Chapter 33: The Hour of the Wolves

WHITE MOUNTAINS

In a heartbeat, Éomer joined Aragorn at the window, ignoring the bolt of pain shooting up his leg as he strained to peer through the small slit of the closed shutters.

"What do you see?" he whispered, aware that Aragorn’s attention was not directed at the path from where they expected the enemy to come, but at the farm.

"The dogs do not bark at something that is coming from our side," the ranger gave back, all senses strained. "Look, their backs are turned on us." He narrowed his eyes and suddenly, all tension fell from him as he beheld the shape of a pale horse in the distance, almost invisible against the snow-covered surroundings. "It is Legolas." The older man exhaled and turned to Éomer, a relieved smile on his face. "It is about time. I began to worry." Again he looked and saw the dark shapes of the others move out of hiding to greet the returning elf.

Following the distant scene with a similar feeling, Éomer silently asked himself why he was still feeling timid if the din had been caused by the return of their comrade, and why, all of a sudden, he found it almost impossible to breathe. It was almost as if the air in the little shed had grown too thick; as if something other than the bandage around his ribs were pressing his lungs together. The atmosphere had changed, shudder after shudder raced down his spine, and even if he had no name for the feeling that had befallen him with frightening intensity, Éomer knew the sensation all too well. His stomach turned into a solid block of ice.

"Éomer?" Puzzled by the young man’s silence, Aragorn shifted his gaze from the scene outside to his comrade – and froze as he stared into wide, dark eyes; the sensation of the abysmal dread he read in the other’s face assaulting him now as well. With all distinctiveness, he felt the short hairs on his neck and forearms rise, and the chill air that slowly filled his lungs suddenly gained the metallic taste of danger as a low sound rose from the back of the shed.

Already knowing what they would see, the two warriors turned toward their horses. Éomer had heard that particular warning uncountable times in his life, and never once had Firefoot been wrong: he didn’t have to see the stallion’s rolling eyes or his flared nostrils sucking in the air in sharp bursts to understand that the enemy was close.

"Sssshh..." he soothed, with a quick step by his steed’s side to lay his hands onto the muscled shoulder. The grey trembled hard. "Giet, Firefoot." His fingers slid down the powerful body just in time to prevent his horse from stomping his hoof and thus alarming the enemy. "Not a sound..." Now he heard or rather felt it, too: the faintest echo of a marching sound, the movement of many heavy bodies in perfect unison; distant but quickly rising in volume. The crunching of the harsh snow that had thawed in the sun and frozen again with the beginning of night underneath their foes’ feet.

Next to him, Aragorn had likewise succeeded in calming Hasufel to the point where he felt confident that the chestnut would not betray their whereabouts with a frightened noise at the wrong time. Both horses were experienced in the art of war and had participated in numerous ambushes. In countless skirmishes, they had learned to unconditionally trust their riders, and though Hasufel had lost his first master not long ago, he had learned to trust Aragorn in the few days he had been carrying the ranger. Convinced that their steeds would remain quiet despite the orcs’ proximity, the Dúnadan and the Rohir turned back toward the window .

"They heard it, too." Aragorn pointed over to where their comrades sought cover behind the barricade they had built, his words but a breath. In Éomer’s gaze and the way that the young man’s gloved hands clenched around the hilt of his sheathed sword, he read the same anxiety over sitting trapped in the small building that he felt himself. They had discussed the details of their stakeout during the afternoon and agreed that with the wind carrying their scent up the mountains behind them, away from the orcs, the risk seemed not exceedingly high. It was time to remember it now.

Taking a deep breath, Aragorn forced himself to calm down. No, their plan was sound. Although the Necromancer’s brood would pass them close by, their attention and powerful senses would be steered away from the shed by the scent of Osred, Halad, Gimli and Legolas – and of Éomer’s blood and sweat-stained old garments they had deposited in the middle of the valley where no cover was to be had and the orcs would make excellent targets for their bows. Involuntarily, he clenched his fingers. Not much longer to wait.

The sound of marching feet was now supplying the background for the guttural grunting of beasts out for blood. The orc-stench preceding the host had grown thick to the point where it no longer took a dog’s or horse’s finer senses to know that the enemy was upon them; a vile cloud in the otherwise clear winter air. Inhaling the putrid reek through his nose in a deep breath, Éomer closed his eyes. This was the moment he knew so well: it separated the warrior from the commoner, and the marshal from the simple rider. Where the frightened man would flee or freeze, the warrior came to life.

The pounding of his heart thunder in his ears, the rush of blood in his veins so loud that it drowned out all other noises, Éomer felt battle-readiness flood his body like hundreds of times before: it was an unstoppable, hot wave saturating his muscles and preparing them for the challenge ahead, while at the same time his mind was overtaken by a great calm and clarity. It did not matter that he had almost died the night before; it did not matter that he was not at his usual strength. When Éomer opened his eyes again, all fear and hesitation had been swept away and been replaced with the cunning and strategic skill of the warrior who had risen to the rank of a marshal faster than any man before him safe Eorl the Young himself.

