Chapter 9: To the Ford.

They left before the moon was high.  

Gildor opened the march on foot, lighting their way as if a star had come down to guide them. Gil-galad followed on the motherly chestnut mare that had a soft, sure step, and Brethil and Cûiell rode behind him on the grey, spirited stallion. They followed a narrow trail between the River Legolin, which ran deep and fast there, and the edge of the teeming, troubled forest. 

“So what happened to all your cities and realms, Gildor?

Brethil groaned. Cûiell’s forwardness always led them to unwanted trouble, yet she seemed unable to grasp the concept of inappropriate moments or inappropriate questions. Not that she had had much training, with that sheltered and wandering life of theirs in which meetings with strangers were scarce, and thus a source of news, but still somehow her bluntness prickled Brethil and Thranduil’s sense of propriety. At times, though, he suspected she did it on purpose, just to watch them wince.

Busy overcoming his embarrassment on her account, he almost missed the cautious glances the Shimmering One cast to the captain before launching into an account of the tale of the ruin of the Noldorin realms in Beleriand; a tale Brethil had only heard in bits and pieces. In his soft voice the Exile recounted battle after battle, defeat after defeat, deeds of bravery and also division among allies. Brethil blushed when he heard how the Havens had fallen without any help from Nargothrond or Doriath reaching them, or how Doriath had not supported Nargothrond in the battle of Tumhalad, but he kept his peace wisely. Once or twice he saw Gil-galad make a warning gesture towards Gildor, urging him to restrain his bitterness and soften his comments.

“So much for all those brave kings and their mighty armies, then,” Cûiell pondered thoughtfully.

“So much, indeed,” Gil-galad nodded in a faint, pained voice. “Can we rest for a while?” he asked then. “I fear I cannot go any further…”

Distracted by the tale, Brethil had not noticed how the captain sagged as they rode, hunched as if in great pain. In two swift strides Gildor was there to catch him before he hit the ground, and dragged him to rest against a slender alder. “You should have warned us!” the older elf fretted, as Brethil and Cûiell dismounted and took care of the nervous horses. “Here, get some water… let me check those bandages...Easy, we still have time…”

Brethil exchanged a worried glance with Cûiell. The feeling in the forest was getting even more urgent, but none of them said a word.

“They were not just Doriathrim who were killed in Sirion, Brethil...” The captain sounded weak but determined. “There were Noldor and Sindar from Beleriand there; and Teleri, too… all of them people with whom we had an alliance… people whom I failed to succour… good friends…elves killed by elves…”  

“Let go, Ereinion,” Gildor pleaded softly, covering the tired elf with his cloak. “You need to rest…”

The captain fixed Brethil in an intense, searching gaze. “We know how you feel, Brethil, we do know…” he sighed wearily. He then closed his eyes and seemed to fall asleep. 

“What do we do now?” Cûiell asked softly, casting worried glances at the increasingly disturbed trees.

“He rests, and we watch,” Gildor grunted.

“But they are getting closer…”

Gildor cast them a thoughtful glance, then handed them his pack. “There. Food for two days. Take the stallion and climb east till you find a stream that crosses the path. You follow it north then and…”

“We are not leaving,” Brethil stated calmly, snapping out of his thoughts. “We will not have you say again that Doriath abandoned its allies…” He almost laughed at the look of dismay on the Noldo’s face.

“Do not be silly, boy! That was politics and this is about saving your lives!”

“I can go check how far they are,” Cûiell offered, supporting Brethil’s decision without the slightest hesitation. That frightened the Shimmering One even more.

“You are not going anywhere!”

“A moment ago you were sending us away,” she joked. “Calm down, Gildor,” she added with the maddening smile that always heralded trouble. “I can get more information from the trees than you could and I need not get very far.”

“We are staying, Gildor,” Brethil clinched. “So you better get used to it!”

The Shimmering One shook his head. He then stood and placed both hands on Cûiell’s shoulders. “May Manwë protect you, child. Do not stray far, just get the trees to tell you how much time do we have and then fly back, will you?” he pleaded, so deeply moved that Brethil felt the need to comfort him as Cûiell ran away with a brief laugh.

“She is our best scout. She will be fine.”

“So I hope.” With great effort the Shimmering One turned his attention to practical matters. “Let us check our weapons… you have a look at our arrows and I’ll see to knives and swords...”

