It's a quiet and cosy evening in the Shire. The gentle fall of snow blankets and cushions the world, almost as if it's encouraging people to stay warm, inside. People's minds turn towards the coming Yule festival, visiting friends and otherwise enjoying the peace and quiet, sitting in front of a roaring log fire, with a cup of tea (or something stronger) and a piece of cake within easy reach.
At Bannockbury hall, things are winding down for the season. The exhibits have been catalogued, cleaned and put back into their cases ready for the halls springtime reopening. Members and guests spend their days and evenings playing games, dancing, laughing and enjoying each others company. Music is always present, and the sounds of Gaity and merrymaking are a constant melody that floats through the halls.
Just about everyone that has been expected has arrived, members and their families. Honoured guests and speakers have gathered in Bannockbury to celebrate the coming of the new year. The entire neighbourhood is a vision of light as though the hobbits want to outdo each other with displays to bring smiles to young hobbits faces.
It's a quiet morning, most of the other guests have gone out for the day, visiting, meeting old friends and new leaving just a few of the chores to be done. More cakes to bake, maybe a bit of a tidy up, by which time, it might just be time for a restoring cup of tea and a bit of cake before settling in for an afternoon's snooze. The world is peaceful and safe and warm, when all of a sudden it is anything but warm. Someone's just opened the door, letting a brief flurry of snow flakes in with them, the wind blowing their cloak about their legs. Denegar takes down his hood and smiles sheepishly mumbling an apology for disturbing you and finds a brush to quickly sweep up the rapidly melting snow. Just for a moment he blinks, almost owlishly at the rapidly melting mass, before shrugging and beginning to divest himself of his gear. The cloak goes on the hook, the bow is carefully un-strung and propped up in the corner amongst the walking sticks and umbrellas, with his quiver propped next to it and his weapon belt is removed and placed inside a cupboard. Still muttering to himself about being Paranoid, he approaches.
Denegars changed. He seems pale and drawn and as he carries his pack and another larger box, obviously of dwarven make further into the Mathom hall, it becomes obvious that he's limping slightly.
“Sorry. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to let the cold air in. Probably shouldn't have tried to make it back through all the snow, but I wanted to come home so desperately. As I came over the Branduin, sorry, the Brandywine....” Anger flashes over his face so fast that you could almost convince yourself that you didn't see it. “I could start to see little landmarks that reminded me of home. Little things. The hedge that surrounds the Golden Perch. Stock Tower, The Frozen Pig-pens of Budgeford, the Water. I saw all these things and just couldn't wait to get home. I'm so sorry for disturbing you. I'll....I'll just get out of your way.”
Denegar dissappears in the direction of his own small room, taking his pack and the strange dwarven case with him. The pack thrown over one shoulder almost negligently but the case cradled, with almost loving care.
Denegar doesn't emerge again until the following day. This absence causing a number of people to question the truth of your words, but the evidence of the bow, arrows and the fact that his door seemed to have been barred from the inside persuade people that Denegar has indeed made it back to the Shire just in time for the Yule celebrations.
When he does emerge he smiles, again with that look of sheepish apology and pleads exhaustion after a long journey, indeed he'd only emerged at all to take some provisions back to his room.
The day after that Denegar comes out of his room and joins in with the rest of the festivities. He laughs and shouts and dances. He cracks jokes and regales youngsters and oldsters alike with stories of his exploits and the places that he's seen. Funny stories about dwarves, men and elves. The behaviour of giants and the strange customs of the wild.
But there's just a hint of something wrong. Just amongst his friends people whisper about how his clothes hang off him whereas before they fit snugly. How he winces every so often when he does this particular dance step. How his appetite for food has all but dissappeared whereas his thirst for ale, wine and spirits had increased ten-fold.
On the night of Adalbern's annual Pre-yule fireworks display, the whispers became more urgent. Denegar came out with everyone else to admire the work and the craftsmanship of Adalbern's excellent fireworks and Denegar was there with the others handing out Sparklers and fire-crackers with everyone else. But when Adalbern started the main part of the display, people near to Denegar commented that Denegar jumped at the first two loud explosions then almost turned in on himself, flinching at every flash and jumping at every bang. Eyes squeezed tightly shut, muttering all the while. Onlookers and gossips told of one hobbit who had expressed concern to Denegar, and when they touched him on the shoulder he whipped around with a snarl before fleeing, actually fleeing from the company of his friends and family.
