Not Quite a Maia

Not Quite A Maia

Chapter 21

Third Age: 3rd-4th March 3019

Helm's Deep

After Ceorl delivered his news, the one thousand-strong Rohirrim army rode relentlessly through the darkness for several hours more. Only a few torch-wielding riders dotted sporadically around the company offered enough light to aid their passage past the White Mountains. A valley began to carve its inexorable path through the cliff face as the company turned slowly eastwards.

"The Deeping-coomb begins!" cried Éomer.

Much to the young wizard's annoyance, the huge blond still looked exceptionally fresh despite the long day of hard riding.

Which, in Neville's opinion, was not fair. His backside was killing him. The least Éomer could do was fake a little discomfort (for the sake of his guests).

One thing was certain: if he got out of this whole Middle Earth adventure with his skin intact (and his heart still beating), the ruddy nag was history!

Oh, yes.

Théoden King could shove his horsey gift up his ...

"Are you alright, dear?" queried Molly, flying overhead on her (comfortable) Cleansweep. She had just spotted him trying to lift himself up in his seat, so that he could clench his aching buttocks (and prevent the rapidly-blooming pressure sore from expanding further - at the rate it was going, he'd be able to shove the ruddy horse up himself).

Not a pleasant thought.

Her motherly concern banished the mental vision of Fæleu bolting up an orifice she had no natural business being anywhere near (at least, not without the saddle to act as a barrier) and Neville lowered himself as gently into his saddle as the million-mile-an-hour gallop would allow.

"Yeah. Just taking a look at the comb ... er ... coomb-thingy," he lied.

Molly eyed him shrewdly.

"Didn't you put a Cushioning charm on that saddle?" demanded the witch after he winced in pain.

"Yeah. But some helpful sod replaced the old one with a new one at the stables in Edoras, and I didn't have time to cast another charm before we all set off."

Nor had he had the inclination. It would have been too embarrassing to cast the spell in front of Háma and all the other (disgustingly manly) Rohirrim, because then they'd know he couldn't ride as far as five feet away without the aid of an invisible pillow. Éomer would've had a right good laugh at that. And what if the lovely Éowyn had seen him cast it, too?

That

didn't bear thinking about.

"Then you should've done it before we set off this morning, Neville. Dear, oh dear! Anyway, never mind: we're almost at Helm's Deep. I can see it from here, actually. It's very impressive. Could do with a few flowerbeds to brighten up the lawn, though. There's plenty of space for them - and a Quidditch pitch, too!"

"I don't think the Rohirrim play Quidditch, Molly. They're Muggles, remember?"

"Oh. That's right. Do you now, I've never really thought of them as such? In fact, I've never thought of any of our nice new friends as Muggles - not the sort we know, anyway. Does that seem strange?"

"No. I know what you mean. they're not ordinary Muggles, but they're not wizards, either. Sort of ... super-Squibs, really."

She laughed. "Ooh, I like that! Super-Squibs! Mrs Figg would laugh!"

Mrs who?

He didn't have time to enquire any further into Molly's mysterious acquaintance, because the company was beginning to veer into the ravine proper. High cliffs loomed ominously on each side of the riders. A few hundred yards further in, Neville could just see the edge of a long trench and rampart, over a mile in length, stretching across the Deeping-coomb.

"'Tis Helm's Dike. Beyond is the Deeping-wall and the Hornburg," explained Théoden's nephew after glancing over and seeing the teenager's wide-eyed reaction to the mighty Rohirric defence.

"Bit small, isn't it?" muttered Neville. Before Éomer could do more than cock an eyebrow in response, there was a horn blast from the scouts who'd ridden ahead to the Fords earlier that day. Out of the darkness, arrows whistled. One of the scouts returned to report that wolf-riders were abroad, and that both orcs and wild men were hurrying southward from the Fords of Isen in the direction of Helm's Deep.

"We have found many of our folk lying slain as they fled thither," the man exclaimed. Théoden, Aragorn and all within earshot listened grimly to the dark news. "We met Riders sent forth by Erkenbrand, also. They travel across the Westfold to gather as many able-bodied Men and horses as are fit to see battle."

"Is the Lord of the Deeping-coomb still by yonder Fords?" the King asked.

"Nay, lord. Both he and Grimbold left there an hour past dawn to call at all the villages of the Westemnet on similar errand. It is said that we shall have need of all swordsmen and archers they find, for there are reports that the Enemy numbers almost nine thousand-strong, if not more."

Neville threw Molly a look. Nine thousand? Hadn't she said ten? The soldiers at the Fords had obviously been busy.

Théoden was of similar opinion. "'Tis a goodly enough number, though our honoured guests did earlier mention more. Yet, I am grateful for the easing of the burden, nonetheless. It seems that the Marshals have at least managed to slay enough of Saruman's servants to lighten our work in the Deep."

"They were not alone in their task, my liege. One of the Riders I met was Grimbold's captain, Hafold, and he claims they had the aid of an Elven warrior and his aunt - a lady known as the Green Witch!"

The scout's words sent a ripple of excitement through the company as the news was passed further back through the ranks of men.

"The Green Witch?" exclaimed Neville and Molly in unison.

"An Elvish Witch? Could he mean the Lady Galadriel?" demanded Aragorn (Gimli's hand rose to his head and he straightened his hair - as if the mere mention of her name could produce the stunning elleth).

"Which Elven warrior? The Lord Celeborn? Why would he and his lady leave the safety of Lothlórien?" asked Legolas in deep confusion.

"I know not their names, lords, my Lady," said the scout with an apologetic nod at the males and Molly. "I know only that Hafold said they gave aid to both Grimbold at the Fords, and Elfhelm farther up the Gap. With their intercession, more than one thousand of our enemies now lay burning in pyres down the length of the Isen."

Théoden spared the brown-haired rider (a novelty in Rohan) an assessing glance. "Where are these strangers now? Have they joined our forces to march to the Deep?"

"Nay, lord. Erkenbrand met with them on the western bank of the Isen ere dawn broke: it seems they have an urgent errand in Gondor and left for Minas Tirith with all haste long before mid-morning. But Hafold himself saw much of their magicks during battle - he says the Witch can command the very elements! That she threw burning rocks into the very heart of our Enemy's forces! And the Elf spoke with the volume of the Deeping-horn, declaring his wrath upon the Enemy in Rohan's name!"

"Well, that's wonderful news!" declared Molly happily. "Whoever they are, at least we now know that they're on our side."

"'Tis a mercy, indeed. We have enough foes to contend with as it is," the King muttered, before addressing his scout once more. "What of Erkenbrand - did Hafold say when he will arrive at Helm's Deep?"

The scout shook his head. "Nay, only that he will arrive ere the night is gone."

"Then let us hope he does not arrive too late to be of aid. I thank you for the news, Léofár. You may rejoin your company."

The scout gave a weary nod, tugged lightly on his mount's reins, then rode down the length of the company and out of sight.

"So it is that we have heard the tidings. The Enemy marches ever nearer to a battle which will determine our fate. Though their numbers are now less than we feared, they are yet great enough to give us pause."

"Then we'll just have to make sure we give them a good reason to pause," declared Neville with feeling.

All nine thousand of them!

It was at times like these that he was glad to be a wizard - and a ruddy good herbology student as well. The thought of all the delightful surprises he had packed in his knapsack, just itching for the chance to be unleashed on the rotten gits whose friends had murdered Boromir, was enough to make him grin in very Gimli-esque glee.

"That is the spirit we need, lad!" cried the dwarf himself from his seat behind Éomer. "We shall make them all rue the day they first set foot upon our kind host's lands. Already my axe hungers for the taste of their blood!"

"It must hunger a while longer still, friend Gimli," said Éomer. "For the moment, we must make swiftly for the Deep if we are to arrive before the minions of Isengard. Yet, do not be disheartened: your axe may know the taste of the Enemy ere we reach it, if any lie already between us and the fastness itself."

"Not if Molly gets to them first," muttered Neville, noting the surprisingly feral glance the witch threw into the distance. Molly was so eager for the chance to cause some damage that she flew a hundred yards ahead in the hope of spotting Saruman's unfortunate friends before everyone else could.

The company of riders took off right behind her, with the young wizard accompanying Aragorn, Legolas and Éomer in the van. Their pace grew ever slower as the darkness deepened and the path climbed southward. Higher and higher they went into the dim folds at the mountains' feet. They did come upon a few roving bands of orcs and, though they were too far for the riders to reach before the majority fled, Molly surprised the life out of a few them (literally) when she swooped down on her Cleansweep and blasted them with a shower of acid rain.

Or rather, one hundred percent acid and no rain.

Horrible screams rent through the night air as the unfortunate few fled clutching their scalps (and what was left of their eyes, where they had been unlucky enough to glance upwards on hearing her yell of 'That's for Boromir, you rotten lot!')

"Did you know that the lady is my sister?" shouted Gimli, fighting to be heard over the cheering Rohirrim.

Éomer spared a disbelieving glance over his shoulder at the smug dwarf.

"Sister?" said the blond with a dubious arch of his eyebrow.

"Indeed. If you doubt it, ask Aragorn," challenged the dwarf.

"If you say it is so, then I doubt it not, Master Dwarf. I am merely surprised. I had no idea Dwarven women were so much taller than their men-folk."

The blond's quick retort wiped the smile off the bushy dwarf's face. "She is not so much taller!" he barked in annoyance. "Why, with her boots off, she is a full inch shorter than I!"

"That's only because you usually still have your boots on, dear!" quipped Molly, returning to a chorus of approval from the riders.

Neville snorted with laughter, earning himself a glare from the furry axe-man. "Why are you looking at me like that? I didn't say anything. It was your sister."

"I am beginning to believe I preferred being an only child," grumbled the dwarf.

The noise of war grew louder behind them and, as they climbed farther up into the Deeping-coomb, the sound of harsh singing carried through the night air. The company paused to look back. Countless flickering torches littered the black fields behind them.

"You know, if they're trying to kill us with song, it might very well work," said Neville with a wince.

"They will need more than a few foul verses to crush the will of Rohan," declared Éomer darkly.

"Yeah, well; if they keep that up when they arrive, I might just have to give them a song of my own."

"Aye, lad. Do that. Mahal's beard, but the sound of your voice raised in song may be enough to slay them in their droves. Yet, I would counsel you to remain as far away from us as opportunity permits when you do so, lest you slay our allies and myself into the bargain."

Sometimes, Gimli could be a right git, decided the teenager, glowering at him through the dim light.

"Don't worry. I'll save it until I'm chucking the Mandrakes at them," he promised (still scowling).

