Haunted, Hunted by Rocky41_7

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Chapter III

The last time Elwing went to visit her aunt, Eärendil was out to sea.

            She had gone so long without direct confrontation from the red wolf she had again begun to question whether it might have somehow been merely a figment of her childhood and adolescent imagination. It seemed unlikely, but she had nothing to prove it had been real, and she would hardly be the first to lose track of what was real and what was a dream within those woods. I was frightened, because of what happened to Doriath, she thought. Was it any wonder her mind might have invented a confrontation with the wolf pack who had killed her parents and her older brothers?

            The nightmares of her youth still came and went, though with less frequency and somewhat less vividity than before. Waking with Eärendil beside her helped.

            “You’ll be careful, won’t you, my girl?” said Evranin, needlessly straightening Elwing’s light summer cloak over her shoulders. Evranin looked precisely as she had when Elwing was six years old, nary a wrinkle nor age spot to be seen. Sometimes Elwing looked at her hands working alongside Evranin’s and wondered how long it would be before she began to look older than her former nurse.

            Evranin had promised to stay at the house and look after Elwing and Eärendil’s twin boys while Elwing was away.

            “I’ll be careful,” she promised. A faint smile quirked the corners of her lips, but faded quickly. Elwing had a sober manner about her that Evranin had never fully placed as natural or a result of her tumultuous and traumatic childhood.

            “Evranin,” said Elwing then, “I had thought to take another path this time. I wanted to see—”

            “No.” Evranin cut her off at once, a shutter drawing down over her face. “I tell you Elwing, steer clear of that place. The soil is soaked in blood; nothing good can come of it. Ghosts abide there; there is a poisoned air about it.”

            “But it was my home,” Elwing said softly.

            “And now it is not,” said Evranin. “And your mother and father did not send you away to save your life that you might end it poking around old graves. Let it lie, Elwing. Menegroth is gone. What survived its assault has been picked off by scavengers or destroyed by the elements years by now.”

            All of the Iathrim carried an ache in the breast for the loss of their homeland, but for Elwing it was a curious grief, less the loss of a home and more the denial of a chance to have ever made it a home. She had no memory—not a real one, anyway—of the land of her birth, nor of her mother and father, nor of her brothers. For long years her mind had persisted in believing that laying eyes on Menegroth—wandering the halls which once belonged to her family and her people—would bring something back.

            But Evranin was likely right—nothing good could come of it

            So Elwing bade her goodbye, kissed the boys’ plump cheeks farewell, and took the usual path, which was nearly entirely consumed by the forest at this point. It took Elwing just as long to traverse it now as it had in her childhood, a result of the many obstacles and portions where the path simply seemed to disappear, and required finding before she could continue. The others who had once used this path had slowly ceased as the forest swallowed it up, as if withdrawing the last physical memory of the Kingdom of Doriath into itself, turning the whole thing to soil fertilizer as it did with the bodies that fell there.

            Her mind was still ruminating on Doriath’s history when she reached the midway point of her route through the forest and she realized there had been a persistent rustling following along her for some time. Immediately she came to a halt, her mind conjuring the image of the red-brown wolf with paws like dinner plates and eyes that seemed to stab through the darkness. She had started carrying a knife again after the last such encounter and had never stopped—it didn’t hurt to have at least a last resort tool of protection.

            For a long moment she stood, hearing the sound of her own breathing and the restless swaying of the trees.

            “Hello?” she called at last, thinking that if the wolf were tracking her, better to have it out and have him say what he wished to say.

            But there was no answer. No one stepped out onto the path.

            Elwing turned about in a circle.

            “Hello?” she called, raising her voice. “Are you there?” For a bizarre and certain moment, she expected to see an Elf emerge or hear them call out in response.

            The jewel of her necklace was comfortingly warm against her breast, reassuring in its steadfastness.

            For several minutes Elwing waited, listening, but she could no longer pick out the distinct rustling of before, and was forced to accept it must have been some other animal whose path had merely run parallel to hers for a while. She continued on her way and emerged on the other side of the forest in the evening, which at this time of year was still reasonably bright.

