Fred was still present but she was not alone.
Through her it spoke and when it spoke, she felt not afraid. For the first time in her life, possibly the only time she suspected, would everything be so clear, would the path ahead have little divergence. As she was carried by Eric through the ruined streets of Tirion following Glorfindel's revelation that Frank Miller was presently at the house of Elrond, the child she was grieved for the destruction she saw. She recalled only recently, coming to visit Galadriel with Tory and Bryan. She liked the golden lady and seeing the woman was always a treat. Galdriel spoke to her and Sam of true things, things that most grown ups did not believe children should know. Thinking of Tory brought grief to her and she remembered how it felt to know that the lady was dead. It was almost as bad as seeing the Nazgul killing her mother and father.
Little one, the voice inside her head said gently. You will see them again someday, I promise you.
I miss them, she answered back.
They live in your heart child and their souls watch over you.
Fred wanted so much for this to be true.
*************
Much of Tirion was abandoned. The balrogs had done their work well and had driven the elves from their city. Those who lingered, did so out of fear loved ones would not find them and also to mount the defense against the enemy they had believed, somewhat erroneously, was vanquished forever. The mobilization was slower than it ought to have been for the Eldar had not known war in a hundred millennia. The complacency that Manwe himself had felt was showing itself and while some rose to the occasion, others were bewildered. It was difficult to offer leadership and to rouse the spirit of battle in those who had never in their lives known what is to fear for one's very existence.
Elrond Peredhil who had fought more battles than any elf or man should do in one lifetime, found himself playing leader to a council of war once again. As Glorfindel and those under him went to defeat the Balrogs, a party had been sent across the island, to seek out Mithrandir if he still remained on the island. It disturbed him because his mother in law, the great Noldor lady Galadriel, seemed to be in a trance like state. In such times, it was her counsel that he relied upon in the past but now, she offered him little guidance and her mental state was so disaffected that her loved ones feared for her. Celebrian had taken to her mother's side, determined not to leave the lady because on one thing Galadriel was immovable, she would not leave Tirion.
"Not yet," she said.
"Elrond I can't stay anymore," Frank Miller found the former lord of Rivendell and declared firmly. "I have to go find my family."
"Frank," Elrond looked at him impatiently as he saw more wounded being brought into his home, the women immediately rushing around them like ants to tend the fallen. "Your wife and children are on the fringes of the island, far from this carnage. They are most likely safer than you are. The balrogs are determined to level this city and while Glorfindel manages to hold some at bay, the danger is still considerable. It is not wise for you to..." his voice trailed when he saw another batch of arrivals enter the hallway.
"FRANK!" Miranda's voice called out immediately upon seeing her husband on the steps leading deeper into Elrond's grand home.
Frank's head snapped around, following that voice, a surge of untold relief flowing through his veins at a sound so sweet to his ears, it was almost music. Without another word, he raced down the steps and met his wife's body in a tight embrace and bruising kiss that was passion, gratitude and a thousand unspoken emotions that only she could see in his eyes.
"Oh bloody hell," he said holding her, not realising until a moment later that she was holding Pip in her arms and the child was being crushed between the two of them. "Oh god I'm so glad you're here, I was just coming to find you, balrogs be damned." Glancing down at his son, Frank offered Pip an equally fond smile, kissing the boy on his forehead and ruffling his hair in affection. "How's my Pip?"
"Happy to see you daddy," the little face looked back at him smiling.
"I know we shouldn't have come," Miranda said quickly as Frank took steps towards Eric, Fred, Jason and his brave Sam who was clutching the camera man's hand tightly but smiling happily at the sight of his family reunited. "But we had to tell you what's happened."
"You know what's going on here?" Frank looked at them.
"Yes," Miranda nodded as Elrond came to greet them. "David Saeran has escaped."
"What?" Elrond exclaimed in a mixture of horror. "That is not possible."
"Its possible," Miranda answered grimly, thinking of the man and the sheer evil radiating from him. Even the Nazgul that they had fought did not seem so sinister. "Not only has he escaped but he released all these things from wherever it was he escaped from."
"Where is he?" Elrond managed to ask after the enormity of what had happened sunk truly into his consciousness.
"He's gone," Eric replied setting down Fred. "He's taken all his monsters with him. They're heading back to our world."
"And no is going to have any idea how to deal with him," Jason added. "Jesus, no one back there has any idea what he's capable of."
"We have to go back and tell them," Frank said without even having to think twice. "We're going to have to tell them what they're up against."
"We can't just march there and blurt it out!" Jason retorted.
"Why not?" Miranda looked at him. "He's not taking any pains to hide himself and whether or not people want to believe, they're going to have to when they see fire breathing dragons turn their cities into rubble. We know he's got an army waiting for him already. We've seen it."
"She's right," Eric nodded in agreement. "We have to go back."
"We must go back," Fred spoke and this time she addressed Elrond directly. "All of us."
Elrond's mind had been so preoccupied with the realisation that Sauron had made his escape that at first the words from the little girl did not register. However, like drop of ink on parchment, it seeped it and left its mark. Power. The child was radiating power. Not even in Galadriel's presence had it felt so strong. Staring at her for a moment, Elrond tried to place it and could not.
"All of us? Do you mean the Eldar?"
"The End of Days has come, son of Earendil," Fred spoke in that haunting voice not at all her own. "It cannot be fought in isolation. If the reign of Sauron and Melkor is to end for all time, then the Eldar must fight along side of the Edain. Even now, Auel's children are awakening. As Sauron is awakening all the fell beasts that still walk the earth, I have called the armies of the light. We must make the crossing to join them."
"Auel's folk?" Frank burst out. "You mean the dwarves?"
"They no longer exist," Elrond exclaimed. "There has been no word...."
"They hide just as well as you," Fred smiled and broke away from her minders. Walking past Elrond, the little girl made her through the hallway.
"What's happening to her?" Eric asked as Fred walked away, a curious sight among the elves dressed in battle armor.
"She is not alone in her body," Elrond stated the obvious. "There is someone with her, someone I do not recognise."
"Fred," Miranda called out, "stay with us love." For Miranda, it did not matter who occupied the child's body, her maternal instincts allowed her to see nothing else and to protect the girl the same way. It was the least Miranda could do for Bryan.
"I must find the White Lady," Fred answered and continued meandering through the bodies towards the steps. "I must speak to Galadriel."
*************
The world changes.
Her grand child had said that once or so Legolas Greenleaf had claimed. Galadriel herself had never heard the words uttered by the dear child for she had by then, sailed across the sea towards the Undying Lands leaving Arwen to her fate. Like Elrond, she had grieved for the child but Galadriel was wise enough to know that great love were worth the sacrifice they sometimes demanded. The Evenstar's love for her ranger had certainly been that. Now, with Valinor thrust unceremoniously into Arda's bosom once more, the protection of the Valar seemingly vanished and the dark creatures of Mandos turning Tirion into ruin, Galadriel knew that the fate of her people was about to take a irrevocable turn for change.
She felt the child even before Fred arrived in her chamber.
Galadriel had felt it for some time now but she had not believed it. She did not think anyone else would either and dared not speak of it to anyone else without leave. Her daughter Celebrian sat at her side, fretting in growing concern. Celebrian took after her father, a gentle more caring soul than her mother who was too long in a position of authority and had been hardened by it.
"Mother," Celebrian said holding her hand. "Please speak to me. You frighten me with your silence."
Galadriel was barely conscious of her words, still locked in stunned silence as the child appeared in her chambers with a small part of humans led by her son in law. Celebrian's first impulse upon seeing her husband was to go to him, needing comfort herself. Galadriel did nothing to stop her because her eyes were fixed on the child that was Fred and something else all together. Meeting those eyes, blue like orbs that could pierce the skin, Galadriel was forced to look away. It was seemingly too.
"You honor me," she said dropping her head down.
"There is no honor," Fred responded quickly, uncomfortable by the humility of one so great and worthy in deeds and counsel. "You know what is coming?"
"Yes," Galadriel nodded, "the End of Days."
"The elves must take part in the battle. The Edain will not know what it is they deal with. Their memories are short, they do not have your knowledge. Only together can you defeat Sauron."
"Who are you?" Elrond demanded to know, for the course this child was suggesting was folly. For so long, his people had remained within the confines of Valinor and though they had recently been exploring Arda once again, they were not ready to emerge in such a manner. They were not ready to attempt an alliance with men who might perceive them as a threat and could conceivably be as dangerous to them as Sauron.
"It matters little," Galadriel spoke in a firm voice. "Except that she is right. We must arm for war and we must do it now."
"You expect us to simply leave Valinor in this state and cross the sea to Arda?" Elrond looked at her incredulously. "What about the danger we face here? There are balrogs roaming through our cities, laying waste to all that we have built."
"If we do not go, it does not matter what the balrogs do," Galadriel answered, "we will be destroyed nonetheless. If Sauron takes Arda, how long do you think it will be before he turns his eye to us? The balrogs were left here to delay us while he unleashes his worst upon Arda."
"We have weapons in our world," Frank spoke up, understanding what Galadriel was saying, "weapons so powerful that they could reduce this entire planet to ash. If Saeron, Sauron, whatever pushes my people hard enough, they will use it and we will all die."
"When that happens," Miranda added her voice to Frank's, "it won't matter whether or not there are balrogs here, there will be nothing left."
Elrond let out a deep breath because while the identity of who was occupying Fred remained a mystery, the word of Galadriel could not be questioned. The word of she whose bloodline was traced directly to Finwe, the first High King of the Noldor and the remaining member of that great and noble house could almost be considered a royal decree. If Galadriel believed their doom would follow if they did not do as this child demanded, then Elrond believed. He had listened to her counsel for too long to ignore it and in more ages than anyone could even count, she had led her people wisely. He did not think that had changed.
"Where will we go?" Elrond asked. "Where would Sauron go first?"
"England," Eric spoke first without thinking.
"England?" Miranda stared at him. "Why England?"
"First port of call and if he intends to use all the resources available to him, then England is Malcolm Industries main seat of power. From there, he can rally all those things we saw under Germany."
"The Uruk Hai," Frank nodded in agreement. "According to Bryan, there was another place, a bigger one in Romania. Gandalf claimed it was the seat of his power back in the ancient times."
"Mordor," Elrond nodded. "Gandalf said that Sauron had built his fortress in your world in what used to be Barad-dur. He will rally them and the Nine."
"The Nine!" Jason exclaimed. "There can't be nine, we killed one. There should be eight!"
"You cannot kill what is already dead," Elrond explained. "Their spirit may be returned to the shadow world but they are bound to Sauron. While he lives, so do they and if he is restored to his former strength, then it should be assumed that they will be as well."
"Oh shit," Jason muttered, "they're going to be really pissed at us then."
The remark earned him a jab from Eric's elbow. Speaking like that in front of Galadriel was like making flatulence jokes in front of the Queen of England or worse yet, the Pope.
"We must rally our forces," Galadriel said looking at Elrond. "We will take everyone who can travel with us to the Enchanted Isles. They will be safe there from the balrogs, at least for a time. Those who can fight will continue on towards Arda."
"Move everyone?" Celebrian gasped. The enormity of it was too much for her to comprehend. "We are to flee?"
"We cannot stand indefinitely against the balrogs," Elrond looked at her, "we could defeat them if we willing to expend the time and effort but we do so with losses we cannot afford if there is a greater battle to be fought."
"Maybe we can get help," Frank looked at the elves. "You are in the real world now, perhaps we can contact them for assistance."
"And what will you tell them?" Elrond stared back at him.
"He's right," Eric said with a heavy sigh. "To even get anyone out this far will take time that is if they didn't think you were insane to begin with."
"Are you going to be able to move that many people?" Miranda looked to Elrond.
"Some of us will remain behind to battle the enemy," Elrond replied. "Most likely Glorfindel and his men. If they are able to turn the tide then the others may return, if not we will abandon the island until such time as Sauron is destroyed."
The gravity of what was being discussed drew a heavy curtain of silence over all of them. Frank could see how difficult it was for the elves to even entertain such a notion, let alone come to the understanding that there could be no other way. While Galadriel seemed set largely because of her strange understanding of who was inside Fred, Elrond and Celebrian who did not have that insight were less certain. Frank could not imagine what it must be like to take a step into a world that was completely alien to fight an enemy so dark and powerful.
"It must be this way," Fred broke the silence by taking Elrond's hand in her own, her small palm closing around his long, slender fingers. "For all to be renewed, there must be a beginning and an end. We are nearing the end. For too long you have remained hidden away, left apart from all others. It was to protect you but it was not a wise choice. Your race like any others must evolve, must become more than what it is. Elves have an advantage that no others have, you have the years to shape your destiny, not race to keep up with it as do men and dwarves. The age of isolation is ended, it is time you joined the world again, even if it is in its final moments."
He looked into her eyes and understood then who she was.
His breath caught and when she nodded at his understanding. Elrond released his gasp and then did the same.
"It will be done as you will," he said finally to her and to the others present. "We will go."
***********
Jesus H. Christ.
That was the only thing that Isaiah Hill could think as they approached the city on horseback. It had been years since he had been astride a horse and the navy captain was somewhat surprised that he had even remembered how it was done. Unfortunately, this had been the island's only means of transport so Isaiah did not have the opportunity to debate the matter. Purcelli had complained bitterly, being a Brooklyn boy, about riding double with one of the elves since the only wildlife he had ever mastered was a New York cockroach and stepping on them was quite different from riding the damn things.
Of course horses were the least of it. Purcelli was riding double with a fucking elf.
An elf, for Christ sake, an elf.
When Aaron Stone had explained it, Isaiah and his men had laughed. No shit, they had actually burst out laughing because it was ridiculous. Elves were the poor, underpaid, overworked little guys in Santa's workshop, not tall, perfect looking specimens that seemed to make men appear coarse and brutal by comparison. They were figments of story tellers' imagination, not flesh and blood and certainly not real. However, it was hard to be so obtuse when Isaiah was standing on an island that had somehow escaped the notice of every cartographer who had ever sailed these waters and had managed to escape modern satellites until a short time ago. Denial could only go so far before empirical evidence and logic won the day.
And he certainly could not deny it when he saw the city in the distance. Even through the rain and wind, Isaiah was mesmerized by it. Years ago, he had found himself in Athens, looking at the Parthenon and wondering to himself what it must have been like to see the ancient city in its former glory, when it stood as the symbol of freedom and civilization for the fledgling human race. When he saw the city of Tirion for the first time, Isaiah knew. He could see ornate spires, tall, exquisitely built towers, seeming like figurines sculpted from crystal, bone and pearl. Even with the grey skies surrounding Tirion, there was no doubting its magnificence. For a brief second, the years of jaded service to his country and everything Isaiah knew about anything, fell away to be replaced by the wonder of the explorer who had just discovered the New World.
For that brief second he believed. They all did.
"Christ," Isaiah gasped, "its beautiful."
"We have spent many ages making it so," Legolas could not help but smile at the man's awe at Tirion. "It is but one of many cities on this island. There is Aqalonde on the coast as well. That is the home of the Teleri."
"How long have you lived here?" Nicholas Purcelli inquired, his disbelief having gone the same way as his captain.
"We have existed on this island for ten millennia," Elladan replied, "as it is measured by your calendar I believe."
"One hundred thousand years?" Isaiah gasped. It was beyond him.
"Bloody hell," Bryan exclaimed as they entered the equally ornate gates of Tirion that stood high like a fortress from an ancient castle. Beyond the gates, the pristine beauty of Tirion ended. The paved streets were deserted and what had not been apparent earlier was clear to all of them now as the horses trotted deeper into the city. Chunks of debris covered the floor, there were blooms of amber fire scattered throughout the buildings. Smoke columns, obscured by the rain and wind was billowing into the sky. Tirion's innards looked like a war zone.
"Jesus," Aaron exclaimed, not realising until this moment how bad the onslaught of the Urloki had been.
"What the hell is going on here?" Isaiah managed to ask.
Having spent most of his adult life beneath the ocean waves, surrounded by a steel craft that could just as easily turn into a tomb if anything were to go awry, Isaiah knew how to read men. Something was happening on this island beyond its sudden discovery by the rest of the world. Something ominous that preyed heavily on the minds of their new companions. Isaiah could see the thin line of tension that connected all of them together. They were all poised for trouble and until reaching the gates of Tirion, Isaiah had been unable to guess what it was that was so ominously awaiting them.
It was Legolas who sensed it first.
Mostly because he was the only one in their company who had ever faced what was looming closer in his awareness. The memory had stayed with him throughout the ages. Time could not erase such terror, no matter how much of it had passed. Ariel who rode with him, noted the straightening of his spine, the sudden clenching of its jaw.
"It cannot be..." Legolas stammered.
"What?" Bryan shot the elf a stare, not missing how the blood had suddenly drained from his face.
"Can you not sense it?" He threw the question at the others.
"Sense what?" Aaron demanded, growing impatient and frankly, alarmed.
Almost in answer to his question, the sudden sound of a tremor rumbled across the ground beneath them. Puddles of water rippled in reaction to the slight quake, growing more intense as the sound repeated itself. Debris shuddered on the ground, breaking into smaller fragments. The elves had fallen silent, all of them, as they were invaded by the same infectious sensation that that made Legolas turn pale with fright.
"What is that?" Bryan looked at them in puzzlement until he saw the shadow emerge from the building and all words left him. "Bloody hell...."
The balrog that Legolas Greenleaf had only seen in his nightmares stood at the end of the debris-covered street, its glowing eyes fixed upon the newest arrivals to the city. Swirls of dark smoke curled around in tendrils, combating the wind and rain. It stared at them for a few seconds before bellowing loudly, the sounds of its scream seemed to almost tear the fabric of the sky. Assailed by arrows that could still be seen protruding from its dark flesh, the great best rumbled forward like a dark storm. Heat and smoke followed its juggernaut pace towards them.
"Come on!" Bryan shouted as he dug his heels into the side of his horse, sending the already frightened animal surging away from the monster pursuing them
"Hold on to me!" Legolas ordered Ariel as they raced away from the gates. Behind him, he heard the smashing of rocks as the balrog burst though the pearl laden archway leading into Tirion. Fragments of rock rained down upon them. Making their horse rear up in an attempt to evade falling debris. Ariel tried to remain behind her husband but the sudden action was too quick and she stumbled backwards.
"Legolas!" She screamed.
"Ariel!" Legolas turned around in horror to see her fall. The balrog was almost upon her. No, no, no! He could not allow her to die! As the others began to ride away, Legolas turned back to reclaim his mate, his horse thundering towards the fell beast.
"Legolas! Stop!" Aragorn shouted as he saw the prince turn back. "BRYAN!"
Bryan was already turning his horse back towards the city. Reaching into the folds of his coat, he pulled out his gun and started shooting, hoping the din caused by the weapon would somehow confused the beast long enough for the elf to reach his wife. After losing Tory today and Eve in Saeran's clutches, Bryan was not about to see another friend lose the woman he loved. That would be too cruel.
She could feel the heat on her skin. As Ariel looked up and saw the balrog, carrying with its cloak of shadow, she became numb with terror. She had heard stories of these creatures all her life but to see one in the flesh was beyond her ability to cope. The beast it seemed could smell her fear and its fiery eyes seemed to glow with greater malevolence as it lashed its powerful whip in her direction. Ariel let out a soft cry as she threw herself out of its path. The great lash of flame struck the wall behind her, destroying it completely. She stumbled out of its path, like a mouse trying to escape a man's angry boot. Scrambling away in desperation, she tried not to show fear but fear she felt. Her senses were becoming overwhelmed by its evil, thick and vicious.
Suddenly a barrage of arrows struck the creature as Ariel saw Legolas riding towards her, commanding his terrified mount to continue forward as he assailed the enemy with more and more arrows. Each met their mark, extracting a pained bellow of pain as they tore into its dark flesh. For a moment, she could only watch in a mixture of relief and pride, her golden archer coming fearlessly to her rescue. However, the charge of the once prince of Mirkwood could not be left unchallenged. The balrogs were the most fearsome creatures of Melkor's army, save the Urloki and would not be cowed by one lone archer.
"LEGOLAS!" She shrieked in horror as she saw the whip coming down at him.
The powerful lash struck powerfully into Legolas' horse, sending both rider and mount into air, like toys flung aside by a petulant child. Ariel's scream died in her throat as she saw the animal bray in helpless agony as the fiery lash set it alight. Legolas landed on the ground hard, falling against the fragment of broken wall. Her breath died in her throat upon seeing him merely lying there, unconscious to the world beneath the gaze of the looming balrog who was preparing to make the kill.
NO! She would not let that happen. She could not!
Running forward, she saw nothing but her husband, lying amongst the debris, about to become another victim of this monster's evil. Ignoring her terror, Ariel scrambled to his side, noticing the blood running down the side of his face. Heart pounding, she dropped to her knees and took him in her arms, trying to wake him before the balrog came any closer.
"Prince!" she shook him hard, her eyes darting back and forth from the approaching monster. "You must awake, please! You must get up!" She shook him harder and could feel the icy cold touch of the shadow that followed creatures of such darkness like slaves to an evil master. "PRINCE! GET UP!"
Legolas opened his eyes and for a moment, thought he was dreaming. She had called him Prince.
"Melia....?"
Ariel did not think it possible that there could be a worse thing than falling prey to a balrog's rampage until she heard her husband call her by someone else's name.
"You must awake!" she said trying not to show how much his words had shaken her. "We must move now!"
Legolas blinked twice and realized why,
"MOVE!" Coming to life as he saw the lash bearing down on them both, Legolas rolled across the ground taking Ariel with him as the earth heaved violently where they had been, raining sots of soil and dirt over them. The last ripped through the soil cruelly and Legolas shuddered to think what would have happened if they had not escaped its reach in time. As it was, they were nowhere near safe and the balrog was resuming its attack. This time, it was aiming for its prey with far more precision..
"Hey!" Bryan Miller bellowed loudly as he closed in on his friends and the beast that was too close to them for comfort. The abrupt appearance of the arrival caused the massive creature to turn momentarily and Bryan took that advantage of that slight distraction to open fire. A murderous hail of bullets tore through the balrog's dark torso as he aimed for maximum penetration. Bryan had no idea whether or not bullets could harm the creature, particularly when it was man made. Having recalled that the Nine could only be affected by elven blessed weapons, Bryan was uncertain if the same rule applied here. However, since the dragon that had chased them earlier was susceptible to bullets, Bryan had to believe that this monster was similarly vulnerable. As the projectiles hit their mark, he saw the creature staggered back, startled by both the noise and the manner of weapon that was assailing it. Taking its disorientation as a good sign, Bryan continued to shoot, emptying his entire clip into the demon's chest.
Riding hard on his heels was Aaron Stone who raced his horse across the ruined landscape towards the fallen couple. Taking advantage of the lesson that the Englishman was currently giving the balrog in twentieth century weaponry, Aaron rode past the creature to reach the elves. "Legolas! Ariel! Come on!" He said extending a hand towards Ariel, to pull her onto the saddle with him. Legolas would expect him to take his lady to safety first.
"Go!" Legolas hoisted his wife onto the saddle and shouted at Aaron.
"But Legolas...!" she protested
"I shall be right behind you," Legolas said not caring on his own safety when his wife and his best friend was imperiled.
"I'm coming back for you!" Aaron said firmly.
"You will not have to," Legolas returned just as confidently. "Go!" He swatted the horse's rump and sent the steed racing away.
As the horse raced away, Legolas followed closely behind the animal and only diverged in his course when he saw the balrog battling Bryan on his horse. The Edain still had the advantage and it was an unearthly sound indeed to hear the sound of such crude weapons bursting in his ears on the isle of Valinor. It added to the unreality of it all, to the deconstruction of paradise. Riding next to him, Legolas saw the newly arrived human who was Imrahil reborn join the former captain of Gondor in doing battle with the balrog. Similarly armed, the one who called Isaiah in this life was releasing the same projectiles at the enemy, causing the balrog to retreat in confusion. Legolas suspected the wounds would be slight in the final accounting of things but the balrog's lack of knowledge was a tool to be exploited.
"Legolas," Elladan's voice reached his ear and he looked up to see the Elrond's son coming to retrieve him.
"Your timing is impeccable," Legolas said taking the offered hand and mounted the horse in one graceful leap.