"Let us hope these Man-drakes will prove as effective as your own voice, young Neville, for the Enemy's host is great," stated Aragorn firmly.

"And they bring fire," said Théoden. "They are burning as they come; rick, cot and tree. This was a rich vale and had many homesteads. Alas for my folk!"

It was true. Neville - and everyone else - could see flames leaping from burning buildings even from where they stood.

Still, perhaps they could do something about that?

He turned in his (aching) seat and raised his head to look at his Guardian. "Molly. That Light of Varda - it works, right?"

She lowered her broom to hover level with him.

"Yes, dear."

"You're sure? Has it ever been tested?"

Her brown eyes danced in reply. "Actually, it has. When the hobbits and I broke free from the orcs back at Fangorn, one of the uruk-hai threw an axe at me. I was too busy Shielding the boys to be able to deflect it properly, but thankfully, when it hit, it was like being tickled with a feather."

Crikey! She'd been hit by an axe? Neville swallowed hard, grateful that he'd had the foresight to ask for protection for her.

"Don't worry, dear! I'm perfectly alright - which is more than I can say for the uruk. I threw the axe right back at him with the help of a handy Banishing charm. He was very unhappy about that - but not for too long, because then he was dead."

"Honestly Molly, you're beginning to seriously scare me. I'm glad it works though, because now I don't feel so bad about asking you this: could you Disillusion yourself and fly over to those houses? Don't engage the enemy yet - just put out the fires. If we can minimise the damage, then some of those poor sods can at least return back to their own homes when this is all over."

"Why, Neville! That's a wonderful idea!" declared Molly in approval. She spared another glance at the distant flames and, when she spoke again, there was a note of doubt in her voice. "I don't think an Aguamenti is going to take care of all those fires, though."

Legolas' musical voice lifted her concern. "You need not worry about that, Lady Molly. I feel the threat of rain in the air - it cannot be much longer until it falls. You need only take care of the worst of them until Nature takes care of the rest. Yet do not tarry long from our ranks: I fear we shall all have need of both your and Neville's arts ere midnight falls."

"In that case, I'd best be off. I'll be back in half an hour at the most."

Molly turned her Cleansweep and tapped her head with her wand. As she faded from all sight (eliciting murmurs of astonishment from everyone except her charge), Théoden advised her to follow a straight path down the valley on her return, where she would soon arrive at the Deeping-wall. She responded with a cheery 'Alright then, see you later!' before whizzing off across the dark fields.

"Would that day were here and we might all ride down upon them like a storm out of the mountains!" said Aragorn after the witch had departed.

"We need not fly much further," said Éomer in response. "Not far ahead now lies Helm's Dike, an ancient trench and rampart scored across the coomb two furlongs below Helm's Gate. There we can turn and give battle."

Furlong?

"Er, how long's that?" queried Neville, feeling slightly stupid.

"One quarter of a mile," supplied Théoden before addressing his nephew. "As for the Dike - we are too few to defend it. It is a mile long or more and the breach in it is wide."

"At the breach our rearguard must stand, if pressed," insisted the younger man.

"Can we talk about this inside? Only, the longer we sit here and argue, the more likely it is we'll be fighting them out here where they can easily surround us."

"Wise words, Wizard of Awes. Indeed, let us make for the fortress at best speed. There we may discover how many Men already wait and may better plan our defences."

With that, the King turned his white horse, Snowmane, and all the riders followed him towards the Dike and through the breach. A lone sentinel challenged their passing, but was quickly pacified when he realised that his liege led an army of Rohirrim to aid in the fortress' defence. The company then halted on the sloping sward above the breach, which was when Neville had his first proper view of their final destination.

Bloody hell! It was huge!

A wall twenty feet high stretched from the southern cliffs to a spur of rock that jutted from the northern side. On top of the protruding rock stood a tall stone fortress surrounded by another stone wall, the tower of which thrust high into the night sky. The northern side of the mountain flanked its rear like an overprotective mother. At the foot of the spur was a long causeway that led up to the main gates.

Wow! They built something that big without the aid of magic? He was officially impressed.

As impressed as Neville was, he was not given more time to admire it. The company was soon distracted by the arrival of Gamling, the leader of those who watched the Dike.

"We have a thousand fit to fight on foot," said the old man after greeting his King. "But most of those have seen too many winters, as I have, or too few, as my son's son here."

"We may add another thousand Riders to that count, Gamling, and Erkenbrand gathers more from the Westfold."

"Yet I fear that he will not arrive ere the battle is underway, from what the scouts have told us," added Éomer. "Already the Enemy fills all the valley behind us!"

Aragorn nudged Hasufel forward to stand before the leader of the Dike, who was visibly concerned by Éomer's news. "Take heart, Gamling. The Enemy may be greater in number, but we are greater in skill. Here before you are one thousand of the best warriors from Edoras, and Erkenbrand will arrive with more. Until then, we have aid which the Enemy cannot guess at."

"My Lord?" queried the old man with a puzzled frown.

"A Wizard, Gamling. We have the aid of a Wizard of great power," declared Théoden, indicating the teenager a few feet to his left.

It was at precisely that point when Fæleu decided she had had enough of her ungrateful teenage charge.

As the young wizard nudged her forward to greet Gamling, the horse reared.

"Aaagh!"

His feet came loose from the stirrups and Neville slipped backwards, tumbling heels-over-head as he somersaulted gracelessly off his horse's back. He landed (fortunately) on his rear with his legs spread-eagled in front of him and his elven cloak hanging over his head.

There was a rumble of laughter from the company and a long-suffering sigh. Aragorn's voice floated down to his ears through the fabric of his pretty cloak.

"This is Neville, son of Longbottom, the Wizard of ... Awes."

Great. Just great.

Mortified that his horrible horse had chosen exactly that moment to offload him (in front of over a thousand witnesses, no less), Neville seriously considered staying exactly where he was and fighting the hordes of Isengard from his seated position.

Might as well be comfortable, after all.

But his wish was not to be fulfilled. He heard the sound of someone dismounting (which was a feat in and of itself, given the gales of laughter still echoing through the valley) and a huge hand grabbed his arm and hauled him up. The miserable teenager fought his way free from his cloak, dragging it off his (scarlet) face and dropping it down his back. He looked up to see the towering form of Éomer gazing down at him with arched brows.

"It would appear that you have yet to accustom yourself to your steed's moods ..."

Oh, please! The nag's moods were 'surly', 'sulky' and 'downright hostile'. He had accustomed himself to all three very nicely, thank you very much.

"... you will never make a Rider if you cannot adjust yourself to her temperament ..."

What? He'd been 'adjusting' himself to her ruddy temperament for the past four days - and he had the bruises to prove it!

"... or control her with a firm hand."

Yeah, right. A firm hand. He'd love to take his 'firm hand' and use it to Avada Kedavra the ruddy mule into horsey heaven. Or - preferably - horsey hell.

"I'm fine, thanks for asking," muttered the teenager in embarrassment as the eyes of the company watched him hobble back to his hated horse. "No broken bones. Might not walk properly for a few months, right enough, and there probably won't be any little Longbottoms running around for at least a decade - Gran'll be devastated. Other than that, I'm just great."

Éomer laid a hand on Fæleu's neck and spoke softly in her ear (which annoyed Neville. Not that he wanted the enormous blond scratching his neck or whispering in his ear - Merlin forbid - but a little sympathy would've been nice). The words calmed the restless horse and she graciously allowed him to chuck the teenager back into his saddle.

Brilliant. Everyone was staring at him like he was an idiot. Especially Gamling. If the man had been impressed when Théoden told him he was a wizard, Fæleu had seen to it that he wasn't any more.

In an attempt to redeem himself, Neville offered a weak chuckle. "Don't worry. She does that all the time. It's her idea of a joke. A bit of harmless 'horsing around', you know?"

Gamling's frown deepened.

Ah. It seemed that not all Muggles were as familiar with that expression as Dean. He was going to have to have a few words with his former classmate when he got back ...

Fortunately, he didn't have to endure Gamling's disapproval much longer. Théoden spoke a few words more with the grizzled old soldier, then the company moved past him towards the causeway that crossed the Deeping-stream. To Neville's great relief, they had to dismount at that point to lead the horses in single file up the ramp before they passed through a set of tall gates into the fortress proper. Gratefully, he handed Fæleu's reins into an eager pair of hands and the chestnut horse was escorted farther up the ravine with all the other mounts.

"Come, Neville," said Aragorn, clapping him on the shoulder and indicating that he follow him away from the heaving mass of people still spilling through the gates. "Théoden and Éomer will need to position their Men before the Orc host arrives. Let us determine what strategy they have in mind for us both."

"Probably the wall itself," answered Neville speculatively. "The tower will be harder for the orcs to reach, but I'm guessing the wall will be the main point of attack because it leads into the valley behind. That's where the villagers fled to, isn't it?"

"Yes. The women, children and older villagers will have taken cover in the Glittering Caves at the end of the ravine after fleeing the oncoming host. You may be correct in your guess regarding the Deeping-wall, but let us first consult with those that know it best."

Neville nodded and followed the ranger through a narrow walkway that led to a staircase winding up onto the tower above. Théoden was there with Éomer, Legolas and (a very happy-looking) Gimli. The King was giving instructions for the dispersal of his forces.

"Éomer: the Men of my household will join me and those of the Westfold at the Hornburg. You will take those that remain to defend the Deeping-wall. Aragorn, you have no objections to joining him there with your trusty friends?"

"Nay, lord. Let it be as you command."

The King gave a grim smile. "No command do I give to thee, heir of Elendil. Instead, I give my gratitude once more for your timely arrival and noble aid."

"And we return that gratitude, King of the Mark, for allowing us the opportunity to partake in this mighty battle!" boomed Gimli. "Tonight, you shall hear the axe of Gimli Glóin's son sing as it sinks itself into the flesh of our foes time and again."

"It shall sing no louder than the Galadhrim bow of Legolas, Prince of Mirkwood!" declared the fair elf with a smirk at his dwarven companion.

Gimli rumbled with laughter. "Ah! A challenge from the pointy-eared princeling! I accept! If your bow fells more than my sharp blades, I will swallow my own walking-axe!"

"'Tis a good thing your mouth is large enough to accommodate your walking-axe, friend Gimli, for I will see you feast upon it ere the new dawn breaks."

Neville snorted with laughter (though Gimli did not). The dwarf shot him a heated glare, then (oddly enough) a beaming smile. Straightening his shoulders, Gimli marched over to the wizard and turned to face Legolas from beside the mystified teenager.

