[Nogrod]

Hadith

Due to Athwen’s medicines Hadith’s left arm was totally numb. Even if it did make him feel himself the most vulnerable in this envirovenment that seemed to offer violent surprises by the day it was still better than the pain of the last night. Athwen had insisted that he should stay with the other wounded under the makeshift shelter to keep the wound as dry as possible. But Hadith would have none of it. As he was now back to his senses he would also want to know what was going on and so he slipped out from the hastily assembled tent for the wounded as soon as Athwen turned to other patients.

He soon got to the crowd gathering near the pit and after spotting Beloan went to stand beside him.

“Well my lad, you’re feeling better already? I’d like to hear your story of the battle but I think the meeting is starting in any minute now... Are you allright Hadith?” Beloan had looked at Hadith delightedly at first but while he spoke a cloud had started to form over his expressions. The boy looked so pale and weak...

“Yes I am, Beloan”, Hadith answered but avoided meeting Beloan’s eyes.

The older man looked at Hadith quizzically but then decided to not press the question any further for the time being as Aiwendil was coming forwards to start the meeting. Instead he took his cape and folded it a few times and set it then on Hadith’s shoulders.

“Keeps you warmer and drier...” he half-whispered as Aiwendil had just started his speech. He smiled to Hadith caringly and then turned straight to hear what Aiwendil and Lindir had to say.

Hadith was most confused. This man who had showed concern about him and who had trusted him from their first hunting lessons onwards - which it now seemed were ages ago – felt like a father Hadith actually never had had but as flashes of memories from his very early childhood. Suddenly Hadith felt an urge to hide himself in Beloan’s lap and be secured of all the evil the world was throwing at him, all those a father would wash away from a child. But Aiwendil’s words froze him.

The Olog-hai? Those from the tales of the War of the Ring?They really exist? And they’re here waiting for us in the north? Hadith was all fear now. He sure had heard of those monsters. There had been two gamlings in their barracks when he was very young and they used to tell stories of valour and evil of the past great wars. The stories about the battles in front of the Dark Gate and those of the Pelennor Fields had been some of the favourites of Hadith when he was a child, stories he would insist the gamlings to tell over and over again. But that monsters of that quality would be actually alive and real and near them... Hadith’s knees were trembling as he listened to the old man and the elf.

He remebered the stories now vividly. The Olog-hai’s skin could not be penetrated but by an elven blade he remembered the other one of the gamlings, Trucwadh, telling him. They could sweep ten armoured man at arms down with one blow the other, Golondor, had said. They were tall like three men standing on above each other, they had teeth like lions but only three times larger and sharper. No arrow, no sling-projectile would bother them more like a mosquito bite does a man. Ten of them had went through a legion of Gondorian footmen like a party of adults might be shooing little children away from them... How could we, a bunch of rugged slaves with a few aids ever match a horde of them? This is folly!

After Aiwendil had answered Khamir’s passionate words with presence that sent chills all around Hadith’s bruised body he gathered his courage to answer to Lindir’s plea for everyone to speak their minds.

“My mother and father were gruesomely killed by plantation-orcs. They even made me watch my mother dying when I was a lot younger than I am now. I have no pity for these foul creatures and will be one to volunteer in killing them... if my strength just allows it. But what you say about these Olog-hai bothers me even more.”

Hadith made a pause to recollect what he was about to say.

“I mean... even if these orcs would not be baits but would actually fight besides us, what chances would we have against that mighty an enemy even in that case? Wouldn’t it take an army of hundreds or more likely thousands of fully-clad and battle-hardened men at arms – or elves - to fight them? So shouldn’t we just kill the orcs that they may do no more harm to anyone and head west instead out of the way of these mosters? If king Elessar was ready to send a fellowship to help us, maybe he would then grant us a refugee in the west somewhere? And there are people here who could claim a place or another his or her home down south... Maybe he would listen to our pleas?”