"As always," Elladan replied grimly, no humor in his voice as he rode away from the scene and shouted at Bryan to withdraw, now that their friends were safe.
Suddenly, there was the sound of rushing air. Like a flock of birds had suddenly taken flight. Their elven senses detecting it first, both Legolas and Elladan honed in quickly on the direction of it. Against the grey sky, they saw it coming, a barrage almost as relentless as the projectiles that Bryan and Isaiah were sending at it. It came from the roofs and balconies of buildings that had not been gutted by flame or demolished by the balrog's lash. Warriors in armor glistening under the blanket of rain, stood tall and brave as their bows delivered their deadly bounty.
"Bryan!" Elladan shouted. "Withdraw!"
It was through the break in gunfire that Bryan managed to hear Elladan's frantic cry and when he saw what was coming, understood immediately. "Get back, get back!" He shouted at the navy captain, digging his heels into his horse to send the animal bolting.
Isaiah who was still trying to comprehend how he had come to find himself battling what could only be the stuff of nightmares, was not about to debate the matter. His brain could play catch up with his survival instincts later. At the moment, he was going to do the sensible thing and follow the Englishman away from that bloody monster. The soldier in him could not stand by and let innocents be killed but Christ, his bravery was fighting up an uphill battle against his sense of reality. Riding away, he looked behind long enough to see the creature becoming engulfed in arrows. There were so many of them that Isaiah couldn't even begin to count them.
"NAR!" The elf lord Glorfindel, standing in front of his archers like a general on the battlefield, shouted once again, sending another wave of arrows at the enemy.
Withdrawing to a safe distance beyond the reach of the balrog's lash, they watched the battle resume between the elves and the creature. Wave after wave of arrows rained down upon the beasts, followed by sharp spikes and lances. Glorfindel's assault was near relentless with the balrog sustaining terrible wounds. Even as it began to comprehend that it would die if it remained, the hail of lances and spikes that brought it to its knees thwarted the beast's escape. At its most vulnerable, the final charge was issued and the warriors of Tirion, led by Glorfindel wielding his great sword, fell upon the balrog and finished the beast before the eyes of an astonished audience.
"Jesus Christ," Isaiah exclaimed as he watched the carnage from a safe distance.
"What is that thing?" Purcelli asked as his captain made that awed statement.
"We call it a balrog," Legolas said watching the elven warriors led by Glorfindel fall upon the creature like a pack of wolves bringing down a large animal. "A demon of fire."
"A demon!" The First Officer of the Connecticut burst out. "Are you kidding?"
"Does that look like a joke to you?" Aaron glanced at the man.
Purcelli felt silent because he had no answer to that.
"Let's keep going," Bryan urged his horse forward. "We need to find the others, tell them what we know."
As the party continued through the ruin gates of the city once more, they rode their horses quickly past the battle raging between Glorfindel and Morgoth's dark minion. It appeared as they hurried past, trying not to become embroiled in the fighting, that Glorfindel's legend as a balrog slayer was no exaggeration or in danger of being forgotten.
*************
Wings uncurled.
Expanding to their full strength, they flapped once, sending a blast of air hurling in all directions. The massive head reared back with a loud snort and as teeth parted, they gleamed in the dim light of the cavern. A hand stroked the long, serpentine neck, tracing across scales of dark mottled grey. The creature emitted a low rumble of content, almost like a cat purring to its master touch. Eyelid blinked but once as another flap of its wings fanned the cloak worn by the one who had nursed this particular animal from infancy to adulthood. The spines along the ridge of its back stood up in pleasure, recognizing the familiar touch of one whom had been gone for too long.
"Ghash," the Black Speech of an ancient tongue filled the cavern.
The beast snorted in answer to its name, nudging its head against the shoulder of the master absent for too long. A gesture of recognition that showed the only affection it was capable.
"I am sorry to be away for so long," Morgul said affectionately to the winged creature, "but we shall be parted no more." Running his hand along the bridge of the creature's nose flattened against its skull, Morgul slipped the leather harness into place. The beast was unconcerned by this action, having endured this before and was accustomed to the sensation of this odd device against its hide. Trusting its master, it allowed Morgul to snap the fastenings into place.
"Come Ghash," Morgul said as he led the beast across the rocky surface of the only home it had ever known. The beast had not seen the sky since its passing and only then, had it ever seen the moonlight night, never the sun or the light of day. Now with the great Lord returning, there was no need for pretext and the shackles of anonymity had been cast aside at last. This day was theirs to soar.
The others were waiting with their own mounts for the journey to begin. Tonight they would leave their underground lair and go forth to greet their own master who was travelling to them from across the sea. Not only was Sauron making a triumphant return to the world of men but he was returning to them in a manner they had never before seen. Even through the great distances, the Nazgul could sense the raw power he now wielded, they understood not how he had suddenly become the equal of any Valar. Nevertheless it had replenished them as fully as Sauron himself had been at its infusion.
Balancing on powerful hind legs with its wing partially expanded, the winged beast followed Morgul out of the chamber, allowing the Nazgul to lead it forth as it had done so many times before in the past. It had taken Irina Sadko's genius and Sauron's own power to give birth to these creatures once again and in truth, they were but a few years old. It had been Sauron's gift to the Nine, a reward for their service. Each had raised and trained each of the winged beasts, preparing them for the day when they would take to the skies unfettered. So far, the creatures had ever only known freedom for brief periods of time in the night sky because the veil of secrecy had to be maintained while Sauron plotted the destruction of Arda.
Now the time for pretext and concealment was over.
The Uruks were moving out of their underground chambers even as Morgul led Ghash to the rest of his brothers. They were arming themselves with weapons the Nazgul had trained them to use. For this war, there would be no pathetic adherence to things long past. The effect of shadow on the Age of Man had been quite effective. The Edain had created weapons befitting an army of Mordor and the Uruks no longer wielded maces and blades as they had done in the wars of Middle earth. Instead, their new armaments were machine guns and hand grenades, explosives and rocket launchers. A fitting arsenal for a more sophisticated age.
Unheard by all others except worshippers of the dark, the minions and allies of Sauron began to emerge from their hiding places. From the fell beasts deep beneath the earth, to the dormant watchers that now found new sport in open waters. Transport vehicles zigzagged across Europe, taking long concealed roads deep into the hidden enclaves beneath Malcolm Industries properties in Germany, Romania, Paris and Spain.
Six months after her death, the genius of Irina Sadko would finally reach the world and set it alight to burn.
*********
The House of Elrond Peredhil was in a state of chaos once the orders to depart was issued.
Elladan and Elrohir returned to their father's home to see the elves preparing for war in a manner he had never seen before. Weapons emerged that had only seen the light of day whenever it was time for upkeep, never for the purpose it was crafted. Elves they had known all their lives were now clad in armor while maidens hurried across the floor in preparation for an exodus neither of the brothers had seen since their departure from Arda at the end of the Third Age.
"Mother!" Elladan called out when he saw Celebrian emerging from their father's study.
"Elladan! Elrohir!" The lady exclaimed in relief when she saw her sons before her, unscathed by the night's evil. "Thank Eru you are safe. I had feared for you both." She embraced each one after the other and repeated the gesture with Aaron when she noticed that her daughter was not amongst them.
"Where is Eve?" She demanded, her face filling with fear.
Aaron could not say it, he just couldn't. "She...she...."
"Sauron took her mother," Elrohir answered softly as he bundled his mother into his arms and offered her comfort when he told her the worst of it. "He took when he left Valinor. She is with him now."
Grateful to Elrohir for bringing this dark news to Celebrian, he struggled to maintain his composure, reminding himself that if Bryan could pull himself together after the devastating loss of Tory, then he had to remain just as strong to save Eve.
"Yes," he nodded quietly. "He is on his way back to Arda."
"Who the hell is this Sauron?" Isaiah demanded, announcing his presence since he felt like he had walked into the middle of a play and had no idea what was taking place.
"Evil," Elrond Peredhil stated at he emerged from his parlor and widened the door so they could all enter. His expression showed his own reaction to the news of his daughter's fate but as always with the leader of so many, he pushed aside such fears for the moment. His sons were comforting his wife and though he wanted to offer her his arms, Elrond had graver matters to attend. "We have much to do and little time to do it. Please come in," he said before stepping back into the room once more.
Isaiah had questions still but something about the man demanded respect even from an experienced naval captain like him. The submarine commander could not explain it and tried to recall when he had been in the presence of someone so great that it was awe-inspiring. He did not understand any of it, this strange world he had stepped into but he knew that there was danger and it looming large over his reality, beyond this almost fantasy like island.
When Elrond had heard the others outside, Frank had been poised to go find his brother, having been told by Miranda what had happened to Tory. All thoughts about dwarves and the End of Days had been driven away by the news that the great love of his brother's life had been snatched cruelly away from him by Sauron's malice. Frank had never known Bryan to fall so hard for any woman and could only begin to imagine what pain his brother was enduring. However, seeing Bryan for himself, seeing the shield over Bryan's eyes that kept those who knew him from looking to his soul, Frank knew that he had miscalculated his brother's anguish considerably.
"Bryan," Frank said meeting Bryan's stony gaze. "I....," the words failed him. What did one say to a loss like that? What could anyone say to him if Miranda had been lost that would make the least bit difference? Nothing.
"Don't," Bryan said abruptly before Frank could offer any well-meaning words of comfort. He couldn't bear to hear it at this time, he couldn't hear it without feeling the resolve he had built up since he had found Tory, shatter like glass. There was too much to be done for him to break, not when Eve was still out there and Saeran was about to unleash a second hell on earth.
Frank's protest died there and then. Bryan offered his brother a look of thanks and sought instead the other female he had loved as much as Tory. The little girl was standing next to Galadriel and suddenly Bryan knew that Fred was the only one who could make this ache inside of him bearable. Crossing the floor as the others spoke among themselves, he swept the little girl in his arms upon approaching her.
"Hello Fred," he said quietly, holding her in her arms. Thinking that it was only this morning, they had set around the breakfast table, talking about their day.
"Bryan," Miranda spoke up, "there's something about Fred...."
"I am sorry Bryan," Fred's small head leaned forward, until her forehead rested against his. It was a familiar gesture of affection between the two. "It was her time. It could not be stopped."
Bryan pulled back and looked at the child. "What?"
"To all things there is a beginning and an end," Fred's blue eyes bore into him as she explained, with a look on face that did not at all seem childlike. For a moment, Bryan swore it was not Frederica Bailey he was holding in his arms but someone else....
"She's been like this since we've arrived," Miranda offered though it was a poor explanation.
"She speaks the truth Bryan," Galadriel added. "You must listen to her. We mourn with you in your hour of loss but the child speaks words we must all listen if we are to survive this."
"What's happening to her?" Bryan demanded, not certain that he could deal with losing Fred so soon after Tory. He stared at the little girl and knew that there was something not right about her, something in her eyes that was not at all Fred.
"I am here Bryan," Fred said holding his face in her hands, her forehead dropping against his. "It was Tory's time to go. To all things that live, there is a moment of birth and a moment of death. I could not stop it when it was Tory's time. I am sorry."
"Who are you?" He asked, not really listening to her words but more interested in who was sharing his child's body.
"One who has always watched you Son of Gondor, who has always known that you bore the courage of a king, even as the son of a Steward. We will have great need of your strength in the battle that to be fought."
"Battle?" Bryan looked to the others.
"You must lead us Bryan," Galadriel explained. "The elves will go to war across the sea in Arda but we cannot do it without guidance. Too much time has passed and we no longer know the enemy we fight. Sauron is gathering an army to him, not just from Mandos but an army he had built over the centuries. They are awakening even now, emerging through the cracks of the world to meet him when he reaches the shores of Arda."
"I am not the Son of Gondor, that man is dead," Bryan retorted. "He died a hundred thousand years ago."
"And his soul lives inside of you and much of who you are gains its power from him," Fred said once more. "All your life, you've sought to finish everything you have set your mind to do, struggling to fill the emptiness left behind by another task unfulfilled. Boromir of Gondor failed his people in its greatest hour and his soul has been plagued with that defeat ever since. You must finish this Bryan, not just for him but for you."
Bryan wanted to refuse but he could not.
Fred and Galadriel were right. From the very first moment he had laid his eyes upon Fred, he had known that his responsibility to her was more than just to keep her from David Saeran's clutches. There had been more, something deep inside of him recognizing that he had failed her once and was not about to do it again. Was this then Boromir's absolution? Leading an elven army against the forces of Mordor, amassing at this very moment in the modern world?
He didn't know for certain but one thing he would do, whether or not it was destiny or absolution. Bryan did give a damn whether it was right or not or whether prophecy had deemed this to be his course. All he knew for certain was that David Saeran once Sauron, Lord of Mordor had taken from him the only thing he had ever loved more than his life.
And the bastard was going to pay.
Before the end Bryan was going to see to it.
With the rest of his crew, Captain Isaiah Hill watched as the exodus from Aman.
For the rest of his life, he would be hard pressed to find another occasion when he was similarly captivated by any one image. As the fleet of ships sailed from the port city of Avallone on the Isle of Tol Eressea, he and his men experienced an unparalleled feeling of unity and shared awe watching the grey ships of the Teleri take to open sea. The submarine had surfaced, like a leviathan coming for air and with its emergence; the crew of the Connecticut witnessed the departure of the Eldar from their island. Surrounded by swirls of gentle mist, the grey ships moved across the waves, gliding with the grace that could only be accomplished by the greatest ship builders the world had ever known. Like the swans they were meant to emulate, these masterpieces of Teleri artistry began the long journey across the sea.
No one who saw this departure was unaffected. In silent awe, his men watched the ships go by and without needing to be convinced or cajoled into believing what they saw was real, they knew in their hearts that this was no fantasy. This was something so old, so beyond the hard rules of their existence, it almost bordered on faith. Unlike the intangible promises of religion, these myths were flesh and blood and they were real. Isaiah Hill found himself playing military escort to the fleet as it journeyed towards England and the cataclysmic battle that the elves were certain would come in too short a time. Isaiah had little experience in the things of which the elves spoke but the balrogs he had seen were real. The notion that a rampaging army of such creatures unleashed in a world that would have difficulty believing in their existence until it was too late, prompted him to make an unorthodox alliance.
The days following his arrival at Valinor had sped by like a whirlwind. Although the humans living on the island were eager to move quickly, the elves were far more prudent and being a soldier for most of his life, he respected their methodical approach to the campaign they were about to embark. Ferrying the elf called Cirdan on board the Connecticut to Tol Eressea, the ancient ship builder had rallied the remaining vessels left that had not be stolen by the enemy the elves called Sauron. Isaiah had found an odd kinship with Cirdan who was as fascinated by his boat as Isaiah was about the elves. During the short journey to Avallone, Cirdan had spent the voyage pummelling the Connecticut's captain and her chief engineer with a multitude of questions. Isaiah found that ship engineers and builders, whatever their background, were able to cross the language barrier when it came to discussions about their ships.
Despite his initial reservations regarding the matter, Isaiah decided to accept the advice of the elf lord Elrond and allow his men to meet and talk to the elves they had encountered on the island. The days prior to the departure had been a time of great activity. While a contingent of elves had chosen to remain in Valinor to distract the balrogs so the rest of their warriors could leave to confront their master, time was still of the essence. Though his men still had trouble believing that an army of monsters was on its way to the civilized world to level it, they could not ignore the urgency of the elves' preparation and thus were eager to lend a hand. In retrospect, Isaiah could see Elrond's wisdom in allowing the integration because men had to begin to accept that they were only the latest masters of the world and a far older and clearly, far wiser people had preceded them.
"They are beautiful are they not?" Isaiah heard the question asked of one of the Connecticut's new passengers. "It has been too long since I have seen them take flight like this."
Turning to what could truly be Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner; Isaiah could not disagree with Cirdan's comment. The ship builder had insisted on making the journey on the Connecticut, desiring to learn all he could about this newest form of sea travel.
"When I was a boy," Isaiah said with a faint looking back at the fleet again, "I dreamed of being an explorer crossing the seas to discover some unknown frontier like Columbus or Marco Polo on ships like those."
"In a manner of speaking," Cirdan replied staring into the misty horizon, "you have discovered a new world."
"I've discovered an old one," Isaiah answered, feeling genuine warmth towards the old seamen. Like himself, Cirdan's love of the sea was great, if not greater than his own and Isaiah found it difficult not to like anyone who appreciated it so much. "And I don't know whether I really discovered it since other humans found it before I did." There was no disappointment in his voice as he said those words because the truth was; Isaiah knew that he was on the cusp of a great change in the world. Everything would be different after this. He knew it in his bones.
"You will be bringing us to your world in a manner we have not dared to entertain before," Cirdan countered, "it will be a new experience for us all."
"I don't doubt it," the captain agreed and then looked at Cirdan thoughtfully. "What is it like to be an immortal?"
All humans asked this question at some point. Cirdan had in his keeping an almost rehearsed response for the question but for reasons he could not discern, he chose not to offer it to his man. "It is a difficult question to answer though you might think it simple," the elf stroked his beard for a brief time before he answered. "Perhaps my answer is best understood with a question of my own. Do you know what it is like to love the sea, to breathe it, to want nothing more than to chart it from one edge of the world to another and find oneself confined interminably to an island that one cannot leave? I have built so many ships in the last ten millennia and yet, I have not experienced true joy until now, now that they are set free at last, like birds finding the sky after being caught in a cage."
Isaiah stared and nodded. "I understand."
The wind had started to pick up speed again and soon the waves were sloshing against the sides of the boat. The men had retreated beneath the hull to the comfort of shelter, leaving only himself and Cirdan on deck. "Well," he said to the older man, "if I am to bring you to the modern world, I suppose we should get underway. Come on Dan, we need to get below before we can submerge."
"Do all your people have a desire to abbreviate every name you come across?" Cirdan asked as he started to follow the captain down the hatch.
"Are you going to be complaining all the time you're on my boat?" Isaiah looked up at him with a grin.
"If it were truly a boat, there would be a view of the ocean. What point is it to be submerged beneath the waves if you do not even place a window to see it?"
Isaiah rolled his eyes, “Bitch, bitch, bitch...."
*********
The London Area and Terminal Control Centre
West Drayton England
Bernard Shaw despised the espresso machine.
An Englishman to the core, he preferred tea but this was due to his vintage rather than any personal choice. The truth was that his mum had raised him on tea and jam scones. His wife drunk it by the litre and it was sheer inundation that forced his own appreciation of the beverage. Every morning, he would come into work, make himself a pot of Earl Grey because that was the only tea for the morning and sit at his station and begin his day. It was terribly predictable and frightfully comforting. Bernard relied on this simple little sequence of events to gauge how the rest of the day would go.
Today however, the espresso machine had come.
It sat there in its corner, taking up valuable tea making space, gurgling with vile thoughts. The younger lot were thrilled and Bernard had found his normally sane workplace, turned into the latest Starbucks as they crowed and cooed over the new espresso machine. Even in the darkened room away from the tea room that would probably be called the Espresso Room soon enough, Bernard was unable to ignore it, imaginary gurgles of percolating coffee would filter through his imagination, trying to tempt him with its aromatic flavour while at the same time driving him to distraction with the ire of being seduced by something so new. A terrible sense of foreboding came over Bernard that the rest of his day was going to be similarly bothersome.
Suddenly, within the darkness of the control, his screen started flashing multiple signals. The man sat up and took a closer look, too shocked at first at the possibility that something had managed to surprise him. In this job, there was no such thing as surprises. A surprise was a BAD THING. BAD THINGS for an air traffic controller usually meant disaster. People died. No, this could not be a BAD THING. He had not been so distracted that somehow it had gotten past him. Yet there it was multiple blips on his screen and no data to accompany them. There was no flight code. Its speed was nowhere the speed of a 747 that led Bernard to leap to the awful conclusion that this could be a small private plane venturing into ATZ by mistake. The other possibility and the one that made Bernard wished he had that bloody cup of espresso after all was the nightmare faced by New York air traffic controllers on that dark day on September 11th.
Multiple signals on approach, with no call sign, no transponder or identification. The radar had detected it travelling from a northeasterly direction through the Upper Airspace and was rapidly approaching Land's End region. For a moment Bernard had the oddest notion that he was watching birds in flight for the pattern looked like migratory behaviour of geese travelling to a warmer climate. However, these were simply too fast and too large to be considered anything of the like.
"Somebody get London on the damn phone," Bernard demanded. "I've got multiple bleeps that have just dropped out of Upper Airspace and heading towards the coast of Cornwell. No identification whatsoever Find out if the bloody military is conducting exercises or something and forgotten to tell us. If they have, tell whoever is responsible to bend over and kiss his arse goodbye because he's not going to have it at the end of the day."
*********
Sennen Cove Harbour
Cornwall
The air was heavy with the salt of the sea.
It rolled across the land the way the tides surf to shore within the sheltered cove, breaking only at the three islands of Cowloe, Big Bo and Little Bo before swirling humbly to shore. Though framed by cliffs, the community of Sennen was accustomed to the vagaries of living at the very edge of Europe. Beyond the cove was the great expanse of the Atlantic Ocean and Sennen's minor claim to fame came from being the First and Last Village in England. Not so big, even with the advent of the commercial invasion inspired by the garish Land's End amusement park or the hosting of the last terrestrial length of the trans-Atlantic cable connecting England to America, Sennen managed to keep one foot in provinciality while another poised on the tugging reach of progress.
It was a village rich in history where folks still drank at the Success Inn, a quaint little tavern that had been standing for more than a century where the only real evidence that time had not stood still around it was the fact that parking was now available. During the day Logan's Rock was the background to many a wedding picture while at night, lovers huddled in the dark, whispering passionate hopes while faced with the beauty of the shimmering sea. It was a place of power, of histories so deep, that the truth of it had seeped into the hard rock its granite cliffs. All who came here felt something of what it used to be, an echo of the past. From the Saxons kings who dined at the Rock Table to the legend of Merlin who prophesized that one day, greater kings would reach these shores. In the days of Arda, those who came to Sennen Cove knew it by many names and it was a place of reverence.
"Sennen Cove," Saeran stated as he stared at the fishing village as the small armada of ships he commanded finally saw land. "An appropriate beach head don’t you think?" He asked, glancing at Eve. Blond hair blew through his hair as the dark coat he wore billowed in the wind.
Eve looked at him in confusion, not understanding the significance even though she had come to learn by now that her captor had a rather odd sense of nostalgia. Confined to her cabin for most of the journey, she was only allowed to see the deck of the ship in his company. The journey had allowed Eve to understand her situation, that for the moment, she had to bide her time. Escape on the high seas was impossible, especially when surrounded by Saeran's minions. Sharing the same space with giant spiders, wargs and every other foul thing that the dark lord had manage to unleash from Mandos dark vaults put her escape plans into some perspective and Eve realized for the sake of her child, she would have to endure the situation.
"Why?" She asked warily, knowing only that his words were ominous, laced with some hidden malice she could not fathom. "It’s barely a village."
"Oh it had a far more auspicious history in the days of Middle earth," he said giving her a thoughtful look, reminding himself that though she wore a coat of meat that resembled the Evenstar and to his mind, the elf princess Luthien, she had no memories of Arda. "In the old days, these waters were home to the elves, the remnants of the Teleri built their ships here, the ones who were too proud to go to Aman when the invitation was given. I believe that this was the last place they stood in Arda before they left it forever."
Eve's eyes widened in understanding. "The Grey Havens?" She asked trying to remember what she had read in the Red Book of Westmarch, the copy transcribed from Bilbo Baggins' original diary brought to Valinor by Legolas when he had left Middle earth so long ago.
"You really do need to brush up on your elvish," Saeran retorted, "even if it is it to be a dead language in a short time. Mithlond is its proper name, though I suppose," he cast his gaze across the cover, from its cliff faces to the grey canopy of sky above, "it is appropriate."
"What are you going to do?" Eve was almost afraid to ask. There was too much pleasure in his face for her to believe that his purpose for coming to this particular place had some more sinister purpose.
Saeran said nothing.
However, the wind around them suddenly turned from a breeze to a stiff gale and Eve found herself clutching the railing as the ship surged over the choppy waters towards the shore. Hair whipping her face while the cold air bit into her skin, she squinted hard seeing the beach closing in on them. "What are you doing?" She cried out, "You're going to drive the ship right into the sand!"
