Perilous Journeys. The Shadow over Rhudaur Part III

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On the Great Road east of the Last Bridge, November 5, 1347, after dark
Written by Gordis
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Gimilbeth felt cold fingers of fear grip her heart as the pandemonium spread. She fumbled for the hilt of the dagger that she knew should have been at her waist, but her shaking hands failed to find it. Then her bay stallion neighed and rose on its hind legs, lashing at someone with its front hooves. Gimilbeth fell forward onto the horse’s neck and gripped the thick black mane with both hands, trying to remain in the saddle. Someone screamed on her right – a high-pitched wail of death. There were hoarse orc voices all around, shouting in their guttural tongue. Then someone gripped the reins of her horse and pulled it down onto four legs. She turned and beat the attacker on the metal helmet with her bare hands, only to find Elvegil’s contorted face looking up at her. The knight was unhorsed and likely wounded as there was blood on his face.

“Oh, that’s you, Elvegil,” she sobbed in relief.

“Yes, my Lady,” Elvegil’s voice grated. “And Gwindor is there, on your other side. Stay mounted at all costs and we shall defend you until our last breath.”

Gimilbeth looked to her left. Gwindor was there all right, still mounted and slashing away at the blood-maddened orcs. “Rally to me, men of Rhudaur!” he cried. More horsemen appeared out of the darkness, forming a circle around Gimilbeth. One severely wounded guard, now unhorsed, stumbled into the circle carrying the banner.

But the orcs were everywhere. They were coming in waves, covered in their own black blood, mouths gaping in horrible war-cries, red tongues lolling. They paid dearly for their boldness, but their losses seemed to bother them little – new attackers immediately took the place of those slain. It seemed the orcs used long pikes with hooks to drag the horsemen down. Gimilbeth watched in horror as one guard after another were unsaddled, thrown to the ground and torn to pieces by the snarling multitude.

An ear-splitting death scream of a horse drew Gimilbeth’s attention back to her left. Gwindor was lying under his fallen mount, helpless like a beached fish, while a fat red-eyed orc was slashing at him with his scimitar, trying to find a gap in his armor.

“Help him, help Gwindor!” Gimilbeth cried. It seemed her voice drew attention of the other guards, as, despite their own plight, several figures rushed to the rescue. They killed the orc and managed to drag Gwindor to his feet when a new wave of assailants came upon them, led by a strong ugly orc, probably the leader of the others. His red eyes were ablaze and his white-and black painted face was like a mask of death. He pointed at Gimilbeth with a bloodied pike and yelled: “Dik shatraug!”

Gimilbeth sat frozen staring back at the approaching orc when a heavy object hit her knee. She glanced down and screamed. It proved to be Gwindor’s severed head that bounced on the road leaving a trail of red blood in its wake. She felt a wave of dizziness cloud her sight. Striving to remain conscious, she gripped the stallion’s neck and buried her face in the black mane.

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On the Great Road east of the Last Bridge, November 5, after dark
Written by Angmar
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Captain Ashuk could smell the fear that rolled out over the young Tark like waves. The young man was actually trembling. The private beside Ashuk thrust his pike forward, ramming the point into the screaming man's eye. There wasn't time for even a grunt of approval from Ashuk, for the jubilant orc's tongue lolled out of his mouth as the sword wielded by another Tark sliced through his throat. Ashuk slammed his mace over the Tark's head, rending the helmet, cutting through metal, and digging out a trough of blood, skull shards, and brains.

As the man fell, the orc beside him speared him through the intestines with his pike. Another Tark went down in his turn, a look of complete disbelief upon his face as the pike point went through his mouth and came out the other side of his head. Slashing and thrusting, the troop beat its away forward, drawing closer and closer to their objective - the Princess. Gurgling bloody foam, another Tark went down to Ashuk's left.

The way ahead was clearer now, and with another savage battle cry, Ashuk led his troop forward, slashing through the last resistance. He could hear the terrified Princess screaming, "Help Gwindor!" They would help him, Ashuk thought maliciously - they would help him right to the next world! She was not far ahead of him now and more of the lads were coming up on the double.

