil and Orophin would almost certainly object to his sudden decision regarding their lives but he could deal with their anger. He could not deal with their deaths.
Eremae stood within the fern draped doorway, raising her eyes to his face briefly. Fedorian did not look up as he appeared on the platform, intent on his gazing, and cradling a glass against his leg.
Waiting a moment longer for acknowledgement, Haldir wasted no words when none came for the commander did not suffer others wasting his time. "Sir, I ask that my brothers be transferred to another command on the southern border."
Fedorian did not seem surprised by his words. He had seen others of late who had requested the same removal of close family from all harm. And he put to Haldir the same questions he had asked them. "For what reason? Is this not a decision they should make themselves?"
"Yes, I would agree in most cases. But..." His brothers would be furious with him. "I fear that they are too proud to admit that they would compromise the battlefield." He allowed a fleeting smile to pass across his face for the sake of effect. "They have a penchant for heroics. I fear the command would be in unnecessary jeopardy should an opportunity to avenge our lost ones arise."
"Is that so?"
This was the right thing to do. He reassured himself. I have to keep them safe. This had nothing to do with compromising the command.
Fedorian sipped thoughtfully from his glass and set it on the floor near his feet as he stood. "And what think you of an opportunity 'to avenge our lost ones?'"
Haldir met his eyes evenly. "I would welcome it gladly."
Fedorian watched Haldir long under his strange gaze. Then smiled and gave him the same answer he had given the others.
"I will look into what you have said," He glanced over his shoulder at the watchful healer. "—if my nurse allows me the time and peace of mind to do so." He turned his gaze away and walked to the edge of the platform.
"Thank you, sir." Thinking himself dismissed, Haldir half-bowed and began to descend from the talan.
Fedorian's voice stopped him. "They have left the woods. The trees allowed them to go."
Haldir looked at his captain staring out over the sun-dappled woodlands, the leaves rustling in their green shadows. "They were frightened. It is understandable—long has it been since the mellyrn have felt the ungentle touch of fire."
"If I have my will, they need never fear it again."
A wide, overgrown lane ran down, curving away to join the road further southward. In this late summer, the sides of the path bloomed with honeysuckle and wild hemlock, its white flowers swaying in the warm breeze. But the beauty was lost in the formless dark.
Away near the looming cleft of rock, an ancient remnant of the mountain's foothills, a burst of orange illuminated the white hemlock stems, casting wavering, dancing shadows across the ash-grey grass.
A cloud of soft grey smoke swirled into the air as Ramir sat with his back flat against a smooth rock, a glowing coal between his knees. He hadn't tasted such leaf since leaving the fertile fields of the Westenmet. It was about the only comfort he had left. Half their forces were simply gone. When they had left Gondor with Anaric they had numbered nearly one hundred strong—a full company—of elite rangers. Now they were a little over a score. If that. Ramir's brow darkened.
Rumors of desertion had reached his wary ears.
Sitting before his dwindling campfire, he was suddenly aware of a figure hovering at the fringes of the shadows. "Sir," a voice spoke softly. "The men favor Calenon. He is the one.
Calenon, that upstart! "This I know. You did well, lad," Ramir said.
Calenon. The chief dissenter. A ranger of Ithilien, no doubt. One of those kind who believed they were beyond the rules of their city and the command of their leaders in the wild. Primitive, savage. Fools all of them! He needed to be dealt with. And soon. The only way this contingent would keep from falling apart would be their unity.
His lurid eyes lit up and he smiled suddenly. "Good work. Do well by me, lad, and I will see to a promotion personally when we return to Gondor," he said, smiling.
His loyal servant nodded his head obediently and vanished.
On the other side of the camp, a lean, sandy-haired man stood boldly before a group of five or six who were listening to him speak.
Calenon idly wielded his favored weapon—a thick-corded bolas—whose heavy stones clacked together at the ends as he twitched them. "We could have ended it then—we could be at the Anduin tonight, feasting on the river shore. No, friends, we're sitting out on these desolate plains with nothing to eat but six-day old meat and nothing but brackish puddles to drink from." He shook his head with a sly glance towards the soft grey smoke drifting in the wind.
