"Humanity has won its battle. Liberty now has a country."
-Marquis de Lafayette
"That's right, you bastards! You ugly sons of bitches!" Amelia screamed wildly as the witch-king set off on his foul beast, his attention diverted for the moment and the armies of Mordor turned their heads towards the sound of horns. "Eat it! Taste it! Taste it and die, you punkass jerkwads!"
"Amelia!" Pippin yelled squeakily, his voice still in a high pitch from his brief confrontation with the witch-king.
"And tell 'em Amelia sent ya!"
"Amelia!"
"What?!" Amelia spun around, a crazed look in her eye, stemming from her huge relief and persisting fear for her life, since the sounds of battle could still be heard coming from all directions of the city.
"Their attention is elsewhere!" Gandalf exclaimed intently, struggling to his feet with Pippin's help. Shadowfax immediately approached him and Gandalf put a still hand on his smooth neck. "Now is the time for us to move."
"Right!" Amelia's breathing came quickly, but neither Pippin or Gandalf commented on it as the three of them took their places of the back of Shadowfax, who bore it well, but Amelia expected it, due to the horse being born as the Lord of the Mearas. Gandalf would have had to truly impress him for Shadowfax to allow him to ride on his back.
Shadowfax's lineage showed, in that he had always been incredibly fast as well as intelligent, and he demonstrated it to his full capabilities as he made a beeline for the higher rings of the city, guardsmen streaming to and fro in the streets still.
"Gandalf! Gandalf, what are those?" Pippin called as they rounded a corner of the fourth, with both Gandalf and Amelia yelling Boromir's name and attempting to ask those they passed of his whereabouts, but they passed them too quickly to get a proper answer.
"What?" Amelia shouted and looked in the direction that Pippin was pointing. He was gesturing in the direction of Mordor, but not at Mordor itself. On the horizon before it, through the dust that had risen from the fighting, lumpy, grey shapes as tall as watchtowers were wading forwards. She squinted. "The fuck?!"
"I do not know what they might be, but they are too far away to affect us as of now." Gandalf called back to them, his focus entirely on finding the Steward's firstborn son.
"They're oliphaunts!" Amelia realized with a silly grin, despite the fact that the oliphaunts would be powerful adversaries against the rohirrim. "There was a song about those things in the books, too!"
"What books?" Pippin called and Amelia shook her head, still smiling oddly to herself.
"Nothing!" She was cut off as Shadowfax sprinted around a corner and nearly collided with a closing door, the one that led up and into the fourth level. "Whoa!"
"Open the doors!" Gandalf commanded, his voice still strong, and his shout carried beyond the doors and they swung open once again. Shadowfax trotted through, holding his head high and clearly thinking himself above such petty men.
"What's happening?" Amelia called at the armored men below her and they didn't meet her eye. "Why are you closing the gate?"
"The lower rings are lost, your ladyship." A man whose helmet told of his rank as a captain looked up, squaring his shoulders. "More lives would be saved if we sealed the gate and gave the people here more time to seek safety."
"Safety?!" Amelia exclaimed angrily, an ugly expression settling on her sweaty face. "Where the fuck is that? Are you gonna stick 'em all in a cellar somewhere and hope for the best?" She was surprised when Gandalf didn't interrupt her, but she saw that he was frowning at the captain as well. "People are dying down there and you'd leave them for the orcs? A good man once told me there is courage and honor to be found in men, but I sure don't see it!" Amelia spat at him, Shadowfax moving into a trot at Gandalf's urging. "Coward." She hissed back at the captain, who turned away from her.
"Shouldn't we find Boromir?" Pippin asked suddenly and both Amelia and Gandalf startled at the question.
"We should." Amelia remarked slowly, looking back. "But so far, we've been through four rings and I can't imagine he's anywhere further from the fighting."
"You do know him best, my dear." Gandalf thought aloud and Amelia cocked her head.
