𝕰𝖑𝖊𝖓𝖆

Chapter Thirty-Eight: The Rising Sun

"I don't need your help, lass!" he shouted, swinging his axe into the gut of an Uruk-Hai.

"What is your score, Gimli?" I asked, as I disembowelled another.

Gimli swept the legs out from beneath an Uruk-Hai, before bringing his axe down on its head.

"That makes twenty five," Gimli said, with a hint of boastfulness.

"Then don't consider it help, but rather, me surpassing you," I taunted, slashing the throat of another and smiling at him, "That's twenty six."

Suddenly a rattling sound drew our attention to the stairs, where Legolas stood upon a shield that glided down them, loosing arrows as he went. Each arrow met its mark with fatal accuracy, and complete his show of expertise, he launched the shield out beneath him at the base of the stairs, embedding it in the chest of an Uruk-Hai.

"Gimli," I said thoughtfully, piercing my dagger into the chest of an Uruk-Hai, "I propose a truce. Whether its you or I who win, let us both just ensure it isn't the elf. I'm afraid it would inflate his ego to the point of bursting."

Gimli gave a hearty laugh, knocking an Uruk-Hai off its feet with his axe.

"We've reached a truce, then," he chuckled, downing another.

Still more Uruk-Hai poured through the gape in the wall, and my spirits sunk with each new snarling and unfriendly face that came around the wall. I looked back at our own army. There wasn't enough. That fact became ever clearer as more and more Uruk-Hai stormed the outer walls and barrelled towards the inner ones. Towards the keep, and the caves.

Gimli and I fell back, out of the knee-deep drainage water and into the fray of battle. Legolas had abandoned his bow for his dual wielding blades, and Aragorn swung his own sword with trained precision at the onslaught of Uruk-Hai. But no matter our skill, no matter how many Uruk-Hai we downed, it was not enough.

"Aragorn!" King Théoden's voice echoed across the fortress, "Fall back to the keep! Get your men out of there!"

"Am Marad! Am Marad!" Aragorn called out.

"Fall back! To the keep, fall back!" I shouted in warning, as I ran with the rest to the keep, pulling fighters with me.

"What are you doing? What are you all stopping for!" Gimli shouted angrily, as Legolas and another elf carried him by the arms back to the keep.

"Haldir, am Marad!" Aragorn called to Haldir, who I saw was on top of the outer walls with his archers.

Haldir commanded his men to fall back, and they began to stream along the walls and down the stairs, as all of Rohan's fighters and allies fled for the keep.

"Haldir!" Aragorn shouted, and my eyes flew back to the elf, whose acquaintance I'd made all the way back in Rivendell.

Who had helped my kingdom through the war, when it seemed almost no one would.

"No!" I cried, as I registered the elf, who clutched desperately at a wound in his stomach.

The Uruk-Hai who'd inflicted it was quick to follow up with a blow to his back. Haldir fell to his knees. Suddenly, Aragorn broke for the outer wall, racing to the stairs. I made the split-second decision to follow, and help Aragorn to rescue him. I owed the elf that much for helping to save my people. I at last made it to the stairs, stepping over corpses as I went.

"Aragorn!" I called desperately, as I fell to my knees before them.

Aragorn held Haldir's body in his lap, looking down on him with unmoving eyes.