"Az ta! Az Tark!" Ashuk bellowed, pointing to a man trapped beneath his horse. He heard the sound of steel connecting with flesh, and he smiled as he ran forward. There she was, right in front of him, the witch Gimilbeth, his purpose for being there! He would be the one to claim the credit for capturing her! He would get the glory! No one else!

"Dik shatraug!" He pointed to her with the pike drenched red in Tark blood. He could smell the fear on her, just like all the rest. Even royalty know fear, he thought with satisfaction. The haughty princess was afraid of him and all his lads with their fierce expressions and battle paint. She would learn to fear him even more!

"What a shame that no one will ever get to enjoy her except His Majesty. Curse the lot of the common soldier!" Ashuk thought regretfully. He saw her face and read soul-wrenching terror on those proud, arrogant features. Then she gripped her horse's neck and buried her lovely face in its mane. The Princess was cringing. Ashuk felt like bellowing out his elation.

"Princess Gimilbeth," he called out her name in Common Speech, "hear my name! I am Captain Ashuk! You will remember that name as long as you live!" Then motioning towards her with his pike once again, he barked out the order.

"Dik shatraug!"

And with a howl that would curdle the blood of the bravest man, a mass of orcs rushed towards her horse.

***

"Az ta! Az Tark!" "Kill him! Kill the Tark!" "Dik shatraug!" - "Capture the witch!"

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On the Great Road east of the Last Bridge, November 5, after dark
Written by Gordis
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Gimilbeth felt dizzy and her head swam. There were clash of metal on metal, curses and terrible cries all around her. Elvegil and the last of the guards fought desperately at her side; both were sorely wounded and leaned heavily on the flanks of her horse. The guard staggered forward a few paces to ward away three approaching orcs. He didn't come back, disappearing in the pile of bodies around the princess.

The orc leader bore down on Gimilbeth. "Flee now, my Lady!" Elvegil cried, moments before the orc drove his pike into his stomach. With the last remaining strength the knight beat Gimilbeth's stallion across the rump with the flat of his sword and collapsed on the ground spewing blood.

Maddened by pain and fear, the bay stallion sprang forward biting and lashing out with its front hooves, but the orc leader gripped Gimilbeth's trailing skirts and yanked her down. She felt the seams at her waist give way, the skirts being ripped from the bodice. At this moment her hand found the ivory hilt of her dagger. Without thinking, she bared the small weapon and, swift as a snake, lashed out at the sneering muzzle of the orc who held her skirts. She aimed for his left eye, but the brute managed to jerk his head away in the very last moment and the dagger ripped his cheek open, baring the hideous yellow fangs.

"Bitch!" the orc yelled. "You will pay for it!" Black blood dripped from his chin, but he held Gimilbeth fast. The bay stallion made another mad rush for freedom and the orcs parted like the sea before the beast's onslaught. The bay managed to fight his way out of the circle of orcs but he was already riderless. As for the princess, she was lying in a heap atop the wounded orc, her heavy damp skirts spread around her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~On the Great Road east of the Last Bridge, November 5, after dark
Written by Angmar
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Captain Ashuk could see the fear in the witch's eyes as she lay sprawled atop him. She would pay for her boldness in stabbing him with her silly little knife! He grabbed her wrist, twisting it viciously and shaking her hand until the dagger slid between her fingers, and enjoyed seeing the agony written in her features. He leered up at her as she grimaced and groaned in pain. Digging his fingers deeply into her hair, the tips of his claws skimming her scalp, he pulled her face down to his. Ashuk kissed her roughly, watching the disgust and terror in her eyes as his loathsome tongue probed between her teeth. Gimilbeth was nauseated at the foul taste of his mouth and felt as though she might retch if the kiss continued.

"You like this, don't you, wench?" he snarled into her ear. "Not so proud anymore, are you?"

Grunting, he kept kissing her, his leathery lips smearing drool over her face and mouth. The orc's bloody cheek oozed onto her skin and his giant paw searched over most of her body, groping her painfully with his talons. Then with a growl and a last painful tweak to her backside, he threw the princess aside. Rising to his feet, he picked up her dagger and thrust it into his belt. With a lecherous sneer on his face, he glanced at her once again.

