Aiër- Chapter Seven Part 1
The company's journey down the mountain was only less miserable than the hike up in that, at the very least, the furious weather conditions let up as they descended. Shëanon, however, found little comfort in the milder temperature and softening wind, for even as sheltered as she was, she knew the evil that was Moria. Elladan and Elrohir had told her tales of the lost mines when she was still little, and then she had read of the fate of the ancient dwarf city in her studies when she was older. Every fiber of her being protested the very idea of entering that place, and were it not for Gandalf and Aragorn and her vow to Frodo, she would not have gone forth. As they had come out of the snowstorm and trodden the frozen earth, Shëanon had made no mention of her hesitation, but as they reached again the foothills in the great shadow cast by Caradhras, she found she could not stay silent any longer.
"What do you think of this path, Aragorn?" she'd whispered when the others had gotten a ways ahead of them. Almost immediately after it had been suggested, she had suspected that the evil road ahead of them had been a topic of conversation between the wizard and the ranger that night that they had spoken in the shadows, the night that Shëanon had gone to sleep feeling lonely and lost and angry.
Aragorn released a deep sigh and turned his eyes skyward, and his eyes looked very blue with the sky reflected in them.
"We must get to Mordor," he said carefully. "Moria seems the last road open to us."
"That is not what I meant," Shëanon said lowly, carefully studying Aragorn's face. He now looked directly in front of him, but his jaw was taut and his movements tense. "Moria has been taken by darkness, Aragorn."
At these words, he finally turned to her. He looked exhausted, sorrowful. His eyebrows were drawn together, but although there was something forlorn in his expression, she saw also something hard.
"Gandalf and I decided that we would go through the mines if all of our alternatives failed us. We have no alternatives now. We cannot go back to Rivendell, we cannot stay where we are, and Moria it seems is the only way to go forward," he said regretfully.
"I have a bad feeling about this, Aragorn," she said anxiously.
Aragorn only sighed again. "We all do," he said plainly, patting her on the shoulder. Shëanon made no response, but every step she took was accompanied by a dark, tugging notion at the very back of her mind which she was aware of but could not quite grasp.
It was the next day when, after passing through a labyrinth of vast, rough boulders that rose well over their heads, the ground ahead of them suddenly rose sharply before the company, gray and dusty and gravelly. Shëanon thought that they had reached a dead end after hours of wandering among the rocks, but Gandalf seemed to know where they were, for he led the fellowship around to a steep, rocky path. They were very close to the base of the mountain, she observed nervously. If they were to find the entrance to the mines, they were not far off. Night had fallen and a heavy mist lay over the land, but the sky was not entirely overcast and as they came to the top of the path, Shëanon was able to see what lay before them. The face of a mountain fell sharply away and in its wake was a long expanse of smooth, flat rock accessible only by a narrow strip of land that ran alongside it. On the other side of the path there was a great body of water. Shëanon's immediate thought was that there was something wrong with it, but it took her a moment to realize why: there was nothing reflected on its surface. She frowned.
"The Walls of Moria," Gandalf declared when all the company stood behind him, gazing out at the looming cliff-face. "Of old, this path we have taken was the Elf-Road from Hollin, though long it has been abandoned. Come, we must now seek for the door."
He led them down the slope and along the edge of the lake, and as they got closer to the water, the ground became slick, not so much a pass as a slimy strip of muck that the water had surely once covered. The lake itself, Shëanon saw, was unnaturally still. It was dark and stagnant and murky, and unlike the dancing water of the Bruinen, it was dead. At its very edge, along the bank, the water was tinted green, but Shëanon could see no vegetation that might have been responsible for this color.
The company walked in silence around the edge of the lake in a single file line, for that was all that the width of the path would permit. When at last they reached the wall, Gandalf laid his hands over the stone. Shëanon guessed that he was feeling for the door, and Gimli's following words confirmed her thoughts.
"Dwarf doors are invisible when closed," he informed the group as he took his axe in hand and began tapping against the rock behind the wizard. Gimli alone did not seem to dread passing through the mines, but his positive energy gave Shëanon little comfort, and she walked close behind Aragorn.
"Yes, Gimli," Gandalf agreed from the front of the group. "Their own masters cannot find them if their secrets are forgotten."
"Why doesn't that surprise me?" Legolas asked rather sarcastically from behind her, and Shëanon bit her lip, privately sharing his sentiments but not wanting to upset Gimli. They walked onwards slowly; Gandalf had his face pressed close against the cliff and had started muttering to himself, but Shëanon could see no crack nor crevice anywhere in the stone to indicate that there might somewhere be a door. She was therefore slightly dubious when Gandalf finally stopped before two great holly trees, ancient and gnarled but still alive, but she trusted that the wizard knew what he was doing. In silence, the company watched him run his fingers over the filthy rock for several long moments, but then finally Gandalf stepped back, grinning and glancing up at the sky. Shëanon followed his gaze, looking up in time to see a great cloud blow aside to reveal the moon, cold and bright above them. When Shëanon looked back at the wall, however, it was bare no longer. Between the trees where Gandalf stood, the outline of a great arch had appeared in the stone, luminous and glowing cold and blue like the stars. Adorning it were two elegant trees, their slender branches twined about the arch, and above them there was depicted a hammer and anvil under a crown adorned with stars, and in the very center of the archway, between the shining trees, was another star whose rays stretched towards the others. Shëanon looked at it in wonder.
