((For Istuir. /mock hihi)))
Rhovanion, Mirkwood,
About 70 miles north-east of Lórien,
Late Summer, T.A. 3017
Heavy water drops fell with a sheer velocity from the sky and plunged unto the thousands of dark leaves, that covered the four figures, cowering beneath a few bushes and below the blankets.
It helped little, the rain was too strong so that they had been wet within the first seconds it had began and Creowyn began to wonder if it would ever stop raining again.
Since well nigh two weeks they were now on the road. If it could be called a road on which Símar, the Younger and Waisûl, the two warriors led them on. They seemingly walked straight through the deep thicket, sometimes made wide arcs around certain areas and not too seldom, Creowyn could have sworn that they had passed the same rock twice or even thrice on one day. She thought if these Elves could get lost, but dared not to utter the question out loudly.
Although Símar was sometimes speaking to her and showed acknowledgement that he would accept her as one of his kin, so did Waisûl speak only to his warrior-companion or seldom to Ælbdís.
Hence the rohirric girl spend most of the time with speaking to her horse or listening to the lessons of her god-mother that were however often more confusing and raised more questions than they answered. Also her progress in the language of these Elves was quite clumsy.
But now, Creowyn wished that the rain would stop already.
Mirkwood's thicket had torn her traveling-attire, so that Ælbdís gave her one of her own robes. The cloth-piece sat unaccustomed on her body, was it tailored in wide patterns that left a lot of space beneath it.
The priestess had been forced to make a few adjustments, for the robes were cut for her form and she was a good head taller than Creowyn. With the help of a girdle and taking off a bit of the hem to the feet, they had made it fitting, what earned the red-headed girl an approving smile and words from Símar.
He said, that now she could go through indeed as daughter of a priestess like Ælbdís.
First Creowyn had been glad, but then pondered again about the scarce words they exchanged sometimes. A bit dejectedly, she had to find it in his uttering that he gave little about mankind.
A slight shudder overcame her as the cold air crawled beneath the cloth. She drew the blanket closer around her and nestled against Ælbdís in the search of warmth.
Only because of her they had made rest more often than it was usual for their kind, for despite her god-mother's continued re-assurances to the warriors that she was one of them now, Creowyn still lacked the endurance of the Elves.
»Will it ever stop pouring?«, the girl sighed in discontent.
Ælbdís, who had been staring plainly with her blind eyes into the empty air, turned her face towards her. »It will, when Manwë sends us his winds and drives off the clouds.«
For almost anything, the white-golden haired priestess seemed to have an answer, though all too often, Creowyn was left unsatisfied with it.
She peeked out from beneath the blanket of leather that they had spanned between two trees like a roof. To the opposite of Ælbdís and her sat Símar and Waisûl, below a quite similar construction. The two warriors did not speak, but merely remained still, sitting with their legs crossed beneath them like a pair of statues.
Aethilcea and Sora, the two horses were not bothered by the heavy rain. They stood under the trees, grazing on the low bushes.
»Did you ask them by now why this king wants to see us?«, Creowyn attempted again to start a conversation with her god-mother. The quiet boredom was slowly starting to annoy her terribly.
»No, I have not«, came the scarce answer of Ælbdís.
»Why, not? Are you not interested in knowing why you were called back? To me it sounded rather urgent and ominous.«
Creowyn bit her lower lip. The first night after they had left she had slept very uneasy. It had passed now, but she still rose sometimes up from her dream, fumbling about to make sure that she sat not in a prison or worse. Though she trusted the priestess, she could not shake off the feeling that these warriors accompanying them were surrounded by a uncanny aura.
Probably because they hold so much in mystery and the unknown about them, thought the girl.
»Símar and Waisûl are no messengers«, said Ælbdís, »for if they were given the circumstances for why Tobaár calls us both to Ámmtara, so they would surely told us of it.«
»Yes, but ...«, Creowyn understood that a king would not share every detail with his servants. She knew it back from her own life at the court of Theoden. »I still find it a bit odd.«
»Odd it is that thou speakest of someone in thy presence to someone else so freely«, sounded Símar's voice suddenly up. The warrior had not moved, nor had he opened his eyes, but obviously his conscious was clearer than Creowyn had thought. A bit sheepish she apologized quickly.
