Author's Note: For Blood, Ye Render Blood is a prequel to my series The Feanoriel Chronicles, however, it CAN be read as standalone. I have specifically outlined/planned this fic to be accessible to a wide audience. This work is updated at random. Usually that's every few days, but I cannot promise specific days. I really hope you enjoy! Leave a review or two if you do. It means the world to writers :)

FOR BLOOD YE RENDER BLOOD

Prequel to The Fëanoriel Chronicles

"No. There is no barrow on Weathertop, nor on any of these hills," answered Strider. "The Men of the West did not live here; though in their latter days they defended the hills for a while against the evil that came out of Angmar. This path was made to serve the forts along the walls.

But long before, in the first days of the North Kingdom, they built a great watch-tower on Weathertop, Amon Sul they called it. It was burned and broken, and nothing remains of it now but a tumbled ring, like a rough crown on the old hill's head.

Yet once it was tall and fair..."

The Lord of the Rings,
A Knife in the Dark

Prologue | Rínior

T.A. 1409

Lightning split the night sky, but the screams of dying men drowned out the thunder. Rínior ignored them. With one swing, he took the head off an orc. With another, he smashed in the face of a man of Rhudaur with his round, elven bronze shield. The rain got in his eyes, but it didn't matter. The army of Angmar stretched on beyond the border. He didn't need to see the eyes of his enemies to kill them.

Fire-tipped arrows sailed overhead, lit by the beacons and torches around the Tower of Amon Sûl above them. Each time one landed near him, Rínior watched his enemies flinch away. He smiled through the battle stench. With another slash, he took the arm off an orc. They needed to learn to fear fire.

"Rínior!"

Over the din, he heard Captain Lumorn bellow his name. But a fist connected with his jaw and Rínior tumbled to the ground. A mix of mud and dark blood covered his face. He choked, turning onto his back.

Rínior rolled. He couldn't see, but someone had knocked him down and he didn't want to find out who. Even as his captain cried out for him again, he scrambled in the mud. A foot slammed onto his hand. Rínior screamed, but even as white hot pain shot through his arm, he finally found the hilt of his mithril and steel dagger with his right.

It took a moment to clear his eyes. When he did, he found a chieftain of Rhudaur standing over him. Sword above his head, ready to send his fëa to Mandos, the chieftain grinned.

Rínior grinned back. He sliced through the back of the man's right knee, sending him screaming down in pain. The chieftain's writhing body became leverage for Rínior to begin to stand. With a cry, he drove the dagger deep into the man's chest. Blood bubbled up as he ripped it back out.

"Rínior!"

Círion. A hand grabbed his shoulder, pulling him out of the way of an ax and back through the Arthedain ranks. Rínior gritted his teeth, trying to ignore the horrific taste in his mouth of blood, mud, and spilled guts.

"Captain needs you."

Círion finally let him go thirty paces back from the lines. Blood plastered his already dark hair against his young face. Rínior frowned. His friend frowned, apologetic.

"Why!" Rínior said.

Círion had no answer. Just a pale, shocked expression that barely wavered as he watched the battle unfolding beyond them. Rínior let out a half grunt, half scream.

"Rínior!"

The scratchy, deep voice of Captain Lumorn carried over the field. Rínior faced him. He held up his dagger. The red gem at the center of the Fëanorian star pommel shone through the light rain. It didn't take long after a shout in his direction for Lumorn to reach them.

"You're needed inside," Lumorn ordered, barely catching his breath. His grey hair fell scraggly about his shoulders. "Go."

Rínior pointed back towards the lines. Heat filled his face "I am the only thing keeping these cravens at bay here!"

For a moment, Lumorn just looked at him. But he nodded. "Aye. But for how much longer, Rínior?" He shook his head. "Go. The King asked for you."

Fire arrows whistled over their heads. Rínior didn't speak. He could not refuse a summons from his king. He would never want to refuse a summons. But as cries for mercy and the shattering screams of battle grew, he looked at Círion. His friend still seemed frozen in place, grey eyes wide. Rínior turned back to Lumorn.

"Go."

Rínior nodded. He used his left arm to wipe as much grime from his face as he could, careful to avoid his fingers which still throbbed. Removed from battle, he noticed every ache and pain over his body. Everything hurt.