"It reads, 'The Doors of Durin, Lord of Moria. Speak, friend, and enter,'" said Gandalf, indicating with his staff the words that he read, inscribed in the elvish characters of Beleriand over the top of the arch. Everyone stood crowded around him with varying expressions of awe, consternation, and fear.
"What do you suppose that means?" Merry asked curiously. Shëanon wondered if the hobbits had any idea of what might have been in store for them on the other side of the wall. She did not believe that it would be the pleasant greeting of any dwarf; the foul water seemed a clear indication of that.
"Oh, it's quite simple. If you are a friend, you speak the password and the doors will open," Gandalf said patiently. He lifted his staff and held it aloft before the gleaming ithildin star and uttered in his deep, commanding voice, "Annon edhellen, edro hi amen! Fennas nogothrim, lasto beth lammen!"
The company watched on expectantly, but the wall remained as solid and impassable as before. In the silence, Shëanon kept thinking to hear the sound of the water lapping at the rocky bank, but such a sound was ominously missing. Instead, she heard Bill whinny softly.
"Nothing's happening," Pippin pointed out as Gandalf stepped forward and began trying to force the rock with his hands and shoulder.
"I once knew every spell in all the tongues of Elves, Men, and Orcs," he muttered.
"What are you going to do, then?"
"Knock your head against these doors, Peregrin Took!" Gandalf snapped at Pippin, but Shëanon turned away and looked instead to the west, from whence there came a single, solitary howl. Her eyes sought for any sign of the creature that had put forth the sound, but it was in vain, for the mist lay heavy over the earth and what it did not obscure was blocked by the great ridge that they had come over to find the wall and lake. Goosebumps all over her skin, she looked back over her shoulder.
"Aragorn," she hissed, for his attention was still on Gandalf and the door. She stepped closer to him and grabbed at his sleeve as she cast an anxious glance behind them. "Did you hear that?"
"Hear what?" he asked quietly, and she saw his eyes flicker in the direction she had been staring.
Shëanon opened her mouth to answer, but before she could speak the howling came again, louder and closer. She could hear now the calls of more than one animal, and the eerie sounds echoed threateningly in the open space, bouncing off the sharp rocks and somehow seeming to stir the still water. The heads of all the fellowship turned now, and she watched Aragorn's eyes narrow.
"Those are not the cries of any ordinary wolves," she murmured to him rather uneasily.
"Wolves of Mordor," Gandalf sneered from where he stood under one of the holly trees. Its gnarled roots stretched all the way into the murky water.
Shëanon's eyes flickered to Legolas, and with a start she saw that he had taken his bow from his back and held it now in his fist. Nervous now, she reached over her shoulder and took down her own weapon. Gandalf sighed heavily and lowered himself onto one of the boughs. "We must not tarry here. Relieve poor Bill of his burdens and take upon yourselves whatever you can carry; we cannot take the beast into the mines. I shall search now for the opening words."
While Aragorn comforted Sam and Boromir and Legolas set to divvying up their provisions, Shëanon stayed close by Gandalf. She was reluctant to turn her back on the water or the distant hills. The wizard sat muttering incantations for a long while, and although Shëanon half-wished he would not ever remember the way into the mines, she also did not like the idea of an attack upon the bank where there was nowhere to take cover and no way to flee. Many sounds were coming to her hears, carried on a howling wind.
Frodo stood close by them, listening to Gandalf's words as Shëanon's eyes roved over and over their surroundings. Suddenly the hobbit stepped closer to the door.
"It's a riddle," he said slowly, staring intently at the arch. Shëanon looked at him in surprise. "Speak 'friend' and enter! What's the elvish word for friend?"
Gandalf blinked at him and then turned his own eyes back up to the ancient words. "Mellon," he said clearly. Shëanon held her breath, but the word had hardly left the wizard's lips when there was the great grinding sound of stone against stone, and the archway was parted down the middle. The doors swung open slowly, rumbling on their invisible hinges, until the darkness beyond them was slowly revealed.
Gandalf chuckled and rose to his feet. He grinned at Frodo, and Shëanon could hear Merry and Pippin give little cheers from behind them as everyone quickly gathered behind Gandalf to file into the mines, but she was focused only on the dank air that hit her face as she stepped after Aragorn into the darkness. Goosebumps rose all over her skin as she stepped over the great threshold. The ground under her feet was of smooth stone, and the footsteps of the company echoed in what she suspected must be a cavernous foyer. She squinted in the gloom.
"Soon, Master Elf, you will enjoy the fabled hospitality of the dwarves!" Gimli exclaimed happily as they stepped tentatively into the chamber. "Roaring fires, malt beer, red meat off the bone! This, my friend, is the home of my cousin Balin. And they call it a mine! A mine!"
Suddenly Gandalf breathed light into his staff, casting a dim glow about their feet. Shëanon's entire body froze as she took in the scene around them and Gimli continued to chuckle on.
Finally Boromir spoke.
"This is no mine," he murmured, staring at the rotting bones and corpses strewn about the room. "It is a tomb."