"Princess Gimilbeth, if you weren't considered prime meat, I'd carve that pretty face of yours with your own dagger. Then, I would be oh-so-careful as I started cutting just under the skin and decorating your flesh with the marks of my clan. If you cried too much and didn't admire my handiwork like I thought you should, I might just cut your nose off to boot! You wouldn't be so pretty then!" Enraged at the wound in his cheek, Captain Ashuk glared down at the woman, his mouth twisting up in a snarl while he cursed her in a language harsh and guttural.

He turned away from her and started barking out orders in Black Speech. There had been a lull in the fighting at this end of the column. In places, the bodies of both man and orc were lying atop each other, the wounded and the living tangled in masses of bodies. Down the road the sounds of the skirmish still raged hot, but at this end, things were relatively quiet, the moans of the injured mingling with a few cheers from the jubilant orcs.

While the rain drizzled down in the darkness, the captain gave the orders for the return home. All those Dunedain at the front of the Princess' entourage were either dead or dying. The captain took the initiative in decapitating one young soldier and turned the rest of the killing party over to his lads.

"All right, men, there is little time to spare. We are all committed to getting the Rhudarian Princess back north, or die in the trying. I am naming Sergeant Ushdurz of the First Company as head of the rear guard. They have the honor of defending our retreat when we leave out of here." As those orders sank in, he turned to a gangling, long-armed orc, who had a cunning, vicious look in his eye. "Corporal Tharb, you are to head up the troop of ten responsible for guarding the Rhudarian princess on the return home. Tie her up, assign a couple men to carry her, and get going now! We will be right behind you as soon as we finish up here!"

"Aye, sir." Corporal Tharb licked his lips and motioned to another orc to help him. Together, they wrestled the struggling, biting, kicking and scratching princess down and bound her ankles and tied her wrists behind her back. Throwing the shrieking, squirming Princess over his shoulder, Tharb gave her bottom a mighty pinch and set off at a sprint at the head of his troop.

"Form on me!' Ashuk shouted as he lifted his pike high. The war horns were just sounding for another charge, when on the ridge to the east, a flare arched upward into the heavens. Captain Ashuk cursed. The flare meant two things: a party of the enemy was heading this way and Saakaf and the group of scouts would be moving towards the trysting place! Curse the luck! Ashuk thought. The knowledge that they might soon be fallen upon by a group of cavalry spread like wildfire among the soldiers. Ashuk scowled. They had been so close to complete victory!

The captain growled out a command which was passed all down the road - "Withdraw in an orderly fashion! If any of you maggots run, I'll hunt you down, and when I find you, I'll have you staked out spread-eagled and rip out your bowels! Now, steady, steady! Fall back! Fall back!"

The war horns blared out again, this time the call for retreat. Now there would be little time to take prisoners or collect booty. However, Captain Ashuk still had much for which he could be proud. They had kidnapped the princess, and there was still the opportunity to take prisoners and booty before the cavalrymen charge onto the scene. They would soon be safe up in the wooded cliffs to the north! Try as they might, no horseman could ever reach them there.

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On the Great Road further east of the site of the ambush, November 5, after dusk
Written by Valandil
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Merendil's men had been riding hard - for a day, a night and another day, with very little rest. They had reached Brochenridge a few hours before dawn, just as the moon was going down the night before and had taken a few hours sleep there, only to get right back on the trail before sunrise.

Alarmed at the report of the large Orc band, and the possible danger to the King's daughter, Count Ormendur of Brochenridge had rounded up 30 more of his men to send forth. With the time it took them to make preparations, they had left only a short while before Merendil's 50, but being fresher - might be a good deal ahead. Brochenridge didn't have enough horses left for all Merendil's men, so their own mounts had to ride on with what rest the men had.

So far there had been no signs of trouble. There was very little sign of other movement on the road - tracks probably from Gimilbeth's party, from the 30 men sent ahead, and from some other party as well, but they had seen no other travelers all day.