            Cheered by the uneventful trip, Elwing hummed a little to herself as she drew near the broad dirt path that would take her up to her aunt’s home, smiling at bird of prey passing overhead, and it wasn’t until she touched the gate that something seemed amiss.

            It was unlatched, for one, which wasn’t in and of itself unusual, except that the front door was ajar as well, and the sign proclaiming the family name hanging there was askew.

            Drat these woods, Elwing thought. She was always unnerved after passing through Doriath, even when the trip itself was perfectly lovely. Wasting no more time, she went up to the door and knocked.

            “Hello?” she called. “It’s Elwing.” Even as she spoke, the smell reached her, rank and coppery, like she’d just stepped into an abattoir. A shudder went through her, ending in a trembling exhale, and for half a moment, she was tempted to simply turn around and leave as quick as she could, never mind having to walk back through Doriath in the dark.

            But that was not what her mother and father would have done, and she would do herself no favors with cowardice. Instead, she stepped into the house.

            The parlor on the left side as one entered the door and the small guest room where Elwing stayed these days on the right were both empty. It was in the kitchen that she had her fears confirmed.

            Aunt was lying in a pool of blood beside the counter, a great wrenching bite taken out of her throat. The blood sprayed up the cabinet and across the floor. Her oldest cousin was nearby, his fingers gripped loosely around a knife he had not quite managed to secure in time to defend himself. Gobbets of blood gathered around the meaty mess on the floor, already drying and congealing. The other was just beyond the threshold into the dining room, as if he had been trying to run. There was no sign of her third cousin.

            For a long moment Elwing only stared at this scene, feeling as if gears were turning in her mind and failing to catch. An empty, stupid click, click, click as her mind tried to process. Then, she went into the parlor and set her basket down. She wiped the sweat of her palms off on her dress. She picked up the iron fire poker beside the fireplace, where a hearty little blaze was going. It was as she was contemplating the burning of a fire at this time of year that she heard a floorboard creak behind her and spun to see one of the russet wolves pacing towards her. She had not seen the other three since the one time they had revealed their existence to her, but she was certain this was one.

            “You killed my aunt,” she said, flummoxed by her own flat tone. “That wasn’t necessary.” The poker hung limply and heavily from her hand.

            The wolf did not bother to respond. It merely leaped.

            Elwing reacted on instinct and did not have the wherewithal to be grateful for her self-defense lessons growing up. Belatedly her body moved and she swung the poker in from the side, far later than she would have liked, but the effect was that while the wolf’s teeth grazed her shoulder, tearing through cloak, dress, and chemise, the iron poker caught the wolf directly in the temple, flooring it immediately.

            Elwing stared dumbly at the still body, and then some part of her mind reminded her she did still need to survive this encounter. She approached, her heartbeat filling up her ears, and pressed the poker against the furry flesh, between two ribs. She leaned her weight on it and the wolf’s skin and meat gave way, the poker sinking in several inches. It took her three tries to yank the thing back out, at which point she heard a noise deeper in the house, in the direction of the dining room. Quickly, she mounted the steps and in one of the upstairs bedrooms, found the corpse of her third cousin abed, as if she had been napping when the beast had sprung on her. The coverlet which this cousin had embroidered herself was ruined with her blood.

            Elwing’s eyes flashed around the room, looking for something more effective than a fire poker with which to defend herself, and as she realized that she had left her own knife in the basket downstairs, the guttural howl from below sounded. A wolf howl was loud enough in the open air or at a distance through the forest—inside the closeness of her aunt’s house Elwing clapped her hands over her ears, banging the twisted metal of the poker against the side of her head. Then, the racing of paws on the stairs.

            She tried to brace herself, taking a wide stance and gripping the poker with two hands, as the second russet wolf came barreling into the room. She swung the poker as soon as the wolf came at her, but this time she caught it on the top of its thick skull and the poker clanged off, staggering the wolf, but not much more. There was now a slight bend in the poker where it had made contact with the canine skull.

            Never would she have known it was a talking wolf if she had not spoken with its packmate; it snarled and spat and made noises she had never heard from any dog before. It lunged at her again, and Elwing tripped backwards over her cousin’s upturned laundry basket, crashing to the ground. The wolf was on her in an instant.