The following day there's a crash from the exhibit room of the mathom hall. A group of hobbits rush in to find that Denegar has grabbed the old curator by his lapels and has slammed him into one of the display cases, now bellowing at him, red faced and spittle flying and it takes no less than three grown hobbits of no small size to restrain the crazed Hobbit. Pineed to the ground, with the old curator being taken off for a reviving cup of mulled wine, Denegar suddenly goes limp and lifeless as a dead fish. Slowly people disentangle themselves and with the attitude of people handling a wild animal people shake Denegar awake.
Denegar scans the room swiftly, eyes darting around. People ask him if he's alright but Denegar just shakes his head, seeming lost and suddenly very afraid.
He asks what happened and when someone tells him a look of dawning horror crosses Denegar's face. Shaking off the restraining hands Denegar flees, scooping up the dwarven box that had lain, unnoticed on a nearby table.
A conference is held in the hall's planning room. The curator, an elderly hobbit, long past his mathom gathering days is questioned.
“I don't know what to tell you masters. Young master Denegar, who up until today, I would have described as a wonderfully polite young gentlehobbit, came in carrying that dwarven box of his and asks if I've got any tools that he could borrow to help him fix what was in it? Naturally I asked what was in the box, and he produced the remains of a crossbow. The crossbrace looked as though it had shattered under strain. I advised him that although I know relatively little about crossbows I thought the crossbow was damaged beyond all repair and suggested that he get himself a new one. He just went mad. Is he alright?”
The conversation went on for several hours, old quirks in Denegar's behaviour are dug up and examined. The stories he's told are exchanged and debated over. But the simple truth is that Denegar is unwell, or something simply isn't right with him. It's also agreed that it seems unwise, and also more than a little bit rude to be discussing Denegar without his input. It's agreed that someone should go and talk to him.
Glances are exchanged, people shuffle their feet but it becomes increasingly obvious that no-one else is going to offer so you step forward. As though girding yourself for battle you march down the short corridor to Denegar's room.
It's some time before you can persuade Denegar to open the door. But when he does you point at the others cowering behind you and he laughs inviting you in.
Clambering over the chair Denegar had used to block the door you see his room.
“Sorry it's a mess. If I'd known I'd be having a guest I might have tidied. The bed's probably the safest place to sit.”
Denegar moves some travel stained clothes off a bed that still doesn't look as though it's been slept in, allowing you to sit. The clothing is flung negligently into another corner. There is a small bottle nearby and Denegar produced a small glass which he wipes clean on a hopefully clean hanky and pours. The smell of strong spirits permeates the room and it suddenly occurs to you that Denegar is more than a little the worse for the drink.
“I've been drinking a lot recently.” Denegar sways slightly in the middle of the room taking an absent-minded swig from the bottle. “Somehow it seems like the right thing to do.”
“I really am dreadfully sorry about what happened I'll apologise to him in the morning after I've sobered up.” The words run into each other and it takes quite a bit of concentration just to keep his speech straight in your head.
“I just. I can't stop thinking about him. Hmmm? Oh who? That is what you're asking me right? I suppose it must be I haven't said anything else that would need a question.”
Denegar collapses to a seated position on the floor and leans back against a chest of drawers resting his head back and closing his eyes.
I'm sure I must have told this story before. I've been back, what, a week now? No?”
Denegar shakes his head in disbelief
“I must be in a worse state than I thought. It's just so difficult to think, let alone to sleep. Every time I try to sleep I see their faces, just two faces. The dwarf and the elf. I've found that I need to get really really drunk to be able to sleep, so I need to get started quite early in the day if I'm going to get a good nights sleep. I keep hoping that I won't dream, but I always do.” he sighs and scrubs his face with his hand. “I suppose I always will.” He stares into space for a moment before you clear your throat.
“Oh I'm sorry, I forget my manners. Drink? So....yes the elf and the dwarf.”
“Did you know that, when you go into battle, they don't give you quivers of arrows, they give you bags. I didn't know that until I actually went into battle. Huge bags, re-inforced by small branches so that they hold the bag shape and each archer is expected to carry two. Whether you're an archer or a cross-bow man you need to be able to carry your ammunition to war. I counted I carried over two hundred arrows into that battle. Two hundred arrows.”