"'Tis fortunate for you that I have a sense of humour, elfling. I will even allow your little jest at my expense to pass without sundering you in two parts. In fact, I will no doubt save your immortal life on many occasions this night - starting right this very minute."

Grinning, he poked Neville in the side. "Give the princeling his pretty crown, lad."

"What crown?"

"The one that will save him from the death cries of your Man-drakes, of course!"

The elf paled. "He has not thrown them yet!"

"But I will, soon enough," promised Neville with a grin at his horrified friend. He shrugged off his knapsack, opened it, and delved into its depths. A few seconds later, he withdrew his hand in triumph.

"There you go: one pair of Mandrake-proof earmuffs," he said, handing them over to the reluctant elf. "Better put them on just now 'cos I've no idea how soon it's going to be before I set off with these plants."

Legolas flushed and snatched at the object of his disaffection. With a final glare at Gimli, he pivoted on his heel and stalked off towards the stairs that led to the top of the Deeping-wall (with a highly amused dwarf in tow).

No sooner had the two friends left, than Théoden addressed the (still grinning) teenager.

"As for you, Master Longbottom: you may choose that place which is best suited for you to launch your magicks against our Enemy."

"Thanks, sir. I was already thinking about going to the wall, if that's alright. It gives me a better view of the layout of the valley and I'll be able to chuck this lot ..."

He indicated the hidden contents of his knapsack with a jerk of his thumb.

"... out over the wall and straight into the heart of their troops a lot easier."

Théoden nodded in approval and was about to reply when a loud cry rose from the wall ahead.

"Can it be the Orcs have arrived already?" exclaimed Aragorn, grabbing Neville and beginning to drag him back down the walkway.

"Nay! It is the Lady Molly - she returns from the village yonder."

Éomer's finger pointed skyward and everyone saw that it was, indeed, the matronly witch. She whizzed overhead, waving at those startled Rohirrim who had yet to see the wonder of a flying witch and scanning the fortress with eager eyes.

"She's looking for me," said Neville, pulling his arm free of Aragorn's grasp and using it to shoot red sparks into the air. The witch saw the signal and zoomed over, descending into the walkway before dismounting her broom.

"I see you all got here safely, then? That's wonderful," she exclaimed, tucking her windblown locks behind her ear and brushing ash from her tweed coat.

"Lady Molly, how did you fare?" asked Théoden with some urgency. She executed a quick curtsey (which made Neville roll his eyes - she did that at every opportunity) before speaking.

"I managed to put out some of the fires in the larger houses after the orcs passed, but I'm afraid the smaller buildings were already ruined by the time I got to them. One of the fields was burning, so I used the stream to tackle that; but it looks like you've lost half the crop on it already. Sorry, your Majesty."

The lordly man offered her a small smile. "The news may have been bleaker still, were it not for your efforts, and for that I thank you. Will you remain by young Neville for the battle's duration, my Lady?"

Her red hair bobbed as she nodded assent. "For the most part. But it's not polite to ignore guests, so I'll be offering our filthy visitors a few home comforts as well. Neville won't mind - will you, dear?"

"Mind? I'm counting on it! Got everything ready?"

"Yes. Mandrakes, Ferns, Devil's Snare - all at the top of my pack and ready to go. Have you taken yours out of their container yet?"

"I'll wait 'til we're up on the wall."

"How far from our position is the Orc host, Lady?" enquired Éomer.

"Another half hour or so, I should think. The soldiers at that thingy out there are already manning their positions and getting ready to defend it ... whatever it is."

"'Tis the Dike, Lady Molly."

She beamed at the younger man for supplying the name.

"Then let us all take to our positions," stated the King firmly, turning to the small postern-door that led into the Hornburg. One of the guards who accompanied him opened it to allow him passage. Théoden paused half-way through, throwing his nephew a glance over his shoulder.

"I do not plan for it thus, but if death takes me this night, sister-son, know that I have always held you as dear to me as my own beloved child. See to it that our people have good reason to love their next King as much as I love him now. See our people to victory!"

"Death may take us both this night, dearer than father," Éomer said softly. "But if it spares me, only to rob me of you, then your will shall be done. I swear it to you!"

Neville almost sniffed. Crikey! Were his eyes welling up?

He brushed at his face discreetly as the two men bid what could be their last goodbye, but it was not discreetly enough. A hand squeezed his arm and he looked down to see Molly had joined him.

"It won't come to that, dear. I didn't knock years off his face just to let those rotten beggars kill him a day later! Now, come on. You and I have got some work to do!"

With that, he followed her, Aragorn and a very determined-looking Éomer back down the narrow walkway and up the stairs to the top of the Deeping-wall.

The battle for Helm's Deep was about to begin.

*~*~*~*

"'Tis dark for archery," muttered Gimli. The dwarf was leaning as far over the breastwork of the wall as his stature would allow.

"Gimli! What the ruddy heck are you doing?" growled Neville, grabbing him by his corslet and yanking him back onto solid ground.

Gimli growled right back. "I was merely trying to get a look at the clefts below where the archers are situated, lad! There is no call for you to mother me so!"

"Another inch more and you would've been getting a closer look at them than you wanted - as you hurtled to your death!"

"Ah, lad! Were you concerned for my safety?" queried the now-beaming dwarf. "Do not fear. 'Twould take more than a mere twenty feet drop to send me to Mahal's Cave!"

"I should've let you fall on your head," grumbled the teenager in frustration. He ignored Gimli's chuckles, opting to look over the wall instead. The half hour Molly had guessed at earlier had already passed, but there was no sight or sound of the enemy any more. Far down in the valley, scattered fires still burned - a testament to their passage. But the harsh singing had stopped a while ago, the orcs choosing to advance with stealth for the time being. It was an effective tactic which caused more than one man along the length of the wall to shuffle nervously as they peered into the inky darkness ahead.

Suddenly, yells and screams broke out from the Dike. The sounds of fierce Rohirric battle-cries pierced the night.

It had begun.

Despite his earlier anticipation for battle, the realisation that it was now upon them made Neville a little nervous. This was it. This was where his duty to aid his friends really began. The reason Varda had pulled him across Time and Space: to help the Fellowship and all the Free Peoples of Middle Earth defeat the evil that had threatened their freedom - their very lives - for so long. Would he be up to the task? Would he be powerful enough to do the job that Gandalf would surely have managed without breaking into a sweat? Or would he disappoint his new friends by failing them this night?

The teenager gave himself a mental shake to dispel his morbid thoughts: this was no time for doubts. There was a battle to be won. He may not be Gandalf, he was certainly no heroic Harry, but he was Neville Longbottom.

And if that was good enough for Varda, it was good enough for him!

With his resolve in hand, he focussed on the Dike ahead. Flaming brands appeared over the brink and clustered thickly at the breach. Then they scattered and vanished. Men came galloping over the field and up the gate to the Hornburg. The rearguard of the Westfold had been driven back.

"The Enemy is at hand!" shouted one of the riders as he sprang from his horse and barrelled up the wall looking for Éomer. But the King's nephew was farther down with Aragorn. Legolas stepped out and asked for his report.

"We loosed every arrow that we had and filled the Dike with Orcs, but it will not halt them long. Already they are scaling the bank at many points, thick as marching ants. But we have taught them not to carry torches."

Great. Fire-wizards. Wasn't that handy?

"Are all your men back from the Dike yet?" Neville asked, having to shout to be heard over the roar of the approaching hordes.

The rider nodded. "All that yet live, yes."

"How far back does their army stretch?"

"Almost three furlongs in length down the Deeping-coomb."

Crikey, how far back was that? Hadn't these blokes heard of the metric system?

"'Tis just over a half-mile," supplied his elven friend helpfully.

Ah, right. Add another quarter of a mile from the wall to the Dike, and a little bit further for good luck, which would put him roughly at the spot Molly had left them to tend to the burning field.

"Molly?"

The witch (who had been whizzing up and down the length of the wall dispensing Cheering charms at will - a goodly number of the formerly anxious Rohirric forces were now almost manic with glee) flew back to find him digging through his knapsack.

"Yes, dear?"

"I'm going to Apparate behind the orcs and start chucking these Mandrakes out," he informed her, pulling out Harry's Invisibility Cloak and swinging it over his shoulders. Every man in sight gave a yelp of surprise (and Gimli almost fell over the side of the wall - again) as the teenager's apparently disembodied head floated several feet above the stone battlements.

"Sorry! It's fine - I'm alive!" he yelled for all to hear, opening the folds to let them see his torso. There was a collective sigh of relief and he covered himself just as a flash of lightning struck the eastern hills. Transfixed, he watched the space between the Dike and the wall with everyone else: it was crawling with black shapes, some squat and broad, some tall and grim, with high helmets and dark shields. Hundreds more were pouring over the Dike and through the breach, and they flowed up towards the wall from cliff to cliff like a dark tide of pure evil. The flash of lightning faded, plunging the night into darkness once more and then a clap of thunder boomed through the night. Seconds later, rain came lashing down on the Deep.

Arrows flew from the open space, sailing over the battlements. Some glanced harmlessly off the stones. Several struck their marks and men began to sink to the ground or topple over the walls.

The battle of Helm's Deep had begun.

"Molly, get your plants ready for the front lines ..." yelled the teenager as Legolas gave a musical cry of 'Elbereth Gilthoniel!' and started firing his deadly arrows into the heaving masses below.

"... but don't drop anything - especially the Mandrakes - too near the wall or our lot might get hurt too ..."

Another wall of arrows flew overhead and Molly produced a Shield charm to prevent any hitting those men positioned nearest to her. Gimli roared in delight (then cursed in rage when he realised he couldn't so much as throw a stone through it at the orcs below).

"... and you might want to think about letting the Light do its work again so the archers can hit their targets!"

"All right, dear! Shoot some sparks up so I know where you are - I don't want to lose sight of you!"

With a quick nod and a warning to Legolas to don his (ugly) brown earmuffs, he pulled the Cloak over his head and Disapparated.

A split-second later, there was a loud crack as Neville Apparated a few feet from the slopes where the company had paused earlier that night. Rain thundered from the heavens, seeping through the Cloak and soaking him completely. The noise of battle boomed several hundred yards away, but the teenager couldn't see anyone in front of him.

Where the ruddy heck was he?

Wiping moisture from his face, he peered through the enchanted material of the Cloak and saw dwindling fires in the distance.

Oh. Fires. That's right.

Relieved that no one was present to witness his faux pas, he swung himself around to face the right direction.

There!

Up the slope, he could see black shapes crawling towards the Dike. A cold sweat ran down his back at the sight, mixing with the moisture of the lashing rain.