            Flinging the poker up, she caught it between its jaws. Hot, rancid breath billowed over her face and flecks of spit sprayed over her as the wolf gnashed its teeth, trying to reach her around the metal. No scream came from her, which surprised her, but it was as if something had seized up her throat. Finally, the wolf drew back to lunge again. Elwing fumbled with the poker and thrust up forcefully with a squeal, and there was a burst of warm blood against her chest and arms. Peeling her eyes back open, she saw the poker had pierced straight through the wolf’s throat. Its paws wheeled with rapidly increasing weakness, and she noticed one had clawed open her arm. She didn’t feel it.

            The wolf slumped, dead, its full weight then borne up by Elwing’s trembling arms, drained from holding back the powerful force of the wolf’s assault. She heaved it to the side and tried to wrench the poker free, but it was caught fast and she could not afford to waste time fighting with it.

            She looked at her cousin’s body, the open gashes in her flesh and the smell of death-loosened bowels in the room.

            “You didn’t have to kill her,” she said.

            She went to the casement and threw it open, peering into the rear yard, seeing nothing amiss. She dangled out the window by her fingertips, then dropped, remembering how to catch her weight so she didn’t sprain an ankle, something any child who loved climbing trees must know.

            For a moment, she pressed her back against the wall of the house, waiting in case something might spring out at her, but nothing came. Someone had been trimming the plants recently; she saw a pile of clippings not far from the back door. Bereft of her one weapon, however ill-suited, she went there and took up the largest branch she could reasonably wield. Ideally it would have been less leafy and more sharpened to a point, but she would rather have something to put between her and the slavering jaws of a wolf than nothing.

            Thus armed, she re-entered her aunt’s house.

            She passed through the dining room, then went left around the back of the stairs towards the parlor, where her basket and knife were still sitting. She reached the parlor at the same time the red wolf appeared in the front doorway and caught sight of the dead russet wolf on the floor.

            For a heartbeat, they looked at one another, and then Elwing charged. The wolf came to meet her, springing forward on those long, agile legs, and she caught him in the face with the brush end of the branch, certain in that moment that she had been right all along, and this was the same wolf pack who had slain her family in Menegroth. More inconvenienced than anything else, he was nonetheless knocked aside, and began a series of short lunges, driving her back towards the wall with snapping teeth.

            “Get out!” she screamed, jabbing at him with the branch.

            “Give me the fucking Silmaril!” the wolf snarled. “You had to make this so complicated! Look what you’ve done! You and your whole wretched family!” Elwing swatted him aside once again.

            “You killed them!” she shouted.  

“I did,” the wolf growled, his voice dropped lower than Elwing had ever heard it. “Because they kept something from me that I wanted. And do you know what you have?”

Elwing’s heart seemed to be trying to burst through her chest as the wolf lowered itself to spring again. She thrust the branch back into the fire place, so that it was alight when she swung it at him again. Alarmed by this turn of events, the wolf retreated for the first, his ears flattening back. Elwing flailed the branch about, knocking several crosstitches off the wall and nearly catching an armchair.

            “You’re going to burn the whole house down!” the wolf exclaimed.

            “Then I’ll take you with me!” And she ran at him, brandishing the flaming branch. “Get out! Get out!” The wolf looked at this wild-eyed woman charging at him like she would be happy to fall into the same grave, and turned tail. Elwing continued to shriek at him as she chased him out the front door, her words blurring into senseless howl as she stood on the front porch, waving the branch back and forth, sparks leaping off to singe her arms and face. The noise resolved once more into words and she screamed until her throat felt raw: “Get out! Get out! Get out!”

            From around the back of the property she saw a dark brown wolf come running, take one look at the scene and the fleeing red wolf, and follow his brother, tail between his legs.

            She went on yelling at them until they were gone from view and the branch’s flames were getting dangerously close to her hands. Quickly, she took it inside and stuffed it into the fireplace, hacking off the unburned bits which were too large to fit inside. Then she sank down to the rug and sat there, watching the branch burn down and listening to the wind whistle through the open door until night was halfway done, and then she barricaded herself in an untouched bedroom and lay down until morning.