A few grumbling words of agreement encouraged him further.
He carried on, softer now, luring them in as he sat casually beside them. "It was a massacre, men." He shook his head darkly. "We watched our own burn in those woods. What kind of a leader would let that happen to his own I ask you? And now, he's letting us starve! You have all seen him! The best smoke… the best meat… I wouldn't be surprised if he had a few bottles hidden in his sacks."
The voice behind him stiffened the hairs on the back of his head. "I would, gentlemen, that we celebrate tonight." Ramir smiled at his friends and companions who were suddenly looking nervously away from him. "Let us face to the West then, Númenor that was, and remember our fallen. May they find their peace in the honored halls of their fathers."
They stood and the last radiant light of the setting sun gleamed on their battered armor, their worn and scarred blades.
Ramir stirred after a moment. "Now, let us honor our victory properly!" he roared. "Organize a hunting party—there's enough meat to be found in this rich land for a few hungry soldiers! Break out the last wineskins! Tonight, we feast!"
The men cheered, their spirits considerably lifted at this news. As disgruntled as they were, many hadn't tasted wine since they crossed the Anduin.
Calenon watched their faces and the face of his commander, surprised when Ramir beckoned him to his side. Cautiously, the younger man approached his leader, wariness and curiosity glittering in his dark eyes.
"In this rich land we will regain our strength—enough to skirt the wood and cross the Anduin. We will be home within the month, men, you have my word." He wrapped a companionable arm around Calenon's shoulders. "All of you showed true courage throughout this campaign and have brought the highest of honor to your Houses. But one, I believe, deserves our praise above the others." Ramir lifted his flask with a wide, fallacious grin. "A toast to my good man, Calenon—now, my second, after Garen was slain. Should I fall in this forsaken place I would that he lead you home once more!"
The other man appeared quite flummoxed by this praise but grinned all the same and, pulling away from the embrace, toasted his leader back with high good humor. "My Lord Captain! It is my highest honor to accept this position and to serve our men well!"
"Well, now." Ramir smiled and turned to his new second. "To the hunt! I'll take half of them out onto that meadow there where we found the spring water earlier today, you can take your half and search the woods—should be plenty of deer to snare."
Calenon grinned right back, inwardly seething at how he'd been deceived. He bowed lightly to his commander and draped his bolas about his shoulders. "So shall it be. We'll be bringing home the feast, boys!"
In their haste to ready themselves and set out with enough light left before darkness fell completely, none of the men noticed the bright, wary eyes that watched them just beyond the light of the fire.
The grief had numbed a little but it still was difficult when he crossed the parade ground and expected Silivren to greet him with a smile and early supper. Or Geilrín out near the starlit plains gathering lapfuls of strange-smelling plants with stranger names. Haldir sighed and shook the useless images from his mind; he could not think of them now. Find the Gondorians responsible first.
But right now all he wished for was the cold comfort and oblivion of sleep.
Someone was already standing at his bedside when he reached it.
"Fedorian summoned me to him this afternoon," Rúmil began without preamble, seating himself cross-legged on his brother's bed. "Orophin as well. He wishes to remove us from the borders."
Haldir feigned surprise. "Why should he have reason to do that?"
"I know not." Privately, Rúmil thought his earlier behavior might have had something to do with it. But why Orophin too? He idly watched his brother as Haldir bent to unbuckle his sword belt and unlace his boots. "Has he spoken to you of anything of the sort?"
"No." In truth, Fedorian had not, he told himself. His brother had not asked if it had been the other way around.
Rúmil sighed and raked a hand through his hair. "Truthfully, I am utterly perplexed. He said nothing to me, nor gave any indication that I was lacking… I cannot understand it. I do not want to be sent away."
Haldir felt a stab of shame but kept his attention intent on unfastening his tunic, saying nothing.
"Brother, I need your counsel."
Haldir sighed and took a seat beside his youngest brother. "Perhaps it is not because you are lacking…" he began without looking up.
