Chapter 12
She is the last one to reach the meeting point. Pain…the old legs don't move like they used to. Back, hip, knee, foot…too hard to keep making them move. Where is that Tuknuk…the one she makes carry her?
He is not with this sorry rabble, she realizes, looking at the ratty group she has joined.
Sent him off, you did.
No matter. The archer is here. This is the task now…strike him, bite him…stick him in the eye.
She laughs to herself. He's been stuck before…but I am Shadowback, and I will make this one count.
Before sunrise, Kili's band of warriors were wet, muddy, and ready to leave their makeshift camp in the dripping trees.
At his signal they moved out, picking their way through underbrush to the gravelly shoreline with a view to the eastern hills, barely limned with coming dawn.
Skirfir alone stepped toward the river's edge, armed bow in hand. Quick lad with sharp eyes, Kili reassured himself. Being the bait had once been his task in his uncle's company…but he'd handed this duty to his ushmar. Skirf knew everything he did about the trickiness of goblin-kind…along with a few things he'd learned from old Bofur as well.
Kili motioned his warriors back. They ducked for cover behind a large fallen tree.
Skirf stepped forward alone.
Kili watched, uneasy. The morning is quiet…too quiet. As silently as he could, he nocked an arrow and drew his bowstring, ears alert.
In the grey pre-dawn light, Skirf bent as if looking at tracks, moved ahead, and then stopped. He knelt on one knee and looked at something in the gravel.
Far off downriver, Kili heard a screecher jay, its sharp call echoing across the water.
Skirfir stood and stepped forward, feigning a yawn and a stretch.
Kili scanned the underbrush. The lads with him had their weapons at the ready, doing the same. There is something here…Skirf senses it…the lads sense it…
Kili's ears were keen for goblins. Unlike a deer or other wild animal, goblin gaits would sound heavy and uneven. They were particularly bad at creeping through underbrush.
There—a crack of twigs to the north of their tree. With a hand signal, he assigned two of the patrol to guard their backs.
And then Skirf, fastest shot in the Blue Mountains, raised his bow and fired into the brush.
Goblins screeched and Kili didn't think twice—he ducked under a low branch and charged north.
He was aware that Skirf nocked and fired, nocked and fired…sidestepping a volley of stones and one heavy spear.
Closer now to the source of Skirf's attackers, Kili fired into the underbrush ahead. Just behind him, seven other warriors fired—arrows, bolts, and a volley of stone pellets.
Sword out, Kili pushed into a thicket, aware that Skirf was on the run to join the fight.
Goblin whoops and the tell-tale shaking of leaves and limbs told Kili this was the goblin camp. A nest of seven—three obviously just awakened—rose and scattered. Two ran directly at Skirf, the rest in different directions.
Kili tested the familiar weight of the battle sword in his hand. The sky glowed a little lighter now, and he spotted the goblin he wanted—the short, scrawny one missing an ear tip, wearing a short, sparse topknot of stringy hair—and dressed in what looked like a tattered potato sack.
She moved faster than expected and slid under a tangle of brush. He charged in, his heavy boots crushing vines and twigs.
He saw movement—and spotted her slithering away.
Three of his lads blocked her path north. She started for open shoreline, then twisted around to go west, deeper into the woods.
Kili angled his path for the intercept, and one of his lads threw bolas.
Her feet tangled and the goblin dropped.
Kili leapt to bring his sword point to her throat before she could rise.
Four more of his lads joined him, their blades already smeared with the green-grey muck of goblin blood.
"Not me, not me!" the pinned goblin shrieked, writhing in the wet leaves in an effort to free her feet.
There—a view of her back. The telltale dark burn scar that marked her as his prey.
"Shadowback," he growled. "You've crossed the Lhûn into dwarf lands. Why?"
She rolled three times to the left, once to the right. "Would never tell YOU," she spat.
"Tell me or die."
She made a guttural noise and clawed at the bolas tangled around her ankles.
Then she stopped, looked at Kili for a long moment, and then her round, dark eyes narrowed.
"Watch it." One of his lads brought the tip of his lance closer in defense of his King.
