i'll be waiting here until the stars fall out of the sky by AdmirableMonster  

The land was covered in choking vapors.  Gweriel’s eyes were stinging, her lungs heaving as she scanned the horizon, but there was no sign of anything but more of that heavy, horrible haze.

“Lanyë,” Hemmoril said from behind her, her low voice turned into something more like a rasp.  “Lanyë, come inside.”

“I can’t see the riders,” Gweriel said and coughed, lungs heaving, then coughed again.

“Lanyë.”

“All right, all right.”  What would seeing the return of the scouting party help, in any case?  They already knew Hemmoril would have to ride out soon, probably in the next few hours.  Maglor could hardly fail to take the best horsewoman of his retinue, his steward and right hand, when they went to face the dragon.

“You’ll come back, won’t you?” Gweriel whispered, half to herself as she re-entered the tent.  She grabbed Hemmoril’s hands and pulled her wife close to her, until they were slotted front to front.  Hemmoril didn’t answer, but Gweriel didn’t know if it was deliberate, or if she simply hadn’t heard the question.  Instead of repeating herself, she pressed her face into Hemmoril’s chest and tried to inhale her scent and not tremble.  It was difficult, because after her ride out yesterday, Hemmoril already stank of ash and some creeping sweet odor that hadn’t faded, but her own smell was still in there somewhere, if Gweriel tried to focus on it.

“Shhh.”  Hemmoril’s slender hand petted her hair, and Gweriel looked up, trying to force her breathing into an easier rhythm.

“You will bring me back a bunch of flowers from your ride, won’t you?” she asked.  The bunch from yesterday was just a scattered handful of little white flowers, but they had survived and now were perfectly cheerful sitting in an earthen mug in the kitchens of the fortress.

“Of course.  I always bring thee flowers.”

“Of course you do, lossenya.”

And still it was not enough.  This nervous energy in Gweriel’s fingertips she would normally channel into her sewing, but they were past that now, at least until her skills were called upon to sew up the wounded, to stitch piecemeal bodies back together.  Gently, she ran a finger across the scar blazoned down the back of Hemmoril’s arm.  She had sewn that up herself, stopped the bleeding, kept her wife safe.  She could do it again.  (As long as there was something left, a sobbing little voice in her mind cried.  As long as there was something left.)

Instead, she turned her fingers to Hemmoril’s dear face, drawing gentle lines across her pointed ears.  Hemmoril gave a muffled exclamation and pulled Gweriel close to her, and then there were hot lips on her own, Hemmoril’s voice moaning into her mouth and sending ripples of desperate arousal through her.

Gweriel clawed at Hemmoril’s tunic, her too-loose trousers—no time to take them in, but she had lost weight, too much weight—no time even to disrobe, when the summons might come at any moment, but time enough to slip her hand down into them, slide her fingers through her wife’s folds, already slickened and waiting for her.

Hot breath on her ear; Hemmoril’s hands tightening on her waist so hard she was certain they would bruise (and would those bruises be the last marks, the last evidence, the last—no.)  More, she needed more, she needed—

They tumbled together onto Hemmoril’s bedroll, kissing frantically, shallowly; wet, open-mouthed kisses dragged across any inch of available flesh.  Hemmoril’s hands were sliding up her chest, tweaking at her nipples.  Gweriel moaned desperately and frantically yanked at her own leggings and too-heavy skirt.  “Please, please, lossenya,” she gasped.

“Yes,” Hemmoril said, kissing her hair and nuzzling into the top of her head.  “Yes, I need you, more, Lanyë, more—nnn—”

One of her hands went down Gweriel’s trousers, while the other grabbed desperately at Gweriel’s hip, sliding over and down and lower, cupping and squeezing.  Gweriel panted, pushing her fingers into Hemmoril’s cunt and riding her, wishing they had more time, wishing they had some surety that this would not be the last—

She nipped at Hemmoril’s throat as heat built between her legs and in the base of her belly, rocked her hips urgently against those clever fingers as she used her free hand to yank open Hemmoril’s shirt so she could get her mouth onto one of those lovely round tits, so she could shudder and mewl and drool all across it and forget, forget, forget—

“Ahhhh—Lanyë, please, oh—” Hemmoril’s voice, high with desire—she needed to remember this—Hemmoril’s cunt twitching around her fingers—this as well—the cresting wave of heat from her own orgasm as Hemmoril’s thumb rubbed circles and her two fingers pumped in and out—

I must not forget, I must not forget, I must not forget—

“Thou wilt bring me flowers,” Gweriel whispered, panting, curling against her wife.  “Thou wilt.”

