The Battle in the Sky

They were nearing the top of Dol Guldur now.  The Stair had steepened the last hour as they neared the summit.  Gandalf tapped his staff against Haldir’s back.

“Haldir…we must stop for a moment.”

The Marchwarden of Lorien turned, a slight concern on his aquiline face, wondering if the old wizard had become winded by the pace of the climb.

Gandalf smiled.  “No, Haldir, it is not altitude that tugs at me.” He glanced up.  The edge of Dol Guldur’s ashen stone skull cap loomed over them, perhaps another two hundred feet further.  It was early evening now, but an indeterminate gray sky blurred time into dimness.

“Why do we halt” Aranarth’s voice was heavy with impatience.

“There are things you must know ‘ere we reach the top and advance towards His lair” Gandalf replied.  Behind Aranarth, his brother Arthed and son Arahael looked up, listening intently.

“Our arrival at the summit will not go unnoticed.  He is not so focused on the south that we may advance undetected.  One by one He will sense you, attempt to enter your minds and probe your intentions.”

He could see concern in their eyes.

“But you are not the fodder he recruits from the East, nor hapless orcs bred for obedience to His will.  Though some say the line grows thin, the blood of Numenor still runs in your veins and your wills are strong even if the kingdoms of men are less so.  Think of those you love and protect, put their faces before you and He will find harsh purchase in your minds.”

“And what defense will He have to greet us?” Aranarth’s dour face looked up at Gandalf

“In truth I cannot say for certain.  Atop Dol Guldur He feels strong, confident.  Yet His strength is not yet near what it was in Ages past.  That is our advantage.  He has committed all that he has to the capture of the Steward and in any event would not deign to have others in his presence except to take orders and be gone.  But even if He is alone, his energy drawn to the battle he desires, do not let down your guard.  Before the first Elves walked under the stars he had already been long in the embrace of darkness.  He was old when Men came out of the east to witness the War of the Valar and the sundering of Beleriand.  Even if His strength is limited, His knowledge is vast.”

Standing above the wizard, Haldir suddenly stiffened, cocking his head, listening to something he alone could discern.  Arahael caught the change in the elf.

“What is it, Haldir?”

The elf put up his hand, begging silence.  A moment passed.  Then he pointed down and to the right of their position, perched on the upper side of the mountain.  Arahael saw nothing at first, just the empty sea of black and gray treetops rolling away in all directions.  But then something caught his eye, an intrusion of color, a dusky brown stream emerging from the lower reaches of the north side of the mountain, flying between them and the forest canopy far below.

“He has released the bats!” Gandalf’s voice rose with excitement.  He looked up to the sky as if seeking some confirming signal.  “Haldir! Look up! Do you see anything…there, just to the north and west.”

The golden haired elf scanned the grey sky.  Seconds passed.  Nothing, then a smile crossed his face and he gestured upward.  “Look, hovering just under the clouds…there” he pointed.

A tiny dot of movement, barely visible, descended from the high overcast.  Haldir turned to the west.  “Look…others have seen his signal”

Their eyes strained to pick out what his immortal sight had spied.  Arahael thought he saw faint dots coming down from the layer of cloud, falling towards the treetops at least some leagues to the west.  He could not be sure.

“It has begun then.” Gandalf intoned seriously.  “Now we must hope that the allies Radagast has recruited will take to their task.  Haldir…let us make way to the top.  Our time has come.”

------------------------------------------------------**-----------------------------------------------

Apodidie could sense the growing restlessness in the flock.  The swifts had arrived yesterday afternoon in the full blaze of early summer sun under a soft blue sky.  That had  been the last of their comfort.

Gingerly alighting in the upper reaches of the forest, they had spent an uneasy night.  Though it had been amply forewarned to them, their instincts still recoiled from the scents and sounds of Mirkwood so close to Dol Guldur.  She wondered how the raptors had fared, though felt their fierce natures would blind them to the more subtle sensations that her swifts detected.

She still felt strong.  Lorien’s elven provender had seen to that.  It would be another day before hunger gnawed and by then they would be back across the Great River for another meal.  That assumed all went well.  Deep inside her there were growing doubts.  She strove to dismiss them, feeling that it was her own empathy with the anxiety of her flock, seeking respite from the oppressive environs of the woods.  Perhaps it was something subtler, some ingredient in the feast they had enjoyed across the river, a calming nutrient that was now fading just in time for them to embark on their task.

And that task would have to come soon.  Apodidie cast a glance at the sky.  There were perhaps two or three hours of light left.  It would take them just over an hour to quit the forest and cross the river.  If the signal did not come soon she would have little choice as they would leave without her, unable to tolerate another night in the forest.