Fili, King of Erebor, stood in his travel leathers on the Mountain's Western Terrace and looked at the horizon. Between him and his brother's kingdom far to the west lay the Misty Mountains. He had journeyed over them three times. First, in the company of his uncle, and second, leading a company of his own. Balin and Gloin had been with him on that second journey to Rivendell. He had met Gandalf there, and he had welcomed Gimli, his younger cousin from Ered Luin, into the company for the return trip.
Seeing young Gimli's eyes go round at the first sight of Erebor was something to remember, he snorted.
Of course, now Gimli traveled the free lands at will and was currently adding to the family legend by establishing himself in the Glittering Caves. He was apparently one part selective miner and one part preservationist.
The third time he crossed the Misty Mountains on a journey back to Ered Luin in support of Kili's Kingship, and just in time for the birth of his brother's first son.
Fili sighed. And now…now he would travel west once again.
At the sound of his Royal Guard admitting a newcomer to his presence, Fili turned to see his younger son approaching.
"Hanz," he was always happy to see Hannar, though he saw him infrequently. Hanz was apprenticed to the smiths and was following Durin's path, as his Uncle had before him. Fili held out his arms and his third son came to him for a firm embrace. "How have you been, lad?"
Hanz leaned forward to touch foreheads with his father. "Busy, Da. So much to learn."
Fili smiled. Hannar's voice had become deep and sonorous—much like Kili and Thorin when they spoke in low tones. Son of Durin… It warmed his heart.
"I have heard about your journey," Hannar said, glancing at the broad view to the west. "But I will stay here."
Fili nodded. He had assumed so.
Hannar motioned for a page to step forward. "I made this for you," he said quietly, taking a leather-wrapped item from the page and turning to hand it to his father.
Fili's brows rose as Hannar placed it in his open hands. It had to be something his son had forged himself. He judged the weight of it in his hands…yes. Had to be.
He peeled away the leather quickly to discover what it was. "Seax!" he exclaimed, seeing the long, slender scabbard. It was a long knife, or a short sword, depending on which weapons master one listened to. He quickly let the leather fall away and gripped the sheath, pulling the blade.
It was a masterpiece—a long seax to be precise, made of Erebor steel with runes running along the spine. It was a light weapon, perfect for quick action.
"Helthar Durin shumrel siginâm," he read aloud. An old blessing, granting the strength of Durin's protection on journeys. "Stronger forged by you, of course." Fili said.
Hanz smiled. "That was my intention." Of course, a blessing that invoked Durin was strongest when worked by one of Durin's line.
"Intention is everything in this sort of work." Fili turned the blade over—razor sharp, exacting form…exquisite. "Your lines are clear, the folds in the steel are flawless."
"Thank you, father." Hannar's face reddened a little bit.
He was young still, Fili knew. But he was nearly the age Kili had been when they'd come to Erebor for the first time. "I accept that you will stay with Fjalar. He will need you. By the time I return, I expect to attend your Forgemaster ceremony."
A shy nod, and again the reddened face. Hannar was near to gaining the master's title, years before most apprentices even dreamed of it.
Fili spent a while longer admiring his son's work—the leather-wrapped handle, the slender sheath with straps to hang from the back belt. It would make the blade easy-to-hand while riding.
"I love it. It will serve me well," Fili said to his younger son.
"As will I, father." Hanz bowed, hand on heart.
Fili's reply was another hearty embrace.
On the gravelly western shore of the Lhûn, Kili held his ground when the dwarves around him stepped back and drew more weapons.
Shadowback the she-goblin twisted and turned as much as she could with his sword point to her throat. She held up her hands (missing three fingers, he noted) while ridiculously shaking one foot as if she could cast off the bolas that had tripped her to the ground.
"Why do I get the feeling that we have met before, Shadow?" Kili murmured to her. "Did you steal a knife from me once?" He had a memory of that two-fingered hand snaking into his coat and finding a throwing knife.
"Head knocks, cleaver hacks…" she snarled. "You were a prisoner."
"Just before we put an end to your so-called Great Goblin." He glowered at her and she stopped writhing. "He fell quite dead, as I recall."
