Chapter: 26, "The Kill"

Word Count: 1,023

Disclaimer: I have never and will never own the Lord of the Rings, all rights go to J.R.R. Tolkien.

Beforehand Notes: There's angst. Like, a pretty good deal of angst. I was going to put part of it in the previous chapter, but it didn't work. So now it's in this chapter. I want to clearify what my two definition of virgin are.

1: Someone who's never experienced sexual intercourse.

2: An innocent, naïve, and overall inexperienced person fitted to whatever context.

When Ruth refers to herself as a virgin, she is using it in the manner that she is inexperienced in what she'll talk about.

- The Kill -

I had searched.

I searched, and searched, and kept searching. I looked on and on until the bodies blurred and blood blackened. Until my world was covered in a veil; dark, grey, lifeless. But no matter how many tears I shed and how many frustrated cries I let out, I did not find him.

"They were outnumbered!" Iorlas had told Denethor, "None survived."

I forced myself to look at the heads of Faramir's men, but though I saw the horrors of orcish nature, I still did not see his head among the others.

Perhaps they did not find it, I thought. Perhaps it lies upon the waste of a graveyard.

"My sons are spent! My line has ended!" Denethor cried.

"He's alive!"

"The house of stewards has failed."

"He needs medicine my lord!"

"My line has ended!"

"My lord!"

"Rohan has deserted us!"

"My lord!" I hadn't realized I began to join Pippin in his calls of my lord.

"Théoden's betrayed me!"

"King Théoden would never, my lord!"

"Abandon your posts! Flee! Flee for your lives!"

Words were thrown carelessly and it became a maelstrom of confusion and command. Soldiers were torn between obeying their lord or their loyalty to the city. Some begin to tentatively leave their post, perhaps wondering if their lord were testing them or had he truly gone mad, while others stood still.

"Can I?" I asked Gandalf, who looked ready to whack Denethor into unconsciousness with his staff (which he would).

Gandalf looked at me in humor, before shaking his head, and began to, basically, beat the steward up. "Prepare for battle. Hurry men! To the wall! Defend the wall! Over here! Return to your posts." He rode up to the wall on his horse, "Send these foul beasts into the abyss."

I don't remember when, or how, or why, but the orcs began piling into the city, and in my hand was my knife, prepared not to kill, but to defend. An orc came towards me, his jagged blade coming from the side. I narrowly blocked it, the force sending terrible shock up my arm, but I did not think about that. I pushed the blade back, only to have the orc come at me again. It became a rhythm of survival; neither of us wanting to lose, only one of us wanting to win.

Suddenly, my blade pushed into his chest, through what must have been a weak link in its armor.

Have you ever killed something?

Have you ever watched the life drain from a living, breathing thing's eyes? Did you see them with fear in those very same eyes? Eyes that would looks slowly down at the blade stuck in its chest, taking the life it once had from it.

I knew it was not possible to go through this journey without taking a life. Growing up in a harsh neighborhood that spoke of murders and rapes on a daily basis, I was, for the most part, okay with injuring orcs, or throwing them from ladders, so long as I kept all the vile deeds and horrid actions they've done in mind. It did not affect me in a way I knew it was supposed to. It did not make my stomach turn, and neither did a battlefield, if I didn't look at it too long. I guess that was one good thing my town gave me- tolerance of death.

Because I could defend myself, if need be, and I could even leave an injured orcs, without a third thought, knowing they would die. But despite all the injury I have caused, I had never taken a life. I had never watched anything die by my hand. Until now.

I thought myself lucky, actually, that it took this long, two whole movies, for me to need to watch something die by my hand. For me to have to murder something. But then I thought, perhaps I shouldn't need to murder anything. Why do I have to kill something? Why?

Because I took the role of a soldier. I chose to fight, and this was my consequence.

In a world of murder, I was a virgin. Suddenly that virginity, that innocence I possessed, was taken, wasted on the life, or rather death, of one orc.

But war waited for no man, woman, beast or burden.

"Do not be so weak-hearted!" Someone said from beside me, taking down another orc. I shut my eyes briefly, and let out a breath.

I continued to block and run, but my world was underwater, and I forgot how to swim. I was backed into a corner, another orc looking at me with loathe. They were bred for war, they knew neither pain nor death. They knew not guilt and regret; the burning compunction of murdering someone. And those were all just big words for a small concept; They would not care if I died from their hand.

The orc wretched my knife out of my hand, and pushed me further into the corner. It raised its sword, and I thought, What if this is karma? A life for a life. The sword began to come down upon me, and I brought my hands up, closing my eyes. I could not bear to watch my own death.

But the sword never came.

"Ruth." It was Gandalf. "Ruth, are you okay?"

"I killed something."

He looked at me with pitying eyes I could not stand, before nodding, and saying, "Go find Pippin, you know where he is more than I do."

I nodded, but said first, "It looked scared, before it died."

Gandalf turned away, and said, "They always do."

I made my way to the high parapet, and find Pippin. My knife was out still, incase the foul beasts came to us, but they did not. Two feet before him I stood, but I could feel sorrow radiating off of him.

"I killed something." Pippin echoed my words from before.

"Yeah," I said in a hollow, perfunctory voice, standing now only one foot beside him. "Me too." I sighed. "I really hate war."

"Yeah," Pippin continued to echo, "Me too."