A Thousand Winds that Blow by StarSpray  

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Seven

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A blade caught Lossenol across his ribs as he tried to twist out of the way—not deep, but ugly and painful—and it took him only a second to take in the situation and then to let himself fall to the ground, going limp. It meant he could not stop them from hauling Daeron away—but two against at least a dozen was never going to turn out well, and he made himself keep still, even when an iron-shot foot slammed into his back. A few orcs lingered, arguing under the tree where Eluréd and Elurín had taken shelter, but in the end decided that a pair of children weren’t worth the effort. 

Once it was quiet, Lossenol could hear both Eluréd and Elurín weeping. He made himself stay still until he was absolutely sure the orcs were gone, and then he rolled over, unable to suppress a groan. 

“Lossenol!”

“I’m here.” He put a hand to his side and grimaced when it came away bloody. The wound hurt, but he didn’t think it was poisoned. Orc poisons worked very fast—another thing he knew without knowing how he knew. When he looked around he saw one dead orc and signs of a fierce struggle—his own and Daeron’s—and a clear trail leading away. Dread rose up and threatened to crowd out every other thought, and he forced it down, forced himself to breathe, to get to his feet, leaning against the tree. His back hurt, too. 

They had taken Daeron alive. That meant that he could get him back. He let that thought settle in his mind, and felt suddenly much calmer, felt more clear-headed than he had in months. He could do this. 

“Can you climb down?” he called up to the twins. “I can’t come get you, and we need to move.”

Two tear-stained faces peered back down at him. “They took Daeron,” Elurín said.

“I know, and we can’t—can’t get him back until you come down.”

This had them both scrambling down the tree. Lossenol caught first Elurín, and then Eluréd, and then he opened the pack that Daeron had dropped and the orcs had, luckily, not taken, to pull out a roll of bandages. They were old and stained, but clean. “Help me with these, please?” he asked, pulling up his shirt. “Just wrap them around—not too tight—just like that.”

“Do you need stitches?” Elurín asked as he and Eluréd tied off the bandages.

“It looks worse than it is,” said Lossenol. “I’ll have a nasty scar once it heals, but I’ve already got a collection of those, so one more doesn’t much matter.” He wiped his hands on his already-ruined shirt as best he could, and then hugged both of the twins close. “You’re all right? You’re not hurt?”

“No,” said Eluréd. “But Daeron…”

“I know. I’m going to get him back, but that means I’m going to have to leave you—so we have to catch up to them and then find a place for you two to hide.”

“But what if they catch you, too?” Elurín cried.

“They won’t,” said Lossenol. “I’m—look, I don’t know who I am but I know what I’m good at.” He tilted their chins up so he could meet their gazes. “I need you both to trust me, all right? I promise, I’m going to rescue Daeron, and then I’m going to get all of us over the mountains to some place safe, where the orcs will never find us.”

“We trust you,” they chorused without hesitation, in spite of the fear. 

“Thank you,” he said. “Now we have to move fast.” Two children were never going to be able to catch up with the orcs, but they would have the advantage of moving in daylight too, when the orcs needed to stop and hide from the sun. If Lossenol could find a safe place to leave them, hidden and out of the way, he could make up the difference on his own, and—

Well, he’d need to find them first, and then figure out a plan. This would all be easier if he were not still recovering from that winter’s injuries, on top of this new one. 

Before they left, he went to the orc’s body. He needed weapons, having only Daeron’s bow. The orc carried an ugly knife that Lossenol didn’t like the look of, but hooked to his belt anyway, and a sword that was badly made and already notched that he left behind. “Come on,” he said to the twins, and took their hands. 