"What else could it be?" Rúmil threw his hands up in distress and rose, pacing restlessly. "Then I have irked him. Intruded where I should not have! Done something to offend him…" He thought he had been comforting, reassuring, but, no, just a nuisance underfoot. A nag. A stripling. Maybe he should have just left him to his misery. Indignation swept over him. "I have defended him against all of them! Laer and—"
Fidgeting with his blanket hem, Haldir finally looked up and let out a tight sigh. "Brother, be not angry with Fedorian. It was I who offered him my counsel to—"
"'Your counsel,'" Rúmil turned on him. "You? What did you tell him?"
Haldir averted his eyes. "I thought it would be in your best interest to be elsewhere… far from here…"
"What? Why?" Realization dawned. "You sneak!"
Haldir stood. "Rúmil, I cannot take this right now."
His brother seized his arm firmly. "You will, Haldir, for I have not had my say." To cower behind the fences like a child! The shame would kill him—if it weren't already. "Always—you wished me not to join the guard. It was only until Fedorian interceded on my behalf that you would even allow me to train!"
"It would not be forever," Haldir explained. Why could he not understand this? "It is only temporary until this matter resolves itself."
"So we are to hide behind your skirts until the bad edain go away?" Rúmil dared the closest thing to a sneer as he could muster.
Haldir sighed.
"Even now when I am fully grown, you still see fit to treat me like a child!"
"That is not difficult, you are acting like one, Rúmil," Haldir said, his expression suddenly hard.
"How could you go over my head like that? Without even speaking to me about it!"
"I wanted you to be safe. I knew you would be too st—"
"Safe? Safe! Where was this sentiment when Lórien burned!" Rúmil laughed—it was not a pleasant sound. "When humans burned our home?" He rolled back his sleeves to expose the bandages on his forearms, his voice taut. "When I received these! Was I safe?"
"That is the very reason why I-"
Rúmil overrode him again, too angry to care who overheard. "You do not wish me to be kept safe! You want me out of the way. So you no longer have to think of me! So I am not underfoot!"
"Rúmil, I thought you had long set aside such childish outbursts," Orophin chided lightly as he stepped onto the platform.
Invective interrupted, Rúmil turned to his elder brother and pointed an accusing finger at Haldir. "He wishes to confine us to the Anduin borders! To rot in recreantise!" He turned back to his brother who sat still on his bed, refusing to get angry which only infuriated the younger elf more. "What gives you the right to make that decision for us?" he demanded. "You are not our father!"
"No. I am your eldest brother. And I do what I think is best for you." Stung finally into retaliation, Haldir retorted sharper than his self-control had intended him to.
"We are old enough to make our own decisions. And long have been," Orophin reminded him calmly, not angry but disappointed.
"I know that!" Haldir sighed again and massaged the corners of his eyelids as he forced himself not to lose control with his brothers. He was too tired to start this now. "It is the Captain's decision to move you if he sees fit. Even I cannot gainsay him."
Rúmil and Orophin could not refute that and subsided into sullen silence.
A creak of wood announced Rameil's arrival. The warrior stopped, ill at ease with the uncomfortable silence that swept in at his coming. "I am intruding. My apologies, I will return later."
Haldir stood up. "No need of that, Rameil. This is your space as well as mine—my brothers were leaving. We will discuss this tomorrow when we are not so vexed," he added in an undertone.
Orophin nodded gravely and slipped away.
"Rúmil—" Haldir reached for his younger brother's arm, reticent to let him leave so angry.
Rúmil jerked violently away and, without word or glance, followed after his other brother.
Haldir let out a deep sigh when they had gone and stretched out upon his bed.
Rameil smiled sympathetically. It was moments like these when he realized how fortunate he was not to have siblings. "Trouble?"
"Oh, I'm sure they are plotting my demise at this very moment."
Rameil nodded sagely as he unfastened the mess of straps and buckles that held his quiver up. Dropping it to the floor, he flexed stiff shoulders and stretched his back, yawning expansively. "What did you do?"
Haldir waved a hand in plea for ignorance and Rameil understood. "All right. I'm too tired for long night discussions at any rate."