Shadowback howled at this reminder. "Goblin-cleaver and Foe-hammer…" Then she went silent and her wide eyes narrowed again. "But no match for Uhdbosh." Now she made a gurgling noise that Kili interpreted as laughter. "Eight hands past the red eaten moon…deep below the ruined place."
"Who is Uhdbosh?"
She snorted and stared at him. "The one who can kill Kings." And then she jerked herself sideways, the tip of Kili's sword leaving a scrape across her neck. In a crazy flurry, she got to her feet and charged at his lads, tripped again by the bolas but able to get her two-fingered hand on someone's boot knife. Quick as a wild rat, she twisted and threw it at him.
One step left and a flick of his battle sword sent it to the ground.
Then Shadowback stopped, eyes bulging, her snarl frozen in place.
And Kili's sword through her withered heart.
Tuknuk hated the sunlight. Some of his kind had learned to use it, but Tuknuk—never. And now he had the secret…
Me! She gave it to me…! He spied a jumble of lichen-streaked grey rocks at the base of a sheer cliff. Yes, yes. Hiding here, hiding under stones and boulders…
He was nearly the same color as the rocks, after all. Him and his travel skin. Used to be deer…or used to be goat. He wasn't sure anymore.
But the secret! He was sure of that. The moon would go dark…the sun would go dark…and these things would tell him it was time.
But not yet. Now it was time to sleep…hide from the sun, hide from the men.
He put his hands on the grey rock, eyes peering into the shadows they created beneath. Yes. There under the large ones. A place for Tuknuk.
He slithered into the gap beneath the rock, turned around twice in the small pocket of space, and settled in to sleep through the day.
Some distance away as the raven flies, young Gunnar of Erebor pulled his axe from the backbone of an equally disgusting thoroughly dead goblin.
"Stand down!"
He paused to see Halden, his Dunedain commander, calling a stop to the melee.
The goblin ambush was done, after all. They'd surprised them on the shoreline of this little west-flowing tributary of the Lhûn, several leagues into Dunedain territory. No goblins survived.
"Check them all!" Halden called, directing the mop-up.
Gunnar bent to the task—this one he'd felled was more orc than goblin, but he kicked the fellow over and was about to check for knives, amulets, coins…
"Gunnar," Halden said quietly, walking to him with sword still drawn. "Find a raven. Are there others of these vermin around?"
Gunz stood, leaving his orc-goblin to the Dunedain. "Yes, Commander." He turned, scanning the sky for a familiar black shape. He saw two—high overhead. Feral or friends?
He walked a few paces away from the clanking and thumping sounds of horsemen stripping gear from their enemies. He held out one arm in invitation and waited. The two overhead moved on…but over the treetop came a new bird, quorking as it flew. It wheeled, extended its sharp-clawed feet, and hovered a moment before clamping tight to Gunnar's gauntlet.
"It is good, it is good," the raven bobbed its head.
"Good that we killed the goblins?" Gunz asked.
The raven kept bobbing.
"Tell me, friend," Gunz nearly whispered. "Did we get them all?"
The raven went still, looked him in the eye and then cocked its head. "One dark place. Under stone." Then the raven on his arm crouched and made a defensive cucking sound like a growl.
The two high-flying ravens were back, circling overhead.
The Friend on his arm stood straight, tense and alert, beak open in a show of anger. "Ferals!" it shrieked. And with that, launched itself to the sky.
Gunnar frowned, wondering exactly how to interpret "one dark place."
"Where is the dwarf?" Someone called from the group of fallen dead.
Gunnar made his way to a knot of three Dunedain gathered around Halden.
"What is this?" his friend Erion asked, holding a small, flat rune-marked stone the size of a large coin in his gloved hand.
Gunz peered at it: one rune for "F" and a triangle. "Easy," he said, picking it up. "Just a Lodestone. Spelled to point in the direction of faham."
"North," Halden translated.
"Yes." Gunz turned it over, revealing the same marking on the other side. Then he flipped it into the air with his thumb and as the little group of Dundain watched, he caught it neatly and opened his hand. The disc seemed to turn slightly of its own accord, then the tip of the triangle was indeed pointing perpendicular to the west-flowing river.
"A compass?" Erion asked.
