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[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Hænir’s heart grew heavier and heavier as they scaled the walls of the land that had very nearly been their tomb. His every muscle ached from the exertions of battle, and his wounds cried out for care and tending. He looked ahead to the rest of their journey with little hope for they had no food, no supplies and no equipment still, and they were weeks from their home. All that they had was the globe that Hænir bore in a small bag upon his back.

It was the weight of this globe that bore upon him most heavily, however, for he could not help but think of what he and Nerin had said to one another about their mission. The globe was clearly the greatest treasure of the Rhûnians, as sacred to them as the Arkenstone was to his people, and they had stolen it from them. He could not shake from his mind the vision of what it would be like in Erebor if a band of strangers from this land had assaulted the Mountain and carried off the precious heart of their realm from the very tomb of Thorin. Hænir shrugged his shoulders against this thought and tried to drive it away. Ever higher they climbed, rising above the jungle below and into the mountains. Soon they would be in the high pass above the waterfall, and then upon the other side of the Mountains and any hope that the Rhûnians had of retrieving the treasure would be gone.

Hænir’s heart should have been light, for they had escaped certain death at the hands of the savages, and he had finally won the honour that had eluded him his whole life. His failure to save his King all those long years ago had been repaid by his protection of Bali, and at long last Hænir would be able to engrave his name upon his axe to join the revered names of his ancestors. The weight of that axe upon his shoulder had never been so reassuring, nor had he borne it with such ease.

But still the weight of globe bore him down, darkening his mind and clouding his joy on this day. As they neared the top of the mountain pass, he paused and looked back over the lands they had entered so unknowingly. His eyes traversed the jungle and looked out to the distant glimmering of the Sea – the Sea that had promised such riches and brought only death and despair to them. The others were plodding ahead of him now, and none watched as he pulled the globe out of his hands. He held it before his face, and even in the full light of day, its radiance was a wonder to behold. At that moment, there came a slight rustling from the scant brush that rose upon the slopes of the mountain almost to where he stood, and from the foliage emerged the form of the woman whom he had fought with in their final encounter. She still bore the signs of their combat, but as she regarded him he could tell that she felt the same guarded respect for him that he did for her. She gazed at the globe with such despair that it rent Hænir’s heart to the very core, and again he imagined what it would be like to have the Arkenstone ripped from his people’s hands. He looked at the woman and their eyes met through the radiance of the globe once more, and Hænir knew that the only thing he could bear from this country that he had not brought with him, was his honour…