"Is it so wrong to wish to protect those you love?" Haldir protested after a moment, unable to keep his thoughts to himself.
His friend made a non-committal noise in the back of his throat that sounded like agreement, wisely not getting involved with a family quarrel.
The dark-haired warrior fell asleep before Haldir did. For a while, he listened to his friend's light steady breathing as the night deepened around him. A cool, soothing breeze ghosted across his cheek, teasing a strand of hair over his jaw. The lantern on the table dwindled to a shadow.
A strong hand clamped over his mouth, startling him awake.
A whisper close to his ear. "Silently now. Do not wake Rameil."
The hand shifted and he sat up, blinking dazedly at the figure standing beside his bed. "Fedorian? What has happened?" he whispered groggily with a quick glance across the talan where Rameil slept on obliviously.
Fedorian ignored the question, his eyes glittering in the starlight. He indicated only for the other to meet him on the ground before he was gone.
Puzzled and wondering if he was ever to get any sleep tonight, Haldir threw his black undertunic on and retrieved his blade from under his bed. Slipping silently past sleeping soldiers, he was on the ground in seconds where Fedorian and, to his surprise, Arenath awaited him.
"What is happening?" he repeated as soon as he touched the ground.
"An opportunity has arisen." Fedorian set off on a swift lope a few paces ahead of them, leading swiftly past the barracks and across the deserted training ground.
"A track has been spotted—less than a score of them in the silt of the riverbank," Arenath explained, his eyes on his commander's back. "We are to intercept them."
"We three?"
Arenath nodded. "We three."
Lórien lay open before them, the jagged mark of fire carving a deep treeless scar, exposing the plainsland and the far-off crags of the Misty Mountains invisible under shadow. The warm smell of aging summer drifted on a damp wind. Skipping shadows of darkening clouds wheeling in the sky overhead, blotted out the stars.
Blood snapped like wire thrumming taut against a chilling wind. It combed through their hair as the trees began to dwindle, growing further apart, the wood thinning gradually as they broke out onto the plain-edges. Brittle treeless lands extended to the brink of sight, scrubs and water befouled with the dead still occasionally fished from the river. But these concerns for the land and anxieties with his brothers dropped away as Haldir ran, his hair flowing behind him, a pale almost white curtain catching the rays of the moon, Arenath and Fedorian silent loping shadows beside him.
Haldir realized for the first time that they were following a path, faint and meticulously concealed but still visible under the moon, receding into the wood. Further out on the plain, however, not further than fifty yards away, a little to the northwest, a pale red flicker pierced the darkness.
But Fedorian turned aside from the light and plunged deeper into the wood, following the unmistakable track of boot prints left in the soft earth. Finally, he stopped. He did not whisper for fear the sibilance would carry even to mortal ears. Instead, he drew them close and spoke in a low, quiet tone.
"They are not far. Carefully now. Ware their sentinels."
Calenon mentally cursed his luck as the trees loomed ahead, dark and foreboding. Cold shadows stretched out to meet him creeping shivers racing up and down his spine. For reassurance, he tightened on the sweat-slick leather strap riding in his hand. Long blue shadows veiled them as they slipped beyond sight of their camp.
Intricate lattices of brittle branches swayed overhead, growing thicker, darker as they moved onward, ears strained for any sound—of deer or elf. They passed a thick grove of yew trees, leaning close together like black-robed conspirators, the wind whispering confidentially in their leafy ears. The thick verge hid all from sight.
Swishing through thigh-length ferns, one of the men startled a wood thrush from her nest and she fluttered up, squawking with alarm.
Calenon whirled round, heart leaping into his throat as he upbraided the hapless soldier furiously. "You blundering ass! Do you want to bring the whole forest down upon us!" His words sounded unbearably loud. The wind had stilled, listening, a heavy silence growing between the branches of the leaning mellyrn. The second in command looked around uneasily.