Then something caught her eye in the formless gray overcast as she judged the daylight.  Something she had been waiting for all day.  At first just a small black dot against the background, one towards her and others to what she knew must be the flocks of raptors not far away.

Moments later Aquilar himself descended in a flurry of great beating wings, his mighty talons clutching a mottled branch, golden eyes blazing with excitement.  The golden eagle and the queen of the swifts spoke in a language of sound and gesture that was hidden to those who walked the land.

“They take to the air…it is time for your flight” It was a command but there was warmth in the glow of his eyes.  Courage was born within him, but he knew that she and her flocks were not bred for battle or risk to life and wing.  All the more he and the raptors respected their contribution in such circumstances.

She knew the plan.  They would fly south, then southwest, the bearing already communicated by Aquilar.  In less than an hour they would reach the southern edge of the forest to execute their part of the plan of deception.  The eagles would follow soon after. 

“Fair skies and full nests, Aquilar…may your hunting always prosper…we will look for you when the day is done.”  Apodidie cocked her head for a moment, gave a glance from her deep black eyes, then launched off her perch, wings beating rapidly as she sought out her lieutenants to strike the flocks in motion.

The warmth faded from the great eagle’s eyes.  His thoughts moved quickly to time and distance, pursuit and prey.  Not far away his chief fighters were passing orders to the leaders of the goshawks, kestrels, kites, red-tailed hawks, small owls, starlings and sharp hawks.  The conversations were blunt and clear as befit hunters of the skies.  Now it was time for he and his three hundred to group and make their way south where much different land based large prey beckoned.  In this case not for the food, but for the killing. 

-----------------------------------------*****-------------------------------------------------------

He knew the terrain well.  The undulating forest canopy, featureless to the eye, was a meticulously etched pattern to the echoes of his soundings and those of his vampire bat species.  Not that he was unable to see the land below.  The Master had bred more into him and his clans over time, increasing strength, endurance, the ability to lengthen the time between feedings, but most importantly enhancing vision to lessen their dependency on their one instinctive sense of echo sounding. 

They had been hungry this day nonetheless.  The usual feeding on the hapless beasts tendered for their satiating had not occurred.  The day had drawn on and the remorseless need for blood had grown, starting in their bellies, filling out their veins and blotting all else from their small minds.  Then the jolt of His presence late in the day, a flash vision of men and horses, reminders of their last glorious meal in the wild when the son of the Steward and his cavalry had been their victims. 

Chirox felt the same surge as the rest of the thousands of bats he commanded.  They had poured out of the cavern, through the small triangular opening above the newly fallen exit gate, past the last of the bellowing beasts dumbly enjoying freedom from their cages. 

He preferred the dark, but knew they could tolerate the gray skies of this early evening, particularly with the blood reward that lay ahead.  They would initially swing to the west, then head south, hugging the treetops, the line of flight imprinted by His command.  There would be no deviation, no deterrence from their destination.

--------------------------------------------****-----------------------------------------------------

Sturnus glared at his flock leaders, commanding their attention.  He knew it was against their normal instinct.  Not a hierarchical breed, the starlings had chafed at this journey and the order it had enforced upon them.  They would soon be gone after its completion, happy as he would be to return to the gregarious open gatherings after breeding season.  But they had made their pact with Radagast and he would see that they stood true to it. 

“The bats will cross our position in the time it takes to pluck a crawler from the field.  Go to your flocks.  Send them up now.  Head south with speed then west, ahead of their line.  Then bend them west, then northwest then north, finally closing the loop around.  They will try to escape, flying higher.  The raptors will join us to halt that.  Close the gap below, let the hawks and others do their work.  Then we leave, cross the Great River and return home.”

It was all trill, whistles, clatter and twitter, but there was little doubt amongst the flock leaders who flew off to pass it on to the thousands who filled the upper reaches of the forest to the southwest of Dol Guldur.    The last of the bats had exited west out of Dol Guldor's entrance, about to make their turn south towards Mardil and his cavalry.  The starlings now rose en masse from the treetops, gathered strength and speed, a great low cloud moving faster and faster to the south, preparing to cut off the bats. 

At their lead, Sturnus cocked his head to the right.  Off to the northwest he could see the lead elements of the bats, wings beating rapidly, perhaps half a league away, making their turn to the south.  He banked to the west now, adding speed, increasing altitude, the dark swarm of the starling flocks behind him. Spreading out now, they formed a dense feathered curtain, its bottom skirting the treetops, the top extending upwards a thousand feet, heading due west walling directly across the intended path of their adversary.

