Xandilif the Banshee stood on the battlements, one heavy boot resting on black stone. The cold basalt of the fortification was cut through with veins of reddish ore so that even the stones of this land seemed to bleed. The Elleth warrior had spent nearly an hour gazing into a smoking brazier with the great sword SilverWand across her lap, occasionally grimacing but not from the smoke. Now she spat into the flames and turned to look out at the horizon..
"Ah Agarnaith...." she intoned seriously as she watched the sun rise over the blasted plain below like a gorey stain, wiping her eyes with the back of one steel gauntlet, "a land so noxious it could only exist down-wind of Sauron on a stagnant day". Shrugging, the Champion turned back to the makeshift picnic spread out on in the middle of the Overlook Terrace of the fortress of Seregost. Her companion watched the sunrise as well, unmoving.
"Awwww...I am truly touched that ya waited for me ta finish my sightseeing, but you could have begun the feast. I wouldn't have held it against ya, old friend." Dropping to one knee, she pulled the cork out of a flask of grog with her teeth and spat it across the courtyard before taking a long pull of the black, oily liquor. "I just had to catch up on this and that with family. You got family? Nah, I wouldn't imagine that ya do. You servants of the enemy, you got the right idea regarding kin. Eat em while they're still tiny, squishy things and save the trouble later. That's what I call sound thinking."
The Elleth brushed a bit of ash off a hunk of cheese resting on the blood stained pennant she had spread out. "Sisters ain't nothing but a pain in Elbereth's intestines...am I right? Course I'm right. I got a sister ain't got the sense Iluvatar gave a dung beetle that been held back a few years to brush up on dung." She took a bite of the cheese and laid back on the warm stone as her companion listened silently.
The Champion continued, speaking with her mouth full. "Xanderian the Monk is the most purely foolish of a purely foolish breed...And I should know. Most of my kinsfolk, they stare off to the West and mumble on about nonsense what happened a couple ages ago and bitching about how the world is the latecomers problem now. They whine on about how they are a rough and tumble lot with no regard for poncy furnishings that are likely to break everything apart twenty minutes after the last Elleth on the last boat leans back and shouts "So long, suckers, and shame about the feckin' trees."...but my Monk takes the cake. Most of my kin wouldn't spit on these latecomers if they were on fire...but Xanderian...XANDERIAN. She falls in bloody love with half of em, kills the other half and then moans about her poor battered heart and sweaty sheets. I don't know whether to laugh or cry, or both at the same damn time."
Her companion held his tongue as the Banshee pulled herself to her feet to take another long swig of grog. "Now, I lose track of my sister the Monk for awhile cause I got better things to do then keeping track of her dramas, and now when she finally says Hello again, she tells me quite the tale. Seems she got a special favorite among the latecomers, a Rohan girl that apparently got tired of horses and decided to try elves. Cyndwin the Shieldstrumpet she is called, I am sure we can find her name scrawled on the walls of a few latrines here in Seregost. She leads my sister a merry chase and then, a few months back while Xanderian was window shopping in Carn Dum, this Cyndwin up and disappears. Just GONE."
Xandilif snorted...her anger growing even as her tone grew more mocking."So what does my sister the idiot do? Does she go on with her duty and figure she dodged a lightning bolt, good riddance? No, that would be too sensible. Does she check every tavern floor or soldier's bedroll in the vicinity and drag the strumpet back? No, that would be too easy and not dramatic enough. What does she do? She goes on a tear through fecking Angmar and then wallows in her own goddamn angst across half the damn map for nigh on a year. A WHOLE DAMN YEAR! SERIOUSLY? OVER A RUNAWAY PLAYTHING?"
The Elleth drained the last of the grog and smashed the flask against the wall of Seregost. "That would have been bad enough. But after this whole damn year, without a by your leave, here Cyndwin comes BACK. Apparently whoever was paying her bar tab got sick of her, or she just decided my sister was ready for the next damn round. She comes BACK with a story about disappearing in a puff of blue smoke and my sister the IDIOT buys every...damn...WORD! In fact, Rian is over the damn moon! "Cyndwin's has returned, Cyndwin has returned" like a halfling in a vat of strawberries. She went on like that until I wanted to puke. By Mandos' scanties I wish I could claim she were adopted, but I CAN'T! I saw the little idiot get born!"
Xandilif sat down next to her companion heavily, her damaged armor rattling like a tinker's wagon and put her arm around his bony shoulders. "So Dulg...I'm sorry, can I call ya Dulg? I feel like we have really gotten to know each other, seeing how many times we've met and all. So Dulg, now what do I do?...well, I tell my sister the IDIOT I will come back West to hear this load of oliphant crap for myself and see what I can do to set my sister the idiot straight. Besides that, if...and that is an IF so big it would fill Khazad Dum...IF the Shieldstrumpet is somehow tellin' the truth about the blue smoke then there is a lot to sort out and some of it may not be nice...and sorting stuff that ain't nice is my specialty. I don't care what happens to any of em, but she IS my sister, and that counts for something, don't it? Besides all that, this little unlikely plot twist happened in Angmar..and anything that touches Angmar touches Kheledul...and I got some old business to take care of in Kheledul. Like our business, only I won't be so pleasant about it. You follow me?"
The champion rose, bringing her companion with her to the edge of the Overlook. "SO, I am afraid this is good bye, Dulg. We had a good run there, you and I...and I swear I will think back on ya often with a fond smile on my face. Anytime I hear a Cargil laugh, or a deep claw squawk when it gets bisected, I will think of you Dulg and the times we shared. I mean, whatever happens, we'll always have Mordor, right?"
With a shrug, the Champion cast the rotting remains of Dulgabeth the Broken, once Dulgabeth the Black Word, the Mouth of Sauron and prince among Gurzyul, down from the battlements of Seregost to the steaming rocks below.
Her business in Seregost done for now, Xandilif the Banshee, Champion of Dol Amroth turned and whistled for her horse...it was going to be a long ride to Bree and she was out of grog.
