The broken old man sat huddled in the rustic shelter of the Southern Gate of Bree, his knees drawn up under him. If he had not seen 70 winters he had not see one. He had two begging bows before him, one for scraps of food and one for coins as he made no attempt to hide the stump of what had once been his right arm. Between the wooden bowls was a faded pennant identifying him as having been a soldier defending fair Eregion long ago, for all the good it did him.
He had been sitting in near this exact place, day in and day out, rain or shine for close to 3 years now. On a good day he gathered enough copper from travelers to drink a bit, got the occasional hot morsel from one of the vendors who worked the gate, and bore an infrequent kick or scolding from his "betters" for being a "public nuisance". On a bad day there were no coppers or morsels, only kicks. Today was destined to be a little bit of both.
Squinting up into the afternoon sun he suddenly realized someone was standing over him. A knight by the armor, but oddly shaped...and smallish. As his vision cleared he realized it was an elf of some kind...an elven maid at that. The old man stared, at first thinking he was having a vision of the past, unable to believe his aged eyes were not playing tricks on him until the elf maid spoke.
"Hail, friend Aron, you dog of a flatlander...what brings your mangy arse here, gone missing from the regiment, ya cowardly clod of orc shite?" The elven maid smirked down at the beggar, running a gauntleted hand through her close cropped black hair.
"Banshee? Can it be the Banshee? By the stars...what are ye doin'...what? the regiment?" He began to laugh, then to cough. "What would the regiment want with the likes of me now...I be old, ya git."
Xandilif looked more closely at her comrade. "Are you?"
The beggar snorted..."Indeed, I am...not to mention short a sword arm now...but you...good lord ya don't look a bit different that ya did at Bucha. I knew your kind were long lived but...god...."
The elven champion snorted and dropped to one knee..."Why should I look different, it has been but a few moons since we drove the filthy Orcish scum back over the falls and liberated their foul encampment of Dar es Bucha for Eregion."
Aron shook his aged head sadly..."No girl, are you jestin' with me...it's been fifty damn years...a lifetime. Just few years after Bucha, I lost me hand to a Troll's boot and retired for good. If I hadn't rolled out of his damn way I'd be sittin' here with both hands but no head." He laughed bitterly and looked up again, flinching as a blue reflection from the hilt of the Elf's greatsword caught his eye. "Lord I ain't seen that sword since you, me and Erech ran up that Orc watchtower with half the damn camp on our heels. Poor old Erech."
The beggar wiped his eyes on his sleeve..."Good ta she she still has ya." It wasn't clear if he meant the elf still had the sword, or the sword still had the elf.
Xandilif's attention was suddenly drawn back to the gate as another elven maid was riding slowly through it on a smoky gray mare, dressed all in deep green armor, her black hair dull with trail dust. She pulled a few gold coins out of her belt pouch and tossed them into the beggar's bowl. "There's the Monk now...thanks for the jawtime, Aron my friend. If I remain in these parts long, we'll have a drink and I'll see what you're made of these days."
She rose with a smirk and a wink, leaving the old soldier staring after her even as he pulled the small fortune out of his bowl.
Shouldering travelers out of the way, the Banshee took the bridle of Xanderian's horse in her mailed fist and looked her sister up and down. "You look like a Barghast ate you and then crapped you out."
The younger elleth did not look surprised to see her sister. "Hello Lif..." she said noncommittally by way of greeting.
Her sister nodded back..."Rian. We got ta have a bit of a parlay. Looked for ya in that dive of an ale pit this town suffers with but nobody seemed ta know who the blazes ya were, or where ya went. Good huntin'?"
Xanderian patted the 40 or so brigand's sashes tied to the horn of her saddle. "Fair...and yes sister, we must speak. First, you had said that..."
The Banshee nodded, now striding beside her sister's horse as they made their way through Bree. "Right ta the point, eh Monk? Yes I spoke to the Child. He asked me ta get ya to shut the hell up and leave him be. He seemed hurt but not bad. I told him I would come gather him up but the little bastard went silent and won't let me find him. I imagine he'll turn up here eventually...or not. Either way the Child is fine, damn his eyes and you are a bleedin' idiot, damn yours ta boot" She laughed then, a harsh, barking sort of sound that made her sister wince.
