Tinder for the Flames

by Lindir's Ghost

Now into Part II: Following the disastrous events of Amon Hen, a desperate Aragorn unwillingly sends a badly wounded Legolas, with Gimli at his side, to Edoras in an effort to save him. But there are venomous snakes writhing in the tall grasses of Rohan, and Edoras might not prove to offer the salvation the ranger seeks. AU, non slash.

20. Chapter Twenty: Watches of the Night

Okay: firstly, sorry. This has been a very long time in coming, and an even longer time in the making.

Kind of as a sorry, I've made it uber long. There's 64 pages of this bad boy. Future posts will be shorter to decrease time between posts, because nine months is plain ridiculous. I now only have one job, and am not working every day (hooray), which means I have time to write. Shorter posts, all the same.

Thank you to those of you who have sent the messages pleading with me to not abandon this story. I will never abandon it: it's my brain baby. And a triple thank you to those wonderful few who have taken the time to give me a word of your thoughts. Love it, hate it, I don't mind – I just want to know! Please take a minute to drop me a line … it has taken me nine months to write this, after all!

Finally, this chapter is for two people: for Mandy, because she has been poorly. For Meredith, simply because she is awesome. For both of them, for their constant badgering! Now that this is up, I can catch up on both of your stories guilt-free!

Chapter Twenty: Watches of the Night

She was like a thing broken as he led her down to her bower. Her back was straight, her eyes forward, and she had shaken his support from her arm long ago. She neither spoke nor returned his edged glances, and their journey through the darkening corridors was lonely and long. Outwardly, Éowyn was the fierce Lady of Rohan the people knew her as. Outwardly. Birshen hated the fracturing he could see deep in her eyes.

They reached the door, and stopped. The deepening shadows slipped over them with a breath of chill. Éowyn shivered, but made no move to go inside. Birshen hesitated, throwing her an uncertain glance and, reaching carefully around her, opened the door.

Éowyn's rooms were north-facing, just as the healing rooms were, and the shades of night had taken hold here long before they had the rest of the house. A banked fire glowed somewhere deep within, painting the blank faces of the furniture with a dark glow. There was nothing welcoming about the place at all in the absence of light, not even a maid awaiting the return of her lady, and Birshen did not want her to go to such coldness, not after what had happened.

"I'll find a sconce…" His voice shied from her silence like a whipped dog from its master. Finding words to offer her seemed so impossible … everything was suddenly so trivial, so meaningless, and it felt an insult to speak of other things…

"I don't need a sconce." Éowyn's words were quiet, hard. "I needed you to help my brother." The quiet melody of her speech bucked with pain, her eyes never leaving the neat grain of oak wood before her. The sun gold river shimmered with the shake of her head, convicting. "I want nothing from you. Ever again."

"Éowyn-"

Finally, she looked to him. The sharpest blade could not have cut him as deeply as her eyes, eyes he had always known to show kindness and love. No more. "I thought they'd crippled your leg, not your courage."

Something in Birshen's chest slipped. And it hurt.

The door was shut and she was gone, and Birshen was alone, the print of her condemnation burying itself deeper into his mind. Coward.

His head too numbed with shock, Birshen's feet seemed to take the decision to get him back to his own chambers. The healer bit back a groan as the pain in his stressed leg woke him from his stupor, resenting his new movement and punishing him fervently for it. It did not matter if the silent walls bore witness to his weakness. Birshen hedged his way through the stillness towards the healing quarters, leaning heavily on the blank panels and moving pitifully slowly away from where the words scorched the dusted air.

Coward.

-(())-

"We have to stop. The light is waning too quickly."

It was. Even out here, in the open places of the world, daylight was still only too happy to abandon them to the blinding dark. Gimli could not have said that he resented Aragorn's decision: his arms felt that they were stretched to at least over a foot their normal length, and his chin had itched for at least the past league. With two hands occupied with holding the makeshift cloak litter, trying to scratch on his chest had not only been ineffective, but maddening.

"Rea-eally?" His response was pounded from him when his foot plunged into an unseen hole. Gimli could not say how many times that had happened through the day. "There's a shame." Finding the hobbits was as much a priority to him, but desperation and exhaustion were no longer balanced, and the pain in his shoulders was making him genuinely doubt that he could fight for them if – by some grace of the Valar – they ever managed to catch up.

A little reprieve, even if it was only for an hour, would be more than welcome.

Yet despite the ranger's words and promise of rest, he failed to stop, his head still bowed as it had been for the entire day, the rise and fall of the land mapped clearly to Gimli in the role of his shoulders. The dwarf watched the thick thatch of dark hair before him, crowned with the glancing gold of the last light.

Exchanges between them had been limited by Aragorn's need to concentrate on the fading trail, his head bent as he read the land with the unparalleled skill of a ranger of the North. Carrying Legolas between them checked their speed, and to make tracking all the harder, it had rained heavily on them at about midday, when the trees had opened and completely abandoned them to the nakedness of the immense grass plains of Rohan. It was only a brief deluge, but it was intense enough to pummel the grass and mute the Uruk's passage to even Aragorn's skilled eyes … all the land looked the same to Gimli, and he could not even begin to understand how Aragorn could distinguish between a blade of grass flattened by a foot or water.

There was nothing around them save winter-burned grass and the most incredible expanse of sky Gimli had ever seen. It seemed a ridiculous thing to observe, but he had never thought the sky to be so imposingly massive. Great columns of cloud conquered the helpless blue, climbing high like the smoke pillars of merciless marauders, aided by the wind that forced the tussocks of pale grass to bow in subservient respect. The same wind cut and chafed at his exposed cheeks and found its way unerringly through every parting in his clothing. There was nothing out here to challenge its passage, no trees, no mounds, and it galloped and gambolled with all the unchecked freedom of the legendary horses of Rohan themselves.

It was hauntingly beautiful, if such a desolate place could be described as such … but for travellers – particularly those more in need of shelter than others – it was wholly unforgiving, and Gimli sighted an uncomfortable and cold night ahead of them.

If they ever stopped.

"Aragorn!"

Gimli felt only a shot of guilt when those rolling shoulders jerked with surprise at his bark. Finally, finally, the ranger's feet came to a halt, his eyes caught with a kind of dazed confusion as he looked over his shoulder to see what his companion wanted. Gentler, Gimli prompted: "There's no more light for this. You said so yourself."

Aragorn blinked, as though remembering his own words was almost too high an ask. "Even if it is only a handful of miles, we must keep going." His tone hung with the same heart-deep weariness that pulled on his posture and weighed his feet. "They've gained too much on us already."

They've an entire day on us. As if a few miles will get us any closer. "And lose the trail in the dark, because you are too tired to see?" Fatigue against stubbornness: this was a battle Gimli knew he could win, and it would take little more than a hard push of will. Aragorn's fort was crumbling, and that could not be allowed to happen: he needed the rest he so ardently denied. His skills as a tracker were beyond anything Gimli had ever encountered, picking out detailed stories from the land where Gimli saw only grass. If he missed something because he pushed himself too far, the implications were too awful to consider.

Aragorn gave no response, but neither did he move. It was all Gimli needed. Taking advantage of the ranger's pause, he announced: "Well, here looks as good a spot as any," and without further hesitation, he moved a little to the left, where the tufts of grass were more level, and lowered his end of Legolas' cloak litter to the ground. Forced to follow suit for Legolas' sake, Aragorn mirrored his action, but not without a well-aimed glare – which Gimli took as a token of triumph on his part.

Despite his reluctance to stop, Aragorn set a rudimentary camp immediately, his hands in his pack and setting his medicines in the grass. Only when he was ready did he turn his attention to Legolas. He called softly to him, cupping his face and tapping his cheek, uttering something in Sindarin that Gimli could not even pretend to understand. It did not surprise the dwarf that the elf gave no reaction, but Aragorn's disappointment was clear in the sagging of the corners of his mouth, his eyes weary and utterly unhappy.

"I thought you wanted him to sleep?"

"Not like this. This is too deep."

"So he needs it," Gimli shrugged, trying to throw Aragorn's concern. "Hard to blame him, with what he's been through." Truth be told, he was as worried as the lad was, but worry was a breeding ground for despair, and Aragorn falling to such a dangerous emotion would cripple their chances of finding the hobbits, and like as not destroy Legolas' chance of survival completely. All Gimli could do was work to dispel the threat. "Hardly surprising, is it?"

Aragorn shook his head to himself as he retrieved his flask from his pack. "I should never have given him the poppy." Before breaking camp that morning, he had emptied his own water reserve into the leaf litter and replaced it with what was left of the fever tea he had brewed. From what Gimli had seen, taking the tea had made little difference to the fever that made the archer's brow shimmer in the dying light, but Aragorn still fed it to him all the same throughout the day. As he did it now, Legolas' head carefully angled for little offerings of liquid to slip down his throat, Gimli watched not Legolas, but Aragorn.

"This isn't your fault, lad, none of it. You can't blame yourself."