They went as quickly as they could—quicker than Lossenol had expected—but had to stop frequently for the twins to rest and catch their breath—and for him, too. His back ached where the orc had kicked him, and his side burned with every breath. At least the trail wasn’t hard to follow, and the orcs did not seem to be in a great hurry. They also did not go straight north—they went east, toward the mountains, where the lands were still wooded and there was more shelter. It made sense, and it also meant they were going more slowly than they might have over open ground. Over the next few days, Lossenol left Eluréd and Elurín hidden in a tree or in a thicket or bramble in the mornings, and went ahead, coming back for them in the afternoons when he had a better sense of where to go and what shortcuts might be taken. In this way he finally caught up and was able to count the orcs and even to get close enough to hear some of what they said—though he understood very little, since for the most part they spoke in their own language. 

He also saw what they did to Daeron—beatings, mostly, keeping him bound and bruised and weak enough that he couldn’t even think about escaping or fighting back. That they hadn’t done anything worse was both encouraging and frightening. It meant they wanted him alive—and it meant they had plans for when they brought him to Angband. 

If Lossenol didn’t stage a rescue before they left the woodlands, Daeron would be lost forever.

He also saw when the Men arrived—and with them an Elf. Lossenol frowned as he watched the Elf kneel beside Daeron, speaking to him and treating him with what, at a distance, looked like gentle kindness. It couldn’t be, though—not judging by the way that Daeron recoiled. 

Lossenol watched for another day, trying desperately to think of something—anything—and then made himself pause and look around. He had climbed a steep slope above the orcs’ camp, and several times he’d feared that he would be caught when bits of earth had dislodged under his feet and gone sliding down. When he pressed his hands to the earth he could feel the instability. It wouldn’t take much to cause a landslide. 

He just needed a way to trigger it, and a way to get Daeron out of the way beforehand. His mind raced as he carefully moved through the trees. In short order he had a plan more or less cobbled together. It was rough and it was risky, but he was almost certain it would work. He slipped away to find Eluréd and Elurín, and led them even higher up the mountain, to where he’d found a small cave tucked among some rocks, hidden from view until one came right up to it, where the ground was firmer, and they would be out of danger. Then he told them the plan, because he couldn’t trigger the landslide himself—but a sturdy limb he cut from a nearby tree and a teetering boulder would do the trick. 

“When I whistle, use this to get that rock rolling,” he told them, shoving the end of the stick under the boulder he’d chosen. “You just have to push it down—both of you at once should be strong enough. But not before the whistle! All right? And once it’s moving, run as fast as you can back to the cave. Don’t look back, all right? We don’t want you to come tumbling down the mountain.”

“But what about you?” Eluréd asked.

“By the time you hear me whistle, I’ll have Daeron and we’ll be out of the way,” Lossenol said. 

“How will we know it’s your whistle?”

“You’ll know—it’ll be loud, otherwise I’d show you now.” Lossenol crouched in front of them. “It might take me some time to get Daeron back up here afterward. The orcs have not been kind to him, and it will be a hard climb. When we do get close, I’ll whistle again, this time like a lark.” He demonstrated this for them. “Can you whistle that back to me?” He had them each do it three times until he was satisfied that they would remember how. “Good. Only answer when you hear that whistle—even if you hear our voices, wait for the whistle. That’s important. Got it?”

“Got it,” said Eluréd.

Elurín threw his arms around Lossenol. “Please be careful!”

“I’ll be as careful as I can. I promise.”

By the time he got back to where he could see the camp, they were starting to prepare to move on. No time to waste. Carefully, Lossenol crept around to the side of the campsite where packs and supplies had been tossed into a haphazard pile, right up against some brambles. No one was watching it—they had no one on watch at all, in fact, thinking themselves entirely isolated and safe. More fools them, Lossenol thought as he pulled up his hood and moved very carefully through the bushes until he could rifle through the bags without being seen, ignoring the thorns that scratched his skin and caught on his clothes. Across the campsite, Daeron lay unmoving; the Elf stood nearby speaking with one of the Men. The orcs were fighting about something—the air was full of snarls and curses. 

Finally, Lossenol discovered a flask. When he opened it the sharp smell of alcohol greeted him. He quickly poured it over the bag and then pulled out his own flint to strike some sparks. That was a risk—someone might hear—but the orcs were loud enough that no one noticed, and when the flames caught Lossenol slipped back into the underbrush. It took only a moment for someone to notice the fire as it started to smoke. Lossenol grabbed a branch and threw it away into the woods; it hit a tree with a loud crack! and he hurried away around to the other side of the camp as several orcs ran to investigate the noise. Everyone else scrambled to put out the fire. 

