[Imladris]

Lira

Lira’s eyes slowly eased open as she woke into consciousness. She saw Uien and Falowik in the camp, as well as the others scurrying about the camp. She herself was resting in the hollow of boulder and her head had been rebound with soft cloth. A meager breakfast was being prepared, but Uien stood a little apart from the group, her head bowed.

Slowly, Lira stood to her feet but stopped as pain surged through her head. Clutching the rock to steady herself, she closed her eyes as she waited for the pain to drift away. When it merely throbbed as a dull ache, she found Lumiel and asked what had happened. Lumiel briefly told her as she continued her work and Lira listened with a frown when she was told of Uien‘s kill. “Thank you, Lumiel,” she murmured as she turned away and approached Uien.

“How is your shoulder, Uien?” she asked softly, standing beside the healer.

“It is better,” Uien answered absently.

Turning her blue eyes towards her, Lira said softly, “It is no wrong to kill to save another. If you had not done what you did, Falowik would be dead. If we have not slain them that attacked us, we also would be dead.” Lira paused and, gazing at the rising sun, said, “It is hard to kill, to watch a human’s life snuffed out. I understand your grief.” With a short nod, she turned away.

With a joyous caw, Corn fluttered to her arm and gazed with a beady eye at her, his beak open as if with a smile. Bringing his head towards her she whispered, “My brave raven.” Then she kissed his feathers, and whispered to him in Elvish.

A foreboding sorrow haunted the ruins of Fornost: death was close.