Merendil hoped that he would be wrong about the Orcs - that they might catch up to Gimilbeth's party, traveling along in safety, and all share a good laugh at his concern. But each time that hope crept into his mind, his heart told him it was not so, and he spurred himself, and his horse, all the harder.

"Captain Merendil! Sir... what in blazes is THAT?" said the man next to him.

Merendil lifted his eyes and saw from the hills far ahead, a trail of flame flying upward through the sky. What the blazes WAS that, indeed? Some strange magic? No flaming arrow would leave a trail of flame like that one... nor could it fly nearly so high!

And what was that? Still further on now, barely to be seen, a second light appeared in the sky just like it.

Tired as they all were, Merendil knew that some mischief was at hand, and that the time for action had come. He raised his right arm high and held it briefly that all his men might see it and called out, "Alright now men... we must fly!" Then throwing his arm forward he drove his horse harder.

And on they rode, westward down the Great Road.

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On the Great Road east of the Last Bridge, November 5, after dark
Written by Gordis
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Gritting his teeth, Lammir, the youngest of Gimilbeth’s pages, watched in horror how his Lady was brought down and maltreated by the savage monsters. Tears of rage ran down his face as an orc ravaged her lovely mouth… Lammir was helpless to aid her, as his lower body was solidly jammed between the ground and his fallen horse. He closed his eyes unable to watch further. Minutes passed, long as centuries.

“Kill them all!”

He heard the guttural voice of the orc commander pronounce his Doom. He opened his eyes – to see the struggling Gimilbeth being carried away uphill. The orcs prowled around slaying the wounded and mutilating the corpses. Lammir tried to lie as quiet as dead, although the horrible pain in his arrow-pierced shoulder made it next to impossible.

A clawed hand gripped his hair and jerked his head up. Pain burst in his strained neck and Lammir cried out, forgetting his plan to try to pass for dead.

”Yet alive, little tark-brat?” the orc sneered. “T’will not be for long.”

Lammir felt the wetness of the blood-smeared blade at his throat and mentally sent his farewells to his parents and to his poor Lady. He failed her dismally today…

“Afraid, tark-snaga?” the brute jeered, drool dripping from his chin. “And right you are - but what do we have here, eh? An arrow-wound! Har! Rotten luck, buddy, eh?... I have reconsidered, y’know - I will not cut off your pretty little headpiece, I will leave you to die slowly of poison on yonder arrow. You will squirm like a roasting maggot, you will wail and convulse, while it takes you… slow-like. Pity I can’t stay and watch!” Hooting with laughter, the orc spat at Lammir and swaggered away in search of another victim.

The boy squeezed his eyes shut and willed himself to remain conscious. He knew that the orc had told the truth about the poison – he felt its slow fire coursing in his blood.

“Sweet Eru,” he prayed, “let me live long enough to tell the others about the plight of my Lady – and to sent them in pursuit, before it is too late for her.”

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On the Great Road east of the Last Bridge, November 5, after dark
Written by Serenoli
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There was an unfortunate obstacle in Hurgon's path to freedom. In front of his horse sprang two people fighting so fiercely neither had the time to pay any attention to Hurgon. For some time he watched them fascinated - it was hard to tell where orc ended and where human began, they were swirling around so fast - but one of them got too close and nicked the horse's leg, and whinnying in pain, the horse thrashed and throwing Hurgon off, ran away in terror. Equally, or maybe more, terrified, Hurgon ran after it, calling its name. His lucky charm strung around his neck to protect him from Gimilbeth's 'evil' spirit, was probably the only reason he was not skewered five times over in this mad dash, because surely one man can not have so much luck at a time.

A horn blared somewhere ahead of him. To the utmost amazement of the shouting Hurgon, he saw the orcs retreating. The closer he got to them, the farther they went back. He had never before frightened anyone or anything in his life - he had been content to be the cowardly one. And these mighty orcs, with their strong muscles and generally ugly faces (what bad luck for a race as a whole to be ugly, he speculated in some distant corner of his mind - it almost justified their hatred for everyone else) were retreating before him! Heartened, he waved his scimitar even more wildly, and screamed louder than ever, trying to think of some good battle-cry. He had no intention of fighting, however, and when something large stepped in front of him, with not one, but two scimitars bared to confront this fearless human fighter, his own scimitar flew out of his hand, and he turned tail and ran for his life.