"I have no need of these archaic elven transports once I reach land," he said coolly, seemingly unaffected by the tempest raging around him.
Behind the lead ship, the others were similarly propelled by the sudden gale and on the deck, Eve could see Saeran's minions howling and screeching in some sort of perverse pleasure. Overhead the dragons circled the flotilla like carrion, their enormous shape obscured vaguely by the clouds. The Watchers seemed unaffected by the uneasy sea and Eve's stomach hollowed at the thought that very soon; these monstrosities would be running rife throughout the modern world.
God help us.
"Brace yourself my dear," Saeran remarked as the swan ship of the Teleri cut through the waves, breaking the blue sea into white foam as the keel began to scrape shore.
Beneath her feet, Eve could feel the deck shudder, wood tearing and splintering as the vessels were forced forward, ripping through the sandy floor of the seabed. From. From the shore, she could see people screaming in shock, fingers pointing at the rampaging juggernaut of ships invading the shore of their quiet village. Those who were on the beach were running in fear, uncertain of how this calamity had come about, knowing only that it would kill them if they did not depart immediately. Eve watched the chaos on the shore, her stomach becoming knots as the gale swept through the town, causing windows and doors to shut, trees to bend impossibly; a whirlwind of tragedy was coming and the wind was jus the beginning.
A tremendous groan of wood tore through her ears as the bottom of the boat dug deeper into the sand, ploughing the seafloor all the way up to the beach. The grey ship came to an abrupt halt, snapping the mast in two and bringing down the sail. Eve dropped to the floor from the sudden stop, covering her head for fear of being hit by falling debris. The former lord of Mordor seemed unconcerned. His attention was elsewhere.
The rest of the fleet arrived at Arda in the same manner. Smashing through the small collection of fishing boats moored along the shore, they were forced into the sand by the powerful gale generated by the dark lord. The shoreline became a debris field of wood and bodies for those who had not been able to leave quickly enough. Blood turned the white sand red and in that brief moment of silence when disaster had occurred and reaction to it had yet to occur, Eve knew it was just the beginning.
When the shock of the destruction had faded away, the locals began reacting to the calamity, emerging in their numbers to investigate what had been the cause. Eve wanted to shout at them to stay back but knew that it was a pointless exercise, already she could see Saeran's horde pouring over the decks of each ship, making their way quickly to shore. It had been a long time since they fed and it appeared this little village was going to break their long famine.
The shock of catastrophe soon faded into screams of horror as the black spiders clambered over the railings of the ships, landing on the soft sand, their arachnid bodies scattering throughout the new feeding ground. The Watchers pushed out as far as the shore would take them, their lengthy tentacles more than capable of snaring victims fleeing in terror and disbelief at what they were seeing. Eve watched the carnage of blood and screams, her eyes widening at the horror of the spiders trapping their prey, the wargs running down Sennen Cove’s terrified victims, ending the chase in a forceful snap of jaws and blood curdling screams that ended all too abruptly.
Eve dropped to her knees, sick with horror, retching all over the wooden deck as Saeran watched on, revelling in the sight of his minions running rampant throughout the village, destroying and pillaging. The air grew thick and heavy with the scent of blood, profaning the salty air of the sea.
“You bastard,” Eve said unable to look, her eyes frozen on the deck. She wanted to shut her ears, so the screams would not reach her but there was no such escape.
However David Saeran, known once as Sauron, Lord of Mordor, was not listening to his captive. Instead his eyes were fixed upon the grey sky, seeing not the dragons that were circling the skies but other winged denizen in his service who were finally making their appearance since he nurtured their creation deep beneath the Carpathian Mountains.
“Perhaps you should go below,” Saeran ordered, looking at her at last.
They were coming. He could sense them.
“What?” She asked almost panting, exhausted. She was a victim trapped in a nightmare and there was no escape. What did he intend by sending her below deck? What did he think she could not see after all this?
“I think it is best that you go below,” there was almost urgency in his request.
Eve would have complied but curiosity got the better of her and she looked up at the sky to see what it was that had captured his attention so. At first she thought they were the dragons but then realized they were smaller but no less terrifying. With their long serpentine necks and flapping wings, Eve felt her terror renew as she saw the cloaked figures riding them.
“Oh my god,” she gasped as her eyes widened in recognition.
A screech, sharp and piercing penetrated her ears and Eve found herself crying out in pain as her hands flew to their ears. As the dragons escorted the new arrivals to the shore, Eve was trembling hard as she saw a new peril amidst the massacre taking place already. Another followed the first bellow until all nine of the beasts had sounded same cry of allegiance to their master as they landed on the sandy shore, their talons digging into the sand. For a brief time all Eve could hear was the sound of flapping wings.
Perched on their backs was the Nine.
No longer in their dark suits, the Nine hid themselves within cloaks of black, billowing in the wind generated by the flapping wings of their dark mounts. Through the shadows of their hoods, their crimson eyes pierced the darkness like knives through flesh. One by one, they climbed off the winged beasts and approached slowly, with the graceful air of a predator about to pounce, towards their lord and master. Heads bowed reverently, they did not meet the eye of their god but dropped to their knees instead on the sandy ground beneath the bow of the boat.
He could feel their joy, as much as Nazgul could feel such things that is, their genuine pleasure at knowing that he had returned to them. Not only had he returned to them, he had done so with far more power than they had ever imagined he possessed. Their reunion did not only see his restoration but theirs as well and once again, they had opportunity to correct the failures of the Third Age. This time, there would be no defeat.
“Rise, my servants,” Saeran ordered, a small smile of pleasure crossing his lips as he took a moment to savour the sweet taste of triumph he felt at seeing Mithlond reduced to this mindless destruction. The creatures he had freed from the vault were rampaging through this tiny community and soon they would spread out across the globe, infesting Arda like a pestilence that no one could stop until the world was breathed in flame.
“What orders my lord?” Morgul spoke, his malevolent voice sending shivers through Eve’s skin. The Witch King’s hood shifted slightly and Eve knew that he was staring at her.
“We go home to Mordor,” Saeran answered, “and see to it that if prophecy comes to pass as the elves predict than the world shall be destroyed along with us. This time, we fight not to win but for revenge. Can anything be sweeter?”
“No my master,” Morgul hissed in answer, a chorus of similarly sinister voices agreed in turn.
“Then we push on for Mordor,” Saeran declared turning to Eve. His outstretched hand like the handshake of soul stealing deal with the devil.
Eve almost spat at him but she remembered what he could do to her or worse yet, to the baby oblivious to the hell she was presently enduring, safe with her belly. For her child, she had to survive this and though bile rose in her throat as she regarded his hand, she had no choice but to take it.
“We might civilize you yet,” he smiled, his triumph achieving a new level of height.
“Go to hell,” she bit back, allowing herself that much defiance.
“I think I rather bring it to me,” he smiled.
“Master,” Morgul spoke up, never understanding his lord’s taste for human flesh but kept that thought to himself. “What of this?” he looked back at what was once Sennen Cove.
Saeran stared coldly at the village whose inhabitants were proving to be a poor meal to satiate the ravenous hunger of his hordes. The dragons were circling above, waiting for him to tell them what to do. They had been snatching fleeing villagers and snacking since their arrival but now Saeran would put them to real work. With the Nine here at last, the conflagration of Arda could begin in earnest.
“When the last of them have seen inside of our minions innards,” he said icily, “burn it down. Burn it all down.”
*********
"Confirmed Station," Captain Richard Wilson said as he charted the progress of the objects on his radar, "the bandits have disappeared off my bloody screen. I'm wondering if they're crabbing about below range…"
No more than twenty minutes earlier, Captain Richard Wilson had been ordered to his Tornado F3 following a report from the LATCC boys at West Drayton that nine unidentified crafts had entered English air space and making their way across Britain. With the state of world politics these days and the shadow of September 11 still looming large over the civilised world, nine planes of undetermined origins or flight plan for that matter had such an enormous potential for disaster that the Tornadoes were deployed immediately.
“They could have landed,” Lieutenant Wallace Green suggested through Wilson’s headset.
“We would have seen it,” the RAF captain retorted, disliking the possibility that nine bandits could simply vanish under his watch. Losing them meant at this moment, those bandits could be on their way to dive bombing a bus full of nuns or something similarly heinous.
“We would still seen some sign of descent,” Wilson insisted. A cloudbank approached and though it was unlikely, the pilot took his bird towards it, just in case the buggers were playing pussy in the clouds. “Let’s keep at it until we find those kites, they can’t bee too far away.”
It was a false hope but Wilson was determined not to give up. They were here somewhere, possibly possessing some form of stealth. Maybe it was the Yanks conducting some kind of exercise but even so, there were jurisdictional clearances that could not be ignored, no matter how big those bastard had gotten for their boots lately.
The Tornado disappeared into the clouds with the sky around the sleek fighter plane vanishing in place of thick cumulus. With only radar to guide him, Wilson’s instruments told him his fool’s errand into the cloudbank was as fruitless as he had suspected. There was nothing here. Frowning behind his facemask, the RAF captain came to the conclusion that there was little left to do but return to station. Suddenly, his radar came so quickly to life that it startled Wilson in his seat.
“I’ve got something…” he started to say when a shadow descended over the cockpit. The pilot looked up just in time to see something impossibly large, with the wingspan that seemed to block out the sun, swoop down on him.
“JESUS CHRIST!” He cried out.
The beast landed squarely on top of the fighter, its weight dipping the nose of the craft violently. In his grasp, the controls struggled with protest as the plane began to enter a dangerous tailspin. Unfortunately, Captain Wilkins was in no position to notice it or rectify the situation. His eyes were staring wide through his visor at the serpentine features of the thing that was staring at him with crimson eyes through the glass bubble of the cockpit cover. Covered in scales, the thing was huge and it seemed to grin, pulling back what passed for lips to reveal a mouth full of serrated teeth as long as his forearm.
Through his headset he could hear Green screaming, “Bloody hell! It’s a fucking monster! It’s tearing through the…” the voice went dead with silence.
Wilkins was in little position to offer comment as the creature firmly latched on to his plane was at this time slamming its long tail against the metal, trying to crack it open like a shell. The plane spiralled downwards even more precariously, its descent creating a corkscrew of exhaust fumes and cloud trails. Frantically, the man struggled to regain control of the Tornado. The creature was bigger and the weight dragged the plane towards the earth as if it were tied to a large rock, flung into the depths.
“Mayday!” Wilkins cried out helplessly into his headset. “Mayday, I can’t get it off!”
Suddenly the smashing against the side of the plane came to a stop and Wilkins gathered his wits long enough to look through the cockpit to see the creature…. the dragon…his mind was telling him even though he couldn’t bring himself to believe it yet, rearing its long head backward, the crest that ran along the ridge of its nose down its long neck, flared. There was a moment of clarity where Wilkins watched in horrific fascination at what the thing was about to do. Those teeth gleamed as its mouth opened and without a warning a gust of fire exploded out of its throat.
Crikey Dick, you’re going to be the first pilot in RAF history to be killed by a real life fire-breathing dragon.
The heat impacted against the glass, turning it black almost immediately. The jets of flame did not cease and inside the cockpit, the hapless pilot felt the temperature rising.
“Mayday!” He shouted as he felt his air become even more heated. The torrent of fire continued until the cockpit glass was completely obscured and he could see nothing above. Unfortunately, there was no reprieve as the Tornado continued its deadly tailspin. Fleetingly, he saw the gauges on the instrument panel, showing how quickly he was approaching ground. Perhaps, he could eject. The propulsion might give him enough velocity for the cockpit to dislodge the damn thing. Realising he had little choice, he resigned that it was his one chance of surviving.
It was a chance dashed with the sound of glass cracking.
Under the intense heat, the glass began to fissure and he was the cracks crisscross across the cockpit bubble. One after the other, they appeared, like spidery webs spreading out even further and further across. In a desperate attempt to keep the bubble from shattering, Wilkins placed a gloved palm against the glass, making a feeble effort to brace it. Even through the leather, he could feel the heat and as he saw the altitude gauge crying out that the ground was coming nearer and nearer, he wondered which death was preferable.
When the glass shattered and Captain Richard Wilkins went to meet his maker with a final burst of flame that consumed him whole, he realised belatedly that there really was no difference.
*********
She was going to be sick.
She was going to be sick and it had little to do with the nausea associated with her pregnancy. This sensation of disgust, that hollowed out her insides like a flesh of a fruit being scooped out with a spoon was the result of something far removed from the sanctity of growing life. This was a malignancy that found its root in cruelty and horror. Eve did not want to look but closing her eyes and shutting out the images could not stop the screams, the terrible, agonized screams of the massacred inhabitants of Sennen Cove. In the end, she had sank to her knees on the soft sand of the shore, her hands covering her ears because she could bear it no more.
As a former police woman, she was used to blood. She was used to seeing the very depths of human ugliness. Crack addicts, serial killers, drive by killers, rapists, molesters and murderers, she had seen the very worst of humanity’s sins and managed somehow, to retain the hope that people were good that the world was a place of light.
Tonight, however, had changed all that.
Never again would her world be that secure. Tonight, she had caught a glimpse of true evil and knew that the memory of it would never leave her.
Tonight she had seen it in David Saeran’s face.
The Lord of Mordor did not move from his place in the sand, standing like a god who had shaped the world in seven days and had come to the conclusion that he liked not what he had created and set about to destroy it all. Sennen Cove was that ruined tapestry now, a mosaic of broken bodies, of flaming buildings and screaming victims, struggling to escape and unaware that their killers were merely offering them a brief respite before the tearing resumed.
After all, what animal did not like to play with its food?
She knew what he was doing of course. He had explained it to her almost with relish, perfectly aware that with each clarification, he was sealing her own fate with words of steel. Each answer was a rivet in the cage he was building around her, showing her how inescapable her prison was as he revealed to her in bloody horror, the consequences of any attempt to escape. Even sheathed in her womb, her baby was not safe from him. Saeran wanted Eve stripped of all sense of power and cursing him inwardly, Eve knew that he was succeeding.
She was beyond horror now.
Her only hope for salvation lay in Aaron’s and the elves ability to defeat Saeran as they had before and even so, that hope was slim. What he had done Sennen Cove showed her just how far he was willing to go, just how much power lay at his disposal. He had wanted to take revenge on the last place the elves had called their own before taking the Straight Road, the last place in Arda they had been seen. He hadn’t just avenged himself on the elves that left here, he had salted the earth so that they could never again set foot on Mithlond without sensing the atrocity that had been carried out here.
“We should go,” Saeran said to her, surveying the destruction with a pleased destruction. A small hint of a smile formed when he saw a young girl having somehow survived, emerging from her hiding place only to be set upon by a dozen spiders. Her screams as she was torn to shreds by their sharp talons warmed his ears like music and noted that Eve had heard too, for she was sobbing louder.
“You bastard…” she somehow managed to curse through her tears..
“Still coherent,” he met her gaze with a smirk, “how resilient of you. No matter, there will be plenty of time for that to change my dear Eve. I am about to recreate the world and I won’t take seven days.”
“You’re no God!” She hissed. “You’re insane!”
“Absolutely,” he said motioning the Nazgul who had been standing by him like an honour guard. “However, I do believe we are done here. It’s time to fly Eve.”
“What?” She stared at him, still trying to grasp what fresh horror he intended on inflicting on her. She noticed the Nazgul approaching her and scrambled away. As if there were somewhere she could even go, she thought sardonically when Eve gave up her attempt and allowed the creature’s gloved hand to wrap around her arm. It felt like ice against the skin.
“Come….” The wraith ordered, pulling her roughly to her feet. Over head, the flapping of wings could be heard and Eve looked up at the dark sky to see the winged beasts the Nazgul had used for their transport descending towards the ground.
“NO!” She protested.
“Don’t be tiresome Eve,” Saeran replied, enjoying her terror so very much. “We have to leave. I have business to attend elsewhere.”
“Let me go!” She struggled as the wraith dragged to the animal that had set down on the shore a few feet away. “I’m not getting on that thing!”
Saeran nodded at his servant, who promptly silenced her with a backhanded blow across the face. Eve saw it coming but couldn’t react fast enough to avoid being hit. The cold hand struck her hard enough to force the air out of her lungs and consciousness from her mind. With a stunted gasp, the world went dark around her and she knew no more.
The Nazgul swept the unconscious woman into his cold arms as his master mounted the winged beast, moving with a brutal grace that kept her from touching the ground and borne away like a lifeless rag doll. Saeran took the leather reins of the winged beast’s harness and regarded the rest of his sentinels, who were waiting for his order as they themselves prepared to fly.
“The word is sent I take it?” He regarded Morgul.
“Yes my master,” Morgul nodded, his eyes looking subserviently at the ground instead of at his lord. “They sensed your presence immediately after you departed the Eldar prison. They have awoken in every corner of the world and are drawing to your seat of power.”
“Good,” Saeran said with a smile, “and the Uruks?”
“They are all awakened my lord,” Morgul answered again, “they are hungry for man flesh and the locals we have been providing them are growing inadequate to sate their stomachs.”
“Naturally,” Saeran replied. “That’s the way it is with pets. You’ve never had a goldfish Morgul so you don’t know.”
“I wasn’t aware that you had one either Master,” Morgul could not resist returning.
“I was born into this body as an infant Morgul. It amused Melkor to buy me one when it was eight years old,” Saeran snorted as he dug his heels into his mount, causing the beast’s wings to flapped dramatically in reaction, “for that alone, I was happy to kill him.”
********
Aaron found him on the deck, staring into the darkness of the ocean that surrounded them. The boat was continuing through the waves without pause, keeping pace with the second flotilla of ships to leave Aman this day. There had not been much chance to talk, what with Saeran’s escape and all the consequences that followed. However now that they had a brief minute to catch breath, Aaron found his thoughts centred on the only other person who could possibly understand what he was enduring by Eve’s abduction.
“Bryan?” He called out to the MI6 man who had said little since they had got underway.
“Yeah,” Bryan turned his head slightly in response.
“Are you alright?”
His shoulders dropped with a sigh, “I’ll live.”
“That’s not the same as being alright,” Aaron interjected.
“Spare me the analysis,” Bryan said shortly. “I just want to bloody left alone for awhile.”
“I understand,” the psychiatrist nodded starting to withdraw. One thing Aaron had come to learn about Bryan during their acquaintance, was the man’s aversion to psychiatrists.
“I just wanted to see if you were alright.”
Another sigh escaped into the air like trapped gas. “Thanks mate,” he said quietly, “but I’m not ready to talk about I feel. We’ve got bigger things to worry about at the moment, getting Eve back for instance.”
Aaron stiffened as Bryan inadvertently turned the tables on him and he felt the groundswell of fear and worry for his wife surface with surprising ease through all his conscious efforts to ignore it.
“Yeah, if she’s still alive.” Aaron could not keep himself from saying under his breath. He could imagine no reason why Saeran would keep her alive and every reason for the man to want her dead. What greater act of vengeance could there be than to take the life of his enemy’s wife and child?
“She’s alive.” Bryan spoke with a voice ground up with glass, sharp and biting. “He did Tory too quick. There was no chance to make me twist in the wind, wondering if she’s still alive or not. He wants more than revenge, he wants to make you pay a hundred times before he actually kills her. He’s going to let her live just long enough for you think that you might get her back and then kill her.”
Bryan did not need to see the shudder in Aaron’s being to know it occurred. Bryan knew evil men and while Saeran seemed destined to occupy a level all on his own, Bryan had seen enough of torture and villainy to know exactly what the dark lord had planned for Aaron. “But he’s underestimated us this time, he thinks we’re coming alone. No Valar or Gandalf, just us and the elves.” Bryan was staring into the sea, his mind formulating plans upon plans, the realisation that was clear to him now that he had time to think about it. His grief for Tory was locked away and when he could, he would mourn her but not right now. Ever the soldier, he kept aside his personal feelings for the job that needed to be done.
“What do you mean?” Aaron inquired, not quite following because unlike Bryan, he did not know how to segregate his feelings as efficiently as the former MI6 agent.
“Fred,” Bryan said firmly, having placed a considerable amount of the voyage into trying to determine what was Fred’s role in all this was. The little girl, who was the only other person in the world who meant as much to him as Tory, was not alone in her young body. Something else was in there with her. Something unexpected. It was a wildcard he was certain not even Saeran had expected.
“Fred?” Aaron spoke up and then let the implication set in. Yes, Fred. “Who do you think is in there with her? One of the Valar?”
“No,” Bryan shook his head. “Whatever Saeran did to play his get out of jail card, he had to make sure that the Valar were out of the way. He’s found a way around them, left them trapped in that dimension where Valinor used to be. If they could have gotten out, they’d done it already when those balrog beasties went trampling over Tirion. No it’s something else. I have a feeling that Galadriel knows what it is and maybe Elrond too. I can’t see any reason why they’d be so quick to leave the island and sail to our world unless they were told to do so by someone they couldn’t refuse.”
“Well maybe the submarine had something to do with it,” Aaron pointed out, however, he suspected that Bryan was right. Fred was down below with Miranda and the kids but it was clear that she wasn’t herself. It gave him some comfort to know that despite the fact the world seemed hurtling forward towards catastrophe, Miranda Miller was nevertheless still fixing dinner for her children and Frank was putting them to bed as if it were any other day. Perhaps that was the strength of families, he thought inwardly and prayed that he and Eve would have a chance to find out.
“I’d love to see the report that Isaiah bloke is going to be writing to Norfolk,” Bryan said finding a little humour in the fact that their tiny armada was being accompanied by a Seawolf Class nuclear submarine. Not exactly the best way for the human race to be introduced to the ancients in their elegant swan ships, descending on the English coastline.
“Could be worse,” Aaron replied. “The guy could have considered us a threat and blown us to bits.”
“I highly doubt that,” Legolas Greenleaf stepped on the wooden deck to interject.
“I hate it when you sneak up on us like that,” Aaron threw the elf a look, always finding it disconcerting how the Eldar could be so stealthy in their approach. “One of these days I’m getting you a bell.”
Legolas smirked, accustomed to these comment from the humans who still could not fathom their ability to move so silently. “Captain Isaiah bears a striking resemblance to Imrahil.”
“Who?” Bryan turned around from the rail and regarded the elf.
“Imrahil,” Legolas explained, “Prince of Dol Amroth. The captain’s manner is much like the Prince. In the War of the Ring, Imrahil was a great supporter of Aragorn in his claim to the throne.”
“Are we going to keep running into people we knew from the past?” Bryan exclaimed, uncertain whether or not he ought to be pleased that Captain Hill had some history with them. Bryan did not relish having to tell the man that about a hundred thousand years ago, his previous incarnation had been a lord of an ancient kingdom. It was not wise to upset a man who had in his possession, several ICBMS.
“Eve said it’s a cosmic turntable,” Aaron retorted, recalling the night she had made that statement and realising that it was at that moment, that he had fallen completely in love with her, again. “We're destined to meet the same people even if we were different in the past.”
“Bloody wonderful,” Bryan grumbled. “I’m going to see how Fred or whoever she is, is doing.” Solitude was not something he was not going to receive tonight, despite his fondness for his companions.
Neither Legolas or Aaron spoke until Bryan had brushed past them, nothing the haunted veil over his eyes that not even his formidable control could hide.
“I fear for him,” Legolas said a few seconds after Bryan had departed. “His heart is broken even if he hides it well.”
“He loved her,” Aaron shrugged, hearing nothing new in Legolas’ words. “He can’t be any other way. I’m praying I don’t find out what he is feeling first hand.”
Legolas reached for Aaron’s shoulder and offered comfort with a light squeeze. “Sauron will not kill her, not until you are there to see it. And when that moment comes, we will do everything we can to stop him.”
Aaron nodded sombrely, “I hope you are right, old friend.”
“Go and rest,” Legolas urged. “You are no good to us exhausted and we will need all your strength if we are to re-enter your world in numbers great as these,” he glanced at the ships sailing around them.
“Alright,” Aaron conceded the request since he was feeling somewhat drained and truth be known, he wouldn’t mind a little sleep to forget the worries plaguing his waking hours. “Thank you Legolas,” he said and turned to leave. As he neared the steps leading into the cabin, he saw Ariel emerge from below. The lady was wrapped in a warm cloak, her dark hair pulled behind her head in an efficient ponytail. Anyone who saw her would know instantly that she was an elf as her delicately pointed ears indicated. Still, Aaron thought that she appeared more faerie than elf.