»If thy mother knows not for why she has been ordered to return and more important to have thee at her side, then she is either badly informed or wishes not to share her knowledge with others.« Símar displayed a grin and his fangs were shown.
Ælbdís' face acquired a deep frown, but she did not set unto the attempt to retort something.
»Thou may ask me, Estra, anything, that I offered thee already and I shall answer to the extent in which my possibilities lie. To many things I am oath sworn to keep silence about and for other things thy mind is not ready yet, for thy youth makes thee unable to understand. Children of our kin must climb the stairs and cannot simply jump up the entire tower.«
Creowyn well heard the sardonic tone in the warrior's voice. But she knew better than falling for such overbearance towards her. Instead, she sighed once and drew the woolen blanket over her head. Her ears were already red of the cold.
»Then why dost thou not teach her something of thy arts, Símar. If thou seest her still as child among us, then thou shouldst be well with showing or telling her of things she knows not yet.«
Finally the warrior had opened his eyes, staring at Ælbdís. His chin was slightly raised.
»Thou knowst as well as I do«, he began, »that she is no warrior and hence no subject to our tenets. Thou hast adopted her. Thereby thou hast the responsibility for her education.«
»I can fight«, threw Creowyn in, what however was met only with a deriding smile of Símar.
»So can thy mother, but there is a lot more to our art than being able to swing a sword.«
The silence that followed after the last sentence was oppressively. Not the warrior, nor Ælbdís spoke another word and the subject seemed closed.
Creowyn felt rebuked and held small as seldom before her in her life. In Rohan she had learned how to handle a sword, was even acknowledged as shield-maiden among her kinsmen, a woman who would follow them into battle if necessary.
But obviously Símar had his own opinion about her skills, despite not having seen them even. She found it hard to make sense of the Elf. He could be polite and respectful and in the next moment he was so terribly overbearing and certain of himself that Creowyn would have loved to see him slipping on a wet root, falling with his face into the mud.
Though despite all obstacles they had met on the way, not one time she had heard something like a complaint from the two warrior. They were resilient as rock, took every situation as it was and found a way to deal with it appropriately.
Some day she would catch Símar off guard, she thought to herself and smirked at the thought of him being covered in the macerated soil.
The rain began to cease finally a bit and Creowyn took the opportunity to see after Aethilcea.
There where the horses stood, the undergrowth was especially thick, so that even a bear could have lay in hiding here.
The two warriors and the priestess remained below the roofs of leather that was warding them against the water coming from above. While Ælbdís and Waisûl sat still, did Símar observe the girl by her doing, how she stroked the horse over the nostrils and began to talk to her.
»In the future we will never cross this forest again«, she promised in rohirric to the horse. »It is all too gloomy. And wet. Oh, Bema, curse this rain.«
Símar appeared suddenly next to her, looked first at the horses and then at Creowyn. After he had remained quiet for a moment, leaving the girl with a baffled expression on her face, his eyes began to survey the wooded surroundings.
»I would advice thee to speak less and more quiet«, he said to her lowly without looking at her. »These bushes are freshly bend aside. No one may say what lurks in Mirkwood's dark wake. The less creatures know that we are here, the better.«
»As I said, this is the first and was the last time I ever cross this forest«, repeated Creowyn and distorted her pretty face with a frown.
Something broke suddenly from the thicket and threw itself against the Elf.
The warrior had noticed the movement too late and toppled backwards, while the wet ground was shred with massive claws into several rifts.
Símar knocked the girl with a single motion of his hand backwards behind the scared horses. She could just perceive from her eye-corner the creature that seemed to have escaped one of her most dire nightmares.