Denegar shakes his head in disbelief before noticing your confusion.
“I really must be drunk. You've been sent to find out if I'm Ok and why I'm acting strangely. Well it's because of this.”
He reached around him and produces the dwarven box, opens it and carefully lifts out, what used to be a cross-bow.
“Pathetic isn't it. It's not even particularly well-made. There were several hundred of these at the battle, mass produced in the forges as there wasn't time to produce anything better and the people needed arming. I saw more than one dwarve's crossbow explode into splinters as it fired the first shot.”
Denegar takes another drink.
“Have you heard of the Iron Garrison? A bunch of very brave dwarves and some Elven allies have agreed to attempt to re-take Moria. I know, I know, the thought of Elves and Dwarves working together made me laugh as well.I'd been helping out in the local wilderness, a group of people had got lost going up the Redhorn pass over the mountains. I'd seen them to safety but the dwarves asked for some help. They needed someone to help keep them fed, provide them with provisions and things . Then the Elves started to help out and things were looking up.
But then it started to go badly. It seems that the previous tenants of the Mines of Moria were more than a little disgruntled at being displaced from the homes that they've lived in for uncounted years.
At first it was almost negligable. Small outlying mining camps would report sightings of Orcs and Goblins, later they would start to report mischief. Then attacks. It was all so slow and gradual. Some of the Elves wondered if that was part of the plan. Then the first Dwarf died. Haugr his name was. I can remember him being brought back to the twenty first hall so that the leaders of the Garrison could examine the body.
He came out, being carried on his shield. He was armoured in Scale mail and his hands clutched his axe hard with his knuckles white. He had a snarl on his face.
What? No, that isn't the face I see. That comes later.
By now I was travelling into the mines on a regular basis, bringing in goods and stock. Also helping stand guard occasionally. My eye-sights pretty good in the dark and I stood many a watch.
The Dwarven fury was terrifying to behold. They went forth in all their wrath to bring their anger and hate to bear on the Orcs.
They found nothing.
But the attacks kept coming. Out from the depths they would come, slithering through cracks and crevasses that no sane or wholesome person would want to climb through, they would kill one, maybe two before vanishing into the endless darkness. Occasionally we would be fast and catch them and kill them but it would only turn out to be one or two of them and our deaths kept on mounting.
The death toll mounted. It didn't sound like a lot, just one or two Dwarves and one or two Elves a day. But the other factors were as bad. They poisoned our water. Not to kill us, but make us sick. They burned our food. Not all of it, but just enough to make us fight over what was left.
On and on it went.
We went out into the darkness hunting them. We would come back having killed scores of them, hundreds even. Only to find that one Orc had got through to cause more mischief.
Tunnels collapsed. New ways opened, old ones closed. All the time we retreated. We simply didn't have the numbers to hold what we had taken in those early days of the expedition.
Then the day came when we were told that an army was coming. I never found out how we knew this, some elven magic of some kind I expect, or we caught one alive, but we found out that they were coming. We lost contact with the outposts on the doors and there was a council of war.”
He sits and considers for a moment.
“I really need a smoke. You don't mind do you.”
He roots around in his pack for a few minutes, throwing things around, occasionally grunting as he finds an item that seems to have been missing for a while before eventually finding a small tobacco pouch, the formerly red leather now darkened to a slightly more sinister colour. Denegar stares at it for a few moments as if he'd forgotten what it was for.
“What was I saying. Ah yes. War council.”
he leans back again and fills his pipe before offering the pouch. The pipe-weed is a little dry and old looking.
“I missed it all of course. I was out with one of the patrols trying to sneak forward and get some idea of what we were facing. Picking off the odd sentry, you know sneaky stuff, using their own tactics against them. I'm told that the council was a very grand affair, people standing up , declaming in a grand voice that all the big people seem to practice all the time as though the world might end at any moment.”
Denegar pauses for a moment in the act of lighting his pipe.
“To be fair, I suppose that to them it might be ending. Anyway, we got called back and they'd changed everything around, battle lines had been drawn up, huge wood an mettle obstacles had been made. As I watched dwarves piled flasks of oil at various places. I saw for the first time why the floor had breaks between the various huge flagstones as they were filled with oil. I'd always thought of siege engines as being the sort of thing that is moved around outside, but the dwarves moved them around, aiming, taking range points. Elves were moving everywhere leaving barrels and barrels of newly fletched arrows and crossbow bolts. We were just a returning patrol coming back and this was all new to us. Have you been to Moria and seen the 21st Hall?”
