The scheme was chancy and some had advised against it. Others had offered encouragement. That the latter seemed invariably those who habitually denounced her unorthodox ideas and erratic methods was telling. If the plan should go awry and she be killed or disappear into the pits of Barad Dur, her disputatious presence would be gone from the precincts of Elrond's domain. The eternal harmony would be restored.
All the same, she obtained the blessing of Elrond. A fortnight was spent in meditation and preparation of her disguise and from the battlements of Gloin's castle Vinderhaul, far from prying eyes, A tall, slim, fair lady with dark red hair drew a tattered sable cloak about herself, like unto an old crone in a snowstorm. At once, he was transformed into a vast winged shadow. A thing of terror, trailing whisps of primal dark.
Clad thus, she swept ever east and south until she passed over a Singular old elven fortress crumbling away upon a spike of rock, grown over with scrub pine, thorny vines and an unpleasant riot of weeds. With her preaternatural sight, she could make out wargs and orcs toiling busily in the works. But she was not here to spy on the Hill of Sorcery. And so she swept ever southeast, across a starry sky. For which she was grateful. When the dawn came, she could make out the distant ramparts of the Ered Lithui and she swept low to avoid the gaze of he who is resident upon the summit of the Barad Dur..
She turned eastward and came at last to rest on a basalt outcrop along the rocky wall north of Isenmouthe. She could not see his tower from this spot. But she could feel his presence. And because of her creation, it would not be long before he felt hers as well. As she raced over the wide road that led from Barad Dur to other parts of his infernal realm, she took impressions of columns of orcs marching hither and yon. She pulled at the black wings and caugth a thermal updraft from the raging volcanic vents below on the plain. Flying here was really a delight, she thought. How freeing this was.
It was vital she have a look at the gate. She cast sharp eyes above and all about. There were other things that flew above this land and she did not relish a fight. It seemed clear so she glided upward over the vast alkali bowl of Udun's crater, keeping close to the near vertical walls of the imploded volcanic dome.
A cold east wind was in the upper air when she spotted the speck below. A single figure trudging over the lonely vista, little puffs of choking dust with each footfall. Suddenly she took thought for who this might be. Winging lower, her fey eyes made out a woman in armor. Some distance behind was a corpse left in the dust. She felt her legs hit the ground like an owl as she set down a bit ahead. The shadow nimbus about her boiled for a moment and she came to a rest, her features still blurred by the shifting cloak.
The woman stopped abruptly, registering some confusion. “What are yousupposed to be?” she shouted. Quit rudely, it seemed. How d'you do?' in Mordor was such a fraught business.
“I'm undertaking a survey,” Rhavanielle chirped. “Makin sure you're all busy and going properly about your duties. What are you doing out in this dust bowl all alone for?
“ A survey!?” What manner of raggedy crow are you, doing surveys? Give me your name or I'll have you on report.”
“Be sure to report that Maellenin of the Tham Mirdain found that you were most faithfully dischrarging your duties. They'll know that name up at the tower. It may cause a pang of nostalgia at the very top.”
The armored woman seemed unimpressed by this, but Rhavanielle had alreay swirled her cloak about her again and was aloft once more, leaving her confused interrogator to puzzle out the nature of the bizarre encounter. The shrouded, batwinged elf flapped twice and turned into the wind, lofting toward the Morannon and over it.
