PASSING SHADOWS|| BOOK II

I

• "isn't it lovely, all alone, heart made of glass my mind of stone..."•

Pain.

It spreads across my head, it's talons grappling in. I moan, trying to open my heavy eyelids. My vision's blurred, and all I can make out are patches of grey and green. And some thumping sound.

I groan a little, waiting for it to clear up, trying to remember what had happened before this. I turned to the side and yelped back. An Uruk, with yellow teeth and eyes snarling, but not at me. He's snarling because he's strained from effort, from running.

'Boromir!' I winced at the memory of my voice 'Merry, Pippin, help him!'

Boromir. My eyes whipped to the other side, noticing another Uruk. I didn't need to be told there were more behind me. They seemed to form a perfect rank, four on each row, running like their lives depended on it, yet never breaking a sweat. Their boots (the cause of the sound) were thunder on the ground and their glinting armour lightning. I gasped, sending another ripple of pain across my head. I tried to rub it gently before I realised that my hands were bound. I raised my head a little, and my eyes met dark, uneven locks.

'I'm strapped to an Uruk.' I realised.

'Boromir! Aaah' Another memory of my voice plays in my mind

I feel my breaths constrict as I struggled with the bonds in front of me. I remembered. Everything. Boromir. He was outnumbered and had been shot. I tried to stop Lurtz but... I must have blacked out since I can't recall what happened next.

I sniffed a little, allowing a tear to roll down my face. I knew Boromir had been killed. No one could have survived that many arrows. Robb Stark didn't. I tried to spot Merry and Pippin, but I couldn't see them ahead of me in the seemingly endless rows of Uruks. They must have been behind. I tried to look back and began fiddling with the rope, which was already rubbing into my skin.

"Stop moving." An elbow is dug into my side, and I groan. I know it's from the Uruk holding me. Once I recover, I scowl.

'I'll make sure to kill you first.'

I tip my head back slightly, if only to alleviate the pain. Now that I'm fully awake, the rope seems to burn, and it feels like I'm bleeding. I just wish I could go back to sleep and forget everything. Forget everything that's ever happened

'And Legolas' My brain whispers to me, and I bite my lip.

A flood of memories threatens to overwhelm me, but I won't let that happen. I won't let them make me crumble.

The Uruks never stopped, not even for the sun. I'd been asleep for most of the day (since the pain was so overwhelming there was nothing better to do than sleep) and at nightfall, I was thrown off when the Uruks finally had to stop for rest for the night.

I yelped, falling wildly onto the floor. It was hard to stop the tears coming to my eyes as I clutched at my wrist, rolling back and forth on the grass to try to quell the pain from my shoulder. The arrow wound was still raw.

Merry and Pippin were next to me, unbound, too. I was really grateful that the Uruks hadn't killed them, too.

"Raina." Pippin cried, scrambling forward on his stomach toward me.
"Can't you be a little more gentle?!" Merry complains.
"Oh, stop your chirping!" Mauhúr, an Uruk surrounding us complains."She's fit as a fiddle!"
"She's got a flesh wound, and if you don't patch that up, she'll bleed to death!"

I didn't hear anything for a while, and I assumed Mauhúr had walked away until I heard him snap. "Fine! See to her wound."

Unfortunately, the orc that had come to see to my shoulder injury didn't seem particularly pleased at doing such a lowly task. He yanked me upwards, grabbed my arm, and pulled me towards him.