Well, everyone but the Elf. He had gone to kneel beside Daeron, very still and silent. Lossenol held his breath as he crept ever closer, trying to see if Daeron was awake—he had to be alive, or else they wouldn’t bother guarding him, wouldn’t bother binding him. There was no way to grab him and just run, not with someone right there to trip him up. 

The obvious thing to do was to kill the Elf—he was working with the Enemy, he was holding Daeron captive. Lossenol was already a kinslayer, and this would be far more justified than Doriath. He found, though, that he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not remembering the look Daeron had given him after that word had first been spoken aloud between them. 

Daeron finally moved, struggling to sit up. He was gagged and bound so tightly that he could barely do more than lift his head. The Elf rose to his feet, turned toward the fire but did not leave Daeron’s side. That made things harder. Lossenol crept forward, moving slowly. The Elf was called forward to help with something—they all spoke the language of the orcs and Lossenol didn’t know what was said—and that gave him his chance. He darted out of the bushes and shoved the Elf from behind, so he crashed into the nearest Men and tripped up an orc, who fell into another, until half the camp was on the ground or trying not to fall. Then Lossenol hauled Daeron up and over his shoulder, and ran, whistling loud and sharply as he went. Instead of moving to the side he went straight up the mountain, knowing they would be pursued. After a minute or so the ground started to shake, and only then did Lossenol slow down. He looked back to see a fight breaking out between orcs who had their bows out and others who clearly didn’t want them to shoot, while the rest gave chase. The Elf stood very still in the midst of the camp, watchful and somehow far more frightening than even the biggest of the orcs. 

Then the shaking worsened, and Lossenol caught a glimpse of the orcs faltering in their pursuit just before he threw himself and Daeron to the base of the biggest and closest tree. Daeron cried out, eyes wide and very frightened—they only got wider when he saw Lossenol’s face. Lossenol pulled the gag free, and Daeron choked out, “Loss—”

“Hang on.” Lossenol rolled over to cover Daeron with his own body as the first boulders went tumbling past, followed by a great mass of earth—rocks, soil, trees and broken branches, as though someone had scooped away a chunk of the mountain itself. Over the din he couldn’t hear what was happening below, but he hoped the enemy was too slow to escape. The tree shuddered as the landslide hit and parted around it; they were showered with dirt and small stones and twigs, but the worst of it passed by on either side.

It seemed like hours passed before the shaking stopped, and it grew quiet. Lossenol carefully raised himself up to look around; a small shower of pine needles and dirt fell from his shoulders with the movement. He saw no sign of the orcs—or of anyone or anything else. After listening hard for a minute, he pulled out the knife he’d taken from the dead orc, and set about cutting Daeron’s bonds. Daeron made a strangled sort of noise before biting his lip as blood flowed back down his arms and legs. “How bad did they hurt you?” Lossenol asked.

“What? No, the—the twins—”

“They’re fine. Who do you think started the landslide?”

“You had them—” Daeron’s voice rose in pitch, but he couldn’t finish the sentence before he started coughing. 

“They’re fine,” Lossenol repeated. “By now they’re well hidden, and waiting for us. Is anything broken?” He ran his hands over Daeron’s limbs, and felt for his ribs. Daeron flinched away, clearly biting back sounds of pain, but nothing seemed broken. It was hard to tell what was dirt and what was bruising, though.

“I’m—no—I don’t—” Daeron sucked in a breath, and struggled to his knees, and then to his feet, looking down the slope. Lossenol rose to catch him when he swayed. “Menelas—”

“Who?”

“He…” Daeron stared down the hillside, at the swath of earth and stone and trees that now covered the campsite. There was no sign of anyone else; nothing moved, and it was very quiet. “He was my friend,” he whispered hoarsely.

