Ashes ⇝Legolas

†9†

CHAPTER NINE
FIGHT TO ESCAPE

Nesryn was yet one of the first to have reacted toward the sight that unfolded at the back. With her eyes burning through the darkness, one golden dagger tightly tracing the skin of her hand in shapes that have many years prior to the moment her people engraved in gold, she ran. Through skulls punctured with arrows, poison that had dried on their points and bones clattering as she narrowly avoided them, she took no time to consideration what might be awaiting on the other side.

"Frodo!" The Hobbits cried after their companion, for it was obvious more than before they feared the monster that had taken Frodo as they, rather unsure began pushing their way to him– too slow as Nesryn rushed with them out, into the sight and fury, eye and reach of a towering being, whose two like cavity black eyes and long, shaky tentacles ominously blocked the pond of water it had came from.

"Strider!" Sam shouted above the sounds of splashing water, as he drew one long wound into the flesh of monster's tentacle, which had then dropped Frodo and withdrawn in the depths of murky water below, yet to push up to the surface by surprise. Nesryn sprinted toward the Hobbit desperately, shiny blade gliding across monster's skin as it caused a line of black blood to trickle below. Unfortunately the woman was not fast enough, for the monster had gripped poor Hobbit once again.

"Strider!" Frodo yelled out to the man, his small figure hanging upside down as one tentacle gripped his legs and the other his hand. Boromir drew his sword, Aragorn joining the man as they both hacked a tentacle. The ground covered in brown, unclear water beneath Nesryn's feet began to shake, yet her preoccupied mind proved not to be aware of anything happening as she swing after swing tried to cut off the monster's tentacle.

"Nesryn, get out of the water!" She heard Boromir's voice cry in warning, it was yet distant as it quieted between her grunting and hollow sound the monster had produced. All too suddenly it rose from the water— a sight that had made even a brave warrior as Nesryn freeze, blood running down her weapon trickle and paint her hand in its sickly color while her eyes had drained of their previous fire. It was a sight that would force a great sickness up the stomach of many, a spider, yet too big to be one whose legs were not just sharp points but tentacles that rather belonged to a huge squid than a being of earth. Nesryn's arms felt weak against the power her weapon held, if it were not for Boromir calling out to her she would stand there, in fury that drowned more by utter fright in the way of the monster who even then held an upper hand in that fight.

As in that moment, her mind came back to reality no longer neither frightened nor too focused on the unfolding bad occurrence as she then pulled out her second dagger. She held them out, both blades reaching even further than the length of her arms could as she eyed the beast carefully and then took off toward the river bank, sliding her daggars into beast's flesh on the way. Nesryn could not deal enough damage to it, perhaps not as much as Legolas, for his bow provided a much better striking range than her precious blades– surely the woman did not want to hear of throwing them in waste, for they were worth more in her eyes as the only remaining piece of her homeland she still possessed.

She did stop eventually just beneath beast's tentacle, the one which held Frodo as she dodged and evaded every blow furious monster gave her. Amongst the fray of desperate fighting Nesryn had caught Legolas' quick glance, which had soon left as he aimed two arrows just above her head. And fired.

The woman deftly caught Frodo, unfortunately the ankle high water and binds of grass in it, even darker shade in shadow above considerably slowed her walk to a mere struggle. A mighty roar sounded behind, strangled yet something full of malice as Nesryn then picked up her pace with as much strength as she managed to muster, pushing past the slimy base of water beneath before her feet had once again stepped onto a solid ground.