Gunz nodded. "Very old. Dwarf made," he said. "Goblins pick these up from raiding miner settlements, unfortunately."
"They know how to use them?" Erion asked.
Gunnar shrugged. "If someone shows them how…" He didn't have to say that "someone" could well have been a rogue two hundred years ago—or a trader vagabond last week. But as he held the stone in his palm something else in the rock spoke to him. The spell was more than old. Ancient, in fact. Like and yet unlike the stone of Nogrod…the place now called Wardspire.
Why are you here, little stone? He wondered. A bit of gold would tell him—draw out anything else the stone might know.
"Commander," he said, looking up at Halden. "I think this lodestone might have something more to say…"
Fili spent an hour speaking with ravens—some with news of his borders, some with silly chatter.
Now he contemplated organizing his caravan to leave Erebor for a time and meet Aragorn at Annuminas.
He expected to feel unhappy or regretful at the thought of leaving his kingdom, his home, and (he barely whispered to himself) the resting place of his beloved An ...but as he stood alone again on Erebor's western terrance and looked to the horizon, he realized there was something determined and hopeful about a journey with a fresh and noble purpose.
It was about protecting the safety of a gathering of Kings—a gathering that would signal peace in the northern lands and reaffirm and the new strength of Arnor.
And he hoped to find his wayward son, if that son wanted finding.
But it was also about giving wings to his daughter Iri...and watching her discover the bigger world around them—something only possible in this new Fourth Age.
Then Fili smiled, his heart warming.
He would be with his brother again.
.
.
.
A/N:
As always, all feedback welcome. Thank you for reading!
Hand on heart to everyone...I think we are all sheltering in place on what is a holiday week for many...Fili and Kili would like to extend Mahal's Blessings to everyone and add that it's a very dwarfy thing to do: stay home and stay safe and well. Until, of course, it's time to go out again.
I've had PM messages from a couple of readers in the last weeks-my deepest respect for SparkleGirl and Oriline, a nurse and a head ER physician. Hand on heart and Du Bekar, ladies. And deepest wishes for your strength and safety. I have no words for this time, but I do have hope that you will be safe and save others.
In the meantime (and far less important than medical work) I have been home on leave for part of the time and teleworking the rest. I hope you and your loved ones are safe and if you need help, I hope you know how to find it.
I have used the extra time to launch Curse of the Night Dragon by S.K. Alden (aka Summer K Alden.) It's Story one of the Erebor series recast as a new work...it's in ebook form and available all over the world! Tolino and Mondadori in the EU, Angus&Robertson in Australia (and NZ?), Kobo in Canada, and Kindle (Amazon), Nook, and (my personal fave) Apple Books. If you have access to Apple Books, the full first chapter is available for preview, free!
I've priced it at the lowest setting (2.99 US) and hope that helps readers afford it. All reviews welcome.
Alternatively, your local public library may have Overdrive eBooks, and you can request that they purchase it through Overdrive (and then you can read it for free!)
You'll recognize Kirin (Kili) and Gill (Fili) and some similarities to the original story one, but of course the storyworld has been reworked-so what remains is my original plotting set in an ancient AU!neo-celtic land called The Green Isle.
I invite you to take a look at my website: skaldenauthor.c o m. Feel free to communicate there. There's also a new pinterest page for skaldenauthor with artwork that inspired the origin story for the new land. S.K. Alden is also a "verified author"on Goodreads-so if you're on Goodreads, please review or add the new book to your listopia.
There's also pinterest page for summerald (Summer Alden) in support of these fan fics. You can just google to find this. Boards: Merry Gathering of Dwarves, The Fighting Dwarf, and my personal fun fave: Modern Dwarf...among other boards.
May all this fandom artwork offer you light in a time of darkness.
And thank you from the bottom of my heart for YOUR encouragement and readership of these fan fic stories-it's what has inspired me to fulfill a lifelong dream of publishing in the big world. Could not have taken that step without your kind words over the years.
As always, a special heartfelt thanks to Jessie152 for proofreading and the translation that appears on fan fik d e. Frodo would be nowhere without Sam.
Stay well and ((hugs))
Summer