Guards lined the path up to the Tower. A lightning strike illuminated the clouds and thunder rolled over the Weather Hills. Aptly named. Turning back, Rínior looked at the dying men of Arthedain. They had a thousand left, maybe. But the enemies of the Witch-king stretched for further than he could count. Rínior stopped.

They couldn't win this. Lumorn had known that. Men had no strength to fight against the sorcery of this new dark shadow. The blood of Fëanor could only do so much, a half-elf alone in a sea of mortal men. Their deaths would be the matter of song, perhaps. But not lullabies they would sing to their children. They'd probably never sing another lullaby.

He turned away. Rínior twirled his dagger in his hand as he stepped across the threshold into the bottom floor of the watch tower. He'd set foot in here many times: a pillar of strength in the hills. He'd spent a year guarding Arthedain and the palantír from within these very walls.

Not that he'd ever been permitted to see it. Lumorn had always posted him on every assignment but the defense of the palantír.

Wounded soldiers filled the round stone hall. Against the walls, on crates, under the steps, they moaned and bled out as healers or fellow fighters tried to save them. Rínior turned away. A guard pointed him up the stairs.

With every step, he found himself blocking out the battle more and more. He had to. He didn't look out the small windows. He didn't listen to the dying. Rínior focused on the pain in his legs and the task at hand.

One of the king's guards opened up the right side of the massive wooden doors into an inner chamber. Rínior stepped inside. Dozens of candles around the room illuminated scraps of paper on a desk, sparse furniture, and the imposing figure of King Arveleg strapping on a final piece of armor.

"My lord," Rínior said, wincing as he dropped to a knee. "What do you need of me?"

"Rise, Rínior." His voice, weathered with time but still strong, like his sword arm, filled the room. "I have a job for you. Do you swear to fulfill it, no matter the cost?"

Rínior frowned. "Of course."

Arveleg's grey eyes smoldered like coals in the light of all the candles. He nodded. With a frown, he began to burn the only remaining scrap of paper with any writing on it.

"Good," he said. "I need you to saddle the fastest horse still left alive and ride straight for my son at Fornost."

Rínior felt his cheeks flushing as a burning anger filled his chest. "You desire me to turn tail, to flee like a coward back to the safety of a castle?"

"To retreat is not always cowardice, Rínior. You would do well to remember that." But he shook his head, the flaming parchment dying to smoke. Arveleg moved to a chest in the corner. He opened it, drawing out a large sack, almost bursting at the seams. "The Witch-king cannot get the palantír. I would think you of all my warriors would know this to be true."

Rínior couldn't speak. He turned to the sack, tied closed, and wished he could open it then and there, to finally see the greatest work of his ancestor that still lay in Middle Earth.

"Take it. Ride hard." Arveleg shook his head. "Do not look back."

Rínior grabbed it. The stone weighed more than he ever expected. Gritting his teeth, he sheathed his dagger and used both hands. His horse would love this.

"I looked in it one last time," Arveleg said. He pulled on his gloves and readied his sword as he began to move Rínior towards the door. "Rivendell is still besieged, but one of Elrond's sons rides out beyond the Angmar lines to us even as the other rides to the High Pass. He will find you."

One last time. Rínior looked up at him. For the past fifteen years, he'd served King Arveleg in his military. For fifteen years, his sister had learned court practices among his noblemen. Shifting the stone to his left hand, he held out his right.

Arveleg paused. But he shook it. "Now, go."

Rínior wasted no more time. Even thirty years for a normal Dúnedan of Arthedain would place him in the prime of his life. He raced down the stairs, ignoring the dying men, ignoring the screams for help. He blocked out the pain in his legs.

Even the thunder became background noise as he focused on finding a saddled horse. The messengers wouldn't be needing their steeds. No one else would make it out alive. He knew that in is heart. In under five minutes, he'd strapped the palantír to a saddle bag and an extra sword to his side.

The rain had stopped. Only the muddy ground and distant lightning remained of the storm. Rínior hoisted himself up. The horse threw its head up and down as he angled it back towards the sounds of war. Rínior looked at the carnage one last time.

He nodded. "Die well."

