The Fellowship of the Fourth Age (Part 1): A New Beginning RPG

[Brinniel]

“I am sorry, Shae. I was wrong. Gondor did not fail us, you did not fail, we will not fail.”

Shae stared at Khamir curiously. She could hear a hint of sadness in his voice, perhaps of defeat. The woman couldn't help but wonder if she were partly the cause of this. She had argued so harshly against his decisions, perhaps enough to turn many of the other ex-slaves against him. It was true- she had been right all along and Khamir wrong- but this was not the reaction she expected.

Khamir spoke up again. “I admire you....your bravery.”

Shae couldn't help but blush at these words.

Me, brave? That was something she always had a hard time believing.

She was surprised at the one-armed man's kind words. Had he spoken the truth? Was she really becoming a different person- one of bravery? As Shae watched Khamir turn toward the others, she realized she was not the only one to have changed over the last several days. The man's face remained unreadable as he listened closely to an ex-slave, Hadith, speak.

Not all changes are for the better.

Shae's focus returned to the situation in front of her as Kwell lunged his horse towards Hadith, Dorran only just grabbing his reins in time. Shae stepped forward, next to Khamir, and listened to what the Rider had to say.

“I understand more than you realize. I grew up on in these parts. We called the plantation the “Iron Cage”. The hunger, the Orc whips, living like a beast….my life was no different than yours. Our family escaped onto the Ash Plain just as you hope to do. Only they never made it further than that. No one could agree on anything; each thought they had the only answer. When the slavers came, they killed my father and mother. Out of seventeen, four escaped. Still, my sister and I were lucky. We journeyed to Rohan and made a new life. ”

Shae's eyes widened at this story. She had no words to express her shock.
"The king sent a former slave to us?" whispered Khamir, sounding just as surprised.
The woman could only glance at him and shrug her shoulders. As Dorran continued to speak, Shae noticed the slightest of scars on his wrist- a brand. She had been the first to tend to the man the previous night.

How did I not notice the scar before?

Shae felt a new admiration for the man. A Rider of Rohan Dorran may be, but was not much different from her. He had been a slave before too. And yet, he managed to start a new life, away from the plantation- even get married. If he could do it, surely Shae and the rest of the ex-slaves could too.

Final words were spoken, and satisfied enough, the ex-slaves allowed the Fellowship to join their camp. By now, daylight had well arrived, bringing with it a bright new day. Shae was searching for a place in the camp when Carl approached.
"Will you be joining us, Miss Shae?" he pointed towards the campfire where the Fellowship and a few select ex-slaves sat planning. "You were such a help to us last night-- we would appreciate any thoughts or ideas."
Shae hesistated, then gave a nod. "Very well. I will join you."
The halfling gave a smile, then hurried back to the circle.

As the woman walked towards the campfire, she caught a glimpse of Khamir and came to a halt.
"Do you not intend to join in?" she questioned, gesturing at the Fellowship.
The one-armed man gave a snort. "I was not invited, like you."

Shae stared hard at Khamir, frowning. Was the man who had led the ex-slaves all these years- the one who had kept them alive- simply going to give up and pass the torch to someone else?
"You are no failure, if that's what you think," she said to him. "You made a mistake- we all do. There are still those who believe in you. I do. Come join us by the circle. You say we will not fail. Then come, and see to it that we don't. For years we have relied on your leadership- and even with the Fellowship here, we still need you." Shae paused, breaking into a warm smile. "Right now, you may see yourself out of place. But do not think for one second you can steal my role as outcast." The woman turned around and found a seat among the Fellowship, between Vror and Beloan. She only hoped Khamir would follow.

[Folwren]

Finally! A fire at which she could work. The delay at the entrance of camp worried Athwen immensely. She had never dreamed that they would be rejected, disliked, and doubted. These people had asked for help, and it had seemed they were going to reject it when they finally got an answer.

But now they had brought the fellowship in and settled them around a fire. The men were speaking together about the slavers, when they planned to attack, where they would come from, and what tactics could possibly be used against them. The fellowship told the men from the group of ex-slaves all they had done, what they had seen, and what little they had guessed about their plans.

Athwen, in the meal while, quietly fished out a kettle and poured water into it. She fixed it above the fire as quietly as she could, trying her utmost not to distract anyone from the councils that they took. She sent furtive glances towards them from the corner of her eye as she opened her herb pack. Thankfully, few paid her any attention at all, and those soon quit being distracted by her small movements.

The water boiled at last and she pulled it off and quickly prepared tea. With the strainer still bobbing in the mug, she carried it out into the shadows where Rôg and Azhar huddled close together.

