We travelled slowly uphill, past the Stonecrop Encampment where we had arranged to meet up with Captain Culufinnel and along the road towards Herne. He was waiting by the crossroads there, and looked as if he may have been for some time. The Captain let out a single deep sigh of relief as he saw us, the warmth from which misted the air before him, showing pale against the leaden sky. Estarfin and I hailed him, but pulled our horses to one side, so that Parnard could dismount from riding behind me on Iavas, and speak with his brother in some privacy. Garbed in some of Estarfin’s spare clothing, he was warm and dry, although slightly engulfed by the overlarge-for-him shirt of mail.
We let them speak. It was important to both.
At one point the Captain took a bundle from the back of his horse, unwrapped it and handed it to Parnard. It was joyful to see my ‘cousin’s face as he was reunited with his sword, ‘Steel Thorn.’ I smiled over at Estarfin and nodded for us to make a little more distance from the brothers. Estarfin moved Norlome forward to match me.
“Parnard will likely be more of himself when we have some distance from this dark land, and his recent memories.” Estarfin said, somewhat reassuringly.
I agreed. “It has been quite a trial for him. I know much of what transpired until we reached that house in Angmar, but he spent time alone with those Sorceresses and others. We cannot yet know what he endured.”
A solitary snowflake settled on Estarfin’s nose, as he raised his head to look for any break in the heavy dark clouds. It was the first of what would be many snow flakes that settled on him.
“Oh no, would that the snow waited for some days!” I said with frustration. I had a sense of ‘out of the frying pan, into the fire’. What could be worse than trudging through icy water in winter? It was possible that trudging through a snow storm was an answer.
“We are dry and warm, and perhaps this seasonal weather will not persist for long.” Estarfin brushed the melted flake away and looked over at Parnard and Culufinnel.
“There is only one Parnard, and thank the stars for that,” Culufinel was saying. Then he headed over to us. “And farewell, Noldor. My thanks. I return with haste to Celondim knowing you will watch over my brother.” He made a salute. We both nodded in acknowledgement. One thing that our travels had taught us both was that the Captain was an honourable Elf, and one to be trusted. He rode off at quite a pace, perhaps hoping to get ahead of the forthcoming storm
“Though I long for home, I think we take it a touch steadier with just two horses?” I suggested. Parnard nodded at me, and remounted.
“Better home in a week than home never,” he said wistfully as he pulled his cloak tightly around himself and made himself comfortable.
The journey north was unremarkable. It grew colder. It grew darker. The snow began to fall with more force so that soon any trail we left was hidden to all eyes. And Parnard began to speak of what had happened to him.
“I knew not the paths I was taken. I was drugged or poisoned, or both. And I was in the back of a wagon that found every rock and bump on the road. There were ash heaps and piles of corrupter, - oh, I know not what it was. It was a road I have never taken through Angmar before, that is for certain.”
“We know you were taken through the Mannish town of Trestlebridge,” I prompted. “That the wagon halted there overnight.”
Parnard shook his head. “ “I know not, the road was long and with few stops. Then we were in a town, and to a house. It was not in the fashion of Angmar dwellings. More like Bree? My head was swimming.”
He looked to me for help.
“The house you were in?” asked Estarfin.
“The House in Angmar was as a nightmare, a house behind a wall in the rock. But you speak of the one in Herne, cousin?”
“The one that was burned down as I was taken away. There was something in that house.” he clarified.
I recalled what he spoke of, and shivered at the memory. “There was much evil in that house. Gaisarix and I would have perished had we not been rescued.”
Parnard was wringing his hands in his struggle to give voice to his thoughts. “Something was outside the door of the room they kept me in. It made me wish to not venture through it.”
I reluctantly recalled the feeling of great weight upon me, making any thought of movement a challenge. My limbs were as lead. I had been tied to a bed while the older of the women opened a vein in my arm and held a silver dish to gather my blood. And yes, although faint, something else was there.
“Do you know of what I speak, Estarfin? You must have been in that house?” Parnard turned to our companion.
“The Dwarf?” an image of Duzir came to my mind.
“A Beast?” suggested Estarfin.
“No, not the Dwarf, not a beast. Something…something more like the Necromancer.” Parnard lowered his voice to a whisper, paled and shivered as he spoke the words he feared.
Estarfin turned sharply to look at us. I shivered again, understanding at last. They were servants of the Dark Lord. But surely there were other, more reasonable explanations?
“The younger Sorceress, Khahaynd, the one who tried to kill me, I had a feeling about her being one deep in the service of the Dark Lord?” I said.
“A feeling of dread so great that it rooted you to the spot?” Estarfin asked me in Quenya.
I nodded, but replied in the usual Sindarin. “Yes. Hard to move, hard to think. Though the older Sorceress has a skill with potions and poisons I suspect. She had administered several draughts to me.”
“The Halfling..” Estarfin began.
“Helped break through the hold on you?” I finished his observation.
He nodded.
“From what little I saw, they seemed less affected than us. Perhaps knowing not what we faced had some advantage?”
Parnard shook his head and flung back his hair over his shoulder. “I stabbed that Sorceress,” he announced with pride. “And then she ran out, and the Corsair flung wide the door and pretended not to guard me.”
‘Naraal?’ I thought to myself.
Estarfin looked momentarily confused, but then nodded, likely also realising what had happened.
“There were two women in the houses, Estarfin,” I began to explain. “The older one, Zairaphel, took Parnard. She seems likely to be the High Priestess or Head of the Order.”
“And a vile, wicked woman she is, Estarfin.” Parnard spoke with conviction, and shuddered again.
“And the younger,” I continued. “ The one who tried to mislead you and the Captain. Also a Southerner, dark red of hair, more like the colour of blood. She hated me from the start, although I know not why.”