Bloody hell - there were thousands of them.

Gritting his teeth, he fired red sparks high into the sky so Molly would know where he was. With that done, he pulled on his knapsack and freed the container of plants and his own set of earmuffs. The roar and screams of battle dissipated instantly when he placed them securely over his head. In its place was an eerie silence that was distinctly at odds with the hulking shapes a few dozen yards ahead. Orcs and (to Neville's surprise) men stumbled over each other in their eagerness to get to the Deeping-wall. They waved crude blades and gleaming axes as they surged towards the Dike.

Another flash of bright, white light lit up the sky, but it was not the temporary flash of lightning that struck earlier. This light remained, moving back and forth across the valley in the direction he had just came from.

Molly! Good old Molly had unbuttoned her coat and was striking fear into the hordes of Isengard with the Light of Varda!

Amongst other things ...

He grinned at the thought of her cursing and blasting Saruman's servants all the way to the fires of hell.

Waving his wand over the container, Neville drew a Mandrake from the interior by its leaves, Engorged it to its normal, mature size and grasped the bottom of the cloth roll which hid the main body of the plant.

Time to wake his little friends up.

Instead of gently unrolling the cloth, he yanked it down hard and threw the Mandrake high into the air, lifting the Stupefy while it was still in motion. Before he had a chance to see the ugly face screw itself up and let its displeasure be known, he gave a quick flick of his cherry wand and sent it soaring into the rear of the unsuspecting dark army ...

... then watched in enormous satisfaction as enemies started dropping like flies.

In their dozens.

Excellent! And that was just with one.

The bodies kept dropping.

Hah! Who needed an Elder wand? One Mandrake and a nice valley ...

Hmm. Valley.

He watched men and orcs alike staggering in mortal agony (before falling and rolling back down the slope) and it suddenly occurred to him that the Mandrake's cry might be magnified because of the high cliff walls. In fact, as he watched scores more bodies collapse in death and roll towards him (forcing him to dodge out of their way), he came to the conclusion that perhaps it would be far too dangerous to throw them any nearer the Deeping-wall.

Which was when he remembered that Molly had at least a dozen of them in her own bag.

Merlin's hairy ...!!

A thrill of absolute horror swept through the teenager. In a flash, his wand shot out from the folds of the Cloak and he waved it wildly.

"Expecto Patronum!"

The silver Labrador burst from his wand-tip and shot a few dozen yards up the slope before it turned to soar back down towards him. Despite the Cloak, it located him easily and came to a halt mere inches away. He bent over it urgently, hoping to pull off the talking Patronus that Gran sometimes used to call him into tea with when he was submerged in the wilds of his greenhouse.

"Molly! Don't chuck the Mandrakes out - their screams will echo off the cliff walls and kill our own people! Keep the Mandrakes in your bag! Send me a sign to let me know you understood!"

Without further ado, he sent the Patronus soaring up the slope and spent an anxious few minutes dodging the ever-increasing number of corpses rolling downhill until she answered.

Blimey! Wouldn't it be just his luck if Varda had summoned him all the way from Yorkshire to help the People of the West fight their own Dark Lord, and he ended up doing Sauron the biggest favour of his (immortal) life by finishing off most of the opposition with one ruddy plant?

"Come on, Molly! Answer!"

Visions of the future King of Gondor toppling to the ground with blood leaking out of his ears flashed through his head.

What was taking her so long? Had she already used them?

"No, no, no!"

It was enough to make him grab his bag and abandon the slope with the intention of returning to the wall. He was about to twist on the spot when another silvery blur came racing through the sky.

Molly's Patronus!

The lioness found him as easily as his Labrador had, and soon, his Guardian's warm voice was soothing his rattled nerves.

"Don't panic, dear. I didn't bother with them after all because poor Legolas fainted a few minutes ago. He must have picked up a slight echo from yours despite the earmuffs - it's the elvish hearing you know - so I guessed that the cliffs were magnifying the sound. We had to move him to the caves at the back of the valley. Gimli thought it was hysterically funny, but poor Legolas will be ever so disappointed. They had a bet on to see who could kill the most orcs, which is a bit macabre, actually. I'll need to have a word with them both later. Gimli's delighted, though, because he's won the bet now, hasn't he? Anyway, I must get back to the wall. I'm going to start dropping the Venomous Tentacula - that should give our guests a pleasant surprise. See you later!"

Relief flooded through the teenager and his legs almost gave out beneath him. Thank Merlin! Manwë would have slaughtered him on the spot if he returned to his nice, bright hall just to tell him he'd accidentally murdered half the nobles of Arda - and the wrong half at that.

Molly's Patronus faded from sight, leaving Neville to watch lifeless orcish bodies tumbling down the slope, and feeling a good deal better than he had five minutes earlier.

The same could not be said for the orcs. Confusion reigned supreme in the rear ranks of the host as those out of earshot of the Mandrake noticed that their numbers were dwindling for no apparent reason. There was no enemy in sight, no company of fierce Rohirric warriors rode up the slope to attack from behind - yet their comrades were dropping like flies. Bemused enemy agents scratched their heads before running back to investigate why their rear guard was rolling down the slope instead of racing up it towards the Dike - only to join their deceased brethren a few minutes later. Slowly, the dent at the back of the host increased.

Thrilled that the Mandrake was proving so effective (and relieved that Molly wasn't wiping out half the Rohirrim further up the hill with her supply), Neville followed the advancing army of orcs up the incline, cutting a path to the right as he moved towards the northern cliffs. He removed Harry's cloak to move a bit more freely and stayed far enough behind the orcs to go unnoticed (not that that was difficult, they were still far too busy charging up the hill to imagine anyone was bold enough to slip in behind them).

Cocky gits.

But not for much longer. It was time to give the Mandrake-free side a shock of their very own.

Thrusting his hand in the knapsack that dangled open over his shoulder, Neville pulled out his dragon-hide gloves and slipped them over his hands before carefully liberating a spiky, dark red plant from the magical container. It was still in its shrunken state, but a wave of his wand soon corrected that. He contemplated the Bludger-sized Venomous Tentacula thoughtfully.

Hmm. Some of those uruk-hai were rather big...

With another wave of his wand, the teenager Engorged the plant until it swelled to the size of Aberforth Dumbledore's (poor, beleaguered) goat. It was so big, he had to charm it to hover while he lifted the Stunning spell.

Blimey, it was enormous! Good thing Professor Sprout wasn't here to see him do things to plants that no respectable herbologist should!

Not that the Tentacula would be complaining: it was about to have the feast of its life!

Neville grinned as he drew his wand back then flicked it violently forward. The goat-sized plant soared into the air, its long, trailing feelers arcing in a graceful curve as it flew over the stampeding army. Soon, it was swallowed by the darkness. Unable to see too far ahead, and fully unable to hear a ruddy thing thanks to his very excellent earmuffs, the young wizard trusted in the power of his (voracious) plant and repeated the process with another. It, too, soared high into the night air, landing too far away for his naked eye to see.

He was unwilling to use all of the carnivorous plants so soon, though: he only had eight, which he'd split with Molly. Despite the gravity of the odds he and his new friends faced, Middle Earth's war was not over until Frodo chucked the One Ring into the fires of Mount Doom, and Merlin knew how many other battles lay ahead of them until then.

Still, not to worry. One really good cutting of Devil's Snare would cause a lot more damage than the Tentacula. In fact, the damp, dark conditions of the nocturnal valley were ideal for it! Wasn't it lucky that he'd brought fifteen?

Lucky for him, at any rate.

Feeling like a third year student in Honeydukes, he sprinted across the width of the valley lobbing three of the dark vines into the orcish forces. A powerful Blasting charm sent them soaring almost one hundred yards up the grassy incline before they dropped.

By this time, Neville had followed the dark army up several hundred yards of the incline - well clear of the worst of the Mandrake's cries. He was having to dodge less corpses and more unconscious forms. It would be a matter of hours before they roused to rejoin their comrades in battle. They'd be spilling through the Dike towards the Deeping-wall before dawn (if the Devil's Snare didn't get them first). Already he could see the outline of the earthen forts ahead. Most of the blade-wielding baddies he followed were still charging towards it, either too desperate to remove themselves from the horrible cries of the Mandrake behind them, or too eager to deal out death to his friends to care that their brethren were under silent attack from behind.

That was about to change.

Leaving the Devil's Snare to do its work, Neville paused by an outcrop of rock to catch his breath. Crikey, he was knackered! The battle had only begun an hour ago and he was already flagging. Still, at least the Mandrake's Hear-Me-Not hex would be kicking in shortly. But for now, it was time to stop throwing things up the ruddy hill and start throwing them down it (from the safety of the Deeping-wall). After he introduced Flaming Ferns to the bloodthirsty ranks of Saruman's servants, of course.

It took some careful planning and execution to free the dangerous ferns from their comfortable environment and Levitate them without accidentally pricking his arm with a spike. Timing the removal of the Stunner so that they shot their deadly darts over the mass of orcs was even trickier, but Neville wasn't the best Herbology student at Hogwarts for no reason. In less than twenty minutes he had ten of the plants floating a few feet ahead of him and ready to launch.

Neville had carried out the majority of his assault so far in silence. Not one of his enemies yet realised they were under attack from behind (although several dozen were becoming increasingly alarmed at the hostile vegetation spontaneously flourishing in the Deeping-coomb - master hadn't mentioned anything about that). But he decided it was now well past time to make his presence known (just to see the looks on their ugly faces).

Deeming it safe enough to remove his earmuffs, he took them off and shoved them into the knapsack as he dashed ever farther up the hill. "Oi! You lot - over here!" he yelled.

No answer.

Great. His first ever fireworks display, and the fireworks were ignoring him. What a bunch of damp squibs!

Muttering in annoyance, he touched the wand to his throat, keeping an eye on the Ferns to make sure he wasn't stretching his concentration too much. Wouldn't do to make himself a fireball because of his own carelessness.

"Sonorus!"

There! That should do the trick.

Opening his mouth, he tried again.

"OI! OI! YOU WITH UGLY FACE - WHICH IS EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU, ACTUALLY. WHAT THE RUDDY HECK ARE YOU DOING RUNNING ALL THE WAY UP THAT HILL, WHEN THERE'S FRESH MAN-FLESH A FEW FEET AWAY?"

A huge portion of the advancing army halted in its tracks as Neville's booming voice reverberated from one side of the valley to the next. Over and over again it careened off the cliff faces of the Thrihyrne, echoing up and down the ravine.

Oh, yes. That was much better!

He gave the surprised army a cheery wave.

