Prophet (a LOTR fanfic)

Beneath the Mountain

I sat quietly by the fire, my sword in my lap and one eye on the mountain pass. Nimeril lurked in the back of my mind, restless. Eowyn quietly sat down across from me and stared blankly into the flames. It almost looked as though she was about to cry. 

"Eowyn, what rumours have you heard of me?"

She looked up, startled.

"I've heard you are a great elven prophetess. Others say you are a witch." 

"Indeed." I glanced over to where Eomer sat with his comrades. "You must go with the men tomorrow, Merry will need you." 

She glanced up at me, questions in her eyes. I stared back.

"You are just as able to go to war as any man, elf, or dwarf. You are a shield maiden of Rohan, and nothing and no one can stop you from fighting with your people." 

I saw her eyes flash with determination, and her jaw set. 

Legolas appeared from behind a tent and called my name. 

"Meril, Aragorn is preparing to leave." 

"Shit, I thought it was still early," I hissed. 

I rushed to our tent and grabbed my gear from the floor, slinging it over my borrowed horse and cinching the buckles at breakneck speed. I yanked on the reigns a little too hard and the horse snorted in protest. 

"Sorry, sorry, I'm in a bit of a hurry here."

We maneuvered through camp, towards the pass and our friends. 

"We can't do this!" Nimeril cried. 

"We have to. We have to make sure Aragorn is safe, remember? we can't do that from back here." 

"Not this time," Aragorn said, looking down at an incredulous dwarf. "This time, you must stay, Gimli."

"Have you learnt nothing of the stubbornness of dwarves?"

"Might as well accept it, we're going with you, laddie." 

"We'd better hurry then," I said, coming up behind. 

Aragorn threw up his hands in surrender, and we headed into the belly of the beast. 

***

The road was bleak and lifeless. The mountain rose up on either side, blocking the morning sun as it lit the sky. 

"What kind of army would linger in such a place?" Gimli whispered. His voice echoed eerily off the canyon walls. 

"One that is cursed," Legolas answered. "Long ago, the men of the mountain swore an oath to the king of Gondor, to come to his aid, to fight. But when the time came, when Gondor's need was dire, they fled, vanishing into the darkness of the mountain. So Isildur cursed them, never to rest, until they had fulfilled their pledge."

"Ghosts," I smiled, but a shiver ran down my spine. 

Nimeril had been too quiet, too calm. I felt her waiting in the back of my head, but just barely, as though she were asleep.

The further we travelled, the darker the sky got, though I doubted more than an hour had passed since the sun had come up. Finally, the path seemed to end, and I caught a glimpse of some horror movie level shit that was passing for a door. I took a deep breath and swung off my horse, leading it the last few meters between the trees. 

"The very warmth of my blood seems stolen away," Gimli said, glancing nervously at the wizened trees. 

We stopped before the skull-decorated archway.