It was cold, my breath frosted on the gentle pre-dawn breeze and the flames snapped hungrily around the green branches neatly chopped and stacked into the campfire before me. It was cold, but I was not. My long cloak wrapped comfortably about my thin frame, my dwarf-crafted trousers protected me from the chill ground, and the padded elven robe shrouded me in gossamer softness that was deceptively comforting for its weight. Of course, the hobbits made the best warm hats, and a Stoutfoot woolen cowl sheltered my ears. I think, perhaps, that the slowly roasting coney that I turned occasionally over the campfire flames helped stave off the chill as well. I casually flipped crispy morsels of roasted rabbit up to the branches above me where my raven, Po, cawed appreciatively as he caught them out of the air. His soft warbling song drifted down to me with subtle hints for larger tidbits that were still slightly bloody, ever hungry he was. I smiled briefly to myself and flicked a slightly larger piece his way. Rewarded by his startled and thrilled cackling I returned to my reverie.
It had been hard on the farm, the beans grew thinly and the crop was always barely enough to feed our small family and rarely did we have sufficient to trade for furs and other necessities as the winter drew closer. The late weeks of Summer fading slowly to the early days of Autumn as a growing sense or urgency overtook us. My father, bless his heart, tried so hard, toiled so tirelessly to provide for us, and asked only that I venture into the woods to bring back perhaps some small game for the pot. I never enjoyed hunting, the cries of the catch always seemed too close to the Common Tongue to my sensitive ears. The panic the game expressed as I drew close to the trap almost always overwhelmed me, frequently prompting me to release the captured creature back into the underbrush - too terrified to even offer thanks - leaving me to return home empty handed and hungry. My mother’s eyes prompted me to leave the farming implements behind and take my snares and traps into the woods that day. Bless her soul; she wanted to cook for us, fulfilling her equal role as provider.
The farm faded quickly behind me as I crept through the woods, looking for the telltale tracks and spoor of smaller creatures, trying to find a likely place to set my small snares. A likely spot underneath an ancient oak called to me, some subtle sign, almost a whispered voice in my ear, told me that it would be fruitful. I remember setting the snare, and climbing the low-hanging branches of the majestic tree to lie in wait. I was not far from the farm, and I thought I could still smell the rich loamy soil being tilled by my parents as I waited.
I must have drifted off.
Beware! They come! They come! Danger! Hide! Hide!
The tiny voices woke me, a thousand screamed imprecations to caution, an underlying sense of panic and threat that dragged me immediately into alertness from my light slumber. It is a wonder I hadn’t fallen from my perch, but as I listened I was deeply grateful that I hadn’t! So alarmed at what I could hear was I that I hadn’t even paused to think where the warning voices had come from.
The wild chittering of the birds in the branches drew suddenly quiet as I heard the approaching crunching and snapping of fallen branches under heavy footsteps through the darkening woods. I took heed of the silence and held myself immobile and noiseless in fear. What could be rushing through the woods in such haste? What could be doing such damage to the patient forest? I could hear hoarse voices grunting and calling to each other as branches were snapped and torn from the trees. It seemed to me then that a long slow groan of anguish followed those voices, each groan coming shortly after a loud retort of a thick branch being broken.
I held still and let the tumult approach me.
Caught! Caught! Run! Run!
I looked down and saw a small squirrel caught by one leg in my snare; it pulled and pulled, but could not get free. Paralysed by fear at the coming cacophony, I did nothing but watch. Its tiny black eyes peered up at me as if it sensed I had seen it. Terrified, I remained hidden.
A thick, dark form passed beneath me, then another, then another. In all perhaps six dark and hairy forms ran beneath out of the dark woods, each hacking wildly at the forest around them with broken and rusted weapons of crude iron and some blackened wood of a type I’d never seen before. Whooping and calling to each other in grating and guttural voices in their own language intermixed with cannibalised and corrupted words from the Common Tongue they carved a trail of broken branches and crushed undergrowth through the forest. One passed directly over my snare, saw it moments before stepping directly on it and it’s frozen captive and deftly dropped a long arm to the ground to pluck with one filthy hand the squirrel - snare-and-all - from the ground before plunging the whole lot into its gaping maw. The squirrel’s high-pitched shriek near deafened me. With a shudder I swallowed my rising bile, gritted my teeth and waited until the last of them had passed, leaving only trampled brush and a pervasive stink in the air. What manner of foul creatures were these foul things? Where Ö were Ö they Ö going? I would later learn to recognise their evil silhouette as brutal orc-kind, and learn to hate them and the chaos they worshiped.
The truth of their direction hit me like a blow. They ran towards my home, and my unsuspecting parents!
With barely a thought I dropped from the tree to land awkwardly on the roots below, right in the path of a fleet form that materialised out of the shadows as I fell. With barely a sound the robed form bounded over me before turning in a heartbeat to still my cry of alarm with a firm hand over my mouth and the point of a blade against the tender skin of my neck.
“Who are you devil? Why do you protect the Orcs!?” a harsh whisper escaped from behind a cowled and veiled face, bright blue eyes glittering in the low light with a savage intensity.
