Daughter of The Darkness

Chapter 21

Elfreda's sword clashed with both teeth and metal. Her skills were finely tuned and perfectly performed. Even with her injuries, Elfreda moved fluently and with grace. As the white warg snapped his head forward, Elfreda forward rolled under his snout and tried to cut the under jaw of the warg. She stood up the wrong way round but with a swivel of her foot and a high kick in the air, her flat leather boot hit the warg in the jaw. Planting her foot back on the ground she swung her sword and was ready to continue the fight.

The tree which was hanging over the cliff creaked and groaned even more. It had toppled over during the fight and now the company were holding as their feet hung down into the valley below. Gandalf was holding both Dori and Ori with his staff as they had fallen from the tree.

Thorin had stood up and braced himself. Azog turned to face him, swinging his club smacking it in Elfreda's chest. She flew backwards and hit a tree, blood now seeping from her ribs.

The white warg ran at Thorin and Azog hit the prince with his club. The warg crunched Thorin and he yelled in pain.

"Thorin!" shouted Dwalin. He tried to run and protect his king but the branches of the tree gave way under his weight. Thorin sliced the warg with his sword, the huge beast threw Thorin out of his mouth. He flew through the air and crash landed in the stone floor.
"Bring me his head," said Azog to another Orc. The Orc got off his warg and strode up to Thorin who lay helpless and defeated on the ground.

Just as the blade was about to perice Thorins neck, Bilbo launched himself at the Orc, nocking him over. He stabbed the Orc over and over again. Azog looked on with confusion. Bilbo stood up from the dead Orc and pointed his sword at the pale Orc.
"Kill him," order Azog. A group of wargs walked toward the hobbit.

In a sudden surge of energy, Elfreda stood up at ran at them, her ribs screaming in pain. She planted her sword in one of the wargs skulls. She was joined by Fili, Kili and Dwalin. Bilbo joined in too. He was making this up as he went along.
"Bilbo! Step to the left!" shouted Elfreda who had collapsed on the ground. Bilbo stepped left just as a huge blade sweeped were he was stood.
"Duck!" she shouted again. He ducked as the same blade swooped over his head.
"Stab the paws!"
Bilbo aimed his sword at the wargs paws and stabbed it. The beast hollered in pain and lowered its head. Bilbo thrashed at its head and killed it.

Elfreda could not help Bilbo now because he had her own problems. Her chest made it impossible to move and painful to breathe. To make things even worse and warg was heading straight for her. The other thing was that her sword was only just out of reach.

The warg was 20 meters away...

The warg was 10 meters away...

Elfreda braced herself for the inevitable death. But the head of the warg fell hard landing on her legs, an arrow right through its skull.

Fili and Kili ran up to her and heaved the head off if her legs. They put her arms round thee shoulders and helped across to Gandalf. Elfreda pulled a dagger from the sheath strapped to Fili's back. With a flick of her wrist the dagger flew into an orc.
"You never give up do you?" laughed Kili. Elfreda tried to laugh back but the strain on her ribs was too much. They reached the cover behind the fallen tree where Gandalf was.
The brothers lowered her onto the ground. She thanked them for their kindness
"I'll be fine, now go they need you out there!" she breathed. The pair were reluctant to leave but Elfreda reassured them she would be fine. They ran back into the flight.

The moth flew back to Gandalf just as Dori and Ori fell. They landed on top of a giant eagle.

The eagles had arrived. Giant birds swooped in from the heavens picking up wargs and dropping them of the edge of the cliff. Their huge wings made the fire dance and fly. The eagles started to pick up the company off the trees. One swooped and grabbed Thorin in his talons.

Elfreda managed to crawl to the edge of the cliff. She leant forward and fell off the cliff. She fell through the air praying that an eagle was going to catch her. She thanked the heavens that one did, its soft feathers like a pillow. She looked over the wings of the eagle to see that everyone had been rescued.

Then she saw Thorin, his injuries worse than she thought.
"Hold on, please hold on" she whispered, ignoring the searing pain. The blood slowly dripping from her ribs and begun to stain her shirt.