Parnard started wriggling about and drew his cloak more tightly about his shoulders as snow settled on his (and our) hair. “Two peas in a pod. Both wicked. We shall cut them down if we come across them.”
I looked back over my shoulder at him, and smiled wryly. “Both wanting to be leader of the group?”
“There can only be one Queen Bee,” he replied wisely.
“Well, if we encounter them again we will be better prepared.” I pulled up the hood of my cloak to stop the snow and the growing winter wind that was building in force.
“They both have the ability to change their likeness?” Estarfin’s black hair was being blown this way and that, as he too struggled to raise his cloak hood. His voice was growing a little thin in the wind.
“Both are shapeshifters,” I confirmed, riding Iavas to travel alongside Norlome, rather than behind. “But I believe now I would sense both despite a disguise, no matter what form they took.” However either of them- appeared, their spirits were known to me, and likely to Parnard. Perhaps to Estarfin too?
And we rode on, taking the longer path to avoid Herne itself, and made onward towards Bree.
“I have some of your belongings,” I said to Parnard, as we left the tiled roofs of Herne behind.
“My stolen things? “ Parnard sounded as excited as possible, given the situation.
“Only a few, cousin, I shall give them back to you as soon as we halt. I should have given them to you earlier, when we came upon the horses, but my mind was on us getting out of that marsh.”
I could ‘sense’ him smiling, and almost hear the turning of his thoughts as he made a guess. “Not my Dwarf-steel eating knife?”
I laughed softly because I could say ‘yes’.
“Indeed, some things were found in the burning house and saved. I have your eating knife, the ring I made for you to lessen the sea longing and the peridot and silver pendant I made for you for Midsummer. I also have your two long-knives.”
He clapped his hands. “And I thought I would never see them again.”
It was a full-blown snow storm in Cardolan. The soft and infrequent flakes gave way to blustery waves of sleet and snow that made what little we could see of the land a pristine white. I turned my head to say to Parnard, “I hope your brother is ahead of this.” He gritted his teeth and nodded.
But we were grown tired, and the two horses were tired. The weak sun had passed under the horizon, and the situation would but worsen. Estarfin gestured to a set of three larger boulders several yards from the track. “They will give us all some protection from this weather. We may even manage to keep a small fire going.”
Neither Parnard nor I questioned his wisdom. We dismounted and led Iavas behind the rocks, as the young stallion shook his head, scattering a mane-full of snow in our direction. Then he curled back his upper lip as if in apology.
Estarfin led Norlome into the small shelter, she and Iavas standing close. They were thankfully shorter than the boulders. I took what was the last of the grain from my saddle bags, and spread it on the sheltered and snowless area beside them.
I offered the others what small knowledge I had of the area. “There is a Mannish camp some twenty miles north of here, off the main trail, though they would have scouts out some distance in better weather. There are craven and lynx in the area. Neither are likely to disturb us. There has been talk in recent years of orcs in small numbers hereabouts.”
“Orcs in small numbers are no problem,” Estarfin began piling whatever he could find on the ground into the building of a fire.
Parnard nodded, his hand moving automatically to the hilt of Steel Thorn.
“We can put the remaining dried meat and berries into another stew?” I suggested. There was not much left to eat.
“I will hunt in the dawn light”, Estarfin said. “It may only be rabbit, but that is easy enough to prepare and roast. We cannot spend time working on a deer carcass.” He took over the stew making as I helped Parnard with the fire. Once all was ready we three sat and managed the hearty hot broth again, as the horses turned their backs to the weather and drew closer to the flame. It was almost cosy! Almost.
After the meal was made, Estarfin stayed close to the fire, wrapped in his heavy cloak, with my cloak thrown around us both as much as possible. I sat at his side. I felt the cold as well, partly a normal reaction, partly, as I had recently been reminded, from recent blood loss. But I did not feel it as he did.
“Perhaps one day you will tell me of the incident in the snow?” I asked softly. He sighed. I thought then, whatever it is, it is too painful for him. I did not press further. “One day, “ he replied equally softly, trying to arrange his cloak so that both cloaks covered both of us. “I would that we are in the warm when I speak of it.”
“As you wish, meldanya,” I snugged close against him, but looked to see how Parnard fared. He may need to be included in our ‘tent’.
Parnard was indeed happier since he had donned Estarfin’s spare armour, and spoken with his brother. He was sitting up beside the fire, Steel Thorn resting across his lap, and patting his stomach in appreciation of the hot meal. “Oh, by the way, it is past Yule. Shouldn’t you two be wed?” He chuckled. Parnard liked celebrations. He liked happy occasions. “You two chilly Noldor keep each other warm, I shall keep first watch,” he said, rising to his feet. He didn’t go far from the fire.
I lent forward and added a few more dried twigs to the fire, then settled back against Estarfin.
“I have not forgotten,” he said.
“That we were to wed at Yule?” I asked, brushing snow from his face with my leather-gloved hand.
He nodded. “This has been a … challenging year.”
“It has not been my favourite year in many ways, but you are here, I am here, and Tintalie watches over us.”
“We are alive, and that is reason enough to be thankful, but this is far from ideal.”
“The date is set for family and friends to know, for us, it is not a set law. At least one year betrothal, and we have had that.
“Lord Elrond said it was unseemly to prolong a betrothal,” he reminded me, with a hint of humour in his eyes.
“Just so, by years or yeni. We are decided, are we not? And we shall wed as soon as it is suitable. At the New Year perhaps?”
“In Coire ?” he replied “And at home, among friends.”
“That does not sound unseemly,” I replied with a chuckle.
“And you would have the opportunity to wear the gown Parnard made for you. Is it crimson, like the berries of the holly?”
“It is not red,” I replied.
He was recovered enough to banter with me? By Tintalie, I loved him.