-----------------------------------------------****---------------------------------------------------

Chirox felt something returning at the outer edge of his echo range, something unfamiliar.  There were no cliffs, no mountains here he knew.  His vision, limited as it was, detected a cloud ahead.  His soundings confirmed cloud, but one unlike he had ever known, one with small gaps of air amidst solid clumps of matter, matter in motion.  Whatever its progeny it was in their way.  They would detour west around it then make to their original course south. 

He had over five thousand bats in number.  Chirox rose in height, leaving a larger gap than usual between their count and the tops of the trees.  An inconvenience, but a momentary detour to their carnivorous destination.

Only the echoes coming back were not reassuring.  The cloud, whatever its form, was heightening, curling to the northwest, forcing him higher and farther away from His directive to the south.  The echoes suggested further height and so he flew, but now angling away, bounded by the wall of the dense cloud, still off to now what was west north west .  

-------------------------------------------------****-----------------------------------------------

It was their turn now.  Striator led his red and white breasted Sharp Hawks from the disagreeable perches they had tolerated in Mirkwood, up into a cloud roofed sky.  The starlings were to their right, curving northwest in a great feathered wall.  Striator drove his wings and made his way upward to a thousand feet above the forest canopy.  There he merged his flock of two thousand with the upper reaches of the starlings.  He could see the bats now, perhaps half a league away, rising higher, slightly confused, seeking still to overtop the barrier in front of them.

Not far behind Stiator was Falcoverus with his tawny breasted Kestrels, all eager to prove their prowess in this special pursuit.  Quickly they rose, blending their rufous wings with the upper reaches of the Sharp Hawks as the entourage bent northwest, forcing the bats higher and further from their goal.

Next the Kites soared beating hard with their brown wings and grey bodies to meet the limit of the Kestrils, extending the regime of the raptors up to three thousand feet.  The great wall of avian defense now curved true north, the top fliers of which looked down on the five thousand of His bats swerving and banking once again.

----------------------------------------------****------------------------------------------------------

It was not going well for the bats.  They were flying north now, and well above the forest.  Every move Chirox made to angle away from the barrier was met with a counter move as it seemed to curl inexorably west, northwest, north, and now northeast.  Even his attempts to gain height and overtop it were defeated as it expanded upward, matching his moves.

Chirox sent out more echoes as he banked to the northeast.  Whatever it was that blocked their path had virtually surrounded them, its leading edge about to close with its back end, forming a vast rotating cylindrical jail in the air. 

Now he was sensing returns from above.  The open hole of sky overhead was filling in, capping over with the great wings of the redhawks and goshawks.   Even with his small bat brain he could sense a trap, feel the confinement.  And the noose was tightening even as he and his flock circled, flapping uncertainly in their column of air bounded by the swirling starlings and raptors. 

They had less than half a league of air space and it was narrowing quickly.  Below, the familiar echo returns of the forest canopy had blurred and disappeared, replaced by a deep layer of milling starlings, rising up, filling the bottom of the shrinking cylinder of air they occupied.

Though attuned for sounds far beyond the register of most inhabitants of Middle Earth, his ears could still detect much that coursed the air.  And now they picked up the cries of the raptors, the kik..kik calls of the Sharp Hawks and the kee..kee..kee of the Kestrils and Kites.  Though he and his minions were the result of His careful breeding, they had not lost their ancestral senses entirely. 

A rill of fear shuddered through his small hairy body.  Flashes of instinctual memory fashioned visions of sharp beaks and iron-gripped talons.  There would be blood spilt today, but it would not be the sweet red nectar of equine flanks and underbellies.  No, it would be the veins of his flock that would rain crimson in the skies over Mirkwood, torn asunder by the cold-eyed hunters now rapidly closing in on them.

The raptors were now picking out their individual targets.  They were that close now.  Their blood was up.  The practice at Rhosgobel, the long journey south, feeding on grains and elven fare, spending the night in the noisome embrace of Mirkwood’s southern fastness.  Their instincts pulled hard at them for the promise of the blood sport of the hunt, of prey and killing.  Now the promise was before them, flapping helplessly. 

Overall, the numbers were nearly even, raptors to bats, but the bats would be no match for the hawks, kites, and kestrels.  There would be a few minutes of frenzied flight, cries and impacts, the rush of feathers and leathery wings.   Then a few stragglers might escape somehow, flying low, descending through the upper branches of the high trees, making back for Dol Guldur.  But the Small Owls would be waiting, unmoved by darkness, seeing all and cleaning up the last of His blood drinking creatures.

The first strikes were being made.  The swarm of bats, were now in a long sinuous vertical thread fluttering anxiously, on the brink of imminent decimation.  Chirox sent out a last series of echoes.  There was little choice.  It might be death either way, but at least this offered a chance, however slim.  He sent out a call, one only his flock could detect, then wheeled around and began a flight directly down towards the earth at the highest speed he could muster.  Behind him the others followed.  But they had company, as the raptors had finally closed in.