“I will, I will, I will return for thee, I promise,” Hemmoril gasped, one arm holding her tight.

She would not break a promise, Gweriel repeated to herself.  She would not.  Her wife would return.

The sound of a frantic horn call interrupted their rapid lovemaking.  “Maglor,” Hemmoril gasped, rolling upright and dislodging Gweriel.  “I have to go, Lanyë, but I promise.  I promise.”

The last sight of her—no, it would not be the last—she vanished from the tent as Gweriel miserably straightened her skirts.  She would have to wait and wait and wonder.  No, she told herself fiercely.  Hemmoril had promised.

* * *

She was waiting on the top of the wall when she saw it—gold glittering through the heavy smoke that lay low across the wild land they had made their home.  At first she thought it was the riders returning, and her heart swelled in her breast with mingled joy and fear.  And then it turned and twisted.  Gweriel’s breath froze as she stared at the undulations of mighty scales.  Even from here she could hear a strange voice whispering of dark and decay and the loss of love and beautiful things.

Her vision blurred, and when she blinked, her eyes were stinging and she was on her knees, and the coils were much closer.  Where they went, the smoke thickened, and she realized the land was burning in his wake.  Coughing, she pulled herself unsteadily to her feet and ran for the edge of the walls, down into the fortress.

Had they lost?  Or had he merely slipped by them in the impossible smoke?  She strained her ears; distantly, she heard the sweet sound of Maglor’s voice upraised in song.  He had slipped by them, then; Glaurung was come upon the fortress.

“The dragon is coming!” Gweriel screamed.  “The dragon!  Glaurung is coming!”  And all the riders gone to war.  The walls of the fortress were thick, but who was left to defend it?  Maglor’s household—the noncombatants, the sick, and the children.

She nearly ran into Calpatamo, one of the cooks, who caught her arms.  “What—do you mean—”

“Glaurung,” coughed Gweriel, pointing desperately.  “What will we do?”

“He cannot breach the walls, surely?”

But the very ground was shaking, the heat rising already.  “Why not?” whispered Gweriel.  “Why should he not be able to breach—” She shook her head. “Go,” she said urgently.  “Find the children—as many of them as you can.  Send them out the South entrance and tell them to hide in the marsh.  The rest of us—” She swallowed.  “The rest of us will remain.  If he cannot breach the walls, then—then he cannot.  And if he can, we, we must hold out.  For Maglor and—and for the children.”

He stared at her for a long moment, then nodded.

“I’ll, I’ll go get—as many of the household as I can.”

Where there any weapons, even?  Would they do any good?  The scythes they used for farming, she thought—or there might be some weapons still in the armory.  She hardly knew where the armory was.

Word spread quickly through the fortress.  Gweriel ran from place to place, yelling what she supposed were orders.  Others were calling out as well; everything was confusion.  There were not so many children, at least, and they were all of them old enough to listen to the instructions and follow them.  They would be safe, hidden in the marshes.

Just as we were to be safe, behind the walls?

There was so very little time to prepare.  Someone thrust a too-heavy sword into Gweriel’s hand.  She didn’t think she had ever held one before.  Brasseneth gave her a helm, ill-fitting and also too heavy.  It persisted in slipping down over one eye.

They waited in the kitchens, silent but for the coughing that grew worse and worse as the smoke grew thicker.  She could see the little white flowers that Hemmoril had given her in the vase, though they wavered a little in the haze that lay across everything.

It struck her, as she heard the heavy tread of the dragon and the crackling of fire that heralded its approach, that Hemmoril had promised she would return.

But Gweriel had not thought to promise that she would be waiting.

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