"Can't I?" Silver met earth brimming with self-condemnation, etching out Aragorn's conviction in unblinking surety. The strength of feeling was so solid, Gimli felt – not for the first time in his relationship with the man – that he stared into the eyes of an ancient. He looked so distinctly elven, it was like sharing one of Legolas' harder stares, the ones that could sear even the roughest warrior into meekness and subservience. It was difficult to maintain the contact without turning away … it made him feel so small, so childish. Before Gimli's resolve could buckle, those powerful eyes finally removed themselves and turned their attention back to Legolas, and Gimli could not deny his sense of relief.

Gimli's offer of help was quietly refused as Aragorn raised Legolas' body against his chest, and so he was reduced to watching as Aragorn continued to tease small amounts of tea down the elf's throat. He could understand Aragorn's concern: other than the awful tremors that wracked his body from time to time even in sleep, Legolas had neither moved nor woken since the night before. The complete unresponsiveness was more than a little worrying, and Aragorn had stated earlier that, where he would normally have decided to administer another dose of poppy, he deemed it too dangerous with Legolas remaining unconscious. What Gimli found strange, however, was when Aragorn had announced, not long after the trees gave way to grass, that Legolas dreamed. It had not been vocalised as a fanciful thought, but as a statement, sure as the sun rises and falls, and Gimli did not understand how Aragorn could possibly know such a thing.

The silence between man and dwarf, coupled with the man's turned attention, prompted Gimli's thoughts to pull away from the scene playing before his eyes. His mind wandered to the true enormity of their situation. If, by some incredible miracle, they managed to catch up with the filthy swine innards who had stolen their friends, how on earth were they meant to fight them? They would be two, facing a squad of twenty or more with a prize to fight for. If his arms and shoulders were anything to go by, exhaustion would have the potential to get the better of the pair of them. And what of Legolas? Those savages could be riled into bloodlust by the slightest scent of blood, and Legolas wreaked of it. Could they keep the Uruks from him and fight for the hobbits? He doubted it. This was more a mission for their own suicides than a rescue attempt.

A difference in movement brought his mind back to their grassy camp. Legolas had been lowered back onto the cloak that had carried him and that would now serve as his bed. The assortment of little pots was back at the elf's side, unplugged and ready. Faint wafts of scent radiated from their clay depths, spicing the wind as it hurried the welcome fragrances away from them. Instead of the easy calm he had first felt when those heady aromas greeted him, the scent pushed him back into a forest not so far away, where he crouched in the leaf litter, vainly trying to offer comfort to one who was far, far beyond its reach. Worst of all, he saw, even as he looked on the elf's unconscious countenance, those dark blue eyes looking to him for mercy he could not grant. He honestly did not know if he could endure in his own mind if he had to witness the elf go through that again.

By the way Aragorn moved, he did not share Gimli's foreboding: his actions were precise and measured, as Gimli had come to associate with the practiced healer in him. At his friend's quiet request, Gimli moved to Legolas' head, tasked with carefully raising him enough for Aragorn to access the web of bandaging hiding the elf's wound from the world.

But despite his steady healers' hands, the noise of dismay Aragorn made at the dark staining of the otherwise crisp white linen was as much friend as healer. At its removal, it became immediately apparent that the bandaging was not just stained, but sodden, colouring the sharp air with the heavy odour of blood and banishing any hint of sweet herb.

"Ai, Legolas…" Aragorn shook his head as he checked the blood-soaked poultice he had placed over the wound the night before. "I think this outweighs any hurt of mine you have ever been forced to nurse, don't you?"

He paused, looking to the archer's face in expectance of a response. Gimli looked down himself at the golden head resting against his leg, at the closed eyes that should be rolling and unremorseful. Instead there was only stillness, the Legolas they knew locked away somewhere without the strength to return to them.

Eventually, Aragorn turned his eyes to the task of cleaning the new blood from Legolas' flank. He said nothing more as he carried out his chore, nor did he speak when he bound Legolas' torso with fresh bandages. Gimli made no comment himself … he did not think there was anything he could say that could change the sharp brightness of grief in Aragorn's eyes.

-(())-

He was used to seeing her in the dead of night, in the silent hours when the wolves of her dreams prowled the shadows surrounding her bed, when he joined them himself, knowing the floorboards that would betray him and those that conspired with him. Times when he was close enough to hear the whisper of her breath, to see the peach-soft down on her cheek in the half-light, when her awareness was blind to him and her face held the clear innocence of one unknowing of another's attentions.

This was no such time.

Tonight, he had been careless. He had been so drunk with the power of his own success that he had allowed his caution to wander, and come the moment he realised the footsteps were not only destined for the chambers he trespassed, but were her footsteps, and worse with the healer, it was too late to bolt. Panic backed him into the relative safety of the shadows, too aware of their ability to shift allegiance should light come to the room…

Fate, as it would have it, was on his side: she refused a sconce from the healer, and his heart was able to calm, just a fraction. His night sight was better than most could claim: so many years dwelling in the shadows, making a concerted effort to remain hidden from those who sought to hurt him, had given him what he regarded as a great talent. He could pluck his way through a darkened room with no effort at all. He could see the details of a letter on a darkened desk without a shade of strain.

From where he hid, just behind the heavy drapes of her bed, his view of the door was completely obscured … but, despite the sudden predicament he found himself in, he found himself smiling. Faces he could not see, but words he could definitely hear, and what he heard brought perfection to his work of the day.

The firm shutting of the door, final in its meaning, and quiet. He could hear nothing, and wondered for a moment if she had actually come in. Then, from out in the corridor, the staggered steps of the crippled healer faded into unimportance. And in their absence, an open sob broke the silence, followed by others.

His panic stiffened his back and stilled his breath when she suddenly ran through the bower into her bed chamber. The bed jolted violently, and she was close, so very close, voicing her pain into her pillows, unrestrained by the fear that someone would hear. He doubted any had ever witnessed such strong emotion from the Shield Maiden before, a woman so characteristically distant that even chosen suitors were put off by her coldness. It had not always been so with her: he remembered days when she smiled and laughed freely, radiating joy at merely being alive.

He had never been so close to her when she was awake, but she was so consumed by pain, she could have been completely deaf and blind, and he decided that he would take a chance tonight. The highs of success told him that tonight belonged to him, tonight and all others laid out before him. Even so, as Gríma stepped out from behind his shield of shadows, his hair bristled at the thrill of potential discovery.

Éowyn did not see him, just as he had anticipated, though her position on the bed sent a lance of daring fear through him…

She was facing him, curled on top of the blankets and skins, the pillow clenched in her fists with such strength her hands trembled with the force of her grip. Her hair flowed with wild abandon over the stark white of the pillow, reaching unchecked over her face in a web of gold. But her face … fascination held Gríma there, at risk of being seen by the one he had observed in secret for so many years now. And if she did see him, what then? The Meduseld was his now, after all: his men had permeated the guard with all the efficiency of woodworm in a rotting tree. If she cried out, who would come?

She had not been in such a disposition for years, since the loss of her parents. And now, here she was, crying for a brother lost forever, with no-one but her decrepit uncle and a good as dead cousin left to her…

Now, she was alone.

Soon, she would be his.

Unbidden, Saruman's reaction at his requested reward for treason rang loud against Éowyn's tears: laughter, mocking and sharp … hearing it had been like dragging his hand through nettles. Even now, in the dark, he shrank back from the words that had followed: "Fine. Have your horse whore: if your price is bedding, you are as cheap as your prize."

He did not look at her like that. Éowyn fascinated him as no other living thing did. She always had, from the day he first saw her as a child, and he had longed for her from that moment. The knowledge that soon she would belong to him set a thrill in his heart that was difficult to contain.

With another stab of daring, Gríma backed away from Éowyn's bed, back into the friendly folds of the shadows, and to the great chest that sat against the wall. Such an ugly thing, he had always thought: squat and inelegant, a fat toad waiting to be fed. Despite its ugliness, an array of objects scattered across its scarred surface brought a beauty to it that it had no right to know. They were bracelets and rings, brooches and hair ear pieces … a mess of decorations she never wore. He liked to browse this table, finding little adornments to his affection for her, tiny things she would only assume she had lost, their disappearances infrequent enough that she would not suspect. He did not take from her room often … but today was a good day. Today deserved to be celebrated…

There was a hair piece, close to the front of the chest. A plain thing really, thin yet elegant, designed for trapping hair in a practical rather than decorative sense. It was made from a single strip of carven wood, with a slip of gold running across its top giving the only indication of the status of the wearer.

She wore it often, it was a favourite. A thread of hair was still trapped in it…

Gríma's fingers closed over it, her treasure of wood, plucking it from the surface like a ripe berry-

It was quiet.

He had not noticed the moment when Éowyn's sobbing stopped, when the silence revealed the light wood-on-wood scrape of his theft, and his skin tightened with the spike of terror at being discovered. Breath stopped flowing from his lungs, suddenly seeming to solidify in his chest, his heart beating so furiously it felt like it might give out any moment-

But tonight is yours. The whisper rippled across his mind with the light brush of a breeze through tall grass. If she sees you? Does it matter anymore?