"I do?" Gandalf mumbled something and Shadowfax slowed, seemingly annoyed with his riders, judging from the way he shook his white head. The intelligence of him was still odd to see, since it would be far too easy to assume him a simple horse with no keen mind to speak of. "Well, then…"
"Mithrandir!" Both Amelia and Gandalf's head perked up and towards the sound of his name being called, seeing a guard from the door elbowing his way towards them. There were still throngs og guards and a few townspeople running through the streets, so it took a while for him to reach them, but reach them he did. "I heard that you look for Lord Boromir."
"Do you know where he is?" Amelia asked quickly, cutting off Gandalf and Pippin.
"Last I heard, he was manning the ballistae on the higher end of the second level," The guard was cut off when another guard bumped into his shoulder. "Though I know not whether he has moved since then."
"How long ago?" Gandalf asked and the guard took a moment to answer. Amelia could see his forehead wrinkling beneath his helmet.
"No more than an hour."
"A lot can happen in an hour." Amelia glanced at Gandalf, who didn't seem too worried, but not too hopeful either. In the distance, Amelia heard a colossal roar and the sound of horns being blown again. "Sounds like Rohan's arrived." She quipped as Gandalf turned Shadowfax and headed back the way they had come, charging back into the fray of frightened men and women.
"Get back! They're here!" The captain from before suddenly cried loudly and Shadowfax hurried backwards as guards suddenly spilled through the gate, with black shapes that jeered and snarled in a vigorous pursuit.
"No!" Amelia protested as she slid off Shadowfax, with both Pippin and Gandalf calling after her, the former anxious and the latter tense. She didn't get far before the doorway was shut, with a few guards still remaining on the other side, desperately screaming for help and gurgling when they met their ends. Then, the gate boomed as something large and heavy slammed into it from the other side and Amelia took an involuntary step backwards.
"Amelia!" Behind her, she heard Pippin call for her again, but she ignored him.
"Gandalf!" She heard another voice exclaim and she twisted her upper body around as she drew her sword, knowing that the doorway wouldn't last long under the assault that the orcs put upon it.
"Boromir." Gandalf greeted him as he slid off Shadowfax himself, leaving the horse to its own devices. "It gladdens me to see you alive."
"The orcs are relentless." Boromir replied darkly. His broad sword was slick with black blood and his brown hair was matted with it. "But new hope has arrived."
"So it would seem."
"Where the flying fuck have you fucking been?!" Amelia shouted as she stumbled out of the throng of guards pressed up against the doorway. Her heart beat fast and furiously in her chest, but after a long night of fighting, she was lacking the energy and patience to express relief instead of anger. Boromir had barely turned before she grabbed his shoulders tightly. "I've had a pretty messed up night, cause I got blown up, again, I've been fighting for my life for hours, I've had tea with the witch-king and I've ridden a kriffing horse through the entire city looking for you and then you're right here right after I heard you were horsing around on the second level-" The doorway boomed again and Amelia snarled at it.
"I see you're uninjured." Boromir's voice was a tad bit odd, but Amelia was too caught up in her own tirade to take particular notice. Amelia heard Gandalf mutter something in a tone that spoke of fond annoyance at absurdism, but he looked quite innocent when she narrowed her eyes at him. She hastily let go of Boromir's shoulders and drew Aeglos again.
"Well, I'm alive." Amelia answered Boromir irritably, forcing herself to look straight ahead, even as she felt his eyes resting on her. "I've got a killer headache…" The doorway boomed again and Amelia heard it groan and begin to crack beneath the onslaught. "My legs feel like jelly, I've got cuts everywhere, blood in my hair and bruises that'll last for weeks, but I can still fight." She heard Pippin draw his short sword behind her, little more than a long dagger in her own hands, and Gandalf readied Glamdring with a determined look in his eyes.
In the distance, a terrible sound suddenly came from the Pelennor and Amelia didn't even register it as she stumbled, black spots dancing in her eyes. The shriek of the nazgûl had always struck fear and terror in the hearts of all who heard them, but somehow the effect was amplified when the shriek itself was filled with it. It was a death's scream, one that seemed to last an eternity before it came to a stop. From the Pelennor, there was something that sounded like an explosion encased in metal and then, it was over again.