The hobbits glanced down and gasped, as Gimli, startled, let out a wail to see the bodies of his kin. Legolas snatched up an arrow from amongst the gore and cast it away as he saw the fowl metalwork. It clattered as it fell.
"Goblins," he spat, straightening and drawing an arrow from his quiver. Adrenaline now coursing through her, Shëanon did the same, bringing it to her bowstring as she heard the metallic hiss of Aragorn's sword being unsheathed.
"We make for the Gap of Rohan. We should never have come here," Boromir growled. "Now get out of here, get out!"
No one needed more persuasion than that; the hobbits were already through the door and Shëanon lingered only long enough in the blackness to see what Aragorn would do, but at his nod she turned back towards the entrance, intent on getting as far from the Mines as possible.
She had only taken a few steps, however, when several screams pierced the air, echoing in the cavernous space. Shëanon's blood froze as she realized what was happening in the doorway; the hobbits were screaming and grappling with—something. Her jaw dropped and she could scarcely suppress a scream of her own; giant, slimy tentacles were bursting out of the water, winding around the hobbits' ankles and trying to pull them into the dank lake.
"Aragorn!" Frodo screamed, and she felt the air stir as the ranger flew past her. It took only a moment longer for Shëanon to regain her wits, and then she sprinted out onto the bank, sliding a bit on the mucky surface. Boromir was hacking at tentacles that were drowning Merry and Pippin; Frodo had been hauled into the air as the monster's body finally breached the surface. It was like nothing she had ever seen before and Shëanon felt like she had been dropped into a nightmare. Panicked, she loosed an arrow. It reached its mark in the great, flailing limb that held the hobbit, but although it flinched, the tentacle did not release him. The creature started screaming, and distantly, she realized that arrows were now embedded in its eyes. Shëanon followed Legolas's lead, aiming instead at the monster's face. It was recoiling and thrashing; the disgusting water was crashing in great waves onto the bank as Boromir and Aragorn went at the tentacles with their swords. Finally, Frodo fell into Boromir's arms. Gandalf was screaming at everyone to flee into the mines while he and Gimli shoved the other hobbits back through the doors. Aragorn and Boromir were sprinting and struggling out of the water, but the giant monster, though blinded, had risen out of the torrents and was advancing after them. Legolas fired another shot as Shëanon grabbed Aragorn's arm and hauled him out of the water, but as soon as he was on the bank he lifted her forcefully by the waist and all but threw her forward.
"Go!" he shouted, and so she turned and ran after the others. She could feel the spray on her back as the monster screamed again and knew that it must have been right behind her, but before she could look back and see what she was sure would be her death, she was through the doors, into Moria, and there was a great, echoing crash from behind her. All was thrown into pitch blackness as Shëanon skidded to a stop, panting and shaken. For a moment there was a resounding silence in which the only sounds that could be heard were ragged breaths and a few straggling rocks clattering onto the ground; Shëanon strained her ears to hear what sounded like a wail of anguish and a final, torrential splash.
"Is everyone here?"
"Merry? Merry, where are you?"
Shëanon tried not to panic as the implications of what had just happened hit her, but they were now trapped in Moria and the hobbits' frantic whispers only played up her anxiety. It was darker than she had ever known. Even with her elvish blood, she could not see a foot in front of her.
"Aragorn?" she hissed, whirling in the blackness, her heart pounding in her ears. She was afraid to move, lest she trip over a dead body and fall to the ground with the corpses.
"Here, Shea."
Aragorn's voice came from somewhere to her right as Boromir and Gimli were trying to do a headcount; blindly and immediately, she moved towards him, more afraid than she would ever later admit, and was about to call for him again when she suddenly collided with someone very solid and tall. Shëanon gasped and stepped back, knowing even in the dark that it wasn't Aragorn, and her imagination immediately conjured an image of some evil being come to slay her in the shadows. A hand gently grasped her arm.
"It is I, aiër," came Legolas's voice. "Aragorn is here," and Shëanon stepped carefully as he guided her past him. She reached out her hands, groping for him with shaking fingers, and finally felt the wet cloth of Aragorn's tunic when a dim light illuminated the chamber with a dull thump. Shëanon had a brief look at Aragorn's solemn and shadowy face, his clothes soaked from the battle in the lake, before she turned to Gandalf, who had started speaking.
"We now have but one choice," he said grimly to the company, his features thrown into relief by the light of his staff, which he held before him. Everyone was silent as he spoke. "We must face the long dark of Moria. Be on your guard; there are older and fouler things than orcs in the deep paces of the world. Gimli, come ahead with me. Legolas and Shëanon, too. I shall need your eyes in the night."
Everyone began to assemble into a kind of double-file line. Shëanon cast a rather nervous glance at Aragorn, reluctant to leave his side, before falling into place behind Gandalf and Gimli, beside Legolas. Behind her walked Frodo with Sam, and then Merry and Pippin, and Aragorn and Boromir guarded the group's rear. She gripped her bow hard as she followed the wizard deeper into the mountain. Although she could now see a little by the dim glow of Gandalf's staff, she found that the rest of her senses were as hypersensitive as if she had been still blinded, such was her anxiety and fear. Her legs were shaking slightly as the company climbed to the top of what was surely once a grand entry staircase, her nerves screaming; every fiber of her body protested each step she took. Her mouth was full of the dead, wet smell of the mines, her ears straining to hear every faint echo of the others' footsteps in the deep spaces around them. Her eyes ached as she gazed into the blackness around her; waiting to detect some sign of goblins or orcs. In her mind, she kept seeing the decomposed dwarf bodies from the entryway, and she walked slightly closer to Gandalf.
