The Phoenix's Griffin

Hope is your survival
A captive path I lead

No matter where you go
I will find you
If it takes a thousand years - Enya

He jerked awake, sapphire eyes wide, and with a hissing breath sat up in the soft bed. Her voice, her cry echoed in his ears. Amaras!

“Amaras?” the elf asked softly, a different voice, sitting up, “is it the dream again?” she lay her hand on his shoulder. At the touch he slid away, repulsed and stepped from the bed, and jerked the blue robe from the chair, pulled it over his shoulders before rising. Belting it he walked to the door pushed it open and was greeted with a blast of cold wind that blew back the sable hair. Cleansing him.

He took a deep shuddering breath and grasped the rails of the terrace in his hands and looked on the dark sea. His heart still skipped in his chest and he took another breath. A memory, a thought, just there, but when he reached for it, it only receded further, leaving a trailing tug that pulled him toward the east.

“Why will you not tell me this dream?” she asked wrapping her own robe around her; she smoothed it, and lifted her hand to push the dark locks of hair behind her pointed ear.

Amaras snapped his head round to look at her, angered she followed, needing to be alone, impatient to be alone with the voice and she took an involuntary step back startled by his countenance. She steeled herself, stepped toward him, concerned and confused but he shrank from her, looked away.

Ten years earlier at the beginning of their affair he had turned to her and from his mouth came I cannot marry you, Malopea and there will be no children from me. She had risen angry and hurt from the bed and they had spent the remainder of the night arguing, shunning his futile effort to comfort her and give an answer he could not, nor explain from where his statement had come, much less why he felt as he did.

Malopea stood clutching the collar of her robe, afraid of him, afraid of what he would do. Amaras who had been so solid and forthright was slipping further and further away. Reaching for him only pushed him and doing nothing tendered her the same results.

He looked away, across the ocean still dark. It was growing in power; becoming excruciating. The feelings of loss, and need, and want when he did not know what he had lost, what he needed, there certainly was no want, but the feelings told him otherwise. He had been contented in his life, happy. Malopea was good to him, loved him and he loved her, so he struggled to push them down, banished them to a dungeon, explained to himself it was only a restlessness of some sort, and then….

One afternoon, while musing alone on the balcony … enyém - mine.

He was startled so badly, he had shied to the left and whirled wide-eyed to find….no one there. Yet there had been a gentle weight against his shoulder; the breath had been warm. The two syllables clear, the voice a deep warning purr of possession. stoostood heart thundering in his chest

Repeatedly the whisper returned until her voice no longer frightened him. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, he erotically hungered for it, and he found his hands moving to reach for her automatically. The whisper; a warm caress of a whisper, that came during the day, or in the night leaving him emotionally fragile, and sexually hard as steel - ‘Enyém’. That voice had brought him gasping awake in the middle of an orgasm or on its’ brink, and turned him irrevocably from Malopea.

Until this morning that was the only word that was clear. Until this morning when she had called his name.

Mistake, mistake, mistake. Please forgive me, he begged to the mystery in his heart, but not to Malopea who stood before him. She and his love of her were beginning to be inexplicably replaced by an undeniable longing; a continual lusting for the voice he did not know but welcomed with all of his heart.

He brushed by her, entered the bedroom to dress.

“I do not understand,” she followed slowly, closing the door behind her, the room cold and full of the smell of the ocean, “You did not always close your heart to me. What has changed you so?”

She sat frightened with knowledge of an impending doom dawning a terrible sunris her her heart she hoped he would disprove, but for years his behaviour had become more erratic and he drew farther and farther away all the while trying not to show the distaste that would flicker briefly in his eyes when she touched him. Affection from him had evaporated. Bed had become a colder place, he never approached her anymore, and the sexdemademands were hers while he sought solitude, adopted poses of listening, eyes turned inward or cast over the sea searching.

Amaras pulled the soft wool leggings up before taking off his robe, keenly aware of his nudity, and the growing discomfort he was experiencing under her watch.