No. Not anymore…

Gríma turned, armoured against his fear by his final acceptance of his new reality. Because she was his, and he wanted her to see him. If she saw him now, his reward could be his, his claim of her could be completed as he had yearned for so long…

But the hazel eyes he longed to see him were hooded. Éowyn slept, her unhappiness still harnessing her face. Such an image of loveliness…

Time to go.

Gríma let his eyes drink in her beauty for a moment longer before he slipped away, following the net of silent floorboards to the hidden network only he and the mice seemed to know.

-(())-

Another swallow. The brandy burned down his throat, joining the rest to smoulder steadily in his stomach. This was the third glass so far, and he had every intention of it not being the last.

Birshen leaned back in his chair, feeling the hard wood biting into his spine and welcoming the discomfort it brought. One day. It had been just one day, and the whole world had dissolved into a sodden, unsalvageable mess.

Throughout these past months, as he had been forced to watch as the king's mind slipped further and further from reach, Birshen had believed that the real threat the kingdom was under could be kept at bay with Éomer and Théodred holding sentry. Attacks from Orthanc, while common and damaging, where quickly stamped on by the éoreds under the command of the two young captains. Whilst the internal structure of the hierarchy was about as sound as a beam riddled with woodworm, at least the boarders were defended…

Until Éomer was banished, and Théodred put on his deathbed.

And then there was Éowyn…

Birshen washed away a groan with another mouthful at the thought of her. How she hated him … and he could not blame her.

The more honourable side of him half-heartedly admonished his behaviour, shutting himself away in his room with nothing but the bottle of brandy on his desk for company. There was meant to be a cat in here, a slight and clever thing gifted to him as a healing present, but Birshen had no idea where she had gone. Probably as far away as possible from him, sharing Éowyn's disgust. They always did get on too well…

Birshen shook his head, trying to banish the ridiculous thoughts from his mind, and ran his fingers idly through the flame of the candle sitting on the pitted desk he had inherited from the last Healer in Chief. The entire sparse room went with the post, positioned right in the midst of the healing wing, that the resident should be better situated to help any under his care. Someone had told him a time ago he was lucky to have it, that field healers were unheard of to gain such a status. That was true … it was normally a position handed down through the generations, the son learning his art from the father, until time took the father away and the son inherited, his knowledge complete. Only, old Tildan had never fathered any children. The closest he had gotten to training his replacement had actually been Gríma, but when Gríma's interests slipped towards politics, Tildan did not try to gain another apprentice.

Birshen's own training came largely from reading: as a child, his interests had bent more towards the gaining of knowledge than the art of war … but an early display of solid ability on a horse and competency at basic field medicine had sealed his fate. Training started when he was eleven, and from that point, riding with Éomer was all he knew. And despite the fact that his love of books ran deep, his love of life in the saddle ran far, far deeper.

That was why the day they said he would never ride again nearly killed him.

Months of healing, and months of wandering what on Arda he was healing for.

Medicine was all he had left. The fact that Tildan's loneliness had carved a position for him as Healer in Chief was sheer dumb coincidence. So, was he lucky to have been given the position? To Birshen, 'luck' was a fickle word, carved from fate and unhappy chance.

The glass rose for his lips again – only this time, it did not make it. He came forward in his chair and gave the door a deeply irritated glare. Someone had definitely knocked. Birshen was far beyond the mood for entertaining, and he turned back to his desk, glass in hand-

Again, the door: sharp, concise raps.

Annoyance pushed him to his feet with an unrestrained growl attesting to his irritation. The brandy swayed his body as he rose, showing him just how clouded it had made his head. Birshen pushed past it doggedly, passing the dust-shrouded saddle on its stool as he limped to the door, his fingers ghosting a trail just out of reach of the tanned hide as they did every time he passed it.

"I swear," he growled, fingers closing over the door handle. He wrenched the door open – "You'd better be dying, or I'll-"

"Good evening, Birshen. Drinking alone again, I see."

Any trace of fog in his head evaporated. Gríma stood in the shadows of the hall, flinching a little from the dim glow of Birshen's room. The traitor's insipid eyes flashed a sly look at the healer from behind a curtain of lank dark hair. That smell sat around him, the smell Birshen always associated with mouldering dark places and forgotten things.

"Leave." Hate sat heavy in his stomach, hot and ten times as potent as any brandy. Ready violence built in his muscles. "I have nothing to say to you."

"How rude," said Gríma with an air of confidence he rarely exhibited. "I was hoping for a more civilised conversation than that."

"Sorry to disappoint you." The door made to slam in the miserable cur's face, but a swift foot jutted across the threshold. Birshen looked down on it, wishing he still possessed a sword.

"What a pity." That leering face came around the door … and there was something in those washed-out eyes, an amused glimmer of warning that set the fire in Birshen's stomach to ice. A white hand pushed the door open again, and Birshen's sense told him to allow it. "All I wished was to thank you," Gríma continued, as though no move had been made to shut him out.

Confusion. "For what?"

Gríma's hairless brows rose in mock surprise. "For your help today."

Birshen bristled, an unrestrained snarl twisting his features. "I never helped you!"

"Oh, but you did." Gríma stepped forward, entering the chamber without invitation. "It would have been so much messier with Éowyn getting in the way. A bad business," he continued with a conversational air, as he allowed his scathing gaze to wander with lazy contempt over Birshen's scant possessions. A barely restrained smirk warped his lipless mouth as his eyes lingered on the spear hole in dust-shrouded saddle. "A pity she had to see her brother abandon her."

Something gold flashed in Gríma's hand, Birshen noticed, something half obscured by the stuff of his sleeve, but just deliberately visible enough, something Birshen knew well-

The punch was a shot of lightning, a knife of rage, one burst of violence to Gríma's mouth powerful enough to fire him into the corridor.

The limitations of his leg counted for nothing as he followed and pinned the rat to the far wall, their faces so close he could see the tiny flecks in Gríma's irises and hear the panicked fluttering flights of breath from the coward's chest. He had his hands wound tight in the cloth at Gríma's throat, ignoring the pulses of sharp pain in his strike-hand -

Gríma's worm-like tongue darted out around his lips, the same trait of fear Birshen knew from childhood. "Before you go any further, listen -"

Birshen slammed Gríma's back hard against the wall, barely satisfied by the yelp he won. "I will never listen to you!" Another slam against the wood. "Understand?"

But the threat did little as Gríma pushed on, the words tripping from his tongue quick-fire: "The Meduseld is mine, as are all in it-"

"You own nothing!"

"But I do, healer." To Birshen's utter dismay, the sickly face inches from his own twisted into a smile, flashing crimsoned teeth in the half-light, the grin of a blood demon. His voice suddenly reached a lethal whisper that could have been screamed in Birshen's face for the strength of what he said: "I am the Meduseld. Because I am everywhere inside this building: I am in the guard and in the council; I am within those wenches who idle in the kitchens and those simpletons who man the stables. Not a corner of these halls hears a whisper if I don't hear it first. And you are completely alone, Birshen: there is not a single man or woman in this miserable hole you can trust-"

"I don't care!" Birshen spat. His heart beat agonisingly hard in his chest … because he knew it was all true. He knew his world – the world he and Éomer and Théodred and Éowyn had shared since birth – was gone … and it terrified him. Terror focused into rage, rage with a target – his hands were shaking with it - and he would see Gríma's blood colour the floorboards before this was done. "You are nothing more than a poisonous louse and I swear, if you have touched so much as a hair on her head-"

Something changed in Gríma's eyes … a kind of ugly look of triumph that made Birshen's stomach drop. When he opened his senses beyond his anger and the dung in his grip, he saw them, the four men who had ghosted through the darkness on either side. Anger could be a dangerous distraction to indulge.

"I don't doubt you, Birshen." That lethal calm again, bolstered by the appearance of his thugs, the same men who had overpowered Éomer earlier. "Equally, if you did hurt me, a touch, even a word I could construe as ill-mannered, the first place they go will be to her." The biliously pale mask of his face turned dark with meaning. "I am sure you don't want that."

Birshen's fists released. He stepped back slowly, a mouse caught in the unblinking sights of a viper. He shook his head, appalled at the threat Gríma was prepared to level at Éowyn to keep him in check. "Why? Why are you doing this?"

"Why have I done this," Gríma corrected, pinning Birshen with blade-sharp eyes. Sourness twisted his lips, his words bitter spears: "Perhaps now, you will all understand what a foolish mistake it was to make an enemy of me."

Birshen's brow crumpled in confusion, straining to comprehend what he could be speaking of… He knew his eyes widened in surprise as his memory found the only thing Gríma could conceivably be trying to use against him. "That was eleven years ago. Eleven years ago, Gríma! We were little more than boys!"

"And look at me!" Gríma spat back.

Birshen flinched, refusing to comply with Gríma's demand. Because he did not need to look: he saw it every time their paths crossed, had done for the past eleven years. He did not need to see the malformation of Gríma's spine to know to what he pertained.

"We never meant…"

"Oh, save your excuses," Gríma snarled. "I wasn't interested in them then, and I'm not interested in them now."