"Quietly now," he murmured over his shoulder as they came to the beginning of what appeared to be a narrow path, stretching before them with a sheer drop on either side. This, clearly, was their road. "It's a four day journey to the other side. Let us hope that our presence may go unnoticed."
Shëanon swallowed. As the fellowship marched through the dark, she decided she did not want to think about what might happen if they were detected. Instead she peered warily around her; it was very lucky that they had Gandalf and his light, for every so often there were breaks in the path and holes in the ground, pits suddenly at their feet or else sudden turns away from great falls. Every now and then someone would whisper hurriedly to a companion, but other than that the company walked in silence. Although they had walked all day and had not stopped to rest, it seemed that everyone was unanimous in the decision to keep walking onward for as long as possible so as to get to the other side all the sooner. Shëanon would have sprinted if given the choice. She wasn't sure if the others were becoming less frightened the longer they walked, but she felt more and more anxious as time slowly passed. A few times their road led them through narrow, long tunnels that made her feel extremely claustrophobic; indeed the very fact that they were deep underground with tons and tons of heavy rock and earth above them made her feel sick to her stomach and she had to force herself to stop thinking about the ceiling caving in.
The sounds of the company's breathing and footsteps were the only sounds that Shëanon could perceive, and after a while she took to focusing on the familiar cadence of Aragorn's footfalls as she stared into the darkness. This was soothing to her for a while, but after a time she noticed something that troubled her greatly. How many sets of feet could she hear? Frantically, she counted. From ahead of her came Gandalf's sure stride and the thumps of Gimli's dwarven steps, Legolas's quiet footfalls from beside her… she could hear Aragorn's even gait, Boromir's heavy trod, and then there were her own quiet steps, and… were those the hobbits' steps she was hearing? She tried to break apart the pitter pattering of their bare feet and match the sounds with the steps of the individual hobbits, picking out Sam's first and most easily, and then the others'… Was there an extra? She could have sworn she heard five sets of bare feet on the rough rock. She counted again. Eventually, she cast a glance over her shoulder and watched the hobbits' feet as they walked, listening. They were looking at her inquisitively, but she was too busy concentrating on their steps and the sounds in her ears. She turned back around, uneasy, but the mysterious footsteps seemed to have disappeared.
Shëanon bit her lip. Was she imagining things? Was she simply being paranoid in the dark? For some reason, she didn't think so. She cast a sidelong glance at Legolas, but his alert expression did not betray any alarm. The company walked on. Shëanon could not shake the feeling that someone was following them, and every time she found her attention slip slightly, she found that the footsteps were back again. Finally, Gandalf and Gimli came to an abrupt stop at a fork in the road, and consequently the fellowship halted behind them. She heard Aragorn and Boromir stop walking at the back of the line, and then, faintly but definitely there, she heard the soft sound of the additional feet take a few more steps somewhere far behind them. She spun around, squinting back in the direction from whence they had come, but she could see nothing with Aragorn and Boromir blocking the way. Aragorn raised his eyebrows at her. Gandalf and Gimli had chosen a direction and started walking again, and so she nervously turned and fell back into step.
"Legolas?" she whispered. She had meant for it to come out calmly, but the anxiety was obvious in her voice. The elf looked down at her. "I think-"
"You are right," he answered before she could even finish her sentence. She stared at him. "It is not a concern for the present," he murmured, and his eyes returned to the darkness ahead of them. Shëanon looked down at her feet, feeling even more nervous now. She was right? There was someone in there with them, following them, and it wasn't a concern? She raised her gaze back to Legolas's profile; he was squinting slightly, staring intensely at something far ahead. Shivers running up and down her spine, Shëanon looked over her shoulder again. Did Gandalf know that they were being followed? She decided that he must; Legolas would never withhold that type of information, and furthermore she doubted that anyone could pursue them without Gandalf's knowledge. If Legolas did not think it was a cause for worry, then she would believe him. Even so, she remained tense and nervous, jumping a little at distant sounds. Still the company journeyed onward.
When the group finally stopped, Shëanon had no idea what time it was or how long they had been walking. Without the sky to go by and with the constant darkness of the mines, she felt disoriented and lost. She could only guess that it might be very early in the morning, for they had entered Moria in the night and then walked for many hours. The footfalls of the others had grown heavier and wearier the longer they had walked, and she knew that most were dead on their feet, but she still wished that they could keep going. The thought of stopping for hours, of lying down in the blackness and waiting like sitting ducks trapped in the deep made bile rise in Shëanon's throat.
"We will rest here for what is left of the night," Gandalf announced. There was a space off to the side that looked as though it might once have been a guard post; there were walls along three sides, but the area was still completely open to the road. Shëanon was torn between her desire to get out of the open and the fear of being boxed in and surrounded. If they were found while they slept, there would be no way to escape. "I will take the watch so that we may still have a little light. Do not drink too much of your water. The streams that run through the mines are not to be disturbed; we will have to wait until we reach the other side to refill our flasks."