Amelia's head swam as she struggled to her feet, the hammering on the gate not having ceased and still strong and merciless.
"What manner of villainy would make such a sound?" She heard Boromir ask beside her, but she couldn't see him as a persistent throbbing thumped behind her eyes and she blinked.
"That…" She gasped out, her memory unfocused in the wake of the scream. She forced her face in Boromir's probably direction. "Was probably something you ought to celebrate." She gasped out, rubbing her face and tightening her hand around her sword. "The witch-king…" Her eyes cleared a bit as she shook her head. "Dead and done." She confirmed and readied her sword, taking the correct stance. She recognized the unmistakable grunt of a troll coming from the doorway.
"No man can kill-"
"Yeah, well, it wasn't a man." Amelia snapped as the doorway boomed and splinters flew. "A little focus, please?" Boromir's jaw set and he turned fully towards the groaning doors, cutting an imposing figure.
Suddenly, in less than a second, the temperature fell dramatically. Amelia's eyes widened and a green glow came through the cracks appearing in the door. Goosebumps rose on her skin and she heard confused men utter their bewilderment around her.
The army of ghosts ran through the door and through the guards behind it, the air filling with the horrified gasps and a few screams at the sight of the army of dead men. Amelia flinched as they passed through her, but she didn't cry out or yell or try to flee in horror like those around her. Boromir whirled around, taking in their unexpected aid with disbelief etched on his pale face.
"Wait, wait, stop!" Amelia called and spread her arms as the panic around her thickened, though the dead men scarcely noticed their presence. "They mean no harm." She frowned and took back that statement. "Well, not to us- they're, they're friendlies!"
"The ghosts of Dunharrow." Gandalf remarked grimly, sheathing Glamdring once again. His face and eyes were dark. "So he walked the path."
"They have come to fulfil their oath?" Boromir asked skeptically and Amelia shuddered as the ghosts continued to sprint straight through them all. Boromir was pale and stoic, standing still as green ghosts ran through him.
"Something like that." Panicked and confused shouts rose from the white city as the green army washed over it like a wave, laying waste to all who served Mordor, but doing harm to no one who opposed it. "I always thought that was a major deus-ex-machina, but right now, I couldn't care less about that." Amelia took a deep breath and looked down at Aeglos, then wiped it clean on her pants. She looked up and took a deep breath, tasting dust and decay on the air, and shamelessly leaned against Boromir, breathing calmly and freely for the first time since darkness had fallen. Above her, the sun broke through the thick layer of clouds.
"Anything?" Boromir called to her as she rested a finger on the neck of a man of Rohan. After a few seconds, she looked up and held a hand above her eyes. Despite him being quite close, she could only see the outline of Boromir through the thick dust in the air.
"Nothing." She called to him, disappointment filled her yet again as she stepped back from the body. Combing the battlefield outside the city for survivors was dirty, tiresome and unpleasant work, but it had to be done and Amelia had volunteered with a deep sigh.
The short grass covering the plain had been trampled and the dirt kicked up by the hooves of horse and oliphaunts. Dead men and their various steeds lay strewn across the battlefield. The air was thick with dust and the smell of sweat.
She trudged through the soft ground, wet with blood, with cumbersome steps, having to pull a bit on her feet to raise them. The ground was a bit muddy, despite no rain having come, but Amelia knew that it was wet with blood and not water. The stench of it was heavy.
A strange sound came from the direction of Minas Tirith and Amelia turned to see the army of ghosts evaporate in the sunlight, the leader, who had borne a jagged crown and a torn cape, facing a man with a grey cloak and a long, silvery sword. At his side was a helmeted dwarf bearing a large axe and a tall elf with a braid in his hair and a quiver of arrows strapped to his back.