Now it was a game of attrition.  Chirox and his best fliers descending at increasing speed, making directly for the deep swarm of starlings that blocked the exit of the trap below.  From either side the hawks, kites, and kestrels were taking their targets, seizing them in sharp talons, mid-flight.   Tearing into their vulnerable bodies with razor sharp bony beaks, they gulped chunks of flesh down their voracious gullets, then coldly dropped the lifeless, bloody corpses of the bats towards the ground in search of fresh prey.

The numbers were dwindling.  Where there were once five thousand, there were now four, three.  But Chirox had built up speed, letting gravity and the desperation of the situation drive him and those in his flock strong enough to follow.  The starlings were now just yards away.  Perhaps he and many others would die, crashing into the dense throng of birds.  But some might dodge through, deftly using their echo location sense to weave and bob.  Others who perished might open holes in the blockade wide enough to allow more the possibility of escape. 

And escape did not mean Dol Guldur.  They had gone too long without a blood meal.  Those who broke free would head south, for the horses, and the men.  There would be no welcome at His abode for failure. 

--------------------------------------------------------****---------------------------------------------

The last Stair snicked back into the rock behind them.  They had reached the top of Dol Guldor.  No tree grew atop its crown, and precious little grass, mostly ragged greasy looking strands, mottled black and gray, hugging tenaciously in little hollows.  Aside from the sparse vegetation there was little save barren rock the color of ash and dried bone. 

The summit rose gently at the edge where they stood to a modest height at the center.  But their eyes were drawn to a structure at that hulked atop this rise.  It was in the shape of a wide, squat dome, its roof supported by great curved black beams, each of which sported a row of twisted hook-like protrusions that seemed to tear at the sky.  Between the points where the massive barbed joists met the rocky floor there were wide arches at least thrice the height of a tall man.  At the pinnacle of the dome the vault was open to the sky.  Beneath this opening, through the arches over three hundred yards away, they could see a pulsing red glow at the heart of the structure.

Gandalf could see the concern in their eyes, the sobering reality of His imminent presence upon them.  He motioned them closer, his voice hushed.

“Any moment now He will reach out, sensing our arrival.  Remember what I have told you.  Be strong.” 

Gandalf tugged lightly at his peaked hat, as if to secure it against a coming gale.  His eyes scanned his companions, all somber, yet quietly confident, bound by a shared goal.  Iluvatar’s Children, he thought to himself, pressed since birth by larger, darker forces that wax and wane in vast cycles of time.  Again they wax and again the young must learn, must be taught.  Gandalf sighed and with a rueful smile he turned and made his way, staff in hand, up the shallow rocky slope towards the Lair of the Necromancer.

Not seconds later they all felt it, like the first gust of wind before a summer storm.  At first just a tingle in the mind, a light dancing on the surface of thought.  But then bolder, a more forceful riffling through memory and soul.  It was not unlike a thief with sullied hands, quickly rummaging through one’s belongings, tossing them awry, leaving a foul scent and streaks of grime. 

But they heeded Gandalf’s words.  Aranarth focused on his long dead father, Arthed on the family that waited his return, Arahael on his young expectant wife, and Haldir on the Lady of the Wood who he served.  Suddenly the intrusion was over, ended with the sound of an evil laughter echoing as if from a distance, mocking, derisive.

But it continued on for one. 

“Olorin……”  It was barely a whisper, an ancient sigh on the wind entering his mind.

“I am known by that name in other lands…” Gandalf responded in thought.

“It is long since we have spoken…little Olorin” the voice was slightly raspy, almost sibilant, probing, mocking.

“More than five Ages, Sauron…it is long you have been absent from the Undying Lands” Gandalf replied evenly

“Absent….?  No little one, I think not…that is your world, not mine.”

“You are still Maia, Sauron.  There is still time to answer Eonwe’s call to return.” Gandalf replied amiably, knowing it would provoke Him.

 “And spend yet how many Ages in thrall? Do not think me a fool!” the voice was briefly harsh, angry.  But then it subsided, softening.

“The Halls of Mandos ill suit me Olorin.  Melkor had no good tidings of the three Ages of his confinement.”

“You need not repeat his mistakes.”

“It is you who err, Olorin.  But what could you know, little one…what could you possibly know, always the wanderer, the seeker, with aught to show for your journeys.  While you sat adoringly beside Manwe I learned the secrets of forge and element from Aule, the Smith.  As you waited at the foot of Nienna, learning her tiresome lessons of pity I wrought the fastness of Utumno with Melkor, a true Vala.  For three Ages while you wandered under the stars guised I lay low and rebuilt Angband after Melkor fell.”

