Movement IV: A Song of Passage

    It was Malron who finally shook her from her battle rage.
    She had been killing, reveling in the sound of screaming, dying orcs, reveling in the blood spilled. Blood for blood, life for life. And they died so easily. They died until there were no orcs left around her, and she went to search for more.
    “Haleth!” Malron shouted as he stopped her from searching for more orcs to kill, shaking her roughly. “Haleth!”
    She did not recognize him, and she was tempted to kill him as well. Who was he to stop her from killing these orcs?
    Then reason returned and she gasped, dropping her sword.
    “Haleth! Take the command!” He made his way to her and protected her from an orc with a huge battleax. “The men are beginning to discover Haldar’s death! Someone must lead us!”
    She nodded and shouted, “Haladin! Stand fast! Haldad and Haldar have fallen this day, but I remain! Stand fast and do your duty fighting the orcs!” She let out an enormous sigh of relief when the Haladin roared back and fought, if not with renewed vigor, then with skill. But her eyes narrowed when she saw a slight figure in white run out into the field, bearing a long pole, and her heart almost stopped when she recognized Janya’s clear voice.
    “Haladin!” she cried, and then revealed what she held in her hand.
    It was a banner of a hound bearing a shield.
    Tears stung Haleth’s eyes. Haldad’s name had meant “watchdog”.
    “Thank you, Janya,” she whispered. How long had she spent working on that?
    She seemed to have asked that aloud, for Malron replied, “Weeks. Janya and I intended to give it to Haldad before the battle, but we never found the time.”
    She nodded abstractedly, absorbed in watching Janya’s progress across the field as she drew near.
    “Do you think she knows?”
    “Of what?” Malron seemed to be as distracted as she was.
    “Haldar’s death.”
    “Oh.” A pause as an orc drew closer to loot the bodies, saw Haleth with blood in her hair and more smeared all over her sword, then fled for safer victims. “No.”
    Gelvar, too, was making his way towards Haleth, and she surged through the empty field. She saw with a curious detachment that there were nothing but dead orcs all around her.
    I never knew that I was this violent… but then, I never knew that Haldad and Haldar would die here today.
    She hardened her heart and settled her stomach. Walking on, she ignored the mutilated bodies and lifted her chin in defiance. She did, however, have to admit that she didn’t quite know who she was defying.
    An orc attacked Janya, and she awkwardly pushed him away with the banner pole. However, she was clearly in trouble, and Gelvar rushed to her aid.
    “Get her off the field!” Haleth screamed. Malron got there in time to take the standard, and Gelvar prepared to haul Janya away.
    But it was too late. The orcs had cut them off from the keep.
    She ran to Gelvar and whispered, “Take her from here and guard her as best you can. See if you can make it to the Eldar, and protect her!” Gelvar nodded and whispered to Janya, and the two of them ran towards the nearest stand of trees.
    Haleth attempted to give Malron a smile, but failed miserably. “Well, brother, it looks like it’s up to us to hide their escape.” Malron grinned fiercely in reply, and struck the standard in the soft earth.
    “Let them come,” he said, then ran to Haldad’s body. He knelt and rose, then ran back to Haleth. He was holding Haldad’s elf-crafted sword. “Give me your sword,” he said, and when she handed it to him, he buckled Haldad’s sword about her waist.
    “This is Father’s sword.”
    He shook his head. “Now yours. He was going to give it to you anyway.” Before she could object, he laid her sword on the ground. “We’ll come back for it later.”
    “Here, we make our stand!” Haleth called. “Haladin, to me!”
    Slowly, agonizingly, both men and women of the Haladin made their way towards Haleth, breaking off private wars. Again she felt tears at her eyes when she saw that the Haladin’s number had been greatly reduced. At least a third of the brave women she had led here were not present.
    And I, I alone, am responsible for this… for if I had not done this, they would yet live. My fault, mine, and no one else’s… my fault that they will no longer live and exult in living, my fault that they are lost to a darkness far beyond my sight, my fault that their spirits have fled this world… She would have screamed, and perhaps she did in her heart and mind. But she was Haldad’s daughter, leader of the Haladin, and she would lead the remainder of her people to glory and honor, at least, if she could not lead them to safety.
    What matters glory and honor against life? Ah, Eru, I was foolish to once think that glory and honor were the most important things in life… for glory leads to a sort of immortality, does it not? Oh, I was foolish to strive for immortality above all else. What matters renown when I no longer live? What matters my own glory against my people’s lives?
    Nothing.
    When all those who could come had gathered, she raised her hand in greeting. “To the gates,” she shouted. The orcs were massing again, and the Haladin had a brief moment of respite. If Janya and Gelvar had not escaped by now, they were not likely to.
    “My lady Haleth,” she heard, and she became taut with worry when she recognized Kellan’s voice. “I beg leave to carry home the lords Haldad and Haldar’s bodies.”
    Tears stung her eyes again. How could she have forgotten? “My thanks to you, Kellan,” she said.
    “I’ll help.” Cullan joined his son, and each hefted a body on broad shoulders.
    “In the center,” she ordered. “We march as a column. Try to make it to the gates. Best of luck to you, brothers and sisters, and may the Valar watch over us all.”
    There was nothing else to say, and she breathed deeply before signaling Malron to her side. She drew Haldad’s—her—sword and saluted her people with it.
    Then she lifted her voice in song and led the column into the midst of the orcs.

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