“He knows who you are,” said Lossenol. “If he’s not buried under that—” He gestured toward the debris— “he’ll be taking word of you back to—to Angband, won’t he?”

“He…” Daeron closed his eyes. “Yes.”

“Then we need to move. Now. Can you walk, do you think?”

“I have to, don’t I?” Daeron turned to him, and his gaze dropped to Lossenol’s chest. “You’re bleeding—”

“Am I?” Lossenol glanced down. “No, that’s old. I’m fine. Come on.” They were near the edge of the debris field, but had to move carefully to get free of it entirely without causing another miniature slide. Lossenol kept hold of Daeron, who moved stiffly, teeth gritted and eyes bright with tears that he didn’t let fall. Once they were on solid ground, he breathed a sigh, and glanced around. In the distance, down the hill, he heard something that sounded like tree branches breaking. “Come on,” he said, reaching for Daeron’s hand. 

Daeron’s grip was tight. Neither of them spoke as they moved through the wood, going more slowly than they needed to, but as fast as Daeron was able. Lossenol made sure they left no trail to follow, and when Daeron stumbled for the third time he stopped and, ignoring Daeron’s protests, hoisted him onto his back. Whether or not any orcs had survived, he didn’t want to take any chances. 

Eventually, though, he had to stop before he fell over himself. It was very late by then; there was no moon, and clouds obscured the stars. It was also very cold, especially as they got higher up the mountain, and Daeron couldn’t seem to stop shivering. Lossenol wrapped his cloak around them both, and tucked Daeron up against his chest, arms and legs around him to try to share as much warmth as he could. Daeron slept, dragged down by exhaustion, but Lossenol only dozed, waking at the slightest noise or shift in the wind. 

Dawn came, and he roused Daeron. “Sorry,” he whispered as Daeron whimpered, his body gone stiff after a few hours unmoving. “We need to keep going. Eluréd and Elurín are waiting.” Daeron nodded, and though he hissed through clenched teeth when he got to his feet, he said nothing, and followed after Lossenol without complaint. It got even colder as they went; the wind picked up, sharp and smelling of snow as it swept down the mountainside.

Finally, after several more hours, they drew near to the cave where Lossenol had left the twins. He whistled the lark’s song, and after a minute heard an answer. “It’s us,” he called then, and both Eluréd and Elurín ran out to meet them. Daeron grunted when Eluréd threw his arms around his waist, and would have fallen if Lossenol hadn’t caught him. “Careful,” Lossenol said. “Let’s get inside, out of the wind. The landslide was perfect.”

“Daeron, what happened do you?” Elurín asked, looking wide-eyed at how battered and dirty Daeron was, covered in mud and bruises with his hair all in a tangle. 

“I’m all right,” Daeron said. He stumbled into the cave and sank to the ground, and immediately both twins latched onto him, in tears of mingled fear and relief. 

Lossenol set about starting a fire, and then carefully pried the twins off. “Can you go fetch water from the stream we found?” he asked them. “I don’t know about Daeron, but I’m filthy, and want to wash off.”

The twins took the pot and the water skins and ran off to fill them. It was very close by, so Lossenol didn’t do more than move to the cave’s entrance to watch for their return. As soon as the twins were out of sight Daeron seemed to crumple, slumping against the wall and curling into himself. “Do you want me to make willow bark tea first?” Lossenol asked.

“No,” Daeron sighed. “There isn’t enough left—”

“We can find more. I’m sure there are willows somewhere on the other side of the mountains.”

Daeron closed his eyes. “You should—”

“I’m not leaving you,” Lossenol said. “Especially not now.”

“You’ll regret it,” Daeron said quietly. “Someday.”

“No, I won’t.”

“You’ll wake up one day and remember who you really are, and then—”

“Do you want me to leave?”

Daeron didn’t answer for several minutes. Then, as Eluréd and Elurín came into view, carrying the pot full of water very carefully, he admitted very softly, “No, I don’t.”

“Then it’s settled,” Lossenol said, and stepped out of the cave to help the twins with the water. 