“Or.. Or.. Orcs! They run to my home! Get off me!” my indignation and alarm for my family over-riding any sensible urge to hold still in the face of this steely intense and quiet man.
In a blink, he was off me, standing against the thick trunk of a neighbouring tree, almost lost in the shadow with his deep green robes and clothing camouflaging him in the low light.
“Then get up Man, and quickly! We must move swiftly to stop the brutes!”
“But I am unarmed,” I objected, “what am I to do?”
“Lorillath Litherieili! If you have needs of arms, just ask! The bounty of the woods shall provide!”
How he knew me so well, more fully than I knew myself at that point, I shall never know. It is said that the long-lived have a canny sense for hidden talents and potential.
“Ask? Ask who? What do you mean?” I stammered, “OK, have it that way! I need arms to defend my family! Please help me.”
My urgency and sincerity lent strength of passion to my plea.
A retort sounded above me and I was showered with a barrage of leaves and small twigs, and then a stout branch fell before me, remarkably straight and true, barely missing my still-prone form before I scrambled to my feet, gape-jawed and wide-eyed.
“The forest has heard you and seen fit to provide,” the stranger said, “come now. Gather your staff and let us run like the fleet deer to catch the minions of evil before they achieve their savage goal!”
Then he was off, running and jumping through the forest towards my home.
The whole bewildering scene had taken mere moments to unravel, but I had no time to lose myself in wonderment or confusion at this unexpected and dramatic turn of events. I stood, swept the staff from the forest into my hand, its wood warm against my skin, and darted after the stranger as fast as I could go.
Run! Run! The voices followed me like a subliminal whisper, and run I did.
The carnage was ... stupefying.
The stranger was laying about with twin blades in a blurred whirlwind of deadly force, two black forms danced just beyond his reach, several launching clumsy attacks only to be swiftly turned aside to the bright ring of steel-on-iron. Two forms lay sprawled and broken on the ground, one with no less than three arrow shafts protruding from its chest, the other with its armor sliced and sundered in too many places to count, dark blood oozing slowly into the torn ground beneath it.
A scream turned my attention to my right and I turned just in time to watch a long-limbed fiend hurl a blazing torch up and onto the thatched roof of my lifelong home, the flames seeming to almost reach hungrily forward before racing with lightning speed across the roof until the whole place was ablaze in an instant. The scream was my mother’s, my pacifist and always-smiling mother, swinging a farm tool viciously into the creatures side where it lodged briefly before a backhand slap sent her and the makeshift weapon to the ground. My father I could see wrestling with the much larger beast before the barn, clearly the match was uneven, and his strength was quickly flagging as the evil creature towered over him.
Attack, I support you.
I know not if the words were spoken, or even heard, but I did not hesitate.
Sprinting forward, I held the forest-staff in both hands over head, screaming as I ran. Both twisted and evil shapes turned briefly towards me before quickly returning to their quarry. With a quick reach and twist I saw my father’s neck broken and his limp body flung to the ground like a poorly made scare-crow. The perpetrator turned to face my charge with spread arms and a wicked smile on its feral face. Simultaneously the second hairy beast spun a blade downwards through the air towards my mother’s feebly crawling form. I do not remember the impact; I felt the laughter and joy of my young life leave me then, to be replaced with an implacable coldness. A chill that brought with it a clarity-of-focus and all-consuming-hatred flowed like a terrible tide through my body and I felt something break inside my mind. The staff flared to light above my head, and I was on them.
“Peace lad! Halt I say! Halt!”
I did not recognise the hand on my arm, staff poised to strike in my tensed arms, a maniacal and feral sneer on my face. The stranger stood before me, gloved hand restraining my blow, two broken and battered dark bodies lay at my feet, their weapons bent and contorted as if by an intense heat, their armor buckled and collapsed over crushed chests and broken limbs. Then it all came back to me. The staff felt cold as it fell from my nerveless fingers, and crumbled into nothingness as it struck the ground. I had no time to mourn its loss as I fell into blackness, sorry-stricken and enervated.
I awoke to twin funeral fires and a knowledge that the void in my breast where once my family had dwelt might never be warmed again. The stranger stood with his back to me, a fire to his right and left while my home burned behind me. The flames felt cold and yet cleansing. He knew I was awake, but gave me the courtesy of silence and my privacy, casting only a glance over his shoulder before walking towards the fringe of the woods that bordered our fields.
“Come speak to me when you feel ready lad,” he said, and with that he walked away.
It took me only moments to gather what few belongings I had and to follow him. No tears I shed as I farewelled my parents’ funeral pyres, but an oath of vengeance escaped my thin lips as I turned away.
I found the stranger just within the shelter of the woods, a small campfire burned low and smokeless beneath the sheltering trees and the stranger sat slowly sharpening his elegant blades. He looked up as I entered the firelight, and with his hood back and veil lowered I was able for the first time to recognise him as Elven. His fine features were dramatically shadowed by the fire’s glow, both golden and dark in equal share, the points of his ears barely visible through the fine hair that lay lank against his head. I had seen precious few elves, trading occasionally at my father’s side as lone or small bands of elves traveled between their refuges. I knew little of elven lore, but knew that they were neither counted amongst friend nor enemy ñ only separate and aloof from the affairs of Men.