The guilt subsided, bringing Birshen back to the present. "So that's your reasoning? You will take down an entire kingdom for the sake of avenging the prank of foolish children?"

"There are other benefits," Gríma uttered quietly.

"And they are enough to make you happy to betray your king?" Birshen fired back. "Your king, who took you in and made you his most trusted advisor?" That was what really bit Birshen. Gríma was petty - it was one of the many reasons they had loathed him as a children – but to willingly take the trust of a man such as King Théoden and twist it -

"I told you, healer." Gríma reminded with a grin, backing away as the four men came forward. "The Meduseld is mine now. You are mine-"

The blow to his leg was powerful enough for his pride to fly and allow the sharp shout of pain freedom. It was enough for him to go down, falling with all the grace of a felled tree. From his new place on the floor, he saw Gríma's face dip into his field of vision, saw the satisfied sneer of yellowed teeth. "Understand?"

He understood perfectly, and he did not need that foot swinging into his line of vision to imprint it on him any further. But, of course, it happened all the same.

-(())-

A harsh zip past his ear and shards of shattered bark pitted his face. Another arrow intended for his back buried itself in the trunk ahead ringing a frightened squeal from his mare. He pulled her tight left around the sudden cluster of trees in their path. Two shafts smacked the tree where his head would have been, and Daerahil whipped her round again, not allowing her to keep straight. Snowflakes hit his face and eyes like ice pellets and set his skin afire, but he could not afford to care. Excited shrieks spat through the trees – ahead – behind – everywhere - and he was so unbelievably terrified-

"Artil! Fly! Fly!"

The skeletons of beech and ash teemed with nightmare shadows, shades of his own race armed with bows and shrieking in ecstasy at the promise of his blood. This part of the forest was completely overrun by the enemy: any who had remained behind after the king's order of evacuation was either dead or captured. Not that there was much real difference between the two. To be captured by orcs was ultimately to die. When was a merely a matter of when toying with their prize lost its appeal.

The trunks were finally thinning. As soon as they could break the treeline, he could give her her head and let her fly across the open land–

Another pull on her mouth and their new direction thwarted the arrow-

Thwup

The punch to his back nearly sent him over her shoulder. His honey mare reared mid-gallop and flung her head back, catching him with her neck. Daerahil's arms wrapped around her, forgetting the reins in a whirl of sudden dizziness and shock. Air was molten fire in his lungs, deep pulls giving him nothing. Through the fog of confusion as his body and mind tried to synchronise themselves again, all he knew was her solidarity beneath him, feeling the heat of her effort to keep them both alive pumping with the fight of her iron muscles, her powerful legs battling the snow and treacherous hard ground beneath…

Daerahil found himself again, trying to forget the burning agony set deep in his shoulder and rising in the stirrups, the reins tight in his trembling hands. Artil responded, grateful for the freedom of her back and neck. Ahead, he could see it, the break in the trees, the blue light of snow at night beyond blurred by the blizzard that raged there-

His horse bellowed - stumbled - found her footing, bellowed again-

They were out.

The snowfall within the forest was nothing compared to the tempest that hit them in the open. No trees tempered the blasts of icy wind, the mountains too far away to impact the vigour of the blizzard. Even his elven sight failed to penetrate the wall of white fury to see the peaks of the Hithaeglir to which they fled. Only his knowledge of his home, polluted as it was, guided him through his blindness…

But the despair bit hard at Daerahil's throat when the wind-shredded hunting howls of wargs skipped over the storm to him, threaded with the bloodlust of their riders. His muscles seized with near-debilitating terror, sensation warping with the sudden freezing of his blood. Light-headedness threatened to send him from the saddle into their coming jaws. They could outrun a horse, he had seen it before…

He had to think beyond his fear, he had to concentrate if they were to stand a chance…

He had to ignore the closing gap between hunters and hunted…

His hunters vocalised their sadistic pleasure in a cacophony of high-pitched yammering and screeches of delight. The excitement of his pursuers clamoured over the thunder of his own heart and the fierce burn of his panicked breathing, shredding his hope of survival and whipping it away on the wind. They were closing in. He knew Artil's endurance was ebbing with each desperate surge of strength she threw into their flight…

Daerahil slipped the reins through his fingers, only just keeping his contact with her mouth. A glance over his shoulder spiked new agony in his heart when he saw her flank, the twin shafts stark and deep against her honey-coloured hide. And beyond, the beasts he knew would kill them – ten at least - coming through the tempest with unstoppable speed, bearing down on them in a nightmare image of death. So close now he could see their dagger fangs, bared in determination to bring down the kill. And on their backs, their orc masters, grinning with the thrill of the chase and promised blood.

Daerahil turned away, straining to see to the river through the constant sting of flying ice, meltwater from his crown running an ice river down his face and merging with his tears.

Artil proved her measure by doing her best to ignore the bolts in her hide, stretching out to and trying to unleash the true potential of her speed…

But the promise of solid land, of a chance to flee from death, was a lie. Snow spray plumed as Artil's legs plunged into the first drift, dragging at her limbs with an unexpected weight. The stuff was far deeper than he had anticipated, so deep her gallop was clipped to desperate bounds. Artil's breath billowed and strained with the new effort, her mouth wide and foaming with the need to get away… She rose, gained speed – and hit another drift, hard. Somehow she found the strength to pull forward but it was draining from her as freely as her blood, her breathing ragged drags…

The land started to dip, descending for the shores of the Anduin. The river was broad and slow here, unlike the bottleneck Thranduil's forces strained to protect deep in the forest behind him: it should be deeper in winter's hold, solid enough to cross. If they could reach the river-

"NO-!"

The warg careered into Artil's path from the side, slammed into her chest and closed its savage jaws around her leg, snapping it as a child might a stick. The horse bowled over in the thing's vice-like grip with a bellow of terror and sickening agony. The violence of the collision flung Daerahil out of the saddle and into the snow with jarring finality, pain shooting through his shoulder and neck at the impact.

They converged on her in less than a breath. Bloodthirsty snarls streaked with her squeals their riders laughing and goading their mounts on at the sport of Artil's death-

Daerahil did not know how he got up, trying to block her screams and the heavy smell of her blood and making his terror-softened legs run. He fought against the snow, trying desperately to reach his own equilibrium and find the thin crust of the snow to light upon it as only his kind could. But his footfalls were heavier than they should be, the wound at his shoulder and blinding panic curbing his natural grace. His boots disappeared and he stumbled like his poor horse – once – twice – and just like his now silent mare, the warg slammed into him. But the beast misjudged its own power, hitting him too fast for it to control, and rather than taking him out, it bowled him over, tumbling into the snow with a yelp. Surprise and pain wrung themselves from Daerahil's throat but he was up again, faster than the beast-

Running again. Behind him, he heard it struggle to rise, snapping and snarling in its own version of the vile curses its rider blared. Next time he knew it would not make the same mistake-

The land dropped away from his flying feet, as though something massive had scooped it out from under him. Daerahil cried out, his limbs flailing uselessly-

He landed hard on the sheet of ice, his feet disappearing through the thin crust to the frigid waters below, and it hurt. A cry rent the air at the shock of it, his reflexes jolting him free and rolling his body across the splitting surface. Daerahil dragged air into his reluctant lungs, looked up-

It was mid-leap, blood-soaked maw wide and destined right for him-

The pain in his feet passed to nothing as he scrambled to get away. He was up again, falling out of reach more than running-

The ice threw an almighty buck with another ear-splitting crack and threw him off his feet – Daerahil used the momentum to fling himself forward, landing hard again but rolling with the impact to bring himself back to his feet. He spun to see what had happened, hearing the ice strain even under his elven weight…

Ice water slashed the snow crust with the violence of the warg's struggle, the thing yelping in panic and fighting to climb onto the ice. But the sheet only broke away from it, refusing to give it purchase for recovery. The orc had abandoned his beast, trying to make for the shore … but the momentum of the warg's leap had taken them far out into the water, putting him in much the same position as his floundering animal.

The others that had joined the pursuit paced the high bank, their snarls agitated and alarmed by their companion's distress.

Two orcs dismounted, loath to let their quarry escape from them. Daerahil stared in horror as they scaled the bank, dexterous as a pair of rats, coming to the water's edge with jagged daggers drawn. The elven lord took a backstep and instantly froze at the stressed creak his action enticed, any hope of bolting eradicated by the thinness of the ice. Only his elven grace kept him out of the icefire waters beneath…

An orcish foot touched the ice, tested it – two feet – the other joined him, victorious snarls marking their success. The first one looked up, locking eyes with his prey, and he laughed. Daerahil's knees nearly buckled with fear, his breath quick and shaking.

The two orcs advanced: "Think you can get away so easily, filth? We'll string our belts with your guts-!"

The high splitting of sheering ice threw them both back to the solidity of the bank with panicked squeals. Their cajoling morphed into spat curses of frustration, the entire band finally drawing their bows, because they would rather see Daerahil's blood spilt over the ice than let him go…

But when they looked back for their target, he had already melted carefully into the shroud of the storm, slipping out of sight and beyond their reach.