A being about as tall as a human, stood in a slightly bend over position before the Elf. Two long arms, each equipped with three long claws sprung from its side, two smaller ones from its shoulders, thick scales covered the body. The massive head was protected by an impenetrable shield of bones, the eyes lay deep within the skull, the short but powerful jaws with the tipped teeth were slightly opened.
A quickly fired arrow from Waisûl was effectless deflected by the thick skin. Then it jumped into the midst of the camp and began to engage the Elves into combat. Their swords landed hit after hit against the creature, stroke however only on the well-protected spots.
Creowyn could hear the terrified neighing of the horses and Ælbdís calling her name, as Símar made a tremendous strike against one of the beast's arms. Twitching was the cut off limb quivering on the wet ground, the monster let out a loud scream and lunged against the warrior.
Strands of scales flew through the air, a dark liquid was flowing out of the smaller wounds of the creature, but to Creowyn's horror, had the gash of the lost limb closed itself already again.
The girl tried to keep Aethilcea at bay, but the horse threatened to escape her grasp and flee into the forest.
The monster, being busy with the two elven warrior, who offered no target with their elegant movements, was destroying the camp, took one of the bags and used it as shield against the strikes of the swords.
Símar raged, attacked and parried the sharp claws, his strikes were hailing on the assaulter, but always in the last moment it was able to evade the hit or to raise something as shield.
Creowyn could not hold the reigns of Aethilcea anymore and the horse stormed off.
»No! Stay here!«, she called after her beloved companion, while behind her reigned the most brutish battle that she had ever witnessed in her life.
Waisûl had finally managed to join at Símar's side, so that four swords where whirling and cutting through the air, driving the creature more and more back, winning slowly the upper-hand in this fight. The monster had been a ferocious enemy against Símar alone, but it seemed to realize that against two of these warriors, its chances for a kill were dwindling immensely.
Wherever it would turn now, there was suddenly a wall of slashing sharp steel to cut through its way. Deep rills that the swords had cloven into the natural armor gave the look free on a dark liquid, that Creowyn thought to be the blood of the beast.
Then suddenly a roar rang up through the forest, followed by the triumphing scream of Símar.
Creowyn wasted no time now. She had stood with Ælbdís on a safe distance to the battle, hurried now however after her beloved horse who had taken flight from the grotesque threat, ere Aethilcea could ran too far into the dangerous forest.
After she ran hundred steps and more, she caught Aethilcea, whose reigns were caught in the low hanging branches.
Then Creowyn felt a warm breeze in her neck, followed by an audible sniffing noise. Aethilcea reared up and the girl let herself fall forward, drawing her sword and turning to fall on her back, the blade held up to be able to parry a possible attack.
With an enormous jump, the second creature was at her and knocked her weapon out of the hand.
The monster in front of Creowyn rose up, stretched the muscular and clawed arms back and aimed for her.
Before another thing could have happened, the right eye of the beast was pressed out of the skull, followed by an undefinable, gelatinous mass. From the wound protruded a slim, three-bladed steel tip.
The creature gave a pitiful sound, while with another crunch, a second projectile penetrated the back of its head, sought its way to the front and let the bone break in the height of its nose another time.
Slowly the monster fell forward.
Strong arms grasped Creowyn beneath her shoulder and pulled her out of reach, then the heavy body of the last assaulter hit dead the mud.
As Creowyn turned around, she saw Waisûl standing before her, his armor dyed in the blood of whatever had attacked them. His silver-eyes sought hers.
»Thank you«, she said in the tongue of the Elf and felt suddenly her knees give in. Luckily Waisûl supported her and took even the reigns of Aethilcea. He waited patiently for her to stand on her own, then patted her on the shoulder and smiled relieved.
The warrior pointed back into the direction of the camp and said something, but Creowyn was not able to pick out its meaning, assumed however that he her told to return. She would love to do nothing more than that and the last bit of her fright fell off her as Ælbdís was there to close her into her arms, laying a protective blanket around her.
They have had an amazing luck, the girl thought. She was even glad to see that Símar, who was as much covered in the creature's blood as Waisûl had remained unharmed.