He took a shirt from the wardrobe and slid his arms through the sleeves; he swept his hair from under the collar and worked the buttons.

He turned to look at her as she sat on the bed, watching him sadly, and hurt and uncomprehending of how her gentle, attentive lover, could turn so callously on her and without reason. And the anger that comes with intense frustration cooled. It was not her; it was another who angered him, deviled him with his inability to seize her.

“Malopea,” he said softly, “I am waking.”
“Waking,” she repeated, knowing its meaning and its implications.

Amaras sat in the chair that faced the bed and looked at her. Gods, she was beautiful, her cheeks pink and dark hair shining. But even the love he had felt yesterday was less today and so it would go, until he felt nothing. But he would not, could not stay that long, he could not stay another night. It was time to leave. The mystery was beckoning to him; appealing to him, struggling to remind him.

Malopea’s great dark eyes grew larger, “What is it? What is it you hear? Dream?”

Amaras sat silently, not wanting to hurt her, not knowing how to answer. A flash of honey coloured hair, the line of a jaw, the curve of the right side of the mouth, a scar on the cheekbone, puzzle pieces of knowledge.

“What are you beginning to know? What calls to you?” she persisted.

Amaras held her look, “My heart. My soul.” The gentlest answer he could give her.

Malopea sat and twisted her belt around her hand, looking down into her lap, “I had hoped…” she gave a bitter laugh, “that you had not … that I was….”

“Malopea,” He reached for his boots refusing to be baited into that conversation again, “I cannot stay.”

“You do not need to go,” she protested, she wanted to keep him close at all costs; had done so already having lived openly with him for these years. Such was battlefield of love. The ground of pride she had surrendered for the sweet encroachment of a beloved enemy.

He pulled on his boots, his hair swinging before his face, and sat up. “Yes, I do.” Amaras was quitting the field.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Dressed, and armored again Phaila sat at the desk finalising her list, the arras moved and she looked up to find Daeron, Berindon, Pelion and Haldir, Maltafuinien holding the heavy tapestry aside.

They all inclined their heads to her and she leaned back in the chair as they filed in.

She lifted her cup to her lips. Haldir gave her a soft smile; she returned it.

“There was a rider,” Daeron took a seat, looked at her expectantly as the remainder sat.

“Yes, there was a rider,” she nodded as Maltafuinien brought in more tea, “Bearing this,” she put her hand on the thick black leather book.
“And ‘this’ is?” Pelion inquired.
“A plan,” she said to them, “thank you, Malta.”

“Berindon, I need you to put together…” she looked at her notes, Haldir smiled, covered his laugh with a cough, she was a prodigious note taker. He had found her handwriting in the margins of her books, notes, thoughts, a cross-referencing of other texts, sheets of paper with a sentence or only one word written on it, stuffed in the pages, “About eight hundred men and elves, swordsmen and archers, the best you know, think, or feel. Daeron, Pelion I want you to set up a fierce barrage today, and I want you to intensify it when I tell you and not before.”

“Of course,” he nodded and looked at her quizzedly.
“Haldir,” she looked to him, “Berindon, you two will be with me, and the eight hundred.”

“I want you to move them, here,” she stood, they all did, as she spread out a map, and pointed to the south near the Ghost Oak forest, “But not before sundown, I do not want them seen from the walls.”

“Dismissed, gentle sirs,” she looked at them all with a smile on her lips.

“Send Maltafuinien to me,” she said to anyone.

“Yes, Your Grace,” Berindon answered taking the chore, “Come Haldir, perhaps you can lend your eye and help me today pick from this army…”
“Of course, my lord,” Haldir smiled happy to be employed rather than standing about.


“In a murderous time
the heart breaks and breaks
and lives by breaking” – Stanley Kunitz


She stood in the snow watching as Daeron performed as she bid and sent boulder after boulder crashing into the walls.

Haldir with his duty performed walked the camp. She was busy; she was preoccupied; she did not ask him to stay behind; did not give him any look resembling a plea to loiter. He ghosted her tent and when she emerged, followed her through the camp to this place.