The rest of the day was spent getting clean and getting rest. Lossenol brewed some willow bark in spite of Daeron’s protests. Daeron drank it, cleaned himself as best he could with the twins’ help, and let Lossenol comb as much of the dirt and grime out of his hair as was possible. 

Now that they were all together again and safe, Eluréd and Elurín cheered up swiftly—but they did not leave Daeron’s side for more than a few minutes at a time, and when they fell asleep it was tucked up against him. Daeron looked at them with an expression Lossenol couldn’t decipher before he sighed and looked up. His face had escaped most of the beatings, which had been a relief to discover—Lossenol was very familiar with the effects of head injuries, and was glad Daeron didn’t seem to be suffering from any of them. 

“What I meant earlier,” Daeron said, sounding a little more like himself, “wasn’t—it’s not that I think you’ll regret staying with us. It’s that—that you’ll regret leaving your own kin behind. That you’ll regret not even trying to find a way to remember. Maybe you won’t ever wake up with those memories returned, but maybe you will, and…”

Lossenol shrugged. “They probably think I’m dead, anyway,” he said, “if any of them are alive themselves. Isn’t it my own choice to make—my life, my mind, my body?”

“It’s the sort of choice that shouldn't be made without knowing all the facts,” Daeron said, “but…of course, that’s the problem.”

“Is there anything about me you know, that you haven’t told me?”

Daeron didn’t answer right away. He looked at Lossenol in that way that seemed as though his dark eyes saw far more than what lay on the surface. “There’s something—there’s some shadow that lies over you,” he said finally. “I don’t know what it is, but it frightens me.”

“Frightens you how?”

“I don’t think it makes you a threat—not to us. But it’s…I don’t know. It brings to mind Melian’s Girdle—the parts of it we were always warned to stay away from in the north, where her power met Gorthaur’s, and made the forest a terrible and strange place. It’s not—it’s not frightening exactly like that, but it’s strange. I don’t know what it means. Someone among the Noldor might—a real healer, with more knowledge and skill than me.”

“I still don’t want to know—and that makes me want to know even less.”

Daeron sighed. “It’s your choice. But when we come upon others in Eriador—we’ll need to tell them something. There is no hiding that you are a Noldo from the West, but we can’t risk it being known that you were likely a follower of Fëanor’s sons—or that you do not remember. I doubt anyone will care much if you say you do not wish to speak of your past, but there should be something—maybe say that you followed Finrod, or perhaps Aegnor or Angrod. A follower of Elu Thingol’s kinsmen will be received better.”

“So. Lie.”

“Do you have a better idea? Does it matter, if it’s only to strangers who we most likely will not spend more than a few days or weeks among?”

“What of you, or the twins?”

“If we find people that I have known before—I hope we can find Laegrim who once lived near Tol Galen, who knew Lúthien when she lived there—then giving them a false name would be pointless. But if we meet strangers, I will no longer use the name Daeron. Eluréd and Elurín will need new names, too—it cannot get back to Angband that Dior’s sons still live.”

“Or you.”

“Or me.” Daeron looked away, strands of hair falling forward to partly obscure his face. “There’s…there is a price on my head. I didn’t know that, before.”

“Why?”

“I was once a very mighty singer—or at the least I had that reputation. I suppose it shouldn’t be so surprising. I just…I’m no warrior. I have sung songs of hiding and protection, but by their nature I would not have expected word of that to get back to Angband. I don’t know.” His voice shook slightly. “There are some who have been taken to Angband and escaped, and remained themselves. If I was ever strong enough for such a feat, I am no longer. If you hadn’t…”

A chill went down Lossenol’s spine at the thought of Daeron turning into something like what his friend Menelas had become. “They won’t have you, Daeron. Go to sleep. I’ll keep watch.”

“You still need rest, too.”

“Not as much as you do right now.”

Daeron made a small sound that might have been laughter, except it was bitter and exhausted. “What a pair we make.” But he lay down, careful not to jostle the twins, and closed his eyes.