They waited in tense silence, only broken by the rhythmic scrap of stone against iron. After some time Brethil looked up from the arrows and risked a question.

“Who was his father?” 

Gildor did not meet his eyes and continued working. “A good friend, and a valiant elf,” he said eventually, in a tone that was not forthcoming. But Brethil was unrelenting.

“You called him Ereinion. That is no common name.”

Gildor cast him a dirty glance and shook his head. “You are a pest, boy.” 

Brethil waited.

And won.

Gildor put away sword and stone and released a deep sigh. “His father was the High King of the Noldor,” he said challengingly. Brethil knew better than to let his shock show.

“So is he a king, now?”

Gildor chuckled softly. “By right. King of a rock, of a bereft people and a bedraggled army, but our king. And our captain, too. Now you know. You can leave when Cûiell returns.”

“I doubt it,” Brethil answered steadily. Asleep on the ground, pale and blood-stained, Gil-galad looked quite unkingly and less threatening than one might expect from the son of a kinslayer. “We are all in this together.”  

“We are, indeed,” the Shimmering One acknowledged with a brief smile. “And we will all be out of this together too; you have my word,” he added before turning his attention back to the swords.

Cûiell came back silently in the grey hour before dawn, short after Gil-galad awoke amidst winces and scowls of pain.

She looked shaken and took a long draught before speaking. “They are almost upon us, they are thousands!” she gasped, pointing back to the forest. The roar grew closer every hour. “The whole forest is marching around them, even from the east, so the orcs are surrounded…but the trees are fleeing something as well! I have seen fires!”

“How long to the ford, Gildor?” Gil-galad asked, assuming command immediately.

“I am not sure… but… we might get there before noon if the trees can hold them back for a while…”

“Then we should start as soon as possible,” the captain decided, extending a hand and urging Gildor to pull him up to his feet. “If they are fleeing something, they might not stop to kill us…”

“But we might be caught by whatever it is they are fleeing,” Brethil blurted, terrified by that unidentified threat. They had all felt the ground shake and roar in the past days, and had no idea of what was causing the stampede of frightened orcs –and now trees. Gil-galad smiled faintly.

“There is that risk, too. But one problem at a time. Now, I want you two to swear that you are going to obey my commands,” he said seriously, facing the youths. Brethil rebelled immediately.

“We are not warriors in your army, you cannot…”

“That is precisely why you must swear,” Gil-galad insisted coldly. “I cannot protect you if I am not sure that you will do as you are told…”

“I do,” Cûiell interrupted, placing both hands over her heart. “Oropher always says that every patrol must follow a leader, Brethil,” she nudged him, “and Gil-galad is the captain here...”

“If you insist…I give you my word for now,” he conceded grudgingly, reluctant to swear obedience to the king of the kinslayers.

Gil-galad watched him intently for a brief while, as if sensing his discomfort, then shook his head. “Let’s go,” he said simply.

They rode on without pause, as fast as the trail permitted, Gildor now protecting their rearguard. Brethil kept a frantic eye on the captain for fear that he would fall. Gil-galad leaned against the neck of his mare, a hand protectively crossed over his injured chest and the other threaded in the horse’s mane. He seemed to be holding on for the moment, despite the deep scowl of pain on his set face.

“The Ford!”  Cûiell cried, and he laughed in relief. Beyond them, not thousand paces away, the Legolin was a wide, shallow current, almost a pool, before narrowing again its course and jumping wildly into Sirion.

“We are there!” he turned to cry to Gil-galad, who had momentarily fallen behind. The sight froze him. Gil-galad had stopped to wait for Gildor, who ran as fast as he could after them, chased by a group of demented orcs and wargs.  Behind them, the trees trembled and shook and roared as if busy stamping on something. “Look!” he cried in joy urging Cûiell to stop the horse and look back. “The trees are trampling the orcs!”

“Ride! Ride to the ford!” Gil-galad roared at them as he helped Gildor on his mount. And then they saw it. Well behind but gaining fast on them a dark, large shape of black smoke advanced steadily through the forest, flames leaping up at its sides, branches and trunks and orc bodies jumping in the air at its passing, as if jolted by a mighty whirlwind of darkness and fire.  Panic grabbed them and they froze on the trail, watching in trepidation as the invisible threat got closer.