-(())-

Gimli sat with the ease of a dwarf victorious as he watched the featureless plains in the darkness. He had won a battle tonight, and he felt that the pipe currently between his teeth was a hard-earned reward for his troubles. Because the rarest of things was happening not ten feet behind him, and it was entirely his doing:

Aragorn was sleeping.

Naturally, there had been a fight, a clash of wills, a display of outlandish stubbornness on both sides … but Gimli had an advantage over his companion. He had slept the night prior, and had reserves to call upon. It had been a dirty trick really, cruel even, but it had worked.

How could a man so incapable of looking out to his own needs competently tend to those of another? How could a man in such a condition possibly see beyond his own fatigue to track their stolen friends? How could that man dare to command his one remaining able companion, knowing he was making himself unfit for the task?

The words had been harsh, but they had had the desired effect: Aragorn had backed down after little more than a paltry effort at angered resistance, crumbling under Gimli's quick-fire attack. It all happened to be true, and there was no real argument the man cou ld attempt that stood a chance of succeeding.

Gimli understood that it would take time for Aragorn to relax into sleep … particularly when Legolas suffered another fit not long after the argument was won. The dwarf worried that it would be all the ranger would need to believe he had to stay awake … but when Legolas finally settled, sleep still possessed him in its selfish grasp, and there was nothing Aragorn could possibly do for him. Under oath that he would wake the man if any aspect of Legolas' condition should change, Gimli was left alone, staring into the night with nothing more than his own thoughts and his pipe to keep him company.

Even from his place in the dark, Gimli could hear the elf's fevered breathing, too quick, too shallow. His hands still felt the burning heat of his skin. He still smelt the blood and the sickness. He still saw Aragorn, with his broken silver eyes fixed hard and hot and unseeing on the grass, with his friend tight to his chest, his voice thick as he tried to utter comforting words into unhearing ears. But it was that fierce scream of pain that really hurt, yet another added to the building catalogue of many his nightmares could choose from…

The wind did not sing with its own wild heart, but screamed with Legolas' voice, flinging varying pitches of pain at Gimli's ears. Even the sound of the swaying grasses rasped in agony rather than whispered sweetly to the night. No matter how hard he tried, Gimli could not persuade himself that he heard anything different, despite Legolas' current silence. Perhaps this was it. Perhaps this was what he was destined to hear, to the end of his days.

A sigh drifted from deep in his chest and danced flippantly with the pipe smoke in the ice blast that was the wind. He had not had a pipe for days, loath to use one in Legolas' presence … but after the events of tonight, he needed one to settle his nerve. If the wind changed direction, he would snuff it out. Until then, he would relish the slim comfort it gave him and watch over his two companions in the dark.

A glance over his shoulder showed him his friends enclosed in what might look like peace to any other. In what Gimli could only guess as an attempt to offer some form of shelter, Aragorn slept tight against Legolas' back, using his own body to block the cold barrage of the wind, an arm draped protectively over the archer's own.

Aragorn would not be pleased when he discovered Gimli had elected to not wake him for watch. Not that Gimli cared … he was a dwarf of Erebor: his people danced in dragon fire. He could endure the ire of one ranger.

-(())-

He likens their march to the flow of a river: steady, constant, without end, ceaselessly running through the deep snow, destined for a place far from here, where the scorched earth has never known the frozen kiss of pure winter. There is something inherently wrong with the image he sees, though he cannot mark what it is … but trying to look into their faces shows him. Because they simply have no faces. It is like they wear a shroud of mist over their features, and despite their armour and weapons, they look ethereal and fragile, like a too strong breath could scatter them into the fathoms of Time. They march, but the sound of their passing is unnaturally monotone: no chink of armour, no whisper of conversation, no ripple of song as is common even with elven armies. Just a deep, slow thrum.

Thrum.

Thrum.

Like a slowed heartbeat.

Aragorn knows that it is a stream of ghosts he witnesses, clear as the day they advanced three thousand years ago to their deaths, the buck of Eryn Galen flapping high over their heads. Days spent as a student of Lord Elrond had told him of an ill-fated army carried by a leader too jealous of his own power to cede command to another. The price for his pride had been more than two thirds of their lives, his own included…

And the life of his eldest grandson…

As though the thought trips something in his awareness, Aragorn realises that he does not stand alone. His head turns to see the one with whom he shares his spectator's position …

There is an elf sat astride a large horse, chest heaving as steam snakes from the animal's flank. Unlike them, his face is ice-sharp in the bright white light of winter, every aspect of his features singing to Aragorn's memory. He is not part of the great company, though he clearly wishes to be. The chain of youth holds him back, and he is little more than a slip of the archer he will one day become. Eyes wide and questing search the sea of featureless faces, and he ignores the teasing wisps of pale gold hair that flutter for his attention. Coltish promise sits about his limber form, and despite the weapons adorning his back, it is doubtful that he has the true trained strength he needs to survive where he clearly plans to go.

Knowing him much later in his life tells Aragorn that it will be a mistake to call him a child to his face … but the label fits him perfectly as a pair of old gloves, and Aragorn finds it unfathomably sad that he is here, armed for a war he cannot possibly fight.

The horse whirls after a sharp kick and a shout of "Baerahir!", and Aragorn's stomach flips:

Legolas rarely spoke of his brother. His loss, even after three thousand years, still sat too heavy in Legolas' heart for him to give voice to Baerahir's memory. To see him now, to maybe hear his voice, renders an element of curiosity in Aragorn too strong to ignore, and he is pleased that he travels with the horse up the line, towards the clear figure he sees marching away from them amongst the sea of ghosts, only the back of a dark gold head visible…

A ripple, deep in his chest, and Aragorn's senses flare warning. The same sensation clearly does not touch his friend's younger self, cantering the horse up the line to his brother –

"Legolas! Daro!"

Aragorn is not heard. They level with Baerahir's band, the horse pulled to an excited walk in reflection of his rider's own elation. But Baerahir does not turn, does not flinch at the arrival of horse and rider. They are alongside, but the elven warrior's face is obscured by golden hair with a deft flick of the wind –

"Baerahir!"

The head that turns is not Baerahir. It is not an elf.

It is melted flesh and flashes of bone-

The scream of horror that erupts from Legolas is drowned by the thing's own vile shriek as it flings itself on him, throwing the terrified horse over into the snow, and Aragorn cries Legolas' name over and over, but there is nothing he can do –

-(())-

The pipe dripped embers into the grass, flung aside so violently that its tip was embedded in a tuft. Gimli found his feet beyond the fright the sudden screams had instilled in him, but he was too slow compared to Aragorn -

The ranger was on his knees and grappling with the archer's wrists as his hands battled to reach his head. It took all of Aragorn's strength to restrain the sudden power Legolas had found whilst trying to be mindful of the broken bone, even if Legolas was not. It seemed no level of pain from his wrist could restrain him from clawing at his own head violently enough to rip his hair –

"Legolas! Saes - it was only a dream! Legolas!"

Eyes that had been sheathed against the sun for over a day fixed with Aragorn's own, wide and brilliant silver-blue in the moonlight. Despite the sickness that crippled his body, Aragorn did not think he had ever seen them so frighteningly clear. The headache that was his constant companion now was practically singing with his friend's distress, and it was all Aragorn could do to hold the elf's hands down and not raise his own to his head -

"I can't see him! I can't see him! I can't-!"

Another seizure took his sentence and twisted it into a scream. Aragorn released Legolas' wrists as they jerked to his stomach, his body folding into itself with agony. And over the agonised cries, one name ripped itself from him with the keening hurt of a broken child, over and over. It crushed crystal grief from Aragorn's eyes, and even Gimli, who knew nothing of Legolas' past, recognised the cavernous heart-pained cries for what they were, because pain and loss transcend all barriers of race and language.

-(())-

Early morning painted each individual frond of grass with a crown of gold, the wind making them wave as one in welcome to the new day. The bowing heads were adorned with dew that shimmered with such brilliant perfection it shamed any mined gem that had ever graced a lady's throat, and had the dwarf belonging to the odd party slowly travelling the wide expanse of Rohan been in a mind to care, he might have found himself jealous. In the short hours that had elapsed since the break of dawn, the landscape had fractured from featureless to pocked with rocky outcrops, becoming more inclined to rise and fall than continue flat as it had. Shadows still hugged the cold flanks of stone, dark with the lingering blue light of night, but the same hot amber touched at their heads with the promise of bringing them to warmth.

Silence was between them again, any words they might have considered speaking harried back by the memory of the night before. Aragorn's concentration was low to the ground again, his head bent to read what the tracks could tell him. Twice already they had been forced to backtrack, Aragorn's eyes falling foul of false tracks. Finding the true trail had worryingly nearly outmatched Aragorn's abilities, and both times they had had to rest Legolas' litter to allow Aragorn to cast out a wide search for the right path. Rainfall and time were against them, and it entered both their minds that, should there be a next time, they may not be so fortunate.