“What happened to you today boy,” he said, “should never be born by one so young. It is with sadness that I witness your family’s fate. Ever sad it is to see the shadow claim another life in its slow encroachment of the light.”
“You’re an elf,” I said stupidly before dropping to sit beside the fire.
He smiled briefly, “Aye, that I am. Laerolan by name, of Mirkwood. They call me Orc-Slayer for that is what I am. And you, my young master of lore, who are you?”
“I have no name,” I replied, “that has been taken from me this day; my farm, my family and my livelihood, all ashes. Why do you call me a master of lore?”
“The forest heard your need and spoke to you in return, even going so far as to provide for you in battle. You called the powers of the ancients to your aid this day, and in your need it was given. I saw the flare of light you called, I heard the gusting of the wind. The orcs stood no chance before you once you awoke your consciousness. Its is a pity that amongst Men that such things go unknown but it gladdens my heart, on this otherwise sad day, to see that some may hear and answer the calls of the Ancient Lore.”
It made sense to me then in the quiet that followed the loss of my family; the calls of nature; the voices I heard; the signs I could read in the skies and the trees and in the flight of birds. I recalled some of the words I had uttered as I ran towards the attackers at the farm, Orcs. Words conveyed to me through the forest-staff I had been briefly gifted with. Words I heard even now. I felt a peace descend on me as I understood that all things must pass, that my parents’ death - while untimely and still very much raw to my memories - was a natural part of all things. They would return to the world that we draw our livelihood from, nourishing it in turn as it had nourished us all. My freshly woken senses allowed me to hear the speech of the birds in the trees, the speech of the trees themselves, and to read meaning into the silence that surrounded Laerolan and myself in this moment.
“I shall be known as Hymn then; I shall dedicate myself to Natural Lore, and shall rejoice in the song I sing of it.”
“A fitting name it is,” said Laerolan, “and I would be honoured to greet you as friend, Son of Man, and to aid you on your path to knowledge.”
“And I would welcome such aid friend Elf. But knowledge must have a purpose, and my purpose shall be to wipe those foul Orcs from the land and return them to dust,” my lips tightened into a grimace of determination, “this I swear on the memory of my family!”
Laerolan’s eyes widened slightly in surprise before an expression of fervent agreement settled across his narrow features.
“I shall teach you what I can then Hymn, Lore Master, but I fear it will be little enough,” Laerolan looked about him into the gathering gloom, “But for now we are safe here in this wood. Let us begin our path together, short though it may be, in the morn. Share with me a meal and let us recover from this day’s sad tidings.”
Laerolan reached deep into his pack and brought out a leaf-wrapped package and there, under the cool shade of the living forest and before the warmth of the glowing fire, we broke bread. Man and Elf, bound by a hatred of shadow in a common cause before the growing darkness.
We traveled together for weeks, tracking bands of orcs across the countryside, very rarely meeting any other fellow rangers. Laerolan taught me what he could, and as he had said, it was precious little. Barely three months after I had first me the Elf we ran across another Lore-Master, Laerolan abandoned me to his teachings and departed one night unannounced. I think that solitude treated him better than companionship and he was too wild to stay when he was no longer needed, but I bear him a burden of gratitude that may never be fully repaid. Still, I do what I can, echoing his good deeds and service to me by assisting other Free Peoples who strive to drive back the dark in these evil times.
My skills have grown, and my name has sometimes preceded me to new places of wonder, though my journey is just beginning. I’ve learned to speak the languages of the Raven and the Bear, and count the myriad creatures of nature amongst my friends. Elf, Dwarf, Man and Hobbit have joined in these dark days, and despite the darkness revelry can still be found in their companionship. These are the days of the Eventide, or so the Elves term it, but together the Free Peoples of Middle Earth still hold hope for a return of the light. While I still feel saddened at my family’s passing, these days remain among the best I have experienced, the conquering of darkness, the camaraderie of my fellows, the seeking of lore ñ they are pursuits that continue to this day. Here I sit, a lone traveler but not alone, a seeker of lore, a warrior for light in the presence of shadow.
More recent events; the Ranger Amdir’s wounding; the defence of Achet and the increasing shadows from Mordor; bring a chill to my heart. But as I reflect on the challenges, triumphs and failures I have seen so far the first rays of sunlight peek over the distant mountains and bring a golden glow to the treetops. My mood lifts and the chill about my thoughts dissipates.
The coney has served as a breakfast fit for a king, and as the rosy sun rises in the East I know have much further yet to travel this day. I stand and Po, my feathered companion, flaps noisily to my shoulder to cheekily pull threads from my cap while I kick dirt over the cooling coals. I turn to the sunrise, give thanks for my full belly and for to have eyes to see the sunrise’s beauty and set forth to see what this day holds in store for an inquisitive mind, whistling as I go.