“You aren’t going to tell them yet?” Haldir asked walking up on her softly.
She turned and looked at him, “No,” a scoff in her voice.
“You do not trust them,” he stood beside her.
“I trust you,” she deflected.
“Will eight hundred be enough?”
“More and we will be tripping over each other on the stairs,” she laughed, it always amazed him that she could laugh in the most difficult or tense of situations, but then, this was her life and had always been thus, “We get the gate open and it is over,” she pointed with her chin, her lips curled in an anticipatory smile.

He smiled at her profile in the clear of the sunshine, and brightness of the snow. The clear gold and forever shifting shades of green gold eyes, making them today very pale green.

“I need you to maintain perspective once we get inside, Haldir,” she turned her smile on him, “See to yourself, I do not need your sword.”

He laughed, thinking on Annúminas, remembering the meadow, having long realised that if she had been really trying he would not be standing here today.

“Yes, Your Grace,” he bowed and she bumped him playfully with her hip.
“Ah, a moment,” she peered past him, held up her index finger and walked away and pulled Daeron aside from the line of catapults he was supervising.

“Come Daeron, when you see that ..” she pointed to the pennant Alanor had run up, “come down, you will know we are inside. Stop,” she laughed, “the bombardment and bring them up quickly. Once we get that gate open…I will need you very much.”

“Inside? How are you getting inside?”
Phaila smiled a roguish smile, leaned toward him and whispered, “Magic.”

At sunset Haldir and Phaila ran through the deep snow, their breath puffing in the cold air. Phaila looked to Haldir, a mischievous smile blossoming on her lips as they jogged silently save for the soft, shush-shush-shush-shush of their legs pulling and stepping back into the almost knee deep power. She moved closer, still smiling and gave him a powerful push in mid-stride rolling him in the snow.

Phaila turned her head back to look at him and laughed, running on; leaving him to pick himself up and ran fast to catch her. Retaliation was impossible for Berindon stood at the edge of the forest watching her swift approach.

He looked at Haldir who trotted up, snow sticking to his tunic, leggings, cloak, “What happened to you, did you trip?”
Phaila stood looking at him with an expression of interest also wanting to hear his explanation.
“Yes, I tripped,” he kept his eyes on Phaila’s, a smile twitching at the corner of his mouth.
“Uh hmmm,” Berindon looked skeptically from Haldir to her, having been the butt of a few of her last minute and highly questionable shenanigans.

“Fine, Your Grace,” Berindon shook his head and rolled his eyes, “If you would be so kind as to tell me what the hell we are doing.”

In the last of the sunlight, Phaila spread the map on the ground and gave instructions. She was tense with excitement and anticipation, her lips caught forever in a slight smile. Fifty would make their way down to the cellar where the hostages would (hopefully) be kept, three hundred and fifty would go for the gate, four hundred take the hall and bring down the pennant, neutralize the men inside the keep, provide cover for those going for the gate, and stay alive in the meantime.

They ran through the snow, shrouded in the thick mist that clung in the branches of the great live oaks and ran along the bank of the Ghost Oak River, here the grass held no snow for the warmth of the springs in this particular stretch of wood. The trees were old and sacred to Phaila and her family none were hewn for lumber. They swept their branches low and long over the ground as if to embrace them as they ran by, or wish them luck this night.

“I cannot believe you did that,” Haldir hissed at her as they ran side by side.
Phaila only laughed and pointed her finger at him, “You should have seen your face.”

On the backside of the mountain the rock was sheer, almost smooth with no cracks and crevices to provide finger hold. The mist hung thick here, allowing no visibility from the back wall, and they had moved in complete silence, their company made entirely of elf or half-elf. They looked up at rock that went up and up before disappearing into the mist. A wolf howled, its’ voice picked up and chorused.

Haldir looked to Phaila who stood lips parted with pleasure at their voices; mournful.

“My friends. They are saying hello,” she spoke softly looking into the gray night and turned from him.

“Napvilágra hoz,” she whispered casting her gaze along the foot of the mountain.