“Ride on!” Gil-galad’s voice broke over the din and startled the stallion. It sprang forward with renewed decision. “Find a place and start shooting!” Holding tightly to Cûiell’s waist, Brethil risked a glance back as they flew madly down a narrow trail and into the wide plain that led to the Ford. Gil-galad’s mare was lagging behind, but the orcs seemed more intent on fleeing than on chasing the elves riding before them.

“Yrch!”  Cuiell’s gasp sounded frightened and made him look ahead. A larger group of orcs ran towards them, pouring out of the forest and rolling down the soft slope that separated the forest from the river bank, dashing in panic towards the river.

“Hold on!” he shouted in her ear, fumbling with his bow. “I’ll shoot them down!”

And suddenly they were into the river, and he heard cries and growls, and arrows felling the orcs that splashed around them, while the land trembled and the roar shook them. A large orc crashed into them, pierced by many arrows, and the stallion reared up in panic. Unbalanced, Brethil slipped and fell into the river. He thought he heard his name before the water closed over him and muted the din. Then he hit his head and all went black.

                                                      ~*~*~*~*~

 Death rode towards them, Oropher knew by the deep silence that blanketed both sides of the river. He could smell the panic in the forest, the smoke that was not yet visible, the fear of fleeing creatures trapped on the other side. Then the roar reached them clearly, the sound of a marching forest this time mixed with a deep bellow that shook the land.

“What is that? It sounds like a thousand deer in the mating season!” one of Lalf’s warriors panted as they climbed a steep hill. Beyond there, Lalf had said, lay the Ford. Oropher shook his head and fell back to where Bronadir closed the march, signalling to Thranduil to come to them.

“A quick charge,” he said briefly. Bronadir nodded in assent. “We get Brethil and Cûiell out of danger and run into safety. As soon as we get down there, you look for a suitable tree and cover our backs, Thranduil...”

“But, ada…”

“You heard me, boy! Someone must cover us! Each warrior must play his part. And you are not even a warrior yet!”

“We are there,” warned Bronadir as they reached the top of the hill. Lalf was shouting commands frantically. With one swift glance down to the Ford, Oropher took in the situation.

“Charge now! They are surrounded!”

“Wait, look!” Maentêw shouted, grabbing his arm. A second horse had reached the Ford. “They are not alone!”

The large stallion was half way into the river when the orcs began to fall by the dozen, pierced by long, black feathered arrows.

“That is Maglor!” cried Gelmir. “And the Erchamion and the Onodrim are with them!”

They were beautiful to behold, a mighty host of shinning elves and angry trees that came up from the eastern flank, wreaking havoc amidst the terrified orcs with bow and sword and root and branch. But still some orcs had reached the river.

“To the Ford!” Oropher bellowed as the large stallion stumbled and reared up and one of the youngsters crashed into the river. “To the children!” He raced downhill, shooting as he ran, his attention fixed on the Ford and the elves in the river. One of the adult elves dismounted quickly and dragged the limp boy out of the waters while Cûiell and the other elf –an exile- kept the orcs at a distance. 

“Hold on!” he shouted, “We are coming!” Distracted by his voice, Cûiell snapped in his direction and missed a couple orcs that had evaded the Exile and got closer to the nervous stallion.

“Cûiell!” Thranduil flew past him and splashed into the river, his long knife in hand, followed at close distance by Glîrdan. Cursing, Oropher sped up after them, with Bronadir and Maentêw on tow.

“To them!” he cried, seeing that Noldor and Onodrim had also entered the river. And suddenly the forest exploded at the other side and a large dark shadow stomped towards the river dragging trees and orcs in flames, roaring in wrath and pain.

“Balrog!” someone shouted, “Stay away!”

The Onodrim were in the river, as were the orcs and the Erchamion’s host, in the path of the flaming creature. Oropher forced his way into the mess, caught a glimpse of Thranduil’s golden head, Brethil’s dark one, an ent in flames, a pale, blood-covered Noldo pushing the children behind him and cutting down a large orc with a curved orcish blade, then charging after the flaming shadow.

“Ereinion, no!” someone cried to Oropher’s right. A black smoke covered the air then, the river hissed and he groped blindly amidst the confusion, desperately looking for his children.

TBC.

A/N Ereinion means “son of kings”