They'd build huge wooden scaffolds when I got there to help shore up and support those parts of the ceiling that were falling into ruin. Now those Scaffolds had sprouted shields and spears like thorns on a bush. A constant stream of dwarves were soaking the wood with water to keep the Orcs from setting fire to it.
We returned through the holes left for us, to get some food and something to eat. I'd never been part of any of the main organisational units that both the dwarves and elves had to keep track of themselves. I'd just helped out wherever I seemed to be needed and as a result, although I found food and water readily. It took some time to find out what was going on and where I needed to be.
Eventually I found that as an archer I needed to be up on some of the higher pieces of scaffolding so that I could shoot down at the enemy. I'd never fired in a volley before, whatever that is, and my bow wasn't one of the strong Galadhrim bows, it was felt that I wouldn't match the range or whatver. I did feel more than a little alone and unwanted. People seemed to talk over me a lot and if I'm honest I would say that the vast majority of the Elves and Dwarves thought I'd already fled.”
Denegar snorts with amusement.
“Not that I had anywhere to flee to. So I got issued with my Arrow bags and found my seat, high up in the rafters. There were several of us up there who's job it seemed to be to pick on those of the Orcs or Goblins that seemed to be gathering a bit of a following and do our best to take them out. I seemed to have been left with the rag-tag leftovers of the various other units. Leftover people who were the only survivors as well as those elves and dwarves who had nowhere else to go.
So we sat there and waited. I'd found myself a nice high perch up in the roof and I sat there waiting for the enemy to arrive. People would occasionally bring us food and water and it wasn't bad. There was another dwarf up there with me. We'd worked together before in some of the patrols. He was a sneaky bastard, could sneak into a camp of orcs and kill their chieftain and get back out again without anyone noticing. He'd found himself a crossbow and joined me up in the rafters after telling me that he was useless with a shield, tripped over his spear and always got tangled up with any axe longer than his small hand axes.
So we sat for a while. He gave me some of his dwarven spirits, and I shared my pipeweed with him.
To be honest, it was fairly pleasant, if not entirely comfortable.
But then the drums started.
I've stood in the high places of the world and listened to the rolling boom of thunder and thought my ears would burst. I've sat in a cave and listened to wolves howling their messages to each other. I fought in the North Downs against the Troll drum beaters. But in the halls of Moria I felt a new terror seize me.
The drums rolled on and on in a wave. Starting with the drummers themselves but then the noise bounced of the walls in a continuous echo. This was no wave of sound, it was....it was almost as if the caverns themselves had come to life and were bellowing their hate at our assembled forces.
I've no idea how long it went on for. Minutes probably but it felt as though hours went by. My head ached, my legs almost felt as though they wanted to dance. I wanted to run, I don't mind admitting it. But I didn't. I don't really know why, but I didn't run.
I suppose I should be proud of that.” Denegar's voice turns bitter for a moment as another spasm of anger crosses his face.
After a long moment of staring at his hands Denegar sighs and continues.
“Then the horde arrived. They seemed to come from all directions at once. Through the large openings, through the corridors, through cracks and fissures that it would have been impossible for any other entirely wholesome creature to crawl down.
But they came.
Long lines of Orcs in armour, Goblins skittering about both in front and behind the horder. Huge trolls stalking amongst the ranks. But it wasn't just the creatures, they pulled wagons, huge wagons piled high with stone, more wagons with half assembled ballista, that no sooner had they arrived than strange orcs in dirty sackcloth would stand and assemble them, engines of war, aiming assessing, testing. Orc Shamans emerged from the ranks, their hair caked with unspeakable substances so that it stood out from their heads in spikes. They hopped towards our lines leaning on staffs made from rotten wood and other things that prevented me from looking too closely, waving their fetishes and idols towards us hurling curses from spittle flecked mouths.
“Steady there lad,” I spun as a hand rested on my shoulder and I my dwarven companion stood there balanced on the beams that we'd situated ourselves on. “Steady now, no need for panic.”