"WHAT - DOESN'T ANYBODY FANCY A MIDNIGHT SNACK?"

The cheeky invitation was enough to send the nearest foes into a snarling, spitting frenzy. Arrows began to whiz down the hill within seconds. They were easily deflected by his Shield charm. A few minutes later, he returned fire (literally) with the first of the Flaming Ferns. It soared across the sky, drawing the attention of a few of his enemies. One or two pointed and laughed as they registered nothing more than a plant.

Hah! They wouldn't be laughing for long. It would be a completely different story in roughly sixty seconds.

The Fern vanished into the crowd. Neville cancelled the Sonorus and donned the Invisibility Cloak again, simply to make the ugly archers' job a bit more difficult. A few of them were already barrelling down the slope to his last known position and he didn't want to give them too easy a target (Gran would kill him if he popped his clogs). He sprinted across the valley with a line of the remaining ferns in tow (and a few slobbering orcs and men not far behind them). The plants were slowly dwindling as he lobbed them across the heads of his guffawing enemies.

To his annoyance, the line of floating plants allowed the orcs to get a rough idea of his position. More and more arrows flew both down the slope, and across from the dozen or so wild men that charged over the valley in search of their elusive assailant. More than once he had to stop to hex the growing threat at his back, or cast a Shield arm to ward off a projectile that gotten too close (which was several, given the sheer number of seriously stinking orcs to his left).

But his luck held long enough to allow him to lob the majority of his weapons into their midst. Already he could hear the telltale screams of surprised agony as enemies began spontaneously combusting from far up the left of the valley, where he had started his death-dash, and almost all the way to the right of it. Screams of horror resounded through the night as flames leapt high into the air and spread quickly throughout the tightly packed ranks. Orcs, uruk-hai and men scrambled wildly away from the Dike and down the very slope they had spent so long trying to climb up, in an effort to escape the inexplicable fires.

"It be Wizard's magic! It be Wizard's magic!" yelled a retreating man in accusation when he spotted the teenager's Shield charm. But before the furious foreigner could retaliate against the upstart youth, the unfortunate man exploded in a fireball of his very own.

Neville had to abandon his attempt to lob the final Fern into enemy ranks when a company of the wild man's shabby friends came storming down the field towards his position, screaming for vengeance.

Er, perhaps this was a good time to leave?

Indeed it was. There were now so many enraged, snarling, blade-wielding bad boys charging towards his Shield (and therefore him) that he was in serious danger of being cornered against the northern cliffs. If they managed to circle him, he would never be able to fend off all their weapons. The Cloak was useless now. His position was well and truly established.

With this realisation, Neville whipped it off to allow free movement and shoved it haphazardly in his knapsack with one hand, trying to maintain his defensive Shield with the other. He turned on his heel and charged across the remainder of the valley, trying to distance himself far enough from the enemy forces so that he could stop to Disapparate.

But now that he had revealed himself in all his glory, the humans on the hill were screaming and yelling like men possessed. More of the swarthy soldiers stormed down the incline to attack their formerly invisible tormentor, hurling arrows and axes in mid-stride. His Shield just wasn't big enough to deal with all of them.

Blimey! At this rate, he wouldn't even be able to Disapparate!

Taking a chance, he dropped it long enough to throw a Blasting curse at the nearest offenders. They flew backwards into those that followed behind, knocking everyone off their feet. With one quick motion, he dipped his hand in the knapsack, shoved it into the waiting dragon-hide glove, and Summoned his still-floating Flaming Fern. He caught it deftly and crammed it into its container (it would be a shame to waste it). Before the men and orcs could regroup, he searched for the mental picture of the walkway behind the Hornburg gates and Disapparated.

Crack!

Fortunately for Neville, he disappeared from the valley just in time to avoid being cleaved in two by an enormous axe.

Unfortunately for Neville, his aim was still off and he Apparated a few feet away from his intended destination - on the opposite side of the gates.

Smack, bang in front of a billion roaring, shield-wielding orcs and men charging up the causeway with two massive tree trunks.

"Aagh! Crap! Crap! Crap!"

What a ruddy time for his aim to be off!

His sudden appearance created havoc among the stampeding masses. They crashed to a screeching halt halfway up the causeway and gaped stupidly at the horrified wizard.

"Er ... hello?" offered Neville politely (manners maketh the man, after all. It was one of Gran's favourite sayings).

"Get 'im!" yelled a large uruk at the head of the astonished crowd.

Oh, no!

Over one hundred enemies came charging up the causeway, with the clear intent of smashing him against the gates with their makeshift battering rams. More than a little alarmed, Neville lashed out with his wand. A Hurling hex sent the trunks, and a good number of their bearers, flying back down the smooth incline. Those that remained tracked their progress high into the air and down over the orc-infested plain.

Not that Neville noticed. He was far too busy banging (uselessly) on the gates (having abandoned any further attempts to Apparate in case his unlucky aim landed him somewhere just as unpleasant; the equally orc-infested Dike, for instance).

"Oi! Let me in! There's a ruddy great load of right ugly gits out here with an appetite for man-flesh - and I'm about to become the first course! Open up!"

An arrow whizzed up the causeway and thudded into the door a mere inch from his right ear. Ah. It appeared that his ugly companions had regained their senses.

Once again, Neville made use of his Shield charm and banged ever more fervently on the Deeping-gates. What was taking them so long?

"Oi! Open the ruddy door!"

Another arrow, followed by another.

Oh, great. Longbottom kebab was back on the menu ...

Giving up on the gates (and therefore the Rohirrim - damn them!), he whirled back around and shot another Blasting curse down the causeway. But his appearance in front of the towering fortress had whipped the bloodthirsty crowd into an excited frenzy and, to his dismay, the population on the broad path had doubled, no trebled, while his back was turned. It seethed with over three hundred hate-filled, leering faces, all anxious to take a chunk out of him.

"Sod off! Sod off! Sod off!" he yelled, sending curse after hex after jinx down the stone incline and forcing the charging minions to retreat in fury as their comrades wobbled, fainted and pulled down their leather breeches with the sudden, urgent need to empty their bladders (right over the protesting crowds below).

Excellent! Molly's Your-I-Nation jinx was a winner.

To his right, the Deeping-wall was under attack from a hail of archers who shot burning arrows more than twenty feet into the air and over the battlements. Screams rent through the night as some of the projectiles hit their mark; men and boys flew from the wall to land on the jubilant mass below. Horrified, Neville stuck his still-gloved hand into his knapsack, pulled out the Flaming Fern that sat at the top of the container, lifted the Stunner and with a quick flick of his wand, threw it over the causeway and into the orcish crowd.

He was, however, completely unable to stand idly by and watch the effect it would have. A mighty crash resounded a few feet from his position and he swivelled his head to gaze through the pouring rain at the causeway beyond.

Water, it seemed, was not the only thing falling from the skies.

"Oi! Stop chucking those ruddy boulders at me!" he screamed at the unseen men on the Deeping-wall who were ... chucking ruddy boulders at him.

Or rather, at the advancing army of shield-ridden orcs and men, who had recovered their battering rams and were resuming their charge in his direction.

Great. Just great.

How in Merlin's name was he supposed to stop the stubborn gits? Every time he turned his head, they multiplied. The Rohirrim weren't letting him in for fear the enemy followed, he didn't trust himself to Apparate six feet to safety, and he was being attacked on all sides from orcs, wild men and horse-fanciers!

What he needed was a distraction.

Or at least a defence strong enough to keep the orcs and their horrible human mates away, and give him enough time to persuade Théoden's men to let him the ruddy hell in!

Decision made, he threw several more Blasting charms down the causeway (and, occasionally, upwards at the rain of rocks the Rohirrim were still chucking at him) then, on impulse Neville followed their path a few metres down the narrow incline - much to his enemies' surprise. They scattered in alarm when he sent his glowing Patronus in their direction, giving him a few more precious seconds to erect the temporary defences that might persuade his allies to open the door to him.

"Latero parietis!"

Out of nowhere, a brick wall - eight feet in height and ten in width - appeared in the middle of the causeway.

Brilliant!

A few more of them ought to give the rancid gits pause for thought ...

Neville backed slowly up the causeway towards the gates, creating one wall after another as he went. They wouldn't stop the howling masses, but they effectively put paid to any serious attempts at battering the doors (and therefore him) to a pulp.

He had little time to congratulate himself when another giant boulder came sailing down from the wall above the gates and smashed into one of his magnificent creations.

"Will you lot stop chucking those bloody boulders!" he shouted in frustration, waving a fist at the sky behind him, before hurriedly repairing the ruined wall. Slowly, he backed further and further up the causeway, creating barriers, hexing those orcs that tried to slip round (or over) them, and keeping a wary eye on the heavens above for the next sign of friendly fire.

Where the ruddy hell was his Guardian, anyway? Wasn't she supposed to be watching out for him?

But Molly was nowhere in sight, forcing him to see to his own defence while he retreated back up the causeway. It took ten long minutes of dodging arrows and building walls before he finally found himself back at the gates. Swinging himself around, Neville resumed his frantic banging at the doors.

"Oi! You can let me in now! They've no chance of getting anywhere near your gates with those trees anymore!"

He could hear yelling on the other side of the gate. An angry voice was berating whoever protected the entry to Helm's Deep, but he couldn't make out what they were saying and neither was there any move to allow him entry.

Could this night get any worse?

Blasting the gates open was out of the question, given that it would allow all nine thousand of the screaming, snarling enemy forces free entry to the Deep at their own leisure; but neither could he stay out on the causeway all night. He'd be a pile of rotting mince before morning came.

"Will you lot open the ruddy gate for ten seconds?" screamed the frustrated teenager. "In fact, five'll do me just fine!"

Still no movement at the other side.

The young wizard gave one final bang on the gates. "Two, then? That's my final offer, you rotten sods!"

More arrows came flying up the causeway, forcing him to abandon the gates and fire a Shield charm to protect his head and shoulders. Roars and screams followed in their wake and he knew that his unhappy companions were beginning to scale his defences in an attempt to capture (and probably chew on) him. It would take them at least fifteen minutes to reach the gates though, and a nasty surprise awaited the idiot that made it to the last two walls (he had decorated the tops with barbed wire - Dean was a huge fan of old war move-ees and was always telling him about this or that Great Escape from enemy prisoner-of-war camps. It had seemed like no more than another odd Muggle custom to him - until now).