Xanderian nodded, taking her sister's scorn..."I suppose I am...but then perhaps other winds I do not know of guided my step here as well, masked as my concern."
"Other winds ya do not know of? My arse." The elven woman spat on the cobblestones, then continued. "Ya know of em damn well ya do. Here we go then, good to get this out of the way before the drinkin' starts...tell me about this runaway daughter you can't shut up about."
Xandilif had led the horse off the side of the main road into a sheltered area, and Xanderian had allowed it. She agreed..."best to get this over with" she thought as she slid out of the saddle and let the beast wander home.
"Fillegedhiel of Gondor...she trains to be a smith. Born in Dol Amroth of the father you know of, and a mother who passed on at her birth. She has many questions about her origin, and no love for or from her father. In fact she lives in terror of his discovery of her."
Xandilif nodded softly, her voice growing quieter and more serious. "Girl has sense to be so. He is a fecking brute who would gut his own mother for a drink and then roger her corpse. I heard a lot about him around the barracks, none of it nice. If he finds the little thing, she'll join her mother as sure as I'm standing here. I don't know what demon rides him, but it rides him damn hard. But that is her look out Rian, what matters it to you?"
The huntress sighed and looked up into the clouds. She had been dreading having to find these words but would not shy away now. "Fille is....Fille. She is my dearest friend, a pure soul, brave and innocent and strong and clever as the night itself. She is joy and laughter and makes me smile. She is all that is best in the young races, untouched by the filth and shame that the likes of you and I have wallowed in. Never have I seen her like and never shall I again."
Xandilif spat again and stared..."Balrog's Snot....I can NOT believe this. Ya love her don't ya?"
Xanderian met her eyes, her gaze hard. "Yes...I love her. I do. I would die to spare her the smallest hurt, and I have taken responsibility for her fate."
A long silence spooled out, the two sisters staring at one another until Xandilif shook her head sadly. "By Elbereth's silky knickers, 'Rian...what do you think you are doing? Help her, hurt her, bed her, burn her, I don't care what you do...but before you blink twice she will be dead and buried and you will have nothing to show for it but a hole in your heart and a nasty rash...and for our kind a hole in your heart lasts a LONG DAMN TIME. You know this, yes?"
Xanderian looked down, kicking a bit of rubble...."I know this...how can I not know this...but I accept this. I will have her companionship for but a turn of a season in our lives...god how I know this...but I thank the stars for every day in which she is my friend. She cares for me, Banshee. Do you know what that means...She cares for ME. If the cost of that is a hole in my heart, in my very soul, I pay it gladly ten times over.
The champion stared at her again, and slapped her hard on the shoulder...the huntress didn't move, still looking down. "Idiot. Will ya still say that when she isn't pert and pretty but a crone, bent and wizened, used up by care and childbirth and whatever else the Daughters of Gondor endure? Will you still say that she turns her face from you lest you remind her of the ruin she has become? Will you still say that when she curses you to your ageless face with her wheezing, dying breath? My god Monk, I fought Orcs with a spitfire named Aron. Just yesterday he was hale and hearty with an arse like mortal sin, and now he is a wreck, begging for bread by the gate of this backwater outpost, burning away the last few moments on nothing before he dies. And when he dies no trip West for him, is there?" Xandlif jerked her head up by the chin. "What will ya say to me about this runaway daughter when she is nothing but dust and buried dreams?"
The huntress slapped her hand away and looked up, face tear stained, words spat at her sister in a growing rage. "I will THANK Elbereth for whatever time I passed with her, and for the chance to watch her grow and age and be happy...and for the memory of her and of all she was and ever will be. I will sing her name in a loud voice on the shores of the Undying Lands so she will never be forgtten. I will thank the stars themselves for her and for the fact that she wasn't twisted like us, YOU DAMN BITCH!"