Then he fled. He rode as hard as the horse could take down the East-West Road. He could hear distant screeches and howls. With the threat of war on two fronts and the Marshes on the right, Rínior decided speed meant more than secrecy. The road was their best shot.

Nothing hindered him. Rínior stopped only when he could find shelter and when the horse teetered on the point of exhaustion. He continued this way for days, avoiding settlements such as Bree, Archet, and Combe in favor of the Chetwood forest.

As he lay his head back against a tree trunk, he listened to the stream and the crickets and the panting of his exhausted horse. He couldn't be sure how close behind the armies of the Witch-king were. How long has the king held them back? He tightened his eyes closed.

He listened to his heart beat. In the relative quiet, he felt his throat closing and palms sweating. How far behind was the enemy? How long could he afford to wait?

Opening his eyes, Rínior stared at the pack sitting beside him. It warmed the side of his leg. An inner flame, from Fëanor himself perhaps. It couldn't hurt to check.

Why shouldn't he? Rínior began to unfaster the straps. It belonged to him. Or it should have. He and Maedeth alone remained of the first house. Children of the line of Caranthir. And children of the line of Haleth. Leaders of two peoples, of two races.

The palantír reminded him of a perfectly smooth ball of onyx at first. As he pushed away the burlap, his hands trailed over the glass-like surface. Mesmerizing. As he looked into its depths, he imagined how Fëanor had once toiled over the stone, all thought bent on its majesty.

The center began to glow. Warmth spread through his hands as he laid his palms on the surface and the world around him died away. He saw only the flame at the center of the Seeing-Stone. Then it disappeared, and he saw the world as if from a bird far above:

Amon Sûl, razed to the ground. Smoking stone thrown down by sorcery. Hordes of orcs pillaging through Cardolan. Men cheering as they followed chieftains beyond the Weather Hills. In Rhudaur, Dúnedain slaughtered or fleeing. In a dark keep lit by sickly green flames, a black-robed, black crowned figure sat upon a throne as all fell prostrate around him. It began to turn towards him.

Rínior let go. The image fell away, leaving him alone with his horse surrounded by the Chetwood. He usually saw Círion staring back from the muddy ground, still terrified, but now unseeing when he closed his eyes. He feared that now he'd never get the dying from his dreams.

And yet, and yet. Rínior looked at the silent palantír in the bag. He couldn't help but smile. He'd felt it. The fire, the same one he felt fill his chest every day of his life. He'd felt the sort of power that fire could create when he'd laid hands upon the palantír.

As the stream gurgled on, he tried to relax. Tried for kinder dreams.

A twig snapped. Rínior shot up, not checking before he swung his sword straight at a shadow's neck. A grunt and the sound of blades clashing caused his horse to scream as his sword met the strangers.

"Be still!"

An elven voice.

"Elrohir!"

"Lower your sword before you get us both killed, Rínior." Elrohir shook off his hood.

Rínior, heart still pounding, paused a moment longer before doing so. He sighed, running a hand through his own brown hair as he sunk back against the tree.

"Are you wounded, my friend?" Elrohir asked, face grave. "How is your horse?"

"I'm fine," Rínior said. He gestured to the still-panicking horse. "I fear pushing him much further. Days of hard riding with few stops is killing him. I cannot carry-"

Elrohir held up his hand. "Speak not of what you bear. We need to move. Let the horse go, for I bring an elven horse for you."

"Thank you, my friend."

For the first time since he'd arrived, Elrohir smiled. He nodded. "Of course. Come. The shadow in the North will not break through my brother's lines, not with Glorfindel and Erestor beside him. But we are not protected out here beyond even the Bree-landers."

"They are useless, anyhow," Rínior said.

Elrohir let out a small laugh as he walked back to the horses. Rínior focused on packing up what small items he'd brought. By the time Elrohir returned with two brown horses of Rivendell, Rínior had driven off his exhausted stallion.

"Ready?" Elrohir said. He offered one more small smile as Rínior settled on top of his horse. "Half-elves must stick together, after all."

Rínior smirked back. He still felt his chest buzzing from the fire of the palantír. He wondered if Elrohir could tell?

He nodded, urging on his new horse as the dawn began to break. "Let's go."