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On the Great Road east of the Last Bridge, November 5, after dark
Written by Angmar
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Captain Ashuk had just hewed off the sword arm of the reckless guardsman who had challenged him. As the man shrieked in pain and looked at his bloody stump in disbelief, Ashuk decapitated him with his scimitar, sending the head toppling to the ground. He licked the warm blood off the side of his blade and found the taste stimulating as always.

After the retreat had sounded, his lads began disengaging themselves from the enemy and falling back towards the cliffs. Though the fighting was at a lull along most of the road, there were still pockets where the hand-to-hand fighting was savage.

A fierce gash on his leathery face and a vicious looking wound on his right arm, a corporal appeared through the gathering misty darkness. Three other stout warriors followed closely behind him.

"Corporal Bidroi with a report, sir," the warrior panted after saluting.

"Out with it, Pizgal!" Captain Ashuk barked.

"As ordered, sir, the men are falling back all along the road in a more or less orderly retreat. I regret to report that there have been a few desertions," the soldier stopped to catch his breath. "There was some fierce resistance from those dwarves that our scouts had reported earlier, but I don't yet have a good estimate of casualties." The orc swayed slightly, dizzy from pain and loss of blood.

"None of the men are wasting time ransacking the bodies and collecting booty, are they?" Ashuk asked suspiciously.

"Not many, sir. After they saw the flare, they just wanted to break off the fighting and get out of here."

"All right, corporal. You need to do something about that arm before you bleed to death. Now get going back towards the cliffs. We'll be right behind you." As Ashuk watched the four men retreat, he heard a loud scream. "The accursed princess! That fool Tharb should have gagged her! If he doesn't shut her up, the Tarks will hear her bleating for miles around!" Another full-throated shriek cut through the night, but ended in a gurgling moan.

"Good!" Ashuk thought to himself. "He's finally gagged her! I wonder what His Majesty wants with a shrew like the princess! Must be planning to hold her for ransom. Maybe her father will refuse to pay and the king will be forced to keep her," Ashuk laughed raucously, remembering the wicked wound she had dealt him. "Or maybe he wants to use her in some kind of sorcery. That is all she would be good for! I hope he turns her into something that she would find repulsive, like a purple spotted lizard!" Although the orc was titilating himself with possibilities for the Princess' transformation by magic, he felt a shudder creep down his spine at the thought of sorcery. The idea of such wonders always made him feel uncomfortable.

Ashuk had never seen any of these sorceries himself, but he had always heard rumors that the king spent hours in his chambers devising marvels of alchemy and invention. His Majesty had been the one who had developed the marvelous blazing arrows which rose high into the air. Such things were beyond him though. It was useless to think about it. He was only a common soldier, after all.

"Never know when one of these workers of magic might decide that you would make a good candidate for their experiments!" All the lads felt the same way; they were fascinated by the concept of magic but feared it. Some of the lads even said that since they were of elvish ancestry, the gift would be with them, too. However, few had ever mastered any of the esoteric arts. They sensed stirrings of powers beyond themselves.

He saw eight of the fellows approach him. Their corporal had just saluted and was about to give his report when he bellowed out a warning. "Sir! Above you!"

Ashuk looked up to see a scimitar plunging downward straight towards him. The sight was enough to make him freeze in fear. He was unable to take a step as he gaped upward at the descending weapon. "Magic! Melkor pro--" he shouted. The words died in his throat as the soldier closest to him shoved him out of the line of the blade.

"Sir!" the private gasped in terror. "Swords don't come flying down out of the air like that! There must be a powerful shaman among the enemy, maybe even an elf!"

Ashuk blanched, turning a lighter shade of greenish gray. "Elves? The Rhudarians are now in league with elves? Come on men! Make haste! Let's get out of here!" the orc shouted in panic as he turned and fled, his men rushing behind him.