Was it his imagination or had the trees grown larger? They loomed far above the heads of those beneath them, their tops lost in shadow. Black warriors that closed ranks behind them or confounded their way ahead. The men crept ever closer behind him, no single soldier wishing to be left behind as the expendable rear-guard. They held their weapons close staring up into the ominous trees. Even the moonlight hid her face behind a purple cloud.
If possible, the quiet had grown even deeper, a winter's chill seeming to spread from branch to branch through the normally warm summer air. Calenon shivered and unconsciously buttoned the throat fastenings of his tunic though sweat made it stick to his back and underarms. Every snap of a twig under one of their boots, every too-harsh breath or quiet murmur thundered in his ears, a cacophony of sound that seemed to shriek their presence to the entire, watchful wood.
It was then that he realized he could go no further. The trees grew so close together he could not pass through and neither was there a path through them. The men turned round to go back the way they had come only to find that the hissing and ever-shifting boughs intertwined behind them, blocking their way back.
Every part of him trembling, Calenon stared wildly about, his human eyes utterly bewildered in the sudden, impenetrable darkness that had fallen with the cowardice of the moon. His bolas dangled ready from his hand before he consciously thought about it.
"Devils! They are trying to frighten us!" he laughed, his eyes darting wildly about their cage. "They wish to break us!" His chuckle turned shrill and swiftly died. "You will not win do you hear me!" He shouted suddenly, past the point of caring for noise.
His voice echoed and reechoed, unanswered.
A relentless crushing grip caught at his shoulder. Wrenching himself free with a cry, he spun around, whirling his bolas which collided solidly with his attacker's body. The creature gasped through a broken throat, a strangled groan, a sharp jerk torqued his wrist as it tried to pull itself free.
"Die, fey creature!" He tore away his weapon, the jagged stones crimson. What had he felled? He crouched and touched the blood-matted clothes, felt the seven-tiered pommel of the sword in his adversary's lax hand, saw the glimmer of the silver tree he'd missed in the dark.
Sweat trickled down his face. He could hear sudden fighting in other parts of the clearing. The clash of steel ringing in his ears with his invisible men's shocked cries. Cries for aid.
Of pain.
Panting with a combination of fear and exertion, Calenon turned this way and that, like a wounded wolf searching for a gap in the ring of his enemies. Eyes seemed to gleam at him from all around, flickering a few yards away and then suddenly at his shoulder. He screamed aloud and staggered backwards, shaking from head to foot as the eyes moved closer, the only part of his assailant he could see. The bloodied bolas in his hand hung numb and heavy, utterly useless in his lifeless fingers. Cowering, he forsook it completely and covered his face with his hands.
But even that could not entirely block out the relentless, sobbing cries in the dark.
Wild exhilaration poured through him as his elegant blade opened another throat, gaping and crimson-filled, the pale form slumping. Haldir bared his teeth in a grim, reckless smile, his sight impaired not at all by the sudden blackness that came with falling night. Burning heat poured through his veins, scalding away fear and uncertainty, only the reek of blood and the pounding of it in his temples filled his senses, his heart leaping at a triple rhythm between his ribs. He didn't remember how many he had felled but the cries around him were growing slowly weaker.
How many had watched Silivren burn? Had they set the fires that had killed Geilrín? How many of these men had witnessed his torment?
Something seized his arm.
His sword fell from slippery fingers as he grasped his attacker by the throat, squeezing mercilessly, ruthlessly, his grasp on his adversary's windpipe exquisitely and inexorably tightening. He felt flesh soften, then bone crack; rigid fingers scraped at his bloody wrist, clawing at him and he only further tightened his grasp, his breath harsh and ragged through the smoke-induced pain scorching his lungs.
Silver flashed before Haldir's eyes and sharp, biting pain erupted on the right side of his chest. He gasped and let go. But a knife lay at his belt, swiftly unsheathed. Snarling he struck out brutally with all his strength, the keen knife easily parting cloth and leather. Once! Twice! The figure stumbled back against a tree, fell, brown-black leaves swirling around its shadowy form. Haldir seized the prostrate shadow, wholly prepared to strike again, to finish it as his own blood slid towards his ribs.