“Your husband is sending me to bed,” Aaron remarked as he passed her.
“He does display some wisdom on occasion,” she said with a wry smile. “Sleep well Aaron, I am certain that thing will appear better in the morning.”
Aaron didn’t believe her but he was grateful for the encouragement. “I’m sure it will,” he said half- heartedly before disappearing below.
“The mood is heavy on this vessel tonight,” Ariel stated as she approached her husband.
“It is,” Legolas nodded in agreement. Tory’s death, Sauron’s escape, their disconnection from the Valar and the destruction of Tirion, all of it left a dark shadow of gloom over all of them. There could be no denying what they faced when they returned to Arda. Not only did they have to contend with Sauron’s agents but would also have to reintroduce themselves to a race who believed their existence to be little more than myths with no basis in fact.
“Husband,” Ariel looked at him with purpose, “we must talk.”
Something in her tone drew Legolas’ gaze away from the sea to sapphire pools of her eyes. A state of uneasiness shifted free inside of him but he could not fathom why she would engender such a feeling in him. “I thought that is what we were doing, my love.” He answered, staring at her in puzzlement.
“Am I husband?” She asked leaning on the railing next to him. “Am I the one you love?”
Legolas blinked. “What in Eru’s name do you mean?” He demanded. “Of course you are the one I love!”
“Think carefully on that question for we both know that it is not as straight forward as it may seem."
“Wife, I do not comprehend what you mean…”
“You see Legolas,” she said looking at the porthole of the cabin through which she could see some of their friends, going about their business, unaware of the observation. “When Eve met Aaron, she was not drawn immediately to him or the memory of what they once had. All she had; was a feeling to tell her that she loved this man once and would do so again. She remembered nothing of the man he had been, nothing of Aragorn Elessar. It is the same for Miranda and Frank, no memory of the people they had been, no knowledge of the past, merely a feeling. They had the chance to know each other again, without expectation of their past selves to hinder them.”
“I suppose,” Legolas stared at her hard, determining by the intensity of her gaze and her voice that he was on the cusp of something he should be wary of. “I still do not see…”
“No you do not,” she said softly. “You do not see very well at all. To you, I am your Melia, nothing else. One hundred thousand years I have been at your side and not once do you see me as Ariel, born in Tirion to Anais and Didriel of Aqualonde. You will not have children with me because you have had them with her, when you cry out in passion, is it my face you see or hers?”
Legolas was stunned.
“How can you even assume such a thing?” He almost exploded. “Of course I see you and not Melia!”
However, even as he said it, he knew he was not entirely sincere. Elves were not prone to untruths but this one he could not bring himself to confess, even to himself. The enormity of it was too much. Ariel had been reincarnation of his wife. His soul had known it the instant he laid eyes upon her. How else could they have married if she were not Melia? Unlike humans who could discard their mates at will, elves chose their mates only once and maintained that choice even if one half of that union was dead. He had known what he risked when he chose Melia for his and though fifty years with her was a mere shadow in the lifetime of an elf, he had been content even if it meant going on without her. When he arrived at Valinor with Gimli, he knew immediately that Melia was returned to him in the form of Ariel.
But the maid before him was not entirely Melia was she? Just as Aaron Stone was not Aragorn Elessar as he had been when he ruled Gondor, Ariel was not the Melia he remember and yet that had not stopped him from seeing her that way, had it?
“When you fought the balrog, when you were dazed, you did not call my name, you called hers.” Ariel accused.
“I did n….” but the words failed him because his memory was as good as hers and he knew he had done just that. He had called Ariel, Melia. “I am sorry,” he said after a pause. “I did not mean to.”
Being proved right did not make her feel any better and the truth was now laid before them both and he could not deny it. Indeed, he was unable to deny it. “I am not Melia, I may share her soul but I remember nothing of her. I know only that I, Ariel, love you. I always will and if that comes from Melia I can live with that but I cannot live with you seeing nothing else. I am a person who is deserving of her husband’s love as much any woman, not merely the representative of his memory of someone who no longer exists.”
“I will try,” he said feebly and knew that it would not be enough. He thought of all the things he had said to her over the years, the demands he had made upon her. Yes, he had denied her children because as far as he had been concerned, his child rearing days were behind him. He had shared that experience with Melia already, having raised a son and daughter, Thalionhis and Annunmelian. There seemed no reason to revisit it. He had assumed that Ariel would share this view since….
Oh sweet Eru.
How ill he had behaved! Legolas was reeling in mortification because he had proven himself even guiltier of her accusation by the train of thought he had just embarked upon. He had assumed that Ariel would share the same view because Melia had raised a son and daughter with him.
“I do not know if I am willing to accept that,” Ariel replied, sensing the pain he felt but could feel little empathy because her own anger and frustration as bubbling to the surface after so many years in suppression.
“What do you mean?” Legolas stared at her sharply. “Will you not give me a chance to prove myself to you?”
“You have been unable to change in ten millennia,” she pointed out. “What makes you believe that you will be able to do so now?”
“This is not the time for such thoughts Ariel,” Legolas implored, a deep sense of despair rising up from within his stomach at the realisation that he might have lost his mate as surely as Bryan, only he had no one to blame but himself. “These are the End of Days and neither of us may survive it. Do you wish to embark upon this course now?”
"That I make this demand of you at this time, was not my intention. However, my discontent has been growing more pronounced of late and today,” she blinked, trying to hide the tears that wanted to come but supposed he knew to well not to notice her anguish. “Today when you called her name not mine, you broke my heart Legolas. You broke my heart and I did not deserve that. I have been a good wife to you. I have played the role you wish me to play, hoping that in time you would see me, not her. Perhaps that was my folly, that I allowed you that when I should have been more forceful in the presentation of my own identity. Whatever the cause of it, I do not wish the continuance of this marriage under these circumstances.”
With that, Ariel brushed past him, unable to trust herself to speak further on this. His grief would cave her resolve and for once, Ariel was determined to remain strong. For once, she would be selfish instead of selfless.
“We are not humans,” he protested, grabbing her arm to stop her from leaving. “We do not break our vows to each other so carelessly.”
“The vows you made were not to me,” she said pulling her arm back, her eyes boring into him mercilessly. “They were made to her.”
And Legolas could do nothing to stop her as she left him because inside, he knew it was true.
For Cirdan, returning to Mithlond was a journey he had longed to make.
In the age of Arda, Mithlond had been his home and it was the course he knew best when returning to the land he and his kind had departed so many years ago. For those who had travelled with him on that last journey, this homecoming was met with excitement, despite the grave circumstance that brought them here. During the last leg of the journey, he had asked to be returned to his ship from the steel beast he had been travelling. While Cirdan found many wonders with the vessel that Isaiah Hill captained, he missed the sensation of wind in his hair and the taste of salty sea air. Like Earendil who sail the sky with the light of the simaril on his brow, Cirdan only felt alive when he sailed great oceans of the world.
From the bow of the tall white ship that led the elven fleet to Mithlond, Cirdan sought out the welcome sight of land in the distance. Yet even as he did so, he could feel the gradual presence of something dark and sinister settling upon his heart. He knew not what this portent could mean but it bode ill for them he was certain and the closer they drew to the shore, the greater his sense of unease became.
“You sense it too,” Elrond Peredhil stated announcing his arrival with that grim question. The stare of Imlardis’ former lord was fixed upon the same stretch of land and his expression mirrored Cirdan’s anxiety.
With him was the girl Fred, the child that all knew was not the same one who had come to them a scarce year ago. She had become something else.
“He has preceded us to Mithlond,” the girl said dryly.
Cirdan shuddered at her manner but this was soon forgotten in the light of her words. “Oh Eru,” he breathed softly as he began to make out the column of smoke rising from the shore in the distance. “What has he done?”
“What Sauron does best,” she answered sadly. “Destroy.”
********
Mithlond or rather the town of Sienna Cove was rorted.
As the elves and humans alike stepped onto its shores, there were no sounds except that of dying cackle of fire. The air was wet with the scent of blood. To those with the keener senses, it was all too evident what had taken place here. Nothing remained standing. Buildings were reduced to burnt-out shells, their foundations and supports were nothing but charred debris. Trees were now dead stumps and everything that lived in Mithlond was reduced to ash.
“Oh my god,” Aaron broke the silence.
“God had nothing to do with this,” Bryan declared turning away, somewhat prepared for scenes like this even before they had caught sight of land. Saeran was back for revenge and it was only natural that this place, which held such significance for the elves, would be his first port of call.
“He’s not going to be hard to find like this,” Eric added, stating the obvious. “If this is what he’s going to do to the rest of the world, we just have to follow the bodies.”
“One man did this?” Isaiah exclaimed as he took in the sight along with his elven and human companions.
“He’s not alone.” Fred explained. “He is more powerful than he has ever been. He has taken Melkor’s power for his own and has called to him all the creatures that served him through the ages. The ones he fashioned himself.”
Miranda’s breath quickened. “The Nazgul.”
“And more,” Fred continued to speak. “They are crawling out of the darkness from every corner of this world. They have been waiting for a long time to rally and the Lord of Mordor has given them purpose again. He is drawing them to him even as we stand here.”
“Then we’ve got to get moving,” Bryan took the lead, “Cirdan, you need to take the fleet and move along the coast. If Sauron’s headed for London, that’s the best place to meet him. If we kill as many of those bloody things he’s got working for him in London, we might be able to stop him before he heads for Romania.”
“Romania?” Isaiah, the novice in all this looked at his companions with puzzlement.
“In our time,” Legolas spoke up, “it was called Bara-dur. It was the seat of his power. It exists in what you now called Romania.”
A grim silence fell over the group as Prince of Mirkwood made that statement.
Bara-dur.
It was a realm they thought was done, its evil they believed to be vanquished. The idea that they would fight another battle, perhaps the battle to end all battles was an ominous feeling. However, it was not a silence Bryan could indulge. Saeran had taken Tory from him and if the desire for revenge could fuel an effort to save the world than so be it. The tactician in him could see they didn’t have a lot of time. Saeran’s actions on this small community proved that he didn’t care who was aware of him now. The veil of secrecy this lot had been so particular about keeping over throughout history had been abandoned and that made Bryan very concerned.
“Come Cirdan,” Elrond placed a hand on the former lord of Mithlond. “Do not look. Do not allow Sauron to place a shadow upon your heart.” The elf lord spoke kindly to his friend.
The old mariner could not avert his eyes and why should he? Mithlond had been his home. From these shores, he had left Arda forever and to return now to this destruction, broke his heart.
“Right,” Bryan interrupted loudly and addressed everyone present. “I know this is hard for you and your people Elrond but we have to move NOW.” He stared everyone down.
“Bryan take it easy…” Miranda started to say.
“I’m sorry luv but we can’t,” he returned promptly and met the eyes of those before him. “We just can’t. I’d love to say we ought to take a minute to mourn the dead but we don’t have the time. We’ve got to move now while we have the time. Saeran was ready to rain ICBMs on the planet the last time we dealt with him, what do you think he’s prepared to do now?”
“Oh my god….” Miranda’s eyes widened as understanding began to fill her thoughts.
“WHAT?” Aaron exclaimed somewhat unnerved by anything that could leave the blonde shaken.
“It’s what he wants,” Legolas said grimly, feeling his stomach hollow with horror. “His minions survive because they are bound to him. No weapon of man can harm them so long as he exists. Using your world’s terrible weapons against him will accomplish only one thing; poisoning your earth so neither Eldar nor Edain can survive here. He and his, however, will manage quite well.”
“Exactly,” Bryan nodded.
He had spent the journey from Valinor trying to discern what Saeran’s plans would be once the dark lord had returned to the world of men and it was so clear if you knew what the bastard wanted to achieve. After all, Saeran had spent years engineering his army of Uruks. He had planned to use them after the bombs from one year ago had been deployed. Everything he had done was to engineer an empire that would emerge after the nuclear fires had died with only the remnant of a beaten human population to contend with.
“Are you saying he’s trying to goad us into a fight?” Aaron declared horrified.
“Yes,” Fred spoke in that unearthly voice before Bryan could answer, “and when your people discover that your guns are useless against Sauron and his dark army, they will in their desperation, turn to the deadlier devices in your arsenal. They will use your weapons of mass destruction against him and learn all too late, that they have no effect on creatures of shadow. However by then the Earth will be so tainted that what is left of your people will be no match for him and his army.”
“And as he has broken the barriers between Arda and the Undying lands, we will be poisoned too though I think our deaths will be a prolonged agony.” Elrond concluded the terrible summation of Sauron’s dark plans.
“Jesus Christ,” Isaiah said wandering away from the group, sickened by the magnitude of Saeran’s evil. A military man, he could almost see it played out as the little girl had so eerily described. Of course they would turn to nuclear weapons when all else had failed. It would be inconceivable to the powers that be that any creature could be impervious to that kind of weapon. If it appeared that they could defeat Saeran’s army, he could imagine NATO coming to that decision. Better to risk a few thousand casualties to wipe out a seemingly indestructible enemy.
It would come down to numbers and though it could be considered a good tactical move, it would instead play right into the hands of the enemy.
“Right,” Bryan said sharply. “Now you know and so we have to act. Captain Hill, you need to lead Cirdan and the fleet to London. Right now, the fastest way to get the elves there is by sea. In the mean time, we need your Operations officer to start monitoring the airwaves. This bloody mess didn’t happen too long ago, a day at most I estimate. I’m actually surprised that we haven’t got any emergency services people here yet.”
“I was wondering that myself, hold on a second.” Isaiah said to Bryan, a thought occurring to him. The Connecticut had reported to Norfolk that it was delayed in the Norwegian basin owing to engine failure. It was a considerably more reasonable explanation than explaining to his superiors that he had discovered an island of elves and was escorting their fleet to England in order to stop an evil dark lord from taking over the world. Considering the Connecticut was carrying nuclear torpedoes, this was the response least likely to cause the navy to send out a fleet of submarines to carry out highlights from the Hunt for Red October.
Isaiah didn’t think he looked a bit like Sean Connery.
Lifting the radio attached to his belt to his lips, Isaiah radioed the Connecticut. “Hennessy, have you been monitoring civilian communication? What’s going on?”
“I have Sir,” Lt. Hennessy reported automatically from within the confines of the submarines’ bridge. He had been ordered to maintain radio silence during their journey back to prevent Norfolk or any other satellite from locating them. However, while he hadn’t been transmitting, he had been listening and the last few hours had been very odd indeed. Hennessy had wanted something more concrete before interrupting the Captain and their guests but the opportunity had not shown itself. “There’s some kind of satellite disruption going on. Local media towers aren’t transmitting clearly. I’m getting a lot of static. I think telephone lines might be down too.”
“What about mobile phones?” Jason asked, not meaning to eavesdrop. “I mean cell phones.”
Isaiah gave the Kiwi a look and repeated the question.
“Can’t say for certain Captain,” Hennessy answered. “At this time, I’m not even sure what’s causing the satellite failure but it’s widespread. People are getting intermittent access. Some of our global position instruments are also having trouble.”
“Alright,” Isaiah nodded. “Keep me appraised as soon as you find out what’s going on out there. Maintain our radio silence. No one needs to know where we are just yet.”
Looking up at the others after ending the call, he had to ask. “Is this him?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Bryan shrugged. “Fred, is Saeran doing this?”
“Yes,” she nodded automatically. “He wishes your people to be divided, frightened. The longer your people are unaware of what is happening, the harder it becomes to rally your defences. It would not be difficult for him to shift the path of your orbiting devices, to let them drift into the darkness.”
Bryan closed his eyes to focus. He had to use the rage he felt, the anger at Saeran for taking Tory away, used that hatred to give him focus, to help him drive the others the way they needed to be. “Captain Hill, Elrond, Cirdan, you should go now. You need to reach London and try to contact the authorities, tell them to clear a path between here and the city. Tell them someone’s deployed Sarin gas or the Ebola virus if you have to, just get everybody out of his way. Tell them to come here and see what he’s done if they don’t believe you.”
“That’s a tall order,” Isaiah pointed out, unable to think of even how he was going to approach this particular task. It didn’t matter, he had to try. Until now, Isaiah hadn’t voiced a secret fear that had been nagging at him since his departure from Valinor. Perhaps the unreality of the whole situation had convinced him the danger was real, not until he found himself at Sennen Cove, face to face with the destruction here.
He prayed to God that Lori hadn’t missed her scheduled flight to the States from Heathrow.
********
Eve screamed.
Her wail of agony travelled across the vaulted ceiling of the famous Exeter cathedral rivalling in tenor and ferocity the building’s famous pipe organ. Clutching her stomach in pain, Eve grovelled on the floor, tears running down her cheeks as the white-hot pain seared through her insides. Through the haze of her excruciating agony, she could feel an even worse violation, the terrified state of her unborn baby’s emotions. She couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak a word of any coherence except to offer fruitless protest against the radiating agony inside her womb.
“Please….” she begged, unaware that she had soiled herself. She knew she had vomited, she could smell the foul odour on her clothes and on the floor where she had regurgitated bile and saliva. “Please stop it! You’re …you’re…hurting….the….baby!” She said through her sobs.
“Nonsense,” Saeran retorted smoothly, oblivious to her agony even though he was most interested in what was happening to her. Watching her closely as he squatted nearby, Saeran studied the swelling of Eve’s stomach with clinical interest. He could feel the baby inside her womb, feel its terror and its pain. The little pup was struggling inside its mother’s flesh unaware of anything except the agony it was experiencing. It couldn’t even register what was happening to it as pain, merely distress. The buttons of Eve’s jeans snapped open, the metal pieces flying in all directions. Her body’s new shape bursting past the fabric.
“The pup will be just fine,” he said looking up at the robed figure standing nearby, waiting patiently for his master’s orders, as slow smile forming on his face. Though Uvath didn’t answer, Saeran could feel his beast’s pleasure. “However I do get impatient waiting for his arrival so we have to expedite things a little faster.”
With a mere flick of his powers, Saeran cast his gaze on Eve once more, his eyes burning with the flames as it did when Frodo Baggins first slipped the One Ring onto his finger.
Eve began to shudder and threw her head back before shrieking again in agony. Her scream so piercing that even Saeran winced a little. However, he did not stop. Within her belly, beneath the layers of skin and inside the wet walls of her womb, Saeran could see the child, could envision its body growing. Arms and legs were lengthening, its skull forming, tissue and clumps of cells becoming organs and muscle. Eve’s let out one final scream before her lungs gave out and she was rendered unconscious at last. Her limbs flopping uselessly against the floor, the woman knew nothing more.
“Strip her and clean her up.” Saeran ordered when it was all said and done.
“Yes my lord,” Uvath nodded and knelt down before the woman. It was just as well she was unconscious, the Nazgul thought as he began disrobing her. Undoubtedly she would struggle if she were not and he had no patience to deal with her hysterics. Uvath would not have cared if it were up to him. This she-elf in Edain skin was known to him and he had relished every tortured scream that led up to this moment. She was filthy with vomit and shit, he noted as he lifted her into his icy touch. Her dark hair plastered to her face in sweaty tangles.
“When she smells less like an animal, put her somewhere she can sleep and feed her when she awakes,” Saeran ordered. “She will need her strength.”
There was a pause. “Yes, my Lord.”
“You disagree?” Saeran said standing up.
“That is not possible my lord,” Uvath returned quickly as he hoisted a naked Eve into his arms. “I was merely….”
“Curious?” Saeran finished the sentence for him..
The Nazgul shifted uncomfortably, his discomfiture showing in the slight rustle of his dark robes. “Is it not expedient that we wait for the babe to be born in the proper course of time? Why do you hasten her quickening? We have much to do in the world of men, enemies to fight. What use is a child to us in the midst of this? It seems to be inconvenient.”
“I will answer you because it is a fair question Uvath,” Saeran said as he walked further down the aisle to the altar at the end of the carpet. “And because you are not one who questions often. Before he dies, I want the Isildur’s heir to see the child that would have been his son, I wish him to know that it is I, his babe will call father.”
There were other reasons of course, secret reasons that had to do with his own sense of self-preservation but for this moment, this would suffice. Saeran spared one more look at Eve as she was removed from his presence. She was naked in Uvath’s arms and the result of her torture was clear for all to see. When they had set out, there was no sign of her impending motherhood. Now, he could see the turgid swell of her belly. Ensuring that her child was more than just a collection of cells would make her more manageable, Saeran decided.
Turning his back on his servant as Eve was removed from his presence, Saeran stared at the altar before him and regarded the God these Edain called upon so often to give them deliverance.
“I am in your house carpenter,” Saeran smirked as he stared at the crucifix. “Do you think that when I reduce this world to ash that these fools will finally realise that is all you are, a bastard born of an adulterous woman with a penchant for story telling? I will leave your house unsullied carpenter,” he remarked turning away towards altar. “I will leave it standing because when the end comes you can make your apologies to them personally.”
********
Dad’s gonna be so pissed.
This thought ran through the mind of one Lieutenant Lorraine ‘Lori’ Hill as the Saab 39 Gripen Fighter she had been asked to pilot during her three week stay at the Royal Marines Base at Devon, spiralled out of control. Warnings lights were flashing across the cockpit console as the fighter jet spun in uncontrollably towards the ground. Her tolerance to extreme G-forces was good so Lori managed not to puke all over her flight suit while she struggled to regain control of her wounded bird.
Not an easy thing to do since most of the right wing was ripped off by a dragon. Yes boys and girls, Lori thought to herself as she ignored the queasiness in her stomach and kept her eyes fixed on the controls, a fucking dragon.
Lori had been thrilled when she and a handful of other American pilots had been selected to test pilot a number of Gripen fighter jets that the RAF had purchased recently. The Swiss made plane had been touted as the next thing in fourth generation fighters and before USAF had its own spanking new planes delivered, they wanted their pilots to have some idea how the things handled. So Lori found herself attached to the RAF for a couple of weeks and was all set to go home the day before when a squadron of Tornadoes were taken out above the English coast.
At first, no one could believe the reports coming out of Cornwell. Some kind of flying creatures were burning down everything in their path. Someone actually used the word dragon. Insanity, that’s what it was, insanity. Then they lost contact with Pendent, Land’s End, Penzance, Hale and Camborne. Aerial surveillance, what they could get of it, indicated towering infernos of black smock and oddly enough, communication blackout. Phone lines were destroyed, cell phones were rendered inert. The first thought that had crossed their minds was a terrorist attack. In these uncertain times, it was a logical conclusion to make.
Then the refugees began pouring out of Cornwall, with fantastical stories of dragons and monsters. Stories that told of enormous spiders and dogs that were as large as bears, tearing and murdering, to say nothing about the stories about real live Dementors leading the charge. No one knew what to make of it except to claim that it was the effect of some kind of gas attack by terrorists that produced hallucinations, Harry Potter ones it seemed.
It was much simpler to believe that than the truth.
The army was dispatched, the Devonshire Dorset Light Infantry was sent to gather some accurate intelligence as to what was happening in Cornwell.
They hadn’t been heard from since.
More planes were sent and in the spirit of trans-Atlantic cooperation, Lori and her fellow American pilots joined the fight. Not that it was much of a fight. The F3s and Gripen had left the Chivenor base at Devon uncertain of what they would face. By the time they took to the air, the panic and destruction had reached Exeter and the communication blackout was expanding. It was as if the world had been cut off from Cornwall. Satellites that were in place a day before were drifting aimlessly into space, having detached from their geo-synchronous by some unseen force. Governments were pointing fingers at each other and all the while, Cornwall was burning.
As they flew over the ground, Lori had shared the shock of her fellow flight jocks when she caught a visual of the terrain beneath them. Huge tracts of land were ablaze, buildings, houses, trees and fields of grass were charred into blackened ash. The smoke was so thick that it robbed them of visibility and though there was no indication of any ground zero, it was all too reminiscent of the September 11 attacks on New York City. Even though England was not her country, Lori felt the same outrage and wanted to find whoever was responsible.
Sharing a bond of kinship with her English brothers in the air, Lori became just as committed at finding out who was responsible for this destruction.
It wasn’t long before they learned it wasn’t a who but rather a what.
There was at least five of them and when they appeared on the scopes, Lori thought she was looking at enemy bogeys. They were certainly moving fast enough to justify the error. A little under Mach One, their ability to manoeuvre was exceedingly fast. Lori hadn’t seen that kind of capability since she had a chance to pilot a Harrier. When they finally got a visual, it was more all she could do to keep her jaw from dropping.