The hobbits rushed forward, clearly eager to get off their feet and take some comfort away from the bleakness of the road, and the others followed. Everyone laid out their bedrolls along the back wall of the small chamber, as far from the road as possible. Shëanon nervously laid out her blanket beside Aragorn. They did not speak, but he had come up beside her and brought an arm around her shoulders as soon as Gandalf had called for the break, steering her over to their current spot along the wall. She wondered vaguely if he could tell how anxious she was.
With mercifully steady fingers, she brought her waterskin to her lips, taking only a small sip, and lowered herself down beside Aragorn as everyone whispered quietly to each other and settled down. Most of the supplies had been left outside in the chaos from before, so the company had to make do with what little provisions they had left. To Shëanon's relief, Legolas sat down on the other side of her, resting his back against the wall as she was. She was past her uneasiness of passing the night beside him; she was just glad of the security of having someone on either side of her instead of empty blackness to her right. Aragorn passed her some dried meat which she ate very gingerly, still feeling slightly sick to her stomach and too nervous to eat. After a few more minutes, everyone hesitantly began to lie down. Gandalf remained seated at the very edge of the group. The light of his staff seemed to have become even fainter, not even reaching Shëanon where she sat.
Aragorn, she, and Legolas remained leaning against the wall for a while longer. Shëanon saw that Aragorn was watching all the hobbits huddle together, but eventually he seemed to decide that he should take advantage of Gandalf's watch and get some sleep himself. Shëanon remembered how he and the wizard had stayed up all the night talking before their ascent up Caradhras, and realized that Aragorn had had hardly any sleep for several days. She frowned as she watched him lie down beside her, and he caught her gaze.
"Shea."
That was all he said, propped up on one elbow in the near blackness, his eyes glittering and stern, but Shëanon shook her head.
"I'm alright for tonight. It is you who has not slept," she whispered, but she knew that he was skeptical. He shook his head, apparently exasperated, but lay down. Shëanon supposed that he had not the energy to argue with her, and she was glad. She sat utterly still in the darkness as Aragorn shifted beside her, closing his eyes, but she noted with an anxious flutter in her stomach that even as he settled down to sleep, his hand rested on the pommel of his sword. She drew her knees in closer to her chest. Beside her, Legolas was still sitting up, but she did not look at him. Instead, she listened to the slow breathing of the others and peered out towards the road. Every now and then, Gandalf would move on the other side of the room, and each time the motion drew her eye. She almost wanted to go over and sit with him, but she felt oddly protective of Aragorn and did not want to leave his side while he slept and in addition to that, Legolas was also awake and alert and she rather liked her position between him and the ranger.
"Are you not tired, aiër?" Legolas asked very quietly after a significant amount of time, so that Shëanon started slightly to hear his low voice break the relative silence. As she turned to him, he was still looking ahead, but he met her gaze when he felt her eyes on him. Shëanon glanced away.
"I will find no sleep in this place," she said softly. She half-expected him to try to persuade her, but was relieved when he did not. For several long minutes, they sat side by side without speaking. Shëanon truthfully was not tired; her body was tense and her mind was racing—the result of her fear. Just when she thought she might be able to lower her guard a bit, she thought she saw something moving far off in the darkness. She froze, holding her breath. Whatever it was moved again, and the pale light of Gandalf's staff was reflected off of two tiny circles in the distance.
Eyes.
Shëanon started and leaned forward, half rising, her heart thundering, and was deliberating about whether or not to draw an arrow or flee over to Gandalf when she felt Legolas's warm hand on her shoulder. She turned to him, unnerved, but his expression was as calm as ever.
"What is that?" she demanded, wanting very much to shake off his hand and shoot the dark creature. Legolas seemed to sense this, for he gently drew her back down against the wall.
"It is Gollum," he explained quietly. "You heard him following us earlier."
"Gollum?" she gasped, turning immediately to look back over her shoulder, but she could no longer see anything but stone and shadow. She shuddered, feeling as though a bucket of ice water had been poured over her head. "Gollum has been following us?"
"Yes."
Shëanon could not understand why he did not appear to be troubled at all by what she considered to be an unimaginably bad situation.
"But—Surely he seeks the ring! He would do anything to retrieve it! Should we not—?"
"Gollum is cunning and desperate, but he is not foolish. He would not dare approach us. He knows who and what Mithrandir is, and he will not soon forget his experience with Aragorn." He offered her a knowing look. "And he knows that we are aware of him."
Shëanon looked at him doubtfully, wanting to be reassured and yet still wary. Legolas was watching her as if to see what she would do, and she found that his gaze was making her nervous again. She crossed her arms over herself and looked down at her knees.
"I do not like this," she muttered. She had meant to refer to Gollum, but she found that her words applied to several things in that moment.
"Nor do I, but you need not worry now."