“Hold this a moment, Rôg,” she said, handing the mug to him. She knelt by Azhar and laid her hand on the girl’s forehead. “As I thought,” she murmured quietly. “Still just as feverish as before. Are you cold?” Azhar shook her head, shrugging her shoulders to indicate Rôg’s cloak around her. “I see,” Athwen said, smiling a little. She shot Rôg a quick glance. “Then I won’t ask you to come by the fire. But you have to drink this. I hope it will help.” She took the cup from Rôg, carefully fished out the strainer and holding it gingerly by its chain so that it dripped on no one, she handed the mug to Azhar.

“Don’t drink it quite yet,” she said, her eyes widening as Azhar brought it close to her lips. Had the child ever drunk tea before? Perhaps not. “It’s still very hot. Wait for it to cool some, or you’ll burn your tongue. I’ll be right back.”

She left the two of them briefly to take care of the tea leaves and return the strainer to its place in her pack. In a few minutes, she came back, and sat down silently. Azhar quietly and steadily drank all of the tea and in ten minutes, handed back the empty cup.

[Child of the 7th Age]

By the time the leader of the slavers awoke and struggled to his feet, it was already well past mid-morning. Imak glanced outside his tent and saw men scurrying from one side of the camp to the other. The deadly business of getting ready for the night's attack was well under way. After pulling on his boots, Imak girded his older sword around his waist and uttered a private curse, swearing that he would retrieve the fine blade that had been stolen from him two nights before. He walked out of the tent and strode purposefully among the men, carefully noting what had already been accomplished as well as those tasks that still needed to be finished.

Men were rounding up the last of the horses, rummaging through small stockpiles of daggers and swords, and finishing up the holding pens in which the young slaves would be stored before being driven back to Nurn. When asked by one of his men if they should build a second pen, Imak had tersely responded that this would not be necessary. Only the fittest and fairest would be left alive: the rest would be summarily slaughtered. The leader of the slavers was in no mood to be challenged. The men exchanged worried glances at this news, since it would substantially reduce the profits they drew, but no one had the courage to cross Imak's path. In any event, the men were not opposed to an easy night of slaughter.

Reaching the center of camp where the cooking fire still burned, Imak met up with Eyshkin, the second in command, and barked out a final series of orders, grudgingly acknowledging that things had gone better than he had feared last night, “There’s no use waiting till nightfall. Our preparations are almost complete. We leave by mid-afternoon. We need no cover of darkness to defeat this rag tale band. Tell the men to be prepared to ride out then.”

Eyshkin nodded curtly, but then hesitated a minute, wondering if he should say anything about what had happened earlier that morning. Still, he had better come up with a good explanation, because the men would be without meat at their mid-day meal and tempers were likely to be frayed. Unable to concoct a believable story, Eyshkin finally decided to tell the truth, despite the fact that the story sounded odd even to him. Nervously clearing his throat, the man continued, “Imak, there’s one problem. Cook was preparing a fat donkey for the mid-day meal. Only now there's a problem. You see the carcass has turned up missing”

“Missing? That’s ridiculous. Has the idiot been into one of the casks? I told him to leave the stuff alone till after we had finished with the slaves.”

“No, Captain. It’s not that. You see one of the men swears he saw a monster come into the kitchen and lug off the meat. The monster was a big ugly thing, as broad as it was tall with fangs as long as daggers. Cook went and hid in the log pile while the thing piled the meat onto its back and ran off onto the plain.”

“You expect me to believe that?” Imak snapped. “Those fools have been drinking. Put the casks into my tent and have one of the men stand guard outside. Nobody, and I mean nobody, touches that brew before we come back tonight. I should have your neck for this one, Eyshkin. It’s your job to handle all these problems. But I’ll let you off this once. Only you’ll be the one to announce to the men they are having grain porridge for lunch. We can’t take any more time to slaughter an animal or prepare it for cooking.” Imak spat on the ground and laughed. “I don’t envy you that job. Just tell them that hunger is good. It makes them fight harder. Tell them to do well and there’ll be a reward for everyone in camp.” With that, Imak turned and marched off to where several men were beginning to practice with their bows.

[Hilde Bracegirdle]

Carl

As the talks around the fire progressed, Carl listened attentively to the discussion as he sat with his quiver, methodically straightening the fletching between thumb and forefinger. And while he knew that there was very little chance of confusing one of the people now surrounding his companions, for one of the villains that would be bearing down on them, he still would look up intermittently, as he tried to learn each man’s face. It would be bad to suddenly find that he could mistake them during the skirmish. And as he studied those faces, he witnessed here and there, a blossoming resolve displace the grim resignation that had seemed etched on so many of them. Backs that had seemed bent with the burden of living grew a bit straighter before his eyes.