The great stone flickered with a clear light. She blinked, and smiled, Gods, how … funny, and trembled at its’ answer.

Phaila held up her hand, and approached alone. Laying her gloved hands on the cold rock, and saying the charm, she stepped back, as interested to see what would occur as everyone else. The boulder shimmered and dissolved to expose a smooth passageway lined with waiting torches. Haldir murmured in awe. She smiled, nodded to herself and beckoned. How had Amaras known that this would one day be necessary? Or was it only a sound precaution?

She entered the darker dark of the passage and using her flint and steel started a torch, using it to light the others along their way. Haldir moved at her shoulder, Berindon bringing up the rear with his four hundred and fifty, the ones who would split up to take the keep and secure the prisoners.

They moved at a brisk trot, Phaila pausing to light every forth torch, as Haldir moved ahead to do the same, until the passage opened into a cavern and they found themselves at the foot of a wide case of stairs. Phaila and Haldir craned their necks.

“Have you been here before?” he whispered in the echoing tunnel.
Phaila laughed softly, “No, but it opens under the stairs to the hall.”
“You’ve not been here before?” he asked unbelieving.
She laughed, “No,” she whispered, “Where is your faith, Haldir?”
“Here,” he took her gloved hand, “and up there,” he looked up the stairs.

They trotted up the wide stairs until it flattened into the wall.

“How is your faith?” she teased him, “Solid as this wall?” and she lay her hands on the rock and morter.

“Ready yourselves,” Haldir whispered and swords were drawn with a sssssk of blade drawn from scabbard.

Oh Amaras, my love, I wish you were here, I am afraid.

She lifted her face and closed her eyes, and whispered. The wall rippled, became translucent. They stood looking through a thin, dark mist revealing the opposite wall and then the mist vanished, and Haldir pushed by her to exit ahead; she had not drawn her sword. Phaila drew her sword slowly, unbelieving of the emptiness of the gray stone foyer. Wide eyed they looked to one another astonished, Phaila motioned those behind her to wait.

Phaila took Haldir’s arm, “this way,” she walked slowly pulling him with her around the corner coming face to face with a startled man. Her sword flashed and he staggered, she turned her head as his blood fountained, splashing her breast, and he dropped, throat cut to the spine.

She turned to Haldir, “bring them up,” she mouthed and he nodded, turned and signaled as Berindon pushed to the top of the stairs. Berindon bobbed his head and beckoned them through to follow him up the stairs that led to the hall, the fifty splintering off at the landing toward the hallway leading north to the cellars.

Bursting through the two eighteen foot tall doors that served as portals to the keep, unmanned, Phaila, Haldir and the three hundred and fifty ran down the steps and into the bailey. The occupants turned from the walls where they had been pressed to avoid the stones sailing over the walls and found themselves pinned as the unexpected enemy ran toward them, led by the Duchess and a tall, broad chested, golden elf who were covered by a hail of arrows.

It was a blur of blood and snow, screams and shouts as they fought toward the gates, all the while avoiding the boulders.

At the bottom of the steps they had fanned out in a convex formation, Haldir running to the left, another half elf cousin of Phaila’s right and she for the gate.

Phaila bolted into the melee, a man grabbed her arm, spinning her toward him and the knife in his hand; she danced into the spin, pulling back her sword to shorten it’s reach, startling him; for it is natural to move away. She sank the tip of the sword into his ribs, and then kicked him off the blade to die in the snow.

She stood, feet spread apart, looking down at him, and a boulder crashed behind her, and she spread her arms to steady herself. She raised her eyes to the coming mass and with a nod of will she stepped to meet them.

Where is she? He turned in the courtyard. It had been a mad three hundred yard dash for those gates, dodging the boulders, arrows from above and before them and she had disappeared in the confusion they had wrought. There! She was engaged with a tall, black bearded man who had no hope in his fight. She moved lithely, her armor like skin. She stood feet braced apart, in black and silver, the single war braid swinging, blood streaking her face; she parried, flicked her sword up and right, then down forcing his blade away, as the knife in her left hand came up and sank into his temple.