“I'm....I'm not panicking,” I stammered, my voice betraying me.
He laughed, and I laughed with him, easing the pain in my throat.
“Look at those Shamans there,” he said, pointing them out. “See how they've stopped just out of arrow range. They try to intimidate us, but in truth, they're all too frightened to get any closer. It's just another one of the tricks that the Orcs use. Ignore them. Here have another drink.
As we watched, the ladders behind us were taken away, whatever supplies we had were now the supplies that would have to last us for the whole of the battle. I counted my arrows and nibbled a biscuit. Now there was only one way off the scaffold, a precarious ladder carved into one of the beams and I would have to walk past numerous companions to get to it. I was commited now, there was no turning back.
I'm ashamed now as I think about how much I wanted to flee. I was terrified. There were so many of them, and so few of us. How could we possibly stand against the orc Horde of Moria. But I didn't. I don't know why, I suppose it's possible that my legs were shaking so much that I wasn't entirely sure that they would support me to walk across the beam, or maybe I was too terrified to move, in the same way that a rabbit will stand and stare as the hunter stalks it.
So I sat, and counted my arrows. It seemed a pitiful number compared to the sheer numbers of Orcs that were coming.
As elven archer walked along the beam behind us.
“Choose your targets,” he said. I remember feeling surprised at how calm he seemed. “Choose your targets, aim for Orcs who seem to be organising them, leader Orcs. Aim for Shamans. Choose your targets carefully. Do not waste your arrows.”
“Or bolts,” shouted a dwarf,
“Indeed,” agreed the elf. “Hold your fire as they charge, wait until they meet our lines, and then commence firing. Wait, always wait until you are sure of your shot. We do not have enough arrows and bolts to throw them away, so make each shot count. May the grace of the Valar, be with you all, and remember to choose your targets,” The elf took his own bow and stood with his fellows.
Still we waitied. It felt as long as years, but it could only have been minutes and then the Orcs came forward. I remember looking for a signal, some leader who gave a shout, or a flag being raised or a horn being sounded, but there was none of this, there was just a ripple through the Orc ranks and on they came, screaming and bellowing as though the sound itself would carry them over the lines. The drums started again and the assault on my ears continued. I tore some cloth from one of my old shirts and stuffed it down my ears in an attempt to deaden the shound.
On they came, like a earth sliding down a hill in the rainstorm.
On they came bellowing their anger and their hate.
On they came, but then, just before they hit the dwarven lines there was the sound of a crossbow volley, not as musical as a volley from ranks of bows, but it was a sweet sond, the first ranks of Orcs stumbled and fell as the heavey dwarven bolts thundered through shield, armour and flesh, the orcskept going and another wall of metal left the dwarven lines, the elven archers added their solid ranks of massed arrows into the mass. The Orcs faltered, staggering from the onslaught, and the Dwarves leapt to meet them. The crash as the dwarves met the orcs forces shook the beams that were standing on and I couldn't restrain a cheer. Hope flared within me again. The elf who had given us the speech before smiled as he heard me and raised his arm before letting it fall and then our own battle started.
We were not the trained ranks of dwarves or elves, we couldn't have fired in organised ranks, or met a charge of that ferocity. What we could do though was see the army, and shoot it down. One well-place arrow from us could cause two, or three Orcs to turn and run. We were devastating. My firsttarget was an Orc who was pushing and pulling a set of orcsand pointing them in a different direction. I didn't know what he'd seen but it couldn't have been good for us. I drew, sighted, let my breath go and fired. I saw the Orc jerk and spin before falling under the rabble.
My second target was a cave troll who the orcs were trying to maneouver into the battle line. I saw a join in his hardened skin and fired. The troll reared back in pain trying to reach whatever it was that had caused it so much pain. But in doing so, it showed two of my companions it's eyes, arrows flashed and the Troll fell dead.
And that's how it was, we cheered each other on, pointing out targets to each other shouting encouragement. Orcs fell, trolls died, my blood was up, and I laughed as I fired. It was the most magnificent feeling. People had told me about the joy of battle, men and dwarves mostly, but I'd always thought that it was nonsense. I'm just a hobbit why would I feel joy in killing? But there it was. The enemy was Orc and troll and other creatures of darkness, and in killing them I was saving lives. In the battle I was protecting the elves dwarves and the odd other man that had come to help but if we failed here it was conceivable that these Orcs would come to the Shire. It felt good.
