A horn boomed over the darkened meadows!
"Forwards Eorlings!! Forwards!!", a hoarse voice roared!!
Thunder rumbled in the dark clouds above and the neighing of panicked horses echoed over the landscape while cold thick rain showered down! Hooves trampled the long grass and a chorus of voices rose up, meeting with the horrifying cries that could only come from Orcish throats!!
"Leave none alive!!"
Then the sound of iron hewing into meat! Cries of pain and anger mixed in the torrent! A small host of horsemen had crashed into a band of Uruk-Hai! Viciously spears stabbed down upon the bodies of those that could not jump away!
"Shoot dem you maggots!!"
Several arrows were sent up, invisible in the thick weather they whistled and split falling droplets! A few men fell from their steeds beneath the volley! Dragged down by large hands and chopped apart with relentless fury!
"The horn! Sound the horn again!", the voice commanded!
Another blow and more voices roared, men on foot!! Armed with spears, axes and several farming tools they rushed to meet the horde in a desperate charge! They were fair and tall! With the heat of bravery or rage they jumped among the Orcs!! Yrminas was among them! His eyes stood wide and his face was haunted, alike to those of his kinsmen amongst him. Hardly all of them were warriors, but they gave their full account! The burning of their farms and the deaths of their families had seen it so! A woman struck an orc with her scythe only to be dragged down by another while her brother ignorant of her doom was still yelling at her to keep going! Yrminas exacted grim vengeance upon her killer with the sharp head of his axe! Still was it going to be enough?! The warband persisted and though for each two orcs that fell an Eorling was brought down with them, a count they could not spare! Yrminas looked over the heads of the enemy, only a few of the experienced riders were left! To his dismay he saw that hornblower being dragged out of the saddle while his steed suffered the cleaving work of these evil creatures! With a wordless howl he descended down upon another. It froze as it saw the tall man's shadow descend upon it like an ancient spirit that had been summoned by the storm to wreak vengeance upon the land it called home!! With clumsy swings the axehead clove arms and heads alike! Even if not every blow of his was mortally wounding, it still drove the orcs away from him! The nearest farmers took heart and came to his aid! The brittle courage of these creatures began to waver.
"Boss they are killing us!!", a voice squeeled amidst the shouting and the swinging of weaponry!
"More meat for us to feast on! Now gut them good!"
The farmers had reached the remains of the fallen hornblower! One of the farmers took up the horn setting it to his lips. Despite the protests of some others he let out a clear sound from it that held no meaning to any of the warriors perhaps. Still, a third chorus of voices yelled together. The voices of children.
"Die and so will your children!", the commanding Eorling yelled as he hacked with his sword!
The farmers whom heard held nothing back! So sudden was the renewed assault that many weapons broke upon the bodies of their enemies! Desperately some tried to wrestle the crude weapons from their hands or kept them in place for their fellows to bring down death! Some kicked, bit and pummeled when nothing else was possible for them to do. And then it happened, before a single child managed to reach the battle the orcs fled. They turned their tails, leaving their leader behind whom saw his last moments in the approach of three horsemen.
The storm had not ceased though and behind the curtain of rain and now hail could the cries of anguished loss be heard. Only the cries of the farming folk, those that were left. From those warriors that were among them during the battle only the dead still remained on this meadow of gloom.