“Too what end, Sauron.   Utumno is weathered rubble.  Angband destroyed.  Barad’dur vacant.”

“Fool! These are mortal lands, in spite of the few Elves that still cling on to their ways.  What care I for these trifling setbacks.  Time has no meaning.  And there are none to contest me.”

“I contest you, Sauron…and there are those of men who will stand fast”

“That rabble with you?”  Gandalf’s head was abruptly filled with laughter, cruel, disdainful.  “Oh I can smell the scent of Numenorean blood on them well enough, little one, though it is weak and pale.  This is the army that Valinor sends? Little Olorin, his vagabond Dunedain and a stray elf?”  the laughter resumed echoing louder.

“Laugh as you will, Sauron.  Much of your power is riven from you, uselessly confined to your Ring, now gone from all ken these two thousand years.”

“There is more than enough left, Olorin and my power grows.  The Ring still abides…I can feel it though it lies distant and ill disposed to discovery.  It will be mine again and this mortal world will tremble ‘neath my foot.  But today I must settle for lesser gain…the Steward of Gondor in chains, his cavalry slaughtered and eaten down to the last horse.  Come, join me, watch it unfold.  You are strong.  You would be stronger yet at my side.”

Gandalf and the others were now approaching one of the great arched openings in Sauron’s mountaintop lair.  It was now that they noticed the stonework around the curve of the opening.  Blocks of black granite, each with a face, astonishingly lifelike, carved upon it.  Not in triumph or celebration, but fixed in fear, agony, or writhing torment, faces of men, elves, even dwarves who had the bad fortune to meet their death at His hands.  Gandalf paused for a moment, sparing a look back at his companions in the fading gray light of early evening.

Haldir’s noble face revealed little other than quiet concentration framed by long golden hair.  Aranarth’s heavy broadsword was already drawn, his iron grey hair unbound, a deep scowl on his face.  Beside him, tall Arthed’s lean, lantern jawed countenance was absent its usual wolfish grin, the wry humor gone from his eyes.  A gleam of metal revealed the long steel handle and sleek scimitar edge of his battle axe swinging gently in his right hand. 

Lastly there was Arahael.  Despite his more than forty years he was still young by the standard of his line, and younger still if his meager battle experience was accounted.  But there was no fear in his face.  Under his high brow and mane of light auburn brown hair his gray-blue eyes were lit with excitement.  A bright sheen of pale blue steel glimmered on a sword not yet tested held by a man waiting to prove himself. 

But there was an answer waiting in the air.  Gandalf turned back to the looming arch, casting his gaze inside, under the shadows of the high dome where the figure of a wolf now waited, large even at over a hundred yards distant. He framed a reply to Sauron’s offer.

“It is true as you say.  I am strong, Sauron, but strong enough to know there is no lasting power in death, fear, enslavement, and corruption.   It is not for me to stand by you, but to cast you out.”

“Then try if you dare, little one, so unused to conflict.  Try while I choke the life out of the Steward’s men just to the south.  Try while I rend your ragged companions limb from limb and mount their torn faces over my doors.  Try while my army marches back, and you join those so unfortunate to have survived my wolves, bats, and infantry.  Or go back while you can, to your pathetic brother to the north with his birds and trees…”

Something hardened in Gandalf’s face, his eyes shone hard and bright.  He drew his sword, long, sleek and silver steeled and spoke out loud now to his companions.

“The time is nigh.  His spirit resides in the body of a great wolf he has bread and fears not our swords.  To our south He expects victory and another weakening of the will of men.  That outcome is in the hands…and wings…of others.  Our task is to drive Him from this place, to slay the beast whilst He inhabits it.  Then such power as I may summon will be brought to bear upon Him ‘ere His spirit can freely escape.”

“But He will not die”   

“No, Aranarth.  But He will be stretched thin, sending His will to his minions on the battlefield, reserving strength to dwell in His great hound and parry our blows.  He will see the defeat of His forces and feel fear.  Then He will share in the pain and death of His host.  He will leave its body and flee, adjuring any further pain.”

“You cannot destroy Him if so weakened?”

“No Arahael…such doom is not in my power.  We can only hope such injury as is done will dissuade Him from return…how long I cannot say, but one hopes that the lives of your children and theirs may be granted some relief, some peace for a time.”

“Five against a wolf, however large…we should prevail.  But what of guards He may have to contest us?”  Haldir queried.

“My dear Marchwarden, that is why I have you and the Dunedain with me.  Otherwise this humble wizard’s staff and my own sharp blade would be more than enough to dispatch Him.”  Gandalf smiled briefly and there was a twinkle in his eye.  Then he turned and made his way through the arch and into the great domed space where Sauron awaited them.    

