View Single Post
Old 08-07-2006, 05:09 PM   #133
Folwren
Messenger of Hope
 
Folwren's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: In a tiny, insignificant little town in one of the many States.
Posts: 5,228
Folwren is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.Folwren is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.
Kwell

Kwell shifted in the dimness of his prison. His arms ached terribly and his wrists felt raw where the ropes had chaffed away at the skin. He shifted for the second hundredth time in the past hour, his eyes darting once again around the pit. Azhar still lay unconsciously on the ground. She had hardly moved and hadn’t waked at all. He had ceased to call to her and now he sat in silence, too, a despairing feeling settling slowly and steadily into his heart.

For sometime now there had been a steady tramp, tramp of feet above him. He knew from that sound that there were guards, at least two of them, pacing back and forth just by the pit. Also, the light had grown until the dimness was easily seen through and he knew that the sun had completely finished clearing the eastern horizon and was probably someway up in the sky. Yet they did nothing.

‘I wonder why?’ he thought to himself. ‘Something should be happening. I don’t know what and I doubt it’d be anything good, but something should be happening.’

The thoughts spun around again and again in his head but just as no answer came, neither did anything happen. Azhar slept on, almost entirely still, the guards continued to walk to and fro, and Kwell still sat in the half darkness.

After a while, Kwell began to notice hunger gnawing at his stomach. It had been there for sometime, he realized, for now it seemed to turn over and groan with its own voice. He winced. It was far past day break now, he was certain. Would they feed them nothing?

Kwell moved forward, pushing himself away from the wall with his shoulders. He got to his knees and crawled forward, just under the grate. No one was in sight, but he knew they were near the grating. “Hollo!” he called. “You! You, up there!”

The steady tread of boots stopped abruptly, and then he heard footsteps again walking quickly to right above him. He saw the figure of a man against the square of light, looking down. “What’dye want?” a rough voice demanded.

“To talk to your leader fellow!” Kwell answered. A great laugh answered him. “To tell him that you’re disobeying orders,” the boy continued at once. The fellow’s mirth was cut short.

“I’m not disobeying no one’s orders,” he barked.

“You were told to take care o’ us, weren’t you?” Kwell asked.

“None of yer business! Keep your nose out of my orders!”

“You were ordered to take care of us and you’re not. You’re letting us go hungry, quite a bad thing, especially if we die. Give us sommit to eat, or I’ll make such a noise that you’re leader will come running whether you fetch him or not!”

“Keep your mouth shut!” the man warned.

“Feed us!” Kwell demanded.

“Here! See if you can eat dirt. Ha! Ha!” Kwell ducked by instinct, bowing his head and receiving a rein of dirt clods on the back of his head.

“We’ve got dirt enough down here, thanks very much!” Kwell answered bitterly, lifting his head again. “Numbskull,” he added after a second’s consideration.

“What did you say?” the man fairly roared. Kwell repeated it, but he had hardly finished before he stooped to grab a rock. Kwell saw him and stopped abruptly and moved to one side immediately. The stone came hurling down and struck Kwell hard on the left shoulder. He bit back a cry of pain, but he didn’t stop the curses. More rocks followed the first and Kwell scurried as quickly as he could away from the opening and into a far corner. “Take that, you little rat, and teach you to talk to us like that!”

Kwell knew better than to answer aloud, but to himself, he muttered further imprecations and insults. “Villains. . .rogues. . .the lot of you ought to be stuffed with stones and tossed into the sea. Or fed to wargs, maybe. And I wonder if that old spider’s still alive. . .oh, yes, I’m sure She’d like them. . .they’re probably nice and fat.” The thought of the pack of slavers being caught by the legendary giant spider in the mountains below old Cirith Ungol seemed a comfort to Kwell’s furious mind, and he relapsed finally into silence.

Last edited by Folwren; 08-07-2006 at 08:22 PM.
Folwren is offline