And then too, as he looked up furtively from beneath his brow, he noticed quite a few sets of narrowed eyes beyond their circle, peering at him as well Vrór, making him feel self conscious as he sat there. He knew of Vrór’s great skill, what had he, a simple hobbit, to offer them? Indeed, he did not know himself. It was that he was a farmer, but then many of them had worked the ground, and understood better then he, the climate here. But he was included for some reason, and deciding that there was no point now in second guessing his betters, especially now when the whole plan was being threatened by slavers, he laid his quiver down in the dust beside him.

Clearing his throat, and avoiding the curious eyes of those passing by, he glanced at Lindir then at Dorran as he waited for a gap in the conversation. “If I might make a suggestion or two?” he asked at length. All eyes turned toward the small figure as Carl stood up to address the them. “I just wanted to say that my people once had to contend with a rough group too, maybe not just like these slavers but close enough to be cousins. Anyway, we found out that while each one of us could do little to get rid of so many of them, when we all came together there was no stopping us. Those ruffians could not stand against us.

“My point is this, even if you’re handy with sword or knife, it’s no good taking care of a hundred slavers if the there is only a handful of us left after the fighting. You need one another, both to help you now, and later on when you start to make your own way in this land. We’ve got keep an eye out for each other, you know? And fight as a group. Otherwise it will go much harder for all of us.”

Carl looked at the ground behind him as he moved to sit down. There was a rock there that he hadn’t noticed before. Picking it up, another thought came to mind, and so he addressed the group again, jostling the stone in his hand. “Oh, and we might try to spare the slavers’ horses as much as we can. I can’t help but think that they will come in handy, if we can catch some of them.”

Settling down again, Carl looked at the rock in his hand, remembering the one Athwen had found near the stream. Somewhere in this group was the person who had drawn on it, and he knew that with the raid imminent, there was a good chance that he might never find out who it was. Taking out his knife, he looked around to see if Athwen was nearby before beginning to carefully scratch the stone with his knife’s handle. Drawing from memory the tree, the moon and the bird’s footprint as he listened to the others' sober remarks.

[Undómë]

Brenna

‘Now that’uns got a good head set solid on his shoulders.’ Brenna listened closely to the little man’s words, nodding her head at the common sense of them. She and most of the other women were sitting at a small fire near that of the others who now sat with the group from Gondor; close by enough to hear what was said, but far enough away that they felt they weren’t intruding.

‘What sort of creature is he, Granny?’ whispered Gwenni. In all her eleven years her only contact had been with those men who were either slaves or slave owners. Among and between their groups they differed in skin and hair color, and height a little, but none she could recall had been as short as these two and still full grown.

‘Him and that other fellow who’s a little taller – they aren’t some kind of good Orc are they?’ the girl asked. She wrinkled her brow, considering the problem. ‘I heard that sometimes Orcs don’t get very big.’ Her fingers slipped up to play with a stray strand of blond hair, wrapping it tightly about one finger then letting it fall again into a lank ringlet. ‘They’re not all that mean looking though. As Orcs are s'posed to be, that is. His hair’s nice and curly, that one as was just talking, and I don’t think Orcs wear such fine clothes.’ She jutted her chin toward the Dwarf. ‘And hasn’t that one got amazing hair! Like fire, almost. And a big bush of it round the bottom of his face, isn’t that a wonder!’

Gwenni’s eyes glittered in the fire’s light, and a sly look tickled at the edges of them. Quick as a mouse she was up on her small bare feet and scurrying as quiet as such a creature, too, toward where Carl sat.

‘Ssst!’ Brenna hissed at her, in a low voice. ‘Get back here, Gwenith! Don’t pester him with your questions, girl.’

Paying no attention, Gwenni pulled up short behind Carl and stood stock still. Craning her neck to one side, she saw he had pulled out a knife and was making scratches on a rock he held in his other hand. The girl’s eyes went wide as she saw what he was carving.

A tree! And wasn’t that a moon?

When he started on those little scratchings that began to look somewhat like a bird’s foot, Gwenni gasped, and stepped up beside him. ‘Do you know Granny’s brothers, then?’ she asked crouching down beside him, looking first at the rock in his hand then up at him. ‘Did they send you with a message for her?’