Great. This was it. His life was over. He was stuck between a rock (one of the Rohirrim's heavy projectiles was falling towards him at that moment and he couldn't lift the Shield charm long enough to blast it or he'd be skewered by an arrow) and a hard place (the wall, the ruddy gates - take your pick). A billion orcs were heading his way (over walls, up the edges of the causeway), his Rohirrim allies weren't budging to let him in, Molly was nowhere in sight and he hadn't had a decent snog in, oh, roughly forever.

Life was not good.

Just as he squeezed his eyes shut to succumb to the inevitable ...

BANG!

The rock above him shattered into dust and he heard the whoosh of a familiar broom.

"Molly!" yelled Neville in a happy delirium. "I knew you'd come. I bloody well knew it!"

"Language, dear!" shouted the witch as she shot jets of acid from her wand over the unlucky men and orcs that had managed to scale ten of his twenty walls. Their screams of agony echoed through the night and filled his heart with joy.

"You can let him in now!" barked the witch to some unseen person above the gates. The message must have been relayed down the stairwell one man at a time, because it took a full two minutes before the banging and scraping of wood indicated that the heavy doors were about to swing inwards. They didn't open far, just enough to allow him to slip into the walkway, but he had never been as happy in all his life to be in such an enclosed space as the tiny, narrow passage. The door boomed shut behind him and twenty huge, hairy blonds repositioned the timber and stones that were being used to barricade them.

"Ah, lad!" cried a familiar deep voice. "We were about to take a sortie out the side door and drive the beasts and their tree trunks off the causeway, but you saved us the trouble. What magnificent magic! With so many walls, the Enemy will never reach the gates with those battering rams!"

The dwarf was beaming at him proudly, but Neville was livid.

"There's a side door?" he demanded in disbelief. There's a ruddy side door?"

Bloody typical. He had spent the better part of half an hour trying to get through the Deeping-gates, when he could have slipped through the side door in a tenth of the time and with none of the bother!

"Why didn't you tell me about that, then? In fact, why did you open the gate instead of calling me from there?"

"The element of surprise was lost to us. There are now so many Orcs attempting to slip past the edges of your stone walls, that they could not but fail to notice a postern door opening mere feet from the main gates. We would not wish to give them an easier target than that."

This from Aragorn, who was striding back down the walkway from (presumably) the direction of said postern door, with the hulking form of Éomer in tow.

The teenager's frustration melted away. He was far too happy to see his friends again to remain irked. "Molly's right outside taking care of the more stubborn ones. And the brick walls should put paid to their attempts to smash the door down."

"You have done well, young Wizard. But tell me: did your efforts with the Enemy's rearguard prove as effective?" enquired the ranger

Neville nodded. "The Devil's Snare should be expanding nicely. I threw three good-sized cuttings in, but the dark and damp conditions will make them spread like a virus. They're strangling orcs as we speak. The Venomous Tentacula will be stuffing their faces, the Flaming Ferns are causing devastation, and the Mandrake has finished off a few hundred orcs and men already. Which reminds me - how's Legolas?"

Gimli snorted. "He swooned and fainted like a maiden not three minutes after you left us, lad. At first I thought him struck by an Enemy weapon, but Lady Molly's glowing shield was upon us at that time. I was greatly relieved - though if you tell him that, I will deny it. It was your Guardian who guessed that you had let loose your Man-drake plant not minutes before, and this Dwarf's knowledge of rock that guessed the cliff walls of Thrihyrne were delivering its echoes to our poorly princeling. It seems that your pretty crown was not quite enough to tame the gift of his pointy Elvish ears!"

The dwarf was looking far too pleased with himself for it to be healthy.

"Do you know, lad, that he slew four of the Enemy before he dropped? Not bad for a few minutes work. Yet my tally now sits at forty."

That surprised Neville. How had the dwarf managed that without the aid of a bow and arrow? All he had were his axes, and the enemy hadn't overrun the battlements yet for him to get a swing at them.

"'Twas with the aid of your Guardian's magic. She has enchanted his axes to return to him whenever he throws one over the Deeping-wall," supplied Aragorn.

Gimli was beaming like a proud father as he fingered one of his beloved weapons. "Mahal was smiling upon me the day my sister was born!" stated the dwarf emphatically.

"We are all glad of your 'sister's' birth," said Éomer brusquely (still not sounding entirely convinced of Gimli's claim to kinship with the Weasley mother), "yet let us now return to the wall ere our Orcish friends begin to lament the loss of your trusty axes. This night is not yet over and we shall have need of them to fell even more of our Enemy, for it appears that the Men of Dunland have joined forces with Saruman's unnatural spawn."

"Dunland? Is that were those shaggy blokes in black I saw on the causeway come from?"

The Rohirrim's face screwed up in disgust. "Yes, it is so. For many hundreds of years Dunlendings have fought to take our fertile lands. They would claim them as their own, and have named us usurpers and thieves ever since the lords of Gondor gave the Mark to Eorl the Young and made alliance with him. Saruman has inflamed their grievance against us with black words of malcontent - they will not give way now for dusk or dawn until the King is taken, or they themselves are slain."

"Then let us set about slaying them as fast as we may!" grumbled Gimli, pushing past Neville to storm down the passage and take the steps to the wall once more.

Suddenly, horns sounded behind the door and a great cry rose.

"Ladders! They have brought ladders to scale the wall!" yelled a voice.

It was enough to make the three men scramble after the dwarf. To their horror, when they reached the battlements Neville and his friends saw that hundreds of long ladders were being lifted up to rest against it. Many had already been cast down in ruin, but even as they fell, many more replaced them. Orcs sprang up the ladders like Doxies up a curtain. At the foot of the wall, their fallen piled up like a macabre dark hill, but still the orcs kept coming, desperate to breach the inner sanctum of the Rohirric defence.

And the men of Rohan were growing weary. Most of their arrows were spent; their swords were yet notched and their shields were torn by the persistent barrage of missiles from the plain below. Leaving Aragorn and Éomer to rally their forces (helped by Gimli's yells of delight as he struck again and again at every orcish head to pop over the wall - the dwarf was clearly in his element), the teenager rushed down the battlement, smacking the nearly depleted quivers of the archers with his wand as he went. Multiple Ever-Full spells flew left, right and centre and men sighed in relief to have weapons at hand once more.

"Share them out! Pass them out to those with none left," he yelled in command. "The spell doesn't work on empty quivers!"

Many heads nodded and soon, arrows were being passed all the way down the two-men deep rows of archers.

Heavy clouds which had gathered over the valley two hours since were beginning to part, heralding an end to the heavy downpour of rain. A slowly-sinking moon shone brightly over the valley, illuminating the hordes of enemies crawling en masse like a great, black wave towards the wall. As he dashed down the battlements, Neville caught a glimpse of Molly soaring over the field and dropping plants over the middling ranks. Barely one minute later, a huge fireball exploded in the crowds below. Dead orcs and men flew up and out in a one-hundred yard radius; those that survived ran screeching and shrieking in agony, but she pointed her wand and flew in a circle around the flames, covering the fleeing foes in jets of thick dark liquid. The fuel attracted the hungry fire. Flames leapt up to engulf the oil-soaked enemies and soon the night air was filled with the stench of burning flesh.

"Molly! Molly - get the ladders!" he shouted, knowing that she would have a better aim at them from her side of the wall than his. "Get the ..."

Oh, never mind. There was no way she'd hear him over the racket below. Sighing, he abandoned his efforts to re-arm the Rohirrim and shoved his way to the front of the wall where the nearest ladder was. Two ugly uruk-hai heads were just popping over the top of it, crowing in delight at the appearance of the fresh-faced youth.

"'Ello there, little 'orse-lord," growled one of the (stinking) creatures. "Yer looks righ' tasty! Young an' fresh, jes' tha way ol' Shublug likes 'em! Jes' give us a second ter I gets me leg over an' I'll make a righ' nice meal o' yer!"

"Not likely," muttered Neville, before shoving his wand in the uruk's eye (a move that had worked very well for him in the past - MacNair would testify to that). The creature yelped in pain and automatically recoiled, tumbling back off the ladder and onto his filthy friends below. The remaining uruk snarled in rage, taking a swipe at the teenager, but Neville Blasted him off the ladder before he could do any damage. From the grunts and yells below, he knew that it would only be a matter of seconds before his two enemies were replaced by a dozen others.

Blimey! How was he going to get rid of all these ladders? True, it would be easy enough to Transfigure them into rubber, or something else that would collapse under the orcs' weight, but he didn't have time to run down the battlements, whacking them all with his wand - not at the rate they were being replaced by the orcs. What he needed was one spell that could take care of the lot of them ...

Merlin's wand! Had he been asleep during the Battle of Hogwarts, or what?

Shaking his head in disgust, he stepped away from the battlement, raised his wand in the air and shouted: "Scalatotum locomotor!"

All along the wall, ladders broke from their moorings and straightened to attention, taking every single ally and enemy in the Deeping-coomb by surprise (most especially those who had been climbing up them). A huge, collective roar bellowed up and down the ravine. Most of those orcs and men that were unlucky enough to be attached to the ladders dropped to their doom shortly after the young wizard cast his spell. The Rohirrim on the wall cheered and began to promptly pick off the remaining targets that still clung to them desperately.

Ecstatic that Professor McGonagall's spell was proving so effective, Neville quickly debated what to do next. From what Luna had told him, their Transfigurations professor had ordered all the suits of armour to defend Hogwarts. But armour had legs to run with. Ladders did not.

Still, he could always order them to smack the enemy into submission ...

Taking a deep breath, he let his gaze settle on the nearest one and spoke.

"I order you to ..."

What was that ruddy word these Middle Earthlings were so fond of? Ah, yes!

"I order you to smite any living being on your side of the wall!" he yelled.

As if it had communicated with its (wooden) brethren telepathically, the ladder ahead - and all those along the wall and beyond - began to throw themselves down on the terrified crowd below.

WHACK! THWACK! CRASH! BANG!

Hundreds of thirty foot orcish ladders all over the Deeping-coomb were hurling themselves away from the wall and smashing into the enemy camp. Many splintered on the ground with the force of their momentum as orcs and men scattered down the incline in an attempt to escape their path. The few ladders that survived the first thrashing rose steadily off the ground and (much to the enemy's dismay) continued to squelch orcs and Dunlendings in their dozens until they, too, splintered into little more than firewood.

Cor - that was brilliant! McGonagall was a ruddy genius! When he took the Sword of Gryffindor back to Hogwarts, then - post-menopausal or not - Neville was going to snog the face off her in thanks.

Mind you, she might kill him afterwards.

Okay then, he would hug her! Or at least shake her by the hand.