"Hey!" Amelia called as the last remnants of a once mighty people faded away, leaving no trace that they had ever come down from the mountains in the first place. The man, the elf and the dwarf did not respond and she broke into a quick jog, heading towards them at a brisk pace. "Hey!" Legolas turned as the first and a calm smile spread on his beautiful face as he saw her, inclining his head as she caught up to him. Gimli exclaimed a hearty greeting as she clasped his shoulder with an exhausted grin, despite sporting a bleeding lip and a bruise over his bushy eyebrow. Aragorn bowed his head to her, a smile breaking out on his face as well. He seemed worn and tired, covered in sweat, grime and things that Amelia didn't want to put a name to, but still he had a regal air about him.
"Wonderful to see you're still out and about." Gimli clapped her back and she nodded down at him, smiling at having reunited with her friends. She had missed them keenly, but had endured it in silence and with no complaint.
"It's nice to have some good news after all this bullshit." Amelia agreed and smiled at Legolas again. "Some night, huh?"
"We heard the orcs had taken the city." Aragorn's voice was calm and steady, but Amelia had traveled with him for a while and knew him well. She recognized a subtle tone of both relief and weariness.
"They certainly tried." Amelia started to get back to checking the bodies strewn randomly around her, checking for any signs of life. "They got the lower rings. They were just about to nick another when you came running." Amelia saw that Aragorn met the eyes of Gandalf behind her back and rolled her eyes slightly to herself when she was that Gandalf bowed his head deeply to Aragorn. She made her way away from her three friends, knowing that she still would have time for a better reunion and much merriment with them later.
Amelia stepped around the body of a horse and spotted a man lying beneath the corpse of an orc. With some difficulty, due to the size of the orc, she pushed it off the man and made to crouch at his side, reaching out a hand to feel for a pulse. She never made it though, for she was interrupted when she heard a choked scream and she furiously looked for the source, scrambling to her feet and immediately grabbing for Aeglos. The plain of Pelennor was big and covered in lumpy bodies both big and small, from oliphaunts to haradhrim to orcs, so it wasn't stupid to think that orcs still hid in some corners, waiting to take as many men and women with them before they died as well.
It was a man who had screamed, but not out of pain or surprise, but shock and sorrow. Amelia's eyes widened and she ran towards Éomer, who was sprinting towards something on the battlefield. When, he reached it, he pulled it into his lab and screamed his denial out over the plains, desperation, disbelief and grief warring for dominance on his reddened face.
Éomer sobbed openly into his sister's golden hair when Amelia came skidding to a stop beside him and fell to all fours, her heartbeat quickening at the sight of how pale and cold Éowyn's fair face looked. She had always known her to be a cool person, distanced and regal in her persona, but a chilly façade was still far more lively that the cold look of death.
Éomer clutched Éowyn ever tighter when Amelia tried to search for a pulse, seemingly not recognizing her or noticing anything around him in his mad grief. Finally, Amelia was able to rest two fingers on Éowyn's icy neck and felt nothing. Searching frantically on the other side, Amelia's mind went back to every interaction she had had with Éowyn, wondering whether any of them could have had a fatal effect on Éowyn's destined battle with the witch-king of Angmar. Then, the barest hint of life made itself known and Amelia searched wildly around herself with her eyes.
"Somebody!" She screamed, her voice low and raspy. "Over here! We've…" She coughed briefly. "We've got one! A healer, a horse, something!" A heavy hand came to rest on her shoulder and Aragorn knelt down beside her. Amelia leaned back to give him the space he needed and he pressed a hand to Éowyn's forehead. Éomer finally looked up as he saw the ring of Barahir on Aragorn's hand and his eyes met Aragorn's for a second before Aragorn looked down at the white lady again.
"She may yet live." He said, though his voice was heavy and weighty with words and worries unsaid. "But she has gone to a dark place. She will need immediate attention." Amelia got to her feet as she watched the two men lift Éowyn's still body and call for a horse, with Éomer refused to let go of her and insisting on riding for the Houses of Healing personally. Aragorn wasn't slow to acquiesce, seeing the hopelessness of arguing quickly, and he and Amelia watched as the horse kicked up a trail of dust as it galloped towards the white city towering above the Pelennor.
"Well…" She coughed awkwardly into a fist as she looked uncertainly at Aragorn. "I guess it's back to work?"