I thought of my friends, my family and the random strangers that I've passed without comment on the long roads that had taken me to this point and I just kept firing.
But the Orcs were not the only people falling.
Every so often, first in a trickle, but then in slowly increasing numbers I could see Dwarves beginning to die. In ones and twos they would be swept away from the safety of the lines and then overwhelmed. The Orcs paid for each life they took, but the numbers mounted up, and up. Eventually the first line broke and fell back to the second line of defence. The troughs of Oil were lit and the pursuing Orcs drowned in fire. Some brave elves and dwarves fought on to give their companions time to reach the second line and as I watched them die, the joy I felt turned to bitterness and a fury that was terrifying in it's intensity.
I fired on and on, now spitting oaths and insults with my arrows. My dwarven companion, Haugr that was his name Haugr, screamed in Ancient dwarven as he killed. His crossbow was slower to reload than my bow but the power of it. I saw it punch one Orc of it's feet and into the flaming oil.
But now the enemy had seen us and our charmed lives had vanished. Goblins and some Orcs started to climb the scaffolding that we were on, Orc archers started returning our fire, and slowly, again, just in ones and two's, we started to die. The elven leader pointed out the climbers, and a number of elves, put their bows down and went to repel the clmibers but as he did soand Orc missile swept through his throat and his red blood pulsed past the hand he had clapped up to the wound. His eyes glazed and he fell.
My heart aches as I tell this.
We fired on. Some goblins reached the top and Haugr charged them with his axes. It was horrible, I saw another dwarf pierced through the body with a spear grab his assailant and pitch himself down to the cavern floor. Another elf leaned out to shoot some of the Goblins climbing up the wood and arrow sprouted from his face, his hands still twitched as he stood there for a good minute before toppling over. His body was pushed over the edge to make room but not before his arrows and other weapons were divided between us. It wasn't heartless, we just needed the arrows.
The Orc ballista that had so scared me when they had first been set up started to hurl their bolts. Long bolts the length of tree trunks but with a smell of rot and decay in them had been hurled into our massed ranks, but now they started to be fired at our fortifications, including the wooden scaffolding that we perched on. Some of us arced our arrows in an effort to discourage the siege workers from their jobs but the range was too great. Most of the blows were glancing and did little to damage the dwarven built structure, but gradually small cracks started to appear, and the sound of battle was joined by the creaking and groaning of the wood straining to keep it's shape. In a crash we saw one arm of the barricades collapse. There were only a handful of elves and dwarves fighting on the barriers, and the collapse fell on far more Orcs than it did on our side, but they were losses that we could ill afford, and there were always more orcs to replace their fallen.
I don't know when I was hit as I didn't feel a thing. We'd been fighting for what seemed like days, although hours was probably closer to the truth. We didn't shout any more, oour arms ached, our fingers bled, our signals were simply passed through signs, people pointed out targets without comment, and we did all we could do to just keep on shooting. My own Arrow box was empty and I remember turning to reach for another an found that I couldn't move. An Orc arrow had pinned me to the beam that I was leaning against and as I shifted in an effort to reach more arrows I could feel the arrow shaft tearing at my leg. Haugr came to my rescue and eased me away, cutting through the shaft, he didn't try to pull it out, he didn't have the skill and anyway, we needed to keep shooting.
I remember that there wasn't any pain, oh no, that came later.
There weren't many of us left now. The elf on my right shoulder had sat down to shoot, his feet dangling over the edge like a hobbit child dangling their feet into a pond. But an Orc bolt had caught him under the chin , driving up through his mouth and into his brain. His eyes had rolled back in his skull with the expression looking, almost comical. I used my bow to hook his half empty arrow bag towards me and kept on firing.
What else could I have done. The battle seemed lost. I could no longer see our own battle line, and although I kept firing I felt that all was lost. There was only one way down, a rickety ladder that my legs were no longer strong enough to climb down and even if I did get down, there was likely nothing more down there than the tender mercy of the Orcs. Haugr and I exchanged the odd glance, and a rueful shrug before turning back to our work.