So thrilled was Neville by the result of the Deputy Headmistress' handy spell, so completely delighted to see the hundreds of fleeing enemies racing back towards the Dike, that he didn't see it coming ...

Whoosh ... thwack!

"Neville! Neville!" screamed a woman's voice as he staggered from the blow. He tripped and fell backwards, crashing against the rear battlements and sliding to the floor. Red-hot pain shot from his left side and he gazed at it numbly.

A black-shafted arrow was lodged through his left arm. It had entered at an angle from the crook of his arm, where the fletchling protruded, to just below the shoulder, where the tip was sticking out on the other side. Most of the shaft was buried along the length of his limb.

Too stunned to take notice of his friends rushing to his aid, Neville stared at it in morbid fascination.

"Ouch," he whimpered, before slumping into the black depths of unconsciousness.

*~*~*~*

Neville was floating in darkness.

No ... wait. It was redness. He was floating in redness. Merlin's beard, but it burned! Was he in hell? It must be, because he felt like he was being roasted alive from the inside out.

Funny that. Neville never thought he'd been bad enough to merit being sent to hell. True, he was no angel. He'd done a few suspect things in his short life; like the time he spat in Gwendolyn Farragut's tea (after vomiting on her face) when he overheard her calling Gran an 'old hag' during his (much-hated) weekly visits to the Knitting Bee (though he had only been six at the time). Or the Christmas before he went to Hogwarts, when he spent almost a Galleon - which he had had saved to buy Gran a present - on a packet of Screaming Sunflower seedlings instead, leaving only one Sickle and three Knuts in change with which to get her gift (he'd spent it on a pair of frilly safety knickers from the Second Hand Shop in Diagon Alley. She had accepted them with grace, but he would bet his Mimbulus Mimbletonia they had never been worn - by her, at least).

Was that enough to merit eternal damnation, though?

As the burning sensation licked through Neville's body, he knew it must be.

Wait - licked through his body? Shouldn't it be licking over it instead?

"... ille ... ville?"

There! A voice! Someone was speaking to him.

He tried to rouse himself from the painful red haze, but whenever he moved, it grew more intense.

"Neville?"

"Whaa ...?"

"He rouses, Lady Molly! Quickly, give him the bees-oar."

Molly? Molly Weasley? What was she doing here? Was he still in the Great Hall? Odd - he didn't remember being hit by a Death Eater ...

"Mrs ..."

"Yes, dear! It's Mrs Weasley - but you haven't called me that for a while now. Legolas, help him sit up."

Neville felt himself being carefully pulled into a sitting position. He tried to open his eyes, but was assailed by a wave of nausea. His head was pounding.

"Open you mouth, dear."

What? What for? He couldn't even open his eyes, let alone his mouth.

"You must do as your Guardian instructs, young one. The Orc arrow was poisoned, as all their weapons are."

Crikey! He'd been poisoned? By a ruddy arrow? Since when did Death Eaters use arrows - and who the ruddy hell was Legless? What a daft name!

"Oh, it's no good. He's still only half-conscious. You'll have to open his mouth for him, dear."

A hand pulled gently at his jaw, forcing it down. A second later, someone shoved something into his mouth and the hand pushed his jaw back up.

"Swallow, dear. It's alright - it's a bezoar. It'll help. But you need to swallow it fast, or you'll bleed to death."

Bleed to death? Blimey, that wasn't good. No wonder he felt terrible!

With a Herculean effort, Neville managed to gulp the little object down, then slipped once more into darkness.

*~*~*~*

The next time Neville awoke, it was to the noise of distant yells. Eyelids fluttered and his blurry vision slowly sharpened, and he found himself lying on a bedroll upon a sandy floor. High above was a domed ceiling which sparkled prettily in the torchlight. Water rushed somewhere in the distance, though he couldn't see it.

Where was he?

Yawning violently, Neville shook his head to clear the cobwebs of sleep, twisting it first left, then right to get a good look at his current environment. To his complete surprise, he found himself in the company of several hundred blondes.

All of whom were watching him ...

Crikey! Was he at a Malfoy family gathering? Had that twat Draco captured him and taken him to Malfoy Manor's dungeons?

Which would be just his luck.

A painful throb drew his attention to his left arm. The sleeve of his brown shirt had been ripped off at the shoulder. His arm was splinted tightly across his chest and secured with a makeshift sling.

Aagh! The gits had already been at him! Tortured him unconscious, treated his wound, then let him gather his strength for the next round of abuse.

How thoughtful of them.

Well, they weren't getting near him a second time!

Decision made, Neville rolled over and pushed himself up with his good right arm.

"Ouch! Bloody hell!"

That hurt! The teenager gingerly drew himself into a seated position and reached out to fumble for his wand. Only then did he realise that Clan Malfoy had probably confiscated it.

"Where's my wand?" he growled angrily at the curious group of women.

And old aged pensioners.

And children?

Some of the youngsters jumped in fright at his harsh tone.

Hmm. Something wasn't right here. Even a Malfoy wouldn't send such children down to witness, never mind participate in, the torture of another human being.

And unless they had cousins that he didn't know about (which, admittedly, was possible), there was no way that all these strangers were related to such a prominent family of the Wizarding World.

Curbing his desire to panic at the loss of his cherry and unicorn hair wand, he spoke again, but with less hostility.

"Er, hello. Sorry about that - didn't mean to frighten you." Neville directed his apology to a little girl a few feet away. She jumped, running to hide behind the skirts of a woman who was obviously her mother. Liquid brown eyes peeped out at him from behind the haven of green fabric.

Great. He'd frightened her again. What a git he was.

Neville let his gaze sweep over the (rather alarmed looking, actually) mass of people who shared what appeared to be a cave with him. He frowned in puzzlement at their odd flowing dresses and long tunics, wondering why so many of them were gathered in this rather peculiar of places. They weren't saying much (at least, not to him; they were whispering amongst themselves and throwing him furtive glances). What was going on here? Why was he lying on a bedroll in sparkly cave with a crowd of people who looked like they came straight out of the Middle Ages?

Middle Ages?

Suddenly, it all came flooding back.

Middle Earth! He was in Middle Earth!

Or, more specifically, Rohan. His companions must be the villagers that fled Saruman's army as it burned its way down the Westfold.

Which explained the blank looks when he'd asked for his 'wand'.

"Do you know where my staff is?" amended the teenager, hoping they understood.

An old man pointed behind him. Neville turned his head and caught sight of his knapsack resting on an outcrop of rock. Beside it rested his wand and Sword of Gryffindor.

"The White Witch bade us watch your belongings carefully and instructed that none approach them," said the old man.

Phew! Thank goodness for that. As much as the thought of anyone else touching his wand alarmed him, it didn't frighten him as much as the mental image of one of the children slicing their fingers (or worse) on the Sword of Gryffindor.

Pushing the unpleasant thought aside, he rose shakily to his feet.

"You are not to move from your bedroll, lord" said the little girl's mother. "The Lady Witch only replaced your lost blood with her magic potions three hours since. You are to rest on her instruction."

"Yeah, well, she's not here is she? She's ... actually, where is she?"

The woman stepped forward, offering her arms in support him when he wobbled on his feet. "As soon as your continued well-being was established, she left with my Lords Éomer and Legolas to wreak her wrath on those that wounded you. And she will return to wreak that same wrath upon me, if you do not lay down! I gave her my word that I would tend to you."

No way was he lying down for a quick nap when Molly and the others were outside kicking the collective posteriors of a dark wizard's army.

Shaking his head (which made it spin again, so he stopped), he addressed the pretty Rohan wife in as firm a voice as he could manage.

"She'll do no such thing, because you've kept your word. I'll tell her that."

He stumbled towards his knapsack and lifted the flap.

Now, where was that flask Cirdan gave him?

"You are not able enough to move, lord! Please, I beseech you. Take rest as the other wounded do."

"Where are the other wounded, then?" he asked, in an attempt to distract her while he shoved his entire right arm into his bag and grappled around for the Miruvor.

"They lie in another chamber. Their cries frighten the children - though they cannot help it and we do not blame them. Our village healers tend them there."

"Really? Why was I brought here then?"

"Because there is no space left there, lord."

Neville was still busy groping between his sealed container of plants, provisions of lembas, pyjamas and dirty underwear while she spoke. Her accent, like all of the Rohirrim's, had a pleasant, throaty sound to it.

"I really wish you'd stop calling me 'lord'," he grumbled, discarding the toothbrush he'd found and digging a little deeper in his bag. "The name's 'Neville'. Plain, old 'Neville'. Nothing lordly about that. And I'm sorry to hear that enough of your men have been wounded to fill an entire chamber. However ..."

Ah, success! He withdrew the flask, wrenched the stopper out with his teeth (which hurt) and took a few swallows before continuing.

"... now that I've swallowed this magic Elven potion, I'm as good as new for a little while longer."

Which was the truth. The combination of the Miruvor and the (no doubt) Blood Replenishing Potion Molly had given him earlier made him feel like a whole new man. The pain in his left arm ebbed to a dull ache, his head cleared, and he felt new, if temporary, energy flowing through his veins once more.

"Please, Lord Neville. I beg that you take your rest! You require more time to replenish your strength - and you cannot fight with one arm!"

Oh for Merlin's sake! It was nice that she was concerned, but he really didn't have time for this.

"Look ... er, what's your name?"

Surprise flickered across the lady's face at the enquiry, but she supplied the information all the same.

"Halwyn, wife of Deobold, Lord Neville."

"Well, Halwyn; you do know that I'm a wizard, don't you?"

She nodded apprehensively and several onlookers took a distinct step back, afraid he was about to curse them en masse.

"Then you know that I only need one arm to use my wa ... er, wield my staff, right?"

Another nod.

"Brilliant. Now, I'm going to take my staff in my very healthy right arm and go outside. Then - and you'll like this bit - I'm going to blast all those ugly gits to pieces that wounded your countrymen and frightened your children. You don't need to worry about me collapsing, or fainting, or whatever, because - as I've already told you - I've swallowed enough magic potions to keep the average Muggle awake for a week. I'm really grateful for your concern, but there's no need for it. And now, if you don't mind, I've got a few thousand orcs and Dunlendings to take care of."

With that, Neville shrank the Sword of Gryffindor and shoved it into his knapsack. He threw the bag over his good shoulder, picked up his wand, and marched confidently past the gaping woman, determined to rejoin the battle. All he needed now was an exit...

Ah! That must be it. A sandy slope led to a recess at the left of the cave and, assuming it was his way out, he gave his companions a big thumbs up and headed straight for it.

And straight into a smooth cave wall.

Typical. So much for his grand exit.