***

            It was only right she stay and see to her aunt and cousins’ effects. She arranged to give the house over to the village, to do with as they saw fit, though she hinted she should like it kept available for refugees if any should come through with intent to settle. The other belongings she gave away, overseeing this only to prevent squabbles. The morning on which she had made the decision to remain, she had sent a letter home, in case Eärendil should arrive back before her and worry, and to reassure Evranin and thank her for looking after Elrond and Elros.

            The bodies of the people were buried; the bodies of the wolves burned after the pelts had been salvaged. Elwing was not familiar with the funerary customs of her aunt’s people, but she let them proceed as they saw fit, and as she stood at the yet-unfilled grave, gripping the Silmaril around her neck, she wondered why it could not protect more of the people around her. Forget the ghosts of Menegroth—was she herself not an omen of death?

            Early in her stay, she purchased from the local smith—for the village was not large enough to have a specialized weapons-maker—a short sword and from the tanner a belt in which to wear it. In the afternoons and evenings, she practiced with it, working through self-defense routines she had left by the wayside too long.

            When it was all done, she declined offers by several of the villagers to stay, and left with her basket, now with a scarf knit by one of her cousins tucked into the empty space once filled with food, her small sword at her waist.

            At the threshold of the forest she stopped. She could go around. If she could get a mount, she could go around. It would take thrice as long, but it could be done. There was no promising she would not meet other dangers on that route. There was almost a guarantee the red wolf and his dark brother were waiting under the undulating forest canopy for her. But Elwing set her jaw against the long route—if the wolves would come for her, let them come. She would kill these two as well, or else they would kill her, and at least it would be done. She had had enough of being haunted by the ghosts of Doriath’s destruction.  

            She took the whole route through the forest with a hand on the hilt of her sword, jumping at every sound, once drawing the blade on a pair of crows, yet she saw not the wolves, nor any sign of them. The path seemed to have degraded double-time in her absence; it was all but gone, and only her memory of it helped guide her through the tangled undergrowth, heart pounding all the way, taking great care not to trod on any mushrooms or beetles or animal corpses. Several times, she had to stop and choose her way forward carefully, and she tried so hard to imagine how this place could have once felt safe and homey for the people who lived there.

            “Adar,” she whispered. “Naneth. Are you with me?” Silently she called out to her great-grandparents as well, who had once ruled in mighty joy over this realm and given shelter to those who lived in it. A breeze stirred the still forest air, shockingly fresh, at at once Elwing heeded its direction, and found a remnant of the path on which to continue.

            As usual, the end of the woods came suddenly upon her: she was cautiously picking her way through the trees as carefully as she could, and then she was stumbling out into the evening light, once again feeling the wind on her cheeks. A squad of bats wheeled overhead, passing inward towards the heart of the forest.

            Elwing sheathed her sword and took several deep, slow breaths. She sat down in the grass for a few minutes and drank from her waterskin. It took this time for her to try to relax the tension in her body and accustom herself to the thought that she had not been mauled by wolves. She was not so foolish as to think she had scared them off for good, but perhaps, she thought, they were still regrouping. Perhaps the village could augment defenses in case they once again ventured out of the woods, which she had never known them to do ‘til now.

            Never had she been so relieved to see the village appearing over the horizon; if she had not been so weary, she might have run to her own front door. Silently praying with all her might that Eärendil had returned while she was gone, she approached their admittedly rickety and slightly lopsided front gate, and realized it was open. The front door was ajar too.

            No. She dropped her basket and ran. Bursting into the house, she set to tearing it to pieces, wailing the names of her sons. “Elrond! Elros! Elrond! Elros!” Evranin lay dead and bleeding in front of the boys’ bedroom and Elwing could not stop herself from being sick reflexively.

Only when she had made a disaster area of the house emptying out any place something much smaller than a little boy might have hidden, throwing things aside without a care for damage as she searched, did she emerge back out front and see in the mud at the corner of the property, seemingly angled towards the edge of the village, a mess of wide, fat pawprints, big as a grown man’s hand.

Chapter End Notes

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