Heart of Flame: A Tale Of Sauron

The Eagles of Manwë

Tendrils of smog curled around the restless bodies of the orcs. Their ruined faces, mutilated from self inflicted wounds, grimaced even in sleep. Iestiel knew the stories. She knew that the Enemy could not create, only ruin creation. These were the scarred shells of the first Eldar, her people. Or at least the descendants of those poor souls. 

Her eyes drifted shut again, her head throbbing. She tried to remind herself of the pain those first orcs must have suffered at the hands of Melkor. If only to keep her sanity, if only to bring reason to a surreal situation.

Grumbling voices woke her, their language coarse and spitting. The Black Speech. She did not understand most of it, but a few words were familiar, bastardized versions of primitive Sindarin. She knew one word immediately. Witch.  

As she opened her eyes where she lay on her side, her hands and forearms bound, stripped to her bloodied shirt and hose with bare feet, Iestiel realized why they were calling her that name. It was barely dawn. They were camped on the outskirts of a great plain, sparse patches of sickly grass growing under a smoggy sky. The smoking mounds of the Thangorodrim loomed in the distance. 

But the air around her was clean of smog. The charm she had cast over herself before they had departed from Doriath was still working. A sharp pain ran up the side of her leg. In her stupor, she had forgotten about her wound.

When the orcs had attacked, she'd called up a wind. It allowed her father and their surviving companion to do battle, slaying a few of their foe, but the orcs had been too many. Soon they were overtaken. When she had been struck in the head by the handle of an ax, another blade had stabbed her in the thigh. The wound burned, the only thing ringing in her consciousness as she was lost to the darkness. The last thing she remembered was her father fighting his way towards her, his expression panic stricken and furious. 

She didn't want to consider how he must be feeling at that moment, his daughter captured by orcs and carted off to Angband. If Lalvon still lived.

The orcs were gathering their things to move on. There were six in total, less than had originally attacked them. Some must have been killed, others moved on to raid other areas. One reluctantly entered her bubble of clean air and kicked her in the side. Iestiel whimpered, pain radiating out from her leg. She was dragged to her feet.

She didn't need to know the language to understand what the creature meant. If she was conscious, she was walking the rest of the way. Iestiel squinted in the faint light. Miles stretched between them and the mountains. Then when they arrived at their accursed destination, she would be put to work. Till she died of it.

Despair filled her to the brim. Her father had been right. Endor was dark and dangerous outside the bounds of Doriath. 

Doriath. She would never see it again. Or hold her mother and sisters. Walk with Melian in her gardens. Iestiel closed her eyes and thought of the whisper of wind through starlit trees as the orc shoved her forward, a chain wrapped around her bound hands.

An arrow sung past her ear, stirring her clumped hair. It pierced the orc through the base of it's neck. The orc fell, dragging her down as the chain caught up under it's heavy body. 

Chaos erupted as figures on horseback broke through the bank of dense, black fog. Hooded with their faces hidden behind kerchiefs that covered their noses and mouths, they fired rounds of arrows into the scattering group of orcs. The piteous beasts let out strangled cries as they were cut down, even as they ran. The horsemen showed no mercy.

Iestiel tried to roll over, but the wound in her leg burned venomously. She moaned and fought through the pain, pulling the chain free from under the orc. Rising to her feet, she used the last bit of her strength to call up a wind from the south. She closed her eyes and thought of the dark eaves of her beloved Doriath. The wind rose up behind her and raced along the plain, dissolving the fog.