Haldir’s heart darkened at the blow. She stepped to the man’s left as he stood with such an expression of shock on his face it was almost comical; turning her back to him, she pulled the knife free with a great jerk and the man slowly keeled over. A sheet fluttered down behind her; a sudden, and beautiful background of pale blue, and white silk that obscured the destruction; Alanor’s pennant. Three boulders landed jarring the ground and ceased.

A straw haired young man engaged him, he was frightened and he was outmatched. Haldir could have laughed at how easy it was to kill him. He could have wept at how easy it was to kill him. Another man stepped forward and Haldir took him as well. The sword flashed up, down and sideways…then it was over. He was struck from behind, staggered but the blade bounced off the pauldron. Haldir turned, and sank his sword in this man’s throat.

Haldir turned to find Phaila behind him; she drew a deep breath and turned, revealing an arrow stuck in her back.

“It did not pierce!” she shouted over her shoulder in the din, assuring him breathlessly, it had knocked the wind from her, and she took his sword and waited while he pulled it loose, threw it on the ground.

“It is fine, Haldir, do not look so pale!” she smiled and patted his cheek, leaving a bloody handprint, handed him his sword. She turned away and an arrow struck her high in the breast, just below the left collarbone between the pauldron and breastplate, spinning her left with its impact. Gods! He grabbed her, keeping her on her feet. She looked wide-eyed at Haldir and laughed, “This pierced!”

Haldir handed his sword to her again, stood a moment looking at the arrow then grasped the shaftt hit his hand in the center of her chest and yanked.
“Baszd!” she shouted in pain and twisted from his hand to flatten her own against the wound, and growled. He needed no interpretation of that word.
He looked to the arrowhead it was bloody from tip to two fingers along the shaft. She stood pale and a pain sweat dotted her forehead over her upper lip.

“Leave it!” she batted at his hand, as his fingers touched the knick in the pauldron and knocked the arrow away, “It is fine.” She looked up to the walls as Haldir took up a discarded shield and held it before her, an arrow bounced off.

“Berindon! God damn it! Secure those walls!!” she shouted up to him, pointing gloved finger as he made his way along the catwalk. He saluted her and ran on with elf-men following.
“What are you doing?” she pushed the shield away, put his sword in his hand and strode past him, “See to yourself,” she advised sternly, turning to look at him as she walked backward. An arrow took him in the upper arm, knocking him sideways as if to prove her point.

Phaila arched an eyebrow and pointed, nodding, and laughing stepped to him, now shaking her head, “No good deed goes unstoned,” she pulled the arrow from his arm and wagged it at him, a gesture that threw him back to their first meeting, tossed it aside, turned and ran to the gates. Leaving him to stand in astonishment.

The huge bolt slid from its’ place, and Phaila threw her shoulder in with the twenty who strained at the three feet thick gates and pushed them open and stood in the arch to watch the snow covered plain fill with elf and men running full tilt toward her, crying “Tur-anion!” and “Ar-Feiniel!”

They broke around her, as water does on a rock in a river, hair flying, faces intent, some smiling, others not, she turned in their downstream progress watching as they scattered in the bailey, ran up the steps to the keep, trickled back toward the walkways. She saw them in her minds eye as they moved onward into the gardens, stables, and mews, outer garrisons….hunting whomever h The They were an unstoppable flood of wrath and honour restored.

She turned to survey the courtyard, trampled; littered with bodies, arrows, boulders and the craters previous stones had left in the ground as her enemy terribly outnumbered, disheartened by the bombardments and the mysterious appearance of the Ar-Feiniel and Tur-anion army in the midst threw their weapons to the ground. Those who did not were hacked down and those who ran, ah well, there was the back wall and the steep drop. They would not get far, and if they did; they did not live long arriving at their destination.

Blood lay black in the snow, melting it before turning to ice. She took a deep breath, thankful for the cold; would keep the smell of decay down as they worked to clean this up.

Haldir gazed himself. He had never killed men before. So similar to elves, and was disquieted, sickened.

