To Live Again: Waiting Between Worlds {Lord of the Rings Fanfiction}

31. A Favour Repaid

My eyes never leave the spot where I watched my daughter disappear. My fingernails claw in my arms anxiously - what have I done?

"Your majesty," RIsta warns, her hand clamping around my arm as she begins to push me forward, "we must reach the trees, and-."

A whistle of movement to my left startles me, and with a gasp I am flung hard on the ground. Scrambling to find my feet, I twist myself onto my back and search urgently for my guard. Thankfully she is crouched a few feet from me, her eyes dark and scathing as she glares into the strong wind, and that is when I notice the slice across her upper arm from a brush with an arrow. Tauriel is at my side in a moment and she quickly helps me to my feet, but her body quivers in fear as she tries gallantly to hide it from me and shield me from whatever hunts us.

"Rista?" Tauriel murmurs, her hands trembling as she clutches her drawn bow. "What is it? What is out there?"

"Maggots," she sighs and draws herself upright. "Get the Queen to the safety of the trees and find somewhere to hide, but do not engage them Tauriel, not unless you are both found."

"And what of you?" I hear myself ask in alarm, as the shrieks of something animalistic make their way to my ears.

"I can slow them down," Rista hisses threateningly, a sneer curling her lip, "I have a grudge with Sauron's swine...now go!"

Before I can argue I am pulled frantically into a sprint, and forced towards the thick and densely overgrown fir trees.

I hear the sickly sound of steel through flesh before I can even reach the blanket of the thick mist clinging to the trees. 

At the sound tears stream freely from my eyes.

Rista...the name resounds despairingly in my head as I force my feet to fly, my eyes trained ahead and my ears on the sound of the young elleth at my heels.

I dare a glance her direction and note her own drained expression, the same grieving in her pale features as my own, but there is also an innocence that I am drawn to protect. She should not be made to risk her life for me, it should be the other way around...I promised her Naneth as much. With a firm resoluteness I push my own terror down into myself and stride out long and sure, forcing myself faster and willing the red headed child to follow my lead, to find assurance in my courage at least.

We reach the depths of the fir wood, and Tauriel searches out the most dense clustering of the dark trees for us to climb. They are not the easiest or most comfortable trees to scale but needs must, and their thick, bushy, branches, offer a great deal of coverage from unwanted eyes.

We move as swiftly and as quietly as we can, each of us settling a few branches apart but still within visual of one another. Tauriel instinctively draws her bow again, and I reach for mine, although I feel more confident with a knife...I don't often trust my aim.

It does not take long for a swarm of orc Shaman to invade the earth below; dangerous brutes that have more instinct and power with dark arts than regular infantry orc. The last time I encountered one of these swine was the fateful day I decided to attempt to heroically save my father-in-law...oh Eru...Thranduil does have a point about me being a magnet for trouble.

I scowl upwards as I knock my head against the tree trunk, silently wishing I knew how to rectify this. I seek out the daylight above and utter a silent prayer, but the moment it leaves my lips my acute hearing picks up the high-pitched gasp. Snapping my head to the side it takes all my energy not to cry out.

"Tauriel," I barely mouth her name above a whisper, watching the gloved arm restraining her chest and the glint of a knife against her throat.