A kind of peace came over me. People talk about your life flashing before your eyes before you die. I still don't know if that's the case, but as I fought I remembered every step of the journey that had brought me to that point, and I realised that I was happy with those decisions, and that if I was to die here, under the mountains, fighting someone else's war then so be it. I would miss the Shire, the smell of good tobacco and the sound of women laughing. I remember realising that I was weeping. I could feel the tears running down my face but those tears felt so sweet. The air was full of death, full of fire and blood but I couldn't remember air ever tasting so sweet. I turned to Haugr and we embraced as I saw that his own cheeks were glistening.
We fired on
We were the only ones left. The two of us, half supporting each other in our weariness continued to look for targets.
My arrows had long since run out and I'd cast my bow aside throwing boulders over the side, when suddenly Haugr pushed his crossbow into my hands and stood up. I looked up at him from where I was sitting and as he saw the question on my face he laughed. I actually remember that he laughed. Then he pointed at the Orc that had climbed up our ladder behind us.
“Go well Denegar, and live free.” he said. I'll never forget it. That was the first of the two faces that I can't forget. His voice was coarse and harsh but I heard him clearly. Then he hefted his axes and charged the Orcs as there were now several that had reached the top. He spun under the first burying his axe in the Orcs spine. He threw his other axe into the face of another who fell backwards and off the stand. I buried a crossbow bolt into a third as Haugr pulled his first axe from where it had jammed in the back of his first kills armour. He grinned at me before running towards the ladder, another Orc showed his head above the rail and Haugr kicked it, square in the face. An Orc crossbow bolt took Haugr in the stomach, another high in the shoulder. Haugr laughed, and bent, almost drunkenly to cut at the lashings that held the beam in place, and then with a last shout he used his own weight to send the ladder crashing down to the ground and Haugr fell with it.
My mouth was to dry to cry out. I wish I could have cried out. This dwarf had died for me and I couldn't call for him. I couldn't muster anything more than a croak and to turn, now using Haugr's crossbow, to just keep firing, painfully slowly, my fingers bled from the bowstring and the constant firing.
Another Orc bolt caught me in the shoulder, fortunately the strength had mostly been spent, but it jutted out, stuck there. I sat there, tired and alone. But I kept on firing. My vision hazed over and it was like I was trying to see through a fog. Sweat came but I started to feel cold. I know I wept. I wept for Haugr, I wept for the elf lying dead at my side, I wept for all the free folk that had lost their lives, but most of all I wept for myself. I was so tired, so very tired.
I didn't hear the counter attack. I didn't hear the horns signalling the counter charge. I didn't know there was a counter attack planned. If I'd ever known then I'd forgotten. I just kept shooting.
Eventually, our enemies defeated, someone, somewhere had started to wonder at who was still shooting, I found this all out later of course, but no-one could get to me. I understand that people called to me and shouted, but I couldn't hear them. Eventually they sent an elf as no-one else could get to me.
This poor elf climbed all the way to the top of the remains of this scaffolding. I can almost laugh about it now as it must have been a hell of a climb to stop this mad halfling raining crossbow bolts down on a field of enemy corpses. He clapped his hand on my shoulder and I spun.
I spun and I swear that I saw an Orc there, I'm told that I screamed and turned my crossbow on this poor elf and pulled the trigger.
His face, so calm, so still as I turned with murder in my eyes stays with me, and his face is the other that floats through my mind.
He just reached forward and plucked the bolt from the crossbow as the string shot forwards onto an empty crossbow. The elf sat quietly as the enormity of what I'd done registered with me and the enormity of what I'd almost done just sunk in, as my vision cleared. Then the elf smiled.
“The day is ours master Hobbit, we our victorious,”
I laughed at him. I was aware enough of myself to realise that the laughter was hysterical and it seemed to me that I fell backwards.”
Denegar sighs and sits for a long moment staring into space. It's several minutes before he moves, speaks or even breaths. But then he almost jerks, realising that his pipe has gone out. He refills the pipe, offers you some more and settles back down to continue his story.
“It was several weeks later when I woke up. As it turns out, the crossbow bolts that struck me had been poisoned and the poisons corruption had taken me to the brink of death. The elves told me that I would be better with rest, but I've wondered since, if a part of me really did die in the depths of Moria, I haven't felt myself since. The wilderness seems cold to me now, rather than full of potential, I wake in the night screaming and reaching for weapons my blankets soaked with sweat.