Phaila wiped her bloodied sword on the back of a fallen man before sliding it into its’ sheath. She reached inside her breastplate and pulled out her silver flask, wet with her blood, unscrewed the lid and lifted it to her lips.

“Haldir!” she called, holding the flask up. He walked across the bailey to her, and reached out, their gloved fingers touching as it passed from her hand to his. She was nonplused by the carnage that surrounded them. She had been killing for three quarters of her life, killing for others, and killing for Amaras. All in a days work; this was that and not much more, except this victory was hers.

She looked at his arm, grasped him by the elbow and spread the fabric with gloved thumb and forefinger they had scrambled to find him proper armor, but an upper vambrace could not be found leaving him exposed, which had led to this. He sipped the pear brandy and gasped for it stole ones’ breath then smiled; blood ran from under her breastplate, down her left leg. He arched an eyebrow, and she shook her head; took the flask back. Yes, she would peer at his wound, but not let him touch her; she deprived herself to show all she could take a blow and walk away laughing. Haldir knew, without doubt, she would have submitted to Amaras’ fingers. He could order her to the surgeon and she would go, but Haldir was not her peer; no matter how much she loved him and before all he must stay in his place.

She bent and took up some unspoiled snow and rubbed it over her face, cleaning it of blood. She slung her gloved hands downward flicking them of the now bloody mess and pink water. She looked back at him. Bent again and scooped up more, “Here,” she held it out to him.

He held his gloved hands up and she dropped it into the cup they formed and then teasingly guided him to rub the snow on places that were not bloody until her smile gave her away and he threw the remainder at her, turned his head and laughed as he wiped his face on his sleeve.

Her eyes went over his shoulder. Now was Haldir’s turn to see her face change if only most subtly with a tightening of her eyes and a thinning of her lips.

Her remaining kin, Alanor’s hostages were being brought down the stairs. She walked by him, and then broke into a run, the braid bouncing between her pauldrons. She held her arms out and was met by a tidal wave of cousins, battered and bloodied, staggering in the snow, crying out, blessing the gods and demanding justice. She disengaged herself from one particularly battered cousin, his left eye black and swollen closed, sat him on the steps, listening to him speak hoarsely, as water was brought, friends, cousins and brothers leaning over them, comforting them.

He walked slowly toward the scene, until he was close enough to see that Phaila stood trembling in rage, her eyes had assumed the falcons’ aspect, the quick snap of eyelids as she blinked.

Pelion and Daeron not wanting to miss an opportunity at meting out their own justice had led the search in the fortress and drug out Alanor and his two grown sons as Phaila and Haldir stood in the bailey before her injured kin, the village men, women and children were herded by them, out onto the plain.

Phaila stepped apart from Haldir, and he reached for her arm. Mercy, on his lips but his eyes went to her cousins. What mercy was there for split lips? Blackened eyes? What mercy for three delivered in small boxes? They had lived with Alanor, ate at his table. Phaila’s court cousins there to see that all was properly done, and having served her well and being close at hand had been ensnared to fulfill his twistejectjective, and his fingers fell away to grasp the air.

Standing alone, she clasped her hands together behind her back and stood tall.

Phaila’s men, elves began shouting in rage, hurling insults, were held at bay by Phaila’s presence as Alanor and his sons were forced down onto their knees before her.

The bailey drew quiet as she stood to look at them.

“You are as white as the snow, Alanor,” she said softly.
“My claim is sound,” he said, his voice steady. Shouts of ‘treason! Abominable treason!’ filled the air again.
“Your claim?” she asked and stared at him and looked to those assembled as if she had not heard him correctly, “Your claim? Through whom do you make your claim? A third cousin four times removed twelve hundred years ago? And why now? Why not sooner? Who stiffened your resolve and why …” she cocked her head, leaned down to look closer at him, eyes narrowing in thought, it was too thin this explanation, “What did you do? What did you do?” She whispered and walked around him and his two sons being held while she thought and considered his answers before he uttered any. “The stone…the seeing stone…?” He looked guiltily away. “Oh, you are a fool to have believed, you should have at the least waited til the army was here before handing it over.” She drew up to her full height.