--------------------------------------------------****--------------------------------------------------

The landscape was familiar again, returning echoes of the darkly wooded uplands at the southern extreme of the forest.  But Chirox was late now and the residue of His commands screamed at him to hurry.  Pain also cried out, leathery wings torn by savage talons, bodies scored with gouges and rents.  The air below them rained a fine mist of their own blood as they made way to the south, barely fifteen hundred survivors now out of over five thousand.

And it was blood they sought.  Starved for two days, they now had to feed soon or fall from the sky.  Chirox felt the same desperation as the remnants of his once mighty flock.  And that desperation, above the power of His commands or the panicky fear of avian pursuit, squeezed the last full measure of speed from their pinions.  They might arrive near dead, but a few seconds greedily drunk on the blood of a horses side would be like a magic elixir reviving them almost instantly back to life.  And so they flew, like the maddened creatures they were, covering ground at speeds they would not normally imagine.

Some leagues behind them blood was also playing a part.  The entrapment of the raptors had led to hunting and slaughter as would be recounted among the flocks for many nestings.  But in the frenzy they had focused on the close kills and not on Chirox’s suicidal escape through the dense wall of starlings below.   They had trained for the one task and now it was done.  The hawks and kestrels were in the trees below savoring the last morsels of broken bats in their talons, unaware of the escaping remnants.  The starlings were already heading west, eager to be done with Mirkwood, their part of the plan completed. 

Chirox sent out more echoes and his heart pounded all the more.  Just five leagues to the edge of the forest now, five leagues until the screaming ache in his body would be sated with a gush of red warmth.  But now he detected something in the return, something new, somewhat hazy at first, like a streamer of fog, now becoming clearer as they approached.  It was another group of birds!  He quickly gained altitude and pushed even harder.  They had to slip over this flock as much as possible.  There was no strength for another battle.

He chirped out a few short signals and they swept up, up, two hundred, three hundred feet, then leveled off pumping away at the air, their hearts almost bursting.

                                                --------*********----------

Apodidie sensed that it would not be long now.  They had been flying at a steady pace to the south, leaving behind the savage battle in the skies that was alien to their peaceful nature.   Thus their role simply as a ruse, their short rapid wing motions so similar to that of bats that they could momentarily fool the unwary eye, particularly as dusk approached.  That they were willing to do, leaving the killing to those who were born to it.

But now something in the flock was moving forward, a swell of concern voiced by those further back.  Then the sound of wings flapping, not just those behind her but something above, something that dimmed the light.  She glanced up, startled at the leathery silhouettes in large numbers against the gray sky above.  They were moving quickly,  outpacing her swifts, but heading on the same line, due south towards the southern edge of the forest.

Apodidie swept up and quickly banked left and right, her eyes taking in more of the air.  They were bats! And they were alone…none of the hawks or kestrels were anywhere to be seen in pursuit.  And she and her flock were alone as well. 

Long were the hours she had spent in the sanctuary of Rhosgobel.  She and the Brown One had from the start developed a special chemistry, a relationship that both startled and pleased them both.  She had volunteered much of the ways of birds and he had passed on wisdom from across the Great Sea, telling her of the origins of her kind, and the ways of plants and animals.

She had shared much of what she learned from Radagast with her flock leaders.  And now the departing bats overhead were not just a distraction.  She knew they spelt potential disaster to the intricate plan and a threat to her own numbers should they still make their rendezvous to the south.  There was little time.  She flew up higher, poised in mid-air, wings beating, summoning her ten lieutenants.  They departed their squadrons, leaving behind orders to circle in place for the while.

Apodidie met the concern and astonishment in their eyes as they approached, the tail end of the bat swarm not half a league distant.  Though her twittering would have been meaningless to men, her message was deadly clear to her kind.

“They must be stopped or all may be lost!” she cried out to her subordinates.

“But how?” they replied.  “Our beaks do not cut flesh, our feet have no talons”

“But our wings have speed and our bodies carry weight” Apodidie’s voice was insistent, implacable.  Suddenly they knew what she planned.

“It is the only way…but I do not command it.  Only those who volunteer.  The rest may do as they will…follow us should we succeed or fly west to safety.”   

There was much chattering, with groups of three and four darting about in debate.  After less than a minute, Aerona, her second in command returned with the other nine.

“We will all fly with you…the others will decide on their own”

“Hurry then…we have much ground to cover and little time”

They darted off to their flocks.  Apodidie could see each of the small swarms circling, could hear the chatter of her subjects, their fears, questions, doubts.  But not long after, the individual flocks formed up into a large circling throng.  Aerona darted over.