Aragorn felt the strain in his legs as the land listed high, and he raised his eyes to see where they were headed. They were coming to a large cluster of boulders, marching up and over a particularly steep crest of the land as a sentry of silent soldiers. Above the rush of his own blood past his ears and the elevated thrum of his heart, he heard something that made him pause…

An exaggerated huff of irritation from behind obscured the sound he was trying to pick out. "If you wanted to stop, what was wrong with stopping at the top? Now my legs have-"

"Sshh!"

Aragorn ignored the annoyed growl from behind him as his hearing picked through the conflicting noises of the wilds, dismissing each sound until he found the one he thought he had heard. He listened harder, and as it became more pronounced, he knew himself to be right. His heart bucked with relief and gladness, but more than a touch of apprehension marred his joy.

"To the rocks. Now!"

"Why? What is it?"

Aragorn could not help the flying grin he flipped in the direction of his companion. "Horses."

Gimli's brow disappeared under his helm. "Horses?" His face quickly darkened. "Friend or foe?"

"Only one way of telling," Aragorn replied, changing course for the shelter of the stones. Horses should mean the men of Rohan, and that in turn should mean good men … but Rohan sat in Orthanc's shadow, and he knew it would be foolishness to meet them without caution. Aragorn guided Gimli into the heart of the stones, picking a route with care that wound round the obscuring shoulder of rock to shield Legolas-

A breath later, and they would have been trampled where they stood. The shape of the land funnelled the riders up and over the rise, and both man and dwarf watched from hiding as hooves pummelled the earth where they had stood seconds before … and the trail they had followed for so long. The passing animals flicked soil and tussocks of grass against the stone, the air filling with the scent of earth and leather and horse. The land quaked in submission at their passing, the thunder of galloping hooves resonating deep in Aragorn's chest. The éored rode at a travelling gallop, stretching their horse's speed without pushing the animals to their full potential, and Aragorn deduced that they neither chased, nor ventured toward a destination. A patrol, then.

The coming of these men could spell a change in their fortunes, and Aragorn waited until the last horse had crested the summit and chased after its companions before he elected to leave his hiding place, an apprehensive Gimli close behind him. He pushed back his own misgivings, found his voice, and raised it high to the retreating backs of the riders.

"Hail, riders of Rohan!"

Even from where they stood high above the men, Aragorn saw a ripple of alarm pass through the riders at the ringing sound of his cry. Their leader wordlessly raised his spear in instruction to his men to turn their beasts, and the riders arced to follow him back up the incline to them. A rapid count, and Aragorn deduced that they numbered at one hundred and five, with another four horses running with them riderless, but in full tack. They must have seen battle, and recently.

"Hold steady," Aragorn breathed to his companion. Gimli made a noise at the back of his throat at the instruction, his heightened tension making it a strain to keep his axe from his hands as they found themselves at the full attention of over a hundred mounted warriors. Aragorn hoped his posture relayed confidence as he led Gimli down the hill towards the oncoming riders, wanting as much distance as possible between them and Legolas.

The speed of the coming éored afforded them no such luxury. Horses were steered into a tight and impenetrable ring, several beasts deep and flowing with the fierce and unfettered might of a storm. The wintering sun shredded into ribbons through the thicket of spears, brilliant and glaring, cutting into their sight until the world was nothing more than blinding white and stark shadow. Though instinct pushed their backs together and put them into ready battle stance, the mismatched pair found their senses utterly bewildered by the ever-morphing torrent of horses and men. They could keep no one man fixed in their sights for more than a breath. Aragorn bore his hands high, keeping his face as quietly impassive as possible and straining to not betray his own anxiety at the situation he had deliberately placed them in.

Aragorn's line of sight filled with tightly-packed horse muzzles, so close he could feel the heat of the snorts blasted at his face, heavy with exertion and excitement. They were so efficiently penned in, he could see nothing of the world beyond the sweating mounts … and the spears of their masters, levelled meaningfully at their faces.

A dapple grey pushed through the éored to come to the fore, and Aragorn and Gimli turned to face the man set to confront them.

"Who are you, to dare walk these lands without leave?" The hard cold of the stones they had hidden in moments ago could not match the unforgiving quality of the man's eyes and flat line of his mouth. Long hair the colour of the winter-scorched grass rippled beneath a fiercely decorated helm. A flaxen drift of horse hair mixed with his own as the wind knotted them together. Aragorn had a fair sense of who this young man was, as his memories of his travels earlier in his life told him the other looked remarkably akin to Éomund. Caution advised him to hold his tongue and keep his familiarities to himself…

"We are no threat to Rohan or her people," Aragorn offered, his tone quiet and non-threatening.

"I shall decide whether you bear threat or no," the captain returned with the low-level warning growl of a wolf. "Spies will often honey their voices and convince the blind they harbour no ill will."

"I promise you, we are no spies-"

"Then who are you?" he shot back. "Speak!"

"Why should we tell you anything when you wave spears in our faces? Eh?" Gimli came around Aragorn without his companion's leave, firing defiance at the taller warrior and earning himself a glare from the ranger. "A funny courtesy to extend to travellers come to your lands!"

A snarl at the challenge, and the captain dismounted, his feet landing with the weight of a man who had been in the saddle for a long time. It had no effect on his bearing as he rounded on the pair, his face dark that the trespassers dared challenge him. There was certainly no sign of fatigue when he drew his sword, angling the tip suggestively at Gimli's head.

"Because if you don't, I will fell both of you whe-"

Shock registered in the captain's eyes a split second after it found Aragorn and one of the mounted men behind him. Even as the rider's dismayed warning cry of "Éomer!" alerted his companions that something was wrong, it was too late…

Because there was already a long, white blade pressed firmly at the side of Éomer's throat.

Legolas stepped silently from behind the stunned warrior, the knife remaining perfectly poised to carry through his unspoken threat. The careful cat-like grace that embodied his movement belied his condition as Legolas ghosted into Éomer's line of sight. Elves could pass anywhere unseen if they wished, but for Legolas to not only have moved undetected through an entire éored, but to press a knife against their leader's throat, was no small achievement. He had moved through the tight formation with the unquestioning acceptance of the horses, and at the complete ignorance of their riders.

The captain's expression passed from outright furious at being caught so unawares, to stunned, his eyes travelling over the archer's countenance with little reservation. Aragorn could not blame him: he had never seen anyone that looked as Legolas did walk, let alone yield a weapon against another with an assassin's stealth.

This could only fall foul. Despite the unwavering stare Legolas pinned on the man at the other end of his knife, his body was not so keen to comply with the solidarity of his will … the slight shake of his arm, the subtle tremble taking control of his shoulder. Deliberate control bridled each breath, rounding off their sharp edges and forcing them to be seem steady and strong. All signs that spoke to Aragorn's knowledge of his friend, telling him he was beyond the known boundaries of his strength. "Legolas…"

Legolas ignored Aragorn's low warning. "My friends cause you no harm." His voice was checked, fighting to hold it together and force some illusion of strength into his words. Holding this pretence clearly pained him, as the tiny beads of sweat gathering at his grey brow openly betrayed. "I ask you-" he stopped. Took a breath. Swallowed. Continued: "I ask you, remove your threat. Or I will fell you where you stand." A twitch of a smile backed his words. "I think that is near what you were saying."

Éomer's eyes narrowed, assessing Legolas' face, guarded but less concerned by the blade at his throat than he should be. Just the smallest trace of intrigue edged its way into his hard stare. He broached no response, keeping his eyes fixed on Legolas. Aragorn saw what he did and was hit by a wave of anger, not at Éomer, but at Legolas, for placing him in this situation, where he was forced to watch as the elf destroyed what little reserve he had left in an act of idiocy.

But Legolas' smile, in the end, was the final crack, the fatal splitting of the failing armour. The focus slipped from Legolas' eyes, the smile fading to be replaced by a light frown that fought to stay in place. "Estel…"

He let go. The white knife lost both its conviction and the silent battle, the blade becoming loose in Legolas' fingers as his body let him down. He pulled a stunted breath, wavering away from Éomer with little more than a half step before his knees buckled and sent him for the grass.

Spears be damned. Aragorn had Legolas under the arms before his body could hit the earth. The ranger eased the elf down in his hold, keeping his charge upright against him and allowing his own legs to fold carefully beneath him. Legolas was heavy against his chest, his golden head resting loosely at his shoulder. Aragorn's fingers found the archer's pulse at his throat, a flitting and flighty thing under the press. The quick touch was fast becoming a habit. Foolish creature. A sigh breeched Aragorn's lips, private and steadying.

The ranger lifted his eyes to the man looking down on them both in the waving grasses. Éomer came across to Aragorn as a guarded character, tempered by experience to protect his thoughts. But if he thought he was hiding his mind well in that moment, he was mistaken: his eyes were prised wide with rods of surprise, his strong brows so high under his helm they could have been pinned in place.

