Broken Borders

Broken Borders is a short story that is the sequal to the previous short story Eastern Fire and chronicles the arrival of Larra Toran into Ethring and the effect that they creates in the situation at the border.

POV Characters

 * Ildarion Elessar
 * Sarah Mason
 * Larra Toran

Broken Borders

 * Larra_Toran_Amazing.jpg"Something felt wrong the moment we went across the border. Back in Umbar they had told me to always trust my instincts even if that meant that they got me into trouble with those above me in power. Death wasn't a mistake you could come back from."


 * -Larra Toran

Only three weeks after returning from Umbar though she found herself with Var Azunion on a mission across the Gondor border, and they would be led directly into a trap they didn't know was coming after Ildarion Elessar grew suspisious of the quiet of the border and had several Great Eagles called from the capital. Ildarion Elessar had become aware through many different sources that either Sarah Mason, or someone else in the leadership of Ethring was betraying the Gondorians to the enemy in Umbar, but he was unwilling to accept that it was Sarah Mason after they had their confrontation and he discovered that she was pregnant. So with the great eagles he had them watching the border east of Ethring, and that would be the spot that Larra Toran would be making a crossing with her husband and his force, of whom were crossing the border in order to join the growing Umbar force on the Gondor side of the border. The Eagles after spotting the Umbar force would return to Ethring where Ildarion would quickly mass a force and moved with full speed to get infront of the Umbar force. With the great eagles able to watch them the entire time Ildarion was able to set up a perfect ambush spot in the middle of a clearing.


 * Sarah_Mason_Small.jpg"Did I hate what I was doing? Did I feel anything? I just didn't know who I was anymore. I wanted to hold him close to me, but I didn't feel like I had the right to. I couldn't reconsile my utter love for Ildarion with my belief in Umbar. And I once more allowed my confusion to risk everything with him."


 * -Sarah Mason

When they arrived at the sight Ildarion was preparing his forces and didn't realize that Sarah Mason who at this point he believed in implictly due to her pregnancy was secretly crafting a letter which she would send through one of her loyalists to the forces of Var Azunion. So trusting in her was he at this point that he invited her into the strategie meetings they had that night, and she would even add pieces of this into a second letter that she crafter for the Umbar troops incoming. That night as she waited and hoped that Var Azunion would get the letter she went to bed with Ildarion, and as he held her and rubbed her still flat belly she begin to cry. She tried to stop crying but she couldn't as for perhaps the first time she realized the true costs of what she was doing. Through her crying Ildarion held her close and whispered loving words to her, and despite how comforted and safe she felt the fact that this man that she loved so much was the target of so much of her deception left her feeling more broken and sad then she had felt in a long time. While this was happening her first messenger would fail to find the force of Var Azunion after he camped his forces in a position that was so tactically foolish that the messenger had bipassed the area in his search for them. The second messenger would find Var's forces but was shot by a sentry and his body quickly burried in the ground without the sentries reading anything he had on him. So despite Sarah Mason attempting to sabotage the ambush by getting word to Var Azunion the Umbar force continued to walk right into it.


 * Larra_Toran_Large2.jpg"The last thing I remember was seeing Var struck in the chest by an arrow and falling dead before everything went dark. The world was quiet."


 * -Larra Toran

The next day Var Azunion would move the Umbar force northward, and as they walked through the ambush clearing Larra Toran felt a terrible chill up her spine and warned her husband that they should travel along the side of the ravine, and in return Var would slap her in the face and verbally attack her as she laid on the ground. As she got up from the slap he was still staring at her as an arrow struck him directly in the heart killing him basically instantly. She would be the only surivivor of the ambush and she survived only after an arrow struck her in the head but deflected off her helmet and knocked her unconsious. With the force destroyed the Gondor force would move in with Ildarion taking the lead flanked by his love Sarah Mason of whom was devestated that the force had been destroyed despite the fact that she had tried desperatly to alert them to the danger. As they searched the troops it would be Thomas Mason that would discover the still alive body of Larra Toran and as Ildarion walked to her he knelt in front of her as she opened her eyes, and he felt something inside him feel for this girl, and thus he ordered her taken prisoner and brought back to Ethring. As she woke briefly back and forth she would watch him moving, and she was captivated by the beaty this man appeared with, and despite the pain in her head she felt safe for the first time in a long time as she was pulled along by the carriage of her supposed enemy.