[Envinyatar]

The Lady's Orcs - Ashukh, Zlog, Gorgu

‘Her flowers! The woman is daft!’ Ashukh looked out into the rubbled remains of what once had been The Lady Garden. A few weeds and tufts of grass clung bravely to the sparse soil, pushing their way up between the stones that had fallen from the fortress.

‘Oh, aye, she’s a bit tetched . . . but she treats us good enough, don’t she?’ Zlog looked out over the barren landscape, too. Words such as 'gentle' and 'kind' and 'forgiving' were not a part of his vocabulary. But were they so, he would have used them about the Lady Giledhel.

In life, he and his two companions had stripped her of her dignity with their murderous blows, bringing her low to bleed out upon the paving stones; her bright red blood now fading to rusty stains at the foot of her bed, where they’d dragged her.

Then they had been slain by several Elves left to secure the fortress until all had gone. And she . . . in death was kind and gentle and forgiving of them. Her fëa giving them some hope that beyond this horrid world there lay some hope for them. She nurtured them, and they, in turn, became her stalwart guardians when what little hold she had on her new reality faded away and she was lost among her old memories.

And so it was that Gorgu called out to her, as she fussed about the place where her wardrobe used to stand, her fingers touching silks and satins that had long gone away. ‘Lady, the gardeners be working hard. Looks as if all your flowers will be showing to their best!’

She went on contentedly about her little tasks as the three of them leaned as far out the window as they might. ‘Those Elves are singing! You heard them! Things feel different, don’t they? Something’s come inside the gate . . .