They told me to rest, but rest was impossible to find. As soon as I could walk I left my bed, much to the consternation of the elf whose life I 'd nearly taken. Turns out his name was Arenin, a fighter out of Lothlorien who had chosen to help the dwarves re-take Moria, he'd volunteered to rescue me as he'd never seen a hobbit before. But I left my bed and went in search of news of Haugr.
Haugr had died in his fall, landing on his head, but still flailing as if to kill other Orcs that came at him. I almost laughed when they told me this, his friends had looked at me strangely. I told them that in the Shire we have a saying, “Where there's no sense there's no feeling,” For a horrible moment I thought they would be insulted, before one of them started to laugh.
I wept at his funeral,
I had to be supported through it as a dwarven burial is a long involved affair, even though he had no real family and there were so many dead that the ceremonies were truncated.
I'll never forget Haugr, the dwarf who died to save me, sometimes I almost wish I could forget him, then maybe he wouldn't haunt me so much. I do miss him. I would give anything, anything to hear him laughing at me again.
The Dwarf that died and the Elf that I tried to kill. Arenin forgave me and Haugr made his choice. But they won't stop badgering me.”
Denegars cheeks glisten as he talks.
“I tried to give the crossbow back. It was one of Haugr's weapons and I wanted to give it back but the other dwarves told me that it was broken and unfit to be buried with him and without thinking what I was doing, I told them that I'd fix it for him. I waited a couple of days for the combined elven and dwarven forces to chase down the Orc survivors before I set out. I took my time, looking for craftsmen to fix this crossbow, but every single craftsmen that I took it to told me that it wasn't worth repairing and that I should break it down for firewood.
It took me so long to come back to the Shire, I stopped for a month with the Eglain in the Lone-lands. I'd been caught in an Autumn rain and the chill had entered my wounds.
No-one can help me. I decided in the end to come back. Surely in the Mathom house there will be tools to help me, I thought. But here I am, and the crossbow is still ruined.”
Denegar scrubs his hands over his face.
“I'm so sorry,” he says, “I'm so very sorry. I can't stop thinking about them. I can't stop feeling that I've let them down. Now I've come home and all I can think about is Haugr and how utterly dissappointed in me he would be. Now here I am, ruining the Yule festivities, drawing you, my friend into my smelly, dirty room and telling you my woes as though you've got nothing better to do. I just want to sleep, just to sleep without seeing his face.
I miss him, so much, his smile, his laughter, the descriptions of the dwarven maiden that he would marry when he found her. I miss his singing, off-key and coarse though it was.
I'm so sorry.”
Denegar trails off after that, going over his story, jumping backwards and forwards in the narrative. Eventually he falls asleep sat where he was and you put a blanket over him and a pillow under his head.
The following morning you're woken by Denegar shaking you.
“Come on, get dressed I nead your help.”
He stumps out of your room giving no time for questions.
After you dress, he stands over you tapping his feet impatiently as you eat breakfast. It's early and the only other people about are the hobbit children playing in the snow. You leave the hall heading North. Denegar looks awake and alert as you haven't seen him in some time. His eyes seem bright and if he still seems pale and drawn there is colour in his cheeks again.
“I've made a decision. I can't repair his crossbow, so I must replace it. Working with Metal and whatnot has never been my thing, but I can make Haugr a bow that he would be proud of. That I can do. I'm sorry that you had to come listen to me pouring my heart out, but now, if you'll bear with me, it won't take long to cut the right wood and then we can head back to the hall where I can carve and shape the wood.
Haugr wouldn't want me to sit in the dark, he died saving my life and he would have been saddened if I let myself be defeated by despair. I don't know why he died for me, I wish I did, I would like to ask him as to why he thought I was worth that sacrifice. But in the meantime, I'm just going to keep on firing and if I can take down, one more Orc, one more Goblin and protect those people weaker than myself then I hope that Haugr would be proud of me.”
It takes hours before Denegar finds the wood to his satisfaction all the time moaning about how winder isn't the proper time for making bows, but refusing to put the task off. You're both cold and wet by the time you get back, but Denegar is profusely grateful for you company, he stays up long into the night carving and shaping, polishing.
A week later, Denegar departs back towards the east, whistling as he goes with an oil-cloth wrapped bundle strapped to his back, along with a quiver full of arrows