Shëanon let out a shaky breath as she tried to take his words to heart. She did not know if she felt better or worse knowing what it was that pursued them. The idea of Gollum skulking behind them in the dark made her skin crawl and her stomach turn, but she swallowed her protests and went back to listening to the quiet and watching the road. She said nothing more for what was rest of the night, sitting still as a statue in the darkness with Aragorn's breathing in her ears and the burning feeling in her chest caused by Legolas's presence beside her. The hours seemed endless and impossibly long, but finally Gandalf rose to his feet.
The second march was much the same as the first, except that the company walked for much longer than they had the night before. The road wound around sharp bends and over deep chasms, sometimes hugging close to a wall or else stretching out across deep rifts in the earth. The others seemed more at ease after some sleep and with the horrors of the lake monster and the dwarf bodies not so fresh in their minds; the hobbits were even carrying on whispered conversations, but Shëanon felt even more on edge, ever listening for the sound of Gollum behind them, ever searching in the dark for another danger.
"The wealth of Moria was not in gold or jewels, but mithril," Gandalf explained to the group about an hour after they had all risen. The company was carefully inching along a narrow ledge, and the wizard held his staff out over the side. Shëanon's eyebrows rose as she saw the glint of the light shining on veins of precious metal running through the rock for what appeared to be miles downwards. It was beautiful and refreshing to see in the dark, but she was relieved when Gandalf withdrew his arm. She trusted his judgment implicitly, but she was still wary of somehow attracting attention to them. She walked wordlessly next to Legolas for several hours as they all climbed steep, crumbling stairs and edged around treacherous holes in the path. It was a long while later when Gandalf came to a stop before three great stone doorways, each leading into pitch blackness, and spoke again.
"I have no memory of this place," he murmured, looking back and forth between the three gateways before him. Shëanon gaped. Gandalf had not shown a single sign of hesitation before then, and she had been reassured by his surety. She did not know what to think now that he did not know which way to go; it increased her feeling of foreboding. At the back of her mind had been the terrible notion that they would never again see the sunlight, that they would never make it out of Moria alive. As Gandalf instructed the others to rest awhile so that he could think, she tried not to let that despair overwhelm her. 'Mithrandir will remember,' she assured herself. 'He will lead us out.'
She settled herself down beside Aragorn, who had lowered himself onto a large stone slab that appeared to have fallen from above in some long-ago battle. He was resting his forearms on his knees, and he glanced at her as she sat down; the expression on his face was so familiar and knowing—it was almost as though they were sitting under their tree in the hollow in Imladris. Shëanon bit her lip against the onslaught of homesickness she felt, but Aragorn's glittering eyes held no trace of concern and she forced herself to keep faith. She was with Aragorn and Gandalf; as long as they were there, she could feel safe.
Legolas came to stand before them, but the three of them did not speak. Shëanon could hear Merry and Pippin complaining that they were hungry and Boromir make a valiant effort to lift their spirits with a jest about hobbits and the luxuries of second breakfasts.
"When we reach the eastern doors, we will be less than a day from Lothlórien," Aragorn whispered to her after a long stretch of silence. Shëanon had known this already, and so she said nothing. She had thought on it in the night. While their path had still been to go to Mordor by the Gap of Rohan, the fellowship would not have traveled through the Golden Wood. When it had become clear that they would need to seek an alternate route, however, the possibility of entering into the forest had come swiftly into Shëanon's mind. Now that they were frightened in the dark, with half their supplies lost to them the day before and no access to food or water, there was little doubt that Lórien was their next destination. Shea did not know what to make of this information. While she would surely welcome the safety and beauty of the forest after the suffocating blackness of the mines, and while she had always wanted very badly to travel there, the idea left sharp pangs of anxiety in the pit of her stomach. She sensed that Aragorn was trying to distract her from the eeriness of sitting still in the dark, however, and so she listened to his voice without complaint.
Shëanon could not say how long they all waited. Deep in the mountain, time seemed to have no meaning, but finally and suddenly Gandalf chuckled and rose.
"Ah, it's that way," he informed them in good humor, gesturing towards the passage to the left.
"He's remembered!" Merry exclaimed with relief as the hobbits all clambered to their feet. Shëanon also leapt up, as eager as they to move on.
"No," Gandalf explained with a small smile, beckoning them all forward. "But the air doesn't smell so foul down here. If in doubt, Meriadoc, always follow your nose."
Bewildered, Shëanon looked at Aragorn, but he only grinned at her and went to walk beside Boromir once more.
It was hours later when they stopped to sleep again. They had reached the outskirts of the dwarf city, and this time the spot they had chosen was not just a hollowed out space to the side of the road but rather a chamber with a great stone door. It was not a large space, and there was a second door on the far side of the room.
"This will do," Gandalf said in as pleasant a tone as the circumstances allowed, and the faint rustling of rucksacks being lowered to the ground filled the quiet. On the road, Shëanon had been able to hear the distant sounds of trickling water and, on occasion, the beating of bat wings, but these were muffled by the thick stone walls of the chamber. Despite the closeness of the stone, however, the air was not as still or as dank as she had expected, and a glance toward the low ceiling revealed dark shafts in the walls that surely provided ventilation.
"Let us take a few hours rest. We have done well. Our path has been as direct as we could have hoped. If we do not tarry, it will take less than two complete marches, I think, to reach the eastern gate," announced Gandalf to the exhausted group. Shëanon was weary as well; it was all she could do not to lean against the pillar that was Aragorn as they listened to Gandalf speak.