Through the small gap between two logs he saw them coming; the Uruk-hais’ dark deformed shapes despoiling the perfect whiteness of the snow as they flooded into the valley in single file to came to a halt right in front of the shed. The lazy trail of his frozen breath rose into the air, and out of habit, Éomer waved it away, not even aware of the movement. To his left, Aragorn imitated his gesture, his keen grey eyes surveying the happenings outside, ready to act.

No more than a few steps away, the host of nightmarish creatures huffed and snorted while their luminous yellow eyes swept the narrow valley and the buildings before them; their broad chests rising and falling with each of their deep breaths as they probed the air for signs of the enemy. From the farm, the dogs’ furious barking announced their presence, yet still they bided their time, mistrustful of the otherwise perfect silence. This was not their first raid of a human settlement; experience told them that usually, the farm’s inhabitants exited the buildings to investigate the disturbance, and yet nothing moved. Had the man-things somehow learned of their approach and fled, leaving their stock and even their dogs at the mercy of the fighting Uruk-hai?

The host’s leader, an enormous creature with bulging muscles and a particularly gruesome armour made of human skin and bones, lifted his clawed hand with a sharp grunt; ending the noise. His army now stood as one, a silent, deadly, dark silhouette waiting for the attack signal. With a soundless, fluid movement, Aragorn had an arrow fitted to the string of his bow with the sharp tip pointing through the small gap in the shutters toward the Uruk’s neck.

‘These are more than twenty-five Uruk-hai!'  Éomer thought with sudden realisation, and from the corner of his eye, he saw Aragorn’s lips move in a silent curse. Somewhere along the way, another group of Uruk-hai had joined their attackers, and instead of roughly two dozen of these beasts, it appeared as if they were faced with more than forty enemies now, crushing their already slim chances of victory. Even before Éomer could truly fathom the meaning of this discovery for their plan, the lead Uruk suddenly turned his head and stared right at them.

The Rohir froze as gleaming amber eyes met his, neither daring to breathe nor blink. He knew that the orc would be dead upon his first step in their direction, and yet the knowledge did not soothe him. He had seen several crossbows among the creature’s brethren; even if Aragorn killed their leader, they would die in a hail of iron bolts only a moment later. The thin wooden walls could not provide protection against these deadly weapons:

‘Does he know we are here? Can he sense us?’

They were still hidden in the darkness of the shed, but what if the creature smelled them?

‘He cannot. He is just cautious.’

Although he did not turn his head to see how their horses were taking the challenge, Éomer felt tension mount to the breaking point within their hideout. He could not tell how, but their steeds sensed that the Uruk-hai’s attention was focused upon them, and while battle-experience told them to remain still, it was an uncommon situation for Firefoot and Hasufel to find themselves trapped in a crammed building with no way to flee. It was a violation against a horse’s very nature, and just as Éomer braced for the panicked shriek with which his stallion would bolt and jump against the thin wooden wall that blocked his escape, the great orc outside turned back toward his host, and a clawed finger pointed at the silently waiting farm as he ordered the attack with a bloodcurdling roar. A black avalanche of death, the Uruk-hai descended upon the farm.

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The wave of relief surging through his body was almost painful, and with a sharp breath, Éomer closed his eyes.

"That was close," Aragorn voiced his thoughts as he lowered the bow. "I must compliment you on your horses’ training. I have known for a long time that the horses of Rohan have no equal in Middle Earth, but to remain silent under the enemy’s scrutiny while their escape way is blocked is something even I would not have expected from them."

"Their trust in us is strong," was all Éomer said, not deeming it important to mention that it would have ended differently had the orc waited for a moment longer. Aragorn probably knew it himself, and right now, they had more pressing things to do. With a last quick glance through the shutter, he turned to Firefoot and grasped the bridle. "It is time."

Ignoring the older man’s sceptical gaze as he limped toward the exit, Éomer stepped out into the chill night air, for once glad to escape the narrow confines of the shed that could have easily turned into a trap for themselves. From below, the din of the dogs’ alarm and the orcs’ war-cries pierced the night as he climbed into the saddle without his usual grace, mechanically readying his bow as he became a predator himself, ready to deal death.

"Éomer?" Aragorn held out his hand as he directed his own horse alongside Firefoot, and Éomer took it. Their eyes met, and in the ranger’s gaze he read the determination to emerge victorious from this battle despite their lessened chances. "Good hunting, brother!"

"And for you, brother! We’ll teach them to avoid this valley for all times." He pressed Aragorn’s hand, and - feeling infected by the ranger’s show of confidence – burst into a grim smile as he threw his steed around. Together, the two warriors charged down the slope in a white cloud of snow; a different kind of avalanche, but just as deadly...