Guess whos BACK baby?! That's right, I have not yet died and I have rediscovered my love for writing fanfiction. I am finally going to finish Upheaval! I literally cannot wait, this is gonna be epic. Enjoy!
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Kaali woke, and she did not expect to. She knew not how long it had been since the Rohanian man had taken his blade and stabbed it into her abdomen. In a panic, her hands shot down to that place where he had assaulted. Her query lent her the satisfaction of feeling unmarred flesh and clothing, but she was not in the same place in which her world went dark. She gazed about and was met only with seep, blue-black stone. She felt as if she was surrounded by water, her body submerged, but strangely, she could breathe. As her eyes adjusted, she saw before her, grand effigies carved from stone and as she looked about the forms and figures of animal heads and human forms, some she recognized, some she did not. Looming around her was Thuris, the ram-god, Eguz, sun-goddess, among others, and the most familiar, directly in front of her, Rokka, god of Pestilence.
The cold, dark, empty silence was broken, as well as Kaali's reverence when a voice boomed from the void,
"You let that Blonde Man get the best of you, did you, my wife?" the statue did not move, though deep was the voice that emitted from it.
"Well," Kaali proclaimed, "It isn't as if I expected him to kill me. I thought these men of Gandalf the Grey or White or whoever he is now, were far more scrupulous than that." She laughed nervously and, dropping to her knees, she grasped at the icy stone beneath her fingers, knowing full well she was here to face the judgement of her own god-husband and all the gods of her people.
"You disgrace me, wife, for you know full well the way of wizards and horse-lords these days." Rokka boomed from his figurine, and Kaali was silent.
Her pregnant pause was ended as she spoke, "Perhaps I was wrong to be off my guard," Kaali rose and felt now the stone beneath her feet, she felt her own skin and beneath her palms was the feeling of that which she had experienced since waking, cold and hard and unforgiving. She could tell she was not, but she, too, felt like stone.
"Indeed." Her husband mused from the mouthpiece of the great stone idol. He let Kaali stay for what seemed like an era to muse over what came next. Would she be taken to whatever came after the mortal plane of existence? Left in this dark and unforgiving room, her soul to rot beneath the stony eyes of the gods? Perhaps she'd be swept to the Shadow Place with her husband, but all too soon she remembered she had a duty to fullfill.
It was a duty far beyond all this. A promise that was made by a sister to a brother, this was a promise far beyond the power or influence of either gods or men. Kaali loved few things more than her family, and she had to help Grima, she promised. She couldn't die here. She could not. In the coldest halls of her holding cell, her blood began to boil. She was desperate to fullfill her oath.
"Rokka!" She called to the void. " I will not perish here, husband! Send me back! You have done this before, I'm sure!" her please echoed in the empty spaces and the walls seemed to close in around her. There came no reply and Kaali began to wonder if the gods really did have such power. Gandlafs gods obviously did, were her gods so much lesser that they could not perform this task? The ground began to shake and Rokka's statue somehow seemed so much larger and closer to her.
"Why would you go back? Why would you ever go back? Your suffering is over." Rokka roared, his tone seeming angry.
Kaali tightened her fists, clenched into as small of balls as her hands could be. "My brother... I promised my aid to him..." she knew what she was getting into. Rokka, like the Plague he commanded and had granted her control of, was volitile and unpredictable.
"Kaali..." Rokka trailed off. "You can come with me. You can live forever at my side as one of my many wives. Like a goddess, you will have eternal life, you will be known among your people, my wife..." The ground, now calm, began to rumble again as if an earthquake aftershock was ripping its way through the cave. "Would you forsake me?"
Kaali whisphered to the earth, "What if I did?"
The rumble stopped. His interest was piqued. "If you choose me, you will live forever with me and your sisters, my godspouses before you. You will be happy, my wife, I will see to it. You could have all you want, anything. But you must stay in the Shadow and not return to the Earth."
Through tear stained eyes Kaali gazed up at the figure before her. She thought for a moment how good it would be, to remain undisturbed and have her needs attended to. No longer would she feel pain, nor concern for the goings on of the Mortal world above. But no, she knew what she needed to do.
"You choose your brother, I can and will send you back, with the favor and fortune I have gifted you. However," Rokka let the silence hang. "You must forfeit that which I returned to you during our celestial matrimony, and I will divorce you. No longer will you have the benefit or reputation of my wife if you choose your brother over me."
Kaali thought for a moment. Grima, though her brother he may be, was unstable and selfish, but she loved her brother. Her father was his father, though their mothers differed, and she remembered, over her short years, the day her sweet baby brother was born. She still saw him this way, certainly. He needed someone to care for him, to look after him, and their parents were long since dead, her siblings only had each other now. After a long time mentally wrestling with herself she finally spoke, knowing what she would sacrifice,
"I choose my brother."
The feeling of being sent back to the eath was something akin to being chain-strapped to a meteor.
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There you go!
Oh dear, what will become of our other friends? Will Haldir ever get better? Who's gonna put an end to Grima? Where the hell is Eowyn? And what exactly did Kaali just give up? Tune in next time for an all new episode!
Thank you so much for reading and be ready for more!