"What time do you suppose it is?" Sam whispered to the other hobbits, who were already pulling bread from their packs.
"It is the middle of the night," Gandalf replied, apparently overhearing. "We have been walking since around dawn."
"It is no wonder I'm so tired," Merry breathed to Pippin, who nodded in agreement. There was a wide stone bench to one side of the room that Gandalf was moving towards, and the hobbits followed behind him like ducklings follow their mother.
Suddenly Shëanon felt the lightest touch at the small of her back, and she jumped slightly, turning to see Legolas step around her. Her eyes snapped down to his hand, which with a jolt she realized had just been on her. Her skin tingled beneath her clothes where his fingers had brushed against her.
"Cerithan i tirith," he said lowly to Gandalf, and Shëanon's eyebrows rose high on her forehead. If Legolas intended to take the watch, did that mean that they would lose Gandalf's light? She watched as the wizard nodded his thanks and made to lie down. Beside her, Aragorn was kicking aside rubble so that he could sleep without the jagged stones digging into his back, and Legolas returned to them, his expression impassive. Shëanon did not dare give voice to her anxieties, but she crouched down beside Aragorn as he reclined against the crumbling wall at his back. The ranger seemed unperturbed by this change of events, though that did not exactly soothe Shëanon's mind; she was well aware that Aragorn would not have been troubled by the lack of light, while Shëanon could not bear the thought of newfound blackness.
After several moments, all but Shëanon and Legolas were curled into their cloaks, prepared to seek sleep in the deep of the mountains. Aragorn, lying beside her, was still awake, and Shëanon could see that Gandalf was as well. She was watching him keenly, for once not giving her full attention to the sounds of the faint movements in the distance. Gandalf's staff was still illuminated, and with desperation she hoped that it might stay so throughout the night while he slept. She balled her fists in her lap, waiting. Legolas was as still as stone to her left, and Aragorn kept tapping at her elbow in what she assumed was either a half-hearted attempt to get her to lie down or a kind of wordless reassurance. Finally, when Aragorn had long stopped his movements and the members of the company were still and quiet and Shëanon had just begun to relax her attention on Gandalf, the light in the chamber flickered and was extinguished.
Shëanon tensed. Her immediate instinct was to shake Aragorn awake, but she scolded herself even before her hand could reach for him in the darkness. Frantically, she blinked and rubbed her eyes—anything to adjust to the lack of light and regain some of her vision, but she could see nothing more than vague, hardly discernable outlines. She cursed internally and drew her bow into her lap, if only to cling to some semblance of control in the situation. Her ears were straining to accommodate for her reduced sight, but she could hear little more than the pounding of her heart in her ears.
"Expecting to shoot something, aiër?"
Shëanon whipped her head around. She could just barely see the shadow that distinguished Legolas's face from the darkness around them. She drew in a breath.
"Gandalf's staff went out," she whispered lamely. She could not see his expression in the dark, but she would have bet all the mithril in Moria that he was smirking at her.
"Yes, he is sleeping," he said in a voice that conveyed none of the humor or condescension she had expected. "He will wake in a few hours."
Shëanon said nothing for a moment, considering, when finally she found her voice.
"Can you see?" she demanded, and this time her voice betrayed her nervousness. Her grip tightened around her bow as she felt Legolas shift beside her.
"Quite well," he assured her, but rather than feel reassured, Shëanon felt a pang of sudden resentment.
"How well?" she pressed, half anxious and half bitter.
This time Legolas paused before answering her, and she wondered briefly if he was going to lie before immediately dismissing the thought.
"I can see the chamber and our companions well enough, though if you were to ask me to identify colors, I could not do so."
Shëanon grimaced. What a difference her diluted blood made in this instance, that he could see detailed shapes and she could make out only dark silhouettes. She bowed her head. The notion that he could see her while she could not very well see him entered her mind, and she did not like it at all.
"If anyone tries to enter this chamber, aiër, I assure you I would see them at once, although I think we would both hear any trouble long before sight became a necessity."
Once more Shëanon was silent.
"Do you not trust me?" Legolas asked softly, and, startled, she immediately went on the defense.
"What makes you think that?" she asked in a rather strained voice that surprised even her.
Suddenly she felt her bow being tugged from her hands and instinctively she clutched it tighter to her chest.
"If you hold that bow any tighter, you will snap the wood," Legolas breathed, and his voice was almost laughter. Shëanon blushed and hoped that in the darkness he might not be able to tell. Sheepishly, she placed the weapon on the ground beside her and focused once more on listening for footsteps beyond the walls of the chamber. The silence in the air was broken only by the sounds of breathing and sleep; if Gollum was near, she could not hear him.
Shëanon's weariness was returning to her. Her mind strove to remain alert, but her limbs felt heavy and her eyes were burning; the strain on them in the darkness did not make matters easier. She thought fleetingly how nice it would be to lie down next to Aragorn, to close her eyes and find the solace of a restful slumber, but then she reminded herself of all the reasons why she should not—what if they found themselves under attack, and she was asleep and defenseless? Or worse still, what if she had a nightmare or vision and cried out and gave them away and the company was slain and it was her fault, all her fault…
"You are weary, Shëanon," came Legolas's quiet voice after she had needed to rub her eyes for the third time.
