Benders: Dragonfire

Stepping Stones

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Dain yelled as the orcs charged, the deep notes of his voice shaking the valley. As the dwarves behind him locked their shields together, he marched his pig forward. A stamp of his hammer against the ground and it split, tearing apart to form a chasm. The line cracked further, and Dain smirked, watching orcs topple over the edge.

His smile was short lived as a gesture from Azog burst springs from deep within the veins of the earth and flooded the chasm. A swipe of his handless arm and the liquid turned to ice.

"Durin's beard!" Dain snorted. "Miserable filth is a bender!"

The orcs reached the dwarven line. Dain's pig protested but no blood drenched the thrust-out spears of the kneeling warriors as the earth rolled like a carpet shaken and reared to freeze into a wall ten feet high and almost as thick.

Another horn rang out. The wall shattered, and an orc leered through, ragged teeth cutting into its lip as it clenched a fist and manipulated a net of boulders to rise.

Dain's eyes turned the rocks to dust, but already more were rising, and a line behind the first orc proved their ability to bend as water, fire earth, and air came alive in enemy hands. He fought back the earth as it struggled to erupt beneath his men, baring his teeth as the fight made itself known in his spirit. Concentrated on one task, the water sweeping toward him carved a free path.

"Oh, where is Ciran when I need him?" Thranduil lamented.

The first line of elves crested the dwarven shields, but he was far in the lead, Flyfire left barebacked as he landed, an explosion of fire rocketing the orcs around him back. A funnel of flame evaporated the tidal wave headed for Dain and he met the dwarf's eyes, unable to help a sneer.

"Princess!" Dain roared, as the shield wall disassembled and thrust itself into the growing fray. He slammed a fist into the earth, watching plates of rock grow up his arms until he stood encased in the rock yet moving as though clad in cotton.

Not to be outdone, Thranduil took a step. The fire started at his ankles, swarming up his legs and encircled his bent waist. By the time his foot landed, the fire haloed his head, turning him into as much a representation of flame as Dain of earth.

The drums started. They lent an odd music, so devoid of rhythm, the beat came clearer than ever. Dain threw his hammer, the flat head breaking a hole in the earth. It expanded, swallowing writhing bodies, and closed as the handle returned to Dain's hand.

Thranduil sucked in a breath and torched an orc as it threatened to birth a tornado over the battlefield. Dain landed at his back and glared at him.

"Care to match kills?" Thranduil inquired.

"Be my guest," the dwarf replied.

They split, each their own to the beat of the drums. Where Thranduil's movements were as supple as dancing flame, Dain's planted themselves with as much grace as a boulder falling from a cliff. The walls of fire and earth bent and curved, lending themselves to the task at hand. The cries around them only strengthened a resolve far removed from personal quarrels.

Leaving the first charge of orcs shattered with snarling figures spread across the battlefield, elves and dwarves retreated back to form their scattered ranks before Erebor's gates.