"I am Aragorn, son of Arathorn. This is Gimli son of Gloín-" he gave a nod in Gimli's direction. Gimli took it as a prompt and offered Éomer a grudging bow of acknowledgement, taking care to not quite lose the glower in his stare. "-And our foolish friend here is Legolas." Aragorn gave the elf a fond look, but his eyes were pushed aside by the burn of pain he received when he saw that Legolas had slipped from them again. He swallowed his worry away, and carried on…

"Our friends were stolen from us." The explanation fell at the horseman's feet, a sorry thing pleading for understanding. "We travel your lands in pursuit of those who took them, but our companion is hurt and sick and our hunt has been slowed. We slip further and further behind, and their trail grows colder with every hour."

Éomer stared at Aragorn, that same stare he had pinned on Legolas mere moments ago. Searching, assessing. He looked for reasons not to trust, and Aragorn resolved to give him nothing to find. Unflinching, Aragorn returned the look, open and non-threatening. He would tell the truth, what he could tell, and say when he could not.

Those green eyes narrowed again. "Taken by whom?"

"A band of Uruk-hai. We were a party of eight, but we were torn apart some days past. We found each other again, but the Uruks found them first. We tried to stop them, but they were too many, and we failed." Bitterness twisted his mouth with resentment, his eyes tracing down to the still elf in his arms. "Just as we fail now."

There was no question from the horse master of how eight came to be five, for which Aragorn was thankful. But Éomer's brows drew close, a snap of something flashing over his face. Dread? It woke an answering sense of unease in Aragorn's chest.

"Uruk-hai?"

"They travel westward across your plains. Servants of Saruman the Betrayer, marked with the White Hand. We have hunted them for days now."

The Rohirric warrior's eyes took on a new gravity. "Then you hunt ghosts."

Aragorn felt the blood drain from his face.

"We annihilated the Uruks two nights gone."

Aragorn's heart lurched painfully. Two nights? We were still in the forest. No … Ai Eru, no…

"Then you must have seen them!" Gimli forced his way forward, animation making his beard positively skip with excitement, even as Aragorn felt sick with countering dread. "Hobbits! Two hobbits! Do you have them here?"

Gimli threw his gaze over the surrounding horses and riders, sighting nothing beyond the solid wall of horse flesh. "Come on! Where are they?" Exasperation took over as the friends he so ardently believed must be concealed amongst the troupe failed to come forward and he lifted his voice. "Merry! Pippin! Come out, you rascals!"

The rock Aragorn had felt teetering on the edge in his chest dropped into his stomach. Annihilated… His fingers tightened in the stuff of Legolas' sleeve. No. Please… "They are small, child-like even. They were taken together." Desperation wanted Éomer to look at him with a sudden ripple of recognition, a flash of a grin and a Bring them forward! to the back of the éored. But there was no such look, no grin, no cry. Just a hopeless and sorry shake of the head, heavy sympathy in his winter-grass eyes. "All were slaughtered and burned."

The hope fell out of Gimli's earthen eyes, his ecstatic grin tumbling from his mouth. He looked to Aragorn, finding a mirror of the devastation he felt in the ranger. "They're dead?" The dwarf shook his head to himself, disbelief and shame warring across his features. "You mean we failed them. After all this time … all this heartache … for naught?"

The ranger looked down to the archer in his arms. Legolas was looking back at him. There was nothing he could say in all the tongues they shared that his glass eyes did not express better. Aragorn pressed a hand in comfort against Legolas' chest. This is not your fault.

"Did you see them?" The question worked its way out of Aragorn's throat without the conscious choice of his mind. He had not known that there was hope left in him until it gave itself voice.

Éomer looked uncomfortable. "We saw nothing out of the ordinary," he confirmed. "But in the heat of battle, and the dark of night, something so small can pass unnoticed."

Aragorn heard both aspects of what the warrior said. But while there was no definite yes or no, there was a chance, and it was that chance that Aragorn would cling to. "Then we must continue to look," he resolved, both to himself and those surrounding him. "I cannot abandon them. Not without being sure."

Éomer nodded. It was a sign of understanding, of respect, and Aragorn dimly felt that the other man had taken his measure and was satisfied by what he had found. Without warning, he gave a shrill whistle. "Hasufel! Arod!"

The ring of horses parted for the two answering Éomer's summons: a chestnut and a dark-pointed grey. Both horses were riderless, still fully tacked and ready. Gloved hands took a bridle each, holding them steady. "These horses lost their riders in the raid," Éomer said, looking on the animals with eyes that saw ghosts on their backs. "Their masters are gone, and there is no hope of getting them back." He took his attention from the horses and turned it to the curious company his éored had beset. "There is no worldly good that can replace a fallen companion. The best recompense I can offer is these horses, and my wish that they bear you well, wherever fate takes you."

Aragorn tilted his head in thanks, even as bitterness bit at the back of his throat. Horses. If only they had had them days ago, this entire sorry situation could have been so, so different. "And we thank you for them. But…" Aragorn paused, considering. Legolas remained pressed limply to his body, having not so much as shifted during his exchange with the rider. The news of the possible deaths of their companions weighed heavily on all of them, but Aragorn knew Legolas well enough to understand that he attributed the entire level of blame for their failure on himself. It was, after all, exactly as the archer had said nights before, that helping him would stop them saving the hobbits. And as heart breaking as it was, he was right.

Aragorn knew he could cover the land at speed to where the battle had taken place. But with Legolas? It would be impossible for him to ride at a gallop as Aragorn intended … taking him could only hinder their negligible chances of finding Merry and Pippin alive…

But leaving him…

Aragorn found himself faced with the decision Legolas had tried to make for him. It was funny how these things managed to spin on him.

"Our companion cannot endure much more of what he has already been put through, despite what he would have you think-" exasperated fondness brushed over Aragorn's tone, before the gravity of their situation pulled it back down. "He needs help, beyond what my skill can give him in the Wilds."

Éomer breathed out through his nose, looking to his companions. "I know what it is you ask," he replied heavily. "Had you asked me a week ago, I would have sent him to Edoras with my blessing. But there are snakes in the Meduseld, and they have poisoned my king against us. We here stand faithful to the throne, and we are banished for it. I fear that sending your companion there would be folly."

Trouble in Edoras? That was not what Aragorn wanted to hear. What was he meant to do? Did the Valar hold something against him? Every move was a false step, every decision felt an idiot's choice. To come so far, to recover Legolas from the claws of death, only to think of sending him alone into a land plagued by political strife…

"I'll go with him."

Aragorn looked up in surprise at his dwarven companion. "What did you say?"

"I will go with the elf to Edoras," Gimli reiterated with a stab of impatience. "You're the more able rider, and he needs someone at his back. I'll do it."

There were no words Aragorn could find to express the gratitude he felt towards Gimli in that moment. Whatever it was that had passed between the pair and removed their age-old prejudices was both a mystery and a blessing. Aragorn found he could not care less.

Although reluctance seemed to hold his head in a vice, he nodded mutely, knowing he had to accept whatever help was offered. No matter how dangerous.

Éomer gave a reluctant nod of acceptance. "Very well." He mounted his horse again, the animal shifting under his weight in anticipation of departure. His men raised their spears, readying their own mounts. The tight ring of horses relaxed, daylight flowing back to the three friends. "Go where you will in these lands with my blessing. Edoras is half a day away if you don't tarry. You'll have to ford the Entwash: turn your horse's head towards the mountains and trust him to take himself home." Looking to Aragorn, Éomer continued: "You've a day's hard ride north-east to where we burned the Uruk filth at the edge of Fangorn..." The warrior paused. "I hope you find what you seek. But hear this, and hear it well:" Éomer's words were directed at Gimli and enforced with a hard stare. Gimli returned it, attentive but wary.

"I told you there are snakes in Edoras. The truth is the place if rife with them. Trust none other, none other, than my sister, Éowyn, and the healer, Birshen. If anyone can save your friend, it's him."

"If they are all I can trust, then how do I get them to trust me in return?" Gimli fired back. "If your name is black in your city and the floor as thick with traitors as you say it is, how can I earn their trust myself?"

"Get an audience with my sister. Tell her, you met a man on the road who says he foaled her horse. She will know you were sent by me…" Éomer paused. "Give her news of me? Tell her … tell her, it wasn't his fault."

Neither Aragorn nor Gimli knew to what he referred, but Gimli made a low grumble of acceptance of the request.

"Riders!" The horse lord raised his spear high, his time spent on the strangers long enough, spurring his dapple mount into a canter. The others followed, flowing with smooth and practiced perfection into line behind their commander. In no time at all, the only evidence of their presence was the sweet scent of horse and bruised grass. The wind plucked playfully at Aragorn's hair, flicking it in his eyes and sending a familiar chill through the gaps of his clothing.

"That was a stupid stunt. You're lucky you didn't get yourself killed."

Legolas' gaze drifted up at the softly-uttered admonishment. His breathing was shallow and quick, the rich colouring of the winter morning failing to lift the pallor from his skin. "You needed me."

"I had everything perfectly under control, actually. It certainly would not have resorted in the need for blades."

"I beg to differ," Legolas gave back, shifting against his companion's chest in an attempt to right himself. All the action resulted in was a hiss of pain and him collapsing back against Aragorn gracelessly, a fresh sheen of perspiration glazing his brow.