"My eyes are just tired from the darkness," she muttered awkwardly, a half-truth. "I cannot see as well as you can," she admitted softly. Her back was sore from her position against the unforgiving stone, and she fidgeted a bit as a result.
"The night beneath the trees of my homeland is without starlight or moonlight."
Shëanon's eyebrows rose on her forehead; she had not expected such a comment and she did not quite know how she was expected to respond.
"Imladris does not see a lightless night unless the stars are hidden by clouds," was all she could manage. On her knees, she flexed and unflexed her fingers.
To her astonishment, Legolas reached out and suddenly her hand was lifted from her lap and held over his. Briefly he ran his thumb over her knuckles before turning her hand palm-side up. He laid his hand over hers; his fingers extended far beyond her fingertips.
"Your hands are so small," he murmured. "It is hard to imagine them wielding that bow, though I have seen them do so with my own eyes."
Shëanon was utterly bewildered; she could find no connection whatsoever between their previous conversation and the size of her hands. As she opened her mouth to speak, she realized that she had been holding her breath, although she did not remember doing so.
"I am sure your hands were smaller," she replied in the steadiest voice she could manage, "when first you learned to shoot an arrow."
"I suppose you are right." Could she hear a smile in his tone? Flustered, she waited for him to release her, but he did not let go. Goosebumps rose on her flesh; this felt different from that time in the rain—then he had taken her hands for a reason, but now she could find no plausible cause for his sudden interest in her fingers. Almost idly, he traced the lines of her palm, and once she felt his thumb sweep across her wrist. As usual, his touch left her skin burning. He continued this for a long while, neither of them speaking, and at first Shëanon felt tense and almost embarrassed, but eventually her mind became almost entranced by the constant motion and the steady, warm feeling his fingertips left along her skin. Legolas seemed to be looking toward the door, but Shëanon could not concentrate on anything other than the feeling of his hands cradling hers…
Shea jerked her head up as, to her horror, she felt herself nodding off. 'Stay awake!' she commanded herself. 'You are in the Mines of Moria! You are trapped in a tomb and surrounded by evil! Stay awake stay awake stay awake…' She tried to sit up straighter as she considered all the terrible things that could be lurking just outside the chamber…
"There is a river that runs through Mirkwood," Legolas whispered. His voice was deep and quiet and breathy, and it seemed to be much closer to her ear than before. "Its origin is in the Ered Mithrin, and though the trees of the land grow so densely together that their leaves and branches obscure the sky, the forest is interrupted by the river and you can see the sky upon its banks. The water is clear and clean, and in the night the sky is reflected upon its surface, and so it appears as a path wrought of starlight…"
Dazed, Shëanon listened to the soothing sound of his voice, the words washing over her like a dream as images of what he described flitted across her mind and he continued to stroke her knuckles with his thumb. When had he laced his fingers through hers? She hadn't even noticed…
Shëanon opened her eyes as the chamber was suddenly filled with light. Confused, she noted blearily that Gandalf was waking the others, that Aragorn was up and kneeling before his rucksack. Had she fallen asleep? She was leaning against something solid but quite warm—Shëanon jolted upright, her body gone rigid as she realized the position she had been in. Immediately her cheeks colored; she had been curled against Legolas, her head on his shoulder and her hand gripping his forearm. Shocked, she looked into his face. He had been speaking to Aragorn (vaguely now she recalled the rumbling of his vocal cords from where her ear had been against him before she had completely regained consciousness), but he turned and met her eyes when she so violently sat up.
"Are you well rested, aiër?" he asked calmly, and the realization of what had happened suddenly slammed into her.
"You—" she faltered, staring at him in disbelief. The corners of his mouth turned up and his eyes glittered with satisfaction, and then he gracefully rose to his feet and went to speak to Gandalf. Shëanon remained where she was, dumbfounded. He had magicked her to sleep! He had literally used the power of elven speech to lull her into a trance and put her to sleep with his voice. Her initial reaction was indignation and anger, followed closely by mortification. It had never even occurred to her that she might be susceptible to such a thing; surely mortals were affected thusly, but never had she been! Stricken, she looked down at her palm, remembering how Legolas had held her hand in the darkness, and she flushed again.
"Shea?"
Still slightly aghast, she looked up at Aragorn, who was offering her breakfast. He was grinning ear to ear, and although the logical part of her brain told her that it was because she had slept and he had so vehemently wanted her to, the more irrational part of her was very keenly aware of the fact that he had seen her snuggled and asleep against the woodland prince. She scowled at him and did not take the biscuit he was holding out for her.
Translations:
Cerithan i tirith- I will take the watch
A/N: Hello everyone. Well... I updated! I am so so so SO sorry it took so long. On top of school and a lot of personal hardships since the last chapter, someone very close to me passed away and for a while I didn't want to do much of anything, let alone write. Anyways, I'm back and I'm so sorry. This chapter ended up being over 30 pages long, so I literally just chopped it in half. I'll post part two either tonight or tomorrow morning! As always, thank you so much to those of you who have been reading and reviewing! You guys are awesome and I love the feedback. More Moria to come. xoxo Erin