Their bogeys were dragons, real life honest to god dragons.
And what Lori had seen in the movies and books simply did not do the creatures justice. They hovered in mid air, the smallest one had a wing size comparable to a DC-10 and the largest, a 747. Their scales glistened from black to iridescent green, smooth, impossibly gracile muscles rippling under the sunlight. Lori thought they were almost beautiful. Malevolent red eyes glared at them before they opened their mouths and revealed impossibly large teeth.
Someone shouted the order to retreat but it was too late.
What happened next happened in blast of fire. Her Gripen was virtually bathed in it and she fired her engines to manoeuvred, felt something very big latch on to her plane. The weight forced the aircraft down and through the voice of panic she could hear through the radio, Lori realised that the dragons had broken formation and was attacking each plane one by one. She struggled to shake the thing off but its huge claws ripped off a wing like it was paper and somehow lost it grip in the process. It was determined however to have the plane and soon resumed its attack. She was saved when McRae in an F3 unleashed a hail of bullets at the beast, distracting it long enough for Lori to make her escape.
Such as it was.
She couldn’t regain control of the craft and it was still spinning. The ground was becoming perilously close but ever the optimist, the dragons were mostly concentrating on the planes overhead and had forgotten about her for the moment. She was fast approaching minimum safe distance for ejection and knew that she had to make the decision fast. A delayed ejection decision could cost Lori her life and she wasn’t quite ready to check out just yet. She could hear the other pilots through her radio and knew that they were having problems of their own.
Looking up, she couldn’t see anything because the air was so filled with smoke. However, through the turbulence, Lori hear their terror and the awful bellowing of the dragon’s roar just before it blasted them with a wall of fire. Closing her eyes, she activated the ejection mechanism.
She shot out of the plane like a bullet in a gun, the canopy sliding away and tumbling from the Gripen as Lori was launched through the sky, strapped to the ejection seat. Bracing herself for the wild ride down, she closed her eyes and waited for the familiar bloom of a parachute to appear above her head. A few seconds later, Lori felt her sharp descent slow and as she opened her eyes, saw that the parachute was there above her.
She’d never ejected before and had something of a phobia that the parachute wouldn’t open and she’d be one of those unfortunate persons who had their parachute silk stolen by that fuck in Catch-22, Minderbender. Fortunately, Lori was spared that much at least. As she descended into the township of Exeter, Lori studied the terrain and knew that if the people were right about the dragons, then they were right about all the other things they had seen too. The pilot wasn’t prepared to travel down that road yet but nevertheless double-checked that she was carrying her service pistol.
Beneath her, a fireball surged into the air when her Gripen hit the ground via the roof of a small office building and ignited the three-storey structure with an explosion that blew out all the windows and set it ablaze. Glass and mortar flew about in all direction, each fragment ignited by jet fuel and other accelerants. Lori hoped the building was empty when it hit but had a feeling that it wasn’t. She forced away the guilt for the moment because her survival depended on her having a clear head. That blast might have attracted the attention of the beast that caused it and Lori kept searching the sky for any signs that it might have seen her descent. The damn parachute was a dead giveaway.
The ejector seat deposited her in someone’s rather unkempt backyard. The house was still standing which was a good sign. Too many she had seen on the way down were burned out wrecks, The seat landed a few meters from the back door and Lori counted herself lucky she didn’t end up on the roof and make an unholy mess of it. Besides, those shingles didn’t look very strong. Quickly freeing herself from the seat, she glanced up and saw the aerial battle taking place.
Another plane was streaking towards the ground, trailing black smoke. She saw no other parachutes in the air and that frightened her almost as much as the dragons.
Was she the only one who made it to the ground?
God, she hoped not.
********
For Morgul, moments like this were far and few.
Even since the destruction of the One Ring and their subsequent resurrection in Arda by their master, Morgul had not experienced true joy as he had when Mordor still stood. The modern world was a bitter aftertaste in his mouth, especially when he had seen how populous the Edain had become. Like an infection, they covered every corner of the globe and their attempt to rule was next to pitiful. The entire race had been bred into weakness with not one amongst them worthy enough to rule.
Soon, the race of man would learn what true power was. Their master had return to them and the promises of a new age, beckoned with all the trappings of destruction in abeyance. As the Lord of the Nazgul moved across the debris covered street of Exeter, the latest city to fall under the onslaught of Sauron’s new army lay before him in ruins. What life there was left in the city was being hunted down by the wargs and the great spiders. The sound of screaming pierced the air at regular intervals as another enclave of cowering humans were located.
The dragons had rained fire upon the city, setting most of it a blaze. What the flame did not kill, the spiders and the wargs did so with ruthless efficiency, picking up the scent of blood and fear and following it back to its source. The spiders were gorging themselves, having not fed so richly in too long. The beasts had claimed the local museum for their own and created hatcheries within its walls. Neither Sauron nor Morgul saw any difficulty with this as there would be plenty of food to furnish the young while they formed, thanks to the good folk of Exeter.
The Edain army had arrived early this morning and attempted to halt their progress. Morgul had led his brothers against the arrayed forces. As none among them knew what they were facing, Morgul was able to end them quickly enough with a blast of Black Breath. When they had been resurrected into this new world, Morgoth had forbade the return of their full powers but now that their master was himself strengthened, he had returned to them to their former glory. The soldiers had fallen where they stood, enveloped by a sleep so dark they could not escape.
And as they lay there, unknowing, Morgul gave them to the spiders.
“Is he done with the female?” Morgul inquired as they past Guildhall towards the city centre.
“I believe so,” Adunaphel remarked, scanning the abandoned shop fronts and detected movement through the glass. Casting a look at the warg that followed behind him as if it were a pet, the wraith gestured in the direction of the shop front and said promptly. “Go.”
The beast launched itself forward on powerful legs, running across the sidewalk before entering the opened doors of the establishment. Its bulk belied its stealth and following the sound of breaking glass and furniture being upended, a terrified scream was cut short by its powerful roar.
“Don’t let the wargs eat them all,” Morgul advised. “The trolls will need to be fed also. Gather any other humans that are still alive and keep them in Guildhall. The trolls can feed when the sun goes down. Tell them to eat their fill because we will be moving at midnight. He wants to be in London by the morning.”
”Shall we send the dragons ahead?” Khamul inquired.
“Yes, he wants London in flames by the time we arrived there,” Morgul answered quickly. “You will go with Mumakan and Akhorahil. Carry out the same instructions, have the dragons burn down all telephone lines and destroy anything that resemble a transmitting tower. Not knowing what is happening or being able to talk to each other will heighten their state of panic. Khamul, you will lead the dragons against their jets. Mumakan and Akhorahil will breathe the Black Breath upon the city. Give them a taste of what is to come when we arrive there with our lord.”
“We will proceed now,” Mumakan nodded behind the dark hood of his cloak. “What of you?”
”The woman needs rest,” Morgul said with an unmistakable hint of disgust in his voice. “While the whelp festers inside her like an open sore, she must be handled delicately. As you would have heard from her bleating, our Lord Sauron has hastened her quickening, a process that taxes her body greatly. He cannot try again until she has regained sufficient strength or else he risks harming her and the babe.”
Adunaphel shook his head in confusion. “I do not understand his fascination for this female. She is fair and does bear some passing resemblance to Luthien but she ruts with the incarnation of Isildur’s heir! She would taint him with her poisonous elven blood.”
“SILENCE!” Morgul roared, a frightening sound that made the wargs following them in attendance shrink back in fear, their ears flattening as their fur rose. “You do not question the Master! Do you not feel what he feels? The elves are coming!”
“The elves?” Adunaphel’s eyes flashed like red embers.
“Yes,” Morgul nodded. “Can you not sense their presence? Search yourself, open your mind to his power and you will feel them...”
Adunaphel did not speak but did as he was instructed, opening his thoughts, connecting himself to their masters’ formidable essence. Like a thirsty man standing on the edge of a great lake, the sheer power at Sauron’s disposal was overwhelming and threatened to drown him in its great depths if he leaned too far in. In the murky water, he saw what Morgul saw…the great ships of the Teleri sailing across the ocean with the Peredhil and the Lord of the Falathrim leading the charge.
“How soon?” Adunaphel started to say.
“They are already here,” Morgul said abruptly, impatient by Adunaphel’s inability to see but then again he had been the last to fall completely into shadow and was always to afraid to test the limits of his connection to their lord. While Sauron saw nothing worrisome in this, Morgul found it annoying.
There should be no secrets among the Nazgul.
“Should we not deal with them?” The lesser Nazgul asked not merely of Morgul but of all his brothers assembled. “They will carry with them elven blessed weapons, weapons that can harm us.”
“If our lord is not afraid, then neither should we be,” Khamul spoke with derision.
“We will be waiting for the Eldar when they arrive in London,” Morgul said smugly. “The Teleri do not have enough ships for all the elves of Valinor to make the journey here and furthermore, they will be perceived as much of a threat to the Edain of this world as we are. They will find no allies on these shores. If nothing else, the Edain are hostile and divisive, they will view the elves with hostility and while they are trying to discern whether Elrond and his ilk ought to be trusted, our Uruks will be awaiting us at Bara-dur.”
However, despite his bold words, Morgul did not reveal to his brother that the arrival of the Eldar was of concern to Sauron, whether or not the dark lord wished to admit it. The others like Khamul and Mumakan could sense it but Adunaphel was too fearful to probe the dark recesses of Sauron’s thoughts. What other reason could there be for hastening the birth of the child?
If nothing else, Sauron knew how to survive, even if it was in the unlikeliest of places.
********
It was the screams that woke Eve up from her black sleep.
It cut through her ears so abruptly, that she sat up as if awaking from a nightmare, only to realise that it was the other way round, she was waking up to the nightmare. She looked around the room and did not recognise where she was but noticed that it was somewhat Spartan in its furnishings. A wooden cross hung on the wall and the few books on the shelves were somewhat theological in its nature. So intent was Eve in studying her surroundings for that first few minutes, that she didn’t notice that she was naked.
But that wasn’t even the worst of it.
Eve looked down and saw her stomach, saw her swollen stomach where only yesterday it had been flat without any outward signs of pregnancy. As she gaped at herself, her hand drifted to the rise of her belly and felt the involuntary kick of the child within. Her fingers shrank back as if scalded, the enormity of what had been done settling over Eve like thick smoke. She couldn’t breathe and had to fight the urge to scream.
What had he done to her? What had he done to her baby?
Almost as if he knew she was awake, the door to the room suddenly creaked open and David Saeran stepped inside, pausing at the doorway to take a long appreciative look at her.
“My dear you are positively glowing,” he smirked, his expression showing no endearment in that remark only mocking derision.
“What have you done to my baby, you bastard!” Eve hissed angrily and yet she hugged her arms around her rounded belly, protecting the child inside of her even though she did not know if it was still her child or some abomination that Saeran had created inside of her using her child’s body.
Saeran completed his entry into the room, shutting the door behind him. In his hand, he carried a glossy paper bag, like something one would get after shopping at a boutique. “I brought you something to wear,” he said indifferently. “As entertaining as it might be to have you continue our journey with nothing on, this damn English weather makes that rather impossible. After all, you have the baby to think about.”
“WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME!” She shrieked with rage, her fists shaking.
Saeran smiled, unperturbed by her outburst. “Nothing that will harm your infant permanently I assure you,” he said coolly. “I accelerated his growth a little. I thought I’d take these new powers for a spin and see what developed. I have to say it was quite informative.”
“Informative!” She sputtered in fury, her memory returning to her in its fullness. She remembered screaming in pain, begging for him to end the agony, pleading for her baby’s life. “If you’ve hurt my baby…”
“You’ll do what?” Saeran asked pointedly.
Eve fell silent, her eyes burning with hatred because she had never felt more helpless than at this moment. “Nothing,” she whispered, blinking tears of frustration that bordered on total despair. “I’ll do nothing.”
“A sensible decision,” Saeran lowered himself unto the edge of the bed next to her, dropping the bag on the floor at his feet. Eve wanted to shrink away from him, she wanted neither his touch nor his gifts. “If you continue to be sensible Eve, your time with me will not be unpleasant. I do not wish your affection but you can be engaging when you wish to be and there are moments when I require being engaged.”
"And in return?” Eve asked softly, refusing to believe that she would be forced to honour such an agreement because she still burned with the hope that Aaron and Bryan would deliver her this nightmare.
“In return, I’ll let you keep your son. If all goes to plan and I’m certain it will, I’ll have no real need of him except to ensure that you behave. Who knows, he might even prove to be as amusing to me as I am certain you'll be."
"You won't hurt him?" She lifted glistening blue eyes to him.
Giving in to him like this was hard. It felt as if a little part of her had died just saying the words. Until now, she hadn’t realised what a sacrifice it would be to ensure this child inside of her remained safe and still, she had no assurances that he wouldn't harm the baby, even if she gave him what he wanted.
If he chose to renege, there was nothing Eve could do to prevent it.
"I won't hurt him unless you give me reason to," Saeran answered, sensing her indecision and the awareness of the situation she was in.
Good, he thought with triumph. The first capitulation was always the hardest. The rest will be much easier.
********
As the flotilla of elven began their journey down the Cornish coast, those who had opted to remain behind set out to find themselves an alternate means of transport to London. Although Bryan wanted to send Frank and the kids out of harm’s way, his brother would not hear of it and was determined to stand by them in this fight. Frank did however, agree to entrust Pip and Sam into Jason’s care. The former camera man had friends in the north of England who could watch over the two boys while the adults in their party headed towards London.
“I don’t want to go,” Sam grumbled as he stood by the four wheel drive they had found abandoned in the outskirts of the Cove.
“Sam you have to,” Frank said to his child as Jason packed up the vehicle with supplies. “I need you to look after Pip.”
He hated sending the boys away but there was bloody work ahead and neither he nor Miranda could focus if they had were worrying about their children. At least up north, Sam and Pip be out of the line of fire while the fate of the world was being decided. Frank only hoped that they could succeed in stopping Saeran or else nowhere Sam and Pip were hidden would be safe.
Sam glanced at his brother who was being hugged hard by their mother and knew that despite his want to stay, he could not. He had to take care of Sam. “What about Fred?” He asked instead, knowing the little girl was not making the journey with them.
“I have to remain Sam,” she came forward and hugged him. “I have to show them the way.”
Frank exchanged an anxious glance with Miranda who had not been happy about this decision. However, it was clear that there was more to Frederica Bailey than they knew. Someone else was inhabiting her body at present, someone whose help they needed desperately to fight Saeran.
“But we’ve always done things together…” Sam protested weakly, knowing she, like his father was right.
“And we will again Sam,” she put her face on his cheek. “But this path I must walk alone and you must keep your brother safe. We will see each other again, I promise.”
Sam offered a small smile that hid his disappointment but he knew the little girl before him wasn’t all Fred and every since he had met her, nothing she told him was untrue. Sam didn’t think this time was any different.
“Alright,” he agreed at last, as if he had any choice in the matter. “I’ll go.”
“That’s my boy,” Frank smiled at his son and hoped as much as Sam that Fred’s promise would be the truth.
********
“You right to do this?” Eric asked Jason as his loyal camera man loaded up the back of the vehicle with supplies of fuel, food and Bryan’s contribution to the stores, a handgun just in case of trouble.
“Yeah,” Jason nodded. Although he wanted to stay and fight with his friends, he knew the importance of the task asked of him. Miranda trusted him with the most precious things in her life and he could not disappoint her. Whether or not it was the kinship shared by their past incarnations or the fact that the woman had earned his respect and admiration, Jason knew he would lay down his life to ensure that Sam and Pip were safe. “I’m right. You’re going to keep out of trouble?” He asked the crazy Australian who had made his life one roller coaster ride after another since their first meeting.
“Are you kidding?” Eric pretended to laugh with false bravado. “I’m keen to go mate. Evil dark lord, dragon and nuclear annihilation, if I don’t get a Pulitzer out of this, I’ll be able to shag all the birds I want.”
“That’s the way mate,” Jason rolled his eyes and laughed, “always thinking with your dick.”
“Has it ever led me wrong?” Eric returned smugly.
“I’m not even going to answer that,” Jason shook his head and said with a sobering expression. “You take care of yourself. If London’s still standing after this is all said and done, I’ll shout you a beer at the Old Bell.”
”You’re on,” Eric grinned and watched him climb into the driver’s seat, praying it wasn’t the last time he’d see his best friend again.
********
Of the group had returned from Valinor, only Aaron, Bryan, Miranda, Frank, Eric and Legolas remained in the ruined town of Sennen Cove. Ariel had gone with the elven fleet to London, a happenstance not unnoticed by anyone present and judging by Legolas’ mood, Aaron suspected that the gulf separating husband and wife was not merely distance. Something had taken place during the journey to Arda that Legolas was being exceedingly closed mouth about. As they prepared to leave Cornwall for London with Aaron and Legolas walking through the ruined town in the hopes of finding another vehicle to make the trip, Legolas’ silence forced Aaron to speak up.
"What the hell has happened between you and Ariel?” Aaron finally asked.
Legolas turned sharply to his friend. “That is none of your concern.” He said stiffly.
“The hell it isn’t,” the psychiatrist would not be deterred. This wasn’t just one of his patients or a consult, this was his friend and Aaron was determined to hear what was distracting him so. “You’re barely here and considering what we have to do and whom we have to face, you not being focussed is going to get you killed.”
“Do not lecture me when you are similarly plagued by Eve’s capture by Sauron,” Legolas bit back.
Aaron swallowed his anger at that rather underhanded comment because he could not deny how he had been acting. He had forced himself not to think of anything except getting Eve back and refused to entertain the notions of what Saeran could be doing to her. Aaron knew the folly in letting his imagination assume the worst; it would make him capable of being of any real use to her. Bryan was right, while Eve was still alive there was a chance to save her and if Bryan could put the battle ahead of his own grief, Aaron could do no less.
And the same applied to Legolas.
“I am plagued by her capture,” Aaron retorted, his jaw tensing with anger as he spoke, anger which he quashed because it confirmed his suspicion that whatever had happened between the elf and his lady, it was no lover’s quibble but something serious. Elves mated for life and divorce was unheard of. For a break of this magnitude, Aaron could well understand Legolas’ despair. “However, I can’t let that stop me from thinking straight. If I didn’t get myself under control, I am no good to her and she needs me to be strong. If Bryan can deal with his grief then I think you and I can manage a little better.”
The mention of Tory’s fate quelled Legolas’ anger somewhat and the elf let out a deep and weary sigh. “Ariel no longer wishes to be my wife.”
“Why?” Aaron exclaimed. “Is that even possible for you guys?”
“We will remain mated for all time and bound to one another but as you have often claimed, it requires more than love to make a union between two people last.” Legolas said unable to meet Aaron’s gaze because confronting his feelings only deepened his shame.
“So what’s the problem?” The human asked of the elf. “You two were together for a hundred thousand years, why now?”
“We have been together for a long time that is true,” Legolas admitted sadly, “but she was not the first love of my life.”
“Yeah I remember, Melia right?” Aaron asked as they saw a station wagon parked haphazardly against the kerb. The shattered glass and the deep grooves along the side panelling indicated the violence that had caused it to come to such an abrupt stop.
“Melia,” Legolas said quietly, remembering the beautiful woman who had been his wife for half a century. How he had loved her and how he had mourned her every day since her passing. A part of him had never really let go of Melia, even when he was convinced that she was reborn in Ariel’s body. At the core of him, Legolas knew he was still slave to the image of that maid from the Sunlands in her faded blue dress.
“And?” Aaron urged as he approached the car cautiously and felt his stomach hollow at the scent of diesel and blood. He needed Legolas to talk, so he wouldn’t be overwhelmed by yet another image of death.
“And Ariel thinks that I do not see her for who she is, just the memory of who she was to me in another life.” The elf admitted after a lengthy pause.
Looking through the shattered window, he could see blood and lots of it. If there was a body in the vehicle, it was no longer there but the torn seats and the claw marks against the upholstery gave Aaron ample evidence of what had taken place.
“So you told her she was wrong and she didn’t believe you?” Aaron said leaning through the window and pulling the lever that popped the hood. He winced as he did so, not wanting to look to closely at the blood just yet.
Legolas turned away, “I could not tell her that,” he said unable to face Aaron as he spoke, “because I do not believe she is wrong.”
A livid sky on London
And like the iron steeds that rear
A shock of engines halted
And I knew the end was near:
And something said that far away, over the hills and far away
There came a crawling thunder and the end of all things here.
For London Bridge is broken down, broken down, broken down,
As digging lets the daylight on the sunken streets of yore,
The lightning looked on London town, the broken bridge of London town.
The ending of a broken road where men shall go no more.
Excerpt from ‘The Old Song’ by GK Chesterton
*************
The bridge that connected London to Southwark had existed in one fashion or another for more than two thousand years. It had begun its life, as a symbol of Roman conquest, for no other empire was known more for the roads and bridges built during its occupation. The exact date of its birth was claimed to be in 46 AD since passage was needed across the Thames and the deepwater access to the sea made it ideal for the purpose. It was a construct of timber and nails that would stand in its place for a thousand years, before being burnt down by King Ethelred the Unready to protect London from the Danes.
By the time Peter de Colechurch had began construction of London Bridge in 1136, it had been rebuilt twice since its destruction by the unfortunately named Ethelred. In 1209, the bridge was rebuilt with stone instead of wood and stood for the next 600 years, although its history was laced with several deadly fires that caused thousands of deaths. In the 1800’s, city planners on the cusp of the industrial revolution opted to rebuild the bridge and this time a more modern thoroughfare was created to meet the needs of a booming Victorian city. In 1968, the bridge had been disassembled and taken across the Atlantic and a newer version stood in its stead.
By the end of this day, the city planners would need to consider its next guise.
*************
If there had been anyone to catalogue the entomology of the creatures known as the Watchers, they would have learned much to their surprise that these water dwelling creations of Melkor were amphibious, not completely aquatic as previously believed. Water gave the large, awkwardly shaped beasts the fluidity of movement and speed needed to snare its prey. However, watchers were by no means, trapped to it or helpless in a terrestrial environment.
Many of them still remained in Arda, hidden in secret places that would give the race of men much anxiety if it were known. Most remained in the depths of the world, in deep caves or on the ocean floor were the eating was good and anonymous. Many longed for the flesh of man but to do so would be to expose themselves and the race if nothing else was tenacious when under the threat from a predator. Others remained asleep for that too, was a characteristic of the breed that largely unknown.
Whatever their course through the ages all that had changed with the call to arms by the former lieutenant of their creator who reeked with his master’s power and provided them with a reason to awake. From the depths they began emerging, the call to chaos bringing them from the bottom of the sea, from watery caves beneath riverbeds and lochs.
They were ordered to gather at the mouth of the river known as the ‘Dark One’, the location selected by their new lord for its irony. In language of the ancient Celts, the translation of Dark One was the Tame or in modern speech, the Thames.
On the morning that Sauron, Lord of Mordor, now David Saeran arrived in London, the residents of that city would have awakened to a low rumble, not unlike the sound of a tuba reaching crescendo. Another soon followed the first blast of this unseen instrument and although the sounds produced did not mesh together like any composition of music, there was a certain beauty in the unity of the unusual noise.
It was perhaps the first time since their creation that the Watchers had assembled like this and in the meeting; the ancient beasts began to sing the songs of their youth, a sound that resembled the earth shuddering. Like other leviathans at play, the dark beast swam around the pylons of London Bridge, forgetting for a moment the purpose of their summons to Angel Isle. It was a brief respite.
The Tower Bridge, owing to its bascule design, did not notice the arrival of the Watchers owing to the elevation of its double leaf span to allow the passage of ships beneath it. The creatures swam easily up the Thames and found a more solid object around which they could vent eons of aggression.
*************
She hated fish.
She hated it with a bloody passion.
Day in and day out, that’s all she could smell. Salmon, trout, hake, bream and cod. Megan swore than no amount of showering could remove the stench. It wasn’t as if she didn’t like fish to start of with but working every day at Billingsgate Fish Market had made her wholly sick of anything that lived under the sea. Trapped in her little Honda with the usual gridlock traffic on London Bridge, Megan looked across the river to the building where the markets were situated with a growing amount of disdain. She knew this level of indifference required her to start thinking about a new job but the money was good and the hours were convenient.