Xandilif shoved the smaller woman, who stumbled and fell to the cobblestones, too upset and angry to avoid the blow. The champion stood over her, practically shouting. "The runaway daughter is one thing...in time you will forget she ever existed, you KNOW you will...but what of the Noldor I smell all over you, who I can feel lurking somewhere in this villiage? No good will ever come of playing lackey to them Rian, we have done that and it did not go well for us, or for them. We wander for a reason you idiot! Stay the hell away from such as them, they are poison!"
Xanderian was on her feet in an instant, dagger drawn, eyes on fire but voice cold as ice. "I swear by my bond to you....if you say one more word against the Lady Arahen, ONE MORE...if you sully her with your filthy mouth and thoughts for even a moment more, I will kill you with our mother's blade...."
The Banshee stepped back, hands up, realizing she had crossed a line with her younger sister. "Slow down 'Rian. Arahen is it, of the Noldor? Name sounds familiar, one of the great and good no doubt, kinswoman to Ingwe himself perhaps."
Xanderian still had the knife out, tears now dripping from her chin..."Finwe actually...of the house of Orodreth. A lady of endless grace and limitness mercy. And YES I love her, you don't need to ask...laugh at me if you wish but I am sworn to her service, and she has shown love to me in return."
Her sister just shook her head..."By the seven stars do you know what you are doing you stupid Sindar cow? She will use you and discard you like the rind of a winter fruit. Her noble peers will call to her and she will leave you with her other toys in the mud. You KNOW this, Xanderian. Why are you doing this to yourself?" The Banshee was now nearly in tears herself.
Xandilif took her sister by the shoulders and kept speaking, the huntresses numb hands letting the blade fall. 'You hid away in your woods all those years for what purpose Rian? To tend your birds and squirrels? No, it is because you knew what I know about you, deep inside. You love too well, too dearly....look what the war has done to you. Every comrade we lost, every stable boy trampled into the dirt, scarred you. I am your sister, don;t you think I know that? I know the price I paid for such things, how much worse would it be for my baby sister? You aren't like me and I would spare you."
Xanderian slumped to the ground. "Don't you think I know I am mad...don't you think I have told myself all that you have? Lif...Lif....If you would spare me then why did you show me all that you did, why did you tell me of their pain and their peril if you did not wish me to go forth amongst them to fight....to fight and fail and to watch them all die. All of them." Her voice was born of the purest despair.
The Banshee knelt beside her, holding her sister against her cold armor. "You idiot...because I knew you would never have rest in the Havens if you would one day look back and know you had done nothing...and because I thought it would toughen you. But I never thought you would take risks like this...never. My god, Rian."
Xanderian looked at her sister, trying to dry her tears on her leather gauntlet and failing, trying to make her see. "The risks are already taken, Banshee....my die is cast. Fille, Arahen, my other friends...I make my stand HERE. With them. The line is drawn. Only my death will change that."
The elven champion stood, wiping her own eyes as if they had dust in them, trying to sound matter-of-fact. "I suppose so...it's your choice, you are of proper age. Just...be careful, Monk. I am not ready for you to die just yet, not even for your epic loves or whatever they are. I would say I hope you know what you are doing, but I know you don't so whatever." Xandilif sighed and stretched. "I suppose I will stay here for a bit, keep an eye on you and meet these wonders you have thrown your lot in with. Beside, I am here on a task for the Host of the West as well, I am to report on the state of Breeland and Eregion to Mablung."
Xanderian nodded, sheathing her dagger wearily..."I understand. Mablung will expect the job done well. So if you must look around anyway, ride South and see if those bandits might have something to do with any Southrons. When you return I will explain why. Look for a halfling called Adso, he can help you and put you up for a bit."
The Banshee nodded."So be it..." and started to walk back to the main road before turning..."Ya know Monk...I care about you too...you're my baby sister, even though you are a pain in my arse."
Xanderian nodded whispering..."I know...and you are an armor plated bitch as always but you are MY armor plated bitch...."
Xandilif started to whistle as she walked away, figuring she better buy Aron that drink quick before he died. She stopped, glancing back to her sister. "I am proud of you, even though you are as stupid as one of Ungolient's spawn humping an Octopus. Just....guard your heart, Rian....because nobody else will."
The huntress watched her go...and whispered to herself..."I think you are wrong Lif...maybe SOMEBODY else will."