He stopped, flushed, spun on his heel and offered the crowd a sheepish grin.

"Er, where's the real way out?"

*~*~*~*

It was a very unhappy Halwyn who led the stubborn wizard to the mouth of the cave, depositing him at the entrance with a disapproving frown before retreating back inside to join her landsfolk.

Making his way from the Glittering caves towards the distant wall, Neville was able to hear the sounds of fighting ever more clearly. Screams and yells split the night, enticing him to greater speed as he hastened to rejoin the battle. His knapsack thumped awkwardly over his right shoulder, forcing him to cast a Sticking charm to prevent it from slipping. As he neared the wall, he was alarmed to see orcish corpses lying in heaps by the southern cliffs.

The enemy had penetrated the wall - but how? There was no breach in it, and the Deeping-gates were surely still intact given the amount of brick between him and the enemy forces.

It was a puzzle.

Several soldiers carrying litters of wounded men rushed past him, eager to deliver their comrades to the overworked healers in the Glittering Caves. Making a snap decision, he sprinted away from the wall towards two of the burly Riders.

"Hey! Oi! How did those orcs get in here?"

The men paused only long enough to answer.

"'Tis said that they came through the culvert."

What the ruddy heck was a culvert?

Grinding his teeth, he voiced the thought aloud.

"Beg pardon, lord. 'Tis the drain through which the Deeping-stream flows from the Glittering Caves to the Westfold. The same drain they almost used to sunder the wall. But the White Witch threw their flaming missile back amongst them, killing a goodly number of their own forces with it. Even now, Men and Witch barricade it against the Orcs with rock and magic."

Neville grinned - something he never thought he'd be doing mere hours after taking an arrow to the arm and almost bleeding to death.

What a woman! Really, Molly Weasley was rapidly becoming his hero!

Er, heroine.

He waved at the men as they rushed away with their unconscious charge and sped back towards the wall. Three staircases led from the back of the wall up to the battlements. Neville split the odds, opting for the middle one, and within seconds he found himself amidst a throng of battle-wearied soldiers who were still valiantly shooting arrows into the snarling enemy ranks. Pushing his way to the forward battlement (and erecting a Shield charm, just in case - wouldn't do to lose the use of his wand arm, too), Neville let his gaze fall on the plain below.

Merlin's beard! What a mess!

Indeed it was.

Fires raged all over the plain between the Deeping-wall and the Dike. The nauseating stench of burnt flesh hung heavy in the air, making his stomach roil. A massive crater pocked the ground near the southern cliffs and bodies lay in droves around it. Huge, thrashing piles of Devil's Snare caught orcs and men alike in its wake and strangled the life out of them.

Saruman's army of nine thousand had suffered serious losses.

Excellent!

But Neville's joy was short-lived. The orcish army might be taking a beating, but it didn't look like they were in any danger of surrendering. Even as he watched, huge uruk-hai threw grappling hooks into the air in another attempt to scale the Deeping-wall. The brick barriers he had erected on the causeway had been completely destroyed, and he could only surmise that they had plenty left of whatever they had tried to blow the Keep up with earlier.

And even now, a lone uruk was charging towards the Deeping-gate with a torch in hand ...

Oh, no! And he was too far away to reach it with a spell!

"Take out that uruk!" he yelled at the archers as he thundered up the wall towards the Hornburg. "He's set a charge at the gates - he'll blow them up! Kill him! Kill him!"

A dozen men swung round to face the new threat, all eager to eliminate the danger it presented. Arrows whizzed across the plain, even as more grappling hooks swung over the battlements - one of which smashed into the chest of a young man two feet in front of the horrified teenager. It pierced the youth's chest and his body convulsed spasmodically before falling still. Orcs and Dunlendings began to scale the entire length of the wall, forcing the archers and the wizard to abandon the causeway target to protect their own lives as enemies flooded over the top.

The uruk was now only ten feet from the gates ...

"GET AWAY FROM THERE, YOU DISGUSTING ANIMAL!" roared a familiar voice.

Molly!

Neville hexed a Dunlending who had just appeared two feet away from him, blocking his view of the Deeping-gate, and the swarthy man flew back over the wall he had spent hours trying to climb. With his view of the causeway now clear, he easily spotted his Guardian as she flew over the stone incline towards the gates and shot deadly curses at the torch-bearing uruk.

But the uruk was surprisingly quick on his feet.

Too

quick.

Saruman's finest leapt over the ruined brick walls, dodging Molly's coloured jets of light all the way, and threw himself at the Hornburg gates.

For a moment, nothing happened. Neville exhaled heavily in relief, convinced her spell had extinguished the uruk's torch at the last second. But, a mere second late, he flinched in shock as an earth-shattering boom! split the air. To his - and everyone else's - dismay, the archway of the gate crumbled and crashed in smoke and dust.

A bellow of victory rose from the remaining ranks of the enemy. Chants of 'Kill the King! Kill the King!' swept enemy ranks in a wave, and orcs and Dunlendings alike prepared to charge towards the gaping remnants of the gateway.

Oh, no! If they reached the ravine behind the Deeping-wall, Halwyn, and all the others who took refuge in the caves, were history!

With a fresh burst of energy, Neville sprinted across the battlements towards the staircase that led to the narrow walkway.

"Molly! Molly!" he yelled, hoping against hope that she could hear him above the racket of baying, screeching orcs, and the death cries of the newly-beleaguered Rohirrim. He waved frantically in her direction, screaming until his throat felt raw, but she was too busy engaged in battle to see him, let alone hear him.

Oh, for Merlin's sake! Was he a wizard or not? With a roll of his eyes, Neville touched his wand to his throat, all set to cast a Sonorus and yell at her to protect the other side of the gateway, when the sound of a great horn blared out over the valley.

Everyone stilled.

Everyone.

For a few seconds, all activity in the Deeping-coomb stopped as ally and foe alike paused to harken at the mighty blasts resounding from the Hornburg.

"'Tis the great horn of Helm!" cried a proud Rohirrim a few feet behind him.

And Neville didn't need to question the pride in the man's voice: the reason was obvious: everwhere he looked, Saruman's army were throwing themselves on the ground and covering their ears with their claws as blast after blast echoed off the cliffs of Thrihyrne.

"Helm! Helm!" shouted men all over the wall. "Helm is risen and comes back to war! Helm for Théoden King!"

Orcs, who only a few minutes before had barrelled towards Helm's Gate, now charged away from it as fast as they could.

And no wonder.

Because from out of the ashes of the ruined gate, with the great Horn of Helm Hammerhand to herald his arrival, rode a tall, proud figure on a white horse.

It was Théoden. The king bore a golden shield and a long spear. At his right hand was Éomer bearing Gimli before him, and behind him, Aragorn and Legolas preceded a long line of the lords of the House of Eorl. Molly flew overhead, throwing curses and jinxes left, right and centre to clear the causeway of remnant orcs so that they had a clear path down it. Light sprang in the sky. Night departed.

"Forth Eorlingas!" shouted the king. With a great roar, they charged down the causeway and hacked their way through the (depleted) hosts of Isengard like a Weasley twin with a Bludger bat. Down over the lawn they poured, out into the distant valley, and all those on the Hornburg Rock poured behind them. And ever the sound of blowing horns. Neville came to a standstill, gaping at them in dismay.

They were leaving! Molly, Théoden, and just about everyone else, was leaving.

Without him!

Well, that was definitely out of order! What were they ruddy well playing at?

Feeling more than a bit miffed (and really quite knackered, actually), Neville gathered his strength once more and tore after the dwindling ranks of his allies, determined not to be left behind.

"Oi! Where do you lot think you're going without me?" he yelled, racing down the stairwell, across the walkway, and out through the shattered gate onto the causeway, where he got a truly excellent view of the damage the charging Riders had already wrought.

If the battle had been in doubt when Neville rejoined his horsey allies on the wall, it was now clear that the Rohirrim were prevailing. Théoden and his troops cleared a bloody path through the ranks of Saruman's troops from the causeway to the Dike and beyond.

Which was handy, because it gave the seriously peeved wizard a clear (if gory) path as he dashed after them (cursing any unfortunate orc that so much as twitched in his direction - not that the wrath of Théoden had left that many alive to bother him).

"Oi! You lot! Where the ... Relashio! ... ruddy hell ... Reducto! ... do you think ... Expelliarmus! ... you're going without ... Tarantallegra! ... me?"

The young wizard alternated between yelling at his (ex) friends, and cursing any enemy foolish enough to stumble into his path. He followed the thundering riders down the makeshift path with the sole intent of hitching a lift to wherever they were going. So intent was he on his path, that he paid absolutely no attention to the plight of his Devil's Snare cuttings (which were withering under the direct sunlight), or his lovely Venomous Tentacula (which had been hacked to pieces by the orcish forces - although not before they had taken a goodly number of the enemy with them).

It was with great relief that the company halted a few yards past the Dike.

Thank Merlin for that! Miruvor notwithstanding, he was seriously knackered!

Lacking the energy to run any further, Neville speed-walked his way to the front of the line (earning many, many strange glances as he did so) and finally came to a winded, dizzy halt at Aragorn's horse. He lifted a heavy arm to tug at the ranger's boot.

"Where the ... ruddy heck ... d'you lot think ... you're going ... without me?" he demanded, swaying on his feet and heaving with exhaustion.

"Master Longbottom!" exclaimed the (sickeningly fresh-looking) ranger-cum-prince-cum-healer, with barely concealed ire. "What in the name of Elbereth are you doing out of your bedroll? Lady Molly will slay you herself if she finds you have risen from your sickbed!"

Nonsense. Molly couldn't hurt a fly. An orc, yes. But a fly? Or a Longbottom?

"Why the ... bloody hell did ... you all ... sod off and ... leave me?" he gasped between huge lungfuls of air.

Aragorn sprang lightly from Hasufel and glared at him. "Because you were seriously wounded, young Wizard. And seriously wounded warriors have no business amidst the ranks of the final charge!"

"Seriously wounded? That's rubbish!" protested the teenager, alarmed to discover that the world was now tilting before his very eyes. He waved a (suddenly leaden) hand in dismissal and bravely attempted a casual grin. "A few Blood ... Replenishing Potions, a swig ... or two ... of Miruvor, and ... Bob's your uncle! I'm perfectly ... alright! Perfectly ..."

With one final sway, Neville succumbed to his exhaustion and fainted (like a maiden). And though he would later (greatly) bemoan missing the arrival of Fangorn's walking trees, and Erkenbrand's valiant forces, it did at least comfort him to realise one important fact: the Battle of Helm's Deep was won.

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