“All have volunteered, Apodidae…we await your command”

“Have the ranks follow me in the usual order, save yours which will take up the rear”

Aerona was about to protest, hers being the usual lead squadron, but Apodidie cut her off with a sharp chatter.

“Many may fall this day, Aerona, most of all those of us in the vanguard of the attack.  Those who live may need a new leader who must still carry out the mission of deception with what numbers may remain.  I cannot afford the sacrifice of your life lest it be the last we have to give."

Apodidie did not suffer a reply, and darted off towards the swarm, circling slowly over the forest.  Aerona sped off, close on her tail.  Through twitterings and subtle wing signals they mustered their numbers into shape.  Led by Apodidie, a long stream of swifts angled up to the sky at increasing speed, rapidly gaining altitude while maintaining a bearing due south towards the bats, now easily a league away.

Two leagues to the northwest of the ascending swifts, Aquilar had marshaled his three hundred golden eagles, descending majestically out of the clouds like the great aerial lords they were, making for the southern edge of the forest.   His talons twitched in anticipation of the ferocious attack on the wolves where he and his numbers were to be given free rein.  But it was his eyes that suddenly took over, amber orbs that could discern the twitch of a mouse’s tail from two leagues in the sky.  What they now saw puzzled him. 

He knew the plan and so could not fathom why the swifts had become separated into two groups.  One was obviously making direct for the forest’s southern edge, hugging the treetops, while the other lagged behind, but was closing the gap while climbing higher and higher into the sky, following the same bearing.   His razor sharp glare bored into the distance, picking, defining, separating. 

The air was split with a loud angry keya! cry as Aquilar realized that some of the bats had escaped, while he and his brothers had gathered their numbers in regal procession well away from what was to have been a foolproof trap.  But he saw more.  The ascending swifts were beginning to flatten their climb.  At their lead was a familiar form, her pattern of black, gray and white strikingly individual to him. 

The cold workings of his avian brain normally spared little sentiment.  There was life, death, the hunt, breeding and the wind.  But there was something special about the little bird that had penetrated this harsh exterior.  Something about her courage to make this journey to start, the way her flocks responded to her, her unselfishness.  He looked upon her as he might one of his new hatchlings, with a fierce protectiveness that went deep into the roots of instinct.  And now she was preparing to sacrifice her own life and the lives of others.  That much was clear from the pattern of their flight as she and the lead elements passed the apogee of their high arc.

Aquilar let out another cry, this time an order, a command.  Chrysaetos, his second, came to his side.

“Yes Lord”

“The plan has failed Chrysaetos.  Bats escape and the swifts prepare to dive upon them to drive them from the sky.  Look, their arc has reached its top”

“They have not beak and claw to do so.”

“Their bodies and speed of flight are their only weapons.”

“The impact will kill them” Chysaetos replied summarily

“Not if we intervene”

“It is not our task, Lord” Chrysaetos was cold, unmoved.

“No Chysaetos, it is not.  And the swifts outnumber the bats three to one.  They will succeed though but a handful may live.  But I will not suffer them to die.”

“The wolves await us Lord” he replied with impatience.

“Then the wolves will wait longer! Heed my command and summon our brothers! We have speed to match and more.  Our bodies are great and strong.  We will sweep the bats from the sky like insects.  The swifts have courage, Chrysaetos and their own task on the battlefield.  Now follow me and dive as if the sky itself was falling upon you!”

With that the eagle Lord began his steep glide, cutting through the air faster and faster, picking up speed like a great boulder rolling down a mountainside.  Behind him the air whooshed with the passage of great wings. 

Just under a league to their southeast Apodidie was about to commence her own dive, having overtaken the bats, which she now spied two thousand feet below her, flapping furiously, driven by their desperate blood hunger.  She would aim for the very lead elements of the leathery throng, hoping to crash into their leader.  Behind her, the flock leaders would hurl their followers into the long line of bats that strung out for half a league over the treetops.  With luck they would succeed.  But too few might remain to preserve the ruse on the battlefield, fooling His troops with their size and batlike wing movements.

Aquilar was nearing maximum speed now, having fallen three thousand feet.  It was time to flatten out, taking the massive momentum built up in the vertiginous dive and harnessing it like a bowshot straight across the treetops.  The tendons strained in his wings, his chest muscles howled at him with the strain of carving out of the steep descent.  But they were closing fast now.  He glanced ahead.  The swifts were plummeting now, their speed increasing rapidly. 

He was cutting through the air like a great knife blade, such was the perfect line of his form.  But as fast as he streaked through the evening sky he could not add to his speed, only watch and hope that he and his three hundred would arrive ahead of the swifts. 