“What is she talking about?” Haldir whispered.
“There was a seeing stone here, locked away…he has given it over, seduced no doubt with empty promises! Who whispered in your ear Alanor? Sauron?” Berindon shook his head and walked forward to lean over their captives, “Gods if I could bleed the human blood from me, I would do so now!!” he shouted furiously at Alanor and his sons kneeling in the snow.
“You would bleed the best from you!” Alanor shouted up at him, and Berindon lunged, but Haldir caught him, pulled him back while Phaila watched.

She drew her sword, it rasped as it was pulled from its sheath. She turned and looked to Haldir.

“I would not have you see this, Haldir,” she said softly, “Go back to camp.”
“I would stay,” he answered firmly, “Your Grace,” he inclined his head.

“So be it,” she gave a terse nod, her tone one of sound advice turned foolishly aside.

“I will not judge you,” he whispered composedly while his heart beat madly in his chest.

Not that it mattered in the least.

She turned, the braid swinging over her shoulder to hang over her bloody chest.

“You were a father to me, your sons my brothers,” she said to Alanor and her jaw clenched, unclenched, and clenched again. She reached for strength, though distress was winning. She spoke slowly to maintain control of her voice, “and I did love you more than there are stars in the sky.” She shook her head slowly, tears rolled from her lashes as she held her head high and bent her eyes to look down at him, “I do not, nor will I ever understand what you have done for such a little thing as title. Not the wisest will be able to explain away this grief I will carry for you and your sons,” She stood staring at him, her head tilted as she read his returning look, “How can you kneel there looking on me with hate when I have done nothing to deserve such sentiment from you?”

Haldir lowered his head for the sadness that rolled from her. Men and elf alike shed tears for her as they listened to the pain and perplexity in her voice, saw the tears on her cheeks. All had been betrayed if only a little by lover or friend or parent. Their own pain as monumental to them as this to her.

She wiped her face with the back of her left hand.

“Stretch out their necks,” she commanded softly, motioning her hand a laying out gesture, lowered her head and tapped her sword against the toe of her boot with an air of patient waiting as she drew herself together.

“Not my sons!” Alanor cried and struggled against his bonds and hands grabbed him, keeping him on his knees, “Not my sons!!!”
“What mercy would you have shown me and the sons of Amaras?” She asked rhetorically.
“Wit he he screamed at her, “It is a good thing that Amaras has not lived to see you so sunk in the vileness of Morrigan! It is a good thing you lost his son!!”

The crowd hissed, looked to one another at this fresh outrage, growled and surged forward.

Phaila leapt ahead and grabbed him roughly by the jaw, and leveled her now fierce eyes to his, “You are a fool to speak to me of my husband and the child. Amaras would have burned you alive for my sake. Oh yes, be sure of that!” she shoved him back by the jaw she had gripped, “Be grateful it is only the witch you deal with this night, for I will give you a cleaner more merciful death. You and your sons.”

Haldir flinched, his stomach knotted, and slid sideways.

Phaila stepped to his first-born. The man in his late twenties looked to the half elf Duchess whom he had grown up knowing as someone always full of great fun despite her shadow of sadness.

“I am sorry, Your Grace. He is my father.” He managed with a fear dry mouth, turning his head to look to his left and up at her. Light brown hair fell over his forehead, fringing soft brown eyes.
“Then I am more so, to reward your faith with death,” she answered and motioned.
“I would go with my head up, Your Grace,” he said and looked straight ahead.
“As you wish,” she smiled grimly at his ery.ery.

She took the sword in both hands and pressed the blade against the back of his neck.

“Steady,” she bolstered him for he began to tremble violently at the touch of the steel. She drew the sword back at an angle over her right shoulder, and swung.

The blade cut the air with a low and deep woooooosh, cut through skin, muscle and blood vessels, the head toppled into the snow, accompanied by a gush of hot blood pulsing from the beating heart. Phaila stood with sword in left hand and watched as the body dropped chest first to the ground where it twitched at her feet while Alanor screamed.