Only when something snicked his hand, drawing blood from his fingertips, did he recognize the unpinned brooch, its green enamel spoiled by a crimson smear.
"Tergon," the name escaped a low moan as the knife slipped as Haldir with shaking fingers rolled the bloodied man over onto his back. "Tergon, why are you here?"
But the dead cannot answer the questions of the living. He could not tell his friend that he had sent his brother in his place to be messenger to his people in Gondor. Tergon remained to see the end through—on the side of the elves. Meeting in secret, he had just blessed his brother on his way when he spotted the hunting party. Trailing them, he had caught sight of a flash of gold while kneeling in the brush and witnessed the carnage that followed as the men panicked, slaying themselves in their wild fear. He had rushed to the elves' aid and, throwing all caution to the side, had lunged to grasp a familiar shoulder in warning and had found the knife of his friend in his heart.
The young man's dimmed eyes upturned towards the trees saw nothing. A scarlet stain had begun to seep horribly through the green cloth, dulling the glimmer of the green brooch pinned there.
"Are you all right?" Arenath came to his side, looking down at his companion's bowed head and the pale body sprawled before his knees.
"What have I done?"
Reaching them, Fedorian stared at him dispassionately, busy cleaning his own weapon in the grass. "You saved his life and you took it away. You owed him nothing." He sheathed his blade securely and seized his lieutenant by the shoulders, pulling him to his feet.
His eyes flared. "Now you have nothing to hold you back. Compassion is a weakness and cannot be tolerated. He was human. He was meant from birth to die. Do not think anymore on it."
"It is not that simple!" Haldir shook his head, still in shock, staring at the young man who had saved him from Ramir's brutality on more than one occasion. "I had no right to take his life—he did nothing to me."
Fedorian raised an eyebrow. "Not even to protect those you love?"
Haldir looked up.
"I will not remove either Orophin or Rúmil from our borders—there are too many dead to sacrifice the living. It was either this life—" he shot a cursory glance at the dead boy. "—or leave one more Gondorian to take those of your brothers. Which would you have?" He turned away, leaving Haldir kneeling in the dirt numb with shock.
His eyes found his crimsoned knife which had fallen into the torn-up grass. Its stains mirrored the ones on his fingers, the ones his black tunic hid. The tendons in his hands flexed under the skin, red-gored ivory like spider webs in the lurid, shameless moonlight that pushed through the tree umbrage. He did not heed the fiery pain in his chest, his mind too awash with shock and disbelief and the growing gnawings of guilt.
Tergon was long cold when he managed to struggle to his feet, his legs chilled stiff and damp with dew. He bent and retrieved his knife, wiping it carefully clean on the grass before sheathing it at his waist. Without looking back, he turned and walked away into the ghostly mists.
Linwen, the young female guard, rolled over onto her back, oddly restless. Her youthful blood pumped still though night had long since fallen and she was dead tired. Something kept her awake. And she could not figure out what it was. A small crease furrowed her smooth brow. What was it?
Thinking about it would not help her remember so she put it out of her mind and rolled over onto her stomach. The days seemed to blur together so much now, she mused. Had it really only been days since the memorial? Her gentle heart sorrowed for them—and all of the northern fences. She did not know any of them very well but she was moved by their grief and had resolved more than ever to help wherever she could, to be useful.
Then she remembered.
The lieutenant hadn't come back yet. Usually, she said good night to him before she turned in; it had become something of a ritual between them while she'd been here. And he hadn't come back yet.
"I will just have to wait then," she sighed to herself, glancing quickly across the way at Eremae who lay sleeping lightly on her pallet. The healer stayed close to the soldiers as well, and Linwen was glad she was here. She was the only other female… now.
Sighing, Linwen rolled onto her side and stared out through the swaying, dancing, reeling boughs. The trees are restless too. She blinked and blinked again. The silver leaves bowed; a soft wind caressed the glittering leaves, dappling silver… moon rays chased by… playful shadows…
The familiar, light step on the platform above brought her up instantly. "Good night, lieutenant," she called softly upwards into the dark.
There came no reply.