The only trouble was the fish.
London, like the rest of England was in a state of panic.
Although the authorities were still claiming fervently that everything was alright and that the strange reports about the strife in Cornwall, Dorset, Devon, parts of Somerset, Hampshire and Surrey were just rumour, the public was finding it harder and harder to believe it. The communication black out that prevented any sort of television; radio or even Internet connection to these counties did not cease in the days that followed the first incident in Cornwell. The authorities were claiming a terrorist attack, that some sort of mass hallucinogen had been deployed over those areas of England.
Refugees pouring out of those areas arrived with implausible stories of dragons and giant spiders were immediately ordered to bed with advice to drink milk to break down the chemical in their systems, by those who received them. The government, unable to reduce public hysteria by any other means had concocted the story of a mass hallucinogenic gas and were had produced measures to ensure the effects wore off in good time. In the meantime the communication silence continued and the roads to southwest were blockaded by men with guns and a great deal of conviction.
Thus the roads were jammed with people who had heard nothing from relatives and friends in those counties, as they travelled to the scene of the blockade and waited on the other side of the barriers for the appearance of loved ones. The media continued to scream cover-up as the press were similarly barred from crossing the blockade to report the news from those affected areas. There were disturbing reports of some journalists that had been shot and across the planet, the world watched with held breath at what was taking place in Wessex.
Setting down the bottle of water she had just taken a sip from onto the dashboard, Megan looked ahead and saw the shimmer of heated air, thanks to the exhaust pipe of the mini in front of her. Once again London Bridge was filled with people either traveling to the barricade or coming from it. If she were smart, it would be a motorcycle she was driving not a car whose purpose in life was to make her pay ludicrous amounts of money in petrol and not be able to weave through traffic effortless like God intended.
Suddenly she noted the water within the bottle resting on the dash shimmer from the rumble of the car. Even though the engine was idling, Megan hadn’t thought the drone from the engine was all that noticeable. Just to be safe, she reached for the bottle and tightened the cap to ensure that nothing escaped if it should vibrate off the dashboard. That’s the last thing she needed this morning on top of everything else.
She hadn’t given the whole thing a second thought when suddenly the sound like a thousand great horns boomed through the air with such force; she dropped the bottle on her lap and let out a cry that was drowned in the blare of the noise. It did not stop and seem to increase until her windscreen shattered and as she raised her hand to shield her eyes, saw other cars experiencing the same troubles. Thanking her brother for convincing her to pay for the shatterproof glass. The windscreen had managed to hold its shape despite shattering. Breaks like the webbing of a spider spread across the glass.
Reaching for the door handle, she staggered out of the car and saw other cars experiencing the same phenomena. Outside, the sound seemed louder and Megan covered her ears trying to block out the powerful blare. People were clambering out their vehicles, trying to escape the explosion of sound and glass. Some were shouting but their cries could not be heard over the noise. It seemed to be all around them and in a confused state; she wondered what she was causing it.
Something slammed hard against the wall and though Megan couldn’t see it, she certainly felt it. Like a ship ramming into the concrete. The vibration travelled past the soles of her feet into her bones. The impact was hard enough to make her stumble and she saw her char actually shudder.
“DID YOU FEEL THAT?” She shouted to a man near her. He was bleeding over the left eye while trying to shake glass off his clothes.
He saw her mouth move and try to answer when the impact was felt again, this time stronger and she was not alone in feeling it. Others had begun to look around them, trying to discern from when this shudder had come. Was the bridge going to collapse? Megan thought frantically for a moment, a flurry of panicked thoughts racing through her mind as she tried to decide how far it was to the other end. The other motorists who were on the bridge with her had similar thoughts and while some clung to the disbelief that this would turn out well, others did not.
Reaching through the open door of her car, Megan grabbed her handbag and decided that she wasn’t’ staying. Slinging the leather strap around the shoulder, her footing was awkward because of the continued shuddering of the bridgework. Convinced now that the terrorists had bombed the bridge like they had to the Tube not long ago, she had come to the decision that the safest place was on solid ground. Joining the exodus of motorists, she began running.
Suddenly the sound stopped.
The stillness that followed was even more chilling than the trembling bridge. People paused and looked at each other, with only a small rise of chattering breaking the quiet as questions were asked as to what was happening. Megan thought it was like the calm before a storm and began to move once again, absolute in her certainty that the silence was not a good sign. She had not made more than a few steps when a scream tore through the air.
It was a woman with flailing arms, shrieking pure unadulterated terror as she was hoisted into the air by what could only be described as tentacle belonging to some family of octopi. The size of it was beyond any she had seen before, almost a foot in width, coiling around its victim with almost effortless strength. Her shriek followed her across the air as she was borne away to the side of the bridge.
Her cry of terror was but the first.
Soon, there were other screams not just women but men, children and following that hitch pitched scream of fear, there followed an even more terrifying sound; the shriek of agony that followed the stomach turning crunch of flesh and bone. Near paralyzed with terror, Megan remained rooted to the spot, watching people being picked off like flies by tentacles belong to creatures that were crawling up the side of the bridge.
A man had dove into his car but could not escape, the tentacle wrapped around the vehicle and lifted him up in the air. She saw him pounding against the glass, his eyes wide with horror before disappearing beyond the railing. Something inside her snapped at that moment and she began running. The screams across the bridge was almost deafening now as multiple tentacles sprouted like the heads of a hydra, spiriting away victims over the railing and into the water.
She was sobbing in fear, terrified that she would not make it to the end. The pandemonium across the bridge was almost complete in its virulence. People were screaming, running, trying to hide in cars. Some had returned to their vehicles, trying to drive off the bridge, crossing the barrier between driveway and pedestrian walk, hoping to clear the gridlock. Their success in reaching it only brought them closer to the edge of the bridge, where whatever menace was attacking them, had a better view of its prey. Megan gasped as she saw whole cars being lifted off the side railings, splashing into the drink a moment later.
A chance glimpse at the direction of the Tower Bridge made Megan freeze in her tracks. For the first time, she was afforded a view of what was attacking them, as it appeared the Tower was under the same assault. Bodies as black as ebony, with shapes that did not at appear like octopus, the creatures were certainly much, much larger that even the biggest that species had been able to produce. She saw tentacles that moved like whips, dragging screaming victims off that bridge the way they were doing t o this one. She saw them disappearing into something wide and gapping like a mouth.
As she continued her desperate flight for freedom, she as man grasping at the bars of the railing, desperate to remain on the bridge as the tentacle around his waist coiled around him, tightening its grip and continuing to tug and tug at him. Megan wanted to stop but she knew she would never be able to free him and may end up in the same perilous state. As their eyes met, she saw his anguish at the dying to come and knowing that she could not help him. She saw his sobs of horror and fear end with a final powerful yank by the beast.
His fingers slackened around the railing.
He did not have time to scream and for that she was grateful because his eyes would follow her to the grave, however, soon that moment might soon come upon her. She looked away from him and saw the tentacles waving about in the air, waving his lower body like a prize, sending blood and viscera everywhere. Her own screams were preempted by the complete loss of control of her stomach.
Bent over, Megan vomited all over the road. However, she barely had time to wipe her mouth when she was forced into moving, struck cold by the thought if she did not move she would end up the same way. Ignoring everything, ignoring her fear, the crowds trying to make the same desperate bid for freedom, the cars in her way, the grisly remains of those who like the man who had tried to resist and been torn apart, Megan kept her eye on the other side of the bridge.
So fixed was her focus, so determined was she to escape the reach of the monsters that were slaughtering people around her so indiscriminately, she did not hear the beating of great wings overhead. Only when she felt the shadow falling upon her did she lift her blue eye so the sky and thought for an absurd moment, she was staring at the great wings of an angel. However, this illusion was quickly shattered when another loud bellow filled the air that made her think of the T-Rex in that Spielberg film.
The blast of fire that swept over Megan Stanley, incinerating her where she stood, came so swiftly that she neither had time to scream nor register the pain of flesh being seared off her bones. The fire rolled across her, continuing forward like a juggernaut, making the tar beneath to bubble and cooking alive anyone who had taken refuge within their vehicles. The tentacled beasts moved further down the Thames, towards Southwark Bridge, seeking more ripe fields to plunder.
As their water bound brothers continued onward, the dragons, like Ethelred the Unready, set London Bridge a blaze yet again.
*************
“Come on,” Lori cursed as she wiped the sweat from her brow. “How hard can this fucking be?”
She wanted to kick and scream, leaving the wretched thing alone but she couldn’t. She simply couldn’t. Lieutenant Lori Hill had to try again or else she was going to die here.
Taking a deep breath, she tried again, feeling more and more frustrated at her lack of success. She knew what she was doing, or rather had a rough idea of what she wanted to do but the execution needed finesse and after one day in Exeter, she was all out of it. Electronics had never been a problem for her in the past however, there was a vast difference understanding the avionics of a jet plane and trying to start a car without the benefit of keys.
Four wires, she told herself. All she had to do was get these four wires in the ignition chamber to connect properly and she could get the hell out of here.
It had been almost a full day since she had ejected from her plane over the skies of the Exeter. That was nearly 24 hours were no rescue had come and she had seen no signs of the other pilots who had taken off with her. Landing in a field outside of town, the wise course would have been to stay there in retrospect, however, she had continued towards it in the belief that she needed to contact her base, tell her what had ambushed them. For the sake of the men and women who had died and the ones who would without any accurate intelligence, she had no choice.
Of course, upon arriving at Exeter, Lori had found herself faced with a town that looked like the aftermath of a war zone. Lori, who had spent some time in Afghanistan, discovered this once quaint English town had been gutted the way that country had been ravaged during the war. She saw bodies, torn apart lying in the streets; some didn’t even escape their cars. There was fire burning throughout half the buildings in town and nothing done to stop it.
It appalled her to no end that the stench of flesh burning was something she had become accustomed to in the last 24 hours.
Making the attempt to manipulate the collection of wires into place, Lori wiped her brow again in the front seat of the hatchback she had found relatively intact, parked in the garage she had taken refuge in. That night, she had remained huddled in its back seat, keeping still and praying that whatever she had spied roaming the streets of Exeter had not found her. Occasionally, she would hear a scream that chilled her blood to the bone and she knew she would never again get be able to see a spider without wanting to squash the living fuck out of it.
The entire town was like a scene from some B grade horror movie starring Peter Cushing or Wings Hauser. It wasn’t the scenes of destruction and corpses that unnerved her so, it was the big black bodies of large spiders scurrying along the walls of buildings, spinning webs between lamp posts, capturing birds and people who wandered unwittingly into it. She saw what she thought were dogs, looking like bears, patrolling the town with malevolent yellow eyes.
And then there were the guys in the dark cloaks.
Dementors, that’s what she called them, Dementors.
It was the closest she could come describing the tall dark men in their flowing black cloaks, whose faces were hidden beneath hoods and whose eyes looked glowing embers of fire. When she saw them, he breath had caught and perhaps it was the chill of the English weather but Lori felt a shiver run down her back and wrap itself around her spine in tendrils of cold. For seconds after they had gone, she could feel only the fear lingering inside her bones, like an unpleasant after taste she could not get out of her mouth.
A good hour had passed before she dared to move again and even then the sense of dread they had left behind in their wake was hard to dispel. She spent the rest of the night, clutching her service revolver to her chest, listening to every sound. From the moment the sun had set, she saw them moving through Exeter, a menagerie of nightmarish creatures, she still had trouble believing was real. Yet she knew they were, the bodies and the blood gave her no illusions about what she was seeing.
The strange procession of creatures moved down the street, led by the ‘Dementors’ before they mounted what looked like a dragon only smaller and less formidable. The winged creatures allowed themselves to be mounted like horses before carrying its riders aloft. Lori was trapped between her fear and her fascination at what these things were. Forgetting their destructive might, seeing the dragons take flight across the sky was one of the most incredible scenes she had ever seen. Majestic, powerful, it was difficult to deny that they were in their own way beautiful.
The other thing that stood out in her memory during her viewing of this midnight exodus was the man.
She didn’t recognize him but the fact that he was their leader was undeniable.
The man and his companion, a human female with just enough swell to her belly to indicate pregnancy emerged from the town cathedral before joining the creatures on the street. Climbing on the backs of the winged animals that also carried the ‘Dementors’, both were borne away into the night sky, amidst the flapping of great wings. While the man seemed totally confident and master of all before him, the mask of fear on the woman’s face struck Lori. However she had come to be in this situation, it was not by choice. If Lori weren’t utterly certain that it would get her killed and avail the woman nothing, she would have tried to help her.
As it was, once both riders were on the backs of the winged beasts, the creatures gained altitude with the grace of a bird, belying its cruel serpentine visage. She watched them ascend, along with the ‘Dementors’ and as if some silent order had been issued, the rest of the bestiary began their journey out of Exeter. As they departed down the road, Lori was able to see for the first time, the complete menagerie of creatures that had laid waste to this small English town.
Watching them made her skin crawl and renewed her determination to get to authorities and warn them what was coming their way. In the air, the dragons flew like flocks of birds, the power of their great wings, making the trees rustle as they passed. On the ground, there were the wolves or bears, she couldn’t tell what they were exactly; only that they were bigger than the largest tiger she had ever seen and muscles rippled powerfully under glossy russet pelts. The spiders were larger than dogs and they were so many that no matter how much Lori told herself that she was an air force pilot who had seen worse things, she still came down with a severe case of the heebie-jeebies at the sight of the things.
Marching along with the wolf/bears and the spiders, were what she could only call giants. Of course these weren’t anything like the Robbie Coltrane version. These ones didn’t look remotely human. They were big and hairless, their features seemed melted and though biped, they were hunched forward, carrying huge clubs and maces. There were so many that Lori knew the two magazines of .357 caliber shells for her Smith-Wesson semi-automatic was just not going to keep her alive for very long if they became aware of her presence.
She had watched long enough to know she needed to hide and hide well. They were leaving and the sensible course was to keep out of sight until they had gone. She returned to her hiding place and squirreled in for the night, wondering what Stygian nightmare she had found herself. This was the 21st century and yet her plane had gone down because of an ambush by a fire-breathing dragon.
It didn’t get much weirder than that.
The next morning, Lori awoke to find herself thankfully alone in the town.
Her brief exploration what she had surmised the night before; everyone was dead and if they weren’t dead, they had wisely left before they met the grisly demise of those who had not. Each house she entered was the scene of some violence with grisly discoveries waiting to be found. When she did not find blood, she instead noted evidence of yet another hasty departure. After trying to use a dozen phones, Lori gathered the tools she needed to start the car she had found.
Sparks bit into her hand as she connected the exposed wires, with Lori holding her breath in anticipation that her attempts to start the vehicle would succeed this time. After a dozen attempts, her frustration was growing and her desire to escape this ghost town was making her more than a little impatient. No one in the outside world knew what was going on and what was worse yet; the government’s attempt to maintain the information blackout was worsening the situation. No one had any idea what was coming their way and by the time they did, it would be too late.
A rumble of the engine after another burst of electricity brought the car to life and Lori let out a cry of triumph. Unfortunately, upon sitting up and taking a look at the gauges, it seemed her luck was only half good. The gauge on the gas tank indicated that it was almost empty. With another curse, Lori powered down the engine and went in search of gas. Considering what she had seen, she wanted to have fuel enough to get her to the nearest military base, which in this case was at Barnstaple at Chivenor. Military bases had their own means of communication and she was certain that they’d have some way around this blackout, possibly even escaped the range of it
She walked to the local gas station and found that the pumps were not working. No big surprise, Lori thought to herself, power lines were undoubtedly damaged in the fires. Hoping to find a jerry can at least, she walked to the closed garage and pulled open the sliding door. It was heavy and creaked as it moved along its rails. Entering the darkness, she pushed the door further along, intending to let in more light so she could see.
The first thing that hit her was the stench.
Its stink was so potent and ripe that Lori’s stomach hollowed immediately. She nearly gagged and wondered, against her better judgment, what could possibly be in here, in a garage to cause this rancid stench. Widening the door did not help and Lori reached into her flight jacket to pull out her trusty Zippo lighter to provide some illumination on the subject. A second later, she wished she hadn’t. As if the night before hadn’t been some twisted chamber of horrors, what she saw now destroyed any attempt at bravado that Lori tended to wear around herself when she was hiding her fear.
The bodies were wrapped in silk, dangling from the ceiling.
Not all of them of them were dead and although there was nothing to be done for them. The eggs sacs had been fastened around their flesh and during the course of formation, the tiny hatchling inside them had begun to feed. If these people were still alive than she couldn’t begin to imagine what they agony they were enduring. What parts of them she could see resembled dry husks like cordwood and some were missing limbs as they were slowly eaten alive by hungry hatchlings. She counted a dozen easily and knew she couldn’t leave them like this.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered and pulled out her gun, taking aim at them.
If they heard her, they certainly did not answer.
The first bullet cracked its victim skull with a wet splatter but it was to Lori’s horror that there wasn’t blood enough in the body to cause any crimson spray. Spiders fed by desiccating their meals, she reminded herself, there wouldn’t be much blood.
Suddenly a flurry of movement caught her eye and she heard a sound like something wet tearing. Holding up her lighter, trying to see what this might be, she began to retreat out the door when she was stopped by the sound of something scratching against the wood. First it was singular and then it became many, until she decided that it was time to leave. She turned to the door and saw them, like a black swarm barring her way, daring her to cross the threshold.
“Screw this,” Lori thought, bracing herself before leaping through the entry.
One of them landed on her back and the size of it was like a cat. Ignoring her revulsion, she grabbed one of its legs and ripped if off her flight suit, flinging it aside. Not allowing herself time to think of twice, Lori took aim and fired. The infant spider had just enough time to roll onto its spindly legs and skitter towards her when the .357 shells tore it apart with sickly squelch. However, it appeared she was nowhere out of trouble. The swarm began to run down the doorway and spilled out into concrete, coming towards her.
No way was she going to be dealing with these things while trying to find an escape out of town. Looking at the abandoned shop front of the gas station, Lori ran into the establishment and scanned the aisle for what she needed. She didn’t have much time, they were starting to spread out, some after her, some not. In either case, she wasn’t letting them get past this point. The soldier in her refused to let it happen. Picking up what she needed, a handful of them, she hurled the bottle into the thickest part of the swarm.
The glass bottle shattered, spraying the creatures with its yellowish fluid. Wasting no time, she let out a round and stood back as the turpentine ignited thanks to the effect a full metal jacket bullet had on concrete. They screamed in agony as the flames lit them up and she saw others retreating before she flung another bottle in that direction and set that alight to. She continued to do so until they had retreated into the garage. Then she threw the remaining bottles into it and set that alight too.
*************
Astonishing as it might seem, the thoughts of Legolas Greenleaf were not fixed upon the rampage of Sauron through Arda but rather on the wife that was sailing not only to London with Cirdan but further away from him.
He knew that he was to blame for much of what had transpired between them and shocked as he might have been for her desire to dissolve their union, if not their bonding, Legolas could not find it in himself to deny her. In fact, as he assessed his conduct over the years, he realized a good deal of what she said was truthful. He was drawn to her because she was Melia in another life. His whole impetus for becoming her husband was because of his love for the Ranger he had wedded in Arda.
The Ranger he had never been able to let go.
He had clung to the memory of her and forgotten all about Ariel. His regret was profound but he did not know how to change, did not know how to alter the course he had unwisely set. Legolas longed for his wife but only because she radiated the spirit of his old love. He wondered if he had ever bothered to even know his wife, the woman not the soul. To his shame, he knew the answer was no.
Perhaps it was for the best that they went their separate ways…
The thought was not allowed to complete itself as it was interrupted by the sudden crack of gunfire.
Legolas straightened up immediately, the keen senses of his elven hearing allowing him to hear before anyone else in the SUV vehicle that Bryan was driving. Since their departure from Mithlond, they had been traveling east to London, one of Sauron’s places of power. The journey there had been harrowing to say the least since it was a path littered by scenes of terrible carnage. The devastation caused by Sauron’s army of fell beasts shocked even the most jaded of them and after awhile, there was an unspoken decision to forge on ahead and not pause unless there was real need to.
It would serve no purpose to fill their heads with so much destruction for the more they saw it, the greater the risk that their belief in Sauron’s defeat would be diminished.
“We have to stop,” Fred declared from her place in between Miranda and Frank.
”What?” Bryan demanded, shooting a look to the back seats.
“Fred, are you sure?” Miranda asked although she was fairly certain that if the girl said they needed to stop, then they needed to stop.
“She speaks true Bryan,” Legolas spoke up before the girl could answer. “I heard the fire of guns.”
“What direction?” the former MI6 man asked automatically.
“Over there,” Legolas pointed to a stretch of road.
“Exeter is in that direction,” Eric commented. “It’s the only large town around here.”
“That’s where we have to go.” Fred reaffirmed, glancing at both Frank and Miranda as she spoke.
“Then that’s where we’ll go luv,” Frank retorted, still going through the motions that it was a child seated between himself and his wife even though everything that Fred had said and done since they left Valinor said otherwise. Nevertheless, the occupant of Fred’s body had been wrong about nothing since they had arrived here. While Elrond and Galadriel knew who it was inside her, neither was about to reveal it and the girl herself, remained damnably evasive.
Bryan wasted no time, turning off the A30 highway on to the stretch of road that led to Exeter. From the highway, they could see the steady column of billowing smoke rising from the ground. It wasn’t the first sign of fire they had seen since they had returned home. Sauron’s dragons had turned much of the English countryside into a flaming pyre. The former lord of Mordor was ensuring that anyone who escaped the destruction would have nothing to return back to.
Alpington Road took them straight into Exeter and as soon as the township began to surround them on either side of the SUV, the evidence of Sauron’s presence began to show rather prolifically. The scene was no different than any they had seen since leaving Mithlond as they passed burnt out buildings, damaged shop fronts and cars that had crashed into lamp posts and halted owing to some similar violence. Deep gouges that ran across the smooth finish, parallel to one another, added further evidence to the fates of those who had resided in this community but likely lived no more.
”Jesus,” Aaron uttered bitterly, “I don’t think it’s going to stop making me sick no matter how many times I see the same thing.”
The sound of gunfire was audible to all of them now and Bryan put his foot on the gas, being an old hat at this long enough to know how which direction it came from to get there quickly. The gunfire was coming from the same place as the column of smoke that was steadily increasing its volume as it emptied dark ash into the air.
*************
In retrospect, Lori realized that burning down the spider hatchery was probably not such a good idea.
Mostly because upon discovering the eminent danger, the hatchlings had erupted from their sacs, found the quickest way out of the burning building before joining the remainder of their rather irate that had not been trapped with fire.
And like all new predators, the first thing on their mind was food.
Unfortunately as Lori was responsible for burning down their nest where their parents had left them provisions that left her as their best source of nourishment since she was the only living thing left in Exeter. Chased by a swarm of the damn things, Lori’s attempt to disperse them with stray rounds had done little to halt their pursuit. She considered taking refuge in a building but knew that was no answer. She had seen what had happened to the citizens of Exeter who had tried that strategy. She had no desire to end up cocooned and hanging off a web like some bug.
The best plan she had was the car she had been working on. It didn’t have much gas but at least it would get her far enough away from here to come up with another plan or better, yet, not be eaten for awhile. Not being eaten for a while was really the foremost thought on her mind as she tore down the road, emptying rounds into the sea of black bodies behind her. After this day, no spider of any size was going to survive long near her person.
The Air Force lieutenant focused on getting away and did not think about how close or persistent the creatures were. If she began to think on that, she might as well let the things kill her now because she’d be no good to anyone let her alone herself. She maintained this line of reasoning when the last bullet impacted against the round body of a spider, splattering noisome material over the others around it. Lori felt her stomach hollow when she saw a group of them close in on their dead sibling and feeding, giving her a clear indication of just how ravenous they were.
Suddenly, amidst all this, she heard what sounded awfully like the drone of a car engine.
Her heart swelling with hope, Lori hoped this wasn’t the product of wishful thinking as she put more power into her strides, determined to gain a few more precious feet so that she could stay alive long enough to find the vehicle in question. She had been a runner in high school but even her reserves were being stretched to the limit. If she didn’t rest soon, her legs were going to give out.