There are exceptional moments that occur when disaster is falling and there reveals a beauty that is alarming in detection for one doubts sanity. This thought is quickly followed by guilt for removing to such a place as to moved by the destruction. Perhaps it is because the senses are sharper, keener that colours intensify, and sounds are louder, clearer. Perhaps with death so near at hand there is a moment of realisation that this may be the last looks on a flower or blade of grass that one is compelled to pause and make appreciation; burn it in memory.

Left handed swing away, Haldir thought, she has a left handed swing away, transferring the blade mid-stroke in its double handed grip from right to left, she stood in the arcing posture of a dancer. Long legs spread, left arm curved up and away.

She blinked and paused a moment then stepped over the body to the youngest whose chest was hitching with his horrified sobs and lifted her sword; lay the edge against the flesh of the young man’s neck, aiming between the bones, grasped the hilt with both hands and raised it.

“Father!!!” He shrieked, piercingly in the heavy silence, shaking violently and then quiet was restored save for the screaming of Alanor who reared against the hands that held him.

There would be talk of this night, Haldir nodded to hlf, lf, they will speak of how the Duchess took back her castle and in the bailey put the traitorous Alanor and his two sons to death, wielding her own sword, taking the responsibilities of their deaths on herself.

It was quickly done, they will say. None would call it cruel, only efficient. He closed his eyes against the hot coppery smell of blood.

Haldir watched Phaila who stared coldly back at Alanor her tears dried and with one stroke of her sword sent him to the gods of man.

She turned to her Generals and Haldir who stood watching. Pelion, Daeron and Berindon looked at her, their faces satisfied, Haldir wished for Amaras suddenly. His head jerking at the unbidden thought, but yes, only Amaras could have taken the sword from her; relieved her of this responsibility, and if she had insisted on completing this task, only Amaras who understood these matters could have eased her heart and mind.

Her eyes drifted to Haldir. He naed hed his eyes, gave a brusque nod. I would not know where to begin never having had these responsibilities. Gods, Phaila. Could I have done this for you?

“Come,” Daeron said motioning to some elves, “see they are properly buried,” his tone that of boredom.

Phaila fixed her eyes on Pelion, “The entire garrison…” she looked at him steadily, “the entire court, but spare the civilians. See to it Pelion, have it done tonight.”

She slid the sword back into its’ place and walked to the keep, fingering her braid. Berindon and Haldir looked to one another and followed. She stood at the bottom of the stairs that led to the great hall, collecting herself and then up she ran. Berindon and Haldir trotted after her and topped the last step as she slid to a stop in the archway of the doors. Haldir saw what froze her.

Alanor had crafted his cloth of state and it hung over the two chairs at the hea the the hall, chairs he was never meant to occupy.

“Oh,” Berindon gasped.

Phaila strode toward the chairs and reached up yanked the silk down and threw it on the floor. She turned to the sideboard stacked with the gold and silver wrought plate; the high crystal of Tur-anion and Ar-Feiniel replaced with Alanor’s and pulled it over. Crystal and fine porcelain shattered and slid across the stone floor.

Berindon took Haldir and pulled him away, and then drew the doors closed and leaned against them, folding his arms over his chest, shook his head an absolute ‘no.’

There came another loud crash.

Haldir leaned his shoulder against the door and lay his hand on the thick oak.

She kept her female tides in check out of necessity. She could not afford to be emotional not if she wanted to lead an army consisting of males. Female emotions were viewed with suspicion and condemned as irrational and belied an unsteady, and therefore unreliable character. Hers she had exiled or yoked or jailed. Smiles and laughter were given their heads; yet her humour sat atop a quality of such unflinching violence that ran too deep for him to fathom. Her anger was quiet, and rage was seen only in a trembling of effort to hold it in check. Nor did she shout in argument, but spoke softly as if lending volume to her voice would loose the emotions in her. There were no fissures in her veneer to warn of impending wrath. It simply manifested. Like mist.

Amaras!