The seconds ticked by.  His eyes gauged the distances and speeds with remorseless precision.  They were closing fast on the stream of bats, aiming to strike them flat on the side, on an angle from the northwest.  But the swifts were closing faster from above, their little stout hearts following their leader who tore through the air at a speed to rival the great eagle himself.  Aquilar let out another keya!, this one a cry of frustration.  If only the swifts could see them coming in.  But it was not so.  The eagles were coming in from the northwest behind the swifts who were utterly focused forward on their leader and their sacrificial dive.

The eagles were coming up fast now, but it would not be enough.  They’d needed another ten, maybe fifteen seconds.  Ahead he could see the first of the swifts making contact, striking the leading bats in an explosion of feathers.  One, two, three hundred made strikes.  Then he and his eagles swept in like a great scythe cutting effortlessly through the sky.  One moment there was a long string of bats flapping frantically, about to be decimated by swifts hurtling from the skies.  A second later they were bludgeoned from the air by eight foot wings and powerfully muscled bodies.

Such was their passage that the air was rent and torn by roiling currents.  The descending swifts were tossed about like leaves on a stormy sea, their formations scattered and dispersed.  But they lived, most of them.

On the forest floor one other still lived.  It had taken him completely by surprise.  His echoes had been out in front and below, scanning the terrain ahead, preoccupied with the blood meal only minutes away.  Then the terrible blow, knocking him out of the sky, blotting out consciousness.  Dimly he remembered crashing through the high branches of the trees, caroming left and right, finally thudding to the forest floor. 

Pain now erased any dimness in Chirox.  His spine was snapped, the narrow bones in both wings shattered.  Any movement was agony.  He thought he could hear a muted, plaintive echo sounding from some distance away on the ground, but it subsided in a mewling cry.  But now there were other sounds, vague rustlings in the moldy leaves that stuck to his hairy body.  He craned his head a bit, straining to see with his limited vision.

Two red pinpoints of light met his gaze, peering out of a bulbous misshapen body the size of a small dog, but mobile with long black spiky legs.  There was a curious clicking and snapping sound as it approached.  Then movement, rapid movement.  He felt himself being tossed about, wrapped in some wet sticky substance. 

The movement was excruciating.  Then more pain as something short and sharp stabbed into his already fatally wounded body.  It was a blessing really, for now he felt all feeling slipping away, his extremities going numb, breathing slowing, consciousness fading into a dark milky haze.  He was barely aware of being carried off by the spider and would be dead by any other measure by the time his corpse reached the arachnid’s lair.

Another was near death just yards away from where he fell.  Though her heart still beat, her neck was broken.  She lay on her back, looking up at a small gap in the trees, a hole through which she could still see the sky, gray and darkening with evening’s onset.  Had they succeeded?  She did not know, though she was certain that her strike had been a fatal blow to the lead bat.  The sounds of the forest had come to her as well, the singular scratchings and shufflings of predators and scavengers seeking opportunity in the small bodies falling from the skies.  One was approaching from her left, only yards away.  She could not turn her head sufficiently to see the messenger of her death, though she hoped whatever it was would be quick and efficient.

Then the furtive rustlings stopped unexpectedly.  Above her there was a shadow, something filling the patch of sky above her.  It was moving, descending carefully on great wings, slowly braking its descent to avoid entanglement in the gnarled trees and hanging vines.  Her vision and consciousness were fading now, but she was still curious, wondering what creature this was to find its way to take her.  The leaves about her scattered with its arrival, its great wings pinioning as it settled to the ground.  Eyes of amber gold stared down at her, eyes at once fierce and angry but now softened with uncharacteristic grief.  Familiar eyes.

“Aquilar….” She let out a weak twitter.

“Yes little one.  Too late…too late” his keya was low and trembling.

“Did we…”

“The bats are dead, Apodidie…through your courage and the vengeful wings of my brothers”

“Aerona?”

“Wends her way south now as does my second, Chrysaetos.”

“Leave me then…you are needed with your hunters.”

“No little one” he leaned over with his resplendent golden head and tenderly nudged her feathers back into place with his great hooked beak.  “We have another journey, you and I” 

With that he gently closed one of his taloned feet about her shattered body and launched himself up, fluffing his massive wings adroitly, building height and ascending upwards through the opening in the branches out into the open skies above the forest.  Free of the forest’s obstructions he began to wheel about the sky, his broad feathered ailerons beating rhythmically.  Achieving his desired height he swung to the north, increasing speed. 

Below, safe in his grip, Apodidie felt the wind on her face as they sailed through the evening sky, skirting under the overhanging clouds.  Where he was headed and why she knew not, only that she felt safe now.  With that she let go of her hold on the present, its concerns and pains.  The little heart beat its last and her small bright spirit left its mortal bounds for the endless skies and warm roosts of another world.