Its game over then Lorelei. Thank you for playing. Nope, sorry not going to go out as a bug smorgasbord. Air force people didn’t die as insect food. They died surrounded by twisted metal and glass, the way God intended.
When the SUV skidded around the corner, Lori came to an abrupt halt.
Behind her, the spiders were gaining and she resumed running, putting the last of her reserves to close the distance between her and the vehicle. Discarding her useless gun, she saw the driver swing the wheel hard, turning the vehicle around so that the back of the vehicle faced her. For a moment, she almost thought that they were going to leave but then the SUV came to a screeching halt. The hatch door lifted open and a blond woman was shouting at her.
“Get in! Get in!”
Don’t have to tell me twice sister, Lori thought to herself as she put everything she had into reaching the vehicle. The spiders sensing that their prey was close to escape had begun launching themselves at her in a desperate attempt to stop Lori from reaching safe harbor. The distance she had gained was narrowing and when she looked behind her to see the ferocity of the pursuit, Lori knew if she didn’t reach that SUV in the next few seconds, she’d never leave Exeter alive.
“HURRY!” A male voice shouted.
Deciding to make or break, Lori jumped the last few feet, her knees making contact with the carpeted floor of the vehicle when she landed. Her kneecaps flared with pain and she felt hands pulling her the rest of the way in. Looking over her shoulder, she saw the spiders jumping forward too.
“GO! GO! GO!” She demanded.
The spiders began jumping off the paved road towards the open door.
“BRYAN GO!” Miranda shouted as one of the filthy beasts landed inches away from the new arrival's feet. The woman's reacting was swift as she brought down a heavy combat boot down on its mid section before a powerful kick sent it hurtling out of the car back onto the road.
Bryan hit the accelerator and sent the car lurching forward, causing his passengers to jerk back and forth unceremoniously as the vehicle escaped its stationary position. The woman they had rescued was scrambling toward the hatch door, slamming it shut on what appeared to be a dark spindly leg attempting to climb into the main body of the car. With a sickening squelch, the door shut heavily and they were off, leaving behind the swarm on insects on the road.
"Hey you alright?" Aaron asked the dark haired woman who was breathing hard and regaining her composure from the front of the SUV. "You hurt?"
"Oh I'm just goddamn peachy!" Lori cursed, letting her nerves settle after that rather nerve-wracking night but grateful to hear a familiar accent.
"Ah you Yanks turn such a lovely phrase," Eric smirked in Aaron's direction.
"Yeah right," Lori retorted looking over her rescuers, "because Russell Crowe is such a class act."
Eric opened his mouth to respond but was given a look of sisterly warning from Miranda.
"Behave," she ordered before turning back to Lori. "Are you alright?" She asked the question and this time, she wanted a proper answer.
"I'm fine," Lori said recognizing the woman as someone who was accustomed to being in charge. She had no problems with that, especially when these people had saved her from what would have a pretty awful death. "Thanks for coming by when you did. I don't think I was going to keep ahead of those things much longer."
Legolas was staring at the woman, thinking that this was indeed a perfect example of Aaron's more description of their past selves finding each other again, cosmic turntables indeed.
Lori caught the blond man staring and furrowed her brow when she noticed something strange about him.
"Hey," she declared to no one in particular. "What's with the ears?"
*************
London Bridge had fallen down.
It had taken less than an hour after the first watcher had collided against the underwater pylons for a good portion of the bridge to crumble and disappear beneath the waters of the Thames. Normally a catastrophe of this magnitude would draw attention of September 11 proportions but hardly anyone had time to react to the destruction of one of London's most enduring landmarks. Everyone was too busy dealing with the more immediate threat that was facing the Southwark and Tower bridge motorists. Having devastated London Bridge, the terrible creatures were now concentrating on these instead and causing motorists to endure the same nightmare that Megan Stanley had found herself facing before her untimely demise.
Emergency services and police were galvanized into action but their rescue efforts were hampered by a number of factors; firstly they had no idea what it was they were dealing with and secondly, an even greater peril had shown itself in the form of the great dragons who were now bathing south London in flames. From Fenchurch to St Paul’s Cathedral, the beasts flew above roof tops on houses and buildings alike, setting anything that was within reach ablaze. London was in a state of chaos that no amount of terrorist response preparation had been able to predict.
This time however, David Saeran did nothing to disrupt the communication blackout that had kept the southwest in the dark. This time, he let the news crews with their cameras capable of invading every home, every computer on the planet; see what he wanted them to see. They took in the grisly images of the bridges and the humans on it who were torn apart by the watchers. He allowed the world to see his dragons swooping down on London and laying the city to waste, unstoppable and relentless.
With amusement, he watched from the backs of the winged beasts, the army being mobilized to deal with the Watchers. Soldiers were rallied from Wellington barracks and by the look of them, not the usual infantry. These were SAS men, the former Lord of Mordor noted and upon realizing this felt a sliver of hatred run through him recalling that Bryan Miller was one of these. With their guns and their missile launchers, they approached the bridges, attempting to deal with the beasts.
A large group of these so called ‘special forces’ types approached Southwark bridge in an attempt to rescue the slowly dwindling number of people who were still left alive that hadn’t been taken by the Watchers and had yet to reach safety. Saeran watched as Morgul’s beast descended upon them. From his vantage point on top of Mansion House, he watched his most powerful lieutenant stepped fearlessly into the fray, with Khamul and Ren at his side. The humans had no idea what to make of these dark robed figures and reacted in almost predictable fashion.
The hail of bullets from their Bren machines guns did little to halt the Nazgul whom Saeran had ensured would never be hurt by the weapons of man and this occasion was no different. Morgul seemed to move through the bullets as if they were hardly there and as the soldiers recovered from this, the Nazul paused before them. His abrupt stop confused them and Saeran smile when he saw them reloading their weapons, desperately seeking another avenue of attack.
It never came.
The Black Breath escaped the trio of wraiths and struck down anyone in its path, soldier and civilian alike. In the surrounding buildings, all who heard it immediately felt into a dark malaise of despair, frozen in place unable to do anything. The soldiers crumbled to their knees, unable to fight the dark magic as their weapons clattered uselessly to the ground.
Suddenly the sound erupted with the sound of powerful engines as Saeran looked up to see even more planes approaching the dragons in the distance. Probably from Tidwoth or even Plymouth. Really it only took 30 minutes for any plane to reach London, Saeran thought. The dragons had been enjoying themselves immensely with the fighter planes, having torn most of them apart like delightful new toys. This time was no different as he saw them break off their efforts in razing London to the ground and flew to greet the approaching planes.
After all, even dragons knew how to play.
*************
If Elrond had been sequestered away during the voyage to London, it had been with good reason. His gift of foresight was allowing him a far clearer view of what was taking place in the city of London than he would have preferred. Each death struck at him like the lash and though he knew that it was not his fault, being able to visualize the destruction and horror of these unsuspecting mortals took their toll upon him. However, as always, the Lord of Imladris rose above such evil to be strong for those who needed courage.
Emerging into the deck, he saw in the distance the pillars of smoke rising into the sky from the land in the distance. They had sailed with the shore within sight, navigating the coast of the islands that had once been the Shire. While its present residents did not recall its history, Elrond could sense that the land itself remembered quite clearly.
As he stepped onto the deck, he saw his fellow elves hard at work. Indeed, many had been engaged in such duty since they had departed Valinor and continued this labour through the voyage. Ahead of the fleet they could see the ripples in the water that indicated the passage of Captain Hill’s own undersea vehicle. Elrond like Cirdan, could not imagine a more indifferent way of traveling in Ulmo’s realm. How could one travel so deep in the ocean and be so far removed away from all its beauty and power at the same time?
The ways of the Edain could be very strange at times.
“Can you feel it?” Elrond asked as he approached Cirdan who stood at the bow of his ship, watching the smoke rising in the distance, a beacon of darkness calling out to all who saw it.
“Yes,” Cirdan nodded, his voice hushed and disturbed. “He is far stronger than he has ever been. The girl was right; he has taken Morgoth’s power for his own. I do not know if we have strength enough to stop him.”
“It is the End of Days my friend,” Elrond patted him on the back. “It may not be fate that this be stopped at all. It may be that our only role is to fight.”
"Even if it means our deaths?” Cirdan looked at the younger lord in question.
“We’ve lived long Cirdan,” Elrond met the sea master’s gaze with a raised brow. “We have seen gods walk among us, we have paid court to kings and wizards. We have lived well. There is no shame in its end.”
Cirdan nodded ruefully, “I suppose that is true.”
“If it must end,” Elrond looked ahead to the horizon. “Can you think not of a better way to enter Mandos than in fighting for a cause that is as great as the one we now face?”
“You always knew how to keep things in perspective,” Cirdan broke into a grin. “No, I cannot think of a better way to leave this world.”
“Neither can I,” Elrond shared his smile and then added. “Still, we are not defeated, not yet at least. How many of harpoons do we have?”
With a determined set to his jaw, Cirdan answered firmly and with no small measure of pride. “Enough to give Sauron the war he craves.”
Elrond nodded and continued to stare at the smoke filled sky, growing nearer and nearer as the elven fleet left the English Channel and began up the length of the great River Thames.
“Well then Cirdan,” he said with his head held high and his eyes fixed on the road head, whatever the outcome, “in the words of the Edain, let us cry havoc and slip the dogs of war.”
After one hundred thousand years, Sauron had finally claimed the White Tower.
Granted it was not the same White Tower erected in Minas Tirith by King Calimehtar as a challenge to his own Barad-dûr in Mordor but it would suffice. The King had built his tower as a beacon of hope, a shining affront to the lord of Mordor that the armies of light would prevail no matter what assault Sauron could hurl at them. Of course, now the city of Minas Tirith, the kingdom of Gondor was a memory and the tower he stood upon now was in fact the Tower of London, sometimes called the White Tower.
Still, Sauron, now David Saeran, took the symbolism for what it was.
Thanks to the Nine, the forces sent to battle them at London Bridge had not only been defeated by their Black Breath but the dragons had seen to it that they received no support from the air. Downed planes burned where they had crashed throughout the city, their demise marked by tendrils of smoke rising into the air in the distance. The watchers had now claimed the Thames, moving up and down the length of the river, killing anyone foolish enough to attempt a crossing at the numerous bridges. Saeran allowed them their play, giving them their just reward after so many millennia forced into hiding, feeding on scraps. Today, his minions would feed.
The trail of destruction that began at Sennen Cove in Cornwall had followed them in their march east, with the cities of Reading, Maidenhead and Hounslow falling to the onslaught of his fell army before they arrived in London itself. Once there, it did not take them long to ensure that city was soon enveloped in the same scourge of fire as the others preceding it. Now London burned as dragon breathe reduced it to a cinder. Its tall buildings ignited like matches, the flame spread quickly to the surrounding buildings, setting ablaze centuries of civilization in a day.
People were scattering in all directions, desperate to escape the carnage once it became clear that the police and the army could do nothing to save them. Roads leading north and southwards were jammed with vehicles, trying to outrun this unlikeliest of enemies, who for many of them until today, existed only in myths. Except these myths had become flesh and were craving blood and meat. The ravenous reach of the host that he had unleashed from the Forbidden Vaults was growing swiftly, pursuing the seemingly inexhaustible source of food.
Saeran did nothing to bring his servants to heel. He wanted them to feast well for they would need the sustenance. As it was, he could feel the presence of the enemy approaching. The elves were coming and they were close, however, Saeran remained unconcerned. His servants were many, not just those released from the vaults but the others he had cultivated over the centuries. Creatures, forced into hiding in the deep places of the world, had waited for so long to be able to answer his call to arms.
In the sky above, Searan could see the dragon’s circling; lording over their mastery of the sky to the terrified Londoners who had yet to become prey to his army of were in the midst of fleeing the city. With a smile, he saw one of the dragons perched atop Big Ben, bellowing its cry of triumph as its saurian neck lifted to the sky and sent a column of flame into the air that parted the clouds above. Its voice rallied the others to do the same and soon the terrible song of the dragon settled over the city like a fine layer of cinder.
They were joined by the Nazgul who travelled the air for a wholly different reason; to watch for the coming of the elves in their fleet of Teleri ships. Through their eyes, he could see the length and breadth of the Thames, the flotsam of dead bodies that had been left in the wake of the Watcher’s feeding frenzy, the detritus of modern civilization in half submerged cars, pieces of clothing and shattered mobile phones. They flew astride their mounts, winged beasts that had been birthed by Melkor at the beginning of the world, older even than dragons. Their wings flapped in great beats as they carried their Nazgul masters, their eyes seeking out any sign of the approaching fleet.
Stepping off the balcony, he retreated into the stairwell that spiraled to the top of Bell Tower, where prisoners of the highest standing were once kept. It was time he attended to the other matter that was as equally important as the task of conquering the free world. In the past, he had always gambled to win without any consideration given to the consequences of loss. Even in recent times, when he had made his bid to retake the world, he was once again thwarted by the children of Gondor and doomed to a prison of flesh in Valinor.
Not this time, this time he would have an escape and his escape would be in the cruelest place imaginable.
Ascending the staircase, he took the path that had been taken by the likes of William Wallace, Charles of Orleans and Elizabeth the First, to reach the cell that was the highest room of the tower. In it, he had placed his unwilling companion, she who wore Luthien’s face but none of her spirit, more valuable to him because of the seed she carried and the instrument upon which he would avenge himself for the trespasses of Isildur, Aragorn Elessar and now Aaron Stone.
Reaching the heavy door, he needed no key to open it. A mere exertion of power and that door swung open as if a strong gust of wind had blown it open. As it slammed against the wall, he saw Eve who was sitting on the wide gap before the large window at the end of the room, shrink into the shadows a little more, perhaps hoping she would remain unseen. She was dressed in a loose dress now, acquired for her when her own clothes had been discarded after his last private visit.
He saw her wiping her cheeks quickly, obviously trying to hide the fact that she had been crying from him before lowering her hands to envelope her swollen belly, a futile attempt to protect the baby in her belly. The proud defiance was gone from her features though he still saw sparks of it in her eyes. He suspected that until he laid her husband’s body in front of her, cold and lifeless, he would not be able to drive from her the hope of rescue.
“Why are you doing this?” She asked disturbed by what she was seeing outside her window, the city of London in ruins with so much blood spilt it could be scented on the wind, along with the smoke.
“I believed we’d already discussed this,” he commented before pausing and leaning against the wall, near the window she was perched, “the world of men gone, burnt to a cinder as it should have been in the Third age.”
“You could do anything,” she shook her head, thinking that if perhaps understood the monster, maybe there was a way out of this for her and her baby. “Why destroy it? You’ve got more than enough power to rule the world.”
The conversation spark a hint of amusement in him for it was always a welcome change when she wasn’t whining her captivity or hurling impotent threats at him for what he and his army were doing.
“We all have our parts to play in destiny,” he said enigmatically. “The time of the Eldar and the Edain is coming to an end. The world changes to suit whatever comes next and this time I intend to shape that outcome. Humans are paranoid and reactionary, what they will do to fight me will ruin this Earth far more effectively than anything my dragons or Nazgul could ever conjure. All I have to do is to frighten them enough and it will unfold as I will it.”
Inwardly Eve cringed because he was right. She knew what humans were like. The last two years in the company of elves had taught her to look at her race with fresh eyes. For all their advancements, humans had evolved little. They still fought over things that ought to be shared, allowed borders and petty rivalries to lead to the bloodiest battles and remained ignorant to each other’s suffering. Why couldn’t Saeran succeed in his plan if he threatened them enough?
She was still pondering these thoughts when suddenly she felt a stab of pain lanced through her belly. There was a brief flash of clarity before the agony took her, when she realized what he was doing and shot him a look of pleading mercy, even though she knew she’d get nothing from him. The pain drove her off the window ledge, to the floor until she was on her hands and knees, staring up at him like a dog.
“No…” she started to whimper, “not again.”
And for the second time since this nightmare had begun, Eve found herself screaming.
She screamed so loudly that the sound penetrated the walls of the tower and caused the wargs currently occupying the compound of the Royal Fusiliers Museum to howl with her, as if they could feel their master’s evil power in her tortured voice. The agony wracking her body was as excruciating as before but now, her strength weakened she could hold nothing back. There was no pride left in her for even an obligatory attempt to maintain her composure.
Inside her womb, she could feel her son’s pain as Saeran’s unnatural power assaulted his tiny body. His pain caused her more anguish than the agony that what she was experiencing herself. What was he thinking? Was there enough awareness in him to understand what was happening or did he simply feel and nothing else? She wanted to soothe his hurts and yet she couldn’t even help herself. Half screaming and half pleading, what ability was left in her mind to think forced to concede that she may have to promise him anything, that she would have to surrender to Saeran for mercy. For her child, she would do anything.
In no way that science could even explain, Eve knew her child was terrified, that within her womb, her baby, innocent and unknowing was crying out in pain. His little mouth making soundless cries as his tiny body continued to develop at an alarming rate, the natural development of his body accelerated by Saeran’s power. As he grew faster, her belly continued to swell, inflating like a balloon. She could feel her abdomen distending, cramping, clenching against the power that was shaping her like a figure of clay, protesting against the magic that was hastening her baby’s birth.
Once again, she lay in filth of vomit and urine, unable to exert any control over her bodily functions in the midst of this torture. Humiliated and broken, Eve’s pain was such that she had completely forgotten that she was not alone in her cell. Saeran watched her dispassionately. He saw no pleasure in her agony as this was a task to be performed, the way the men who worked in an abattoir viewed the cows they were forced to slaughter. It was a necessary evil.
While Saeran wouldn’t consider what he was doing to Eve McCaughley evil, it was necessary for his ultimate revenge.
Eve had not fallen unconscious this time, perhaps because she was becoming inured to the pain but she couldn’t decide if this was a blessing or a curse. When the pain ended, she collapsed against the hard floor, panting hard, sobbing in despair at her cruel circumstance. She couldn’t let this continue, couldn’t let him turn her baby into a slave or worst yet a monster. She shuddered as she wept, oblivious to him, wishing her hate could become tangible and strangle the smug bastard where he stood.
“I think that will be all for now,” he said finally, tired of the screaming.
It was such a pity, he found himself thinking, not for the first time, that she had not inherited Luthien’s sweet siren voice. The memory of the lady’s song when he ruled Tol-in-Gaurhoth, the Isle of Werewolves had been one of the few memories he had that could be considered pleasant. Perhaps it was also part of the reason why Eve was still alive.
“Leave me alone you bastard!” She hissed, spitting out the words like venom. As she tried to hug her knees to her chest, Eve discovered with fresh horror that she couldn’t. She knew that he was warping her body to shape his own needs but until now hadn’t realised how much. She didn’t look like she was two months or even five months pregnant any more; she looked like she was seven or eight. Her body was ripened, its fruit almost ready to be picked.
“Oh God,” she gasped at the realization, sobbing fresh tears. “Please,” she met his gaze, desperate for any kind of clemency. “No more, I’m begging you no more.”
He would have smiled but gloating seemed followed at the moment. Instead, he said brusquely as he started to leave the room, his back to her as he spoke, “I trust you will be able to attend to yourself this time?”
Eve let out a cry of frustration and rage, shouting after him. “BASTARD!”
********
BILLINGSGATE FISH MARKET
EAST LONDON
It was hard to believe the building with the stately appearance overlooking the Thames with domed ceilings and ornate architecture was actually home to one of London’s oldest institutions, the Billingsgate Fish Market, however, that was precisely what it was. On a good day, the courtyard outside the building fronting the river would be filled with fish mongers selling their wares in barely hygienic stalls, with the salty stench of the sea wafting through the place and clinging to the clothes of all comers.
For the beast called Draugluin, made whole upon his release from the Forbidden Vaults, it was a moment to rejoice as he feasted on the bodies of the freshly killed with his wolf brothers and distant cousins, the wargs. They had moved across this place like a scourge, quickly overtaking the fleeing men and women who had tried vainly to escape their jaws. There was a symphony of screams whose song was as sweet anything sung by an elf as Draugluin, led his people to the feasting that came with slaughter.
Some had leapt into the water, trying to escape the death of crushing jaws only to fine that the river was no safer. The Watchers were happy to claim any food that was within its reach. The ground ran red with spilled blood as they hunted, stalked and brought down the prey. The race of men had always provided the best sport for they were more delightful to hunt than any creature and the meat just as tasty.
Draugluin moved through the killing floor, his paws as big as plates, his bulk the size of a small elephant and as he passed his brethren, some of whom were shaking their prey by the necks as if needing proof of death, his muscles made his russet pelt shimmer under the sunlight. He thought with some acrimony that when he had been killed by Beren, it was his pelt that the hero had taken and the thought made his blood boil, made him yearn for a fresh taste of man flesh. He needed the taste of blood to wash away the taste of that indignity.
A woman screamed and Draugluin the father of werewolves turned to see that somehow one female had escaped, she was making for the water and the great beast bared his teeth in the semblance of a smile and launched himself upon her. His paw landed on her back, driving her into the concrete ground. Her arms and legs struggled until his weight crushed her spine and by the time he snapped his jaws around her head, she was incapable of offering any resistance. He lifted his great neck and pulled her skull of her shoulders with ease, ending her final scream abruptly. Widening his jaws, he barely chewed as he swallowed her head down his throat.
Suddenly, a shadow fell over him and Draugluin reared his head to the sky to see Morgul astride Gnash, hovering over him. The beast retreated as did the other wolves feeding, clearing a space for the Witch King to descend. The winged creature touched upon the ground, its wide wings folding neatly to its sides as its master beckoned Draugluin to come forward with fingers encased in amour.
Draugluin snorted, his nostrils flaring annoyance at the summons but stepped forward nonetheless. His yellow eyes narrowing as he stared at Sauron’s chief lieutenant. “What is it you will of me, Nazgul?” He asked, sounding more like the uneasy tremor of the earth than a voice speaking its mind.
“Are you happy to grow fat with easy prey or would you care to undertake some business for me?”
“For you?” Draugluin retorted, his brow furrowing at the question.
“For me…yes,” Morgul answered, his voice a hiss. “The children of the shield bitch are on these shores. When the time comes, having them in our power will make her bend to our will like the whore she is. Bring them to me, alive and unharmed and I will let you feed on a ring bearer when our victory is complete.”
Of course Morgul had ulterior motives that lay closer to home but there was no need for Draugluin to know this. What was required of the hound was obedience.
A ring bearer, Draughlin’s ears twitched in interest. Child flesh was tender enough but a child that was a ring bearer? That was an especial treat, one that Draugluin was happy to entertain. His mouth watered at the thought, clear rivulets of saliva hung pendulously from his jaws.
“How do I find them? I must have scent to track.”
“Return the way we came,” Morgul continued to instruct. “Retrace our destruction and you will find their scent, journeying northwards.”
“How can you know this?” Draugluin asked and then again, decided he should have known better than to ask. The Nazgul and the master had their ways of gathering intelligence.
“Our allies are more than just the beasts of the Forbidden Vaults. There are creatures here in Arda that are willing to share in our victory. Carrion eaters who know that war makes for plentiful feeding are our eyes and ears. They speak of the children being taken to the lands of the north. Do as I instruct and you will find them.”
“And if I encounter others who are our enemies?” The greatest of the werewolves asked.
“If you must ask the question that you are not the hunter of legend,” Morgul taunted.
Draugluin snorted once again in contempt and replied with a growl now that the compact was agreed upon. “It will be done.”
Gnash’s wings extended outward, flapping once again, extending to its full span before it let out a screech that made the wolves howl back in response. A second flap and it was airborne, with Morgul’s robes flowing along the sides of the beast. Draugluin watched rider and beast soar into the sky, rejoining the other wraiths who had had taken mastery of the sky, now that he’d been given new instructions to follow.
“Remember,” Morgul warned once more in parting, “they are no use to me dead.”
“I know my duty,” Draugluin retorted and then turned to his brothers and summoned them forth in a roar loud enough to shatter glass in unbroken windows. Fragments few in all directions as the wolves approached him and he delivered his demands in sharp barks that conveyed Morgul’s instructions.
And with that, Draugluin set off with his pack, embarking on a hunt, ready for the kill.
Ready to feast upon a ring bearer.