Only a few short moments later, Brenna reached the girl and Carl. ‘I hope this one’s not been bothering you,’ she said, laying her hand on Gwenith’s shoulder. ‘She’s a curious one…and bold to boot.’ She raised a brow at the girl. ‘Let’s go, and leave the folk to their talking.’

‘Granny Brenna!’

Brenna turned at the sound of her name. One of the women called from their fire, waving to Brenna to come back. ‘The tea’s done. Come have a cup!’

[Hilde Bracegirdle]

Carl

Carl felt as if someone was watching him intently, and trying to ignore his feeling of discomfort, he stifled the shudder that welled up in him to sit like a prickly collar about his neck. But at a delicate gasp from over his shoulder, the hobbit looked up from his work to find a young girl stationed nearby him, looking wide eyed at the rough sketch in his hand.

“Do you know Granny’s brothers than?” She asked as she crouched down next to him, without the least sign of hesitation. “Did they send you with a message for her?” She looked him in the eye with such honest, childlike curiosity; it struck Carl almost as refreshing as the words that she spoke.

Meeting her inquisitive glance with enthusiasm, he turned his full attention to her, as he whispered. “Well young Miss, if you aren’t just the person I was hoping to meet!” And not wishing to unduly disturb the thoughtful conversation around him, he added quickly. “I don’t reckon I know if we have been carrying a message for her or not, but we may have seeing as you know this drawing. I would very much like to meet this Granny of yours after we are done here, if you’d be kind enough to let her know as much.”

The fair-hair girl opened her mouth to speak, but she was quickly silenced by an older woman, who walking up, laid her hand on the girl’s shoulder, apologizing. But before the hobbit had the chance to set this matron’s mind at ease, and admit his utter delight in the child’s line of questioning, the two were called away by another. And they quietly slipped away.

Granny Brenna, the woman had called. Granny? Carl thought making the connection belatedly. He raised a finger behind the retreating figures as though about to call them back, but thinking better of it, he put the rock safely in his pocket and tried to concentrate on the matter at hand.

[Tevildo]

"That was good," Azhar responded as she pushed the cup into Athwen's outstretched hands. "I'm sorry to be a burden. I feel so useless being sick especially when everyone is getting ready for the attack. Back in Nurn, I was never ill. The others used to say I was hard like a rock, and that nothing ever got to me. I don't understand what's happening."

Azhar's face fell. The girl closed her eyes and cradled her forehead in her hands. A moment later, she remembered something and sat up abruptly. Speaking with as much cheerfulness as she could muster, Azhar called out to the healer, "But I haven't thanked you for what you did. You are kind and have come a long way to help. If I had a real place where I belonged, I don't think I would ever want to leave. In fact, I know I wouldn't. Back in Nurn, I only cared about myself. I was good at weaseling out of work and stealing trinkets and food from the guards to make my life easier. I didn't pay any attention to the others." A little embarassed, Azhar glanced away and wondered if she had said too much. She did not quite understand her feelings but she wanted Athwen to like her.

If the healer was surprized by Azhar, she did not show it. She reached out and pressed the girl's shoulder in a reassuring way, "Those thoughts are important, but you'll have time later to sort things out. Now your only job is to rest and get well."

“Rôg,” she said gently, bending towards him, “don’t let her stay up too late talking. Please get her to go to sleep.” He nodded and she turned and walked back to the fire.

************************

"You're supposed to be sleeping. I promised Athwen." Rôg smiled at Azhar who was still lying down but listening to everyone in the circle talk about the attack.

"Oh, Rôg. I can't sleep. Just don't tell Athwen I am awake." Azhar's eyes twinkled as she put her hand up to her mouth and laughted. "I am feeling a little better, and I am so excited about what is going to happen. I only wish I was well enough to fight."

Athwen struggled to sit up but then sank back onto the ground. "I don't know what's wrong with me. In my head I feel stronger and happier than I have in a long time. But it's almost as if there's a fight going on inside my body. If I could just step outside for a minute, I could show my body that my head is in charge. Then, it wouldn't keep making me sick. Do you think I could do that?" There was an earnestness in Azhar's voice that showed she was serious.

Before Rôg could respond, Azhar had posed a second question, "The people you told me about....the ones who beat the evil clan leader and their allies in Harad....they weren't great and mighty warriors. How did simple herding people do that? How did you do that? Did someone teach you how to fight with swords and bows? Or maybe that lady you were looking for was so powerful she could drive everyone off? Or did you persuade others to come help you, the way you are helping us?" She looked quizzically at Rôg.