Aragorn shook his head as he pushed his hands under Legolas' body, toning the right levels of tension into his own back and legs for his intended action. "You are no friend to yourself, Legolas," he rebuked. "I'm getting up. Ready?"

"No-"

The ranger rose regardless, stressing his legs enough to lift both of them from the ground and falling deaf to the sharp yelp it rendered from the elf in his arms. They had to get up, whether it hurt or not, and Aragorn found himself annoyed enough to dampen his sense of sympathy. He trudged over to the waiting horses, casting his keen eye over the two beasts. Both were war horses, but the chestnut was the lighter of the pair, better built for speed, while the grey was more of an endurance animal, a little stockier and better suited to bearing a heavier man…

Or two riders.

"Gimli." Aragorn threw his brows at the horse he had selected for them. "Pull his stirrups down and mount, can you?"

The dwarf made a sound at the back of his throat, something between a growl and a huff, if such a sound could exist. But he did as Aragorn asked, stretching above his head to pull the irons down the long straps into riding position. They reached far below where his legs could possibly reach – it would be a stretch for the stout warrior even if they were adjusted to their highest point.

"What if he had turned on you? What if his éored had killed you for threatening their captain? It would have been their right. And what about your side? You could have torn it – you probably have. And what do we do then, Legolas?" It burned, this fire of anger spilling from his mouth. He wondered at its strength, surprised by its power.

"Why are you so angry?"

"Because you don't think, Legolas!"

They came to the grey's side, Gimli sitting awkwardly in the saddle like he fervently wished he could walk instead. The reins sat loose in his hands, too slack to offer any real instruction to the animal beneath him. Arod was clearly unimpressed by the idea of his new rider, his head high and ears flicking in protest at the novice on his back. It was not a perfect situation by any means, but the pair of them would have to work out their differences, and fast.

Aragorn altered his hold on Legolas' body to try and ease him up into the saddle behind Gimli as carefully as possible, gentle despite his irritation with the archer. It was difficult, and not entirely successful, as the spike of agony in his own head betrayed when Legolas was settled at Gimli's back.

His hands found the girth buckle and proceeded to battle against the cold steadily seizing his joints to tighten the thing. Arod, like so many other more savvy horses, knew of his novice rider and clearly hoped for shared naivety on Aragorn's part. "Breathe out!" The ranger gave the stallion's chest a soft thump of warning, at which the horse gave a breathy – and decidedly disappointed – huff. I'm wise to you, my friend. Aragorn pulled the strap tight with the extra inches his rebuke earned him.

Stirrups next-

"You're wrong."

Numbed fingers paused at the elf's quiet accusation. "Really." His eyes fixed on the leathers, assessing the holes and the length of Gimli's legs, refusing to look up. This horse was far too large for him… "Gimli. Move your leg forward. No – up here. Thank you."

The slap of leather on leather coupled with the renewed odour of warm horse reached him as he tugged the strap clear. Even on the highest notch they would be too long. Two loops, then, and that should take the irons close enough…

Legolas was undeterred by the stony silence he being given. He might be ailing, but he had been born stubborn. "I do think." Again, the wall of silence. "I think about you. I think that you are my brother-" his voice bucked with pain, punctuated by an echoing spasm of heightened discomfort in Aragorn's head. Hands that had been so busy occupying his mind slowed, the horse-warmed stirrup iron near forgotten in his grip. "I think … I think I need to know you understand that."

"So you would stand at the mercy of a hundred spears?" the ranger challenged to the iron in his hand. "You would risk yourself to prove a point?"

"No." The word was soft, an offering to his understanding. "I would stand … I would stand at the mercy of one hundred thousand spears. If there was one drop of blood left in my body, I would spend it for you."

"Legolas…"

"If it means," the archer pushed on, forcing the words past his lips with all the effort his waxing strength could allow. "If it means I earn your anger, I will take it gladly. Because it means you are well. And that is enough."

"If it earns your anger, I will take it gladly." And Aragorn would do the same. He had done the same, as the barely repressed shudder reminded him, the haunting shrieks of the Nine raking through his mind and stinging sensation finding the cuts in his palms and fingers again. They had been so far together, so so far…

"And I you, Legolas. Does that not tell you something?"

The archer fell quiet. Aragorn's mind returned to the cursed scree slope and the horrors it had held, and hoped that Legolas still could not recall it. If the previous night was anything to go by, their imprint on him was deep, a dark place where memories he had once treasured held the power to undo him completely.

As suddenly as it had struck, his anger dissipated, a drop of hot blood in an icy lake. He let his gaze finally meet that of his friend. Legolas looked right back through his own personal fog of hurt and worry, his need for understanding battling with the pain for dominance. Right then, it was concern for Aragorn that was winning out. The wind that shoved so enthusiastically at Aragorn's back whipped pale gold around the archer's face in a teasing dance, strands catching in his lashes and brushing over the hurts his face had taken over the past days. Legolas leaned into Gimli's back, his strength too clearly depleted, and if it bothered the dwarf at all, he gave no indication of it. An offering of peace and apology in the form of a wan smile, and Aragorn found that he could not help but return it. His hand found Legolas' as it rested against his leg, the calloused fingers achingly cold in his own. Once again, the struggle to retain focus was too much, and Legolas' eyes shuttered themselves, blocking out the brilliant sunlight and the stinging wind. He was not asleep – his clipped breathing told Aragorn as much – but he struggled to keep exhaustion from getting the better of him.

We're losing him. The thought flashed across the ranger's mind without warning. It knocked the breath from his chest and brought a numbing fear into his heart. A breath, two breaths, and he swallowed his rising grief.

"I will come to you," he affirmed, hearing the betraying pain in his own voice. Legolas started, his eyes flying open again. Any hope Aragorn had harboured that the archer would not detect his upset was dashed as Legolas' brow creased in reflected worry. The ranger managed a guarding smile, forcing it into his eyes. Whether the elf was deceived was not certain, but he lacked the strength to challenge Aragorn's lying mask, for which the ranger was selfishly thankful. "When I have found them, I will come to Edoras." Aragorn gripped Legolas' hand a little tighter, fighting with his reluctance to let go.

"Gimli."

The dwarf turned his head at the hail as though his neck had been fused. He looked quite comic, sitting stiff as a board on such a large animal. Aragorn broke away from his contact with their elven companion and adjusted the dwarf's grip on the reins, placing them into the proper position and shortening the leather for the correct contact with Arod's mouth.

"Remember what Éomer said: tell none who you really are, or what your true purpose is.

"You need to go west. If you ride steady, you'll be in Edoras by nightfall. He'll take you, don't worry about direction … you'll be best off if you canter, it'll be the smoothest pace for all of you, but you must rest him-"

Gimli waved Aragorn's instruction away with a: "Pahh, never mind about that! I can handle this dumb beast-"

Arod flicked his head back with a sharp and indignant snort and Gimli nearly fell from the saddle. Aragorn's brow peaked in amused doubt, but he said nothing to the contrary. "Here, take these and give them to the healer-" he handed the dwarf the last of his medical supplies. "Have Legolas drink the fever tea. There should be enough left to keep him comfortable…"

Silence took over, the same thought sidling into the minds of both man and dwarf. Both of them spared the elf a glance: consciousness had abandoned him, Legolas leaning heavily into Gimli's back. Gimli was the one to voice it. "…And if he fits?"

Aragorn's jaw tightened with his decision. "No more poppy."

Gimli adjusted his seat, releasing a slow breath that plumed into the snatching wind. It was blatantly clear in the set of his face that he wished for a different decree, but he held any comment back.

"He just isn't strong enough. I wish he could withstand it, but…"

"I know, I know." Gimli huffed. "Let's just prey he doesn't need it, eh?"

Aragorn nodded with a wan smile, backing from the horse with reluctance. Arod picked up on the impending departure, becoming fitful with anticipation.

"I'll see you in Edoras."

"You'd better! I'm a Son of Durin, not an elfling's nursemaid!" Despite the words, they were said in fond jest, and Aragorn knew that. All the same, Gimli amended: "I'll watch him, Laddie, be sure of that. He'll be fine. You'll see."

"Be safe. Both of you."

Gimli gave him an angled smirk in response before pulling Arod's head west - a little harder than the horse would clearly have liked by the way he shook his mane – and kicking him into a canter. The stallion took off, his gait smooth and powerful and glad to finally be away.

The wind plucked at the ranger's hair as he stood alone, watching the grey horse bear away his two friends. His own horse nickered enquiringly at his shoulder. Time to go. Hasufel accepted his weight readily, obedient as Aragorn turned his head north for the far longer ride to the pyre and kicked him into a canter. Exhilarating as it was to finally be mounted and covering ground with speed, worry still niggled at Aragorn's mind. And at the very edge of his consciousness, the sensitive seam of connection between Legolas and himself tinged with the discomfort enticed by Arod's movement. Aragorn knew it was dangerous, having an elven consciousness touching his own, but he could not deny that he valued it.

Ai Elbereth, both of you be safe.