********
“That’s impossible,” Aaron declared after hearing Lori Hill’s story about what she’d seen in the town of Exeter after she had been forced to make an emergency ejection from her fighter over that town.
They were on the motorway, having left Exeter behind and flanking Taunton on route to London. The multi-lane road was devoid of cars and there was nothing on the radio. Whatever power Searan had used to interfere with communication, it seemed to be continuing the closer they reached the capital. Ahead of them, the clouds were grey and heavy, threatening to rain but not quite managing. Yet there was an eerie stillness in the air likened to the sharp intake of breath before a scream.
Lori had related experience in Exeter, how she’d seen the Nine and Saeran leaving the ruined town, taking with them their terrible army of darkness. Most of what she had revealed came as no surprise to any of the SUV’s occupants save one detail.
“It can’t be Eve,” Aaron insisted. “She’s barely six weeks pregnant.”
“The woman I saw wasn’t six weeks,” Lori retorted, unable to forget how terrified the poor woman had been. Her pale skin was almost white with fear. Lori had recalled feeling terribly helpless as she watched the robed Nazgul as she now understood they were called, ferrying her away on those winged monsters. “She was at least five months pregnant.”
“Well then it can’t be Eve,” Aaron retorted, aware that they were talking in a circle. He’d been relieved at first when Lori described a woman with Saeran and the Nine who had to be Eve but the last part of her description was impossible which made he question where was Eve, if this wasn’t her.
“What did she look like again?” Eric asked once more, wanting to get the truth for Aaron’s sake. The doctor looked like he was about to lose his head.
“I told you,” Lori frowned, unable to tell whether or not she had named the right person with her description “She was very pretty, really dark hair, blue eyes and great skin. You know the creamy, supermodel kind.”
“Aaron,” Legolas tried to reason with his friend though he knew his words would do little to comfort Aaron. “I do not understand how this can be but the lady’s description does resemble Eve. Furthermore, the possibility that Sauron would have discarded Eve for another woman with child appears to be remote and highly improbable. As impossible as it is…”
“It is Eve,” Fred spoke for the first time, confirming everyone’s worst fears.
“You must be strong Aaron, the enemy had quickened your child’s growth in her belly for his dark purpose.”
Lori was looking at the faces of the people with her and wondered what kind of insanity she had wandered into. However, after everything she’d seen thus far, what with dragons, dark robed specters on flying monsters, insanity seemed the order of the day. Still none of it was as unnerving as listening to this little girl who spoke in the voice of someone far older, revealing truths that she couldn’t possibly know yet felt right nonetheless.
“Dear God,” Miranda whispered, stabbed to her maternal core by the horror of Saeran meddling with a baby’s growth while still in the womb. “We have to get away from that animal.” Her mind was still filled with the terrible sound of bone snapping when Saeran took Tory’s life. She had felt so helpless then and she felt helpless now.
Aaron couldn’t breathe. The walls of the car felt like they were contracting around him. He was struggling not to lose his calm but knowing that his wife was being tortured by Saeran and worse yet, his child was being twisted inside her body, made it almost too much to bear. He could hear his friends trying to speak words of comfort but there was none to be had, not when Eve was still in Saeran’s power and now something was happening to the baby too?
“Why?” He managed to ask, not expecting an answer. Whatever force was occupying the little girl’s body seemed to offer intelligence in dribs and drabs but Aaron took what he could or else he’d end up screaming.
“Because he wants to make you suffer,” Bryan spoke for the first time. “He wants the baby born before you die so you can see it, so you die knowing he’s won.”
“Jesus,” Aaron whispered, his face turning ashen because Bryan was right. There was no other reason for Saeran’s actions other than spite. He wanted to kill the bastard, murder the son of a bitch with his hands. Aaron had never wanted to kill anything in his life as much as he wanted David Saeran dead.
“Alright enough,” Frank spoke sharply, reminding everyone that some delicacy needed to be shown because Aaron’s fears were getting out of control and it would not take much to send him over the edge. “The best way to help Eve is to reach her.”
Suddenly, Fred’s head snapped sharply to the rear window, her blue eyes staring down the road they had left. “STOP!”
Her cry made Bryan jam his foot on the brake causing everyone inside the vehicle to be jostled forward and then back again.
“What…what is it?” He demanded anxious, the car still stationery as he stared at Fred in question at her sudden outburst.
“Are you people completely crazy?” Lori declared, unable to keep up with everything that was taking place around her. However, no one appeared to be eager to answer her as they seemed to be taking their cues from the little girl. Another weird thing she couldn’t figure out.
“Just take it easy,” Eric tried to placate the woman, appreciating that an outsider might have difficulty following anything they were saying right now. The woman was being dropped into this cold and Eric, who was used to all the strangeness had to admit, they were taking in a lot in a short time.
Fred looked to Miranda and for the first time, her features were devoid of the calm they had been accustomed to seeing in her since departing Valinor. In fact, her expression was anxious and disturbed. “Your children are in danger.”
“What?” Miranda exclaimed, her heart starting to pound as she thought of Sam and Pip in the arms of that monster again. “What do you mean?”
“The Witch King sends him minions after the Ringbearer,” Fred answered and looked Miranda in the eye. “He’s still fears you, even if you are no longer the shield maiden of Rohan. He still fears that at the moment of his greatest triumph at his master’s side, you have it in your power to destroy him, that weakness he cannot abide. Thus he seeks to gain your subservience by capturing your children.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Frank retorted, maintaining his composure even though he was no less alarmed than Miranda at this sudden turn of events. However, Frank had learnt that he had to be the voice of reason when his wife was not. “Bryan, first car we see, stop. Miranda and I are going after them.” He spoke with a tone that broke no argument from anyone in the SUV.
“Alone?” Bryan shot his brother a look of alarm. Frank wasn’t a fighter, not the way Miranda was and there was no telling what that damn Nazgul had sent after his nephews. “You don’t know what it’s sent after the kids…”
“We don’t have a choice,” Frank cut him off because there was no argument that Bryan could make that would have him or Miranda stay behind. When it came to their children, there was no such thing as sense. “We’re going to get our children, one way or another.”
*****
If someone had told Detective Sergeant Gerald McInnes a week ago that he’d be battling monsters in front of a fish and chip shop in Bermondsey Wall, he have thought they were barmy. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen his share of monsters in this job. After ten years as a policeman, he encountered all manner of villains, pedophiles, rapists, thieves and murderers. He’d come face to face with the depths of human ugliness and he coped with it by retreating to his little house in Blackheath, potter about the garden and all would be right with the world again.
Unfortunately after today, he’d have to spend a year in his garden before he was able to feel that safe again.
The last twelve hours had seemed like something a nightmare.
All through the day, they’d been hearing reports of something approaching from Cornwall. It was all jumbled mess really. Telephones weren’t working, radios spat out some nonsense about flying creatures that were downing airplanes and they’d thought it was some kind of a joke, like the sort that Orson Wells pulled on the Americans during that fabled War of the Worlds broadcast. Then there were people flooding into London from the west, evacuating on mass, fleeing from burning cities with stories of a monster army that was slaughtering everyone in sight.
Large spiders, wolves the size of bears, goblin men and giant trolls, wielding maces and blades, cutting down civilians, eating them as they moved through the countryside, led by dragons the size of 747s, breathing fire and oh…Dementors. At first the authorities had thought that this was the result of mass hysteria caused by the anguish of the Harry Potter series coming to an end. It was easy to discount such things as rubbish until the proof presented itself in a way that could not be denied.
What had happened on London Bridge was not mass hysteria. Gerald had seen it from Potter’s field Park and after that, he was a believer. How could he be anything but? Leviathans had risen out of the river, massive things with too many tentacles, with maws edged with sharp, terrible teeth. He watch people desperately trying to escape, only to be turned to a cinder by the dragons’ fiery breath, washing the length of the bridge with a flame so intense that nothing could escape. Those who hadn’t died there had been snatched off the bridge by the leviathans, taken screaming into the Thames, leaving a pool of a red where they’d disappeared.
The F-35 fighter jets had been called into attack but there was no contest. The dragons picked apart their planes like they were toys, hurling them to earth like a child throwing away and unwanted toys and Gerald remembered the horror of watching those fighters flying into his city, a trail of fire and smoke following them until a fireball marked their crash sites across the city, creating more destruction and death.
Then the monster army from the west entered London, like a two pronged attack and Gerald didn’t even know they were attack. The army was called in. He’d seen trucks with soldiers from the British Army and even those SAS blokes going to meet the creatures. He’d seen none of this at first, his duties requiring him to evacuate the city. However, it was soon evident that the soldiers were no match for whatever was coming. There was talk of the Dementors being able to turn soldiers mad and in their madness, the horde of hellish creatures devoured them with ease.
In a matter of hours, London was over run. With telephone lines down and communications disrupted, it was difficult knowing if reinforcements were coming. After all, this was the heart of the British Empire, it could not simply fall right? Gerald didn’t know but when he saw the creatures moving through the streets, killing everything in sight, he knew that it was no longer possible to ponder such questions. In an effort not seen since the Blitz, London’s tattered civil defense services moved into action.
The first business was to get everyone out.
They’d let the army deal with the creatures and focus on evacuating.
“Come on! Come on!” Gerald shouted at the constables who were ushering frightened civilians into a lorry they’d commandeered for the evacuation. A few streets away, Gerald could hear screaming and growls. Another slaughter was on approach and Gerald didn’t know if he wanted to face what it was doing the killing. As it was, his gaze kept touching the sky, trying to keep a vigil for the dragon, fearful they’d see the big shiny lorry and get in their mind to take a look because that would only follow an incineration.
“I’m hurrying as fast as I can!” hollered Constable Janine Harris, who was helping an elderly man into the back tray of the lorry.
“Well work faster,” Gerald demanded, glancing anxiously at the sky again. Gerald checked the AR-15 in his hand and turned to the other five policemen from his station. “Resh! See anything?”
Constable Kumaresh who was keeping an eye on the other end of the street, shook his head beneath the riot gear helmet he was wearing. “Nothing yet Sarge,” he answered. “But lots of a noise though. We better get a move on quickly.”
“No shit,” Nicols, another one of his men grumbled. Nicols stood at six foot four and looked rather formidable in his riot gear, armed to the teeth with all the guns they could carry and yet, Gerald could sense the anxiety in his voice. Nicols had fought in the Falkland Wars and did a stint in Kuwait. When he got scared, you knew you had to worry.
Constable Kai Chong, whose parents who’d given him an English first name that they’d thought would help him fit in but misspelled it in his birth certificate, was standing near the front of a butcher’s shop window. Like the rest of his comrades, he was struggling to grasp with the unreality of the situation even though what they’d seen on the telly and with their own eyes was no illusion and there were flesh eating monsters trolling the streets of London today.
He glanced at Janine and thought fleetingly, she looked pretty hot in the riot gear and wondered if she’d like to go out for a drink when this insanity was over. Not that it was just the riot gear that had made him asked the question. She had pretty red hair and sea green eyes that lit up when she laughed. Janine was organizing the civilians into the truck.
“That’s it!” She announced and he was about to answer when something appeared at the rear of his vision.
He swung around just in time to see a large yellow eyes staring at him through the glass a second before it pounced. The creature smashed through the glass, landing on top of him with such force that he was almost knocked out by the weight of its meaty paws on his chest. He closed his fingers around his gun, prepared to shoot when he realised that the weapon had fallen out of his hand…
The last thing he thought as it moved in for the kill, was thinking that he’d should have asked Janine out for a drink before this.
“KAI!” Gerald shouted as he ran forward, firing into the creature’s pelt as the beast took Kai’s head with barely a thought. The bullets tore through its massive bulk and the creature turned its large head towards the remaining police.
“GET GOING JANINE!” Resh ordered Janine and he and Nicols ran to join his sergeant.
“But…” the youngest of them opened her mouth to object but then she saw that there were more creatures emerging through the shop front. These ones were carrying weapons. Thinking about the terrified people who had broken out into cries of fear at the sight of the enemy, waiting for rescue, Janine swore under her breath and hurried to the front of the lorry and climbed behind the wheel.
Unleashing a hail of bullets at the beast, the wolf lunged at him when suddenly, something blew past his ear, coming from the direction of the Thames behind him. For a moment, Gerald wasn’t sure what he was seeing until the arrow slammed into the open mouth of the creature and kept going, striking the concrete behind it. The beast twitched uncomfortably and this halted the progress of the goblin creatures that had spilled out through the shop front.
“What the hell…” Nicols exclaimed.
“GET CLEAR!” The voice that sang out of chaos was unfamiliar yet strong and commanding.
Gerald spun around in confusion, wondering if Central had managed to send some reinforcements. However, whoever had issued that warning was no policeman. It came from a man standing on a boat that was fast nearing the embankment. The boat reminded him of one of those gondola things he’d seen when he’d taken the missus to Venice, except this one was white and its shaped like that of a great swan. It was…beautiful. There was no other word to describe.
The man wasn’t alone. He and his company, Gerald countered at least nine, were wearing amour from medieval days except these didn’t seem rusty or cumbersome. This armor gleamed and when they moved in it, it felt almost fluid. There were shields across their backs, swords hanging at the hip, long broad swords from an age more civilized than this one. They were arming bows, preparing to fire a phalanx of arrows at the enemy. The unreality of the situation made him feel light-headed, made him think that he was dreaming.
Then he remembered Kai, whose headless corpse was still bleeding all over the sidewalk where he’d died and reality returned soon enough. These things may seem improbable but they were here and they were capable of killing.
The goblin creatures, overcoming their shock, were spilling out of the shop front, spreading out across the street. They were barking at each other in a foul sounding language that Gerald couldn’t identify but understood nonetheless. The language of violence was one he understood quite well. They moved like roaches, unsheathing jagged swords and arming their own bows, rushing to keep up with the new arrival’s own preparations.
“GET CLEAR!” The stranger shouted at Gerald again.
By now the lorry full of civilians was speeding away from the scene. Janine doing her job to get the innocents out of the way. Gerald retreated, not about to argue the point when it was clear what was about to happen. Besides, judging by the fear he could see in the eyes of the villains, Gerald wasn’t about to argue and there was more, a sense of trust in the stranger that he couldn’t explain.
The stranger and his ilk looked almost luminous and as he lingered his gaze on them a moment more, something made him want to trust them. It was just like the time he’d sat in church and saw the sunlight peering through the stained glass window, trust that God was in the room, listening.
“Do as he says!” Gerald shouted at Nicols and Resh who were in a similar state of shock as he. His shout jolted the sense back into them as they were able to deal with something tangible, a direct order from a superior.
“You sure?” Nicols looked at him, grapping with similar difficulties about what was happening in front of them but relying on his sarge’s lead to act.
“No,” Gerald answered honestly, retreating out of the way and ensuring that Nicols and Resh were doing the same as these two opposing forces prepared to meet in combat. If they stayed too long, they’d get caught in the middle and Gerald still wasn’t sure whose side the new lot was on. A skip bin sat up against one of the walls and Gerald motioned Resh and Nicols to it, deciding that its large size would provide ample cover. Besides arrows or not, he didn’t want to get caught in the crossfire.
Still on the boat, the new arrivals stood upright and tall, like the statues of ancient warriors. Their arms pulling back the strings of their bows with one hand, while the other stretched forward, bending the limbs of the bow, ready to unleash death upon the enemy. The leader, the one who had ordered Gerald to retreat stood at the head and shouted a command in a language that he did not understand but knew instinctively was old, very old.
"Si!”
The arrows flew through the air, a hail of them that struck the goblin creatures with such force that some were swept off their feet and brought down like the animals they were. A second volley of arrows followed, impaling more of the creatures as the boat reached the stone embankment. The archers wasted no time, leaping gracefully from the embankment onto the pathway beyond it.
This slight delay gave the goblin creatures time to react and they did so, firing arrows in return. The archer moved with speed that Gerald didn’t think was human. Like dancers, they reached behind them, swung the shields above their heads and let the twisted, gnarled arrows bounce harmlessly off them to clatter to the ground.
With the distance between the two groups narrowed, the bow was forgotten and swords were drawn. The swords belonging to the archers gleamed in the sunlight and the light seemed to make their goblin like opponents flinch and recoil. Then they rushed the enemy and for the next few minutes there were screams and gurgles of pains as limbs were hacked off, bodies run through and dark blood splattering across the streets that was for once, not the blood of innocent victims. Gerald and his men simply watched, aware that with their guns, they could have helped put an end to this melee decisively but it almost like intrusion, like their weapons were the unnatural thing here.
Even when they fought, the archers were mesmerizing to watch. Their movements were fluid, their speed so quick that it didn’t seem possible, and when they fought, it was almost like a dance, except that there was only death to follow their performance, not applause. Still, Gerald watched with awe, trying to understand how any of this could be.
Next to him, Resh and Nicols were similarly affected by the scene. The three men knew that they were seeing something incredible but there didn’t seem to know how to articulate it.
“I think I saw this movie…” Resh remarked, not knowing what else to say.
The skirmish ended quickly with the goblins making a run for it when too many of their number had been killed and the victors gave brief chase, felling those who ran off with swift arrows to the backs, letting none of them escape. The leader of the archers swept his gaze across the empty street, wincing when he sighted Kai’s body and walked over to it. He seemed to offer a silent prayer to the dead and the others dropped their head in similar respect for the fallen human. The gesture touched Gerald deeply, they hadn’t known Kai, not like he, Nicols or Resh had but it was nice that they showed grief at his passing.
“You can come out now,” the leader spoke out loud, draping his cloak over the dead body.
The three policemen looked at each other and it was Gerald who gave them silent instruction to remain until he decided if it was really safe or not. Emerging from behind the skip, he approached these strangers who looked like something out of a story book.
“Thank you,” Gerald said softly, glancing at Kai’s dead form.
“He is one of your men,” the stranger asked.
“Yes,” Gerald nodded, “he was a good lad.” Behind him, Nicols and Resh emerged, deciding it was safe now and joined their sergeant at his side.
The stranger nodded and removed his helmet, allowing dark hair to spill around his shoulders, revealing his ears. Gerald spotted the tips immediately and noted the same feature on all the archers. “What are you people?”
Having dealt with a similar reaction from Eve once before, Elladan smiled faintly and introduced him. “I am Elladan, son of Elrond. We are elves.”
“Go on…” Nicols started to declare and then looked at the men closer again, finding hard to find a credible argument after the day he’d had where he’d seen goblins, dragons and sea monsters.
While the rest of the company kept a vigil on the sky, ensuring that they were not set upon by dragons, Elladan addressed the Edain since he was the only one of them who could speak the language. He only hoped that this man, with the graying hair and the craggy face would be as open to reason as Frank and Aaron had been during their first meeting.
“Elves?” Gerald voiced his own disbelief. “Elves?” He repeated himself only because it sounded so bloody insane.
Once again, this was not the first time he had received such a reaction since returning to the world of men. “Is it any more difficult to believe that we are elves in light of what you have seen this day? Today you and your men have learned that the world is a far more mysterious place then you know. There are dark forces a foot my friends, dark forces that are tearing your world apart, if we are to survive this, we must work together.”
Already other boats like the one he’d commanded to the shore had left the fleet and were disembarking to help the Edain combat the creatures that were turning this city in a killing ground.
“I don’t fucking believe this…” Nicols retorted shaking his head.
“Shut it,” Gerald snapped because he had trouble believing it too but the proof was there. The city was under siege and even if the invaders weren’t conventional, he knew that something was happening. Today, he had seen sights he’d never imagined were real. People were dying and no one had any answers until now. Trying to wrap his head around it, he asked the elf (yeah the elf) named Elladan the most obvious question on his mind. He’d deal the ramifications of the answer later on.
“What were those things?” He gestured to the dead goblin like creatures on the ground.
“They are orcs,” Elladan answered, his face curdling in distaste as he spoke. “They serve a master that has come to your world to rule. You have already seen his Watchers and his dragons claim the sky and the sea. He has armies of orcs and other foul creatures that intend to claim the land as well. We have come to help because this matter concerns not just the realm of the Edain but also that of my people.”
“We?” Gerald asked, feeling lost again.
Elladan gestured to the river.
In all his life, Gerald MacInnes would never forget the day he saw the Elves return to the world of men.
An audible gasp escaped him as he saw the great, white ships of the Teleri sailing across the Thames. They were like great birds swimming…no gliding across the water. With graceful swan necks that tapered into the ship’s bow, he saw the shaped wings that made up the side of the ships. It was the most breathtaking thing he’d ever seen. He thought of all the terrible things he’d seen in his life and how his garden had been his balance and now, for the rest of his days, this image would be a symbol of how beautiful the world could be.
********
The white ships of the Teleri sailed up the breadth of the River Thames, a flotilla that caught the eye of all who saw it. Cirdan, master of the lead ship, saw people on the river banks, watching with mouths agape as the ships of the elves passed them, staring in a mixture of wonder and awe. It was a reaction that he was accustomed to from men, even in the Third Age. He wondered if they thought they were dreaming or perhaps there was a part of them that remembered that once long ago, they shared Arda with races far older than themselves.
Whatever was in their mind, Cirdan could not say. However, when he saw their city being assailed by dragons in the air, with their great towers in flame, the foreboding scent of the innocent slain coupled with the stink of orc, just as it had been at Sennen Cove, it set a flame an unquenchable anger within the heart of the elder elf. Sauron’s power was indeed strong, stronger than it had been during the War of the Last Alliance but Cirdan like Elrond was determined to put an end to him once and for all.
If this was indeed the End of Days and time was diminishing for the Eldar then they would go into Halls of Mandos with their heads held high and with the enemy destroyed once and for all.
Suddenly, the water began to froth ahead of his craft and he knew that the attack that they’d been expecting had finally come. Sauron had finally sent his minions to deal with the Eldar. He did not have to see the beast to know what it was about to assail them. Cirdan had been master of the sea for nearly the entire existence of his people. He knew the fell creature s of Morgoth, particularly the ones who had terrorized the oceans during the dark days of the First Age.
“WATCHER!” He shouted out loud to the elves on the deck. ‘WARN THE FLEET!”
No sooner than he had said those words did he hear the great horn being blown and its trumpet roar bellowed warning to the rest of the fleet. Across the deck of his ship, the rest of his crew were emerging from below, armed with swords, spear and arrow, preparing for battle.
Sure enough, the battle came swiftly when tentacles exploded out of the river, slithering over the deck as the dark beast attached to them lifted itself out of the water, widening the monstrous maw of its mouth in readiness for the feeding. Cirdan did not doubt that this watcher was alone and knew the rest of the creature’s kin would be spreading out to the fleet, launching similar assaults. He drew his blade, prepared to give Sauron’s dark minions and even the dark lord himself, when the moment came, a fight that none would not forget.
The ship shook underneath his feet as the river became violent with the battle raging and he saw bowmen showering the watcher with barrage after barrage of arrows while others hacked at limbs trying to snatch them off the deck. As he stood behind the ship’s wheel, a tentacle came at him, its thick, grey arm trying to snare him. Cirdan waste no time severing it in half and turned his eyes to the front of the boat for a more decisive attack plan.
As expected, he saw other watchers appearing out of the river, carrying out similar assaults on the fleet behind him. Cirdan hoped the rest of the his kin were as prepared for the attack and he hacked away yet another tentacle trying to entangle him, causing a spray of black blood to splattered across the deck from the severed appendage. The creature roared in pain, retracting the severed limb, trailing dark ooze as Cirdan fought his way to the bow, watching with dismay when he saw one of his elves being dragged away screaming into the water.
“USE YOUR HARPOONS!” He heard Elrond shouting to the other ships as he made his way to the front of the ship and pulled away the cover that concealed the weapon he had installed before leaving Valinor, knowing what it was they would fight when they returned to this world. He had ensured that all the remaining Teleri ships were similarly armed.
Wasting no time, Cirdan ignited the wick and stepped back as the black powder within the mechanism was ignited. He covered his ears as the loud boom roared through the air and the harpoon was sent on its way, tipped with mithril to kill not merely watcher but a dragon if it came to that. The harpoon sailed neatly through the air and struck the watcher in the dead centre of its large misshapen skull, the mithril point driving deep into its flesh. The beast howled in agony at the killing blow. Its limbs became slack and as its life drained, it began to sink, its limp tentacles dragging over the deck before being pulled into depths with it.
And for the first time today, the blood that turned the Thames dark was neither elf nor man.